Friday, September 30, 2011
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Singapore's manufacturing output up 21.7% in August
Posted: 26 September 2011 1304 hrs
Singapore manufacturing sector
SINGAPORE: Singapore's manufacturing output expanded 21.7 per cent on a year-on-year basis in August, boosted by a surge in biomedical output.
The increase compared with a 7.6 per cent revised expansion in July, according to data released by the Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB).
The figures showed that excluding biomedical manufacturing, output declined 10.5 per cent, worse than the 6.4 per cent contraction in July.
On a seasonally adjusted month-on-month basis, manufacturing output rose 3.9 per cent in August 2011, but declined 4.7 per cent when biomedical output was excluded.
Output of the biomedical manufacturing cluster jumped 145.8 per cent on-year in August, due to a 156.7 per cent surge in pharmaceuticals output.
The strong growth in the pharmaceuticals segment was attributed to a mix of higher valued-added active pharmaceutical ingredients being produced.
Output of precision engineering cluster grew 4.1% on-year in August, while transport engineering rose 1.2 per cent. The aerospace segment expanded 5.5 per cent, with a higher volume of maintenance and upgrading work received from commercial airlines.
The chemicals cluster's output shrank 1.2 per cent on-year. EDB said the specialties segment continued to post a strong growth of 22.5 per cent on the back of new production capacities that started earlier this year.
The petroleum segment grew 8.9 per cent on-year, with throughput impacted by maintenance shutdowns. However, the other chemicals and petrochemicals segments fell 8.7 per cent and 26.1 per cent respectively.
Output of the general manufacturing cluster declined 8.0 per cent on-year in August, and the electronics cluster fell 21.9 per cent compared to the same period last year.
The weakness in the cluster was broad-based as global economics uncertainties put a drag on demand for electronics, EDB said.
Via: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporebusinessnews/view/1155571/1/.html
Singapore manufacturing sectorSINGAPORE: Singapore's manufacturing output expanded 21.7 per cent on a year-on-year basis in August, boosted by a surge in biomedical output.
The increase compared with a 7.6 per cent revised expansion in July, according to data released by the Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB).
The figures showed that excluding biomedical manufacturing, output declined 10.5 per cent, worse than the 6.4 per cent contraction in July.
On a seasonally adjusted month-on-month basis, manufacturing output rose 3.9 per cent in August 2011, but declined 4.7 per cent when biomedical output was excluded.
Output of the biomedical manufacturing cluster jumped 145.8 per cent on-year in August, due to a 156.7 per cent surge in pharmaceuticals output.
The strong growth in the pharmaceuticals segment was attributed to a mix of higher valued-added active pharmaceutical ingredients being produced.
Output of precision engineering cluster grew 4.1% on-year in August, while transport engineering rose 1.2 per cent. The aerospace segment expanded 5.5 per cent, with a higher volume of maintenance and upgrading work received from commercial airlines.
The chemicals cluster's output shrank 1.2 per cent on-year. EDB said the specialties segment continued to post a strong growth of 22.5 per cent on the back of new production capacities that started earlier this year.
The petroleum segment grew 8.9 per cent on-year, with throughput impacted by maintenance shutdowns. However, the other chemicals and petrochemicals segments fell 8.7 per cent and 26.1 per cent respectively.
Output of the general manufacturing cluster declined 8.0 per cent on-year in August, and the electronics cluster fell 21.9 per cent compared to the same period last year.
The weakness in the cluster was broad-based as global economics uncertainties put a drag on demand for electronics, EDB said.
Via: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporebusinessnews/view/1155571/1/.html
Sunday, September 25, 2011
天文学家发现星系“中央心脏”黑洞相互吞噬
发布时间：2011/9/2 13:10:08 来源：腾讯科技
核心提示：据报道，天文学家发现位于星系心脏核心位置的巨型恐怖的黑洞正在被另一个更大的黑洞吞噬。这个发现也是科学家首次了解到这个真实的现象。
模拟图像显示两个黑洞正在互相围绕旋转
据国外媒体9月2日报道，天文学家发现位于星系心脏核心位置的巨型恐怖的黑洞正在被另一个更大的黑洞吞噬。这个发现也是科学家首次了解到这个真实的现象。而在几乎所有的大型星系中心都存在着一个巨型黑洞，其质量是太阳的数百万倍至数十亿倍不等，通过模拟星系的形成和增长的数学模型上看，星系心脏部位的黑洞也存在合并而逐渐增长的情况，通过互相吞噬变成更大的黑洞。
科学家在此前也目睹过同等质量的大星系合并的最后阶段的情景，即大星系之间的兼并，而较小的星系之间发生兼并情况，从理论上说应该更为地普遍，因为通过相互的兼并是一种星系增大的方式。但奇怪的是，到目前为止这个现象还没有被观测到。
在一份新的研究报告中，天文学家可能意外地发现在距离地球1.6亿光年处的NGC3393星系中，存在较小规模星系的合并情况。利用美国宇航局钱德拉X射线天文台，已经探测到该星系的中心心脏部位中存在两个黑洞，并且这两个黑顶正在发生相互吞噬的情况。这两个黑洞分别具有一百万倍和三千万倍的太阳质量，大约相互仅仅490光年。根据美国宇航局的分析表明：这同时也是距离地球最近的超大质量黑洞。
同时，据位于马萨诸塞州哈佛大学史密森天体物理中心的天体物理学家法比亚若（Giuseppina Fabbiano）介绍：探测到这个现象完全是个较为意外的事件。而天文学家原先对这个星系进行观测，只是为了对黑洞在星系中的具体情况进行研究观测。
而星系之间的碰撞是个较为“戏剧性”的情况，这个两个星系附近的NGC6240和MRK463星系就是通过远古时代的碰撞而产生的，并最后合并成一个较大的星系，但是，这个过程是非常缓慢的，而且星系的形状以及恒星分布都会受到影响，并且还会在核心周围产生新的恒星。相比较之下，这个新观测到的星系合并现象，算是个较为小规模的碰撞融合，但是其也具有类似银河系这样的漩涡状外形，并且在星系心脏中心附近大多是处于年老的恒星。
通过这个研究观测，也在一定程度上支持了较小规模的星系碰撞可能并不会扰动较大星系。这同时也说明了为什么我们到目前为止还没有发现较小规模的星系合并现象，就是因为其对周围的星系够不成干扰，仅发生在一个较小的范围之内。即使我们通过可见光或者X射线的探测观测设备也较难获得这些证据。而如果星系的碰撞与黑洞的相互吞噬发生在同一时间段上，那就会极大地增强各种电磁辐射的强度，也使得其较容易被地球上的各种观测装置探测到。
而钱德拉X射线空间望远镜就可以检测到这个微小的变化，而现在，我们已经观测到了这个现象，也正在研究其中的到底发生了什么，据法比亚若介绍：两个黑洞距离如此之近，还会观测到什么现象还是个未知数。
转自： http://news.geo-show.com/201109/02/74691.shtml
核心提示：据报道，天文学家发现位于星系心脏核心位置的巨型恐怖的黑洞正在被另一个更大的黑洞吞噬。这个发现也是科学家首次了解到这个真实的现象。
模拟图像显示两个黑洞正在互相围绕旋转据国外媒体9月2日报道，天文学家发现位于星系心脏核心位置的巨型恐怖的黑洞正在被另一个更大的黑洞吞噬。这个发现也是科学家首次了解到这个真实的现象。而在几乎所有的大型星系中心都存在着一个巨型黑洞，其质量是太阳的数百万倍至数十亿倍不等，通过模拟星系的形成和增长的数学模型上看，星系心脏部位的黑洞也存在合并而逐渐增长的情况，通过互相吞噬变成更大的黑洞。
科学家在此前也目睹过同等质量的大星系合并的最后阶段的情景，即大星系之间的兼并，而较小的星系之间发生兼并情况，从理论上说应该更为地普遍，因为通过相互的兼并是一种星系增大的方式。但奇怪的是，到目前为止这个现象还没有被观测到。
在一份新的研究报告中，天文学家可能意外地发现在距离地球1.6亿光年处的NGC3393星系中，存在较小规模星系的合并情况。利用美国宇航局钱德拉X射线天文台，已经探测到该星系的中心心脏部位中存在两个黑洞，并且这两个黑顶正在发生相互吞噬的情况。这两个黑洞分别具有一百万倍和三千万倍的太阳质量，大约相互仅仅490光年。根据美国宇航局的分析表明：这同时也是距离地球最近的超大质量黑洞。
同时，据位于马萨诸塞州哈佛大学史密森天体物理中心的天体物理学家法比亚若（Giuseppina Fabbiano）介绍：探测到这个现象完全是个较为意外的事件。而天文学家原先对这个星系进行观测，只是为了对黑洞在星系中的具体情况进行研究观测。
而星系之间的碰撞是个较为“戏剧性”的情况，这个两个星系附近的NGC6240和MRK463星系就是通过远古时代的碰撞而产生的，并最后合并成一个较大的星系，但是，这个过程是非常缓慢的，而且星系的形状以及恒星分布都会受到影响，并且还会在核心周围产生新的恒星。相比较之下，这个新观测到的星系合并现象，算是个较为小规模的碰撞融合，但是其也具有类似银河系这样的漩涡状外形，并且在星系心脏中心附近大多是处于年老的恒星。
通过这个研究观测，也在一定程度上支持了较小规模的星系碰撞可能并不会扰动较大星系。这同时也说明了为什么我们到目前为止还没有发现较小规模的星系合并现象，就是因为其对周围的星系够不成干扰，仅发生在一个较小的范围之内。即使我们通过可见光或者X射线的探测观测设备也较难获得这些证据。而如果星系的碰撞与黑洞的相互吞噬发生在同一时间段上，那就会极大地增强各种电磁辐射的强度，也使得其较容易被地球上的各种观测装置探测到。
而钱德拉X射线空间望远镜就可以检测到这个微小的变化，而现在，我们已经观测到了这个现象，也正在研究其中的到底发生了什么，据法比亚若介绍：两个黑洞距离如此之近，还会观测到什么现象还是个未知数。
转自： http://news.geo-show.com/201109/02/74691.shtml
Perempuan sila baca artikel ini. SANGAT Penting!
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Ini adalah sangat menakutkan, serupa dengan kes Ms Canny Ong. Pada suatu hari, terdapat seorang wanita yang berhenti di stesen minyak untuk mengisi minyak. Setelah selesai memenuhkan tangki minyak selepas membayar menggunakan kad kredit di pam dan ingin meninggalkan stesen tersebut, atendan di dalam kedai lantas bercakap menerusi speaker dan memberitahu sesuatu yang berlaku dengan kad itu dan meminta wanita itu masuk ke dalam untuk membayar tunai.
Wanita itu keliru kerana dia telah selesai mengisi minyak dan pembayaran menggunakan kad kredit telah diluluskan. Dia menunjukkan isyarat tangan kepada atendan tersebut dan bersiap sedia untuk meninggalkan tetapi atendan tersebut sekali lagi menggesa wanita tersebut masuk ke dalam kaunter kedai untuk membayar tunai. Dengan perasaan sedikit marah, wanita itu terus masuk ke dalam kedai dan mempertikaikan tindakan petugas tersebut dan menuduh dia menipu. Atendan tersebut memberitahu supaya wanita itu bertenang dan mendengar dengan teliti Atendan memberitahu ketika wanita tersebut sedang mengisi minyak, dia telah melihat seorang lelaki telah masuk ke dalam kereta dan bersembunyi dikerusi belakang. Dengan segera beliau telah menghubungi pihak polis. Wanita tersebut terus menjadi takut dan segera melihat pintu keretanya terbuka dan lelaki itu telah menyusup keluar dan meninggalkan kereta itu dengan tergesa-gesa.
Kes baru-baru ini didapati mempunyai kaitan dengan ujian untuk permulaan geng jenayah terbaru dimana memerlukan seseorang untuk membawa balik bahagian badan seorang wanita .. Salah satu cara yang mereka lakukan adalah dengan merangkak perlahan-lahan dan menyusup masuk ke dalam kereta wanita manakala sasaran utamanya adalah stesen minyak atau di kedai runcit pada waktu malam. Kemudian, mereka akan potong kaki / buku lali mangsa menculik mereka dan kemudiannya membunuh dan mencerai-beraikan mereka. Kaedah lain adalah dengan memaksa wanita itu masuk ke dalam kereta kemudian menculik mereka, Sila sebarkan ini kepada wanita lain, orang muda dan tua.
Pertama, wanita seharusnya lebih berhati-hati apabila ingin masuk ke dalam kereta pada waktu malam.
Kedua, Jangan letakkan kereta di tempat sunyi atau terpencil semata-mata ingin mendapatkan tempat letak kereta percuma!
Ketiga, Jika boleh, elakkan memandu seorang diri pada waktu malam! Ini adalah situasi sebenar! Penculikan! Pembunuhan! Putus dan anggota badan dicerai-ceraikan! Ini semua berlaku di Malaysia !
Jadikan amalan:
1. Pastikan kereta berkunci setiap masa walaupun anda meninggalkan kereta sebentar.
2. Periksa sekeliling kereta sebelum masuk ke dalam kereta.
3. Sentiasa peka terhadap sebarang tanda-tanda pelik dari persekitaran anda dan individu lain di dalam sekitar umum, terutama pada waktu malam!!!
Nyawa sangat harga, harus sentiasa berjaga-jaga!!!
Dari: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=291129054233987&set=a.172743942739166.45238.100000106851950&type=1&ref=nf
Ini adalah sangat menakutkan, serupa dengan kes Ms Canny Ong. Pada suatu hari, terdapat seorang wanita yang berhenti di stesen minyak untuk mengisi minyak. Setelah selesai memenuhkan tangki minyak selepas membayar menggunakan kad kredit di pam dan ingin meninggalkan stesen tersebut, atendan di dalam kedai lantas bercakap menerusi speaker dan memberitahu sesuatu yang berlaku dengan kad itu dan meminta wanita itu masuk ke dalam untuk membayar tunai.
Wanita itu keliru kerana dia telah selesai mengisi minyak dan pembayaran menggunakan kad kredit telah diluluskan. Dia menunjukkan isyarat tangan kepada atendan tersebut dan bersiap sedia untuk meninggalkan tetapi atendan tersebut sekali lagi menggesa wanita tersebut masuk ke dalam kaunter kedai untuk membayar tunai. Dengan perasaan sedikit marah, wanita itu terus masuk ke dalam kedai dan mempertikaikan tindakan petugas tersebut dan menuduh dia menipu. Atendan tersebut memberitahu supaya wanita itu bertenang dan mendengar dengan teliti Atendan memberitahu ketika wanita tersebut sedang mengisi minyak, dia telah melihat seorang lelaki telah masuk ke dalam kereta dan bersembunyi dikerusi belakang. Dengan segera beliau telah menghubungi pihak polis. Wanita tersebut terus menjadi takut dan segera melihat pintu keretanya terbuka dan lelaki itu telah menyusup keluar dan meninggalkan kereta itu dengan tergesa-gesa.
