Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Troika Demands 38 New Changes in Greek Tax, Spending and Wage Policies in Next 6 Days
Pact With the Devil Over Gold
Don't Worry, It's Only a "Mild Recession"
Misunderstanding "China's Sweatshop As Great Wall Starts Building Cars In Bulgaria"

Troika Demands 38 New Changes in Greek Tax, Spending and Wage Policies in Next 6 Days

Posted: 23 Feb 2012 03:40 PM PST

The hit parade of demands on Greece keeps right on marching. The Troika has 38 new demands in addition to 10 pages of prior demands that have not been met.

The ten-page list of prior demands need to be met by the end of the month. Fortunately this is leap year so Greece gets an extra day.

The Financial Times reports Athens told to change spending and taxes.

European creditor countries are demanding 38 specific changes in Greek tax, spending and wage policies by the end of this month and have laid out extra reforms that amount to micromanaging the country's government for two years, according to documents obtained by the Financial Times.

The reforms, spelt out in three separate memoranda of a combined 90 pages, are the price that Greece has agreed to pay to obtain a €130bn second bail-out and avoid a sovereign default that the government feared would throw Greek society into turmoil.

They range from the sweeping – overhauling judicial procedures, centralising health insurance, completing an accurate land registry – to the mundane – buying a new computer system for tax collectors, changing the way drugs are prescribed and setting minimum crude oil stocks.

"The programme is much, much more ambitious than economic reform," said Mujtaba Rahman, Europe analyst at the Eurasia Group risk consultancy. "This is state building, as typically understood in traditional low-income contexts."

Most urgency is attached to a 10-page list of "prior actions" that must be completed by Wednesday in order for eurozone finance ministers to give a final sign-off to the new bail-out at an emergency meeting scheduled for Thursday.

Among the measures that must be completed in the next seven days are reducing state spending on pharmaceuticals by €1.1bn; completing 75 full-scale audits and 225 value added tax audits of large taxpayers; and liberalising professions such as beauty salons, tour guides and diet centres.

Demands Designed to Fail

The Troika demands 75 full-scale audits and 225 valued added tax audits in 6 days! Is that going to happen?

This setup is without a doubt designed to fail and that should have been obvious ever since Germany asked to put a commission in charge of the Greek budget on Feb 7. Please see Greece to Cede Sovereignty to Eurozone "Budget Commissioner" for details.

These new demands are in addition to a requested a constitutional change that is impossible before 2013.

For details, please see Greece Needs New Constitutional Provision Imposed by the Troika; Slight Problem, Constitutionally It Can't Do it

It is possible some of the new demands need constitutional changes as well. I simply do not know.

Please also consider the Pact With the Devil Over Gold

As I have said repeatedly ...

Germany has put up roadblock after roadblock attempting to get Greece to scuttle the deal, only to have fools like Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos agree to them.

It may be up to Germany to come up with still more ludicrous demands in hope that the Greek finance minister and Greek politicians finally get the message "it's not wise to make a pact with the Troika devil", especially one that requires Greece to relinquish its gold.

On Tuesday I said it's a 9 Day Race to Ecstasy; Only Way Greece Can Win Is To Lose

It's now 6 and counting.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
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Pact With the Devil Over Gold

Posted: 23 Feb 2012 12:44 PM PST

The one and only thing that might possibly spare Greece the agony of a completely worthless currency is Greece's small hoard of 111 tons of gold.

Pact With the Devil

Yet, in the fine print in the latest deal, Greece's lenders will have the right to seize its gold reserves according to the New York Times article Growing Air of Concern in Greece Over New Bailout.

In the fine print of the 400-plus-page document — which Parliament members had a weekend to read and sign — Greece relinquished fundamental parts of its sovereignty to its foreign lenders, the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

"This is the first time ever that a European and probably an O.E.C.D. state abdicates its rights of immunity over all its assets to its lenders," said Louka Katseli, an independent member of Parliament who previously represented the Socialist Party, using the abbreviation for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. She was one of several independents who joined 43 lawmakers from the two largest parties in voting against the loan agreement.

Ms. Katseli, an economist who was labor minister in the government of George Papandreou until she left in a cabinet reshuffle last June, was also upset that Greece's lenders will have the right to seize the gold reserves in the Bank of Greece under the terms of the new deal, and that future bonds issued will be governed by English law and in Luxembourg courts, conditions more favorable to creditors.

Causing a Nightmare Scenario

On Tuesday, Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos defended the new debt agreement, calling it "the most significant deal in Greece's postwar history" and asserting that it had "averted a nightmare scenario."

