PPCC - Pisitófilos Creditófagos - HoT SuMMeR 2021

[Saturio]

Andando el tiempo creo que se ha hecho evidente que aquella fue una mala "decisión" -- o si se quiere una "obligación" estratégica--  y que nos hubiera ido mejor siguiendo la que hoy podríamos llamar la "opción Coreana" que en mi propuesta de entonces llamé la "vía Japonesa" porque entonces Corea era como España. Dos países muy homogéneos industrial y económicamente.
Esta opción  se centraba en la industrialización para un mercado global con una estrecha alianza con los EEUU --sin intermediarios en Bruselas--, moneda propia e integración directa en las instituciones imperiales (OTAN, etc.) 
Creo que esta opción pudo estar sobre la mesa con los EEUU pero no estábamos internamente unidos para un frente común.

Quiero recordar que USA fue el último país con el que España estuvo en guerra y donde ellos se quedaron con Cuba, Puerto Rico y Filipinas como botín tras vencer. Esa guerra cambió a España, de ser una potencia ultramarina a un país de la periferia europea.
No entiendo como puede haber gente en este país, especialmente en la derecha, que vean a los anglosajones como defensores de nuestros intereses. Debe ser algún síndrome de Estocolmo. Tampoco no descarto que los americanos e ingleses instalaron a sus dobleagentes dentro de los partidos de la derecha, viendo la anglofilia que tienen PP y Vox.
Los de la pulserita  rojigualda como defenderos de los intereses de los que nos derrotaron en guerras…en fin.

A Estados Unidos eso no le interesaba en absoluto. Fin de la negociación.

[Frommer]

Exacto. Y si no, pues compran a quien haga falta. En los cables de wikileaks era el tópico sobre España, lo barato que resulta comprar un Ministro... 🙈

[senslev]

https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/021015/how-does-quantitative-easing-us-affect-stock-market.asp

The Federal Reserve's quantitative easing (QE) program inevitably affects the stock market, though it is difficult to know exactly how and to what extent. The evidence suggests that there is a positive correlation between a QE policy and a rising stock market. In fact, some of the largest stock market gains in U.S. history have occurred while a QE policy was underway.

After all, the purpose of a QE policy is to support or even jumpstart a nation's economic activity. In practice, QE policy entails buying massive amounts of government bonds or other investments from banks in order to inject more cash into the system. That cash is then loaned by the banks to businesses, which spend it to expand their operations and increase their sales. Stock investors anticipate the increased company revenue and buy the stocks.

That's the big picture, but there are other, more subtle, effects of a QE policy on stock prices.

That cash is then loaned by the banks to businesses, which spend it to expand their operations and increase their sales. --> Esta parte es la teoría, la práctica es que ese cash se utiliza para recompra de acciones o simplemente para invertir con dinero a coste cero en otros hactibos y mercados, como el inmobiliario.


Estos me los tengo que leer pero los pongo por si alguien quiere echarles un vistazo.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/simonmoore/2021/01/25/results-of-qe-benefit-stock-prices-more-than-economy-study-finds/?sh=462141d31d9f

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2838128

Yo continuo escéptico al respecto, dudo de que no exista una correlación entre los QE y la Bolsa & Inmuebles. Y si no existe de forma directa, al menos, existe de forma indirecta.


Precisamente muchos economistas están de acuerdo en que las políticas económicas actuales no solo fomentan las burbujas, sino que las alimentan directamente. Tales economistas son Sven Henrich (mencionado en este foro) o Hans-Werner Sinn.


Saludos.

[PopArt]

Entiendo de ahí que el dinero que infla la bolsa no viene de las precarias rentas salariales, ni del pueblo que está pasando penurias.

Viene de uno de estos:

- Los chicos del Dinero de Otras Personas (fondos de pensiones, etc.)
- Rentistas aproductivos, y,
- 'Bienpagaos' de salarios abusivos (en España, cuatro gatos)

Y de que no hay otro sitio donde ponerlo, debido a que la economía ordinaria está en gran parte secuestrada por la elefantiasis pisitófila.