Kes baru-baru ini didapati mempunyai kaitan dengan ujian untuk permulaan geng jenayah terbaru dimana memerlukan seseorang untuk membawa balik bahagian badan seorang wanita .. Salah satu cara yang mereka lakukan adalah dengan merangkak perlahan-lahan dan menyusup masuk ke dalam kereta wanita manakala sasaran utamanya adalah stesen minyak atau di kedai runcit pada waktu malam. Kemudian, mereka akan potong kaki / buku lali mangsa menculik mereka dan kemudiannya membunuh dan mencerai-beraikan mereka. Kaedah lain adalah dengan memaksa wanita itu masuk ke dalam kereta kemudian menculik mereka, Sila sebarkan ini kepada wanita lain, orang muda dan tua.
Pertama, wanita seharusnya lebih berhati-hati apabila ingin masuk ke dalam kereta pada waktu malam.
Kedua, Jangan letakkan kereta di tempat sunyi atau terpencil semata-mata ingin mendapatkan tempat letak kereta percuma!
Ketiga, Jika boleh, elakkan memandu seorang diri pada waktu malam! Ini adalah situasi sebenar! Penculikan! Pembunuhan! Putus dan anggota badan dicerai-ceraikan! Ini semua berlaku di Malaysia !
Jadikan amalan:
1. Pastikan kereta berkunci setiap masa walaupun anda meninggalkan kereta sebentar.
2. Periksa sekeliling kereta sebelum masuk ke dalam kereta.
3. Sentiasa peka terhadap sebarang tanda-tanda pelik dari persekitaran anda dan individu lain di dalam sekitar umum, terutama pada waktu malam!!!
Nyawa sangat harga, harus sentiasa berjaga-jaga!!!
Dari: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=291129054233987&set=a.172743942739166.45238.100000106851950&type=1&ref=nf
美联储的“扭曲操作”和QE3
作者：唐小乐日记 发表日期：2011-9-24 20:01:00
本周全世界都在等待的答案总算出来了，美联储给出的是“扭曲操作”的办法让世人大吃一惊，同时也迷惑不解，什么意思？也许时间才是最好的裁判。相对论出来的时候也没有几个人能懂，可现在呢？伯南克的深意要过一阶段才能体味的。要不，美国人不会高薪去聘个白痴的，那不是美国人的做派。
本次的“扭曲操作”和QE3似乎是风马牛不相及的事情。很奇怪的事情，美国高了两次货币宽松政策可是让全世界骂的臭死，所有的过错，所有的问题都推在了美国的货币宽松政策了，万恶的美帝国主义啊。可现在美国不发第三波了，又让人骂了，什么“扭曲操作”啊，什么白痴做法啊，说什么的都有，那在这些天才的眼里应怎样做呢？很简单啊，继续印钞票啊，那么你们之前又怎么会去骂美国是世界通胀的源头呢？很奇怪。全世界从骂美联储的货币宽松到大家每一个人都仰着头等着美国人从天而降的钞票，这可是天下最滑稽的事情了。
时间会证明一切的，现在已经有所显现了，大宗又跌了，石油大跌，黄金大跌，为什么啊？美联储没发钱，世界经济形势不妙，大宗卖给谁去啊？石油卖给谁去啊？黄金也不保值了，也跌了。那么伯南克到底要干什么呢？为什么做莫名其妙的事情啊？其实伯南克要的就是这个效果！前两轮的货币宽松政策，钱是印了不老少，可最终经济还是没有起来，而由于石油和大宗的疯狂上涨，美国人自己的通胀倒来了，那是一件多么得不偿失的事情。于是摆在美联储桌上的首要任务和我们一样是抗通胀，抗通胀的首先就是降低石油和大宗商品的价格，而不是我们那么不着调的去养猪、养鸡，那是市场的事情，绝不是政府应该做的事情。
于是有了云里雾里的“扭曲操作”，美联储把长期的利率看低了，那么是不是意味着在美国投资的成本减少，世界的热钱包括企业就会回流到美国，重新去投资实业，这是美国的长期利益所在，哪里不着调了？但这毕竟是长期的事情，短期是不会见效的，于是全世界认为美国也无计可施了，经济下滑是不可避免的事情了，于是大宗、石油紧跟着跌了下了，殊不知这正是伯南克要的效果。但同时也带来了新的问题，美元上涨了，看看这几日美元对世界各国的主要货币都在上涨，这同样不是美国人所要的结果，因为汇率上涨了，进口就多了，出口少了，经济同样起不来。那就是说“扭曲操作”只不过是先招，美联储是必有后招的，是什么还没人知道，就像没人料到“扭曲操作”一样，但有一点QE3是必定会出来的。因为现在不管是“扭曲操作”还好还是别的什么那都不是现在的药方，那是中长期的事情。就好比现在头疼，却拿出了治脚的方案，但从长远来看这是必须的。那么美联储在等什么呢？等时机，在等最佳的时机。在等大宗、石油大跌后不可能在翻身的时候，在等全世界的经济死的差不多的时候苦苦哀求美国人多印些钞票的时候。
热钱和其他国家的实业从此会慢慢的向美国转移了，美国的经济必将率先实现复苏，虽然那是要几年以后的事情，可它已经规划好了。伯南克学到了中医的精髓，那么我们的发改委呢？还在忙着约谈吗？
什么是“扭曲操作”？
所谓扭曲操作（Operation Twist），是指美联储卖出较短期的国债，买入较长期限的国债，从而延长所持国债资产的整体期限，该操作会导致长期国债价格上涨，收益率下跌。按照国际惯例，一般国债期限越长，其年利率应该越高，以吸引投资者购买，因此一国的国债收益率曲线一般是一条由下向上的曲线。而美联储扭曲操作计划的内容是，卖出短期国债，并在2012年6月底前增持4000亿美元长期国债，这将使美国国债的收益率曲线的较远端向下弯曲，所以将之称为扭曲操作。
市场分析认为，前两轮量化宽松并未起到太大作用，扭曲操作是目前唯一可取的方案，目的在于压低长期国债收益率，降低市场借贷成本，从而刺激实体经济。对此，国家信息中心经济预测部首席经济师祝宝良在接受媒体采访时表示，扭曲操作将不会对中国产生重大影响，其负面效果小于QE3。祝宝良建议中国更多购买美国短期国债，因为美联储此举将拉高这类债券的收益率。不过，如果美国长期国债收益率下跌，游资会寻找其他收益更高的资产，因此祝宝良认为，在人民币升值预期下，扭曲操作可能导致热钱加速涌入中国。
转自： http://www.tianya.cn/publicforum/content/develop/1/847691.shtml
参考： http://money.163.com/11/0923/11/7EKOGLQK00253B0H.html
本周全世界都在等待的答案总算出来了，美联储给出的是“扭曲操作”的办法让世人大吃一惊，同时也迷惑不解，什么意思？也许时间才是最好的裁判。相对论出来的时候也没有几个人能懂，可现在呢？伯南克的深意要过一阶段才能体味的。要不，美国人不会高薪去聘个白痴的，那不是美国人的做派。
本次的“扭曲操作”和QE3似乎是风马牛不相及的事情。很奇怪的事情，美国高了两次货币宽松政策可是让全世界骂的臭死，所有的过错，所有的问题都推在了美国的货币宽松政策了，万恶的美帝国主义啊。可现在美国不发第三波了，又让人骂了，什么“扭曲操作”啊，什么白痴做法啊，说什么的都有，那在这些天才的眼里应怎样做呢？很简单啊，继续印钞票啊，那么你们之前又怎么会去骂美国是世界通胀的源头呢？很奇怪。全世界从骂美联储的货币宽松到大家每一个人都仰着头等着美国人从天而降的钞票，这可是天下最滑稽的事情了。
时间会证明一切的，现在已经有所显现了，大宗又跌了，石油大跌，黄金大跌，为什么啊？美联储没发钱，世界经济形势不妙，大宗卖给谁去啊？石油卖给谁去啊？黄金也不保值了，也跌了。那么伯南克到底要干什么呢？为什么做莫名其妙的事情啊？其实伯南克要的就是这个效果！前两轮的货币宽松政策，钱是印了不老少，可最终经济还是没有起来，而由于石油和大宗的疯狂上涨，美国人自己的通胀倒来了，那是一件多么得不偿失的事情。于是摆在美联储桌上的首要任务和我们一样是抗通胀，抗通胀的首先就是降低石油和大宗商品的价格，而不是我们那么不着调的去养猪、养鸡，那是市场的事情，绝不是政府应该做的事情。
于是有了云里雾里的“扭曲操作”，美联储把长期的利率看低了，那么是不是意味着在美国投资的成本减少，世界的热钱包括企业就会回流到美国，重新去投资实业，这是美国的长期利益所在，哪里不着调了？但这毕竟是长期的事情，短期是不会见效的，于是全世界认为美国也无计可施了，经济下滑是不可避免的事情了，于是大宗、石油紧跟着跌了下了，殊不知这正是伯南克要的效果。但同时也带来了新的问题，美元上涨了，看看这几日美元对世界各国的主要货币都在上涨，这同样不是美国人所要的结果，因为汇率上涨了，进口就多了，出口少了，经济同样起不来。那就是说“扭曲操作”只不过是先招，美联储是必有后招的，是什么还没人知道，就像没人料到“扭曲操作”一样，但有一点QE3是必定会出来的。因为现在不管是“扭曲操作”还好还是别的什么那都不是现在的药方，那是中长期的事情。就好比现在头疼，却拿出了治脚的方案，但从长远来看这是必须的。那么美联储在等什么呢？等时机，在等最佳的时机。在等大宗、石油大跌后不可能在翻身的时候，在等全世界的经济死的差不多的时候苦苦哀求美国人多印些钞票的时候。
热钱和其他国家的实业从此会慢慢的向美国转移了，美国的经济必将率先实现复苏，虽然那是要几年以后的事情，可它已经规划好了。伯南克学到了中医的精髓，那么我们的发改委呢？还在忙着约谈吗？
什么是“扭曲操作”？
所谓扭曲操作（Operation Twist），是指美联储卖出较短期的国债，买入较长期限的国债，从而延长所持国债资产的整体期限，该操作会导致长期国债价格上涨，收益率下跌。按照国际惯例，一般国债期限越长，其年利率应该越高，以吸引投资者购买，因此一国的国债收益率曲线一般是一条由下向上的曲线。而美联储扭曲操作计划的内容是，卖出短期国债，并在2012年6月底前增持4000亿美元长期国债，这将使美国国债的收益率曲线的较远端向下弯曲，所以将之称为扭曲操作。
市场分析认为，前两轮量化宽松并未起到太大作用，扭曲操作是目前唯一可取的方案，目的在于压低长期国债收益率，降低市场借贷成本，从而刺激实体经济。对此，国家信息中心经济预测部首席经济师祝宝良在接受媒体采访时表示，扭曲操作将不会对中国产生重大影响，其负面效果小于QE3。祝宝良建议中国更多购买美国短期国债，因为美联储此举将拉高这类债券的收益率。不过，如果美国长期国债收益率下跌，游资会寻找其他收益更高的资产，因此祝宝良认为，在人民币升值预期下，扭曲操作可能导致热钱加速涌入中国。
转自： http://www.tianya.cn/publicforum/content/develop/1/847691.shtml
参考： http://money.163.com/11/0923/11/7EKOGLQK00253B0H.html
Saturday, September 24, 2011
宇宙空间某处发现神秘能量束 黑洞正吞噬恒星
2011年06月18日07:06 腾讯科技 编译Everett
天文学家发现40亿光年处天龙星座中探测到神秘能量束，该能量束被证实是由一个巨型黑洞在吞噬一颗恒星时发出的，然而这个黑洞的背后却隐藏着更大的秘密。
腾讯科技讯（编译Everett）据国外媒体报道，美国宇航局雨燕伽马射线探测器扫描天龙星座时，发现其内部出现神秘能量源，大约距离地球40亿光年，科学家将其编号为Sw 1644+57。这股神秘的能量来自黑洞的中心，这个现象让科学家感到非常奇异，后来被证实：这个黑洞正在吞噬一颗恒星！而且整个过程被天文学家目击到了，这是一个相当罕见并且非常特殊的宇宙事件，概率小到每1亿年才有可能被观测到一次。相关的数据发表在6月16日的《科学》杂志上。
天龙星座的黑洞正在吞噬一颗恒星
发现这个现象的过程还伴随着一些诡异的情节，美国宇航局雨燕伽马射线探测卫星在扫描宇宙某一深处时突然出现强烈的射线闪光，后来范围进一步缩小到天龙星座，进行详细的观测。天文学家最初认为这只是一个比较普通的伽马射线暴发，而这个伽马射线来自一个正在坍缩的恒星，恒星坍缩则是宇宙中最强的能量释放现象之一，其中也伴随着伽马射线的释放，从这个角度上解释似乎还行。但是科学家发现这次的能量集中释放居然能持续数月，所以他们意识到这其中的原因肯定不止这么简单，必然还隐藏着更加神秘的东西在起作用。
根据美国加州大学伯克利分校天文学教授Joshua Bloom的叙述：这是一个非常并且是极其不寻常的事件，到目前为止，这个能量束释放时间大约从3月24日至25日的某个时间开始，到现在已经超过两个半月了，而且还在继续释放能量，衰减的程度也很弱，从已经掌握的证据来看，虽然可以将其认定为具有部分伽马射线源释放能量的特征，但是这肯定不是个普通的伽马射线源，同时这些释放的能量之中还有其他射线。
位于天龙星座内的NGC6543星云
基于观测对象的特殊性，除了雨燕伽马射线探测卫星外，美国宇航局同时也动用了哈勃望远镜和钱德拉X射线望远镜对这个神秘的能量释放源进行探测。这种极端异常的能量释放，基本上可以确定为是一颗恒星在被超大质量黑洞吞噬的时候释放出来的，而如果将其定性为仅仅是伽马射线的暴发，却又不能完全说明问题，伽马射线暴发一般只能持续一天左右的时间，虽然也有的伽马射线暴持续的时间很长，但是这个射线的特征又不足以认定为是长伽马射线暴。这个能量释放还将在未来一段时间内持续很长的时间，这是因为在黑洞撕裂恒星的过程中，被撕扯下来的物质会在黑洞吸积盘上形成质量漩涡，就像水池放水时产生的漩涡一样，而在这个过程中，将释放大量的能量。
针对这个问题，美国宇航局进行了详细的讨论，最后得出的初步结论是：巨大的能量释放以及长时间的X射线、伽马射线的暴发均来自这颗正在被黑洞吞噬的恒星，这个颗恒星的大小和我们的太阳差不多，而撕裂它的黑洞质量比这颗恒星大至少100万倍。但是这其中又有出现了一个谜团：在宇宙中，一颗恒星被黑洞吞噬是比较正常，然而为什么这个特殊的黑洞不吞噬该区域周围的其他物质呢，并且有证据表明在该区域还存在着其他很活跃的黑洞。研究人员也筛选了这片宇宙空间的观测记录，并没有发现长时间的X射线和伽马射线暴发记录在案。也就是说，如果这个黑洞在此之前吞噬了其他物质，那就一定有X射线和伽马射线暴出现，但事实上却没有。
黑洞中心发出的神秘能量束
然而，在这个谜团的解释上，伯克利分校的Bloom教授认为：这个黑洞可能是另一类型的黑洞，它不像一般黑洞那样见到物质就大量吞噬，从迹象上看，更像是一种随机性的吞噬行为。这个事件可能发生在任何一个星系之中，但是其发生的概率非常的低，仅仅是一个偶然性事件，很可能永远都不会再发生。
基于此，天文学家对能观测到一个特殊的黑洞在进行罕见的吞噬恒星的行为，都感到十分地幸运，本来黑洞的引力足以强大到任何东西都逃不出去，但事实这颗黑洞在吞噬的过程中，X射线和伽马射线喷流在黑洞的“物质漩涡”上打了个转，朝地球方向释放。
虽然这是一个令人难以置信且有罕见的事件，但其确实能帮助天文学家进一步了解黑洞的成长。也在一定程度上明确了黑洞增长不仅仅依靠星系合并过程中黑洞的相互吞噬，这次观测到的是一个特殊的黑洞，它仅仅是依靠吞噬了周围恒星和气体维持增长，这也为黑洞的成长提供了新的方式，这很有可能改变目前对黑洞吞噬方式的看法，或许黑洞之间或者黑洞与某种物质之间还存在着更大的秘密。
转自： http://tech.qq.com/a/20110618/000039.htm
天文学家发现40亿光年处天龙星座中探测到神秘能量束，该能量束被证实是由一个巨型黑洞在吞噬一颗恒星时发出的，然而这个黑洞的背后却隐藏着更大的秘密。
腾讯科技讯（编译Everett）据国外媒体报道，美国宇航局雨燕伽马射线探测器扫描天龙星座时，发现其内部出现神秘能量源，大约距离地球40亿光年，科学家将其编号为Sw 1644+57。这股神秘的能量来自黑洞的中心，这个现象让科学家感到非常奇异，后来被证实：这个黑洞正在吞噬一颗恒星！而且整个过程被天文学家目击到了，这是一个相当罕见并且非常特殊的宇宙事件，概率小到每1亿年才有可能被观测到一次。相关的数据发表在6月16日的《科学》杂志上。
天龙星座的黑洞正在吞噬一颗恒星发现这个现象的过程还伴随着一些诡异的情节，美国宇航局雨燕伽马射线探测卫星在扫描宇宙某一深处时突然出现强烈的射线闪光，后来范围进一步缩小到天龙星座，进行详细的观测。天文学家最初认为这只是一个比较普通的伽马射线暴发，而这个伽马射线来自一个正在坍缩的恒星，恒星坍缩则是宇宙中最强的能量释放现象之一，其中也伴随着伽马射线的释放，从这个角度上解释似乎还行。但是科学家发现这次的能量集中释放居然能持续数月，所以他们意识到这其中的原因肯定不止这么简单，必然还隐藏着更加神秘的东西在起作用。
根据美国加州大学伯克利分校天文学教授Joshua Bloom的叙述：这是一个非常并且是极其不寻常的事件，到目前为止，这个能量束释放时间大约从3月24日至25日的某个时间开始，到现在已经超过两个半月了，而且还在继续释放能量，衰减的程度也很弱，从已经掌握的证据来看，虽然可以将其认定为具有部分伽马射线源释放能量的特征，但是这肯定不是个普通的伽马射线源，同时这些释放的能量之中还有其他射线。
位于天龙星座内的NGC6543星云基于观测对象的特殊性，除了雨燕伽马射线探测卫星外，美国宇航局同时也动用了哈勃望远镜和钱德拉X射线望远镜对这个神秘的能量释放源进行探测。这种极端异常的能量释放，基本上可以确定为是一颗恒星在被超大质量黑洞吞噬的时候释放出来的，而如果将其定性为仅仅是伽马射线的暴发，却又不能完全说明问题，伽马射线暴发一般只能持续一天左右的时间，虽然也有的伽马射线暴持续的时间很长，但是这个射线的特征又不足以认定为是长伽马射线暴。这个能量释放还将在未来一段时间内持续很长的时间，这是因为在黑洞撕裂恒星的过程中，被撕扯下来的物质会在黑洞吸积盘上形成质量漩涡，就像水池放水时产生的漩涡一样，而在这个过程中，将释放大量的能量。
黑洞中心发出的神秘能量束然而，在这个谜团的解释上，伯克利分校的Bloom教授认为：这个黑洞可能是另一类型的黑洞，它不像一般黑洞那样见到物质就大量吞噬，从迹象上看，更像是一种随机性的吞噬行为。这个事件可能发生在任何一个星系之中，但是其发生的概率非常的低，仅仅是一个偶然性事件，很可能永远都不会再发生。
基于此，天文学家对能观测到一个特殊的黑洞在进行罕见的吞噬恒星的行为，都感到十分地幸运，本来黑洞的引力足以强大到任何东西都逃不出去，但事实这颗黑洞在吞噬的过程中，X射线和伽马射线喷流在黑洞的“物质漩涡”上打了个转，朝地球方向释放。
虽然这是一个令人难以置信且有罕见的事件，但其确实能帮助天文学家进一步了解黑洞的成长。也在一定程度上明确了黑洞增长不仅仅依靠星系合并过程中黑洞的相互吞噬，这次观测到的是一个特殊的黑洞，它仅仅是依靠吞噬了周围恒星和气体维持增长，这也为黑洞的成长提供了新的方式，这很有可能改变目前对黑洞吞噬方式的看法，或许黑洞之间或者黑洞与某种物质之间还存在着更大的秘密。
转自： http://tech.qq.com/a/20110618/000039.htm
Friday, September 23, 2011
Steeper rise in CPI for August
Steeper rise in CPI for August
Posted: 23 September 2011 1307 hrs
Shoppers pay for their groceries at check-out counters at a supermarket in Singapore
SINGAPORE : Singapore's inflation rate is now at its highest in almost three years.
In August, the consumer price index rose 5.7 per cent, much higher than many had expected and up from July's 5.4 per cent.
Despite the possibility of a global recession, inflation in Singapore showed no signs of abating, rising for the third consecutive month.
Even industry experts were stumped.
Song Seng Wun, an economist at CIMB, said: "What caught everybody off (guard) was the steep climb in the private transport CPI itself ... the COE premium, that had been rising all the way ... into August itself."
