Progress and its discontents

"ο παγκόσμιος καπιταλισμός σημαίνει λιγότερη φτώχεια από ποτέ"
Ακολουθούν σκέψεις. Στο τέλος του άρθρου είναι το κείμενο με την αντίθετη άποψη.

Greece cuts 2017 growth forecast

Sat May 13, 2017 | 5:24pm EDT

Reuters

Greece cut its 2017 growth forecast to 1.8 percent from 2.7 percent, according to a mid-term budget plan unveiled late on Saturday, driven by uncertainty caused by delays in concluding the latest review of bailout reforms.

Greece and its foreign creditors reached a deal on reforms in early May after six months of tense negotiations but the wrangling hurt economic activity. The Greek central bank governor had warned the delays could hobble economic recovery.

Mersch Says ECB Policy Shift Premature as Economy Shows Strength

by Carolynn Look  and Fabio Benedetti Valentini
January 6, 2017, 12:00 PM GMT+2

Bloomberg

Improving euro-area economic numbers and a faster-than-forecast inflation pickup aren’t enough to warrant an immediate shift in the European Central Bank’s policy, according to Executive Board member Yves Mersch.

“It is absolutely premature today to claim victory over a weak economy,” Mersch, considered one of the more hawkish members of the ECB’s Governing Council said in Paris on Friday. “We have good results but it is absolutely premature to say: drop the guard.”

How Greece’s Troubled Economy Could Turn Around in 2017

Nicholas Economides
Updated: Jan 03, 2017 8:48 PM UTC
Fortune

Violating the terms of its bailout program, the Greek government recently announced that it will distribute a sizeable “Christmas gift” to Greek pensioners even though this requires additional borrowing from the EU since the Greek budget is not balanced and Greece cannot borrow from money markets. The move has prompted the EU finance ministers to freeze implementation of debt restructuring. Greece is at the brink again.

Japan economy: Exports help faster-than-expected growth

BBC

Japan's economy expanded at a faster-than-expected rate between July and September, due to higher exports.
Gross domestic product rose at an annualised rate of 2.2% in the three months to September, the third consecutive quarter of expansion.
Japanese firms have relied on overseas sales to make up for lacklustre domestic demand.
There are concerns a Donald Trump US presidency will hurt Japan if anti-free trade rhetoric became a reality.

Why India Is A Better Investment Bet Than China

OCT 26, 2016 @ 08:14 PM 5,942 VIEWS

Forbes

Panos Mourdoukoutas ,   CONTRIBUTOR,
"I cover global markets, business and investment strategy  "

Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.

China may be the world’s largest emerging economy, beating India in many economic and financial indicators. But India is beating China in an indicator that matters the most to emerging market investing: financial market development. This means that India is less prone to a financial crisis than China, and therefore, a better investment than China.

Forecast Bright for Greek Tourism, Despite Refugee Crisis

Voice of America
http://www.voanews.com/content/greece-tourism/3332701.html

Margaret Besheer
May 16, 2016 3:10 PM

Despite the ongoing migrant and refugee crisis, Greece expects to welcome a record 27 million tourists this year.

“I think it’s an achievement given the fact that we have capital controls, we still have the refugee and migration crisis - which make tourists think twice if they want to visit Lesbos or some other places that are migration hubs,” the government’s top spokesperson Lefteris Kretsos told reporters on Monday.

“Greece is a brand name in tourism. It was always, and I think it will always be,” he added.

Tsipras inaugurates TAP gas pipeline in Greece

By Nasos Koukakis, special to CNBC
17-5-2016
CNBC.com

ATHENS- Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras will inaugurate the start of construction for the TransAdriatic Pipeline (TAP) in Thessaloniki, Northern Greece on Tuesday. Official representatives of the European Union and U.S. State Department as well as high ranking officials from Greece, Turkey, Albania, Italy and Bulgaria will attend the ceremony.

TAP will transport Azerbaijani gas from Shah Deniz-2, extracted in the Azeri sector of the Caspian, to western Europe through Greece and Albania. It is part of the Southern Gas Corridor, one of the most complex gas value chains ever developed stretching over 2,174 miles. The first delivery of Azerbaijani gas is scheduled for early 2020.

The $45 billion project represents the biggest foreign investment that has ever taken place in Greece. The shareholders of the project are: Socar (20 percent), BP (20 percent), Snam (20 percent), Fluxys (19 percent), Enagas (16 percent) and Axpo (5 percent).