Quería también decir, acerca de la inflación, que cuando leo a Asustadísimos hablar de que no habrá inflación entiendo que se refiere a que no va a haber problemas de subidas de precio de los bienes y servicios, dado que el poder de compra de los consumidores (Estados en su faceta de consumidor, familias y empresas) está tremendamente mermado por la elefantiásica deuda contraída en estos últimos años, y por lo tanto en este contexto nadie tiene margen para gastar, salvo que sea a crédito, y entendemos que si no estamos al límite de crédito, estamos cerca.

Si la vivienda bajara de golpe un 30%, se podría liberar esa parte de la renta de las familias para aumentar el consumo, el ahorro y el repago de deuda, pero pienso que en ese caso también los sueldos y las partidas presupuestarias bajarían hasta que todo llegara a un punto de equilibrio.

[puede ser]

https://elpais.com/eps/2021-07-31/castillos-en-el-aire.html

Artículo de Irene Vallejo sobre la usura inmobiliaria desde Roma a nuestros días. Ya es vox populi; hoy en la tele los hosteleros que no encuentran currantes admitiendo que el problema es la vivienda...

[Mad Men]

El problema es que la gente ha tomado el gusto a ese placer solo permitido antiguamente a la nobleza, me refiero al placer de vivir de los demás.

El rentismo también ha sufrido revoluciones y cambios. Ahora es democrático, todo el mundo si quiere puede esquilmar al vecino.

Saludos.

[Maloserá]

Parte 2 de la serie de 5 dedicada a los precios inmobiliarios mundiales por el Financial Times. Creo que es la parte 2 porque los títulos del índice que pusieron el otro día no se corresponde exactamente, pero es el segundo que publican, y es dedicado a Estados Unidos, así que asumo que lo es.

Global house prices: Raising the roof
House prices are rising in many major economies — but is it sustainable?

Part 1: How the pandemic has triggered the broadest global house price boom for over two decades
Part 2: Buyers flock to smaller US cities, renewing policymakers’ concerns about affordability and risk
Part 3: Netherlands grapples with the social consequences of rapidly rising house prices
Part 4: Why Berlin’s renters want to expropriate their homes from Germany’s publicly listed landlords
Part 5: Should house prices count in inflation data, and what can central banks do about the economic effects?




Part 2: Buyers flock to smaller US cities, renewing policymakers’ concerns about affordability and risk
https://www.ft.com/content/36cdd5d2-18af-4745-88e8-b101fd4cab3f

‘It has never been like this’: US house price spiral worries policymakers
FT Series: Pandemic-fuelled boom boosts smaller urban areas but revives affordability concerns

   
Lauren Fedor in Columbus and Colby Smith in New York AUGUST 4 2021
House prices are rising in many major economies. This FT series explores whether these increases are sustainable.

A decade ago, the average house in Ohio’s leafy state capital Columbus would sit on the market for almost 100 days before being sold. Today, a similar property sells in just 10 days. “It has never been like this,” said Michael Jones, a real estate agent at Coldwell Banker Realty with more than 20 years’ experience in central Ohio. “It’s unprecedented.”

US policymakers are becoming increasingly concerned about the rising price of housing for both homeowners and renters, as the broadest global house price boom for at least two decades drives up living costs.

“Today, it is harder to find an affordable home in America than at any point since the 2008 financial crisis,” Marcia Fudge, US housing and urban development secretary, said at a recent congressional hearing.

Nationally, house prices in May were 16.6 per cent higher than the year before, according to the latest S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller index update — the biggest jump in more than 30 years of data and up from 14.8 per cent in April. “A month ago, I described April’s performance as ‘truly extraordinary’, and [now] I find myself running out of superlatives,” said Craig Lazzara, global head of index investment strategy at S&P Dow Jones Indices.

The pace of price growth and sales has been particularly fast in smaller cities, suburban enclaves and towns. Columbus’s housing market has exploded since the start of the pandemic, as historically low interest rates, remote working, increased demand for larger homes and a relatively limited supply of houses for sale sparked a feeding frenzy among prospective homebuyers and a windfall for sellers.





Homes in Columbus sold more quickly than in any other large metropolitan US area, according to Zillow, the property website. Almost three-quarters of Columbus properties were under contract in less than a week in April. Other fast-moving areas included Denver, Colorado, and Salt Lake City, Utah.

