The timing of when to strike the ball is everything in the wonderful sport of cricket – and also, apparently, in the American pastime of baseball. An Australian banker is fond of reminding the English how much better his country is at playing cricket. But his gloating doesn’t extend to how well he’s been timing […]
Asian Chemical Connections
Micro-management gone too far?
micro-management, human resources, APIC, commodity chemicals, CEOs, credit control, financial meltdown
Reasons to be cheerful?
Any excuse to make a reference to the late, great and wonderful Ian Dury. I sent the following email to my friend in response to the stock market rallies and the green shoots of optimism seemingly turning into beautiful May flowers: “I take it nothing can has fundamentally changed? The confidence couldn’t possibly be so […]
US-Asia Propylene arbitrage closes
arbitrage, US-Asia exports, financial meltdown, piracy, Somalia, ICIS news
It really is a Mad World
As the potential swine flu pandemi threatens more lives – and even more damage to the global economy – it’s time to watch American Idol re-runs. It would be great if we could all collectively retire to some paradise island where Manchester Utd and Chelsea have never won a Premiership trophy, or any kind of […]
Is it better to be right for not quite……
……all the right reasons than to be wrong altogether? Sounds a dumb question, perhaps – unless you take particular pride in being one of those know-it-alls. The point I am trying to make (and assuming that chemicals pricing doesn’t collapse beforehand on a broader retreat in crude and equites on maybe panic over swine flu […]
Is China repeating the mistakes of the US?
My current favourite blogger is Michael Pettis, professor at Peking University’s Guanghua School of Management, who, in his latest post, makes a very worrying point below. As an aside, and without wanting to take the 1930s analogy too far, this debate in China is a little like the split in the 1930s between the internationalists […]
It’s getting darker and darker out there
China’s economy, Canton Trade Fair, China unemployment, deflation threat, high inventories, China Daily
China’s economy: A case of wishful thinking?
Could the chemicals industry be in danger of wanting to believe something so much that ignores overwhelming evidence to the contrary? The widespread perception is that China’s economy has reached a turning point. “The worst of the crisis is over and the world is entering the time when things will gradually get better,” wrote former […]
The China Recovery Conundrum
eutsche Bank, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, China economy, China Q1 growth, China Q1
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