Aside from higher costs of private road transport which increased 12.5 per cent, the other factor was the rise in accommodation costs which increased by nearly 10 per cent. Meanwhile, food prices rose by 3 per cent.
But the good news is that inflation is expected to moderate for the rest of the year.
Looking ahead, industry observers said inflationary pressures should moderate slightly, given the likelihood of dampened consumer sentiment.
Mr Song said: "COE prices, which are already coming off, will trail off; the housing component, the rental revision will start to reflect the cautious environment."
With inflationary pressures shifting to concerns over growth, focus will fall on the Monetary Authority of Singapore's (MAS) direction for Singapore dollar next month.
Most agree that it would be unsustainable for the Singapore dollar to continue its steep appreciation trend, with the growing weakness in the export sector.
Wu Kun Lung, an economist at Credit Suisse, said: "The dilemma is this inflation and growth trade-off. So with this in mind, MAS would want to keep as flexible as possible. The Singapore dollar will continue to appreciate against its trading partners but at a slower pace."
Whatever the outcome, it will probably be prudent to adopt a more cautious outlook for the months ahead.
Via: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporebusinessnews/view/1155036/1/.html
Via: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporebusinessnews/view/1155036/1/.html
HDB announces bumper launch of 8,200 flats
Posted: 22 September 2011 1028 hrs
Punggol Waterway Woodcress (photo: HDB)
Jurong West Golden Peony (photo: HDB)
Sengkang Anchorvale Harvest (photo: HDB)
SINGAPORE: The Housing and Development Board (HDB) on Thursday announced a bumper launch of 8,200 flats under the joint Build-To-Order (BTO) and Sale of Balance Flats (SBF) Exercises.
This is the largest supply of flats in a single launch.
HDB said a total of 5,415 new flats will be built in seven BTO projects in Sengkang, Punggol, Jurong West, Jurong East and Ang Mo Kio towns.
They are likely to cost between S$134,000 for a three-room flat to about S$375,000 for a five-room unit.
The remaining 2,847 units are balance flats from earlier BTO exercises and repurchased flats.
These units are scattered across 15 estates, including Kallang, Punggol and Ang Mo Kio.
HDB said first-time buyers will be given priority, with at least 95 per cent of the flats set aside for them.
Property agents said they do not expect the HDB resale market and private property market to be affected by the bumper launch.
Mr Mohamed Ismail Gafoor, CEO of PropNex said: "(It is) simply because these (BTO) flats will only be coming onboard in three years' time. In the resale market, the demand is really by people who're not able to wait.
"Most of these newly-married couples are first timers applying for BTO, most of them cannot afford to buy a resale flat due to the high COV (cash over valuation) currently."
Via: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1154759/1/.html
Punggol Waterway Woodcress (photo: HDB)
Jurong West Golden Peony (photo: HDB)
Sengkang Anchorvale Harvest (photo: HDB)SINGAPORE: The Housing and Development Board (HDB) on Thursday announced a bumper launch of 8,200 flats under the joint Build-To-Order (BTO) and Sale of Balance Flats (SBF) Exercises.
This is the largest supply of flats in a single launch.
HDB said a total of 5,415 new flats will be built in seven BTO projects in Sengkang, Punggol, Jurong West, Jurong East and Ang Mo Kio towns.
They are likely to cost between S$134,000 for a three-room flat to about S$375,000 for a five-room unit.
The remaining 2,847 units are balance flats from earlier BTO exercises and repurchased flats.
These units are scattered across 15 estates, including Kallang, Punggol and Ang Mo Kio.
HDB said first-time buyers will be given priority, with at least 95 per cent of the flats set aside for them.
Property agents said they do not expect the HDB resale market and private property market to be affected by the bumper launch.
Mr Mohamed Ismail Gafoor, CEO of PropNex said: "(It is) simply because these (BTO) flats will only be coming onboard in three years' time. In the resale market, the demand is really by people who're not able to wait.
"Most of these newly-married couples are first timers applying for BTO, most of them cannot afford to buy a resale flat due to the high COV (cash over valuation) currently."
Via: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1154759/1/.html
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Special report: Crunch time at America's richest union
By Deepa Seetharaman and Kevin Krolicki
DETROIT | Thu Sep 22, 2011 8:26am EDT
(Reuters) - Bob King, the president of the United Auto Workers, has a problem: the labor union that credits itself with creating the American middle class has glimpsed the end of the line.
Two years after the wrenching restructuring of the U.S. auto industry and the bankruptcies that remade General Motors and Chrysler, the UAW is facing its own financial reckoning. America's richest union has been living beyond its means and running down its savings, an analysis of its financial records shows.
Unless King and other officials succeed with a turnaround plan still taking shape, the next financial crisis in Detroit may not be at one of the automakers but at the UAW itself.
That picture of the growing financial pressure on the 76-year-old union emerges from a Reuters analysis of a decade of UAW financial filings and interviews with dozens of current and former union officials and people close to the union.
King, 65, has just wrapped up a round of fast-track talks with General Motors on a new contract that includes new job promises and bonuses of at least $11,500 for each of the automaker's 48,500 factory workers.
Now King has turned to Chrysler and Ford Motor Co to wrap up similar deals on wages and benefits that King hopes will show a new and more business-friendly labor union has emerged from the industry's near collapse.
But winning a new four-year contract deal with the Detroit automakers will just clear the way for a battle that King believes will determine whether the UAW survives - organizing plants run by the likes of VW, Toyota, Nissan and Hyundai in order to reverse a steady slide in the union's membership and influence.
In some ways the union's situation recalls the early days of GM's own slow-motion slide toward bankruptcy.
Just as with GM before, the UAW has been left to carry an outsized bureaucracy. Also like GM, the union's recovery plans hinge on reversing unfavorable perceptions decades in the making.
King, who has a law degree and looks more like a college professor than a hardened labor leader, has moved to cut costs at the union's riverfront Detroit headquarters by negotiating buyouts with members of the UAW's own union.
UAW clerical workers, who are represented by the OPEIU, have also taken cuts to pay and their health care coverage in retirement and agreed to other concessions. UAW staff approved the buyouts earlier this month by a vote of 132-to-110.
The UAW's 17-member board has also considered a shift toward a more aggressive investment strategy and ways to shed some of the empty union halls that have been dumped back on its books, officials involved in those discussions say.
But fundamentally, King is betting that a union forged in Depression-era Detroit can connect with a generation of American workers who grew up long after the peak of the UAW's clout in the 1950 and 1960s and who live in southern states traditionally hostile to labor unions.
That will mean spending big on a campaign to attract non-union workers in plants owned by foreign automakers in the south.
Earlier this year, the UAW considered buying a commercial during the Super Bowl, the most widely watched event on American television. The plan was hatched by Richard Bensinger, a veteran organizer hired last year. The idea was to try to turn public opinion against foreign automakers that have spurned the UAW's advances. It would have cost over $3 million.
The plan was scrapped but its consideration shows the kinds of risks that King could be willing to take, people familiar with the effort said.
That more aggressive approach threatens to push costs higher for the UAW when it has been forced to sell assets to make up from dwindling dues from a declining base of active workers.
The union has been slow to trim other outlays. Since 2007, the union's spending has included promotional items such as flyswatters emblazoned with the UAW logo ($5,000), bowling ball buffers and bags ($33,000) as well as spending on golf outings and at golf resorts ($346,000). The union says it is forced to book meetings at golf resorts because in some areas of the country those are the only conference facilities large enough.
The UAW also spent at least $2 million on advertising in 2008 to build support for the union and the first wave of "bridge" loans for General Motors and Chrysler. Both automakers were spared liquidation by a bailout orchestrated by President Barack Obama in 2009.
UAW officials acknowledge that the practice of relying on the union's savings will have to end.
"If the UAW continued to sell assets to operate, how long of a period does it take before you no longer can sustain that?" UAW Secretary-Treasurer Dennis Williams told Reuters.
"The answer to that is we don't want to continue that strategy."
