Risks rising for Asian banks from climate change | FinanceAsia

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Bankers are assessing how these dangers are playing out for their risks and how the so-called” passive” credit risk may be growing as a result of the recent severe storms that have ravaged Asia Pacific ( Apac ).

In early September, Super Typhoon Yagi caused billions of dollars of financial losses and cost hundreds of lives across Hainan, Guandong, the Philippines, Vietnam, Myanmar, and to a lesser degree Hong Kong. Banks need to realize how climate change makes lending more prone to risk because the insurance gap is also significant throughout the area. Banks are currently protected by ( re )insurance against the most extreme weather events, but if that becomes more expensive or difficult to access, the physical risks of climate change become more directly transmitted to the banks.

Tom Mortlock, weather threat expert guide – analytics, Apac, Aon, told FinanceAsia:” Financial institutions and the stream of credit is key to economic development across Asia, but so too is the insurance that sits behind this, that de-risks the lending. Sadly, Asia’s plan distance is one of the largest in the world, with only 14 % of economic costs covered by insurance in 2023, making banking in areas with high climate risk a potentially dangerous task.

Why is climate change important for financial institutions? is a report that Aon has just released.

Mortlock remarked,” Climate change is increasing the underlying risk profile in many locations and over time scales that banks are lending on. Low insurance coverage and high climate risk, combined with low insurance coverage and high climate risk, can pose a” silent” credit risk on lenders ‘ books, which has so far gone unnoticed.

Analytical analysis might be essential to weighing the risks. We are now starting to see a variety of financial institutions use traditional insurance-based analytics to understand their climate risk exposure and incorporate this into their loan origination and risk appetite decisions, according to Mortlock. &nbsp,

Although extreme weather is almost unavoidable in every region, some Asian cities are much better suited to extreme weather than others thanks to investments in drainage systems.

The Climate Risk Group’s Head of Corporate and Financing Sector Engagement, Philip Tapsall, head of the Cross-Department Initiative, stated:” Hong Kong is better prepared than other cities and regions for extreme weather events that are expected to worsen with climate change, particularly typhoons and flooding.”

However, banks operating in Hong Kong are significantly more exposed to less developed regions like south-eastern China and Southeast Asia ( SEA ), where climate change raises financial risks to balance sheets due to direct losses and economic effects.

Exposures can be caused by disruptions to trade, construction delays in supply chains, or direct financial losses caused by bank office shut downs, etc. &nbsp,

In order to help banks assess their physical risks to climate change in the city earlier this year, XDI collaborated with the Hong Kong Monetary Authority and KPMG. &nbsp,

Regulation rising

Aon’s Mortlock also noted a rise in the region’s incoming regulatory issues.

He noted that” we have a raft of climate-related regulation coming in across Asian jurisdictions where businesses will have to start making their climate related risks known to the market.” In fact, according to some analysis we conducted, over 10,000 listed companies will be required to disclose climate information by 2027 for the Asia-Pacific region.

According to Mortlock, “at the same time, regulators are beginning to conduct their own climate stress tests on the financial services sector to make sure there is enough money in the system to withstand climate shocks both now and in the future,” &nbsp,

¬ Haymarket Media Limited. All rights reserved.

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Stocks fall, yen rises as Ishiba takes helm in Japan – Asia Times

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Sanae Takaichi, a protégé of former prime minister Shinzo Abe and a supporter of his stock market-friendly Abenomics, won the Liberal Democratic Party’s ( LDP ) first-round presidential election on Friday, with support from stock market investors and currency traders.

In that first round, Takaichi received 181 votes, followed by Shigeru Ishiba with 154, Shinjiro Koizumi ( backed by ex-premier Yoshihide Suga ) with 136 and six other candidates who lagged far behind. Financial experts, who had ranked Takaichi as their top selection in an Asahi paper surveys, celebrated in progress.

The Nikkei 225 rose 1, 959.30 items, or 5.2 %, in two weeks to crest at 39, 829.56 on Friday afternoon after the first-round voting. But buyer hopes were dashed when Ishiba won the run-off, 215 to 194, to be party chief and almost surely Japan’s future prime minister.

The Nikkei 225 Futures index dropped about 6 % in the after-hours session on Friday. The Nikkei 225 itself lost 1, 910.01 points, or 4.8 %, on Monday ( September 30 ), falling back to 37, 919.55.

Takaichi publicly declared her antagonism to higher interest rates, endearing herself to stock market investors. She favors monetary easing and stronger fiscal stimulus, much like her later coach Abe.

She said, “Economic development comes first and foremost, and that’s what people are shocked by the price of tomatoes and almost everything else these time.”

Ishiba, on the other hand, supports Bank of Japan Governor Kazuo Ueda’s scheme of gradually raising costs to maintain the yen, which had been dropping like a stone, and tame prices.

Ishiba added that he would think about raising corporate and financial money fees, which may improve the taxation system in Japan and lessen its enormous government deficit.

Soon after Ishiba’s triumph was confirmed, the yen jumped from 146.2 to 143.3 to the penny. It therefore continued to rise, reaching 141.65 on Monday.

The share prices of Chinese manufacturers, on the other hand, were pounded. Toyota, which was up 2.0 % on Friday, dropped 7.6 % on Monday. With the notable exception of bankers, which may do nicely as interest rates rise, nearly every industry was over.

The yield on 10-year Japanese government bonds rose 0.045ppts to 0.85 %. The BOJ’s policy rate is 0.25 %.

Financial business owners may initially be disappointed, but Ishiba is supported by Chinese companies. The president of the Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry described Ishiba as” a competent policymaker who has addressed numerous obstacles head-on,” as reported by Nippon Television.

