Remarkable new for ENDESA and COLBUN, that have seen its prices affected positively.

Last week we received positive news, and also bad news that stopped the sudden rally generated by Bin Laden’s death, and that drove upwards major stock indexes, but that was stopped by the negative news related with the debt crisis in Europe. Later, gripping markets became gloomy, and all green numbers turned red. Nonetheless, the week ended with positive numbers, and more numbers reassuring recovery.

What’s to come this week? more apocalyptic news from Europe, inflationary pressures, and commodity prices breaking their upward trends? If so, there’s a chance to make a profit this week. Let’s start with oil. It seems to be peaked, and many oil traders were betting that the oil prices would fall. Instead, the prices kept rising. On Monday his luck finally turned around. And prices started to collapse, and have slid 12% in the span of a week. In the other hand, gold and silver prices were affected by, positive economic data. Gold will be most likely to keep its upward trend due to the long run inflationary expectations.

I consider my position to be a little different; I consider that there’s no data backing a medium-term falling of commodities, so I bet it is temporary. Nevertheless, just in case, if you see that prices keep falling, breaking your resistances lines in either market your investing, just proceed with your stop loss, because one important lesson must’ve been learnt during the last months: when one investor starts the sell-off, all of them will follow him.

This is an excellent news for the construction company SOCOVESA that closed at CLP 325 on Friday’s trading session at the Stock Exchange. These numbers may push the stock’s price up on Monday’s aperture, but you must be careful with the global landscape, because it has shown to be more relevant when it comes to market prices. It must, also, be taken into account the dividend payment period, which is growing nearer, and that has a limit day of  buying of 12.05.2011 and it will be paid on 18.05.2011.

To begin with, killing, burning, demolishing and claiming responsibility for terrorist acts is not a way of dialogue. It has been proved that the only way to settle differences upon ideological issues can be achieved either negotiating, litigating or debating. Otherwise no results will be achieved from any of the parties that participate in a public dispute, taking into account our pertinence to a democratic system that privileges debate over belligerent disputes.

Secondly, under any circumstance killing people is required to be heard. Terrorists have a misguided way of asking for a little of public, and governmental attention. Moreover, killing people is not going to give them additional points in favor when it comes get some public attention. In fact, the only thing that we have seen so far is the increasing security in airports, metros, trains and other transportation means.

Thirdly, no matter how corrupt and nefarious our governments are, they will never tolerate a mistaken ideology. I do not know with precision what are the pillars -or main ideas- that led terrorists to killing innocent people so that they can be heard. They say they follow what the Qur’an says, and that, according to them, are words written by God’s hand. Notwithstanding, and based on scientific facts, no religious-book has proven to command someone to commit assassinations in the name of god-or at least I have not heard about one.

Obviously, terrorists are destroying the most precious gift given by our lord -human life- hiding their ominous intentions behind words written in sacred books. Through this essay, I just wanted to express my full repulse for acts that attempt, and put in danger, other people’s lives, as well as showing through my words a vindication of why terrorists are cowards that conceal its fears and life-discontent by taking innocent lives. As a way to give peace to all those souls that were making his way home, going to work or just going to hang out with friends when a bomb exploded right in front of them, I wish god receive their souls on his kingdom, allowing them find peace.

First of all, Juan Assange has shown the world how governments truly are. Before knowing the so-called “cables” disclosed by Wilikileaks, I thought that our governments were nefarious and corrupt as hell, and after reading them, I have found enough evidence to endorse my assumptions. Ergo, the conclusion is clear: governments use dirty tactics to get what they truly want. Therefore, as being the person that showed to us the back story of the governments, Assange must be considered a liberator, and also, due to his imprisonment, a martyr of freedom.

Secondly, Mark Zackerberg inventor of facebook is dated. If we take into account the fact that Time’s magazine selects the person of the year based on the importance that the one had in the present year, Julian Assange would be the chosen one. As we all know, Facebook was created in 2003 and then followed its succes until the present days. Wikileaks, as opposed to Facebook, was launched on 2007, which awards it the title of being fresher compared to facebook. And we cannot make a comparison in terms of users, because, obviously, their objective public is different. While Facebook tend to alienate people wasting their time with idiotic appz, as well as skew people’s beliefs using only a “like” button, not giving the user the posibility of choosing the “dislike” button, Wikileaks offers its users the posibility of interpret by themselves the Cables, avoiding biases of any kind.