'THE NEXT DETROIT'
As the Detroit automakers prepared for contract talks with the UAW this summer, the labor-relations department at one of the companies sent an unusual request to the in-house economist. Based on the UAW's financial statements, how long would it take before the union ran into trouble? The answer: the UAW might have three to five years before its budget difficulties forced a financial crunch, absent changes.
The "hand-grenade" math of the projection gave the union less than a five-year window of opportunity to turn things around by winning new membership at foreign-run auto plants, said the person who saw the internal forecast and asked not to be named because of its sensitivity.
The assumptions behind that projection could not be independently reviewed. But the fact that one of the Detroit automakers commissioned a deep dive on the union's finances underscores the seriousness of the situation facing King.
The UAW remains America's richest union. The value of assets on its balance sheet top $1 billion. Some of that, especially real estate, could be worth far less if the union was forced to sell in a hurry, analysts say. Even so, the UAW's reported wealth is almost twice as much as that held by the second-richest union, which was the United Brotherhood of Carpenters in 2010.
Most of the UAW's wealth sits in its strike fund, which stood at $763 million at the end of 2010. But the sheer size of the fund masks a deterioration of the union's day-to-day finances, especially since 2007.
To bridge the gap between spending and revenue, the UAW has increasingly relied on selling its investments, which include U.S. Treasuries and stocks, and a handful of properties. From 2000 to 2006, the UAW sold $7.3 million. That ballooned to nearly $222 million from 2007 to 2009, government filings show.
"It illustrates to me that their cost structure is not aligned with the revenue that they're getting from their rank and file," said Peter Bible, former chief accounting officer for GM who is now a partner-in-charge at accounting firm EisnerAmper LLP.
The UAW reported a $44-million drop in the value of its cash and investments outside the strike fund in 2009. If that rate were sustained, the UAW would run through all of its cash and liquid investments in just over 20 years.
That simplified projection does not account for additional investment gains the UAW might realize by moving money out of U.S. Treasuries where it has parked about 60 percent of its assets. It also does not reflect the benefit of any additional cost cutting or dues from organizing new workers or winning additional jobs or higher wages at the Detroit Three.
The UAW said the current environment was "challenging with bond yields continuing to fall and equities continuing to be so volatile." It said it was reviewing its strategy: "We continue to pursue investment opportunities with the goal of increasing the expected degree of overall risk."
Analysts said it was likely that the UAW would see changes to its membership rolls, costs and the value of its investments in coming years. For that reason, a straight-line projection based on the UAW's performance in 2009 could overstate the pressure on the union.
Kristin Dziczek, an analyst at the Ann Arbor, Michigan-based Center for Automotive Research, said the years from 2007 to 2010 were an "anomaly." Union officials also take that view.
"The auto industry crashed hard and fast, over 316,000 members left the UAW, and, at the same time, the union's investment returns were tanking," said Dziczek, who has worked for both the UAW and GM.
But even a diminished war chest could hurt the UAW. A weakened UAW might not be able to pay for the kinds of campaigns it has run to bring recalcitrant companies to the bargaining table.
For example, in 2009, during a bitter fight with casino operator Caesars Entertainment Corp, the UAW spent at least $4.8 million on outside consultants and advertising to win the first-ever contracts for about 2,500 UAW-represented workers in Atlantic City.
One UAW billboard urged gamblers to shun casinos without union contracts. The company's rejoinder in a separate ad showed a forlorn and apparently out-of-work assembly worker with the caption, "Don't let the UAW turn Atlantic City into the next Detroit."
The erosion of the UAW's wealth could also undercut the union's power in national politics where it remains a key ally of the Democratic Party. Williams, for example, is a veteran political organizer who campaigned for Obama in 2008 and remains close.
Union officials and experts say the UAW has no obligation to make a profit, only to safeguard its future. "It's all about the best benefits for the members of the UAW," said labor historian and UAW archivist Mike Smith. "If there is a secondary goal, it's sustaining the UAW."
'FACTS ARE STUBBORN THINGS'
King likes to say he wants to take the union back to its roots under legendary leader, Walter Reuther.
Reuther saw the UAW emerge from bare-knuckled battles with GM and Ford to become a part of the American establishment. From 1946 to 1970, when Reuther died in a plane crash, the UAW won a series of ever-richer contracts that set the bar for other industries.
In the same year Reuther died, King joined the UAW. He was hired at Ford's massive Rouge plant, once the world's largest industrial complex with over 100,000 workers and its own railroad and electric power.
The Dearborn, Michigan plant was also the scene of the 1937 "Battle of the Overpass" where thugs hired by Ford beat up Reuther as he passed out leaflets outside the plant. The images of a bloody Reuther hang in the hall of nearby Local 600, commemorating a major step toward organizing Ford, the last Detroit holdout.
Despite the reputation of the Rouge as a UAW hotbed, King emerged as a pragmatist with a knack for seeing things from the other side of the bargaining table and admitting when the union was wrong.
"Many years ago I was in the grievance area," he said last month. "The Ford representative there said, 'You know, Bob, facts are stubborn things.'" King paused for a moment and added, "I think I was trying to argue around the facts."
As King rose up the ranks starting in the 1980s, the outlook darkened for the "Big Three" as they were rocked by higher oil prices and gains by Japanese competitors who were held up as the icons for a different and better model of production and factory teamwork.
UAW membership slowly fell from its peak of 1.5 million in 1979. By the time King became the UAW's tenth president in 2010, membership had plunged 75 percent from its high point to under 377,000 workers. Less than a third of the membership works at the Detroit Three.
The decline in active workers cut deeply into the UAW's dues, a major source of revenue. Union workers still pay dues equivalent to two hours of work a month. For a long time, the relatively high wages of auto workers helped protect the UAW's coffers.
As recently as the SUV boom of the late 1990s, some workers could make more than $100,000 a year with overtime. Today a new hire starts at about $30,000 per year under a two-tier pay deal negotiated in 2007.
King, who concedes the UAW bears some responsibility for the near-collapse of the American auto industry, quickly doubled down on a bet made by his predecessor, Ron Gettelfinger. In 2006, UAW delegates voted to move about $110 million from the strike fund to pay for organizing. In 2010, King went back for an unprecedented double-dip in the fund and won clearance to spend up to another $160 million over four years.
"Just like President Obama took a big risk in betting on us, we're taking a big risk on money from our strike fund," King told Reuters.
GOOD COP, BAD COP
By the spring of 2010, even before he took over as president, King began putting together his team. That included hiring Bensinger, a veteran organizer known for his out-of-the-box ideas. King had first worked with Bensinger in the early 1990s as part of a task force at the AFL-CIO. The group had agreed on the need for unions to take bigger risks in organizing.
Joe Ashton, a Philadelphia native and UAW official who had organized the 2,500 casino workers in Atlantic City, was given charge of GM negotiations. The message was clear: the new UAW would live or die in organizing battles and that's where it would draw its leaders.
Toyota proved the first test for King's increased willingness to pick fights outside the UAW's comfort zone. The provocation was an announcement that the Japanese automaker would close a joint-venture plant it had operated with GM in California.
The U.S. automaker had pulled out of the Fremont, California plant known as NUMMI as part of its bankruptcy. About 4,700 workers, most of them UAW members, lost their jobs. Those jobs represented the UAW's only foothold in a major U.S. auto factory outside those run by Detroit. At every turn, the UAW had failed to organize Toyota, Nissan and Honda plants in efforts going back to 1989.
"The only luck we've had has been bad luck," King said last year.
In the early spring of 2010, King traveled from Washington to Chicago to California to bring pressure on Toyota. In part because of that increased travel by King and other senior UAW officials, compensation recorded for UAW officers increased 24 percent from 2009 to 2010.
When Toyota announced a deal allowing electric-car start-up Tesla to take over NUMMI in late May 2010, King eased back on the public pressure.
But just a few weeks later, Toyota announced it would make the Corolla at a nonunion plant in Mississippi. King learned about the move shortly before speaking to assembled delegates at the UAW convention in Detroit as he took office. In a rare moment of public anger, he vowed to "pound Toyota."
The UAW equipped workers and retirees with picket signs that included a caricature of the Toyota logo as an ominous skull. The signs, splashed with red to suggest blood, read "Toyota is killing American jobs." Pickets were assembled outside Toyota dealerships, but quickly disbanded when UAW officials judged that the hard-line campaign could backfire.
In the end, the union spent over $300,000 in a failed bid to get Toyota to save NUMMI. That included almost $65,000 paid to a Washington, D.C. firm, Free Range Studios, for expenses and fees to develop a website critical of Toyota's safety policies. UAW leadership also opted to scrap the site before it went live.
By the fall of 2010, King was done being the bad cop and banging on Toyota. Now he would try a more diplomatic approach as he began to prepare for the upcoming round of talks with the Detroit automakers.
ORGANIZING THE SOUTH
King saw the Detroit talks as a way to show that the union finally got it. The new UAW would not press to saddle the automakers with out-sized costs. It would be a partner with management. The subtext was clear: the transplants had nothing to fear from Bob King.
"We're betting that we can be successful with the right program and the right approach to organizing," King told Reuters.
"If the UAW can show that it makes reasonable demands in bargaining, it will make it easier to organize the transplant companies by saying we're not as crazy as you think," said Gary Chaison, a labor relations professor at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts. "You can live with us."
Union officials say workers at foreign auto plants feel threatened by their bosses, though the companies disagree. Another obstacle is that many of the "transplant" factories are in right-to-work states, where laws prohibit the companies or the UAW from making membership in the union a condition of employment.
Another problem is that the UAW can no longer point to a record of winning much higher wages for its members.
Volkswagen AG is paying newly hired workers at its Chattanooga, Tennessee plant $14.50 per hour. That is almost exactly what a second-tier UAW worker would make in Detroit. In a sign of demand for jobs at that pay level, the Chattanooga plant had 85,000 applications for more than 2,000 jobs.
VW workers have been promised $19.50 after three years on the job. That is just above the $19.28 per hour maximum that entry-level workers at GM would make over the term of the four-year contract now before workers for ratification.
"You don't pay dues to make less or the same as somebody who isn't paying those dues," said Gregg Shotwell, a UAW dissident retired from GM and Delphi Corp.
Organizing Chattanooga could cost the UAW up to $3 million, or some $1,500 per worker, according to Chaison's estimates. It would take the union over four years to recoup its investment based on projected dues.
King has been reminding workers at every turn that the UAW has no choice. In 1970, when King joined the union, the UAW represented over 80 percent of U.S. auto sales. By 2010, the union built only about a third of the cars and trucks sold here.
"If the UAW is going to exist as we know it, it's going to have a strong auto backbone," said Gary Casteel, director of a UAW region that includes Tennessee, South Carolina, Alabama and Georgia where most of the transplants are located.
Last August, the union won a small battle in that hostile terrain when workers at a Johnson Controls battery plant in South Carolina voted for UAW representation.
Even so, in Chicago recently, King delivered a cautionary message to UAW officials representing Ford at a room in the Fairmont hotel. The hotel was less than a block from where Obama greeted thousands of enthusiastic supporters on election night 2008, a major victory for the union.
For some at the Chicago meeting, the proximity to the election-night celebration was a reminder of the hard choices facing the UAW two years after winning a bailout that spared the union from a more immediate crisis. The UAW believes Obama's intervention saved more than 1 million jobs, even though the auto bailouts remain controversial.
King told the UAW officials not to expect a rollback of concessions at Ford or other Detroit automakers.
"We can't put the companies at a disadvantage by asking for more than the transplants are paying," said Gary Walkowicz, who represents workers at King's old plant, the Rouge, and attended the Chicago meeting. "We have to organize them first." (Additional reporting by Bernie Woodall, Clare Baldwin, Ben Klayman, Meghana Keshavan and David Bailey; Editing by Paul Ingrassia and Claudia Parsons)
Via: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/22/us-usa-autos-union-idUSTRE78L27R20110922
DETROIT | Thu Sep 22, 2011 8:26am EDT
Two years after the wrenching restructuring of the U.S. auto industry and the bankruptcies that remade General Motors and Chrysler, the UAW is facing its own financial reckoning. America's richest union has been living beyond its means and running down its savings, an analysis of its financial records shows.
Unless King and other officials succeed with a turnaround plan still taking shape, the next financial crisis in Detroit may not be at one of the automakers but at the UAW itself.
That picture of the growing financial pressure on the 76-year-old union emerges from a Reuters analysis of a decade of UAW financial filings and interviews with dozens of current and former union officials and people close to the union.
King, 65, has just wrapped up a round of fast-track talks with General Motors on a new contract that includes new job promises and bonuses of at least $11,500 for each of the automaker's 48,500 factory workers.
Now King has turned to Chrysler and Ford Motor Co to wrap up similar deals on wages and benefits that King hopes will show a new and more business-friendly labor union has emerged from the industry's near collapse.
But winning a new four-year contract deal with the Detroit automakers will just clear the way for a battle that King believes will determine whether the UAW survives - organizing plants run by the likes of VW, Toyota, Nissan and Hyundai in order to reverse a steady slide in the union's membership and influence.
In some ways the union's situation recalls the early days of GM's own slow-motion slide toward bankruptcy.
Just as with GM before, the UAW has been left to carry an outsized bureaucracy. Also like GM, the union's recovery plans hinge on reversing unfavorable perceptions decades in the making.
King, who has a law degree and looks more like a college professor than a hardened labor leader, has moved to cut costs at the union's riverfront Detroit headquarters by negotiating buyouts with members of the UAW's own union.
UAW clerical workers, who are represented by the OPEIU, have also taken cuts to pay and their health care coverage in retirement and agreed to other concessions. UAW staff approved the buyouts earlier this month by a vote of 132-to-110.
The UAW's 17-member board has also considered a shift toward a more aggressive investment strategy and ways to shed some of the empty union halls that have been dumped back on its books, officials involved in those discussions say.
But fundamentally, King is betting that a union forged in Depression-era Detroit can connect with a generation of American workers who grew up long after the peak of the UAW's clout in the 1950 and 1960s and who live in southern states traditionally hostile to labor unions.
That will mean spending big on a campaign to attract non-union workers in plants owned by foreign automakers in the south.
Earlier this year, the UAW considered buying a commercial during the Super Bowl, the most widely watched event on American television. The plan was hatched by Richard Bensinger, a veteran organizer hired last year. The idea was to try to turn public opinion against foreign automakers that have spurned the UAW's advances. It would have cost over $3 million.
The plan was scrapped but its consideration shows the kinds of risks that King could be willing to take, people familiar with the effort said.
That more aggressive approach threatens to push costs higher for the UAW when it has been forced to sell assets to make up from dwindling dues from a declining base of active workers.
