CFR Forum: Expert Conversations on World Events.
A series of discussions about pressing international
issues hosted by CFR fellows. Every few weeks, a
different fellow hand picks a group of experts to tackle
a new subject of international importance.
As global markets fall sharply, the
BBC News website looks at the regions of the world
most affected to see what governments are doing to
alleviate the financial turmoil.
Federal Reserve Board Statistics:
Releases and Historical Data Daily, weekly,
monthly, quarterly, and annual, including commercial
paper, loan charge-offs, and medium term notes
United Nations
Economic Council for Europe: UNECE strives to foster
sustainable economic growth among its
56 member countries. To that end UNECE provides a
forum for communication among States; brokers
international legal instruments addressing trade,
transport and the environment; and supplies statistics
and economic and environmental analysis.
OECD Economic Survey France (September 2007)
In the recent OECD Economic Survey of France, the
authors focus strongly on poverty, social exclusion and
duality in the labour market. The impact of the
education system on equity and growth is critically
assessed. Several observations in this report are very
relevant for Belgium.
Canada’s economic
performance has been among the best in the OECD as a
sound policy framework has enabled the country to take
advantage of strong global growth and soaring terms of
trade. The economy has adapted well to recent shocks, as
labour and capital have shifted rapidly from
manufacturing towards the resource and service sectors,
with strong net job increases.
www.oecd.org/canada is a one-stop-shop for OECD
reports and statistics on Canada. Browse the documents
in chronological order or by topic (e.g. economy, trade,
development, environment, energy, social issues).
The Economic
Policy Institute, a nonprofit Washington D.C. think tank,
was created in 1986 to broaden the discussion about economic
policy to include the interests of low- and middle-income
workers. Today, with global competition expanding, wage
inequality rising, and the methods and nature of work changing
in fundamental ways, it is as crucial as ever that people who
work for a living have a voice in the economic discourse.
Morgan Stanley's Global Economic Forum and Strategy Bulletin:
June 30, 2009
Global Economic Analysis: Real-time
coverage of the globaleconomy. Analysis, data,
forecasts by Moody's Economy.com. Subscription based.
World Markets - Technical
Analysis
Alternating leadership. A long-term
review of bull markets
Over
the past 120 years, there has been a constant shifting
of leadership between stocks and commodities. From 1875
to 1905, the U.S. stock market provided greater relative
performance than raw materials. This changed to
highlight commodities over equities from 1905 to 1920.
The crown shifted back to stocks throughout the 1920s
only to lose that leadership again to natural resources
from 1930 to 1946. Stocks, once again, offered greater
relative performance over commodities in the late 1940s
and continue to prove superior until 1965 where raw
material prices took the leadership back from stocks and
provided higher returns for investors until 1982. The
secular shift occurred again in the 1980s and 1990s with
raw material prices remaining flat to down and the S&P
500 enjoying one of its strongest upward runs. The
leadership was once more transferred back to natural
resources in 2000 and commodities are now in a secular
bull market whereas the paper-based S&P 500 has been
pinned in a nine year bear market.
Chart
1 illustrates the leadership transfer, over the past 20
years, of the S&P 500 and the Commodity Research Bureau
Index (CRB). One of the main triggers for this
alternating performance is the movements of the U.S.
Dollar Index. In recent times, from the mid-1960s to
present, whenever the USD has been weak, it has fueled
future inflationary pressures and driven the price of
commodities upward. In contrast, the stability and
upward movement of the big dollar in the 1980s and 1990s
provided the underpinning for a disinflation environment
which allowed the paper-based S&P 500 to enjoy a
substantial advance from 90 to 1600.
As mounting nation debt and negative fundamentals began
to weight down the American currency in 2000-2002, the
tide of greater relative performance began to favour
commodities over stocks. The secular bull market for
stocks had ended and the next long-term run for natural
resources had begun.
The correlation between the dollar on the CRB can be
closely seen in Chart 2. This long-term picture outlines
the affects of the currency to raw material prices.
Bottom line: Since 1875, the average transfer of bull
market leadership between stocks and commodities has
been about 18 years. Historical data would suggest that
the current 9-year bear market of the S&P 500 is only
half completed. Building inflationary pressures are also
a byproduct of prolonged leadership in natural
resources. During the last great commodities bull market
(1965-1980) stagflation was the initial development in
the early 1970s which was followed by hyperinflation and
interest rates exceeding 20%.