This project opens broad opportunities for transportation of Azerbaijani gas to such European markets as Italy, Germany, Great Britain, Switzerland and Austria. It also will help Europe diversify its sources of natural gas. Currently Russia is the major gas supplier for the continent.
At the same time, construction of the pipeline will help the anemic economies of Albania and Greece. It is expected that construction of the pipeline will employ 150 Greek companies as contractors, subcontractors or track support, and about 8,000 workers.

On Monday, Greek Minister of Environment and Energy Panos Skourletis told the Athens News Agency, "We are entering into a new phase for the economy. The TAP project will offer a strong boost to move forward."

TAP's initial capacity of 10 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas per year is equivalent to the energy consumption of approximately seven million households in Europe. In future, the addition of two extra compressor stations could double throughput to more than 20 bcm as additional energy supplies come on stream in the wider Caspian region.

Russia is trying to bolster pipeline links with the continent through southern Europe. Gazprom tried and failed to gain strategic entry through Bulgaria and Turkey. Recently it announced new plans with Italian utility Edison and Greece's DEPA to supply natural gas along the seabed of the Black Sea into Greece and Italy, from where it could be sold in Europe.

The so-called Interconnector Turkey Greece Italy (ITGI) Poseidon pipeline scheme — unable to get off the ground for years — was shelved in 2012 after it lost out to TAP. Gazprom is now trying to get this project revived. It would consist of an offshore pipeline that will connect the Greek and Italian natural gas transportation systems. The capacity of the pipeline would be 8 billion cubic meters of natural gas a year.

It is expected that during his visit to Athens on May 28 Russian President Vladimir Putin will seek to gain support for the Poseidon pipeline.

Follow CNBC International on Twitter and Facebook.

—By Nasos Koukakis, special to CNBC.com

Analysis: Greece hopeful, but any debt relief likely to be symbolic

BY JAN STRUPCZEWSKI

BRUSSELS Tue Jan 14, 2014 9:55am EST

(Reuters) - Greece expects the euro zone to provide some debt relief to Athens later this year but the impact on its vast liabilities will be little more than symbolic.

The magic bullet for Greece would be the writing-off of some portion of the 240 billion euros in loans it has received from the euro zone since 2010. But Athens is adamant it does not want that and the euro zone is not willing to provide it.

Instead, what Greek officials seek is some combination of at least three measures: a further lowering of interest rates on existing loans, an extension of the maturities and pay-back schedule, and some relief on financing EU structural funds.

Slower China inflation reduces worries of tighter policy

BY KEVIN YAO

BEIJING Mon Dec 9, 2013 2:58am EST

(Reuters) - China's annual consumer inflation unexpectedly slowed in November, easing market fears of any imminent policy tightening as authorities meet this week to outline their policy and reform priorities for 2014.

Rising money market rates and bond yields indicate the People's Bank of China (PBOC) is tightening liquidity conditions, to reduce debt levels and contain credit growth, but there is little sign of a sharp turnaround in monetary policy.

Annual consumer inflation unexpectedly slowed to 3 percent in November from an eight-month high of 3.2 percent, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Monday. Analysts had expected the inflation rate to hold steady at October's level.

Greek retail workers protest Sunday shopping rules

ATHENS | Sun Nov 3, 2013 9:44am EST

(Reuters) - Retail workers protested in Athens against a relaxation of rules restricting the number of Sundays a year when shops can open, a reform demanded by Greece's foreign lenders which aims to make its recession-hit economy more flexible.

After opposition from small retailers and the Orthodox Church, the government has backed away from allowing retailers to trade on any Sunday. Instead, the new rule lets them operate on seven Sundays a year, up from two now.

The Surprising Relationship Between Corruption and Economic Growth

Posted By Park MacDougald   Tuesday, July 16, 2013 - 7:45 PM

Foreign Policy

Another day, another ballooning corruption scandal in southern Europe. On Monday, the former treasurer of Spain's ruling center-right Popular Party (PP), Luis Bárcenas, admitted in court to authoring handwritten ledgers detailing the secret flow of cash from private firms to top-level officials in the PP. Bárcenas also alleged, after months of speculation in the media, that Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy accepted regular payments from the illegal slush fund.

Krugman Accused of ‘Uncivil Behavior’

May 26, 2013, 6:29 PM

The Wall Street Journal

The gloves are off in the roiling academic dispute over the merits of austerity and the dangers of debt.

In the latest round, Harvard economists Kenneth Rogoff and Carmen Reinhart accused Princeton economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman of “spectacularly uncivil behavior” and the inaccurate allegation that they refused to share data supporting their work linking heavy debt levels to subsequent slow economic growth.