Deficit
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Apr 16, 2019; Arlington, TX, USA; Los Angeles Angels relief pitcher Dillon Peters (52) reacts to giving up a two run home run to Texas Rangers center fielder Joey Gallo (13) during the sixth inning at Globe Life Park in Arlington. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports
April 17, 2019
James Paxton struck out 12 and pitched eight dominant innings of two-hit ball to outpitch Chris Sale, and the host New York Yankees rolled to an 8-0 victory over the Boston Red Sox on Tuesday night.
Paxton (2-2) delivered his best showing as a Yankee by thriving in the first meeting between the rivals since the Red Sox won Games 3 and 4 of the American League Division Series last October.
Clint Frazier, Mike Tauchman and Gleyber Torres homered for the Yankees, who scored their most runs in a home game this season. Frazier hit a solo homer off Sale (0-4) to start the fourth after the Yankees built a 2-0 lead on RBI singles by DJ LeMahieu and Luke Voit in the third.
Tauchman had an RBI double off Sale in the fourth and then slugged a three-run homer off Erasmo Ramirez in the sixth. After Tauchman’s first career homer, Torres made it 8-0 by opening the seventh with his fourth homer of the season.
Pirates 5, Tigers 3 (10 innings)
Starling Marte hit a two-out, two-run homer in the 10th and Pittsburgh topped host Detroit. Marte’s homer was his second this season and Jung Ho Kang also hit his second homer, a two-run shot in the fourth.
Pinch hitter Jason Martin led off the 10th with a single. Reliever Shane Greene retired the next two batters before Marte jumped on a slider and launched it over the left-center wall. Greene (0-1) hadn’t allowed a run this season before Marte’s long ball.
Keone Kela (1-0) picked up the win despite giving up a ninth-inning run. Nick Kingham recorded his first save by getting the last three outs.
Phillies 14, Mets 3
Scott Kingery and J.T. Realmuto each had three hits and five RBIs as host Philadelphia built a 10-run lead in the first inning and cruised over New York as Mets starter Steven Matz (1-1) faced the first eight batters without recording an out and was lifted for Drew Gagnon.
Kingery hit a three-run home run and set a career high for RBIs. He entered the night with no RBIs through 17 at-bats this year. Realmuto added a solo homer, and Maikel Franco also had a three-run homer.
Phillies starter Nick Pivetta (2-1) tossed five innings and gave up seven hits and three runs. Jerad Eickhoff picked up a rare four-inning save, allowing no runs on three hits.
Diamondbacks 9, Braves 6
Christian Walker had three hits, including the go-ahead homer in the ninth inning, to help visiting Arizona beat Atlanta as Walker was 3-for-4 with two runs and two RBIs.
Walker, playing first base while Jake Lamb is out with a strained left calf, led off the ninth with a long, majestic homer, his fifth. It came against Atlanta reliever A.J. Minter (0-2) and put Arizona ahead to stay.
Adam Jones followed by doubling in two insurance runs against Jacob Webb, who was making his major league debut for the Braves. Yoshihisa Hirano (1-1), who worked 1 1/3 scoreless innings, was the winner. Greg Holland got the save, his third.
Cubs 4, Marlins 0
Jose Quintana pitched seven scoreless innings, and Javier Baez blasted an opposite-field, 439-foot home run as Chicago defeated host Miami as Quintana (2-1) allowed six hits and no walks, striking out seven and extending his scoreless streak to 14 innings.
Against Miami, Quintana threw first-pitch strikes to 21 of 27 batters. He retired nine straight hitters from the first to the fourth innings, and he had an 8-6 groundball-to-fly-out ratio. He also picked up 15 swing-and-miss strikes.
Baez, who is hitting .314, went 3-for-4, including two singles and his fifth homer of the season. Miami starter Pablo Lopez (1-3) lost his third straight start, allowing five hits, one walk and two runs in five innings. He struck out six.
Blue Jays 6, Twins 5
Teoscar Hernandez broke a tie with a two-out, bases-loaded single in the seventh inning and then combined to throw out the potential game-tying run for the final out of the game as Toronto held on in Minneapolis.
It was the second straight game in which Hernandez had the game-winning hit for the Blue Jays, as he belted a three-run home run in the eighth inning on Monday night to rally Toronto to a 5-3 victory.
Aaron Sanchez (2-1) pitched six innings for the win, allowing four runs on four hits and four walks while striking out five. Ken Giles picked up his fifth save despite allowing a run in the ninth.
Rays 4, Orioles 2
Avisail Garcia hit a two-run homer that gave Tampa Bay the lead for good and finished with three RBIs as they defeated visiting Baltimore, winning for the seventh time in eight games while the Orioles lost for the sixth time in eight games.
Garcia’s homer came off Baltimore starter Dylan Bundy (0-2) in the fourth inning as Tampa Bay rallied from an early 2-0 deficit. He added an RBI single in the eighth inning.
Tampa Bay right-hander Tyler Glasnow (4-0) struggled over the first three innings, giving up two runs, but then settled down and didn’t yield another run in his seven-inning stint.
Giants 7, Nationals 3
Evan Longoria, Steven Duggar and Brandon Belt hit homers off Stephen Strasburg as light-hitting San Francisco beat host Washington. Nationals manager Dave Martinez was ejected in the fifth for arguing with home plate umpire Tony Randazzo after several of his players took called third strikes.