The Chamber of Commerce, like Ishiba, is dedicated to the advancement of regional economy and the support of small and medium-sized businesses.

The chairman of Keidanren ( Japan Business Federation ), said that Ishiba is” the right leader to drive forward transformation” in the current challenging environment. The tone of Japan Inc. is typically referred to as Kaidanren.

Furthermore, an Asahi poll showed Ishiba to be the most popular candidate among the general public, supported by 26 % of respondents compared with Takaichi’s 11 %.

In the end, the LDP opted for practice and expediency over a rehashing of financial plans that were developed over a decade ago for a unique financial period. At a public vote that Ishiba intends to call on October 27, the LDP’s option may be tested.

Stock market experts chose Takaichi over the LDP debate’s first-round results, failing to consider where former prime minister Suga did vote Koizumi’s support in the two-candidate run-off.

Looking for short-term profits, they fell for Takaichi’s go-for-growth repeat of Abenomics. However, both Ishiba and the general public prefer Ishiba. As the LDP’s trust recovers among voters, the opposition Constitutional Democratic Party is in a hard place.

Following this poet on&nbsp, X: @ScottFo83517667

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Cause to buy, cause to sell China’s new bull market – Asia Times

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As Beijing’s signal campaign sends China stocks skyrocketing, matter analyst Stephen Jen&nbsp, among the bull who think China’s biggest protest since 2008 is just getting started.

” Foreign equities&nbsp, are really devalued”, says Jen, the chief executive officer of Eurizon SLJ. Because “investors are so thin everything Taiwanese”, he notes,” a severe rally is entirely feasible”.

Chinese shares rose for a ninth straight day on Monday ( September 30 ) thanks to China’s bold moves last week to slash interest rates, lower mortgage rates, relax regulations for homebuyers in major cities, reduce the amount of cash banks must keep in reserve, and telegraphed moves of stimulus to come.

Today’s wave by as much as 9.1 % in the standard CSI 300 Catalog is the biggest since 2015, a month drenched in relevance for President Xi Jinping’s state. In July and August 2015, Shanghai shares plunged to a third of their worth in just three months.

Fast-forward to the present, the People’s Bank of China’s ( PBOC ) actions, coupled with the US Federal Reserve’s big easing and falling global oil prices, mean China’s risk assets “ought to do very well”, Jen says. ” After the US vote, I expect world stocks to march profoundly into year-end”, he adds.

No so fast, warns Stephen Roach, past Asia-region chair for Morgan Stanley. Is China’s long-term financial problem over now that the Politburo has issued a message of further emergency meetings, asks economist Roach? If it were only that easy”.

Roach remains “increasingly concerned that China was at risk of falling into a&nbsp, Japanese-like quagmire&nbsp, –&nbsp, a&nbsp, balance strip recession&nbsp, characterized by slowdown and depreciation as an extension of the bursting of a big debt-fueled property bubble”.

Matter Roach among the academics wondering what, oh what, the share bulls rushing China’s means are thinking.

In fact, investors are rushing up into everything China without project plans to restore the still troubled real estate market, rebalance growth engines toward services and apart from exports, enhance local governments ‘ struggling balance sheets, and create strong safety nets to encourage China’s families to save less and spend more.

President Xi’s staff should be focused on the gap between those reversing China little posts, which Bank of America Corp discovered was one of the most crowded industry in the world, and the unrelenting China bears if it wants to keep the bulls work going.

That means entering the march with bold plans to carry out the liberalizing measures his Communist Party has promised to do since 2013 but has failed to deliver.

For today, China’s rapid return to economic stimulus setting has the nation’s attention. However, Zhiwei Zhang, an economist at Pinpoint Asset Management, is right to say that” the key policy to address the macro challenge remains to be fiscal.

In order to help China meet its 5 % economic growth target, local media are buzzing about an additional 2 trillion yuan ( US$ 285 ) worth of bond sales. Much more may be needed, nevertheless, to improve poor household demand and offset headwinds from overseas.

Japan’s increase in interest rates to their highest level since 2008 poses a risk to other countries. Another shows signs of strain in the US economy as a contentious election draws near, with both Democrats and Republicans threatening new tariffs on everything made in China.

Last week, PBOC Governor&nbsp, Pan Gongsheng&nbsp, unveiled a barrage of support measures, including a reduction in the seven-day reverse repurchase rate to 1.5 % from 1.7 %. Additionally, the PBOC announced the largest-ever rate reduction for its one-year policy loans, cutting loan prime rates and deposit rates.

The Politburo, Beijing’s top decision-making body, called for a “forceful” implementation of these and other measures supposedly to come. Additionally, it highlighted a new need to” stop declining” the real estate market.

These efforts might include removing some of the restrictions on home purchases that are still in place. Top cities could impose restrictions on visitors who are not from their own neighborhoods. In other words, liberalizing China’s “hukou” residence permit system.

Beijing has n’t yet provided a detailed timeline or procedure for getting bad assets off the balance sheets of large property developers to lessen their default risks. Or to encourage local governments to purchase unfinished real estate projects without further deteriorating their already fragile fiscal standing.

Premier Xi Qiang’s team has also made significant efforts to make more market space available for small and medium-sized private companies by reducing the dominance of state-owned enterprises. And global investors still are n’t clear on the state of Xi’s crackdown on China’s biggest tech companies.

Roach is one of the people who is concerned that last week’s Politburo statement only “paid lip service to fiscal stimulus imperatives,” even on fiscal issues. These actions were more likely to be viewed as broad promises than as a comprehensive list of planned actions.

Roach points out that while the Politburo vowed to stop the housing market’s decline, policy choices were made in support of this goal, primarily through lower mortgage rates, downpayment requirements for second homes, and lower interest rates on so-called social housing.

