CHAN AKYA

March 12, 2010

"Do not be very upright in your dealings for you would see by going to the forest that straight trees are cut down while crooked ones are left standing." - Chanakya (350-275 BC)

For more on the original Chanakya, the inventor of skullduggery, click here.

The G-20 piles folly on folly

Broken window panes apart, the only tangible result of the Group of 20 meeting in London - the tripling of International Monetary Fund resources to US$750 billion - is astounding. The people whose incompetence has made the fund a byword for poverty and who had no clue about the present crisis until it burst on us are now supposed to show the foresight to end it.

(Apr 06, '09)

Goldplay

Another merry week for the markets underscores the utter moral bankruptcy of the Group of Seven countries that will soon translate to financial bankruptcy. Inflation will become more common, but contrary to the apparent thinking of the People's Bank of China, there is no room for a "global" currency. All you need is gold.

(Mar 30, '09)

Bonus-free knuckleheads

The way out of the financial logjam is to provide the private sector with incentives to get its act together rather than by driving through retrospective moves designed to placate popular anger. Governments don't have any experts to deal with this problem, and it is time they acknowledged that fact.

(Mar 21, '09)

Buyer beware

Endemic fear of deflation has pushed Western governments to issue mountains of cash to their citizens. Asia is feeling the pinch, and not just in terms of currency values. Savers are seeing a decline in both current income and future purchasing power.

(Mar 16, '09)

No work and no play ...

Terrorist attacks on sportsmen have pushed the conflicting agendas of social development, national ego and attention-seeking into a new reality that is compounded by the ongoing economic crisis. Being fabulously wealthy and all too often cheating their way to achievements, sportsmen risk becoming the new focus of social anger. That is, once anger over the financiers has cooled down a tad.

(Mar 09, '09)

Beggar, I thy neighbor

The economic crisis, unsurprisingly if painfully, is forcing political realignments around the globe. The pace at which pseudo-autonomous states, from within Europe to the Gulf to the western United States, are being pushed into the embrace of richer neighbors presents rare opportunities for a new generation of Bismarckian politicians.

(Mar 02, '09)

Israeli election muddies Obama's waters

A successful and critically acclaimed film may well do more to get Indians out of their self-inflicted rut than any other media in this movie-crazy country. The more everyone around the world praises the film Slumdog Millionaire, the greater the embarrassment for the Indian middle classes who look but do not see the abject poverty and low living standards around them.

(Feb 17, '09)

False hope of protectionism

It didn't take too long for protectionist impulses to rear up across the Group of Seven leading industrialized countries as the initial bouts of Keynesian spending failed to provide any relief. Yet demographic factors dictate that any salvation for developed countries waits on increased consumption in the Asian region.

(Feb 09, '09)

Keynesian bomb is ticking

A likely consequence of the global credit crunch mixed with Keynesian spending is an inflationary spiral driven by supply shocks and a possible weather-led collapse in agricultural production. The outlook for commodities and in particular gold has improved dramatically.

(Feb 02, '09)

Family value

Family-run businesses are under siege across much of Asia amid the credit crunch and macroeconomic changes, even as they make a comeback in Japan. The need for overhauling the structures in keeping with the requirements of new capital providers must be balanced by strong leadership; suggesting that reports of family businesses simply dying away in Asia are vastly exaggerated.

(Jan 26, '09)

Capitalism at the crossroads

The battle between capitalism and its alternatives is set to intensify as the malcontents of 2008 come back seeking systemic adjustments that could prove unnecessary in the realignment of the global economy. Every step the socialists take will bring a great depression closer for a bulk of the world population.

(Jan 16, '09)

Ask not for whom the bells toll

Analysts taking perverse pleasure at the decline of emerging markets miss the main point - that the serious erosion of confidence will become an all-pervasive global affair. As the decline of the United Kingdom can be attributed to the conniptions faced by Russia, other developed countries could be tripped by the current decline of emerging markets.

(Dec 24, '08)

Honey, I switched the medication

Every government in the world is engaged in exactly the wrong course of action in response to the current crisis. As the largest borrowers attempt to bump up their borrowings, the largest savers are attempting currency devaluation to increase production. Both groups are doomed to fail, and improvement to the global economy is most unlikely over the near future.

(Dec 15, '08)

Going, going, GOME

China continues to avoid a radical overhaul of its corporate governance structures, leading to the scandals that plague its top companies, the arrest of GOME's founder and chairman being the most recent. That further erodes what remains of investors' trust, undermines capital-raising and leaves too much for the government to do.

(Dec 06, '08)

Debt cold turkey

Perhaps the worst thing you can tell a bankrupt person on a festive day such as Thanksgiving is that worse is yet to come. That precisely is what is in store for people across the global economy as deleveraging will continue to devour every scrap thrown at it by well-meaning but useless government officials around the world.

(Nov 27, '08)

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THREAD: Re:Asia's permanent advantage
DrCore
(Mar 12, '10)
A few random points: USA's interstate highways served a significant military purpose. Its cost should be calculated under military spending, then its economic ROI is a...
Read full post/respond
THREAD: Re:More Denial by CA...
Michael
(Mar 12, '10)
two separate issues replacing and upgrading infrastructure is different than building it for the first time, the stuff that we are adding in NA is usually of the mass t...
Read full post/respond
THREAD: Re:More Denial by CA...
quark
(Mar 12, '10)
(Gad! These Chinese are becoming like us!) So why not upgrade your infrastructure like China is doing?
Read full post/respond
THREAD: Re:More Denial by CA...
MonsoonWind
(Mar 12, '10)
quark wrote: [quote Seven lane superhighway: Expressways in China are financed with various mechanism. Only a fraction of new roads are financed by central governm...
Read full post/respond
THREAD: Re: heres one for you Mike!
MonsoonWind
(Mar 12, '10)
Michael wrote: after that hockey game no one is feeling anything but good Speaking of hockey: perhaps you could clarify for me what Sarah Palin meant during her ru...
Read full post/respond
THREAD: Re:More Denial by CA...
quark
(Mar 11, '10)
How do you figure out the ROI on infrastructure? China is building infrastructure and the multiplier affect can be compared to a similar multiplier in US in the 50/60's an...
Read full post/respond
THREAD: Re:More Denial by CA...
MonsoonWind
(Mar 11, '10)
Chan Akya wrote: Permanent Advantage explained - did I extrapolate much? Actually no. You need to travel around Asia to see what I have seen, and enjoy what I ...
Read full post/respond
THREAD: Re:More Denial by CA...
Chan Akya
(Mar 11, '10)
Not at all .. but the point is that an empty 7 lane superhighway in China has a tendency to fill up over 3 years and within 5 years they are soon talking about the need fo...
Read full post/respond
THREAD: Re:More Denial by CA...
Michael
(Mar 11, '10)
Read full post/respond
THREAD: Re:More Denial by CA...
Michael
(Mar 11, '10)
so your telling me that its actually full then?
Read full post/respond

More...

Login

The G-20 piles folly on folly

Goldplay

Bonus-free knuckleheads

Buyer beware

No work and no play ...

Beggar, I thy neighbor

Israeli election muddies Obama's waters

False hope of protectionism

Keynesian bomb is ticking

Family value

Capitalism at the crossroads

Ask not for whom the bells toll

Honey, I switched the medication

Going, going, GOME

Debt cold turkey

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