The Giants entered the game last in the National League with a team batting average of .199 and they now have 13 homers. Longoria and Duggar homered in the fifth for a 3-1 lead and Belt hit a solo shot in the sixth to make it 4-1.
Gerardo Parra had an RBI double in the seventh and some sloppy fielding by the Nationals led to a run-scoring infield single by Joe Panik for a 6-1 advantage in the seventh. The Giants took a 7-3 lead in the eighth on an RBI single by Kevin Pillar off struggling reliever Trevor Rosenthal.
White Sox 5, Royals 1
Yoan Moncada homered twice, and Reynaldo Lopez pitched six effective innings for his first win of the season as host Chicago stopped Kansas City.
Lopez (1-2), who entered the game with a 12.15 ERA, permitted five hits and a run in his 104-pitch stint. He issued two walks and struck out five. Four relievers obtained the final nine outs as Chicago won for the fourth time in five games and clinched a victory in the three-game series that concludes Wednesday.
Jorge Lopez (0-2) fanned 10 and walked two over six innings for Kansas City, but he couldn’t keep the ball in the yard, allowing three homers among his eight hits. Lopez was touched for four runs.
Rangers 5, Angels 0
Joey Gallo and Asdrubal Cabrera provided the power and right-hander Mike Minor (2-1) threw a three-hit shutout as Texas shut down Los Angeles in Arlington, Texas.
Gallo welcomed Angels reliever Dillon Peters in the sixth inning by crushing his second pitch, a low fastball right in Gallo’s sweet spot, 439 feet into the right-field bleachers for a five-run cushion.
In the fourth, Gallo helped to spoil the first start for Angels right-hander Jaime Barria (1-1), who was promoted to the big leagues Monday. Barria got two quick outs to start the inning and had Gallo down in the count, 1-2. But Gallo held off on three straight sliders to work a walk and set up Cabrera. He sent a deep fly to right that Kole Calhoun nearly snagged at the wall, but the ball bounced off his glove and out for Cabrera’s sixth home run and a 3-0 Texas lead.
Rockies 8, Padres 2
Nolan Arenado homered in a third straight game, and Jon Gray continued his mastery of San Diego as visiting Colorado completed a two-game series sweep.
Arenado’s two-run homer in the first, which followed a single by Garrett Hampson, produced the first runs scored by the Rockies in the first inning this season. Colorado would score five runs in the first three innings against Padres left-handed rookie Nick Margevicius (1-2).
Meanwhile, Gray (1-3) didn’t allow a hit until Wil Myers led off the bottom of the fifth with his second homer in as many nights and his fifth of the season.
Brewers 8, Cardinals 4
Brandon Woodruff threw 5 2/3 innings and doubled home two runs for Milwaukee against visiting St. Louis as Woodruff (2-1) allowed two runs and seven hits while striking out six and walking two.
He also improved to 5-for-7 at the plate this season, and the Milwaukee pitching staff is 12-for-31 overall.
Christian Yelich also continued to make big contributions for Milwaukee, especially against the Cardinals. Yelich went 2-for-5 with a three-run homer, improving to 11-for-21 in six games against St. Louis this season with eight home runs and 18 RBIs.
–Field Level Media
Source: OANN
Retired army officers hold Lebanese flags as they block a highway during a protest in Naameh, south of Beirut, Lebanon April 16, 2019. REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir
April 16, 2019
BEIRUT (Reuters) – The Lebanese government has yet to disclose its budget for 2019 but protesters are already in the streets fearing the “difficult and painful” reforms it is expected to announce as it tries to get spending in control and rein in public debt.
Retired army officers blocked several highways with burning tires on Tuesday, a preemptive warning to the government against any cuts to their pensions that might be part of its effort to reduce one of the world’s heaviest public debt burdens.
Though small, the protests offered a glimpse of the political minefield facing the government.
The budget is seen as a critical test of its will to enact long-stalled reforms that economists say are more pressing than ever for an economy that has suffered years of low growth. State finances are strained by a bloated public sector, high debt servicing costs and hefty subsidizes spent on the power sector.
“We went out today to tell them that our pensions are a red line,” said Khaled Ammar, one of a number of retired officers blocking the highway south of Beirut.
The budget has yet to be finalized but speculation it will include cuts to the massive public wage bill has grown since Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil hinted at such steps on Saturday.
“There are those who should be making people aware today that if a temporary reduction doesn’t happen, then there will be no salaries for anyone,” he wrote on Twitter, adding that “if we must start with the ministers and MPs, so be it”.
Protesters said tackling corruption should be the priority.
“If the economic condition of the country has reached this difficult level … we are not responsible for it, the politicians are,” said Ammar, a father of three who served in the military for three decades.
BLOATED PUBLIC SECTOR
Lebanese leaders have been warning of economic crisis for some time. In a February policy statement, the new government committed itself to launching fast and effective reforms that could be “difficult and painful” to avoid a worsening of economic, financial and social conditions.
Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri said last week he was concerned about a Greek-style crisis in Lebanon while saying that government measures would prevent “economic problems”.