The fierce competition means many properties are selling at a significant premium to their listing price, favouring those on higher incomes or younger first-time buyers whose parents are willing to stump up the cash required to win a bidding war.

Columbus’s average sale price has jumped 15.8 per cent in the past year, according to Columbus Realtors, the local industry body of which Jones is president.

“People say to me, ‘Don’t you love this market?’” he said at a recent open house for an almost 6,000 square foot family home with a listing price of just under $1m in a residential neighbourhood east of downtown Columbus. “I say, ‘Not especially, because I represent buyers and sellers alike’,” he added. “Somebody is a loser here.”

Other places have experienced even more frenetic sales. Median home prices in Austin, Texas, have risen 40 per cent year on year, according to online real estate brokerage Redfin. Buyers have also flocked to Phoenix, Arizona, where prices are almost 30 per cent higher in the same period. In Detroit, Michigan, they have risen 56 per cent.

Suburban enclaves and smaller towns have also benefited. Redfin reported last month that median home prices in “car-dependent” US areas had surged at twice the pace of those in “transit-accessible” cities since the start of the pandemic — with the former gaining 33 per cent while the latter increased 16 per cent.

Across the 30 largest metropolitan areas in the US, Columbus, along with St Louis, Missouri, and Tampa, Florida, logged some of the biggest net increases in people arriving in the area, according to an analysis of US Postal Service records of mailing address changes by commercial real estate and investment firm CBRE. Most moves came from the “surrounding area”, defined as a few hours’ drive from the householder’s previous address, the analysis suggested.

The house price spiral is feeding into the rental market too. According to Apartment List, a listings website, national median rent has risen 11.4 per cent so far this year, more than three times the average increase in the same period in the previous three years. “The high cost of housing keeps millions of families up every night,” Fudge warned. “They wonder if they can afford to keep a roof over their head — and still manage to keep their lights on, to pay for their prescriptions, to put food on their tables.”





The number of existing-home sales rose 1.4 per cent month on month in June, according to the National Association of Realtors. Lawrence Yun, chief economist at the industry body, said supply had “modestly improved in recent months due to more housing starts and existing homeowners listing their homes, all of which has resulted in an uptick in sales”.

Real estate experts and economists surveyed by Zillow expect price growth to peak this year and then ebb. “At a broad level, home prices are in no danger of a decline due to tight inventory conditions, but I do expect prices to appreciate at a slower pace by the end of the year,” Yun said. Daryl Fairweather, chief economist at Redfin, said “homes that would have gotten 20 offers are now getting only two or three”. But she added that while “we are already seeing demand start to stagnate”, prices were not coming down significantly — suggesting that policymakers’ concerns about affordability are likely to persist.

Federal Reserve chair Jay Powell recently said that today’s trend looked distinctly different to the one a decade ago that pre-empted what was at the time the worst recession since the Great Depression — but he called the problem of housing affordability “a big one”. “Housing prices are moving up across the country at a high rate,” he told a congressional committee last month. Although he acknowledged that it was “not being driven by the kind of reckless, irresponsible lending that led to the housing bubble that led to the last financial crisis”, he warned that it “makes it more difficult for entry-level buyers to get into the housing market, so that is a concern”.

[kerberos]

Quería también decir, acerca de la inflación, que cuando leo a Asustadísimos hablar de que no habrá inflación entiendo que se refiere a que no va a haber problemas de subidas de precio de los bienes y servicios, dado que el poder de compra de los consumidores (Estados en su faceta de consumidor, familias y empresas) está tremendamente mermado por la elefantiásica deuda contraída en estos últimos años, y por lo tanto en este contexto nadie tiene margen para gastar, salvo que sea a crédito, y entendemos que si no estamos al límite de crédito, estamos cerca.

Si la vivienda bajara de golpe un 30%, se podría liberar esa parte de la renta de las familias para aumentar el consumo, el ahorro y el repago de deuda, pero pienso que en ese caso también los sueldos y las partidas presupuestarias bajarían hasta que todo llegara a un punto de equilibrio.