The union has been slow to trim other outlays. Since 2007, the union's spending has included promotional items such as flyswatters emblazoned with the UAW logo ($5,000), bowling ball buffers and bags ($33,000) as well as spending on golf outings and at golf resorts ($346,000). The union says it is forced to book meetings at golf resorts because in some areas of the country those are the only conference facilities large enough.
The UAW also spent at least $2 million on advertising in 2008 to build support for the union and the first wave of "bridge" loans for General Motors and Chrysler. Both automakers were spared liquidation by a bailout orchestrated by President Barack Obama in 2009.
UAW officials acknowledge that the practice of relying on the union's savings will have to end.
"If the UAW continued to sell assets to operate, how long of a period does it take before you no longer can sustain that?" UAW Secretary-Treasurer Dennis Williams told Reuters.
"The answer to that is we don't want to continue that strategy."
'THE NEXT DETROIT'
As the Detroit automakers prepared for contract talks with the UAW this summer, the labor-relations department at one of the companies sent an unusual request to the in-house economist. Based on the UAW's financial statements, how long would it take before the union ran into trouble? The answer: the UAW might have three to five years before its budget difficulties forced a financial crunch, absent changes.
The "hand-grenade" math of the projection gave the union less than a five-year window of opportunity to turn things around by winning new membership at foreign-run auto plants, said the person who saw the internal forecast and asked not to be named because of its sensitivity.
The assumptions behind that projection could not be independently reviewed. But the fact that one of the Detroit automakers commissioned a deep dive on the union's finances underscores the seriousness of the situation facing King.
The UAW remains America's richest union. The value of assets on its balance sheet top $1 billion. Some of that, especially real estate, could be worth far less if the union was forced to sell in a hurry, analysts say. Even so, the UAW's reported wealth is almost twice as much as that held by the second-richest union, which was the United Brotherhood of Carpenters in 2010.
Most of the UAW's wealth sits in its strike fund, which stood at $763 million at the end of 2010. But the sheer size of the fund masks a deterioration of the union's day-to-day finances, especially since 2007.
To bridge the gap between spending and revenue, the UAW has increasingly relied on selling its investments, which include U.S. Treasuries and stocks, and a handful of properties. From 2000 to 2006, the UAW sold $7.3 million. That ballooned to nearly $222 million from 2007 to 2009, government filings show.
"It illustrates to me that their cost structure is not aligned with the revenue that they're getting from their rank and file," said Peter Bible, former chief accounting officer for GM who is now a partner-in-charge at accounting firm EisnerAmper LLP.
The UAW reported a $44-million drop in the value of its cash and investments outside the strike fund in 2009. If that rate were sustained, the UAW would run through all of its cash and liquid investments in just over 20 years.
That simplified projection does not account for additional investment gains the UAW might realize by moving money out of U.S. Treasuries where it has parked about 60 percent of its assets. It also does not reflect the benefit of any additional cost cutting or dues from organizing new workers or winning additional jobs or higher wages at the Detroit Three.
The UAW said the current environment was "challenging with bond yields continuing to fall and equities continuing to be so volatile." It said it was reviewing its strategy: "We continue to pursue investment opportunities with the goal of increasing the expected degree of overall risk."
Analysts said it was likely that the UAW would see changes to its membership rolls, costs and the value of its investments in coming years. For that reason, a straight-line projection based on the UAW's performance in 2009 could overstate the pressure on the union.
Kristin Dziczek, an analyst at the Ann Arbor, Michigan-based Center for Automotive Research, said the years from 2007 to 2010 were an "anomaly." Union officials also take that view.
"The auto industry crashed hard and fast, over 316,000 members left the UAW, and, at the same time, the union's investment returns were tanking," said Dziczek, who has worked for both the UAW and GM.
But even a diminished war chest could hurt the UAW. A weakened UAW might not be able to pay for the kinds of campaigns it has run to bring recalcitrant companies to the bargaining table.
For example, in 2009, during a bitter fight with casino operator Caesars Entertainment Corp, the UAW spent at least $4.8 million on outside consultants and advertising to win the first-ever contracts for about 2,500 UAW-represented workers in Atlantic City.
One UAW billboard urged gamblers to shun casinos without union contracts. The company's rejoinder in a separate ad showed a forlorn and apparently out-of-work assembly worker with the caption, "Don't let the UAW turn Atlantic City into the next Detroit."
The erosion of the UAW's wealth could also undercut the union's power in national politics where it remains a key ally of the Democratic Party. Williams, for example, is a veteran political organizer who campaigned for Obama in 2008 and remains close.
Union officials and experts say the UAW has no obligation to make a profit, only to safeguard its future. "It's all about the best benefits for the members of the UAW," said labor historian and UAW archivist Mike Smith. "If there is a secondary goal, it's sustaining the UAW."
'FACTS ARE STUBBORN THINGS'
King likes to say he wants to take the union back to its roots under legendary leader, Walter Reuther.
Reuther saw the UAW emerge from bare-knuckled battles with GM and Ford to become a part of the American establishment. From 1946 to 1970, when Reuther died in a plane crash, the UAW won a series of ever-richer contracts that set the bar for other industries.
In the same year Reuther died, King joined the UAW. He was hired at Ford's massive Rouge plant, once the world's largest industrial complex with over 100,000 workers and its own railroad and electric power.
The Dearborn, Michigan plant was also the scene of the 1937 "Battle of the Overpass" where thugs hired by Ford beat up Reuther as he passed out leaflets outside the plant. The images of a bloody Reuther hang in the hall of nearby Local 600, commemorating a major step toward organizing Ford, the last Detroit holdout.
Despite the reputation of the Rouge as a UAW hotbed, King emerged as a pragmatist with a knack for seeing things from the other side of the bargaining table and admitting when the union was wrong.
"Many years ago I was in the grievance area," he said last month. "The Ford representative there said, 'You know, Bob, facts are stubborn things.'" King paused for a moment and added, "I think I was trying to argue around the facts."
As King rose up the ranks starting in the 1980s, the outlook darkened for the "Big Three" as they were rocked by higher oil prices and gains by Japanese competitors who were held up as the icons for a different and better model of production and factory teamwork.
UAW membership slowly fell from its peak of 1.5 million in 1979. By the time King became the UAW's tenth president in 2010, membership had plunged 75 percent from its high point to under 377,000 workers. Less than a third of the membership works at the Detroit Three.
The decline in active workers cut deeply into the UAW's dues, a major source of revenue. Union workers still pay dues equivalent to two hours of work a month. For a long time, the relatively high wages of auto workers helped protect the UAW's coffers.
As recently as the SUV boom of the late 1990s, some workers could make more than $100,000 a year with overtime. Today a new hire starts at about $30,000 per year under a two-tier pay deal negotiated in 2007.
King, who concedes the UAW bears some responsibility for the near-collapse of the American auto industry, quickly doubled down on a bet made by his predecessor, Ron Gettelfinger. In 2006, UAW delegates voted to move about $110 million from the strike fund to pay for organizing. In 2010, King went back for an unprecedented double-dip in the fund and won clearance to spend up to another $160 million over four years.
"Just like President Obama took a big risk in betting on us, we're taking a big risk on money from our strike fund," King told Reuters.
GOOD COP, BAD COP
By the spring of 2010, even before he took over as president, King began putting together his team. That included hiring Bensinger, a veteran organizer known for his out-of-the-box ideas. King had first worked with Bensinger in the early 1990s as part of a task force at the AFL-CIO. The group had agreed on the need for unions to take bigger risks in organizing.
Joe Ashton, a Philadelphia native and UAW official who had organized the 2,500 casino workers in Atlantic City, was given charge of GM negotiations. The message was clear: the new UAW would live or die in organizing battles and that's where it would draw its leaders.
Toyota proved the first test for King's increased willingness to pick fights outside the UAW's comfort zone. The provocation was an announcement that the Japanese automaker would close a joint-venture plant it had operated with GM in California.
The U.S. automaker had pulled out of the Fremont, California plant known as NUMMI as part of its bankruptcy. About 4,700 workers, most of them UAW members, lost their jobs. Those jobs represented the UAW's only foothold in a major U.S. auto factory outside those run by Detroit. At every turn, the UAW had failed to organize Toyota, Nissan and Honda plants in efforts going back to 1989.
"The only luck we've had has been bad luck," King said last year.
In the early spring of 2010, King traveled from Washington to Chicago to California to bring pressure on Toyota. In part because of that increased travel by King and other senior UAW officials, compensation recorded for UAW officers increased 24 percent from 2009 to 2010.
When Toyota announced a deal allowing electric-car start-up Tesla to take over NUMMI in late May 2010, King eased back on the public pressure.
But just a few weeks later, Toyota announced it would make the Corolla at a nonunion plant in Mississippi. King learned about the move shortly before speaking to assembled delegates at the UAW convention in Detroit as he took office. In a rare moment of public anger, he vowed to "pound Toyota."
The UAW equipped workers and retirees with picket signs that included a caricature of the Toyota logo as an ominous skull. The signs, splashed with red to suggest blood, read "Toyota is killing American jobs." Pickets were assembled outside Toyota dealerships, but quickly disbanded when UAW officials judged that the hard-line campaign could backfire.
In the end, the union spent over $300,000 in a failed bid to get Toyota to save NUMMI. That included almost $65,000 paid to a Washington, D.C. firm, Free Range Studios, for expenses and fees to develop a website critical of Toyota's safety policies. UAW leadership also opted to scrap the site before it went live.
By the fall of 2010, King was done being the bad cop and banging on Toyota. Now he would try a more diplomatic approach as he began to prepare for the upcoming round of talks with the Detroit automakers.
ORGANIZING THE SOUTH
King saw the Detroit talks as a way to show that the union finally got it. The new UAW would not press to saddle the automakers with out-sized costs. It would be a partner with management. The subtext was clear: the transplants had nothing to fear from Bob King.
"We're betting that we can be successful with the right program and the right approach to organizing," King told Reuters.
"If the UAW can show that it makes reasonable demands in bargaining, it will make it easier to organize the transplant companies by saying we're not as crazy as you think," said Gary Chaison, a labor relations professor at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts. "You can live with us."
Union officials say workers at foreign auto plants feel threatened by their bosses, though the companies disagree. Another obstacle is that many of the "transplant" factories are in right-to-work states, where laws prohibit the companies or the UAW from making membership in the union a condition of employment.
Another problem is that the UAW can no longer point to a record of winning much higher wages for its members.
Volkswagen AG is paying newly hired workers at its Chattanooga, Tennessee plant $14.50 per hour. That is almost exactly what a second-tier UAW worker would make in Detroit. In a sign of demand for jobs at that pay level, the Chattanooga plant had 85,000 applications for more than 2,000 jobs.
VW workers have been promised $19.50 after three years on the job. That is just above the $19.28 per hour maximum that entry-level workers at GM would make over the term of the four-year contract now before workers for ratification.
"You don't pay dues to make less or the same as somebody who isn't paying those dues," said Gregg Shotwell, a UAW dissident retired from GM and Delphi Corp.
Organizing Chattanooga could cost the UAW up to $3 million, or some $1,500 per worker, according to Chaison's estimates. It would take the union over four years to recoup its investment based on projected dues.
King has been reminding workers at every turn that the UAW has no choice. In 1970, when King joined the union, the UAW represented over 80 percent of U.S. auto sales. By 2010, the union built only about a third of the cars and trucks sold here.
"If the UAW is going to exist as we know it, it's going to have a strong auto backbone," said Gary Casteel, director of a UAW region that includes Tennessee, South Carolina, Alabama and Georgia where most of the transplants are located.
Last August, the union won a small battle in that hostile terrain when workers at a Johnson Controls battery plant in South Carolina voted for UAW representation.
Even so, in Chicago recently, King delivered a cautionary message to UAW officials representing Ford at a room in the Fairmont hotel. The hotel was less than a block from where Obama greeted thousands of enthusiastic supporters on election night 2008, a major victory for the union.
For some at the Chicago meeting, the proximity to the election-night celebration was a reminder of the hard choices facing the UAW two years after winning a bailout that spared the union from a more immediate crisis. The UAW believes Obama's intervention saved more than 1 million jobs, even though the auto bailouts remain controversial.
King told the UAW officials not to expect a rollback of concessions at Ford or other Detroit automakers.
"We can't put the companies at a disadvantage by asking for more than the transplants are paying," said Gary Walkowicz, who represents workers at King's old plant, the Rouge, and attended the Chicago meeting. "We have to organize them first." (Additional reporting by Bernie Woodall, Clare Baldwin, Ben Klayman, Meghana Keshavan and David Bailey; Editing by Paul Ingrassia and Claudia Parsons)
Via: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/22/us-usa-autos-union-idUSTRE78L27R20110922
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Singapore dollar falls to six-month low against USD
04:46 AM Sep 21, 2011
SINGAPORE - The Singapore dollar touched a six-month low against the US dollar in late Asia trade yesterday as global economic uncertainties kept investors away from riskier assets.
Traders and analysts say market sentiment also took a hit after Standard & Poor's cut Italy's credit rating.
During the day, the US dollar touched a high of S$1.2717 before giving up some of its gains. "It (weak emerging market currencies) is primarily a reflection of the weakness in the advanced economies. The concerns about European growth remain and there is no growth story to talk about in the other G-7 economies," DBS Bank currency analyst Philip Wee said.
Investors will now look for cues from the US Federal Reserve's Federal Open Market Committee meeting that ends Wednesday.
Also, increasing expectations that the Monetary Authority of Singapore will ease its currency policy in October due to worries about the global economy continue to prompt investors to sell the local unit, a trader with a local bank said.
Via: http://www.todayonline.com/Business/EDC110921-0000359/Singapore-dollar-falls-to-six-month-low-against-USD
SINGAPORE - The Singapore dollar touched a six-month low against the US dollar in late Asia trade yesterday as global economic uncertainties kept investors away from riskier assets.
Traders and analysts say market sentiment also took a hit after Standard & Poor's cut Italy's credit rating.
During the day, the US dollar touched a high of S$1.2717 before giving up some of its gains. "It (weak emerging market currencies) is primarily a reflection of the weakness in the advanced economies. The concerns about European growth remain and there is no growth story to talk about in the other G-7 economies," DBS Bank currency analyst Philip Wee said.
Investors will now look for cues from the US Federal Reserve's Federal Open Market Committee meeting that ends Wednesday.
Also, increasing expectations that the Monetary Authority of Singapore will ease its currency policy in October due to worries about the global economy continue to prompt investors to sell the local unit, a trader with a local bank said.
Via: http://www.todayonline.com/Business/EDC110921-0000359/Singapore-dollar-falls-to-six-month-low-against-USD
Monday, September 19, 2011
South Korea Suspends 7 Savings Banks, Citing Weak Finances
By Saeromi Shin and Seonjin Cha - Sep 18, 2011 2:34 PM GMT+0800
South Korean financial regulators suspended seven local savings banks today, citing their weak finances.