At a Paris conference last year, Lebanon promised to cut its budget deficit by 1 percent of gross domestic product a year over five years. Economists are now looking for a bigger cut because last year’s deficit was bigger than expected at between 10-1/2 to 11 percent of GDP instead of a projected 8.2 percent.
Serious reforms would help Lebanon unlock some $11 billion in financing pledged in Paris.
The government last week approved a plan to overhaul the power sector – a major drain on state finances for years. Critics say the government must deliver this time, pointing to previous such plans that were never implemented.
The public sector wage bill is the state’s biggest outgoing, followed by servicing the public debt equal to around 150 percent of GDP. The wage bill went up in 2017 after increases were agreed ahead of a parliamentary election.
Nassib Ghobril, chief economist at Lebanon’s Byblos Bank, hopes to see the deficit brought down by 2 percent of GDP and says reforms should include shutting down the many obsolete government agencies.
“They have to freeze hiring, freeze future salary increases, and increases in benefits, and they have to cut the number of public sector employees and restructure the way companies restructure when they are in financial difficulties,” he said.
“The public sector has recruited 31,000 people over the last four years – more than the entire financial sector.”
(Reporting by Tom Perry, Amina Ismail, Laila Bassam; Editing by Frances Kerry)
Source: OANN
FILE PHOTO: Pigs nearing market weight stand in pens at Duncan Farms in Polo, Illinois, U.S. April 9, 2018. REUTERS/Daniel Acker
April 16, 2019
By Chris Prentice and Tom Polansek
NEW YORK/CHICAGO (Reuters) – China would likely lift a ban on U.S. poultry as part of a trade deal and may buy more pork to meet a growing supply deficit, but it is not willing to allow a prohibited growth drug used in roughly half the U.S. hog herd, two sources with knowledge of the negotiations said.
The United States and China are trying to hammer out a deal to end a months-long trade war that has cost the world’s two largest economies billions and roiled global financial markets and supply chains.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration is pressing Beijing to address concerns over Chinese practices on intellectual property rights, forced technology transfer and industrial subsidies.
Washington is also pushing for greater market access for agricultural products by seeking to reduce tariffs, lift bans and overhaul regulatory processes. The United States has asked Beijing to lift its bans on the drug ractopamine, which some U.S. pork producers use to boost hog growth, and on U.S. poultry, said two sources briefed on the discussions who spoke on condition of anonymity.
China’s negotiators have resisted lifting the ractopamine restriction even though Beijing may boost imports of U.S. pork as its own hog herd is devastated by disease, the sources said.
Huge losses in China’s hog herd due to African swine fever have left the world’s largest pork market facing a protein deficit, stoking hopes among U.S. pork and poultry producers.
“I think that China will do anything possible to make it easier for them to import protein,” said Bob Brown, an independent U.S. livestock market analyst. “This is such a gigantic thing,” he said of African swine fever.
Up to 200 million pigs could be culled or die from infections as the disease spreads through China, reducing the nation’s pork output by 30 percent from 2019, according to Rabobank.
Iowa State University agricultural economist Dermot Hayes said he expects China will import about 4 million to 6 million tonnes of pork in 2020, following losses in Chinese herds. The amount imported from the United States will depend on a trade deal, because Beijing maintains tariffs on shipments of American pork and has alternative suppliers, he said.
The Chinese poultry market also “has tremendous potential” for U.S. producers, said Jim Sumner, president of the USA Poultry and Egg Export Council in Stone Mountain, Georgia, valuing it at $500 million.
“With China’s situation with African swine fever, they’re going to have a real protein shortage in the near future,” he said.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture projects China’s total chicken imports will surge 68 percent this year to 575,000 tonnes, not including popular chicken feet, as African swine fever spurs consumers to turn to proteins other than pork. The disease is fatal to pigs but not harmful to humans.
Beijing has banned all U.S. poultry and eggs since January 2015 due to an avian influenza outbreak, which has been over for years. That caused imports to tank after the United States shipped $390 million worth of poultry and products to China in 2014. The following year, shipments were less than a fifth of that, at $74 million.
China lifted a similar restriction on poultry from France last month, and last year dropped duties on U.S. white-feathered broiler chickens. A total lifting of the ban would reopen the gates for U.S. poultry to compete in the world’s largest, and best-paying, market for products like chicken feet, and benefit companies such as Sanderson Farms Inc..
While it looks increasingly likely China may lift its ban on U.S. poultry, Beijing is seeking a “two-way street” and would want to be able to export some poultry products to the United States as well, two sources said.
China’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs did not respond to a request for comment. A spokeswoman for the U.S. Trade Representative’s office declined to comment.
A U.S. meat exporter said officials from the USTR indicated that China will not drop its ban on ractopamine, though trade talks are still ongoing.
Chinese authorities blocked the use of ractopamine in livestock in 2002. They say it can cause health problems in people and is too similar to clenbuterol, an illegal additive in pig feed used to keep meat lean. The European Union also prohibits ractopamine, although the United States and other countries say it is safe.
Keeping the ban on ractopamine could benefit companies such as Smithfield Foods, a subsidiary of Hong Kong-listed WH Group Ltd that already raises most of its hogs without the drug. WH Group declined to comment. Smithfield Foods did not respond to request for comment.
