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The Sharing Economy Was Always a Scam

This article by Susie Cagle for Medium.com may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

In some instances, the sharing economy appeared to inflame the very problems it purported to solve. The supposed activation of underutilized resources actually led to more, if slightly different, patterns of resource consumption. A number of studies have shown that the ease and subsidized low cost of Uber and Lyft rides are increasing traffic in cities and apparently pulls passengers away from an actual form of sharing: public transportation. Students at UCLA are reportedly taking roughly 11,000 rides each week that never even leave campus. In putting more cars on the road, ride-hail companies have encouraged would-be drivers to consume more by buying cars with subprime loans or renting directly from the platforms themselves.

Alongside making it easy to rent out spare rooms, vacation rental platforms encouraged speculative real estate investment. Whole homes and apartment buildings are taken off the rental market to act as hotels, further squeezing housing markets in already unaffordable cities.

Early sharing champions were ultimately correct about technology enabling a shift away from an ownership society, but what came next wasn’t sharing. The rise of streaming services, subscription systems, and short-term rentals eclipsed the promise of nonmonetary resource sharing. The power and control wasn’t decentralized; it was even more concentrated in the hands of large and valuable platforms.

Why go through the trouble of swapping your own DVDs for a copy of Friends With Benefits, after all, when you can stream it through Amazon Prime Video for $2.99? The idea of paying for temporary access to albums rather than outright owning them may have been galling at first, but we’re increasingly comfortable with renting all our music, along with our software, and our books. Downloading and sharing the materials that live on these streamed resources is impossible, illegal, or both.



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Indonesia's imminent presidential election

This article by Lex Rieffel and Alexander R. Arifianto for the Brookings Institute may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

Another vulnerability for Jokowi is the nation’s economic performance during his first term. Indonesia’s exceptional track record of sound macroeconomic policies since the transition in 1998 has been maintained. However, as The Jakarta Post noted in a 2016 article, he has been unable to lift the growth rate from the lackluster pace under his predecessors. His promised surge in infrastructure investment has not materialized, the state enterprise sector is largely unreformed, and a host of environmental challenges are not being addressed adequately.

The possibility that disenchanted voters will abstain from the election and that enthusiasm among potential voters backing Subianto will produce a surge of votes in his favor has led independent observers (including one of us—Alexander) to conclude that electoral support for both candidates is actually in a statistical dead heat.

The one point of consensus among most analysts is that neither of these two candidates is a committed democrat, implying that Indonesia is likely to continue drifting away from democratic rule in the near term.

A Jokowi-led government will clearly be more aligned with American values than a Subianto-led government because it will be more respectful of human rights and the rule of law. By contrast, a Subianto-led government might be more favored by the Trump administration due to its tough-guy, authoritarian approach to domestic governance and its hardline foreign policies.

The best outcome for long-term U.S.-Indonesia relations would arguably be a landslide victory for Jokowi that makes it easier for him to fix some of the weaknesses of Indonesia’s democratic political system, especially the role of the parliament. His policy leverage during a second five-year term may be enhanced significantly. According to a January 23 piece in Republika, Jokowi’s party, the Indonesian Democratic Party Struggle (PDIP), and its coalition allies are expected to control approximately 56 percent of seats in the new parliament that will also be elected on April 17.



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Rand Bears in Ascendance as Risks Rise From Moody's to Poll

This article by Colleen Goko for Bloomberg may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

Short Positions
Investors in the futures market are becoming more pessimistic, with non-commercial short-rand contracts outweighing longs, CFTC data show. That’s a turnaround from February, when traders were net long-rand for a brief period.

Selling Out
Foreign investors are getting out of South African bonds and stocks. Non-residents have been net sellers of government bonds at an average rate of 115 million rand ($8 million) a day over the past month -- not a huge number, but a turnaround from mid-February, when inflows averaged 434 million rand a day. And offshore investors have been net sellers of South African equities for the past 14 days, the longest streak since October 2017.



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How a Chinese Exodus is Exacerbating Australia's Property Slump

This article by Michael Heath for Bloomberg may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

Reserve Bank Governor Philip Lowe noted the withdrawal of foreign buyers in a speech Wednesday as he sought to explain the drivers of Australia’s property slump. The central bank is closely watching the decline, especially as it’s starting to impact household spending and slow the economy.

“Another demand-side factor that has influenced prices is the rise and then decline in demand by non-residents,” said Lowe. “The timing of these shifts in foreign demand has broadly coincided with –- and reinforced –- the shifts in domestic demand.”

While Chinese buyers helped inflate the property bubble, they’re unlikely to return in sufficient numbers to stabilize the market. For one thing, shifting money abroad from China is tougher these days as authorities there are strictly enforcing rules aimed at curbing capital outflows.