Today this same puppet of the Troika installed government claims, as he has been for weeks, No Loan Deal Means Absolute Catastrophe

Greece Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos said Thursday Greece would face an absolute catastrophe if it didn't approve the terms demanded by international creditors in exchange for a second bailout, which includes a EUR107 billion debt write-down plan.

Greece is already in a state of absolute catastrophe. The one thing 100% guaranteed to make matters worse for Greece is if Greece lost its hoard of gold to the thieves and plunderers at the IMF and Troika.

Rather than "averting a nightmare scenario" that pact is going to "cause" a nightmare hyperinflation scenario.

Value of 111 Tons of Gold

One tonne = 1000 kilograms = 32150.746 troy ounces.
At $1780 per troy ounce, the value of that gold is roughly $6.35 billion.

Given an estimated size of the Greek economy at $290 billion or so, that is not a huge hoard.

However, something is better than nothing as Zimbabwe proves. Something is enough to prevent a currency from going completely worthless, although obviously not enough to prevent a massive devaluation.

Still Time

There is still time for Greece to come to its senses and reject the deal. Also recall the conditions of the deal require a constitutional change and that is impossible before 2013.

For details, please see Greece Needs New Constitutional Provision Imposed by the Troika; Slight Problem, Constitutionally It Can't Do it

Biggest Hope for Greece is Germany

In an enormous irony, Germany may be the biggest hope for Greece. Although France and other countries do want this pact to go through, Germany's words and actions prove that Germany does not.

Germany has put up roadblock after roadblock attempting to get Greece to scuttle the deal, only to have fools like Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos agree to them.

It may be up to Germany to come up with still more ludicrous demands in hope that the Greek finance minister and Greek politicians finally get the message "it's not wise to make a pact with the Troika devil", especially one that requires Greece to relinquish its gold.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

Don't Worry, It's Only a "Mild Recession"

Posted: 23 Feb 2012 07:30 AM PST

The economic clowns in the EU have finally acknowledged something that was blatantly obvious at least six months ago (and a lot longer if one factored in the likely effects of multiple austerity programs in numerous countries).

However, the economists' new conclusion is about as silly as the "no recession" call that preceded it. The new forecast: there will be a recession in the eurozone but not the EU and it will be "mild".

Please consider Euro zone economy to shrink in 2012.

The euro zone's economy is heading into its second recession in just three years, while the wider European Union will stagnate, the EU's executive said on Thursday, warning that the currency area has yet to break its vicious cycle of debt.

"Recent developments in survey data suggest that the expected slowdown will be rather mild and temporary," EU Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner Olli Rehn told a news briefing following the release of the European Commission's interim report on the EU economy.

The wider, 27-nation European Union, which generates a fifth of global output, will not manage any growth this year, the Commission said.

"The EU is set to experience stagnating GDP this year, and the euro area will undergo a mild recession," it said.

"Negative feedback loops between weak sovereign debtors, fragile financial markets, and a slowing real economy do not yet appear to have been broken," the Commission said.

Germany and France, the euro zone's two largest economies, are likely to escape recession this year, growing 0.6 percent and 0.4 percent respectively, while Greece will enter its fifth year of economic contraction and Spain will shrink 1 percent, the Commission said.

Alternate Viewpoint

Let me reiterate things I have said many times: Germany and France will not escape recession, the German export machine will see a shocking slowdown (likely billed as "no one could have possibly seen this coming"), the overall EU will face a recession with the UK leading the way (the UK is highly in recession already), and these recessions will be neither mild nor fleeting.

By the way, a "negative feedback loop" is self-correcting by definition.

Negative feedback occurs when the output of a system acts to oppose changes to the input of the system, with the result that the changes are attenuated. If the overall feedback of the system is negative, then the system will tend to be stable

The writer meant a positive feedback loop (with negative consequences).

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
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Misunderstanding "China's Sweatshop As Great Wall Starts Building Cars In Bulgaria"

Posted: 23 Feb 2012 12:23 AM PST

ZeroHedge posted an interesting article called Europe Is Now China's Sweatshop As Great Wall Starts Building Cars In Bulgaria. Unfortunately the article contains many often repeated trade fallacies as well as numerous other errors.

ZH: "With China Forecast To Reach Wage Parity With The US In Five Years, Is A New Manufacturing Golden Age Coming To The US?"

Mish: China's wages are rising fast. Sometimes in leaps of 20%. From where? How sustainable is it? Please consider this snip from the Reuters article HP, Dell watch rising China labor costs for Apple written February 22, 2012:

"Taiwan-based Foxconn said the pay of a junior level worker in Shenzhen, southern China, had risen to 1,800 yuan ($290) per month and could be further raised above 2,200 yuan if the worker passed a technical examination. It said that pay three years ago was 900 yuan a month."