Other U.S. pork producers that use the drug could benefit if China dropped its ban.
“It’s unfortunate news,” Christine McCracken, senior protein analyst with Rabobank in New York, said of the likely continuance of the ractopamine ban.
(Reporting by Chris Prentice in Washington and Tom Polansek in Chicago; Additional reporting by Dominique Patton in Beijing; Editing by Caroline Stauffer and Dan Grebler)
Source: OANN
Yesterday was tax day.
We’d like to think the money we hand over to the IRS is paying for stuff – things like roads, education and national defense. But an increasing number of tax dollars are simply going to pay interest on the national debt. According to Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget president Maya MacGuineas, the average taxpayer forked over more than $2,000 this year just to cover their share of the interest on the national debt.
In other words, we’re not paying for stuff today. We’re paying for the spending of the past.
In an op-ed published by The Hill, MacGuineas and former Pensylvania Gov. Ed Rendell said interest payments on the debt rank as the fastest growing part of the federal budget. It will be bigger than Medicaid next year and larger than the military budget by 2025.
Even so, borrowing and spending show no signs of slowing. The federal government set an all-time record monthly deficit of $234 billion in February. The net interest payment that month alone was $25 billion. The annual interest expense for the federal government is approaching $500 billion. And it will continue to accelerate as each month’s deficit adds to a national debt already topping $22 trillion.
Despite the ever upward spiraling debt, there seems to be no urgency to address this issue in Washington D.C. The Hill article lists a litany of excuses used to sweep the problem under the rug.
- Tax cuts pay for themselves (they don’t)
- “My priority” is too important to worry about paying for it.
- Don’t worry we can just print more money
- The debt isn’t really important and we can deal with it down the road.
Wrap your head around this. At the current rate, within 50 years, the national debt will be twice as large as the entire US economy. This is using conservative numbers and assumes Congress doesn’t do anything to make the situation worse – probably not a safe assumption.
These spiraling interest payments are one of the reasons the Federal Reserve can’t let interest rates rise. Every uptick in the interest rate increases the government’s interest payment. At the current trajectory, the cost of paying the annual interest on the US debt will equal the annual cost of Social Security within 30 years.
Now, imagine where we’d be if we were actually in a “normal” interest rate environment. If the interest rate on Treasury debt stood at 6.2% – as it did in 2000 – the annual interest payment on the current debt would nearly triple to $1.3 trillion.
This is a debt-spiral.
Mike Adams exposes the agenda of the private Fed as a war against the prosperity of Americans that simply want to make America great.
John Rubino of DollarCollapse.com made an important observation about the trajectory of interest payments. They were held artificially low through the massive Obama spending spree thanks to the Fed’s low interest rate policy.
“The decline in interest expense between 2007 and 2014 – while we were running trillion-dollar deficits – was due to the Fed lowering interest rates to levels not seen since the Great Depression. This seemingly free lunch led many in the political/Keynesian class to conclude that they’d discovered a perpetual motion machine: simply cut interest rates every year and borrowing is essentially free … The recent 25% spike in interest expense in just three years exceeds the percentage increase in government debt because interest rates rose concurrently. So the US is now being hit with a double-whammy of debt that’s both rising and becoming more costly. Now the real trouble begins. As the government’s short-term debt is refinanced at ever-higher interest rates, interest expense will rise even more steeply. Within three years at the current rate of borrowing, US federal debt will be $25 trillion. An average interest rate of 4% – below the historical norm and easily within reach if current trends continue – will produce an annual interest expense of $1 trillion. Interest will be the government’s largest single budget item, raising the deficit and adding to future debt increases. The perpetual motion machine will have shifted into reverse.”
When you get into a debt-spiral, rising interest expense begets higher deficits begets rising interest expense. As Rubino points out, once you’re in the spiral, there really isn’t a way out – only a choice of crises. Push rates down and risk a currency collapse or allow rates to continue rising and burst the bubble economy.
Big Tech is now bragging about the amount of control they will have over public discourse online. Alex explains that globalists have been planning to have this type of control for decades.
Source: InfoWars
FILE PHOTO: Workers assemble vehicles on the assembly line of the SEAT car factory in Martorell, near Barcelona, Spain, October 31, 2018. REUTERS/Albert Gea//File Photo
April 16, 2019
By Belén Carreño and Ingrid Melander
MADRID (Reuters) – For the first time in a decade, Spain’s economy is taking a back seat in an election campaign as the main contenders, switching tack with a growth run entering its sixth year, focus on winning voters’ hearts rather than filling their wallets.
That suggests whichever parties take office after the April 28 ballot are unlikely to shake up economic policy – a source of worry for some analysts and business leaders who believe unconcern could lapse into complacency.
Voters say unemployment, still hovering around 14 percent, remains a major problem, and the pension system and labor market are overdue for structural reform.
However, the jobless rate has nearly halved from its 2013 peak, and growth in the euro zone’s fourth largest economy has consistently outpaced the bloc’s average since shortly after it exited recession in the same year.
That has encouraged the main candidates in Spain’s most open election in decades not to dwell on the need for further reform.
Instead, they are focusing on a range of often emotive social issues, including Catalonia’s independence drive, women’s rights, Francisco Franco’s legacy and the depopulation of small villages.
