Written by Econintersect
Early Bird Headlines 01 Apr 2019
Econintersect: Here are some of the headlines we found to help you start your day. For more headlines see our afternoon feature for GEI members, What We Read Today, published Monday, Wednesday and Friday, which has many more headlines and a number of article discussions to keep you abreast of what we have found interesting.
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​Global
- Stocks in Asia jump following better-than-expected Chinese economic data (CNBC) Major markets in Asia surged on Monday following data released over the weekend that showed economic activity in China unexpectedly bouncing back in March. The U.S. dollar index was higher at 97.143 after touching lows below 96.6 last week. Brent crude futures contract rising 1.04% to $68.28 per barrel and U.S. crude futures adding 0.71% to $60.57 per barrel. Spot gold was down about 0.2% at $1,290.01 per ounce by 0750 GMT, but was higher than its lowest since March 8 at $1,286.35 on Friday.
U.S.
- United States’ first female Muslim judge found dead in Hudson River (CNBC) A groundbreaking black jurist who became the first Muslim woman to serve as a U.S. judge was found dead in New York’s Hudson River on Wednesday, police said. Sheila Abdus-Salaam, a 65-year-old associate judge of New York’s highest court, was found floating off Manhattan’s west side.
Police pulled Abdus-Salaam’s fully clothed body from the water and she was pronounced dead at the scene. Her family identified her and an autopsy would determine the cause of death, the spokesman said.
Abdus-Salaam, a native of Washington, D.C., became the first African-American woman appointed to the Court of Appeals when Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo named her to the state’s high court in 2013.
- Migrants cleared from enclosure beneath El Paso bridge after outcry (The Hill) Hundreds of families of asylum seekers are no longer being detained in an enclosure beneath an El Paso, Texas bridge, according to The New York Times. Following public outcry, officials have moved processing for some migrants to a site on the other side of the bridge near a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) facility, according to the newspaper. CBP said on Sunday that the agency is in the process of transferring all the migrants temporarily held in the enclosure to a northeast El Paso processing station. See Migrants Moved Out of Holding Pen Under El Paso Bridge (The New York Times).
- The eviction crisis is starting to look a lot like the subprime mortgage crisis (Market Watch) Stable housing is increasingly out of reach for many Americans, as both rentals and homes to own grow more expensive and options dwindle. Evictions may be one of the most visible manifestations. For research details see Multifamily Evictions, Large Owners, and Serial Filings: Findings from Metropolitan Atlanta (Urban Studies Institute).
- Role of Government Should be Less Say Older Voters (Pew Research Center) Millennials have moved firmly into their 20s and 30s, and a new generation is coming into focus. Generation Z – diverse and on track to be the most well-educated generation yet – is moving toward adulthood with a liberal set of attitudes and an openness to emerging social trends.
On a range of issues, from Donald Trump’s presidency to the role of government to racial equality and climate change, the views of Gen Z – those ages 13 to 21 in 2018 – mirror those of Millennials.1 In each of these realms, the two younger generations hold views that differ significantly from those of their older counterparts. In most cases, members of the Silent Generation are at the opposite end, and Baby Boomers and Gen Xers fall in between.2
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- Trump Job Approval (Gallup) After a spurt in approval in February, President Trump’s approvelrating has fallen back below 40%, according to this tracking survey.
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- Job Approval of Congress Reaches Two-Year High (Gallup) Congress’ 26% job approval rating is the highest it has been in over two years. Congress last had a higher reading — 28% approval — in February 2017, shortly after Donald Trump became president and began working with Republican majorities in both houses of Congress. Congress’ ratings have typically not been stellar, averaging 30% since 1974.
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- Consumers Revert to “Normal” Range, after Red-Hot mid-2018 (Wolf Street) Much of the data for Q1, including the all-important data for February and March consumer spending, are still not available, and it’s still too early to draw conclusions. But the trends show slowing growth, heading back to post-Financial-Crisis normal, without signs of a recession at the moment.
UK
- Brexit in disarray: May under pressure to go for soft Brexit (Reuters) Britain’s exit from the European Union was in disarray after the implosion of Prime Minister Theresa May’s Brexit strategy left her under pressure from rival factions to leave without a deal, go for an election or forge a much softer divorce.
