Baltic
Dry Index. 1845 -144
Brent Crude 87.26
Spot Gold 2260 US 2 Year Yield 4.59 +0.05
We have a system that increasingly taxes work and subsidizes nonwork.
Milton Friedman.
China’s manufacturing sector finally got some good/better news. For Japan the day’s news was far more mixed.
Meanwhile in Baltimore, the attempt to remove
the collapsed bridge got underway, but with no forecast so far, on when the
port of Baltimore will reopen.
China stocks rise
after factory activity data; Japan business optimism falls slightly
UPDATED SUN, MAR 31 2024 11:13 PM EDT
China
stocks rose Monday as investors assessed the country’s business activity, while
Japan stocks slipped as business optimism fell.
China’s National Bureau of
Statistics data showed that manufacturing activity expanded in March, with the
purchasing managers index registering a reading of 50.8, compared to February’s
reading of 49.1.
Economists polled by Reuters
expected a reading of 49.9, which still represented a contraction in the
sector.
The Caixin Global manufacturing survey for
March showed China’s factory activity expanded at its fastest rate in 13
months. The private PMI reading came in at 51.1, above expectations for 51.
China’s CSI 300 index gained
about 1.6% after the reading.
Separately, Japan’s first-quarter
Tankan survey showed that business optimism among large manufacturers fell,
with the gauge at +11 compared with +12 in the last survey.
However, optimism among
non-manufacturers rose, with the Tankan gauge at +34 compared with +30 in the
fourth quarter and beating Reuters expectations of +33.
The survey gauges business
sentiment, which the Bank of Japan monitors when formulating monetary policy.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 fell
1.4% after the reading, trading well below the 40,000 mark. The broad-based
Topix fell 1.9%.
South Korea’s Kospi was up 0.27%,
and the small cap Kosdaq gained 0.97%.
Australian and Hong Kong markets
are closed for Easter Monday.
More
Asia markets live
updates: China PMI, Japan tankan, U.S. inflation (cnbc.com)
Weak Asian factories
take shine off China's rebound
By Leika Kihara April 1, 2024 4:50 AM GMT+1
TOKYO, April 1 (Reuters) - Factory activity in many
Asia economies weakened in March despite a rebound in China as lacklustre
domestic demand dragged on growth, surveys showed on Monday, clouding the
outlook for a once fast-expanding, key driver of the global economy.
Export powerhouses Japan and South Korea saw
manufacturing activities shrink, as well as Taiwan, Malaysia and Vietnam in a
sign of the fragile state of the region's economies.
China's Caixin/S&P
Global manufacturing purchasing managers' index (PMI) rose to 51.1 in March
from 50.9 the previous month, a private survey showed on Monday, expanding at
the fastest pace in 13 months with business confidence hitting an 11-month high.
The finding joins an official PMI survey released
on Sunday that showed China's factory activity expanded for the first time in
six months.
The rebound in China, which is struggling to mount a strong
economic revival partly due to a protracted property crisis, provides some
welcome relief to Beijing and investors globally.
Yet, the weakness in other parts of Asia highlights
the challenge the region's policymakers face as they wrestle with patchy signs
of recovery in global demand and uncertainty on when the U.S. Federal Reserve
would start to cut interest rates.
"China's exports are picking up a bit but
that's because their goods are cheap. That means other Asian countries must
compete with China for demand that's not growing," said Toru Nishihama,
chief emerging market economist at Dai-ichi Life Research Institute.
"With no clear driver of global
growth, it's hard to paint a rosy outlook for Asia," he added.
More
Weak
Asian factories take shine off China's rebound | Reuters
Wall Street Breakfast: The Week Ahead
Mar. 31, 2024 7:38 AM ET
Market
participants are looking ahead to the "jobs week" for clues on the
labor market. The latest Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) is
scheduled for Tuesday, followed by ADP's private employment report for March on
Wednesday. The main event will be Friday's U.S. non-farm payrolls data, with
economists expecting an addition of 216K jobs in March. That would mark a
deceleration from the 275K additions in February.
