PPCC: Pisitófilos Creditófagos. Invierno 2024

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.eleconomista.es/banca-finanzas/noticias/12617959/01/24/la-guerra-hipotecaria-se-recrudece-sabadell-se-suma-a-ing-y-rebaja-sus-hipotecas.html

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.eleconomista.es/vivienda-inmobiliario/noticias/12616557/01/24/el-precio-de-la-vivienda-sigue-subiendo-y-se-acerca-a-los-maximos-del-boom-inmobiliario-en-estas-zonas-.html

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.pressreader.com/spain/el-economista/20240111/page/2/textview

Buena situación financiera de los hogares

https://www.eleconomista.es/economia/noticias/12616809/01/24/la-riqueza-neta-de-los-hogares-espanoles-sube-un-86-interanual-en-el-tercer-trimestre.html

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.pressreader.com/spain/el-economista/20240108/page/27/textview

Los salarios por convenio firmados en 2023 superan por un punto al IPC

https://www.eleconomista.es/economia/noticias/12617061/01/24/la-subida-del-salario-minimo-apunta-al-5-tras-rechazar-la-ceoe-al-acuerdo-tripartito-.html

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.eleconomista.es/economia/noticias/12616542/01/24/de-guindos-bce-hay-posibilidad-de-una-recesion-tecnica-en-el-segundo-semestre-de-2023.html

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.eleconomista.es/economia/noticias/12614773/01/24/los-buques-errantes-cargados-de-petroleo-ruso-muestran-que-las-sanciones-de-eeuu-empiezan-a-funcionar.html

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

Thousands of Software Engineers Say the Job Market Is Getting Much Worse
Posted by BeauHD on Wednesday January 10, 2024 @06:30PM from the sea-change-in-the-coding-world dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard:

For much of the 21st century, software engineering has been seen as one of the safest havens in the tenuous and ever-changing American job market. But there are a growing number of signs that the field is starting to become a little less secure and comfortable, due to an industry-wide downturn and the looming threat of artificial intelligence that is spurring growing competition for software jobs. "The amount of competition is insane," said Joe Forzano, an unemployed software engineer who has worked at the mental health startup Alma and private equity giant Blackstone. Since he lost his job in March, Forzano has applied to over 250 jobs. In six cases, he went through the "full interview gauntlet," which included between six and eight interviews each, before learning he had been passed over. "It has been very, very rough," he told Motherboard.

Forzano is not alone in his pessimism, according to a December survey of 9,338 software engineers performed on behalf of Motherboard by Blind, an online anonymous platform for verified employees. In the poll, nearly nine in 10 surveyed software engineers said it is more difficult to get a job now than it was before the pandemic, with 66 percent saying it was "much harder." Nearly 80 percent of respondents said the job market has even become more competitive over the last year. Only 6 percent of the software engineers were "extremely confident" they could find another job with the same total compensation if they lost their job today while 32 percent said they were "not at all confident."

Over 2022 and 2023, the tech sector incurred more than 400,000 layoffs, according to the tracking site Layoffs.fyi. But up until recently, it seemed software engineers were more often spared compared to their co-workers in non-technical fields. One analysis found tech companies cut their recruiting teams by 50 percent, compared to only 10 percent of their engineering departments. At Salesforce, engineers were four times less likely to lose their jobs than those in marketing and sales, which Bloomberg has said is a trend replicated at other tech companies such as Dell and Zoom. But signs of dread among software engineers have started to become more common online. In December, one Amazon employee wrote a long post on the anonymous employee platform Blind saying that the "job market is terrible" and that he was struggling to get interviews of any sort.

"In the age of AI, computer science is no longer the safe major," Kelli Maria Korducki wrote in The Atlantic in September. AI programs like ChatGPT and Google Bard allow users to write code using natural language, greatly reducing the time it takes workers to complete coding tasks. It could lead to less job security and lower compensation for all but the very best in the software trade, warns Matt Welsh, a former computer science professor at Harvard.