Thirdly, and maybe the most important motive, is what people believe and choose. As if the prior arguments weren’t enough, TIME magazine made an online survey to choose the so-called person of the year of the present year.in the balloting, Assange was superior in terms of votes to Mark Zackerberg, but guess what, suddenly it turns out that Facebook’s inventor is the winner. Come on, give me a break, it is so clear that something smells like a rat, and it is not me, is the balloting process itself. I’m pretty sure that TIME’s board reasoning was “if we choose Assange as the person of the year, we would lose lobbying power with politicians and other government institutions,” for that matter they chose someone else.

If you are not socked by TSA pat-downs you will probably be thinking in what could propel your career, as well make you earn some extra money in these tough times. Well, the answer could be learning a new language, or at least that is what Language Schools say. Taking into account that learning a new language is a time consuming experience that will take at least 3 years or so, I am pretty sure that you would like to learn a new language that will make you “valuable” by the job market. Therefore, Chinese is the language that you should learn, but you must be careful, because all that glitters is not gold.

Learning Chinese is difficult, but rewarding. Chinese will be the most influential economies in the coming years, so it would be a good idea to learn the language. The problem is that is very complicated and will take you sometime, because of the dialects used by Chinese’s people; and when I say words, I am not talking about letters who are similar to Spanish or English dialect, I mean strokes, as If you were painting and drawing instead of writing. Moreover, Chinese characters are divided in two big groups: traditional, and simplified characters. These characters may as well be completely different writing systems to non-Chinese students.

If you are interested in learning Japanese, there are many options to learn, and at reasonable prices. You could start trying Rossetta Stone if you want, which includes proves various features that will make your learning experience easier. The only problem is that, after ending your classes, you cannot say that you are an experienced Chinese speaker because this software (Rossetta Stone) teaches barley what you need to feel confident talking, writing, and listening to the language. Regardless, there are other options that I consider more effective, and at a reasonable price, like eChineseLearning.com, which allows you to learn Chinese through Skype; talking to a real teacher who can help you at any stake of the learning process. Another important feature is that the course is cheap –prices go from 8-20 USD per lesson- and flexible, so you can accommodate the course to your agenda.

China will monopolize the world completely. More important than that, it is your decision if you want to learn a new language just for financial reasons, if anything, is there another reason to do so? I don’t think so.

“When something bad happens, precedes a period of abundance and prosperity that suddenly is interrupted.”

When there is still 40% chance of a double dip recession in the US, Peter Senge’s  adages become extremely applicable to our economy. Even when the vast majority of the important economies are growing at a good pace, figures of the largest economy have started to slow down, and concerns on behalf of Central Banks have started to grow between Central Banks. For example, Ben Bernanke an interview given weeks ago, in which remarked that if a new recession unfolds, the Central will not hesitate to spend money to spur the economy.

How to face and tackle another recessions considering that the last one left most Countries indebted and with huge budget deficits? Easy answer, spending more and more money created out of thin air, and creating artificial inflation in order to put money in people’s pockets and making them spend more, and in this way, companies hire more labor. However, that is happening. When consumers receive money, they save it, they have become parsimonious and reluctant to spend. And that is what businessman and big corporations have done for many years, concentrating almost 80% of world’s wealth in only 5% of the world’s population.  Another important fact, is that small businesses also prefer to have fewer employees and use more technology on the day-to-day activities.

Beyond that, there has not been too much innovation in terms of economic policy making. This idea comes from Keynes’ Theory that was created at the beginning of the Second World War by the English economist. However, the logic of the model says that every time the economic slips into recession, authors should spend money saved during prosperity periods; but this theory says nothing about an economy that has no prosperity period after a recession, or even worse, there is no money to spend.

However, saying that a double dip recession is coming would be contradictory to what NBER declares. This private research group claims that if there is a new recession, it would be wrong to call it double dip, because the past recession ended in June 2009. The recession, according to them, lasted 18 months, which makes it the longest of any recession since World War II. Previously, the longest recessions were those of 1973-75 and 1981-82, both of which lasted 16 months.