Jeil Savings Bank (024100), Jeil II Savings Bank, Tomato Savings Bank, Prime Mutual Savings Bank, Ace Mutual Savings Bank, Dae Yeong Mutual Savings Bank and Parangsae Mutual Savings Bank were ordered to halt operations for six months, the Financial Services Commission said in an e-mailed statement.
“The measures announced today completes a series of restructurings of the savings bank industry,” FSC Chairman Kim Seok Dong said in a webcast briefing. “Resolving the uncertainty surrounding the industry will help stabilize savings banks troubles, which have been cited as a factor causing unrest in our financial market.”
South Korea has been tightening supervision of small lenders after a real-estate market slump soured construction loans. The financial watchdog in July began assessing 85 savings banks to determine if they are sound enough to receive government aid or should be sold.
Six of the suspended lenders had capital-adequacy ratios below 1 percent under Bank for International Settlements criteria, their debts exceeded assets, and their proposals to improve management weren’t approved by regulators, the FSC said. One savings bank requested suspension, it said.
45-Day Deadline
The institutions will be offered for sale or their operations transferred to state-controlled savings banks should they fail to improve finances and bolster capital within 45 days, the statement said. Savings banks with BIS ratios of 5 percent or higher can tap government-supported funds to boost their capital adequacy, it said.
South Korea suspended nine savings banks earlier this year after their finances deteriorated because loans for construction projects went bad.
Woori Finance Holdings Co., the country’s largest financial company by assets, acquired assets of Samhwa Mutual in March.
Licenses of Daejeon Mutual Savings Bank, Jeonju Savings Bank and Bohae Mutual Savings & Finance Co. were canceled after they failed to attract buyers, the FSC said on Sept. 5.
Via: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-18/south-korea-suspends-7-savings-banks-citing-weak-finances-1-.html
South Korean financial regulators suspended seven local savings banks today, citing their weak finances.
Jeil Savings Bank (024100), Jeil II Savings Bank, Tomato Savings Bank, Prime Mutual Savings Bank, Ace Mutual Savings Bank, Dae Yeong Mutual Savings Bank and Parangsae Mutual Savings Bank were ordered to halt operations for six months, the Financial Services Commission said in an e-mailed statement.
“The measures announced today completes a series of restructurings of the savings bank industry,” FSC Chairman Kim Seok Dong said in a webcast briefing. “Resolving the uncertainty surrounding the industry will help stabilize savings banks troubles, which have been cited as a factor causing unrest in our financial market.”
South Korea has been tightening supervision of small lenders after a real-estate market slump soured construction loans. The financial watchdog in July began assessing 85 savings banks to determine if they are sound enough to receive government aid or should be sold.
Six of the suspended lenders had capital-adequacy ratios below 1 percent under Bank for International Settlements criteria, their debts exceeded assets, and their proposals to improve management weren’t approved by regulators, the FSC said. One savings bank requested suspension, it said.
45-Day Deadline
The institutions will be offered for sale or their operations transferred to state-controlled savings banks should they fail to improve finances and bolster capital within 45 days, the statement said. Savings banks with BIS ratios of 5 percent or higher can tap government-supported funds to boost their capital adequacy, it said.
South Korea suspended nine savings banks earlier this year after their finances deteriorated because loans for construction projects went bad.
Woori Finance Holdings Co., the country’s largest financial company by assets, acquired assets of Samhwa Mutual in March.
Licenses of Daejeon Mutual Savings Bank, Jeonju Savings Bank and Bohae Mutual Savings & Finance Co. were canceled after they failed to attract buyers, the FSC said on Sept. 5.
Via: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-18/south-korea-suspends-7-savings-banks-citing-weak-finances-1-.html
Sunday, September 18, 2011
NODX rebound may 'ease technical recession fears'
by Ryan Huang Wenwu
Updated 10:04 AM Sep 17, 2011
SINGAPORE - Contrary to the contraction the market had been expecting, Singapore's non-oil domestic exports (NODX) surprised on the upside, rebounding strongly last month to register an increase of 5.1 per cent from the same period last year, in contrast to the 2.8-per-cent drop in July.
This could ease fears of a technical recession by the market, which had expected the NODX to contract by up to 6.5 per cent.
DBS economist Irvin Seah said: "While we do not discount the fact that economic conditions are worsening with the deteriorating sentiments, this set of figures is most encouraging, given the exceptionally high base and negative currency effects."
He noted that last August saw the second-highest NODX value of S$15.8 billion in the entire year, and "that's a significant high base to contemplate", adding that the Singapore dollar has appreciated by about 11 per cent in the last 12 months.
The lift in last month's exports came from sales of floating oil rigs and other marine vessels, as well as optical equipment. This helped the non-electronics segment expand by 20 per cent from last year.
Mr Seah pointed out that, on a month-on-month basis, the NODX increased by a seasonally-adjusted 8.3 per cent. "This may soothe the cries of a technical recession for now."
But CIMB regional economist Song Seng Wun pointed out that, excluding "lumpy exports" like oil rigs, the NODX actually fell 4.6 per cent from last year, with exports to key markets down except for China (up 16 per cent), Thailand (up 10 per cent) and Japan (up 1.6 per cent).
Total exports were dragged down by a drop in electronics, which extended its downward trend by falling 19 per cent. And Mr Song said demand for tech parts and components remains sluggish, "which means there could be little festive cheer for most tech exporters this year".
There was also weakness in the typically volatile pharmaceuticals sector, which dropped 7.1 per cent. Unless drug exports provide a massive lift in the rest of the year, Mr Song expected NODX to return to negative territory in September.
Barclays Capital economist Leong Wai Ho said the economy would likely narrowly avoid a technical recession in Q3, and remains on track to grow 5.5 per cent this year. Still, he is revising his GDP growth projections for next year down to 4 per cent from 4.5 per cent, on the back of a recent downward revision in its US and Europe growth assumptions. "We think the balance of risks has tilted towards lower growth, from higher inflation," he said.
Noting that senior policy-makers have been more "explicit" about their growth concerns in recent weeks, Mr Leong believed the Monetary Authority of Singapore would weaken the slope of the Singapore dollar policy band to 1 per cent next month, down from 3.5 per cent.
Mr Leong expected the Singapore dollar to move lower to US$1 to S$1.19 in six months, and US$1 to S$1.18 in 12 months, on broad US dollar weakness. He added: "We do not expect a narrowing of the policy band due to financial market volatility and fluctuations in euro/US dollar."
Via: http://www.todayonline.com/Business/EDC110917-0000451/NODX-rebound-may-ease-technical-recession-fears
Updated 10:04 AM Sep 17, 2011
SINGAPORE - Contrary to the contraction the market had been expecting, Singapore's non-oil domestic exports (NODX) surprised on the upside, rebounding strongly last month to register an increase of 5.1 per cent from the same period last year, in contrast to the 2.8-per-cent drop in July.
This could ease fears of a technical recession by the market, which had expected the NODX to contract by up to 6.5 per cent.
DBS economist Irvin Seah said: "While we do not discount the fact that economic conditions are worsening with the deteriorating sentiments, this set of figures is most encouraging, given the exceptionally high base and negative currency effects."
He noted that last August saw the second-highest NODX value of S$15.8 billion in the entire year, and "that's a significant high base to contemplate", adding that the Singapore dollar has appreciated by about 11 per cent in the last 12 months.
The lift in last month's exports came from sales of floating oil rigs and other marine vessels, as well as optical equipment. This helped the non-electronics segment expand by 20 per cent from last year.
Mr Seah pointed out that, on a month-on-month basis, the NODX increased by a seasonally-adjusted 8.3 per cent. "This may soothe the cries of a technical recession for now."
But CIMB regional economist Song Seng Wun pointed out that, excluding "lumpy exports" like oil rigs, the NODX actually fell 4.6 per cent from last year, with exports to key markets down except for China (up 16 per cent), Thailand (up 10 per cent) and Japan (up 1.6 per cent).
Total exports were dragged down by a drop in electronics, which extended its downward trend by falling 19 per cent. And Mr Song said demand for tech parts and components remains sluggish, "which means there could be little festive cheer for most tech exporters this year".
There was also weakness in the typically volatile pharmaceuticals sector, which dropped 7.1 per cent. Unless drug exports provide a massive lift in the rest of the year, Mr Song expected NODX to return to negative territory in September.
Barclays Capital economist Leong Wai Ho said the economy would likely narrowly avoid a technical recession in Q3, and remains on track to grow 5.5 per cent this year. Still, he is revising his GDP growth projections for next year down to 4 per cent from 4.5 per cent, on the back of a recent downward revision in its US and Europe growth assumptions. "We think the balance of risks has tilted towards lower growth, from higher inflation," he said.
Noting that senior policy-makers have been more "explicit" about their growth concerns in recent weeks, Mr Leong believed the Monetary Authority of Singapore would weaken the slope of the Singapore dollar policy band to 1 per cent next month, down from 3.5 per cent.
Mr Leong expected the Singapore dollar to move lower to US$1 to S$1.19 in six months, and US$1 to S$1.18 in 12 months, on broad US dollar weakness. He added: "We do not expect a narrowing of the policy band due to financial market volatility and fluctuations in euro/US dollar."
Via: http://www.todayonline.com/Business/EDC110917-0000451/NODX-rebound-may-ease-technical-recession-fears
Friday, September 16, 2011
UBS Has $2Billion Loss; Man Arrested in London
By Elena Logutenkova - Sep 16, 2011 12:06 AM GMT+0800
Alleged renegade UBS trader Kweku Adoboli, centre, walks to a security van flanked by police officers after appearing at the City of London Magistrates Court in London, Friday, Sept. 16, 2011. (AP / Matt Dunham)
UBS AG (UBSN), Switzerland’s biggest bank, said it may be unprofitable in the third quarter after a $2 billion loss from unauthorized trading at its investment bank.
London police arrested Kweku Adoboli, a UBS employee, in connection with the loss, according to a person with knowledge of the situation who requested anonymity. City of London police and UBS declined to identify the man.
UBS management aims to “get to the bottom of the matter as quickly as possible, and will spare no effort to establish exactly what has happened,” the bank’s group executive board, led by Chief Executive Officer Oswald Gruebel, said in a memo to staff today.
The bank tumbled the most since March 2009 in Swiss trading following the announcement, which deals a blow to Gruebel’s attempts to rebuild the investment bank after the division recorded 57.1 billion Swiss francs ($65 billion) in cumulative pretax losses in three years through 2009. The trading loss may revive calls for Gruebel to shrink or shut the unit.
“How many times do we have to see huge UBS losses?” said Simon Maughan, head of sales and distribution at MF Global Ltd. in London. “It looks unreformed, unwieldy and ultimately unsustainable. This could be a critical tipping point for UBS’s strategy.”
‘Suspicion of Fraud’
UBS fell 11 percent to 9.75 francs, bringing the drop this year to 36 percent, compared with a 33 percent decline in the 46-company Bloomberg Europe Banks and Financial Services Index.
A 31-year-old man was arrested at business premises in central London at 3:30 a.m. on “suspicion of fraud by abuse of position,” City of London Police Commander Ian Dyson said in a statement today. The man remains in custody while the police investigate, the police said.
Adoboli’s LinkedIn page lists him as a director in ETF and Delta1 Trading at UBS investment bank in London. He previously held the position of trade support analyst at the investment bank, according to the LinkedIn profile. A University of Nottingham spokeswoman confirmed that Adoboli graduated from the school in July 2003, earning a degree in Computer Science.
Risk Management
The matter is still under investigation and the “current estimate of the loss on the trades is in the range of $2 billion,” UBS said in a statement today, the third anniversary of the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. No client positions were affected, the company said, declining further comment.
Showing a logo of global financial services company UBS in central London on Monday Oct. 1, 2007. (AP / Akira Suemori)
UBS had to raise more than $46 billion in capital from investors, including the Swiss state, to make up for the record losses during the credit crisis. The investment-banking unit had pretax earnings of 1.21 billion francs in the first half of 2011, while UBS as a whole had net income of 2.82 billion francs in the period.
The bank’s tier 1 capital at the end of the second quarter was 37.39 billion francs, giving it a tier 1 capital ratio of 18.1 percent, compared with 14 percent at Deutsche Bank AG, Germany’s biggest bank.
The June 11, 2010 file photo shows the logo of Swiss bank UBS in Lucerne, Switzerland. (AP Photo/Keystone, Gaetan Bally)
While the loss is “manageable” for UBS, it’s “obviously not helpful for sentiment and confidence in the bank’s risk management following the near-death experience of 2008-2009,” said Andrew Lim, a London-based analyst at Espirito Santo Investment Bank, in a note. Lim had estimated third-quarter net income of 1.1 billion francs for UBS.
Gruebel, Kengeter
UBS last month said it will eliminate about 3,500 jobs, with about 45 percent of the reductions coming from the investment bank, as stricter capital requirements and market turmoil hurt the earnings outlook. The bank in July scrapped the target of doubling pretax profit from last year’s level to 15 billion francs by 2014.
Gruebel, 67, and Carsten Kengeter, 44, who runs the investment bank, have been trying to revive earnings at the division for two years. They hired more than 1,700 people across the investment bank and brought in new business heads to replace those that left or were fired. They’ve also increased risk- taking to improve earnings opportunities.
The investment bank last had a pretax loss in the third quarter of 2010 when what Gruebel called “very low levels of client activity” and a charge related to the bank’s own debt hurt revenue at the division.
Kerviel, Leeson
UBS’s trading loss doesn’t rank as the largest. Societe Generale (GLE) SA of Paris said in January 2008 that the bank lost 4.9 billion euros ($6.7 billion) after trader Jerome Kerviel took unauthorized positions on European stock index futures.
At Amaranth Advisors LLC, trader Brian Hunter’s bad bets on natural gas triggered $6.6 billion of losses in 2006, while Long-Term Capital Management LP lost $4 billion after a debt default by Russia. Nick Leeson piled up $1.4 billion of losses that brought down Barings Plc in 1995.
Credit Suisse Group AG, Switzerland’s second-biggest bank, had a loss in the first quarter of 2008 in part because of writedowns on debt securities that were intentionally mispriced by a group of traders.
Costas, Wuffli
UBS, created through a merger of Swiss Bank Corporation and Union Bank of Switzerland in 1998, was shaken in its first year of existence as the new entity by losses related to Union Bank’s $1 billion investment in Greenwich, Connecticut-based hedge-fund firm Long-Term Capital Management, which was rescued by a consortium of banks.
This century the bank was among the first stung by the subprime contagion when its Dillon Read Capital Management LP hedge fund, run by former investment banking chief John Costas, lost 150 million francs in the first quarter of 2007. By May that year, UBS decided to close it, and in July CEO Peter Wuffli stepped down.