"More than 60 percent of those surveyed said they believed their company would hire fewer people because of AI moving forward," reports Motherboard.

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

Google Cuts Hundreds of Jobs in Engineering and Other Divisions
Posted by msmash on Thursday January 11, 2024 @01:03AM from the max-pain dept.

Google laid off hundreds of workers in several divisions Wednesday night, seeking to lower expenses as it focuses on artificial intelligence and joining a wave of other companies cutting tech jobs this year. From a report:

The Silicon Valley company laid off employees in its core engineering division, as well as those working on the Google Assistant, a voice-operated virtual assistant, and in the hardware division that makes the Pixel phone, Fitbit watches and Nest thermostat, three people with knowledge of the cuts said. Several hundred employees from the company's core engineering organization lost corporate access and received notices that their roles were eliminated, two of the people said.

"We've had to make some difficult decisions about ongoing employment of some Google employees and we regret to inform you that your position is being eliminated," the company told some workers in the division, according to text reviewed by The New York Times. Google confirmed the Assistant cuts, earlier reported by Semafor, and the hardware layoffs. "We're responsibly investing in our company's biggest priorities and the significant opportunities ahead," a Google spokesman said in a statement. After cuts throughout the second half of 2023, "some teams are continuing to make these kinds of organizational changes, which include some role eliminations globally."

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

Aprobados los primeros ETF de Bitcoin, toda una validación para el mercado de la primera y más reconocible criptodivisa

POR @ALVY — 11 DE ENERO DE 2024

Tal y como cuentan Reuters, el New York Times y otros medios, el regulador del mercado estadounidense, la SEC, ha aprobado los llamados ETF de Bitcoin, algo que podría considerarse un «momento histórico para las criptodivisas».

El momento ha coincidido casualmente –o no– con que hace precisamente 15 años un programador llamado Hal Finney, muy cercano al anónimo creador de Bitcoin, publicaba esto:

https://twitter.com/halfin/status/1110302988

Finney (DEC, 1956-2014) fue todo un personaje, un gran hacker y la segunda persona que puso a funcionar sus equipos en el proyecto, siendo quien recibió la primera transacción de bitcoins en pruebas, enviada por el mismísimo Satoshi Nakamoto.

QUÉ SON LOS ETF (DE BITCOIN)

Los ETF de Bitcoin son instrumentos financieros cuyas siglas se corresponden con ETF (Exchange-Traded Fund) (o ETP, Exchange-Traded Products, según la terminología de la SEC en su nota). Esos ETF no son bitcoins como tales sino que se trata de fondos compuestos de acciones negociables, que representan a bitcoins como «activos subyacentes».

Comprar o vender «partes» de un ETF facilita la inversión en un producto complejo y poco cómodo para el común de los mortales –una criptodivisa– haciendo que sea algo más flexible y accesible. En el caso de los Bitcoin –a diferencia de otras criptomonedas, que no han sido aprobadas– se ha dado luz verde a once de estos ETF inicialmente: BlackRock, Fidelity, ARK, Grayscale y otras empresas del sector financiero, tras una larga historia de idas y venidas legales antes de su aprobación.

Un ejemplo similar a cómo funcionan los ETF sería operar con petróleo, oro o trigo. Nadie que negocia con estos productos va al banco a por un barril, unos lingotes o sacos de trigo para guardarlos en su casa. En vez de eso, compra el equivalente a un ETF que opera con barriles de petroleo, lingotes de oro o toneladas de trigo y recibe un «papelito» que es lo que guarda (o se lo guardan en un contrato en el banco electrónicamente, más bien).