Investment approach: The downward trending USD is
steadily moving commodity prices higher. Economic
demand, largely generated from Asia, is anticipated to
rebuild starting in 2010. Commodities can be expected
outperform stocks for another two business cycles (8-9
years). As the leadership contest between stocks and raw
materials is a normal reoccurring development within the
markets, investors may wish to overweight their
portfolios toward commodities for the next few years to
take advantage of this present secular bull market.
Suggested exchange traded funds are: PowerShares DB
Commodity Index Tracking (DBC), PowerShares Agriculture
(DBA), StreetTracks Gold (GLD), PowerShares DB Base
Metals (DBB), iShares Comex Gold Trust (IGT), iShares
S&P/TSX Materials (XMA), iShares S&P/TSX Energy (XEG),
Claymore Global Mining (CMW)and Claymore Global
Agriculture (COW).
More research is available in the June newsletter. Go to
www.technicalspeculator.com and click on member login.
IMF:
Reshaping the Global Economy The economic and financial crisis marks the end (for
now) of a rapid expansion of globalization (March 2009)
Economics A-Z: Pareto efficiency? Phillips
Curve? Inflation? Deflation? Stagnation? Look up
economic terms in this handy online resource, provided
by The Economist
IMF Commodity Prices -- Monthly updates of tables
providing information on primary commodity market
developments.
Webfinanser is the financial site for
Scandinavian market. We give you all you need in
the area of finances for Scandinavia. (Multilingual)
PathEast is a
research and consulting company that specializes in
helping clients identify and capitalize on investment
opportunities in Central and Eastern Europe
(CEE).
CEEmarket.com
- a reliable source of information on the macroeconomic
situation in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Russia
and Slovakia.
www.karoll.net
focuses on the financial/economic/capital market news
and analyses of the emerging capital markets in
Bulgaria, Romania and Russia. The site provides the
latest stock exchanges news, quotes, comments and
technical analyses as well as the opportunities to
invest on those three dynamic markets.
Asian
Development Bank: ADB is an international
development finance institution whose mission is to help
its developing member countries reduce poverty and
improve the quality of life of their people.
The
China Perspective provides business-related
information with daily updates of major trends and
developments in the burgeoning Chinese economy, as well
as a weekly summary of the most pertinent issues in the
foreign press. $$$
The
JapanInvestor
is dedicated to investors in Japanese stocks,
bonds and the yen. TJI provides a weekly strategic
analysis of Japanese stocks and financial markets,
providing you with views you can profitably use to
invest in Japan.
Asian
Business Watch - A comprehensive source for
investment and economic information on Asia and Japan.
Australian
Stock Exchange data and information: Live Data
from the Australian Stock Exchange. ASX data, End of
day. Live, Dynamic. Australian economic news. Financial
& company news. Charts.
Sharetradingeducation: Home of
the Investing Online Newsletter & practical risk
management and tools. Download FREE TRIAL ISSUE and free
sample of Atkinson-Guppy Articles ebook of articles from
Daryl Guppy's newsletter, Atkinson portfolio tools &
Home Study courses on the work of Jim Berg, Daryl Guppy,
Alan Hull and Simon Sherwood.
InfoMoney focuses on providing
financial information about the Brazilian market.
News, stock quotes, technical and fundamental analysis
and interactive tools. (Portugese)
Financial
Chat
is home to the Internet's most sophisticated and
active real-time trading chatrooms. In our forums, we
have some of the world's finest traders with us daily,
willing to share information in real time, as well as
educate and assist you in your trading. Real traders
trading US and foreign markets, posting real-time
trades, and giving real-time market commentary.
StocksAbroad.com
- Resources for Investing in Asia and Latin America
Stocks
The XE.com
Universal Currency Converter ®, the world's most
popular currency tool. You can perform interactive
foreign exchange rate calculations, using live,
up-to-the-minute currency rates.
Forex Trading
- Online 2 pips forex trading with Leading Swiss
Brokerage House.
NEW: OECD Factbook 2009:The online gateway to OECD Factbook PDFs,
Excel™ and interactive graphs. Access to the key
indicators for the World’s leading economies is only a
click away. To access all the contents free online,
click
here.