Roach remarks that the long-awaited fiscal program, which would absorb the surplus of unsold homes and turn it into low-income public housing, had a notable lack of detail.

China continues to be wary of implementing the kind of fiscal bazooka that was so successful in sparkeding its recovery in 2009-10, like Japan, where fiscal actions in the 1990s were repeatedly strained by rising public sector indebtedness. And perhaps that’s with good reason”, he says.

Roach points out that the Chinese government’s debt-to-gross domestic product ratio was 85 % in early 2024, nearly three times what it was in 2009. Following Lehman Brothers ‘ demise in the US, Beijing finally started using the stimulus apparatus.

It’s imperative, though, that Team Xi do more to deal with investors ‘ underlying concerns about China’s financial system than just throw money at the problem, economists say.

Last week, the PBOC cheered stock punters by unveiling a new 500 billion yuan ($ 71 billion ) swap facility that funds, securities firms and insurance companies can tap to buy equities. The facility could be increased to 1.5 trillion yuan ($ 214 billion ).

Beijing is also introducing a lending facility for publicly traded companies to buy back shares and increase holdings. It will start at 300 billion yuan ($ 42 billion ) and possibly grow to 900 billion yuan ($ 128 billion ). Additionally, a type of market stabilization fund might be in the works.

Last week, Wu Qing, the chairman of China Securities Regulatory Commission, said Beijing will roll out moves to encourage mergers and acquisitions.

With all that, there’s little doubt the stimulus floodgates have been opened. We believe that the persistent growth weakness has hit policymakers ‘ pain threshold, and the policy put has been triggered, as Goldman Sachs analysts wrote in a note.

Yet Team Xi needs to combine supply-side actions to further strengthen China’s investment environment for the long run to ensure the bull run continues.

As Roach explains, comparisons with Japan are far from perfect. There are many characteristics of China that are fundamentally different from those that contributed to Japan’s numerous “lost decades,” he claims.

” Other than being a large developing economy with several still untapped sources of future growth– namely, &nbsp, household consumption, urbanization, and&nbsp, insufficient capital endowment&nbsp, of its large workforce – China also benefits from understanding the lessons of Japan”.

For now, Roach admits,” China’s seemingly outsized policy stimulus took most of us by surprise”. He adds that” the financial authorities apparently came to the rescue with their own version of a “big bazooka” just as we had grownaccustomed to Beijing’s grudging response to increasingly serious economic problems. ‘&nbsp, At least that’s the verdict of the Chinese equity market”.

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China wakes, US builds, woke wanes and tariffs tally – Asia Times

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Your weekly, almost weekly Noahpinion collection of intriguing news from around the world is now in order.

1. China accepts the fact of the economic system.

I made the argument two weeks ago that China is experiencing a lack of global demand, and that the answer would be to have the central authorities A) loan out banks and local government funding entities, and B) apply fiscal and monetary stimulus. Maybe Xi Jinping reads my site. China is implementing some more significant signal steps:

In a unique staged media briefing broadcast live around the world on Tuesday, the People’s Bank of China led the charge to rekindle mood, opening its stock market and lowering borrowing costs. The next day it kept the good news flowing by&nbsp, lowering&nbsp, the interest rate on its one-year money to lenders by the most on history, while the government issued exceptional cash pamphlets and floated new incentives for some homeless graduates…

The 24-man Politburo under the leadership of Xi made a second-quarter-of-a-kind promise on Thursday, adding more growth-boosting goodies, vowing to increase governmental spending, and making its first “declining” pledge to prevent property prices. The wave of policy announcements even revealed a new emphasis on boosting use, saying it was “necessary to listen to the concerns of the people.”…

Foreign companies soon soared. Xi’s state appears to be attempting to bail out the Chinese banking system, which is even more encouraging ( at least if you want China to keep growing ):

China’s largest state lenders may receive up to 1 trillion yuan ( US$ 142 billion ) of money to strengthen their capacity to support the country’s struggling economy. Such a move would be the first moment since the global financial crisis in 2008 that Beijing has injected money into its large businesses.

Injecting money refers to “giving businesses money,” for those who are unfamiliar. It implies a loan.

This is probably even more important than trigger, since getting banks lending once is the key to a sustained recovery. Foreign supporters have long held that the state and banks are one and the same because of the “unitary position” principle, which is applied to the “unitary state” concept.

That concept is probably incorrect. Foreign banks have their own subsidies, and fear getting culled by the state if they fail. Giving them a cushion against loss by injecting them with money helps them gain the confidence to give again.

The last step in this process would be to rescue China’s regional government financing systems, which have grown to be very significant in China’s regional economies. But only bailing out the banks and doing some significant fiscal and monetary stimulus may have a huge impact in terms of shortening and ameliorating China’s recession.

2. The “build something country”

US economic policy has been shifting toward industrial policy. A number of commentators who are opposed to this change have been quick to dismiss the entire endeavor as a result of seeing any signs of trouble. For instance, Matt Cole and Chris Nicholson wrote an op-ed in The Hill in March of this year that was so explosively titled” DE I killed the CHIPS Act.”

Their single piece of evidence for this bold thesis was that TSMC’s fab in Arizona was projected to have significant delays due to a dispute with local construction unions.

In fact, the labor dispute it referenced had already been resolved even before that disparaging op-ed was published. And just one month after the op-ed was published, TSMC was given the official receipt of its CHIPS Act funding and suddenly declared that its Arizona project was on schedule.