Subprime-related losses that followed at UBS’s securities unit also led to the departures of executives including finance chief Clive Standish and Huw Jenkins, the head of the investment bank. Chairman Marcel Ospel resigned in April 2008 after shareholders demanded he take responsibility for the bank’s woes.
Gruebel, who formerly ran Credit Suisse, was brought out of retirement by UBS in February 2009 to take over from CEO Marcel Rohner after the company posted the biggest annual loss in Swiss corporate history. A former bond trader, Gruebel doubled profit at Credit Suisse between 2004 and 2006.
Via: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-15/ubs-may-have-unprofitable-quarter-on-unauthorized-trade-s-2-billion-loss.html
References:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-16/ubs-loss-may-prompt-global-regulators-to-limit-banks-trading.html
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9PPM53O0.htm
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/BUSINESS/09/15/switzerland.bank.lost/index.html
Alleged renegade UBS trader Kweku Adoboli, centre, walks to a security van flanked by police officers after appearing at the City of London Magistrates Court in London, Friday, Sept. 16, 2011. (AP / Matt Dunham)UBS AG (UBSN), Switzerland’s biggest bank, said it may be unprofitable in the third quarter after a $2 billion loss from unauthorized trading at its investment bank.
London police arrested Kweku Adoboli, a UBS employee, in connection with the loss, according to a person with knowledge of the situation who requested anonymity. City of London police and UBS declined to identify the man.
UBS management aims to “get to the bottom of the matter as quickly as possible, and will spare no effort to establish exactly what has happened,” the bank’s group executive board, led by Chief Executive Officer Oswald Gruebel, said in a memo to staff today.
The bank tumbled the most since March 2009 in Swiss trading following the announcement, which deals a blow to Gruebel’s attempts to rebuild the investment bank after the division recorded 57.1 billion Swiss francs ($65 billion) in cumulative pretax losses in three years through 2009. The trading loss may revive calls for Gruebel to shrink or shut the unit.
“How many times do we have to see huge UBS losses?” said Simon Maughan, head of sales and distribution at MF Global Ltd. in London. “It looks unreformed, unwieldy and ultimately unsustainable. This could be a critical tipping point for UBS’s strategy.”
‘Suspicion of Fraud’
UBS fell 11 percent to 9.75 francs, bringing the drop this year to 36 percent, compared with a 33 percent decline in the 46-company Bloomberg Europe Banks and Financial Services Index.
A 31-year-old man was arrested at business premises in central London at 3:30 a.m. on “suspicion of fraud by abuse of position,” City of London Police Commander Ian Dyson said in a statement today. The man remains in custody while the police investigate, the police said.
Adoboli’s LinkedIn page lists him as a director in ETF and Delta1 Trading at UBS investment bank in London. He previously held the position of trade support analyst at the investment bank, according to the LinkedIn profile. A University of Nottingham spokeswoman confirmed that Adoboli graduated from the school in July 2003, earning a degree in Computer Science.
Risk Management
The matter is still under investigation and the “current estimate of the loss on the trades is in the range of $2 billion,” UBS said in a statement today, the third anniversary of the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. No client positions were affected, the company said, declining further comment.
Showing a logo of global financial services company UBS in central London on Monday Oct. 1, 2007. (AP / Akira Suemori)UBS had to raise more than $46 billion in capital from investors, including the Swiss state, to make up for the record losses during the credit crisis. The investment-banking unit had pretax earnings of 1.21 billion francs in the first half of 2011, while UBS as a whole had net income of 2.82 billion francs in the period.
The bank’s tier 1 capital at the end of the second quarter was 37.39 billion francs, giving it a tier 1 capital ratio of 18.1 percent, compared with 14 percent at Deutsche Bank AG, Germany’s biggest bank.
The June 11, 2010 file photo shows the logo of Swiss bank UBS in Lucerne, Switzerland. (AP Photo/Keystone, Gaetan Bally)Gruebel, Kengeter
UBS last month said it will eliminate about 3,500 jobs, with about 45 percent of the reductions coming from the investment bank, as stricter capital requirements and market turmoil hurt the earnings outlook. The bank in July scrapped the target of doubling pretax profit from last year’s level to 15 billion francs by 2014.
Gruebel, 67, and Carsten Kengeter, 44, who runs the investment bank, have been trying to revive earnings at the division for two years. They hired more than 1,700 people across the investment bank and brought in new business heads to replace those that left or were fired. They’ve also increased risk- taking to improve earnings opportunities.
The investment bank last had a pretax loss in the third quarter of 2010 when what Gruebel called “very low levels of client activity” and a charge related to the bank’s own debt hurt revenue at the division.
Kerviel, Leeson
UBS’s trading loss doesn’t rank as the largest. Societe Generale (GLE) SA of Paris said in January 2008 that the bank lost 4.9 billion euros ($6.7 billion) after trader Jerome Kerviel took unauthorized positions on European stock index futures.
At Amaranth Advisors LLC, trader Brian Hunter’s bad bets on natural gas triggered $6.6 billion of losses in 2006, while Long-Term Capital Management LP lost $4 billion after a debt default by Russia. Nick Leeson piled up $1.4 billion of losses that brought down Barings Plc in 1995.
Credit Suisse Group AG, Switzerland’s second-biggest bank, had a loss in the first quarter of 2008 in part because of writedowns on debt securities that were intentionally mispriced by a group of traders.
Costas, Wuffli
UBS, created through a merger of Swiss Bank Corporation and Union Bank of Switzerland in 1998, was shaken in its first year of existence as the new entity by losses related to Union Bank’s $1 billion investment in Greenwich, Connecticut-based hedge-fund firm Long-Term Capital Management, which was rescued by a consortium of banks.
This century the bank was among the first stung by the subprime contagion when its Dillon Read Capital Management LP hedge fund, run by former investment banking chief John Costas, lost 150 million francs in the first quarter of 2007. By May that year, UBS decided to close it, and in July CEO Peter Wuffli stepped down.
Subprime-related losses that followed at UBS’s securities unit also led to the departures of executives including finance chief Clive Standish and Huw Jenkins, the head of the investment bank. Chairman Marcel Ospel resigned in April 2008 after shareholders demanded he take responsibility for the bank’s woes.
Gruebel, who formerly ran Credit Suisse, was brought out of retirement by UBS in February 2009 to take over from CEO Marcel Rohner after the company posted the biggest annual loss in Swiss corporate history. A former bond trader, Gruebel doubled profit at Credit Suisse between 2004 and 2006.
Via: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-15/ubs-may-have-unprofitable-quarter-on-unauthorized-trade-s-2-billion-loss.html
References:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-16/ubs-loss-may-prompt-global-regulators-to-limit-banks-trading.html
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9PPM53O0.htm
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/BUSINESS/09/15/switzerland.bank.lost/index.html
Singapore's NODX rebounds 5.1% in August
By Ryan Huang | Posted: 16 September 2011 0832 hrs
SINGAPORE : Singapore's non-oil domestic exports rebounded strongly in August. They grew 5.1 per cent from a year earlier, against the market consensus of a contraction of 6.5 per cent.
August's growth was also a reversal of a 2.8 per cent drop in July.
The figures help ease concerns over the prospect of a recession this year, after the Singapore economy shrank in the second quarter.
The surprise lift in August exports came from the sales of floating oil rigs, other marine vessels, and other specialised machinery such as optical equipment.
That contributed about 11 per cent of overall non-oil domestic exports that month, more than double the monthly average of 5 per cent in the first half of 2011. That helped keep overall export numbers afloat.
Song Seng Wun, regional economist at CIMB Research, said: "We saw S$1.8 billion worth of lumpy exports being recognised last month. It is significant because 11 per cent of overall NODX for that particular month ... it has averaged around S$500 million or around 5 per cent of overall NODX, without which August NODX would have declined closer to 5 per cent year-on-year rather than a surprise growth of 5 per cent. So that is the difference that we saw from a particular export item itself.
"Does that mean that the recession fear has been averted because of better-than-expected NODX for the month of August itself? Not necessarily, because if you look at the underlying performance of the other sectors, you will see that in particular electronics continues to be weak."
The export of non-electronics grew by 20 per cent. But total exports were dragged down by a drop in electronics, which extended their downward trend, falling 19 per cent.
The typically volatile pharmaceuticals sector was down 7.1 per cent.
On a month-on-month basis, exports grew 8.3 per cent. While that may ease some concerns of a technical recession, growth is expected to taper off towards the end of the year.
Only three of Singapore's top 10 export markets expanded in August - China (16 per cent), Thailand (10 per cent) and Japan (1.6 per cent).
Irvin Seah, a senior economist at DBS Bank, said: "Despite the fact that we are seeing some strong and healthy export numbers, it does not imply that the downside risks to growth has dissipated.
"In fact, if you look at the global environment, it is still plagued by uncertainties - the US and eurozone economies still have a lot of problems which need to be tackled. So essentially, that will imply significant downside risks to the Singapore economy going forward."
Indicators of manufacturing and business sentiment are still weak. And if the growth outlook remains soft, the Monetary Authority of Singapore is expected to make it more difficult for the Sing dollar to appreciate during its policy review next month.
Via: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporebusinessnews/view/1153513/1/.html
References:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-16/singapore-exports-unexpectedly-rise-on-sales-of-ships-boats.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/16/singapore-economy-exports-idUSS7E7IF00M20110916
SINGAPORE : Singapore's non-oil domestic exports rebounded strongly in August. They grew 5.1 per cent from a year earlier, against the market consensus of a contraction of 6.5 per cent.
August's growth was also a reversal of a 2.8 per cent drop in July.
The figures help ease concerns over the prospect of a recession this year, after the Singapore economy shrank in the second quarter.
The surprise lift in August exports came from the sales of floating oil rigs, other marine vessels, and other specialised machinery such as optical equipment.
That contributed about 11 per cent of overall non-oil domestic exports that month, more than double the monthly average of 5 per cent in the first half of 2011. That helped keep overall export numbers afloat.
Song Seng Wun, regional economist at CIMB Research, said: "We saw S$1.8 billion worth of lumpy exports being recognised last month. It is significant because 11 per cent of overall NODX for that particular month ... it has averaged around S$500 million or around 5 per cent of overall NODX, without which August NODX would have declined closer to 5 per cent year-on-year rather than a surprise growth of 5 per cent. So that is the difference that we saw from a particular export item itself.
"Does that mean that the recession fear has been averted because of better-than-expected NODX for the month of August itself? Not necessarily, because if you look at the underlying performance of the other sectors, you will see that in particular electronics continues to be weak."
The export of non-electronics grew by 20 per cent. But total exports were dragged down by a drop in electronics, which extended their downward trend, falling 19 per cent.
The typically volatile pharmaceuticals sector was down 7.1 per cent.
On a month-on-month basis, exports grew 8.3 per cent. While that may ease some concerns of a technical recession, growth is expected to taper off towards the end of the year.
Only three of Singapore's top 10 export markets expanded in August - China (16 per cent), Thailand (10 per cent) and Japan (1.6 per cent).
Irvin Seah, a senior economist at DBS Bank, said: "Despite the fact that we are seeing some strong and healthy export numbers, it does not imply that the downside risks to growth has dissipated.
"In fact, if you look at the global environment, it is still plagued by uncertainties - the US and eurozone economies still have a lot of problems which need to be tackled. So essentially, that will imply significant downside risks to the Singapore economy going forward."
Indicators of manufacturing and business sentiment are still weak. And if the growth outlook remains soft, the Monetary Authority of Singapore is expected to make it more difficult for the Sing dollar to appreciate during its policy review next month.
Via: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporebusinessnews/view/1153513/1/.html
References:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-16/singapore-exports-unexpectedly-rise-on-sales-of-ships-boats.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/16/singapore-economy-exports-idUSS7E7IF00M20110916
Malaysia to repeal ISA
by AGENCIES
Updated 11:55 AM Sep 16, 2011
Bold policy changes come as Prime Minister seeks to bolster popularity ahead of election, say analysts
KUALA LUMPUR - Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak last night announced that his government would repeal two controversial laws which allow for detention without trial - the Internal Security Act (ISA) and the Emergency Ordinance - as well as lift licensing curbs on the media and review laws forbidding free public assembly.
Critics and the opposition have long blamed these laws for curbing civil liberties and silencing dissent in the country.
Bowing to pressure, the announcements come as Mr Najib seeks to bolster his flagging popularity ahead of likely snap polls early next year. While welcoming the policy changes, widely regarded as the boldest by Mr Najib since he took the helm in April 2009, opposition leaders and political analysts were cautious about the laws that would replace the ISA and their implementation.
"I am happy to announce on this historic night that the ISA will be completely repealed," Mr Najib said in a nationally-televised speech on the eve of Malaysia Day.
Before an audience of about 800, which included his entire Cabinet, Mr Najib added: "The changes are aimed at having a modern, mature and functioning democracy which will continue to preserve public order, ensure greater civil liberty and maintain racial harmony."
The ISA has long been a hot-button issue in Malaysia. Over the past five decades, thousands of people in Malaysia have been detained for a variety of crimes under the ISA, which allows for indefinite detention without trial.
Apart from suspected terrorists, the law has also been used against communists, forgery experts, religious militants and even opposition politicians - prompting critics to argue that in Malaysia the ISA has often been abused by the government to stifle dissent.
The ISA and the Emergency Ordinance, which allows suspects to be detained without charge for up to two years, will be replaced by two new laws.
Mr Najib said the new security laws would be introduced for preventive detention, be limited only to cases of terrorism and "ensure that basic human rights are protected".
Under the new laws, detentions could only be extended by the court and therefore "the power of detention will be shifted from the executive to the judiciary, unless it concerns terrorism", he added.
Later in the night, de facto Law Minister Mohamed Nazri Aziz said the legislations replacing the ISA would still allow for detention without trial but only for "terrorists", reported The Malaysian Insider.
"The new laws are strictly for terrorism. What we are going to do now is enact similar laws like the Patriot Act in the US or the UK ... We have once and for all decided that no laws should be enacted allowing for individuals to be arrested for having a difference in ideologies," he was quoted as saying.
Malaysia's strict media law will also be amended to allow a one-time licensing of media outlets instead of annual renewals which critics say the government has used to threaten newspapers against publishing dissenting views.
Other laws which restrict civil liberties would be reviewed, and Mr Najib pledged that the government would not detain any individuals merely on the basis of their political ideology.
"Many will question whether I am moving too far, too fast. Some will say that the reforms should only be carried out in small steps, or not at all," Mr Najib, said in the address.
"To them I say, if a reform is the right thing to do, now is the right time to do it," the Prime Minister said, adding that the changes may result in "short-term pain for me politically".
The move to scrap the law has been hailed Penang Chief Minister Lim Guang Eng and an ex-ISA detainee himself as an "epochal move".
Opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim tweeted in Malay: "ISA: Welcome its abolition after being championed by the people all this while and opposed by Umno. However, need to be mindful ..."