Trabajar con ETFs para productos «peculiares» de este tipo es increíblemente más cómodo y flexible, aunque también está la cuestión de la volatilidad, más alta en bitcoin que en los activos tradicionales. También tiene la desventaja de que el banco o la empresa que comercializa estos fondos puede quebrar o defraudar a los accionistas que han comprado los fondos si no está todo correctamente auditado y respaldado; se supone que ellos tienen realmente esos bitcoins que guardan a la gente pero no siempre es así. Es sabido que en el MundoReal™ existen infinidad de casos de fraude similares. Así que ¡cuidadín con dónde se mete el dinero! Que luego vienen los de los sellos, los de las preferentes, los de los NFTs y ya se sabe…

La alternativa a no usar ETFs en el ejemplo anterior sería comprar los lingotes de oro y guardarlos en casa debajo del colchón –cosa que algunas personas hacen– aunque eso conlleva otros problemas de seguridad: que no se te incendie o inunde la casa, que no te roben la caja fuerte cuando no estás, que no tengas familiares o amigos codiciosos… En fin, lo típico.

En el caso de Bitcoin los más desconfiados –o conscientes, depende de cómo se mire– prefieren comprar, vender y guardar sus bitcoins personalmente, algo que puede hacerse en casas de cambio (exchanges) o con apps (hot wallets), aunque no es la opción preferida. Las llamadas carteras frías (cold wallets) son el método más seguro, que evita el problema de «not your keys, not your coins» e incluso los hackeos más comunes, dado que la cartera es una llave física que incluso está desconectada de internet.

Hay bitcoiners más espartanos y survivalistas todavía que prefieren memorizar unas cuantas palabras clave a modo de supercontraseña o guardarlas grabadas en placas de metal que protegen en su rudo cuerpo o bajo mil candados. Pero eso también tiene sus problemas: robos, olvidos, accidentes…

LA MAYORÍA DE EDAD DE BITCOIN

La SEC aclara que la aprobación de los nuevos ETF de Bitcoin «no implica un respaldo a Bitcoin ni a las plataformas de comercio de criptoactivos», del mismo modo que advierte que son productos no aptos para todos los inversores, especialmente los minoristas que podrían perder todas sus inversiones.

En cualquier caso la decisión del regulador estadounidense puede entenderse también como una especie de gran validación ante el mercado y una mayoría de edad para Bitcoin, que pasa a diferenciarse del resto de criptodivisas –ninguna de las cuales tiene todavía un ETF, aunque algunas empresas ya lo han solicitado– y que marca un punto de inflexión en su ya larga historia: 15 años y contando. Hay empresas, bancos y plataformas tecnológicas que han durado menos, todo sea dicho.

Advertencia: La CNMV española tiene varios documentos sobre estos temas que siempre conviene leer, por ejemplo Los criptoactivos: aspectos que debes conocer y comprobar y la famosa lista de Entidades no autorizadas por la CNMV («Chiringuitos Financieros») sobre dónde no confiar tu dinero.

Saludos.

[Lem]

Thousands of Software Engineers Say the Job Market Is Getting Much Worse
Posted by BeauHD on Wednesday January 10, 2024 @06:30PM from the sea-change-in-the-coding-world dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard:

For much of the 21st century, software engineering has been seen as one of the safest havens in the tenuous and ever-changing American job market. But there are a growing number of signs that the field is starting to become a little less secure and comfortable, due to an industry-wide downturn and the looming threat of artificial intelligence that is spurring growing competition for software jobs. "The amount of competition is insane," said Joe Forzano, an unemployed software engineer who has worked at the mental health startup Alma and private equity giant Blackstone. Since he lost his job in March, Forzano has applied to over 250 jobs. In six cases, he went through the "full interview gauntlet," which included between six and eight interviews each, before learning he had been passed over. "It has been very, very rough," he told Motherboard.

Forzano is not alone in his pessimism, according to a December survey of 9,338 software engineers performed on behalf of Motherboard by Blind, an online anonymous platform for verified employees. In the poll, nearly nine in 10 surveyed software engineers said it is more difficult to get a job now than it was before the pandemic, with 66 percent saying it was "much harder." Nearly 80 percent of respondents said the job market has even become more competitive over the last year. Only 6 percent of the software engineers were "extremely confident" they could find another job with the same total compensation if they lost their job today while 32 percent said they were "not at all confident."