In terms of Federal Reserve speakers, the spotlight
will be on central bank chair Jerome Powell who will be delivering a speech on
economic outlook at a Stanford forum on Wednesday.
The earnings calendar is quite light next week,
with jeans maker Levi Strauss (LEVI) and Canadian technology
firm BlackBerry (BB) among the few notable
names scheduled to report their quarterly results. Investors will also be
watching out for monthly production and deliveries updates from major
carmakers, including a highly anticipated quarterly report from electric
vehicle giant Tesla (TSLA).
Wall Street Breakfast: The Week Ahead | Seeking Alpha
Finally, in the commodity sector, just how
high will cocoa prices soar?
Why
Cocoa Prices Spiked and What It Means for Chocolate Lovers
March 31, 2024
(Bloomberg) -- A steady rise in the price of cocoa beans over two years skyrocketed in March, with futures contracts more than doubling in three months to reach a level twice as high as the previous record. It’s a progression that has its literal roots in small West African farms but also involves climate change and the intricacies of the futures market. The latest surge has been driven in part by the kind of financial turmoil that can happen when commodities rise so fast that they overwhelm strategies meant to protect against such volatility.
The upshot is almost certainly bound to be more expensive chocolate that may come in smaller servings. But even if prices recede from current levels, they’re likely to remain elevated for years to come. Economists like to say that the cure for high prices is high prices, since they can reduce demand, spur increases in supply, or both. But the situation with cocoa shows how messy that idea can be in practice, given market complexities and obdurate physical facts like how long it takes for a new cocoa tree to grow.
Cocoa futures in New York and London are pricier than they ever have been in nominal dollars, surging past the highs seen in 1977 when the world was facing another cocoa shortage. Futures contracts traded in New York hit an intraday record of $10,080 a metric ton on March 26 and have since been trading above $9,500, while London beans are being in the £8,000 a ton range (about $10,000). Before this rally, New York futures had largely remained below $3,500 since the 1980s.
A record
supply crunch has driven the surge, with the world on track for a third year of
deficits. Production is expected to fall short of demand in 2024 by 374,000
tons, according to the International Cocoa Organization, while manufacturer
Barry Callebaut expects a gap of about 500,000 tons, equal to about
a 10th of the global market.
More
Why Cocoa Prices Spiked and What It Means for Chocolate Lovers (msn.com)
Global Inflation/Stagflation/Recession
Watch.
Given
our Magic Money Tree central banksters and our spendthrift politicians,
inflation now needs an entire section of its own.
Caixin survey
shows China's March factory activity at its most robust in 13 months
China’s factory activity in March expanded by its
strongest pace in more than a year, a private survey showed on Monday, in signs of
stabilizing growth in the world’s second-largest economy.
The Caixin/S&P Global
China manufacturing purchasing managers’ index was 51.1 in March — its
strongest since February 2023 — after coming in at 50.9 in February. Economists
had expected the reading to hit 51, according to a Reuters poll. The 50-point
mark separates expansion from contraction.
This reading corroborates another official survey of manufacturing activity that
surpassed market expectations and came at its strongest in 11 months. The
official survey for non-manufacturing activity in China recorded its most
robust reading since June, adding to encouraging recent export and retail sales
data.
“Overall, the manufacturing sector
continued to improve in March, with expansion in supply and demand
accelerating, and overseas demand picking up,” Wang Zhe, a senior economist at
Caixin Insight Group, said in the survey release.
China’s National Bureau of
Statistics released survey data on Sunday that
showed the country’s official manufacturing PMI coming in at 50.8 in March, its
strongest reading since March last year that was also stronger than
expectations for 49.9 in a Reuters poll.
These surveys are typically the
first economic data points available each month and provide insights on the
state of the Chinese economy.