Germany
- Deutsche Bank Seeking a “Guarantee of Existence” with Monster-Merger? (Wolf Street) Unless something drastic is done soon, the next downturn could prove fatal for an already gravely weakened Deutsche Bank whose stock has been in a death-spiral since 2007, having lost over 90% of its value, and whose price-to-book ratio – the equation often used to reflect the value that market participants attach to a company’s equity – is currently below 25%. So the solution is a proposed merger with Germany’s second largest (and also troubled) bank, national rival Commerzbank.
But opposition to the deal is building. On Wednesday, the Financial Times reported that union bosses representing Deutsche Bank workers have threatened to scupper the integration of Postbank, which Deutsche Bank bought nearly a decade ago but still hasn’t fully ingested, if the merger talks continue. Worker representatives make up half the supervisory boards of both banks and have unanimously rejected the proposed tie-up.
It’s not just the banks’ workers who are worried about the merger. So, too, are Deutsche Bank’s all-important Qatari shareholders, who fear their already beaten-down holdings will get further diluted. The five economists of Germany’s highly regarded Council of Economic Experts, which advises the federal government on economic matters and is often referred to as “The Five Sages”, have also expressed deep reservations about the planned merger.
Turkey
- Turkish President Erdogan’s ruling party dealt a blow, loses Ankara to opposition (Market Watch) urkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling party led Sunday’s mayoral elections but suffered setbacks as the opposition regained hold of the capital Ankara and made significant inroads in other parts of Turkey. The elections, which the Turkish strongman had depicted as a fight for the country’s survival, were largely seen as a test of his support amid a sharp economic downturn. See also Erdogan suffers major setbacks in local elections in Turkey’s big cities (Reuters).
Russia
- Treaty’s end would give U.S., Russia impetus to make more nukes: study (Reuters) The demise of the only U.S.-Russia arms control pact limiting deployed nuclear weapons would make it harder for each to gauge the other’s intentions, giving both incentives to expand their arsenals, according to a study to be released on Monday.
India
- India’s Coal Paradox (Oil Price) As any regular traveler to India will know, while power outages are not as common as they once were, they remain an almost daily occurrence in many areas. According to the FT, quoting figures from the New Delhi-based Energy and Resources Institute, per-capita electricity consumption by the country’s 1.3 billion people is just 38% of the global average, while tens of millions of households still lack grid connections – so demand growth is high and set to continue for decades to come. Coal is the only fossil fuel India has in abundance, with extensive deposits situated in the northeast of the country, although power plants in the west and south often import coal from Indonesia rather than haul product across the country on a rickety rail network. Oil and gas have never been favored because they are largely imported.
Part of the problem for coal-fired plants has always been competitively priced coal supplies; even though the country has abundant supplies, it suffers from an appalling logistics infrastructure. Today, only plants sited very near to the deposits in northeastern India remain viable. Most of the rest are in trouble, with Credit Suisse estimating half of them as being ‘stressed’ – i.e. interest payment exceeding profits – putting some $35 billion of investments at risk
Over the past couple years (and estimated into the future), India’s thermal power capacity additions have given way to solar and wind.
China
- China’s Xi says West has long-term economic, military superiority (Reuters) Developed Western nations have long-term economic, technological and military advantages over China and the Communist Party has to realize that some people will use the West’s strong points to criticize socialism’s failings, President Xi Jinping said.
- China’s manufacturing activity hits 6-month high (Market Watch) Factories showed a pickup in activity almost across the board, from new orders to production, according to the official purchasing managers index released Sunday. The index rose to a six-month high of 50.5 in March from 49.2 in February, well above the forecasts of many economists.
- China’s smaller cities offer hopes of growth amid the economic slowdown (CNBC)
- In particular, five industries present prospects for growth: Internet, autos, healthcare, education and tourism.
- Much of the growth for companies in these markets comes from smaller cities and county districts, which analysts say account for more than 70 percent of China’s population.
Mexico
- Trump aides stress president’s resolve to close US-Mexico border (The Hill) Members of the Trump administration on Sunday defended the president’s vow to shut down the U.S.-Mexico border, referring to a “crisis” in the number of migrants attempting to cross over.
President Trump said multiple times that he could close parts of the border unless Mexico’s government immediately stopped illegal crossings. He also blamed Democrats for “weak immigration laws.”
- ‘Fox & Friends’ apologizes for headline about ‘3 Mexican Countries’ (The Hill) The State Department announced Saturday that the U.S. will no longer provide foreign assistance to El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, the so-called Northern Triangle countries in Latin America. Fox News botched a graphic when the move was being discussed.
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