Over 2022 and 2023, the tech sector incurred more than 400,000 layoffs, according to the tracking site Layoffs.fyi. But up until recently, it seemed software engineers were more often spared compared to their co-workers in non-technical fields. One analysis found tech companies cut their recruiting teams by 50 percent, compared to only 10 percent of their engineering departments. At Salesforce, engineers were four times less likely to lose their jobs than those in marketing and sales, which Bloomberg has said is a trend replicated at other tech companies such as Dell and Zoom. But signs of dread among software engineers have started to become more common online. In December, one Amazon employee wrote a long post on the anonymous employee platform Blind saying that the "job market is terrible" and that he was struggling to get interviews of any sort.

"In the age of AI, computer science is no longer the safe major," Kelli Maria Korducki wrote in The Atlantic in September. AI programs like ChatGPT and Google Bard allow users to write code using natural language, greatly reducing the time it takes workers to complete coding tasks. It could lead to less job security and lower compensation for all but the very best in the software trade, warns Matt Welsh, a former computer science professor at Harvard.

"More than 60 percent of those surveyed said they believed their company would hire fewer people because of AI moving forward," reports Motherboard.

Saludos.

Acerca del amigo Welsh:

- Tiene una startup AI https://www.fixie.ai. Pump que te pump.
- Lamentable charla cancamusera en YT, en el por otro lado respetable canal CS50: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhCl-GeT4jw.. tl;dr no harán falta programadores porque no habrá programas: le pediremos a la LLM-oráculo y ella nos dará el resultado. Momento exacto en https://youtu.be/JhCl-GeT4jw?t=1780

[el malo]

Thousands of Software Engineers Say the Job Market Is Getting Much Worse
Posted by BeauHD on Wednesday January 10, 2024 @06:30PM from the sea-change-in-the-coding-world dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard:

For much of the 21st century, software engineering has been seen as one of the safest havens in the tenuous and ever-changing American job market. But there are a growing number of signs that the field is starting to become a little less secure and comfortable, due to an industry-wide downturn and the looming threat of artificial intelligence that is spurring growing competition for software jobs. "The amount of competition is insane," said Joe Forzano, an unemployed software engineer who has worked at the mental health startup Alma and private equity giant Blackstone. Since he lost his job in March, Forzano has applied to over 250 jobs. In six cases, he went through the "full interview gauntlet," which included between six and eight interviews each, before learning he had been passed over. "It has been very, very rough," he told Motherboard.

Forzano is not alone in his pessimism, according to a December survey of 9,338 software engineers performed on behalf of Motherboard by Blind, an online anonymous platform for verified employees. In the poll, nearly nine in 10 surveyed software engineers said it is more difficult to get a job now than it was before the pandemic, with 66 percent saying it was "much harder." Nearly 80 percent of respondents said the job market has even become more competitive over the last year. Only 6 percent of the software engineers were "extremely confident" they could find another job with the same total compensation if they lost their job today while 32 percent said they were "not at all confident."

Over 2022 and 2023, the tech sector incurred more than 400,000 layoffs, according to the tracking site Layoffs.fyi. But up until recently, it seemed software engineers were more often spared compared to their co-workers in non-technical fields. One analysis found tech companies cut their recruiting teams by 50 percent, compared to only 10 percent of their engineering departments. At Salesforce, engineers were four times less likely to lose their jobs than those in marketing and sales, which Bloomberg has said is a trend replicated at other tech companies such as Dell and Zoom. But signs of dread among software engineers have started to become more common online. In December, one Amazon employee wrote a long post on the anonymous employee platform Blind saying that the "job market is terrible" and that he was struggling to get interviews of any sort.