Now, less than six months later, &nbsp, Tim Culpan reports&nbsp, that TSMC’s Arizona plant has started making some chips for Apple. They’re producing a fairly advanced chip, and they’re reportedly producing good yields:

The A16 SoC from Apple, which debuted in the&nbsp, iPhone 14 Pro, was first introduced two years ago in the&nbsp, iPhone 14 Pro, and is currently being produced in small, but significant quantities at TSMC’s Fab 21 in Arizona. This puts the Arizona project on track to reach its&nbsp, production target in the first half of 2025.

This is a BFD. The US government’s$ 39 billion CHIPS for America Fund is the star project under the CHIPS Act. The fact that they chose the most advanced chip in terms of both volume and technology shows that Apple and TSMC want to start big…

Currently, TSMC produces yields in Arizona that are, in essence, neck and neck, slightly below what is enjoyed in Taiwan back home. Most important, though, is that improvements are moving so rapidly that true yield parity between Taiwan and Arizona is expected to be reached in coming months.

Everyone has egg on their face now that everyone leaped at the chance to call the CHIPS Act a failure after the initial delay report.

In addition, the Inflation Reduction Act, Biden’s other significant piece of industrial policy legislation, appears to be giving US solar manufacturing a significant boost. Solar manufacturers are &nbsp, ramping up production, and the US is getting the ability to build the pieces of the solar supply chain that it had previously outsourced entirely to China and other countries:

Source: Jesse Peltan &nbsp

Although this is still insignificant in comparison to what China can produce, it means that if a war breaks out, the US will not be able to use solar power.

Note that both the successes in chips and solar are cases where the private sector made most of the investment itself, and the US government simply&nbsp, prompted&nbsp, that investment with subsidies.

This contrasts starkly with the US government’s promise to build things itself, and which was stymied by its lack of state funding and its own byzantine permitting process.

A big lesson to be learned from this is that Matt Yglesias is correct, and that the US government has willfully squandered a lot of its state funding since the 1970s. Therefore, the most effective industrial policy, at least right now, is for government to act as the spur for the private sector to invest its own money.

The even more important lesson is that knee-jerk critics of industrial policy need to be a little more prudent and circumspective, or else they’ll keep coming off as silly when industrial policy succeeds. We need intelligent, thoughtful critics who can identify the problems, challenges, and drawbacks that are bound to be found in industrial policy. People who simply pounce on any whiff of difficulty are unhelpful.

3. Justifications for tariffs

The US government is becoming more hostile to Chinese imports all the time. The “de minimis” exemption, which allows Chinese companies like Temu and Shein to send Americans small, inexpensive packages without paying tariffs, has recently been made public by Biden. Additionally, Biden’s administration is putting a ban on Chinese components in any cars that are connected to the internet to prevent potential sabotage, considering an outright ban.

Meanwhile, Trump is going around promising tariffs, tariffs, and&nbsp, more tariffs&nbsp, as the solution to a variety of economic ills ( or just because&nbsp, he really likes tariffs ). Some people are talking about it, but this is not the election’s most important policy issue.

For instance, Kim Clausing, an economist, contends that the US should cut down on tax havens by reducing the incentive for offshoring in favor of tariffs. But I think that while this is a laudable move, it would n’t really do much vis-a-vis China, because China is not a tax haven. The reason Democrats have been favoring tariffs on China, which is&nbsp, national security, is really missing from Clausing’s proposal.

Meanwhile, Oren Cass has a post at the Atlantic in which he makes a general case for tariffs as a useful policy tool. Some excerpts:

[Economists ‘] first error is to only take into account the costs of tariffs, and not the benefits… [ D] omestic production has value beyond what market prices reflect… [ D] tarifs [d ] omestic production has value… to the extent that they combat those harms, they accordingly bring collective benefits…

Manufacturing does matter, as the effects of globalization have shown. It matters for national security, ensuring both the&nbsp, resilience of supply chains&nbsp, and the&nbsp, capacity of the defense-industrial base. It also has a significant impact on growth…

Manufacturing is the engine of innovation. As the McKinsey Global Institute has &nbsp, noted, the manufacturing sector plays an outsize role in private research spending. Complete supply chains and engineering expertise are followed when offshore manufacturing heads. Firms and workers positioned near the factory floor and close to competitors, suppliers, and customers benefit from the tight feedback loop between design and production, which is necessary for improvements in both.

Cass also argues that the harms from tariffs will be limited when foreign companies circumvent the tariffs by building their products in the US. Additionally, he makes note that tariffs do generate more tax revenue.

You’ll hear me saying similar things when I defend industrial policy because all of these arguments are reasonable. But there are two questions here that Cass does n’t really address.

First of all, I believe Cass has largely identified real externalities, but that does n’t imply that tariffs are the most efficient policy tool for addressing those externalities. &nbsp,

Tariffs ‘ effects are limited&nbsp, by exchange rate adjustment — when you put tariffs on China, the yuan gets cheaper, partially negating the effect of the tariff. Additionally, tariffs on intermediate goods actually exacerbate many of the externalities Cass discusses by preventing domestic manufacturers from receiving affordable inputs for their production processes. For national security reasons, it might be a cost that is worthwhile to pay, but it is a real cost.

And second, Cass ‘&nbsp, general&nbsp, defense of tariffs ignores many of the real, specifc features of Trump’s tariff proposals. Trump would impose tariffs on US allies rather than strengthen national security because it would stifle competition on both sides and prevent them from achieving economies of scale. Additionally, it would strain both sides ‘ defense-industrial bases.

So on both sides of the tariff debate, I still see too much debate about ideal policies, and not enough engagement with the specific policies being enacted or proposed. That said, I think the debate has significantly improved since it was a few years ago, which is good. I always want to see more of Clausing and Cass ‘ arguments made in a reasonable way rather than yell at ideological positions.

