Category Archives: Business/Economics

Business/Economics, Opinion, U.S.

U.S. corporate executives continue to make bank, while the rest of us struggle

A report by Standard & Poor’s shows that while the workers of the United States continue to struggle, the corporate leaders are raking in the dough.  In fact corporate executives are making more now, than they did before the 2007 market correction.

S & P’s 500 reports that in 2010, the average yearly salary of a corporate executive was $9 million, NOT counting bonuses.  That’s a 24% increase over 2009.  Are you making that much?  Did you get a 24% raise?

The S & P’s report proves you are not making that much.  The report says the average worker got a piddly 3% increase in pay.  The average pay for those who are employed is $40,500 per year (41% earn less than the average).  That’s only one half a percent of the average salary for a CEO.

When are workers going to wake up?  Who is really doing the work that makes the corporations money?  It’s NOT the executive officers!

 

Business/Economics, U.S.

Proof the housing market is still crashing; Fannie Mae wants another $8.5 billion bailout

The top mortgage lender in the United States, Fannie Mae, wants another $8.5 billion dollars to save its butt.  This after reporting a loss of $6.5 billion during the first three months of 2011.

Fannie Mae blames the loss on credit expenses. They also blame falling home prices.  If Fannie Mae gets the new bailout money (at taxpayer’s expense) it will make it the costliest government bailout, of a single company, in U.S. history; $99.7 billion.

 

Business/Economics, International, U.S.

China wants to move Cinese companies to U.S., but says U.S. blocking them

“As the U.S. government continues to request accessibility to the Chinese market for its firms, we now raise a similar request on behalf of Chinese firms.”-Zhu Guangyao, Vice Finance Minister

For decades U.S. companies have been shipping off factories, and jobs, to China.  Now China says the United States is blocking their attempts to bring factories and jobs to the U.S.

“We have received many complaints from Chinese companies that have met discrimination as they try to invest in the United States, even though the U.S. side has repeatedly stated that Chinese companies are welcome.”- Zhu Guangyao, Vice Finance Minister


Business/Economics, International, U.S.

Commodities crashing? More signs that there is no economic recovery

The cost of living in the U.S. rose at its fastest pace since December 2009 in the year ended in March, the same month when Chinese consumer prices rose by the most since 2008.-Bloomberg report

Rising commodity prices can bring inflation.  Commodity prices go up when there is an expected higher demand than supply (or speculators playing the market).  Today, May 5, commodity prices are falling.

Some people blame an increase in the value of the U.S. dollar, but has it really gone up that much? When the U.S. dollar is up, it makes commodities that much more expensive on the world market, because commodities are traded in U.S. dollars: “The common denominator for all the commodities selling today is the strength of the dollar.”-Bayram Dincer, LGT Capital Management Ltd

Others are pointing out that commodity traders are realizing that the world’s economy is still bad, and that the average person can’t afford to pay higher prices.  That means demand will go down.

If you buy commodities (oil, gas, metals, food stuffs, etc) why bid higher when there’s a good change you can’t sell it on the retail market?  Some analysts think this will be the crash of the commodities (which is a good thing for us little guys): “This could be one of the most severe corrections that we’ve seen over the last year. If things get really bad, we could possibly retrace half of the rally of the past six to nine months.”-Sean Corrigan, Diapason Commodities Management SA

How about the fact that a little known company, Glencore, who turns out to have a lot of say in the commodities market, has told their clients to be “underweight” when it came to commodities.  Glencore expects prices to actually go up in the next 12 months.  Being “underweight” means to sell off your investments, so maybe what we’re seeing is an intentional, and temporary, sell off.  A sell off would drive prices down.

 

Business/Economics, International, Opinion

Oil prices drop, suddenly there’s a new oil disaster, big pipeline leak in Canada

Ever since the supposed raid to kill bin Laden was announced, oil prices have been falling.  In fact, May 5, oil is about $99.00 per barrel for WTI.

Guess what, now there’s a huge leak in a big oil pipeline in Alberta, Canada.  How convenient.  Not only that, but officials who control the Plains Midstream pipeline claim the leak started on April 29!  So far, 4.5 million liters (1.2 million gallons) of oil has leaked out.

Business/Economics, International, U.S.

Who’s behind high commodity prices? Glencore, ever hear of them? Call them food crisis managers

Glencore is a private company in Switzerland.  The company is valued at $60 billion.  What do they do?  Buy and sell commodities.

Glencore is the world’s biggest commodities trader, buying and selling much of the world’s wheat, corn, rice, sugar and edible oils. They also buy and sell minerals; metals, oil, coal.  In fact they control 3% of the world’s daily oil supply.

Because Glencore is a privately held company, no one has heard of them.  Why are they in the news now?  Glencore wants to become even more powerful, so they are going public, offering public stocks in their company for the first time.  For those of you who think ,”If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.”, the public stocks offering will take place at the end of May, in the London and Hong Kong stock markets.

Glencore has on it’s board some controversial people, including people with their hands in the pockets of U.S. politicians, so do your research.

 

Business/Economics, International, U.S.

Kraft moving chocolate production to Brazil?

The U.S. doesn’t need to lose anymore jobs, but Kraft just announced they will build a new plant in Brazil.

“Brazil is one of 10 priority developing markets where we’re making big bets. Today, we’re among the fastest growing consumer goods companies in markets like Brazil, India and China. We’re excited to build on what’s working by making our biggest investment in Brazil in more than 10 years!”-Sanjay Khosla, Kraft Foods

Kraft will build an $80 million chocolate factory in Pernambuco, Brazil.  They hope to have it up and running by 2012.

Business/Economics, International

Germany to pump more money into Mexico

Despite the bloody Drugs War, German companies are about to invest more money into Mexico.

German President Christian Wulff wants to increase business relations with Mexico.  Already there are 1,200 German operations in Mexico, employing 130,000 people.  Wulff also implied that Germany will help the Mexican government in their Drugs War.

Germany has historically been interested in relations with Mexico, this could be a sign of the declining influence of the United States.