Part of that shift is also down to the rapid emergence of a populist party Vox which, barring a single deputy some 40 years ago, looks certain to become the first far-right party to sit in the lower house of parliament since Franco’s dictatorship ended in 1975.
Vox leader Santiago Abascal, far from focusing on the economy during campaigning, has criticized former conservative prime minister Mariano Rajoy – who built his reputation dragging Spain out of recession – for doing so at the expense of other issues.
“He forgot that it was the nation that was truly at risk,” Abascal told Antena 3 TV last week, in a nod to the political crisis that erupted in Catalonia in 2017, when Rajoy imposed direct rule on the province after it unilaterally declared independence.
While that crisis rumbles on, the IMF expects the Spanish economy to grow 2.1 percent this year, well above its 1.3 percent euro zone forecast, boosted by domestic demand, public spending and ultra-low interest rates.
In a poll by the state-run Center for Sociological Studies (CIS), voters cited unemployment as their main concern, but this is not reflected in the public debate.
One reason, said Federico Steinberg, economist at Madrid’s Universidad Autonoma, is that many of those out of work tend not to vote, and candidates want to avoid worrying those in jobs by talking about deep and possibly painful structural reforms.
“No party wants to talk about the fact that the reforms they are going to make would generate losers,” he said.
JOBS MISMATCH
Some say this approach is shoring up problems for later.
“After the elections, we need to flee from short-term measures and promote a reformist agenda with a long-term vision, inclusive growth and social cohesion,” Santander chairman Ana Botin told shareholders on Friday.
Economy Minister Nadia Calvino sees one priority as tackling a mismatch between jobs and the skills the unemployed can offer, she told Reuters in an interview last month.
For now, however, what little economic content has appeared on campaign platforms has generally sent two simpler messages – changing the tax base and safeguarding pensions.
Because one in four voters is a retiree, all parties have tried to bill themselves as the main defender of the pension system. But while the right has said it wants to cut taxes sharply, the left aims to increase public spending across the board.
None have explained in detail how their proposals would impact the public deficit, which Spain has given a priority to narrowing in recent years.
According to calculations by Ignacio Conde-Ruiz, analyst at the Fedea economic think-tank, they would all widen the budget gap.
Out on a limb, Vox has dismissed Spain’s pension system as a pyramid scheme, and proposed creating a new system from scratch.
But with Vox’s chances of playing a major role in government limited, analysts doubt the next administration will produce any economic big bangs.
Goldman Sachs believes all possible coalition governments after April 28 would be committed to the European project and a competitive market economy.
“As such, changes to economic policies are likely to be more incremental than transformational… A limited further reform agenda implies some risks of complacency,” its analysts wrote in a note.
(Reporting by Belen Carreno; Writing by Ingrid Melander; Additional reporting by Jesus Aguado; Editing by Mark Bendeich and John Stonestreet)
Source: OANN
FILE PHOTO: Employees work on the production line of a factory manufacturing fashion accessories in Sihong county, Jiangsu province, China March 27, 2019. REUTERS/Stringer
April 16, 2019
BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s stimulus measures will shore up economic growth this year and next but may undermine the country’s drive to control debt and worsen structural distortions over the medium term, the OECD said in a report on Tuesday.
Beijing has stepped up fiscal stimulus to prevent a sharper slowdown in the world’s second-largest economy, which is being squeezed by weaker domestic demand and a trade war with the United States.
Local governments will be allowed to issue 2.15 trillion yuan ($320.60 billion) worth of special purpose bonds in 2019 to fund infrastructure projects, a jump of 59 percent from last year.
But S&P Global Ratings estimated last year that local governments were already sitting on hidden debt that could be as high as 40 trillion yuan.
“Infrastructure stimulus could lift growth over the projection horizon, but it could lead to a further build-up of imbalances and capital misallocation, and thereby weaker growth in the medium term,” the OECD said in its latest survey on China’s economy.
“The stimulus risks increasing once again corporate sector indebtedness and, more generally, reversing progress in deleveraging,” it said.
China’s corporate debt has fallen to about 160 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) due to a multi-year clampdown on riskier types of financing and debt, but the level was still higher than in other major economies, the OECD said.
The government in March announced tax and fee cuts of 2 trillion yuan for companies this year, which will lift its budget deficit to 2.8 percent of GDP this year from 2.6 percent in 2018.
China’s fiscal stimulus could be as high as 4.25 percent of GDP this year, up from 2.94 percent in 2018, the OECD added.
Easier monetary policy should help reduce the risk of liquidity strains which could put further pressure on businesses, said Ludger Schuknecht, deputy secretary-general of the OECD.
But he said Beijing should prevent any policy “overshooting”.
Fiscal policy should aim to support the economy while avoiding any side-effects, he added.
“I’m sure government authorities and the PBOC are monitoring this carefully. It’s a matter of implementing it (stimulus) in the right way,” he told an event ahead of the release of the report.
New bank loans rebounded more than expected in March, and totaled a record 5.8 trillion yuan for the quarter, as policymakers pushed lenders to support struggling smaller, private companies, which are seen as higher credit risks than state-controlled firms.
But there are concerns that looser lending standards may fuel a further rise in bad loans as well as inefficient investment and speculation, particularly in the property market.