Yo comparto su punto de vista respecto a la inflación. Entiendo que el carácter servil de los españoles es difícil de combatir y, por poner un ejemplo, la subida de luz no ha supuesto más que una vuelta de tuerca adicional al nivel de frustración colectiva pero....si se ponen a subir pollo, huevos, pan y demás no las tengo tan claras que la gente no proteste.

Vamos, con los bajos salarios de la media de españoles no creo que estén dispuestos a cargar con subidas de precios si no van asociadas a subidas de salario acorde. Rizando el rizo, podrían salir los propietarios a reclamar sus subidas también, sería otra forma interesante de movilización colectiva 

Pero como siempre, lo que deseamos y lo que pase al final puede que se parezca como un huevo a una castaña.

Saludos!

[sudden and sharp]

GameStop, Victoria’s Secret to join S&P Midcap 400
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/gamestop-victorias-secret-to-join-s-p-midcap-400-11627487384

GameStop Corp. and future standalone company Victoria’s Secret are among the additions to the S&P 400 Midcap Index, index provider S&P Dow Jones Indices said late Tuesday.

GameStop GME, -3.11%, a videogame retailer that became one of the most recognizable names among the “meme stocks,” will replace Weingarten Realty Investors WRI, -2.06% in the midcap index, with Lakeland Financial Corp. LKFN, -0.18% replacing GameStop in the S&P SmallCap 600 SML, +0.77%.

The changes are effective Aug. 4, S&P Dow Jones Indices said in a statement. Kimco Realty Corp. KIM, -2.40%, an S&P 500 index constituent, is buying Weingarten Realty in a deal expected to close on or about that date, it said.

[...]

[puede ser]

Entrevista con C.Tangana, un tío lúcido:

P. Y como empresario, ¿se gusta?

P. No tengo propiedades inmobiliarias, no he invertido en la Bolsa, no he hecho nada con mi dinero que no sea apoyar ideas de gente cercana que creo que pueden ir para delante, así que de momento no hay queja.

https://elpais.com/revista-de-verano/2021-08-04/c-tangana-solo-voto-en-caso-de-emergencia.html

[senslev]

Coches usados en USA, más no-inflación. Esto me recuerda a la no-QE de Powell de 2018 o por ahí, al final todo lo que hacen los bancos centrales como transitorio se convierte en una transitoriedad permanente.

[Derby]

más no-inflación

https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2021/08/update-framing-lumber-prices-down-year.html

Update: Framing Lumber Prices Down Year-over-year

(...) Lumber price are down 6% year-over-year.

There were supply constraints over the last year, for example, sawmills cut production and inventory at the beginning of the pandemic, and the West Coast fires in 2020 damaged privately-owned timberland. 

The supply constraints have eased somewhat.

And there was a huge surge in demand for lumber (demand remains strong).

[Derby]

https://www.ft.com/content/f57f3c31-e622-425e-9aee-5261803cb275

We should not be too sanguine about a shrinking population

Falling birth rates are good news for the planet but they are also a symptom of generational inequality

When my mother was born, there were fewer than 3bn people in the world. When I was born, there were almost 5bn, and when I gave birth to my daughter, there were 7.7bn. She may live to see the beginning of a new era: the point at which the number of people on the planet begins to decline.

The pandemic has caused a baby bust of historic proportions in some countries. In Spain, 20 per cent fewer babies were born in December 2020 than in the same month a year earlier, the lowest number since 1941, when such records began. Births fell 22 per cent in Italy and 13 per cent in France.

There isn’t a dearth of babies everywhere (some countries, such as Germany, have experienced a mini boom) and the pandemic’s impact on procreation may prove fleeting. But it has focused attention on the long-term decline in the number of babies women are having more or less everywhere.

Almost half the global population now lives in a country or area where the lifetime fertility rate (the average number of babies per woman) sits below the “replacement rate” of 2.1 — the number that would keep the population stable. Even in sub-Saharan Africa, where the population is still growing fast, the fertility rate has declined from 6.8 in the 1970s to about 4.6. The latest UN World Population Prospects report from 2019 predicts global population growth will level off by roughly 2100, while a paper published by researchers in The Lancet last year forecasts that the number of people in the world will peak in 2064 at 9.7bn and decline to 8.8bn by 2100.