4. The onset of fatigue

The inert coagulum of a once highly reactive sap is the conservatism of a religion — its orthodoxy. — Eric Hoffer

Let’s talk about wokeness as long as we’re on the subject of identity politics from the year 2010. I wrote a number of posts about this sociocultural phenomenon back in 2021 and this one is the one I summarized here.

My basic thesis is that wokeness is a Protestant-derived American belief system and social phenomenon that has been around since before the founding of the United States, and that it periodically resurfaces for a while when technological and economic changes allow.

And my fundamental prediction is that after the efflorescence of the 2010s, wokeness will fade into a waxy orthodoxy, ruling a shrinking number of university administrations, school boards, and online communities, before reappearing on the scene many decades from now.

Musa al-Gharbi wrote a great post last year that pulled together various data sources to show that the” Great Awakening” of the 2010s is waning. Now The Economist has &nbsp, a similar post, with different data sources. Several examples are provided:

[ D] discussion and support for woke views reached their peak in America in the early 2020s and have since declined significantly… Almost everywhere we looked, a similar trend emerged: wokeness increased sharply in 2015 as Donald Trump entered the political fray, increased in the aftermath of# MeToo and Black Lives Matter, reached its highest point in 2021-22, and has since decreased…

In the most recent Gallup data, from earlier this year, 35 % of people said they worried” a great deal” about race relations, down from a peak of 48 % in 2021 but up from 17 % in 2014…In]General Social Survey ] data the view that discrimination is the main reason for differences in outcomes between races peaked in 2021 and fell…in 2022. Young people and those on the left have experienced some of the biggest rises and subsequent declines in woke thinking…

The share of Americans who view sexism as a serious issue or a moderately serious issue reached a record high of 70 % in 2018….

Pew finds that the share of people who believe someone can be a different sex from the one of their birth has fallen steadily since 2017, when it first asked the question. According to YouGov, the proportion of trans people who play for sports teams that match their chosen gender rather than their biological sex has increased from 53 % in 2022 to 61 % in 2024.

The use of the term” white privilege” in television reached its highest level in 2021, appearing roughly 2.5 times for every million words in the New York Times and The Times in 2020…

Mentions of DEI in earnings calls shot up almost five-fold between the first and third quarters of 2020…They peaked in the second quarter of 2021…They have since begun to drop sharply again…The number of people employed in DEI has fallen in the past few years.

This corresponds to my 2021 forecasts. And if I’m correct, this pattern will continue over the coming years, even as conservatives continue to find and highlight instances of wokeness in mainstream culture, including academia, and other progressive areas. Wokeness is an orthodoxy now, and orthodoxies are n’t fun and cool anymore.

However, wokeness is not particularly optimized for being a conservative set of rules and traditions, but rather for being a charismatic activist movement. So I anticipate that its decline will be quick, up until, of course, it resurrects. But that will be when you and I are very old or dead.

5. Unions versus automation

It’s very hard to be a pro-union pundit when&nbsp, unions make demands like this one:

About 45, 000 dockworkers along the US East and Gulf Coasts are threatening to strike on October 1st, a move that would shut down ports that handle about half the nation’s cargo from ships…

The International Longshoremen’s Union wants to see a total ban on automation of cranes, gates, and container movements used in 36 US ports…

A prolonged strike would almost certainly hurt the US economy. The union members anticipate going on their biggest fight against the automation of job functions at ports, according to Union President [ Union President ] Daggett.

We do n’t think robotics should supplant humans, he said. ” Especially a human being that’s historically performed that job”.…

According to experts, it’s unclear whether automation will cause layoffs in the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, according to a study conducted by the Economic Roundtable of Los Angeles in 2022 that was funded by the West Coast dockworkers union…

However, another study conducted by a professor at the University of California, Berkeley that year, which was commissioned by port operators and shippers, found that paid hours for port union members increased by 11.2 % between 2015 and 2021, the same year.

At the huge Port of Rotterdam, one of the world’s most automated ports, union workers pushed for early-retirement packages and work-time reductions as a means to preserve jobs. And ultimately, a researcher from Erasmus University in the Netherlands discovered that mechanization did n’t lead to significant job losses.

In terms of automation, US ports outperform their counterparts in Asia and Europe. Analysts note that most US ports take longer to unload container ships than do those in Asia and Europe and suggest that without more automation, they could become even less competitive.

The prohibition of automation is only a means of destroying the goose that produces the golden eggs, ultimately causing harm to dockworkers. It also imposes a tax on the entire US economy. If you did n’t like the inflation of 2021, you should want more efficient, high-capacity automated ports. Instead of resuming self-defeating luddism, the US should emulate Rotterdam.

This shortened and reorganized article was originally published on Noah Smith’s Noahpinion&nbsp, Substack, and is now republished with kind permission. Read the original here &nbsp, and become a Noahopinion&nbsp, subscriber&nbsp, here.

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China property shares jump as major cities ease buying curbs

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After first-tier cities eased restrictions on home purchases shortly after the Politburo pledged to stop housing market declines, shares of Chinese property developers surged on Monday ( Sep 30 ). Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Mainland Properties Index jumped more than 10 per cent in first investing, and the island’s CSIContinue Reading

Chiang Mai dam opens spillway for 1st time in years

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PUBLISHED: 30 Sep 2024 at 06: 05

Water rushes out of the spillways of Mae Ngat Somboon Chon reservoir in Chiang Mai on Sunday at a rate of 110 cubic metres per second. (Photo: Irrigation Office 1 Chiang Mai)
On Sunday, liquid evaporates from the spillways of the Mae Ngat Somboon Chon pond in Chiang Mai at a rate of 110 cubic meters per second. ( Photo: Irrigation Office 1 Chiang Mai )

Officials in Chiang Mai province’s Mae Ngat Somboon Chon tank on Monday issued a warning to residents along the Mae Ngat and Ping river for potential storms, for the first time in 13 times.