Underscoring the OECD’s warning about debt risks, data on Tuesday showed growth in new home prices accelerated in March after cooling since November 2018.
Average new home prices in China’s 70 major cities rose 0.6 percent, quickening from a 0.5 percent gain in February, according to Reuters calculation of data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
Home prices in China are expected to rise more this year than predicted just a few months ago, a recent Reuters poll showed, as the government urges banks to increase lending and lower interest rates to support the economy.
The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) has already slashed banks’ reserve requirement ratio (RRR) five times over the past year and is widely expected to ease policy further in coming quarters to spur lending and reduce borrowing costs.
But top officials have repeatedly vowed not to open the floodgates in an economy already saddled with piles of debt – a legacy of massive stimulus during the global financial crisis in 2008-09 and subsequent downturns.
China’s economic growth is likely to slow to 6.2 percent this year – the weakest pace in nearly 30 years, and growth is expected to cool further to 6.0 percent in 2020, the OECD said. The economy expanded 6.6 percent in 2018.
In March, the OECD cut its 2019 growth forecast from 6.3 percent.
The OECD’s outlook on China’s economy was in line with a Reuters poll published last week.
Growth of China’s exports of goods and services could slow to 4.5 percent this year from 5.1 percent in 2018, amid trade frictions with the United States, the OECD predicted.
China’s current account may swing to a deficit of 0.1 percent of GDP this year from a small surplus in 2018, amid its rebalancing towards domestic demand, the OECD added.
(Reporting by Kevin Yao; Editing by Kim Coghill)
Source: OANN
Apr 15, 2019; Raleigh, NC, USA; Carolina Hurricanes left wing Warren Foegele (13) celebrates this second period goal against the Washington Capitals in game three of the first round of the 2019 Stanley Cup Playoffs at PNC Arena. The Carolina Hurricanes defeated the Washington Capitals 5-0. Mandatory Credit: James Guillory-USA TODAY Sports
April 16, 2019
Warren Foegele and Dougie Hamilton each scored two goals as the Carolina Hurricanes, despite being down to 10 forwards for most of the game, trounced the visiting Washington Capitals 5-0 in Game 3 of their first-round Eastern Conference playoff series Monday at Raleigh, N.C.
It was the first home playoff game in 10 years for the Hurricanes, with PNC Arena full of energy. The Capitals hold a 2-1 series lead going to Game 4 on Thursday night in Raleigh.
Brock McGinn added a goal and an assist, and Carolina goalie Petr Mrazek stopped 18 shots for his fifth career playoff victory — four of them shutouts. Washington, the defending Stanley Cup champions, had won six straight postseason games dating to last season.
Hurricanes rookie Andrei Svechnikov, 19, exited in the first period after he was dropped by a punch from Alex Ovechkin. Svechnikov, who appeared to be knocked out, hit the back of his head on the ice as he fell. Carolina’s Micheal Ferland also left in the first period because of an upper-body injury.
Avalanche 6, Flames 2
Nathan MacKinnon had two goals and an assist, Cale Makar scored in his NHL debut, and Colorado put 56 shots on goal while beating Calgary in Denver in a Western Conference quarterfinal series. Makar played Saturday for UMass in the NCAA championship game.
Mikko Rantanen and Matt Nieto had a goal and an assist each, Erik Johnson also scored, and Philipp Grubauer stopped 25 shots for eighth-seeded Colorado, which took a 2-1 series lead over the top-seeded Flames.
Sam Bennett and TJ Brodie produced goals, and Mike Smith made 50 saves for the Flames. Calgary has dropped the past two games in the series after shutting out the Avalanche 4-0 in Game 1. The Flames allowed two power-play goals and a short-handed tally Monday.
Predators 3, Stars 2
Mikael Granlund’s goal midway through the third period broke a deadlock, and Pekka Rinne sparkled in net as visiting Nashville defeated Dallas and took the lead in their opening round Western Conference playoff series.
The Stars had all the momentum, and not just because they had erased a two-goal deficit, when Granlund sent a long wrist shot that somehow beat Ben Bishop with 8:19 left on the clock.
The Predators held on the rest of the way thanks to Rinne to take a 2-1 edge in the best-of-seven series. Rinne made 40 saves, including a mammoth stop on Jamie Benn right after the Stars made it a 2-2 game.
Maple Leafs 3, Bruins 2
Auston Matthews and Andreas Johnsson each had a goal and an assist as Toronto defeated visiting Boston. The Maple Leafs took a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven first-round Eastern Conference playoff series.
Trevor Moore also scored for Toronto, while David Krejci and Charlie Coyle scored for Boston.
Frederik Andersen stopped 34 shots in the Toronto goal. On the opposite end of the rink, Tuukka Rask made 31 saves for Boston.
–Field Level Media
Source: OANN
FILE PHOTO: Czech Republic’s Prime Minister Andrej Babis arrives for a European Union leaders summit in Brussels, Belgium March 21, 2019. REUTERS/Eva Plevier/Pool
April 15, 2019
By Jason Hovet and Robert Muller
PRAGUE (Reuters) – A year after embarking on a record spending splurge, the Czech Republic, one of the European Union’s star fiscal performers, is falling back into deficit and has started tightening its belt to prevent an economic slowdown from wrecking its budget.