The next general election is not due until 2013 but Mr Najib is likely to call one in the next six months amid growing uncertainty about the global economic outlook, analysts say.
Despite making record gains in a 2008 general election, the Opposition led by Mr Anwar has struggled to build on that momentum, and is plagued by infighting.
But analysts say Mr Najib's own troubles run deep and yesterday's announcement may not be enough to reverse the ruling Barisan Nasional's 2008 poll losses, which he needs to do to remain firmly in power.
"This will be attractive to the more educated and critical classes, typically urban professionals and minority non-Malays, but this group will also look to see whether or not this will be translated into credible change," said Mr Ibrahim Suffian, director of the independent polling outfit the Merdeka Center.
"Najib is defining his agenda for political reform, but the devil will be in the details in whether he can translate these promises into concrete implementation," said Ms Bridget Welsh, a Malaysia specialist at Singapore Management University.
"Institutions like the police and judiciary are also still criticised as not being independent so while he's embraced political reforms he has touched only the surface of it," she added.
Via: http://www.todayonline.com/World/EDC110916-0000340/Malaysia-to-repeal-ISA
Updated 11:55 AM Sep 16, 2011
Bold policy changes come as Prime Minister seeks to bolster popularity ahead of election, say analysts
KUALA LUMPUR - Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak last night announced that his government would repeal two controversial laws which allow for detention without trial - the Internal Security Act (ISA) and the Emergency Ordinance - as well as lift licensing curbs on the media and review laws forbidding free public assembly.
Critics and the opposition have long blamed these laws for curbing civil liberties and silencing dissent in the country.
Bowing to pressure, the announcements come as Mr Najib seeks to bolster his flagging popularity ahead of likely snap polls early next year. While welcoming the policy changes, widely regarded as the boldest by Mr Najib since he took the helm in April 2009, opposition leaders and political analysts were cautious about the laws that would replace the ISA and their implementation.
"I am happy to announce on this historic night that the ISA will be completely repealed," Mr Najib said in a nationally-televised speech on the eve of Malaysia Day.
Before an audience of about 800, which included his entire Cabinet, Mr Najib added: "The changes are aimed at having a modern, mature and functioning democracy which will continue to preserve public order, ensure greater civil liberty and maintain racial harmony."
The ISA has long been a hot-button issue in Malaysia. Over the past five decades, thousands of people in Malaysia have been detained for a variety of crimes under the ISA, which allows for indefinite detention without trial.
Apart from suspected terrorists, the law has also been used against communists, forgery experts, religious militants and even opposition politicians - prompting critics to argue that in Malaysia the ISA has often been abused by the government to stifle dissent.
The ISA and the Emergency Ordinance, which allows suspects to be detained without charge for up to two years, will be replaced by two new laws.
Mr Najib said the new security laws would be introduced for preventive detention, be limited only to cases of terrorism and "ensure that basic human rights are protected".
Under the new laws, detentions could only be extended by the court and therefore "the power of detention will be shifted from the executive to the judiciary, unless it concerns terrorism", he added.
Later in the night, de facto Law Minister Mohamed Nazri Aziz said the legislations replacing the ISA would still allow for detention without trial but only for "terrorists", reported The Malaysian Insider.
"The new laws are strictly for terrorism. What we are going to do now is enact similar laws like the Patriot Act in the US or the UK ... We have once and for all decided that no laws should be enacted allowing for individuals to be arrested for having a difference in ideologies," he was quoted as saying.
Malaysia's strict media law will also be amended to allow a one-time licensing of media outlets instead of annual renewals which critics say the government has used to threaten newspapers against publishing dissenting views.
Other laws which restrict civil liberties would be reviewed, and Mr Najib pledged that the government would not detain any individuals merely on the basis of their political ideology.
"Many will question whether I am moving too far, too fast. Some will say that the reforms should only be carried out in small steps, or not at all," Mr Najib, said in the address.
"To them I say, if a reform is the right thing to do, now is the right time to do it," the Prime Minister said, adding that the changes may result in "short-term pain for me politically".
The move to scrap the law has been hailed Penang Chief Minister Lim Guang Eng and an ex-ISA detainee himself as an "epochal move".
Opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim tweeted in Malay: "ISA: Welcome its abolition after being championed by the people all this while and opposed by Umno. However, need to be mindful ..."
The next general election is not due until 2013 but Mr Najib is likely to call one in the next six months amid growing uncertainty about the global economic outlook, analysts say.
Despite making record gains in a 2008 general election, the Opposition led by Mr Anwar has struggled to build on that momentum, and is plagued by infighting.
But analysts say Mr Najib's own troubles run deep and yesterday's announcement may not be enough to reverse the ruling Barisan Nasional's 2008 poll losses, which he needs to do to remain firmly in power.
"This will be attractive to the more educated and critical classes, typically urban professionals and minority non-Malays, but this group will also look to see whether or not this will be translated into credible change," said Mr Ibrahim Suffian, director of the independent polling outfit the Merdeka Center.
"Najib is defining his agenda for political reform, but the devil will be in the details in whether he can translate these promises into concrete implementation," said Ms Bridget Welsh, a Malaysia specialist at Singapore Management University.
"Institutions like the police and judiciary are also still criticised as not being independent so while he's embraced political reforms he has touched only the surface of it," she added.
Via: http://www.todayonline.com/World/EDC110916-0000340/Malaysia-to-repeal-ISA
Malaysia to abolish unpopular security law
By EILEEN NG - Associated Press | AP – Thu, Sep 15, 2011
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Malaysia will abolish an unpopular, colonial-era security law allowing detention without trial and relax other measures curbing the media and the right to free assembly, Prime Minister Najib Razak announced Thursday.
The policy changes are the boldest by Najib since he took the helm in April 2009 and are seen as a move to bolster support for his ruling coalition ahead of general elections, which are not due until 2013 but are widely expected next year.
Najib said the Internal Security Act, which allows indefinite detention without trial, would be replaced with two new anti-terrorism laws that would ensure that basic human rights of suspects are protected. He pledged that no individuals would be detained for their political ideologies.
Critics have long called for the security law to be repealed, saying that the government has abused it to silence dissidents.
Najib said the government also would lift three emergency declarations and amend police laws to allow freedom of assembly according to international norms. He said a law requiring annual printing and publishing licenses would be repealed, giving more freedom to media groups.
The move to have a more open democracy is "risky but we are doing it for our survival," he said in speech on national television.
The speech was to mark Friday's anniversary of the 1963 union of peninsula Malaysia with Sabah and Sarawak states on Borneo, six years after the country's independence from British rule.
"It is time for Malaysians to move forward with new hope," he said. "Let there be no doubt that the Malaysia we are creating is a Malaysia which has a functional and inclusive democracy."
Najib's National Front has been working to regain public support after suffering its worst performance in 2008 polls, when opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim's alliance wrested more than one-third of Parliament's seats amid public allegations of government corruption and racial discrimination.
The National Front's popularity recently took a dip after authorities arrested more than 1,600 demonstrators and used tear gas and water cannons against at least 20,000 people who marched for electoral reforms in Kuala Lumpur on July 9.
Via: http://sg.news.yahoo.com/malaysia-abolish-unpopular-security-law-135452084.html
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Malaysia will abolish an unpopular, colonial-era security law allowing detention without trial and relax other measures curbing the media and the right to free assembly, Prime Minister Najib Razak announced Thursday.
The policy changes are the boldest by Najib since he took the helm in April 2009 and are seen as a move to bolster support for his ruling coalition ahead of general elections, which are not due until 2013 but are widely expected next year.
Najib said the Internal Security Act, which allows indefinite detention without trial, would be replaced with two new anti-terrorism laws that would ensure that basic human rights of suspects are protected. He pledged that no individuals would be detained for their political ideologies.
Critics have long called for the security law to be repealed, saying that the government has abused it to silence dissidents.
Najib said the government also would lift three emergency declarations and amend police laws to allow freedom of assembly according to international norms. He said a law requiring annual printing and publishing licenses would be repealed, giving more freedom to media groups.
The move to have a more open democracy is "risky but we are doing it for our survival," he said in speech on national television.
The speech was to mark Friday's anniversary of the 1963 union of peninsula Malaysia with Sabah and Sarawak states on Borneo, six years after the country's independence from British rule.
"It is time for Malaysians to move forward with new hope," he said. "Let there be no doubt that the Malaysia we are creating is a Malaysia which has a functional and inclusive democracy."
Najib's National Front has been working to regain public support after suffering its worst performance in 2008 polls, when opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim's alliance wrested more than one-third of Parliament's seats amid public allegations of government corruption and racial discrimination.
The National Front's popularity recently took a dip after authorities arrested more than 1,600 demonstrators and used tear gas and water cannons against at least 20,000 people who marched for electoral reforms in Kuala Lumpur on July 9.
Via: http://sg.news.yahoo.com/malaysia-abolish-unpopular-security-law-135452084.html
Singapore employment up in Q2
By Ambiga Raju and Qiuyi Tan | Posted: 15 September 2011 1011 hrs
Singapore's Raffles Place
SINGAPORE: With job creation slowing down, Singapore's overall unemployment rate increased to 2.1 per cent in June.
Total employment in Singapore was up by 24,800 in the second quarter, higher than the preliminary estimate of 22,800 released in July.
The Manpower Ministry (MOM) in its latest labour market report said the pace of job creation was slower than the first quarter but comparable to the second quarter of last year.
HR firms said the pace of job creation will continue slowing down for the rest of the year.
But it's not all doom and gloom, as observers agree that Singapore's unemployment rate of 2.1 per cent remains a very healthy figure, compared to other developed countries like the US and France, where unemployment hovers above 9 per cent.
Services continued to generate the bulk of the employment gains, though the pace has eased.
The sector added 20,200 workers in the second quarter, down from the gains of 26,500 in the previous quarter.
Sustained by increased building activities in the public sector, the construction workforce expanded by 3,600, higher than the 1,500 increase in the last quarter.
Manufacturing employment rose by 800, up from flat gains from the previous quarter.
The MOM report said layoffs remained low, and job vacancies stayed healthy, in line with HR firms' observations that it's still a tight labour market.
"What we're seeing is companies not prepared to take drastic measures or do knee-jerk reactions to the uncertainty, but rather being much more conscious and cautious about protecting their talent pools," said Karin Clarke, Regional Director of Singapore & Malaysia, Randstad.
In a blog post, Minister of State for Manpower Tan Chuan-Jin said raising skills and productivity remains the best way to inoculate Singapore against external risks.
Commenting on the latest labour market figures, BG(NS) Tan said while the Trade and Industry Ministry expects Singapore's GDP to grow by 5-6% in 2011, this could eventually be lower if market conditions in US and Europe worsen.
And there can be an impact on jobs for the people.
BG(NS) Tan said the ministry is keeping a close watch on the unfolding global situation.
He explained: "While we may not be able to stay immune from the economic contagion, we should try to build up our immune system or inoculate ourselves as best as we can. The best way to do this would be to raise our productivity and skills."
So employers and workers must seize opportunities to improve their productivity levels to remain globally competitive even in the face of bleak economic conditions.
He added that at the same time, workers can upgrade their skills and enhance their efficiency by taking relevant training courses to be more adept in handling complex tasks.
And he is confident the strong tripartite partnership will again see Singapore through the impending storm as long as Singaporeans worked hard and stayed united for the common cause.
And the challenge may get harder, what with the ministry report showing a 2.5 per cent drop in productivity in the second quarter.
The labour movement added that productivity efforts must come from all sides, with management leading the way.
"There are companies who are more enlightened, through moral suasion or partnership. They are able to see that a better worker leads to better productivity, and ensure that the company continues to become competitive and relevant in the industry," said Zainudin Nordin, director of Care & Share, NTUC.
Randstad said productivity could also be constrained by firms unable to find top talent, or lacking the mechanism to capture and implement innovative solutions.
Via: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1153268/1/.html
Singapore's Raffles PlaceSINGAPORE: With job creation slowing down, Singapore's overall unemployment rate increased to 2.1 per cent in June.
Total employment in Singapore was up by 24,800 in the second quarter, higher than the preliminary estimate of 22,800 released in July.
The Manpower Ministry (MOM) in its latest labour market report said the pace of job creation was slower than the first quarter but comparable to the second quarter of last year.
HR firms said the pace of job creation will continue slowing down for the rest of the year.
But it's not all doom and gloom, as observers agree that Singapore's unemployment rate of 2.1 per cent remains a very healthy figure, compared to other developed countries like the US and France, where unemployment hovers above 9 per cent.
Services continued to generate the bulk of the employment gains, though the pace has eased.
The sector added 20,200 workers in the second quarter, down from the gains of 26,500 in the previous quarter.
Sustained by increased building activities in the public sector, the construction workforce expanded by 3,600, higher than the 1,500 increase in the last quarter.
Manufacturing employment rose by 800, up from flat gains from the previous quarter.
The MOM report said layoffs remained low, and job vacancies stayed healthy, in line with HR firms' observations that it's still a tight labour market.
"What we're seeing is companies not prepared to take drastic measures or do knee-jerk reactions to the uncertainty, but rather being much more conscious and cautious about protecting their talent pools," said Karin Clarke, Regional Director of Singapore & Malaysia, Randstad.
In a blog post, Minister of State for Manpower Tan Chuan-Jin said raising skills and productivity remains the best way to inoculate Singapore against external risks.
Commenting on the latest labour market figures, BG(NS) Tan said while the Trade and Industry Ministry expects Singapore's GDP to grow by 5-6% in 2011, this could eventually be lower if market conditions in US and Europe worsen.
And there can be an impact on jobs for the people.
BG(NS) Tan said the ministry is keeping a close watch on the unfolding global situation.
He explained: "While we may not be able to stay immune from the economic contagion, we should try to build up our immune system or inoculate ourselves as best as we can. The best way to do this would be to raise our productivity and skills."
So employers and workers must seize opportunities to improve their productivity levels to remain globally competitive even in the face of bleak economic conditions.
He added that at the same time, workers can upgrade their skills and enhance their efficiency by taking relevant training courses to be more adept in handling complex tasks.
And he is confident the strong tripartite partnership will again see Singapore through the impending storm as long as Singaporeans worked hard and stayed united for the common cause.
And the challenge may get harder, what with the ministry report showing a 2.5 per cent drop in productivity in the second quarter.
The labour movement added that productivity efforts must come from all sides, with management leading the way.
"There are companies who are more enlightened, through moral suasion or partnership. They are able to see that a better worker leads to better productivity, and ensure that the company continues to become competitive and relevant in the industry," said Zainudin Nordin, director of Care & Share, NTUC.
Randstad said productivity could also be constrained by firms unable to find top talent, or lacking the mechanism to capture and implement innovative solutions.
Via: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1153268/1/.html
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