Let's do the math. $290 a month is $3,480 a year. Assume 20% annual wage hikes, once a year for 5 years. Should that happen, at the end of that time, the salary would be 8,659.35. US minimum wage is $7.25 an hour (not sure what it will be five years from now), but that is about $14,500 assuming a 40 hour work-week and 2 weeks unpaid vacation.

It would take 33% raises every year for five years just to match US wages. Is that likely?

Bear in mind that shipping costs and productivity issues are also in play. This is not simply a wage issue.

ZH: As Spiegel reports, carmaker "Great Wall this week became the first Chinese automobile manufacturer to open an automobile assembly plant inside the European Union in the latest move suggesting the country's carmakers are seeking to establish a beachhead into the European market." Yes, that's right: it is now cheaper for China to make cars in the European Union: "It used to be that European carmakers opened plants to assemble their cars in China. Now the Chinese have turned the tables with the opening of their first factory in Bulgaria, an EU country with low labor costs and taxes.

Mish: Is it really cheaper to build cars in Bulgaria, or is something fundamentally different happening? I suggest the latter, possibly both, but the latter point is critical. China is sitting on huge piles of forex resereves. Those reserves must return at some point. China can either buy goods from Europe, or it can invest in Europe. What better place to invest than in a country with low taxes and low labor costs? The Bulgarian Lev currency is pegged to the euro at €1 = BGN 1.95583. Bulgaria is expected to join the Eurozone by 2015. Whether joining makes sense is debatable, but China sees an opportunity. China also has a need to put euro reserves to work. That need is a mathematical identity. By the way, this is likely a good deal for Bulgaria. It gets badly needed jobs.

ZH: Chinese carmakers are setting their sights on the European and American automobile markets." The ramifications of this landmark development are massive for virtually every aspect of the economy: for domestic labor migration, for inflation, for the trade balance, and certainly for US workers.

Mish: Agreed but for different reasons. This is a necessary part of global rebalancing.

ZH: Bulgaria, the EU's poorest country, is attractive as a labor market because it is an oasis of cheap wages and low taxes. Workers are considered well educated and the country is ideal as the site for a company like Great Wall to launch. Given that wages for factory workers have risen considerably in China in recent years, assembly sites abroad have become increasingly attractive for some manufacturers.

Mish: Exactly. So just how likely are those 33% annual raises for Chinese workers if the trend catches on? How likely are those 33% annual raises regardless?

ZH: So the real question is if Chinese wages can no longer compete with those in a poor EU member, just how high are they?

Mish: $290 a month for junior level workers and I will take a stab at not much higher for senior level workers.

ZH: And how long before China, for so many years a happy mercantilist importer of Bernanke's monetary inflation courtesy of its currency peg, is no longer competitive with ever growing parts of the EU, and then America? Does this mean that China's cheap labor force has pleateaued and the labor migration of peasants moving from the periphery to the cities no longer provides cheap labor? This was the topic of an extended analysis by SocGen from early January (posted here), of which the salient chart is presented below.

Mish: Is that alleged shortage of labor due to inflation and monetary stimulus in China or the US? How much Chinese labor goes into totally unaffordable projects driving up the price of labor? How much of the worker stagnation is simply do to falling export demand? I do not have the answers to those questions but there are multiple explanations for the alleged "shortage of labor". The single most likely explanation however, is unsustainable stimulus and growth, in China.

ZH: Aside from demographics, the macroeconomic implications on foreign trade and capital flows are monumental: most immediately for the US, it puts today's Wal Mart miss in a very different perspective, as it means that China is no longer the source of cheap commoditized produce, which in turn means that the entire discount retail vertical may have entered the secular sunsetting phase.

Mish: For a completely different viewpoint, and a deflationary one at that, please consider Hugh Hendry of Eclectica Discusses Hyperdeflation, Europe, China, and Japan.

ZH: Most importantly, it means that going forward China will have zero tolerance for Fed monetary expansion as any hot money will immediately set off an inflationary forest fire as China suddenly finds itself with absolutely no output gap slack (unlike America which allegedly has more than enough, even though it is really just a secular regression to the mean shift).

Mish: Most importantly, such events are a necessary part of global rebalancing. As a mathematical identity, China's hoard of euros must eventually return to Europe just as China's hoard of dollars must eventually return to the US. The sooner this happens the better. The US and Europe should both embrace Chinese investment. Unfortunately, that is highly unlikely.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List

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Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

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