The government is seeking savings worth 25 billion crowns ($1.10 billion), or half a percentage point of economic output, to keep its 2020 budget from breaching targets and, for the first time, forecasts a run of fiscal surpluses to end.
To critics, including economists from the state’s own budget council, the cost-cutting foreshadows uncomfortable budget choices ahead to offset slowing growth.
With a humming economy and record-low unemployment, Prime Minister Andrej Babis’s government had expected growth would pay for pension hikes higher than automatic adjusters, double-digit pay raises for a growing state workforce, and even free train tickets for seniors and students.
Instead, the Finance Ministry cut its 2019 gross domestic product growth forecast to 2.4 percent, from 3.1 percent, although that may still be optimistic as main trade partner Germany slices its own outlook.
The Czechs also cut predictions for an overall public sector surplus to 0.3 percent of GDP this year, from 1.0 percent.
The ministry sees a swing to a 0.2 percent deficit and deeper from 2020, according to a report for the European Commission seen by Reuters that erases previous predictions of surpluses.
(GRAPHIC: Czech fiscal balance to GDP – https://tmsnrt.rs/2IjoDX1)
That, critics say, is proof that Babis has wasted a strong economic stretch, failing to invest in roads and other critical infrastructure.
“We wasted the good times for (making) structural improvements and preparing for worse times… (and instead) we increased consumption expenditures and did not invest,” said David Marek, chief economist for Deloitte in Prague.
“We are eating our future.”
In surplus since 2016, Czech debt has fallen to the fourth lowest level in the EU, hitting 32.7 percent of GDP last year. Annual growth has ranged between 2.5 percent and 5.3 percent since 2015.
Babis, a chemicals and agriculture tycoon before entering politics, fought spending rises as finance minister in 2014-2017 when his ANO party was a junior government member and built his image with pledges to whip state finances into shape.
But after a landslide 2017 election win, he let rip.
BUDGET DEBATE
The 2019 budget earmarked a 141 billion crown spending rise over the 2018 budget, equal to 2.7 percent of 2018 GDP.
(GRAPHIC: Czech budget expenditures – https://tmsnrt.rs/2Ilj9eA)
Critics complain that while spending surges, investments are lagging, below 4 percent of GDP annually since 2016. In nominal terms, 2018 investment spending was lower than in 2009, when the global financial crisis struck.
The central state budget – the main component of overall public finances that also include regional governments and some healthcare – posted a first-quarter deficit for the first time since 2012. Expenditure rose 13 percent against a 5 percent income gain.
Finance Minister Alena Schillerova wants savings to maintain a planned 40 billion crown deficit for 2020.
The Finance Ministry declined to say how the savings plan would look. It has until the end of May to submit a draft budget to the government.
So far, the ministry, besides calling for workforce cuts and administrative savings, hopes to raise around 9 billion crowns by increasing tax on cigarettes, alcohol and gambling.
The Social Democrats, the junior ruling party, wants a bank sector tax, which Babis opposes.
The Czechs are not alone in central Europe as others raise social spending, leading to an outlook of widening deficits in Poland while Slovakia may abandon its target of reaching a surplus next year.
But the state Czech Fiscal Council, which warned against exorbitant pension hikes, is still worried. Council member Richard Hindls said the government lacked a strategy and was avoiding reforms to ease future burdens.
“It is important to have priorities,” he told Reuters. “One thing bothers me… that this favorable period was not used to start with systemic (budget) change.”
(Graphics by Jason Hovet; Editing by Gareth Jones)
Source: OANN
FILE PHOTO:Chairman of The Social Democratic Party Antti Rinne speaks to media at the Finnish Broadcasting Company Yle studios in Helsinki, Finland April 15, 2019. Lehtikuva/Antti Aimo-Koivisto via REUTERS
April 15, 2019
By Justyna Pawlak
HELSINKI (Reuters) – Voters across the Nordics are telling politicians to safeguard their cherished, comprehensive welfare model but Sunday’s election in Finland shows how prohibitive costs and a surge in nationalism make it hard for parties to deliver.
The Finnish Social Democrats, who played a significant role in the growth of public services after World War Two, won the ballot for the first time in two decades, feeding off a rising sense of insecurity among voters following years of austerity.
Their victory was limited, however, by a strong showing by the anti-immigrant, nationalist Finns Party, which finished a close second at 17.5 percent of the vote behind the SDP’s 17.7 percent, final results showed.
The split underscores the fragmentation of politics in Finland and elsewhere in the Nordics where populist parties are becoming mainstream, as well as divisions over how to tackle the soaring costs of healthcare and other welfare provisions.
The Finnish left argues that tax hikes are inescapable at a time when care costs are rising and people are living longer. Many voters in Finland agree, even though the nation has one of the highest taxation rates in the world.
The nationalists, echoing a continent-wide backlash against migration over open European Union borders, say that reversing an influx of foreigners can relieve the pressure on services.
That is a red line for Social Democratic leader Antti Rinne, a 56-year-old former trade union boss, leaving him just one option – seeking out coalition partners among center-right groups that favor reforming welfare to cut costs.