]]> http://heconomist.wordpress.com/2010/09/11/are-chiles-figures-heralding-a-doble-dip-recession/feed/ 0 Hermes Morales Arrey http://heconomist.wordpress.com/2010/09/06/war-has-finally-ended-lets-take-a-last-review-of-it/ http://heconomist.wordpress.com/2010/09/06/war-has-finally-ended-lets-take-a-last-review-of-it/#comments Mon, 06 Sep 2010 17:22:00 +0000 heconomist http://heconomist.wordpress.com/?p=184 ]]> 9/11 is the day when two jets collided with the Twin Towers making them collapse. For me was a sneaky image when I just first saw it on CNN, I couldn’t tell if what my eyes had been looking was the truth or another  Steven Spielberg’s movie, either way was horrible. After that, I saw what millions of people saw: fire, smoke and wreckage, and the collapse of the towers. Intimidating as hell, and I was millions of miles away from that place.

The United States were no safe anymore. That country that fought nearly all of its wars abroad was attacked by, at that moment, an unknown enemy,  an enemy who knew the effect an attack at a landmark would have on the people’s minds. Thereby, everything goes awry. Every single person started the gathering of food, water and other elements that could be required in the event of Blitzkrieg. Thankfully, nothing happened. There was no antebellum in U.S. territory, but there would be for Irak.

In the financial markets investors started the sell off, bringing forth the madhouse that these kinds of events have in the volatile, and speculative financial markets across the world. The most affected ones were, obviously, airlines and insurance that were hit directly by investors eager to eliminate the systematic risk, and migrate to safer securities. This massive sell of securities brought Dow Jones down 684 points after the short close that NYSE was obliged to take after the events. Although the attacks were in U.S. territory, the other indexes followed the bearish trend of American indicators, just to name a few: employment, exports and  GDP.

In front of this paranoic outlook, the evidence seemed to point out to Osama Bin Laden, Al-Qaeda and Saddam Husein had openly claimed responsibility on the attacks, and were known for several threats against the U.S. government. Moreover, the U.S. intelligence had intercepted secret messages and videos of Bin Laden that kindled spark of war, and a profound desire to take revenge for what occurred on September 11, 2001.

The war was declared on March 20, 2003, whit the invasion of troops coming from America and Britain, other countries joined the battle later, specially those ones that were part of the NATO. The reason why The Ocupation of Iraq represented a vantage point was due to the anti-terrorism plan that the NATO had developed, and possibility of taking revenge for what Bin Laden had done. Truth be told, Husein was hung and Nin Laden was never found, and remains free so far. On August 19, 2010 the war had finally ended, and some people ask themselves if it was really worth it.

Aside from that, and taking into account the level spending the war meant, and some conspiracy theories have arised as a consequence of video recordings of both, the events occurred in The Pentagon and Twin Towers, I have to say if these attacks were caused by people from the government with personal interests, it means that money and power have transformed us in animals, animals that are not able to feel grief for other people’s pain, and that personal interests represent justified reasons to kill thousands of people. I’m not saying that these conspiracy videos are true, what I’m saying from my ignorance, is that money has been the drug of many people. Money has been the cause of deaths, prostitution, delinquency, and, nowadays, depression of millions of people.

The poignant costs of the Irak war by year are the following:

From this numbers, $900 of  US taxpayers funds were approved to spend through Septembre 2010.  Lost & Unaccounted for in Iraq – $9 billion of US taxpayers’ money and $549.7 milion in spare parts shipped in 2004 to US contractors. Also, 190,000 guns, including 110,000 AK-47 rifles. Missing – $1 billion in tractor trailers, tank recovery vehicles, machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and other equipment and services provided to the Iraqi security forces. ( 6, 2007.) Mismanaged & Wasted in Iraq – $10 billion, per Feb 2007 Congressional hearings. Halliburton Overcharges Classified by the Pentagon as Unreasonable and Unsupported – $1.4 billion. Amount paid to KBR, a former Halliburton division, to supply U.S. military in Iraq with food, fuel, housing and other items – $20 billion. Amount paid to KBR, a former Halliburton division, to supply U.S. military in Iraq with food, fuel, housing and other items – $20 billion.

Hopping that this situation could be avoided with other controversial countries, the conclusion is clear: a war is expensive, brings death, and should be avoided at any cost.