There are other domestic factors suggesting prices could keep declining too. Australian banks have turned gun-shy on lending following an inquiry that exposed widespread misconduct in the industry and more homes are coming to the market.



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The message behind the Target balances

Thanks to a subscriber for this note from Commerzbank which may be of interest. Here is a section:



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Your Avocados and Olives Are Pricier Because Fat Is In Fashion

This article by Lucy Craymer for the Wall Street Journal may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

The average prices of avocados, butter, olive oil and salmon have climbed as much as 60% since 2013, after stripping out seasonal price patterns and the effects of unusual weather events, according to various sources. Over the same period, prices of corn, soybeans, sugar and wheat either fell or didn’t change significantly.

These changes in fortune reflect the broad dietary shifts of recent years. Many people have switched to eating more foods that are high in natural fats from high-carbohydrate, low-fat diets. And government agencies and nutritionists are recommending that people avoid consuming industrial-made fats and margarines and instead eat more fish, nuts and healthier oils.

Stephan Hubertus Gay, a senior agricultural policy analyst at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, said consumers are eating products that contain fat again. But he said “we were a bit surprised that it came so fast,” referring to the sharp increase in demand.



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Wild Week Ahead for Trump, Kim, Brexit, Cohen and Fed's Powell

This article by Tony Czuczka for Bloomberg may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

After days of buildup, Trump kicked off the week by delaying a threatened increase in U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports and dangling a summit with President Xi Jinping at Mar-a-Lago, his Florida retreat, if “both sides make additional progress.” Along the way, he slapped down Lighthizer on a semantic point. Earlier, the two sides were haggling over how to ensure Beijing lives up to its promise to not weaken the yuan. Trump then reported substantial progress, including on currency.

And

Look for Powell to offer signals on what’s next for the Fed during two days of congressional testimony. When they last met, policy makers broadly backed ending the runoff of the central bank’s balance sheet. Lighthizer, who testifies Wednesday, may give a sense of how likely the U.S. is to impose tariffs on auto imports. The European Union is threatening to hit back. U.S. fourth-quarter gross domestic product, due Thursday, is expected to show 2.5 percent expansion last year, short of the Trump administration’s ambitious goal.



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U.S. Bets on China's Special Envoy in Trade Talks

This article by Lingling Wei and Bob Davis for the Wall Street journal may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

While Chinese negotiators offered to stop providing government subsidies that distort prices and put Western rivals at a disadvantage, they haven’t so far produced a list of subsidies they would be willing to eliminate, the people said.

Instead, the Chinese side so far has focused its offer on greater purchases of U.S. agricultural and energy products such as soybeans, crude oil and liquefied natural gas, they said.

Whatever deal is struck, the U.S. is also seeking guarantees it will be enforced and a means to resolve disputes.

“It’s one thing to write something on a piece of paper,” said Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Fox Business Network on Thursday. “It’s another thing to have enforcement mechanisms. And I know our trade team is hard at work, making sure that the American people get that.”



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Walmart's US e-commerce sales up 43% in Q4, thanks to growing online grocery business

This article by Sarah Perez at Techcrunch.com may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

Walmart has also made shipping to your home more affordable. In 2017, Walmart introduced an alternative to Amazon’s pricier Prime membership with free, two-day shipping on orders of $35 or more. This past year, it expanded free, two-day shipping to its marketplace items by working with hundreds of its top sellers and third-party fulfillment providers, like Deliverr.

The company last year also launched a new, more personalized website, which included a revamped Home section, as well as a cleaner, more modern design and sections that showcased items trending in the shoppers’ local area. The redesigned website made it easier to order groceries and reorder favorites, too.

In November, eMarketer noted Walmart had overtaken Apple to become the No. 3 online retailer in the U.S., with Walmart (including its Jet and Sam’s Club brands) poised to capture 4 percent of all online retail by year-end. Amazon, of course, remained No. 1, followed by eBay.



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RBNZ Remains On Hold And The Kiwi Strengthen

This article from Actionforex.com may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

As was widely expected, RBNZ remained on hold at +1.75%, yet may have sounded less dovish than expected. Despite the bank being cautious, its forecasts include the official cash rate remaining at +1.75% for 2019 and implied a rate hike in 2020. The bank also expects the core inflation rate to gradually rise to 2% yoy mid-point which necessitates a continued supportive monetary policy. Analysts pointed out that the bank seems to have time at its side, albeit they expect that as the year progresses growth could undershoot the bank’s projections causing for a more dovish stance. Governor Orr in his press conference stated that the chances of a future rate cut have not increased.



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