Category: TRENDS ON THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC FRONT

Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, lost 355,300 jobs in 2020, pushing the unemployment rate to 9.6 percent, its highest since 1993, the province’s Financial Accountability Office reported last week. The sheer number of jobs lost was the largest in Ontario’s history. “The rise in the unemployment rate in 2020 was tempered by a surge in...

A limping economy and massive deficits wrought by stimulus and bailout spending have created an “inescapable” fiscal reckoning for the country, a new report from the Conference Board of Canada (CBC) warns. The government of prime minister Justin Trudeau has pledged to spend $100 billion and up to 4 percent of GDP over the next...

The European Central Bank (ECB) will leave its stimulus measures unchanged, the bank’s governing officials decided at their January meeting, and will not react to short-term blips in inflation or nominal interest rates. The ECB pledged to maintain “favorable financial conditions” into the future, largely through its €1.85-trillion bond-buying program. Analysts interpreted the decision to...

Europe’s manufacturing economy continues to rebound while services still droop. The IHS Markit Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) for Germany’s manufacturing sector climbed to a three-year high of 60.6 in January, up from 57.1 the month before; France’s PMI for the sector added 3.4 points to reach 55. The pan-European PMI in manufacturing rose from 54.8...

The number of corporations seeing their credit rating fall last year was 4.67 times more than those with rising ratings, according to ratings service DBRS Morningstar. The pace of downgrades surpassed 2008’s 3.08 ratio and approached the 5.39 mark set in 2009 at the worst of the Great Recession. Morningstar recorded 70 downgrades in 2020,...

The COVID War that politicians have been fighting now for one year by locking down entire nations, has wiped out 225 million jobs worldwide… four times more than the Great Recession, according to a new report from United Nations’ International Labor Organization (ILO). The loss took out 8.8 percent of the economy’s worked hours, using...

As we have forecast, the 20th century was the American century – the 21st century will be the Chinese century. The business of China is business; the business of America is war.  While America spent countless trillions waging and losing endless wars and enriching its military-industrial complex, China has spent its trillions advancing the nation’s...

MGM REVENUE TANKS IN FOURTH QUARTER. The casino operator reported a 53-percent drop in revenue for the period, collecting $1.5 billion, less than half of the $3.2 billion it gained during the same period a year earlier. Revenues fell 66 percent in Las Vegas and 58 percent in Macao, the Chinese gambling mecca, the company...

The world’s largest cosmetics manufacturer is predicting “a fiesta of make-up and fragrances” once the COVID pandemic subsides, similar to the exuberance of the 1920s that followed World War I, CEO Jean-Paul Agon said in comments quoted by the Financial Times. “Putting on lipstick” – pointless when everyone is wearing masks – “will be a...

Coca-Cola reported shrinkage in both revenue and profits for 2020’s fourth quarter, with a global sales volume of 3 percent year over year. Sales lost at shuttered eateries and bars outweighed gains in sales from consumers drinking sodas at home, the company said. The company has weathered the pandemic by shedding more than 200 minor...