“Our values are quite far apart at the moment,” Rinne said on private television broadcaster MTV on Monday, referring to Finns Party leader Jussi Halla-aho. The far-right Halla-aho was fined in 2012 for blog comments linking Islam to paedophilia and Somalis to theft. “I’ve read your blog,” Rinne said.
In Finland, which struggles with one of the fastest rates of population aging in the world, public debt is expected to fall within EU limits this year after austerity steps by the outgoing center-right government of prime minister Juha Sipila.
But social and healthcare costs are expected to jump to 26.5 billion euros per year ($30 billion) in 2035 from 18.7 billion in 2018. That would jack up such costs as a share of gross domestic product to 9.6 percent in 2035 from 7.9 percent.
At stake for the Finns is a wide array of services that now come nearly cost-free such as comprehensive health care, state pensions and home visits by nurses for the elderly.
The state was even more generous in earlier decades, when deductibles on medicine costs were lower and the state would pay for nannies to help with childcare free of charge while another child in the family was in hospital.
“Rinne has promised to raise the lowest state pensions, funded in part by higher consumption and capital gains taxes,” Capital Economics said in a research note.
“We expect these plans will end up diluted as and when the reality of coalition politics bites.”
MANEUVERING TO STAY RELEVANT
In Denmark, opinion polls ahead of an election due no later than June forecast victory for opposition parties led by the Social Democrats who are calling for a partial rollback of welfare cuts.
The Danish left has echoed some of the anti-immigration tilt of the nationalist Danish People’s Party, in what Social Democratic leader Mette Frederiksen said is an effort to ensure her party remains relevant.
Running in first place with some 28 percent of popular support, the Danish Social Democrats endorsed a “jewelry bill” which, passed in 2016, allows police to confiscate refugees’ valuables to help pay their costs, among other measures.
The Danish People’s Party is now polling at 14 percent, down from the 21 percent they had in 2015.
While the jewelry bill has not itself ensured their lead in the polls, it lent nuance to the Social Democrats’ stance on immigration, winning back some voters from the populists.
In Sweden, left-wing leader Stefan Lofven faced a similar dilemma. His only route to retaining power after an inconclusive election last September was to join forces with reform-oriented liberal parties that, like his own Social Democrats, shun the fiercely nationalist Sweden Democrats.
The price was a pledge to enact a string of largely right-wing reforms, including tax breaks for top earners and a scrapping of designs to curb the privatization of services, a decision that has appalled many rank-and-file Social Democrats.
The scale of welfare financing woes varies across the Nordics.
In Sweden, the region’s most populous nation, public finances are relatively healthy, with state debt at its lowest since the late 1970s.
But governments are obliged to stick to a budget surplus target introduced after a banking crisis in the early 1990s, meaning any cost increases as baby boomers enter retirement need to be found through means other than deficit spending.
(Reporting by Justyna Pawlak and Anne Kauranen in Helsinki, Simon Johnson and Niklas Pollard in Stockholm, Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen in Copenhagen; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
Source: OANN
FILE PHOTO: Aluminium ingots at the foundry shop of the Rusal Krasnoyarsk aluminium smelter, Russia October 3, 2018. REUTERS/Ilya Naymushin/File Photo
April 15, 2019
By Polina Devitt
MOSCOW (Reuters) – Rusal is making its first investment in the United States since Washington lifted sanctions against the Russian aluminum giant, teaming up with U.S. manufacturer Braidy Industries to build a mill in Kentucky.
Rusal, the world’s largest aluminum producer outside China, announced the deal in one of the main markets for the sector less then three months after it was removed from a blacklist. It had already resumed supplies to the U.S. market.
The U.S. imposed sanctions on Rusal and its co-owner Oleg Deripaska in April 2018. Sanctions against Rusal and its parent En+, were lifted in January as Deripaska reduced his stake after months of talks and several extensions of the deadline for sanctions to take full effect..
Rusal and aluminum alloys manufacturer Braidy will create a joint project to produce flat-rolled aluminum products for the U.S. automotive industry, the Russian company said on Monday.
“The output from the mill will aid toward rebalancing the anticipated deficit of the auto body sheet in the U.S. market,” Rusal said in a statement.
The Atlas mill will be the first greenfield aluminum mill in the United States for 37 years, Braidy and En+ said.
“In 2021, Braidy Atlas will make the largest order for primary aluminum rolling slab worldwide,” Braidy Chief Executive Craig Bouchard said.
The binding documentation for the mill in Ashland, Kentucky, which will be 40 percent owned by Rusal and 60 percent by Braidy is expected to be signed by July, Rusal said.
It will have an annual capacity of 500,000 tonnes of hot-rolled band and 300,000 tonnes of finished cold-rolled products.
Rusal plans to supply aluminum slab alloys and primary metal for the new mill from its Taishet aluminum smelter that is currently under construction in Siberia. Rusal previously planned to launch the Taishet smelter in late 2020.
The Russian company intends to invest $200 million in this mill and supply about 2 million tonnes of low-carbon aluminum over 10 years worth about $500 million per year.
Rusal produced 3.8 million tonnes of aluminum in 2018. It historically has been the number two non-domestic supplier of prime aluminum in the United States, Braidy said.
(Reporting by Polina Devitt, Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky, Sherry Jacob-Phillips and Alexander Smith)
Source: OANN
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