According to reports in the media, the spillways of the Mae Ngat Somboon Chon pond on Sunday released 110 square meters of water per next. The release, regional officials said, will ending at 5pm on Monday.

People living on the lenders of the river were instructed to be on the lookout for sudden floods of water from upstream as water levels were anticipated to rise. The Thai Meteorological Department ( TMD) predicted further downpours will be expected in the upper Ping River basin until Tuesday, which the Royal Irrigation Department also announced on its Facebook page on Saturday.

The precipitation, which can be big in some locations, is likely to increase water flow in the Ping River and its tributaries. The RID warned that the dam’s emergency spillway could send 150 to 200 square meters of water downstream, which would have an impact on Chiang Mai city and additional downstream areas.

The groundwater spillway’s flow rate was increased to make room for more water and stop an unrestrained overflow, according to Chalermkiat Intakanok, project director.

The next time the government of Mae Ngat Somboon Chon tank was able to transfer water was in 2011, when severe flooding hit the entire nation.

Mr Chalermkiat said that although water levels along the Ping River at Nawarat Bridge have receded to 3.05 feet, which is below the critical stage, some places, including those around Chiang Mai’s economic area, remain flooded.

Clean-up initiatives are hindered by small water force, he said. Many people are now having trouble removing mud and debris because authorities have not yet dispatched liquid trucks to help.

Separately, the Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation ( DDPM) issued warnings to 63 provinces in the North, Northeast, Central Region and the South to be on alert for changing weather conditions. Storms and gusty winds may arise until Wednesday in all northern regions, all northern region regions, including Bangkok, and the southeastern state of Chumphon.

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Chao Phraya Dam bursts banks, flooding communities in Ang Thong

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PUBLISHED: 28 Sep 2024 at 13: 21

The water level in the Chao Phraya River, which runs past tambon Phong Pheng in the Pa Mok district of Ang Thong and tambon Ban Kum and Bang Chanee in the Bang Ban district of Ayutthaya, continues rising on Saturday. (Photo: Nakhon Sawan Public Relations Office)
The Chao Phraya River’s water level, which passes through Ban Kum and Bang Chanee in the Bang Ban city of Ayutthaya and tambon Phong Pheng in the Pa Mok city of Ang Thong, is continuing to rise on Saturday. ( Photo: Nakhon Sawan Public Relations Office )

On Saturday, the Chao Phraya Dam burst its lenders, sending a lot of water into affluent areas outside storm embankments in the Pa Mok city of Ang Thong state.

Three settlements in tambon Phong Pheng were affected by the storm position, with more than 20 homes submerged under 40 to 50 centimetres of rainwater.

Montri Torsillapakit, president of Phong Pheng tambon management company, on Saturday led authorities to put up bags to strengthen storm surfaces and build earthen dykes. &nbsp,

After the Chao Phraya Dam in Chai Nat discharged water downstream at a rate of 1, 899 cubic meters per second, Raksak Thienchai, the captain of the city of Pa Mok, said relief products may be distributed to enable the affected households. Over 20 properties outside storm gullies were inundated, he added.

11 central provinces along the Chao Phraya River should be prepared for rising water levels, according to the Royal Irrigation Department ( RID), as Chao Phraya Dam in Chai Nat accelerated water drainage.

Free acting director-general Det Lekwichai issued the notice on Thursday to the rulers of Uthai Thani, Chai Nat, Sing Buri, Ang Thong, Suphan Buri, Ayutthaya, Lop Buri, Pathum Thani, Nonthaburi, Samut Prakan and Bangkok.

People in Ayutthaya’s Bang Ban city, tambon Phong Pheng of Ang Thong, and tambons Bang Chanee and Ban Kum, respectively, have concerns about rising waters levels in the Chao Phraya River.

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Singapore launches 24-hour anti-scam hotline

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The fresh anti-scam collection includes renaming the existing NCPC ScamAlert programmes to ScamShield Alert in addition to the new ScamShield site. &nbsp,

The existing stations now have over 35, 000 members on WhatsApp and Telegram. &nbsp,

These programs will continue to send out scam-related cautions and bite-sized updates often, keeping subscribers informed of the newest scams and sharing ways to protect yourself from scams. &nbsp,

The Scamshield Suite combines the various anti-scam activities and programmes under one title.

K Shanmugam, the head of the laws and home affairs ministry, spoke about the transforming criminal environment in Singapore at the NCPC dinner dinner on Friday, the day before ScamShield Suite was officially launched.

Scams and crime have increased, he said, while real crime has remained persistently low for years. &nbsp,

MORE SCAM VICTIMS

A total of 26, 587 fraud cases were reported in the first quarter of 2024- a 16.3 per cent increase compared to the exact time period last season- with at least S$ 385.6 million ( US$ 295 million ) lost&nbsp, –&nbsp, a 24.6 per cent increase.

Students, young people and individuals under the age of 50 make up the majority of fraud victims at 74.2 per share.

However, among the age groups, the ordinary lost to a victim was the highest.

The state also said that&nbsp, 86 per cent of overall reported schemes in the first quarter of 2024 had involved mainly self-effected payments. &nbsp,

This may be the result of social engineering and deception, which involve a variety of sophisticated fraud schemes, it added. &nbsp,

SPF, NCPC, and OGP stressed that individuals may continue to contribute to strengthening their resilience against frauds. &nbsp,

We urge the general public to make active use of the ScamShield Suite of resources to protect themselves and their loved ones from con challenges.