"In the age of AI, computer science is no longer the safe major," Kelli Maria Korducki wrote in The Atlantic in September. AI programs like ChatGPT and Google Bard allow users to write code using natural language, greatly reducing the time it takes workers to complete coding tasks. It could lead to less job security and lower compensation for all but the very best in the software trade, warns Matt Welsh, a former computer science professor at Harvard.

"More than 60 percent of those surveyed said they believed their company would hire fewer people because of AI moving forward," reports Motherboard.

Saludos.

Acerca del amigo Welsh:

- Tiene una startup AI https://www.fixie.ai. Pump que te pump.
- Lamentable charla cancamusera en YT, en el por otro lado respetable canal CS50: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhCl-GeT4jw.. tl;dr no harán falta programadores porque no habrá programas: le pediremos a la LLM-oráculo y ella nos dará el resultado. Momento exacto en https://youtu.be/JhCl-GeT4jw?t=1780

No harán falta médicos porque no habrá que hacer diagnosis. Le diremos a la IA qué nos pasa y ella sola dirigirá el robot que nos pondrá el tratamiento o nos operará.

No harán falta arquitectos ni ingenieros. Le daremos a la IA todos los requisitos que necesitamos en nuestra construcción y ella sola hará los cálculos y los planos de todo.

No harán falta ingenieros aernáuticos. Le diremos al IA las aeronaves que queremos tener y ella sola diseñará lo que necesitamos.

No harán falta abogados. Le daremos la IA todos los inputs del caso y ella sola generará la defensa que necesitamos. Incluso la leerá en voz alta en el juicio.

Y así podría seguir y seguir hasta decir que "no hará falta gente en el mundo.. la IA hará todo en un mundo completamente mecanizado y servirá "al sistema" en vez de servir a la gente".

El Powerpoint lo aguanta todo, hasta a los CEOs imbéciles.

[Derby]

Y así podría seguir y seguir hasta decir que "no hará falta gente en el mundo.. la IA hará todo en un mundo completamente mecanizado y servirá "al sistema" en vez de servir a la gente".

El Powerpoint lo aguanta todo, hasta a los CEOs imbéciles.

Totalmente de acuerdo. Por eso a todos nos "encanta" hablar con asistentes telefónicos automatizados, chatbots, contestadores automáticos, etc.  Y hacemos todo tipo de maniobras para llegar a hablar con un/a operador/a "Otras cuestiones" es la expresión mágica para poder hablar con un ser humano.

[Derby]

De momento parece que los tipos de interés no cederán...

https://www.ft.com/content/368c3193-043c-4fef-95a5-751bce4e0699

US inflation outstrips forecasts with rise to 3.4% for December

Figures dim market expectations that interest rates will fall as soon as March

[Derby]

https://www.lavanguardia.com/local/catalunya/20240111/9494799/catalunya-limite-precio-alquiler-municipios-febrero.html

Catalunya limitará el precio del alquiler en 140 municipios a partir de febrero

Gobierno y Generalitat pactan empezar a aplicar la ley de contención de rentas en la comunidad el mes que viene

La ministra de Vivienda y Agenda Urbana, Isabel Rodríguez, y la consellera de Territorio de la Generalitat, Ester Capella, han acordado que a partir del mes de febrero entre en vigor la ley de contención de rentas en los 140 municipios de Catalunya calificados como áreas tensionadas. Así lo ha anunciado Capella tras el encuentro que ha mantenido con Rodríguez. (...)

[Derby]

Estos tampoco ceden...Continúo pensando que hará falta algo más que mantener los tipos altos para facilitar un cambio de sistema de cara al año que viene.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-01-11/us-mortgage-rates-climb-for-second-straight-week-hitting-6-66

US Mortgage Rates Climb for Second Straight Week, Hitting 6.66%

Affordability remains a headwind for buyers, economist says
Homebuyer demand has marginally increased in recent weeks

Mortgage rates in the US inched up for the second week in a row.

The average for a 30-year, fixed loan was 6.66%, up from 6.62% last week, Freddie Mac said in a statement Thursday.(...)