Continue reading Comfort Zone Investing: Should You Invest in China?

Comfort Zone Investing: Should You Invest in China? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Sat, 23 Jan 2010 10:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

The international research company, Ipsos Global Public Affairs, conducted a survey to determine the sentiment in emerging market countries including China, India, and Russia. They found it to be deteriorating rapidly. Consumer optimism dropped to 31% in November compared with a year ago. The largest drops were in China and India, with China dropping to 46% from 90% 18 months ago, and India dropping to 65% from a previous 88%.

One big factor for the drop in sentiment has been the sharp drop in crude oil prices from $147 per barrel to under $40 per barrel. It had a strong psychological impact on emerging market economies and brought home the notion that they were not immune from the worldwide economic slowdown.

Ipsos also surveyed 22 Western developed countries and found that nearly 75% of people were cutting back on entertainment, vacations, and luxury items.

Gloom and doom in emerging market countries originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Sun, 28 Dec 2008 16:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

The plan makes sense, at least on paper. GE (NYSE: GE) believes that it can offset any slowdown in its US business by the acceleration of revenue in China and India. It is, perhaps, one of the benefits of being a multinational.

The FT writes that, "GE's chairman and chief executive (Jeffrey Immelt) said the company's sales in emerging markets such as China and India were expanding at 20 percent a year, and there were few signs of this growth slowing."

But, GE's view is based on two assumptions that may not be true. The first is that a slowdown in the US will not spread to Asia and the Indian subcontinent. Much of the export income from China and India depends on demand in the US and Europe. if that demand slackens, there is no guarantee that their own economies will be able to continue growing rapidly.

GE is also assuming that growth in these countries, particularly China, will not come without a cost. Trade tensions between the US and the world's most populous country still exist. The China toy debacle demonstrates that. It would not take so terribly much for China to shut its markets to certain US goods and services, if it feels that it has been provoked.

GE's plan to keep growing outside the US looks good, for now.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 247wall st.com.

GE looks to China and India to balance US slowdown originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 29 Oct 2007 09:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

The U.S. Federal Reserve's bold action Tuesday to decrease short-term interest rates by 50 basis points, or one-half percentage point, served as clear signal to the markets that the Fed agrees that the housing slump and subsequent subprime mortgage default-induced credit crunch have helped slow U.S. economic growth to near-stall levels, but the interest rate cut and likely future cuts do not offer a downside-free economic horizon.

On the contrary, the easing and the growth stimulus that's likely to ensue will undoubtedly bring to the forefront an issue that the world's major industrialized economies have danced around for about a generation: namely, the inexorable rise in the price of oil.

Recall that in 2005 the Fed began to tighten monetary policy, i.e. started its short-term interest rate increase cycle, in part to slow the U.S. economy in order to take price pressure (inflation) off commodities, principally oil, but also natural gas, copper, aluminum, silver, corn and wheat, among others. Leaving aside for the moment the philosophical critique regarding whether its possible for a nation's central bank to slow inflation of globally-based commodities, the Fed's action did have the effect of slowing U.S. growth, which reduced price pressure on numerous vital commodities. Hence, from an inflation standpoint, the Fed's tightening can be interpreted as a qualified success.

Continue reading Oil's tipping point

Oil's tipping point originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Sun, 23 Sep 2007 17:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.