Many will see this as good news for the planet. Rapid population growth has helped to put the environment under extreme stress. And in developing countries, declining fertility rates are usually connected to women gaining more education and opportunities.

Meanwhile, countries that struggle with how to pay for and look after their ageing populations in the coming decades could allow more immigration from places that are still growing. The Lancet paper predicts that Nigeria will be the second most populous country by 2100, after India. “There are so many people all over the globe who are dying to come to Europe and the US — we could just let them in,” says Joshua Wilde, a research fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research.

In any case, we might not be able to return fertility rates to replacement levels in rich countries even if we wanted to. Finland has a number of policies that help parents combine work with children, yet its fertility rate remains well below this level. “We made a study of parents with kids below 16, how they combined work and family life, and our biggest problem was to make an interesting report because they were all so satisfied,” says Anna Rotkirch, a research professor at Finland’s Population Research Institute. “There was hope that true gender equality would raise fertility levels, but . . . if we have this mode of two careers, dual earners, maybe the average fertility rate will be around 1.5,” she adds. “Is that then a bad thing in itself if people are happy?”

That said, we shouldn’t celebrate declining fertility rates regardless of the cause. In some countries, people are having fewer babies than they say they want. In South Korea, where the fertility rate is now below 1, the working hours are too long, housing and education are too expensive and mothers too unsupported. Erin Hye-Won Kim, assistant professor at the University of Seoul, says the same system that powered the economy’s rapid development has put society under stress: “Working long and working late became virtuous.”

A stressed generation is not something to welcome, and it is not unique to South Korea, though it is particularly acute there. When the Financial Times surveyed young people around the world earlier this year, many spoke of a deep sense of insecurity that spanned unstable work and housing to the fear they would never be able to retire. Some said they didn’t feel secure enough to have children.

The risk is that, as countries begin to age and shrink, these dynamics enter a vicious circle, especially if young people see policy shaped increasingly around the needs of the more populous older generations.

In Japan, where the population started to decline in 2011, panel surveys by Hiroshi Ishida, a professor at Tokyo university’s Institute of Social Science, show young people are satisfied with their current living standards but are “much more grim” about the future. Sachiko Horiguchi, an associate professor at Temple University’s Japan campus, says: “They know they don’t have much voice over politics — the older people have a lot of votes, they mobilise in politics, all the money is going to that generation.” One of the defining policy challenges of the next 100 years will be to meet the needs of ageing populations while ensuring there is still hope and security for the young.

We can’t control the number of babies women have, nor should we want to. But in many ways, having a child is an act of faith in the future. If some people are not having the babies they say they want, it is a warning sign we should heed, not something to shrug off because there are too many humans on the planet anyway.

[Derby]

https://www.news.com.au/finance/real-estate/housing-price-boom-losing-steam-values-climb-at-slower-rate-as-affordability-crisis-deepens/news-story/d0b7002b0c8eefed97fb60a46cc78fcf

Housing price boom ‘losing steam’, values climb at slower rate as affordability crisis deepens

Residential property prices continue to climb but the pace has slowed as more and more Australians simply can’t afford a roof over their head.

[Derby]

https://www.reuters.com/article/usa-treasury-yellen-inflation/yellen-says-monthly-u-s-inflation-rates-should-subside-by-end-2021-idUSW1N2LK033

Yellen says monthly U.S. inflation rates should subside by end-2021

ATLANTA, Aug 4 (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Wednesday she anticipates that monthly inflation rates will subside by the end of 2021, even as year-over-year inflation readings stay elevated due to lingering comparison effects from the coronavirus pandemic.

Yellen, speaking to reporters after a tour of a social services agency in Atlanta, repeated her view that currently high inflation is a transitory effect from supply bottlenecks and shifts in spending demand caused by the pandemic and recovery.

“Even if monthly (inflation) rates come down, we’ll see somewhat elevated year-over-year rates for some time. But my expectation is that by the end of the year, that monthly rates will come down to a pace consistent with the Fed’s interpretation of price stability,” Yellen said.