China has set a growth target of “around
5%” for 2024, while setting a deficit-to-GDP ratio of 3% for the
year and reiterating a plan to double down on “high-quality growth” and
manufacturing.
Given the high base of 2023 data, several
economists have cautioned Beijing may have to resort to more robust stimulus to
achieve its 2024 growth goals.
Some lingering concerns
The latest data
point to some lingering concerns, particularly about prices.
China’s producer
prices have dipped for well more than a year now, while consumer prices have
declined in four of the last five months.
“Manufacturers
increased purchases and raw material inventories amid continued improvement in
business optimism. However, employment remained in contraction and a depressed
price level worsened,” Caixin’s Wang said.
“Prices remained low. A drop in raw material prices reduced
production costs for manufacturers, providing leeway for them to lower prices
amid fierce market competition. Both gauges for input costs and output prices
reached new lows since July 2023,” Wang added.
Caixin
PMI: China's March factory activity at its most robust in 11 months (cnbc.com)
US inflation increases moderately in February; consumer spending surges
March
29, 2024
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. prices
increased moderately in February and the cost of services outside housing
slowed considerably, keeping a June interest rate cut from the Federal Reserve
on the table.
The personal consumption expenditures
(PCE) price index rose 0.3% last month, the Commerce Department's Bureau of
Economic Analysis said on Friday. Data for January was revised higher to show
the PCE price index climbing 0.4% instead of 0.3% as previously reported.
In the 12 months through February,
PCE inflation advanced 2.5% after increasing 2.4% in January. Economists polled
by Reuters had forecast the PCE price index gaining 0.4% on the month and
rising 2.5% year-on-year.
Price pressures are subsiding, though
the pace has slowed from the first half of last year.
Fed officials last week left the U.S.
central bank's policy rate unchanged in the current 5.25%-5.50% range, having
raised it by 525 basis points since March 2022.
Policymakers anticipate three rate
cuts this year. Financial markets expect the first rate reduction in June. Fed
Governor Christopher Waller said on Wednesday, "there is no rush to cut
the policy rate" right now, but he did not rule out trimming borrowing
costs later in the year.
Excluding the volatile food and
energy components, the PCE price index increased 0.3% last month. That followed
an upwardly revised 0.5% gain in January. The so-called core PCE price index
was previously reported to have advanced 0.4% in January.
Core inflation increased 2.8%
year-on-year in February after rising 2.9% in January. The Fed tracks the PCE
price measures for its 2% inflation target. Monthly inflation readings of 0.2%
over time are necessary to bring inflation back to target.
PCE services inflation excluding
energy and housing gained 0.2% last month after surging 0.7% in January.
Policymakers are monitoring the so-called super core inflation to gauge their
progress in fighting inflation.
Consumer spending, which accounts for
more than two-thirds of U.S. economic activity, jumped 0.8% last month after
increasing 0.2% in January, the report also showed.
US inflation increases moderately in February;
consumer spending surges (msn.com)
Covid-19
Corner
This section will continue until it becomes unneeded.
Covid-19 Linked To Higher Risk
Of Developing Autoimmune Inflammatory Rheumatic Diseases
Mar
29, 2024,06:33am EDT
A recent study that
included over 22 million adult patients from South Korea and Japan revealed
that an acute Covid-19 infection could be linked to a higher risk of developing
autoimmune inflammatory rheumatic diseases up to one year after getting infected.
This includes
conditions like rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, Sjögren syndrome,
systemic sclerosis, polymyalgia rheumatica, mixed connective tissue disease,
dermatomyositis, polymyositis, polyarteritis nodosa, or vasculitis. According
to the study’s findings, even vaccinated patients who survived a severe
Covid-19 infection could be at a higher risk of suffering from one of these
conditions.