Global Business Cycle Indicators
- The Conference Board publishes leading,
coincident, and lagging indexes designed to signal peaks
and troughs in the business cycle for nine countries
around the world
The confluence of multiple adverse
shocks—the turbulence in financial markets, high
commodity prices, and the appreciation of the exchange
rate—have depressed growth in Europe. At the same time
commodity prices increases have boosted headline
inflation. While containing inflation remains a major
concern, supporting the recovery is likely to gain
policy prominence in the advanced economies. Looking
forward, improvements in prudential regulation could
mitigate the procyclicality of credit standards, which
should help reduce macroeconomic volatility.
Cross-border labor flows are generally seen to have
beneficial macroeconomic effects.
The November 2008 Asia and Pacific
REO focuses on the difficult economic environment facing
policymakers in the region. Chapter 1 provides an
overview of the outlook for the region. With growth
slowing, and the global financial crisis increasingly
affecting the region, macroeconomic and financial
policies will need to be proactive. Chapter 2 looks more
closely at inflation in Asia, finding that it is
increasingly imported and volatile, which raises
important questions about monetary policy frameworks in
the future. Chapter 3 takes a longer-term look at how
the expected rapid aging of the region may affect
capital flows and financial markets in the years to
come.
The ongoing global turmoil
represents a confluence of negative shocks for Latin
America and the Caribbean: a freeze in global credit
markets, weaker external demand, and lower commodity
prices. But the region is expected to deal with these
global shocks better than in previous crises, reflecting
progress made in improving macroeconomic fundamentals
over the past decade. Still, there are a number of
downside risks going forward. Against this uncertain
background, the report discusses the implications of the
global financial crisis for the regional outlook and the
corresponding challenges facing policymakers.
Regional Economic Outlook: Middle
East and Central Asia underlines that the region has
continued to experience strong growth in 2008, and the
short-term outlook is generally favorable. However,
inflation has emerged as a key issue, and while the
global credit crunch has thus far had a limited impact
on regional financial markets, the financial turmoil and
slowdown in developed economies could lower growth in
the period ahead. Policies will need to focus on
tightening the fiscal and monetary stance where
appropriate, with greater exchange rate flexibility, and
continuing efforts to strengthen the resilience of
financial sectors.
Sub-Saharan Africa's prospects have
deteriorated somewhat and the risks have
increased, according to the October 2008
Regional Economic Outlook: Sub-Saharan Africa.
Growth in the region is projected to dip to 6
percent in 2008 and 2009. The fall is due mainly
to the global food and fuel price shock, which
has weighed particularly on growth in
oil-importing countries, and to the global
financial market turmoil, which has slowed
global growth and demand for Africa's exports.
Inflation is expected to rise to 12 percent in
2008, mainly on account of the food and fuel
price shock. As a result of rising prices,
particularly of food, poverty may well be on the
increase in 2008. In 2009, inflation should ease
to 10 percent, helped by recent commodity price
declines. There are significant risks to the
outlook related to a potentially deeper and
longer period of global financial turmoil and
resulting slowdown in global activity, and
substantial uncertainty concerning commodity
prices.
International Data Base - Produced by the U.S.
Census Bureau, IDB is a data bank containing statistical
tables of demographic and socio-economic data for 227
countries and areas of the world
Moody's
Economy.com FreeLunch.com is a great source of free
economic data. Users can quickly and easily chart and
download economic data. Moody's Economy.com data
services teams in Asia, Europe, and the United States
update FreeLunch.com's economic data as is it is
released by the primary source.
InfoNation
- From the United Nations, this site allows users to
generate customized statistical and comparative tables
using current information for all UN member countries
An Economic Survey is published every 1½-2 years for
each
OECD country and for some larger countries that are
not members of the OECD, such as
China, Russia and
Brazil. It identifies the main economic challenges
faced by the country and analyses policy options to meet
them. You can find all Surveys catalogued
by country.
The publication
Going for Growth takes stock of growth performance
for each country and identifies ways to improve
productivity and employment on the basis of
international benchmarking.
OECD
Country summaries (31 individual PDF files,
including a euro area summary)
Also see
Annex Tables: 61 cross-country tables of historical
data and projections (XLS)
Click on the country of your choice and all OECD
documents pertaining specifically to the country will be
listed. Don't miss the the "Economic Surveys" listed
under "Country Surveys/Reviews/Guides".
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Europe
Morgan Stanley's Global Economic Forum and Strategy Bulletin:
June 30, 2009
