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EMERGING MARKETS
Emerging Economies are Tapped Out Twelve emerging countries, including Brazil and Russia, drew down their foreign currency reserves in March by a combined $143.5 billion, the fastest rate since 2008, according to Arkera, a London-based research firm. Turkey has depleted its reserves to $56 billion, a level last seen in 2006. The country’s banks hold $79 billion in debt coming...
CHINA
Chinese Consumers Not Ready to Spend China’s economy is showing signs of shaking off the lockdown, with mines and factories back in production at or near pre-pandemic levels, according to a variety of Chinese government statistics. But, in large measure, consumers are not yet ready to return to their old ways of spending. Many in China’s young “spending class” had...
EUROPE
Eurozone’s Contraction Could Reach Double Digits The Eurozone’s economy contracted 3.8 percent in this year’s first quarter compared to the last three months of 2019. That figure translates to an annual contraction rate of 14.4 percent if the pace of economic retreat is maintained throughout this year. In Spain, the annualized contraction was 19.2 percent; Italy saw a 17.6-percent reduction....
NOTES FROM THE FRONT LINES
Nationwide Rent Strike Looms Organizers in Chicago, Philadelphia, New York, and several other large U.S. cities have urged renters not to pay their May rent. The national rent strike is intended to call attention to the plight of the one-third of Americans who don’t own the places where they live. About half of those renters pay a third or more...
THE “NEW ABNORMAL” BUSINESS MODEL
Macy’s plans to reopen all of its 775 stores within six weeks, beginning with 68 stores that were scheduled to open their doors on Monday this week. The stores are in Georgia, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas, all of which have relaxed lockdown orders and will be open only from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. The pace of reopening...
OUT OF WORK, OUT OF LUCK
During the week ending 24 April, 4.4 million more American workers filed for unemployment benefits, bringing the total out of work to about 30 million and pinning the actual jobless rate above 20 percent. The number of U.S. workers idled is now double that of the 15.3 million in 2008’s Great Recession. States’ unemployment insurance systems have been overwhelmed, with...
THE FED WORLD AND THE REAL WORLD
Last week, the U.S. Federal Reserve announced it was adding new lanes to its $600-billion Main Street lending program, ostensibly designed to help small businesses. But by the facts, its sales pitch is a lie. The Feds helps the Bigs. Indeed, small businesses employ, at best, a few hundred people, not tens of thousands. Nor do they earn billions of...
PERU: PEOPLE FLEEING BIG CITIES
A significant trend seen around the world is the mass movement of poor working people, locked down in crowded cities where they are now unemployed, who are seeking to escape and return to their rural towns. In Peru, some 167,000 citizens have sought help from the government to flee urban cities for the countryside. Yet, with the country reporting just...
YEMEN WAR: END IS NEAR?
As the Trends Journal has been reporting on a regular basis, the five-year war in Yemen, initiated by Saudi Arabia’s invasion to squash anti-government Houthi rebels in the civil war there, has led to the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. It is estimated that over 100,000 Yemenis have been killed, including many women and children, mostly by Saudi air raids supported...