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Chiang Mai begins flood clean-up

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University college back to normal, coach travellers&nbsp, to obtain full refunds for disrupted services

PUBLISHED: 27 Sep 2024 at 18: 37

A municipal official explains the plan to clean up flood damage in Chiang Mai city at a gathering for workers before they begin their tasks on Friday. (Photo: Chiang Mai Municipality Facebook account)
Workers gather at a meeting to discuss the plan to repair flood harm in Chiang Mai city on Friday, according to a municipal official. ( Photo: Chiang Mai Municipality Facebook account )

After flooding eased in some professional areas, workers have begun a campaign to clear roads and collect dust in city Chiang Mai.

In an effort to revive economic engagement in the typically bustling north tourism area, the Chiang Mai Municipality launched the activity at 5pm on Friday. The job is divided into five sections, including the famous Night Bazaar and the Naowarat Bridge.

Removing trash and debris that waters that had pierced the Ping River’s businesses into the area is one of their top priorities.

Although the situation is improving in some of the city’s designated areas for cleaning, the city cautioned inhabitants to stay vigilant. The river is also red-flagged, meaning water levels are at or near a critical level.

At 5 p.m., the Naowarat Bridge’s valley detail was estimated at 4.23 meters, after moving around that mark from 8 am all day long.

According to the provincial water office, the city still has about 3 million square meters of floodwater that needs to be emptied every two days.

Chiang Mai University, one of the recently flooded places on Friday night, was hit by discharge from the rain that soaked Doi Suthep.

In the evening, the academy announced that things had settled back down. On its Facebook page, it stated that” the traffic routes and the CMU Transit service are now operating as usual.”

On Saturday, Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra may travel to Chiang Mai from Chiang Rai.

She arrived in Chiang Rai on Friday evening and organized a meeting with leaders to distribute assistance to those affected by flood in the northern region. Among the towns in Chiang Rai that were the most afflicted were Muang and Mae Sai.

The State Railway of Thailand ( SRT ) provides buses to Lamphun and Chiang Mai, but Northern trains continue to operate at Lampang Station. &nbsp,

The SRT stated that it would recoup all discounted coach tickets purchased between September 26 and September 30.

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Japan’s Ishiba needs China to thrive to survive – Asia Times

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Japan — As Japan’s new prime minister sets out to promote development in Asia’s second-biggest business, Shigeru Ishiba is about to learn the hard way that it’s definitely up to China.

Washington, also, where authorities are making more efforts to prevent the US from experiencing the crisis economists have been anticipating for years. Beijing and Washington’s stances on stimulus may benefit Japan more than anything else Tokyo-based legislators might be able to acquiesce to in the months to come.

Ishiba, 67, will have an additional concern because his reign may last more than a year in power. Though Kishida’s been around for three ages, and coach Shinzo Abe lasted roughly eight from 2012 to 2020, Chinese chiefs tend to get 12 months to make their mark. And history shows most do n’t.

By October 2025, Japan must keep its next general election. The new government of Japan has a unique skewed economic trajectory, making it presently tick.

On the one hand, the prices Tokyo had been craving for 25 years has arrived. And the Bank of Japan is ultimately trying to restore a super-aggressive interest-rate program.

On the other, that really rising-price fluid is tanking home and business confidence. Japan is actually the country’s economic equivalent of the dog that hit the automobile as consumers avoid recession, which some people view as a secrecy tax cut.

Kishida, who became president in early October 2021, found this juggling act to be too much. Basically, Kishida’s dismal approval scores reflected political funding crises within his Liberal Democratic Party. In fact, it was an failing economy that ended his career quickly.

By putting foreign policy before economic reforms, Kishida himself gave himself no benefits. Problem is, did Ishiba, a previous defence minister, do the same?

Ishiba’s an old-school China bird who favors creating an” Eastern NATO”, a force that Xi Jinping’s government almost needs at the moment. He today has opportunity to lobby the area to create a barrier against Beijing’s interests.

Not that Tokyo’s divided political system is currently poised to pass legislation to reduce bureaucracy, release labour laws, start a business boom, empower women, or implement other reforms to improve national competitiveness.

Ishiba may understand this quickly enough. Which is why Tokyo is thus ensnared in Beijing and Washington activities.

This year, Chinese head Xi Jinping seemed to say, directly of course, that the nation’s No. 2 market is in difficulty.

Beijing announced drastic stimulus measures on Tuesday ( September 24 ) to help its economy, which is dealing with a growing property crisis. The People’s Bank of China announced its first continuous reduction in significant short-term prices and banks reserve needs since at least 2015.

This year, island stocks rose the most in the news since 2008. Additionally, according to PBOC Governor Pan Gongsheng, the company’s statement that additional cash-only restrictions on institutions are coming indicate that the stock market may have a tailwind.

Some economists concur that this is only the start of China’s signal work. ” This is a step in the right direction”, says Julian Evans-Pritchard, head of China economics at Capital Economics. ” But it wo n’t likely be sufficient to initiate a growth turnaround without greater fiscal support,” he said.

The policy announcements for this week are more good than expected, according to economist Larry Hu of Macquarie Group, but this alone may not be enough to put an end to the longest negative streak since 1999. It’s obvious, he notes, there’s “rising necessity among best officials to fight recession in China”.

The signal storm, according to Scott Rubner, Goldman Sachs ‘ handling director for worldwide markets. ” I actually think this time is different for China”, he says. Being thin China, he notes, is the “largest discussion trade” in world markets. That implies a significant benefit.

Billionaire investment David Tepper tells CNBC he’s buying more of “everything” China-related then that Beijing is hitting the gas on signal. According to Tepper, founder of Appaloosa Management,” I did n’t know that what the Fed did last week would lead to China easing,” and that’s what I thought the Fed did.