The researchers
based in Seoul, South Korea, analyzed data from two national population-based
cohort studies in Japan and Korea to delve into how Covid-19 impacts longterm
risk for autoimmune inflammatory rheumatic diseases (AIRD). The data belonged
to more than 10 million Koreans and 12 million Japanese adults who were older
than 20 years. That included patients who tested positive for Covid-19 from
2020 to 2021.
The team gained
access to every study participants’ demographic and mortality data from each
country’s insurance database. They also studied the participants’ history of
cardiovascular disease, chronic kidney disease, and respiratory diseases.
Among the South
Korean participants, 3.9% of them had a history of Covid-19 and close to 1% had
been diagnosed with influenza in the past. The percentage of Japanese
participants who had Covid-19 was higher at 8.2% and again, close to 1%
reported having a case of influenza.
“We found increased
risk for incident AIRD up to 12 months after COVID-19 diagnosis compared with
influenza-infected and uninfected control patients. Greater severity of acute
COVID-19 was associated with higher risk for incident AIRD,” the researchers noted.
However, the
researchers admitted that the study has several limitations. Their results were
from a period of the Covid-19 pandemic before the Omicron variant had emerged.
Also, the team highlighted that certain AIRD outcomes were uncommon and some of
their estimates were “imprecise.”
More
Covid-19 Linked To Higher Risk Of Developing Autoimmune Inflammatory Rheumatic Diseases (forbes.com)
Technology
Update.
With events happening fast in the
development of solar power and graphene, among other things, I’ve added this
section. Updates as they get reported.
Foreign
battery manufacturer makes global advancements in EV industry with winter-proof
battery cells: 'We are trying to lead in new technologies'
Frigid winter weather can
take a chunk off the range and charging speed of your electric vehicle's battery,
the Associated Press reported early this year, though some EV manufacturers
have pushed back on that and
said their models perform better than gas cars in the cold.
Recent cold spells across the
northern United States and China put a spotlight on the issue either way, with
reports of EV drivers waiting hours at
charging stations in areas with insufficient capacity.
But thanks to breakthroughs
from major battery makers in South Korea, those winter worries could soon be a
thing of the past.
SK On Co., which
supplies batteries to Ford, Volkswagen, and Hyundai, has developed a new
lithium iron phosphate battery called the "Winter Pro," as
Bloomberg has reported. While typical LFP batteries can lose up to 70% of their
range in temperatures as low as minus-4 degrees Fahrenheit, per the battery
maker, SK On's
innovation extends charging
capacity by 16% and energy density of the battery by 19% even at low
temperatures. Imagine zipping by charging stations in the dead of winter with
confidence that you've got the juice to go the distance.
The company has also
turbocharged its fast-charging tech. Their previous
SF Battery could hit an 80% charge in a speedy 18 minutes. The new SF+ slashes that to a mere 15 minutes — perhaps not even enough time to finish that gas
station coffee.
"There
are a lot of concerns among potential consumers over charging, especially about
fast-charging," said SK On vice president Youngmoon
Riew, per Bloomberg. "At the same time, carmakers want to release cheaper
EVs, calling for cheaper batteries too, like LFP cells, to increase the
adoption of EVs."
Per Bloomberg, SK On is in
talks to supply automakers with these winter-conquering, time-saving
powerhouses. Yet they're not the only ones racing to banish winter battery
woes.
Samsung SDI, which is
partnering with Stellantis and GM on U.S. battery
plants, plans to start mass producing next-gen solid-state batteries as early
as 2027, according to a news release.
"There should be a jump
in battery technology for expansion of EVs as the technologies for lithium-ion
batteries, especially for materials, are almost saturated," Stella Go,
Samsung SDI executive vice president, told Bloomberg. "We are
trying to lead in new technologies."
More
Finally,
our latest new section, the world global debt clock. Nations debts to GDP
compared.
World Debt
Clocks (usdebtclock.org)
There are severe limits to the good that the government can do for the economy, but there are almost no limits to the harm it can do.
Milton Friedman.
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