Team Xi, process, huddled with the Communist Party’s 24-man Politburo, which pledged to make this year’s 5 % growth goal. A key emphasis is that the house market” quit declining”. This suggests more help, given that data showed a month-long decline in new home prices for the first time in a century.

Members of the Politburo reportedly focused on reducing the effects of the property sector, poor domestic consumption, and large youth unemployment.

According to the Xinhua news agency,” some new conditions and issues have arisen in the current running of the economy.” ” We may view the current economic situation fully, honestly and calmly, face difficulties firmly, and strengthen confidence”.

Chinese stocks are getting a raise, also, from reports that Xi’s inner sphere is being directed to” face up to difficulties, develop confidence, and earnestly increase the sense of responsibility and urgency of doing monetary work well”.

Reuters reports that Xi’s Ministry of Finance might soon issue 2 trillion yuan ( US$ 285 billion ) of special sovereign bonds. According to Bloomberg, Beijing is considering putting more than US$ 140 billion into the biggest state-run businesses. It would be the first capital injection in this way since the” Lehman shock” of 2008 was a success.

The sooner Beijing lowers the business, the better will be for Japan’s future, and the better chance Ishiba has of becoming prime minister in a year.

China is by far Japan ‘s&nbsp, biggest trading partner. When it comes to deflation, having the best customer for your goods is often beneficial to financial confidence.

The good news in Beijing is that” the speed and scope of coverage rollouts have exceeded our expectation,” according to Jing Liu, an analyst at HSBC Holdings. ” The sea has turned, be prepared for more strategic activities”.

In Washington, also, the Federal Reserve is now in rate-cut style. That, over time, may enjoy its unique benefits as US families buy more Chinese goods.

” In the US”, says analyst Louis Gave at Gavekal Research,” the world’s largest economy, the central bank is now easing monetary policy, and January 2025 will most likely see another round of fiscal stimulus”.

That is, he adds, “unless Kamala Harris wins the presidential poll but is saddled with a Republican-controlled House of Representatives which proceeds to strengthen state spending.”

In China, Gave documents,” the world’s second largest business, the government is presently easing monetary and fiscal policies and constantly looking to boost property prices. The two biggest economies in the world do n’t sound particularly deflationary if monetary and fiscal policies are both eased at once.

Average Chinese home prices slid 6.8 % in August month on month, following a 7.6 % decline in July.

According to Yue Su, an analyst for China at the Economist Intelligence Unit,” Bottom-out stability in the housing market will be a prerequisite for homeowners to take action and break the wait-and-see period.”

This suggests that the policy’s top goal is not to raise housing prices to bring about a success effect, but to motivate families to make purchases. This real house plan aims to lower the economy‘s strain.

The problem, of course, is what’s following from Team Xi. Beijing appears to be determined to unleash its bazooka signal quickly, according to Ting Lu, Nomura’s general China economist. Markets should value Beijing’s acknowledgment of the country’s difficult economic environment and its lack of success in a wholesale approach.

What significance does these efforts have for the Bank of Japan? The BOJ increased costs to the highest level since 2008 on July 31.

Since that time, BOJ Governor Kazuo Ueda has resisted the aggressive speech that came with that tightening proceed. The central banks was chastened in part by the violent response in the world markets and in part by Ueda being summoned to the congress by concerned politicians.

Here, Ishiba’s vote was deepen the plot. He supports the BOJ tightening more forcefully, warning that the poor renminbi is reducing both Chinese purchasing power and economic trust.

Over&nbsp, the&nbsp, next 11 years, &nbsp, the&nbsp, BOJ hoarded state bonds and stocks via exchange-traded resources. By 2018, &nbsp, the&nbsp, BOJ’s stability sheet&nbsp, topped&nbsp, the&nbsp, size&nbsp, of Japan’s annual gross domestic product.

The resulting fall in the renminbi killed&nbsp, the&nbsp, urgency&nbsp, for politicians to amount playing fields, boost productivity and increase competitiveness. It even took stress off corporate CEOs to invent, restructure and destroy.

On the flipside, it’s not like Japan’s sector is performing effectively amid slow home use. To promote GDP, Ishiba’s authorities must act quickly to put some huge transformation wins on the scoreboard.

That will enable him to ensure that his presidency is present for more than just a year. It will also confirm the investor optimism that is responsible for the Nikkei 225 Stock Average reaching its all-time peaks this time.

Over the past ten years, BOJ policies and steps have been significantly weakened to support business management, contributing to Japan’s share boom.

Investors are beginning to question whether underlying fundamentals support today’s noble stock valuations now that the first ingredient is in dispute. There are some necessary quick steps to convince the Warren Buffetts of the world that Japan should be rediscovering.

A strategic approach to the US poll results on November 5th is necessary. Many Tokyo authorities are up at night due to the threat of a Donald Trump 2.0 White House and an even more risky” Trump trade” this day. Ishiba’s young authorities will be most concerned about preparing for a Trump or Harris leadership.

Tokyo’s international coverage is likely to be in a state of suspended animation until the US president is resolved. There is a good chance of there being a lot of stability with the Kishida time if Democrat Harris wins.

If Trump, a Democrat, returns to the White House, Ishiba’s LDP may devise a strategy to reduce the credit damage to Japan’s business.

Trump is certain to establish additional tariffs on China and other countries. Additionally, he is almost certain to begin his romantic relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, a rift that still perplexes the Tokyo creation.

Ishiba could undoubtedly improve the quality of Asiatic geopolitics if he took a more confrontational stance against China. Just as long as I can remember how many China’s ability to still lead in a year is based on him.

Observe William Pesek on X @WilliamPesek

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