quinta-feira, 26 de novembro de 2009

As lições de Dubai para o quadro da economia global

Por Cláudio Gradilone São Paulo (Reuters)

- Até poucas horas atrás, a palavra Dubai parecia evocar um milagre econômico. A mais conhecida das seis monarquias que formaram os Emirados Árabes Unidos no início dos anos 1970, Dubai parecia congregar o melhor de vários mundos. Um país pequeno (83 mil quilômetros quadrados), com pouca gente (4,7 milhões de pessoas) e com um subsolo riquíssimo em petróleo, Dubai parecia fadado a ser mais uma das ditaduras árabes em que uma minoria usufrui dos petrodólares e a massa da população vive na miséria das tendas. Esse script, porém, não valeu.

Os Emirados não apenas atingiram um elevado padrão de vida como também conseguiram algo raro para um país árabe. Sua economia reduziu a dependência do petróleo. As faraônicas construções não são palácios reais, mas hotéis e sedes de bancos.

Mais do que tijolos e concreto, Dubai conseguiu firmar-se como um centro financeiro regional, ao oferecer um ambiente favorável aos negócios e uma sociedade islâmica aberta. Por isso a forte repercussão da notícia que circulou nesta madrugada, de que a holding Dubai World estava tentando postergar o pagamento dos 59 bilhões de dólares em dívidas.

Com cerca de 80 bilhões de dólares em ativos, a Dubai World é o veículo de investimentos do governo do emirado que permite aos investidores internacionais participar, por exemplo, da construção de hotéis, resorts e marinas às margens do Golfo Pérsico. Julgava-se que as reservas em moeda forte de Dubai tornavam sua economia tão sólida quanto seus hotéis.

Financiar essas construções requer muito capital, dinheiro grosso até mesmo para um país rico em petróleo. Por isso o pesado endividamento do Dubai World, que financiou alguns dos mais suntuosos hotéis do mundo por meio da emissão de títulos no mercado internacional.

A empresa atravessou bem os piores momentos da crise graças às suas abundantes reservas em moeda forte e à recuperação recente dos preços do petróleo. No entanto, a retração econômica drenou recursos e desviou investimentos dos países emergentes, o que mostrou-se pesado para o Dubai World.

O impacto sobre o Brasil deverá ser pequeno. Além de as duas economias serem pouco conectadas, os investidores brasileiros ainda não descobriram o mercado islâmico. Ao contrário, as incursões dos bancos brasileiros no Oriente Médio são muito mais para buscar dinheiro do que para investir. Mesmo assim, é essencial falar de Dubai.

RISCOS CONTINUAM

A súbita inadimplência de um participante do mercado financeiro tido como inabalável mostra que os riscos da crise ainda estão longe de acabar. Demorou, mas a desvalorização dos imóveis e a retração dos mercados vergaram o Dubai World. Novos casos podem ocorrer, e, principalmente, podem ser gerados pelas condições atuais.

Já se discutiu à exaustão como os pacotes de ajuda governamentais injetaram trilhões de dólares em uma economia global sem demanda. Um dos efeitos colaterais negativos dessas políticas é a possibilidade de captar dinheiro barato para financiar qualquer iniciativa.

Em um artigo recente, Bill Gross, diretor do fundo norte-americano Pimco, o maior do mundo, lembrou que alguns fundos estão oferecendo um rendimento líquido de 0,01 por cento ao ano. Nesse passo, um investidor demoraria 6.932 anos para dobrar seu capital, diz Gross.

Poucos têm tanta paciência ou tanto tempo --entre os patriarcas bíblicos, nem mesmo Matusalém chegou aos mil anos de idade-- o que estimula uma busca pelo risco. Com dinheiro abundante e barato, aumenta a possibilidade de geração de novas bolhas especulativas rapidamente.

Os juros baixos nas principais economias podem acentuar surtos incontroláveis de alavancagem, com consequências imprevisíveis. Ou seja, cumpre estar atento às lições que Dubai pode nos ensinar.

61 Free Apps We're Most Thankful For


61 Free Apps We're Most Thankful For [Downloads]

As we prepare to stuff our faces with a bountiful Thanksgiving feast, we turn our Thanksgiving spirit to the gobs of free software we love to say thank you to the developers, and to give our computers a feast of their own.
Earlier this week we asked you to share the free apps you're most thankful for, and after rounding up thousands of your suggestions, considering our own favorites, and performing a little spreadsheet magic, we've cooked up our own cornucopia of excellent free software and webapps we're extremely thankful for. So whether you're an American celebrating the season or not, the selection of apps below is like gravy-drenched turkey and mashed potatoes for your computer. Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!

61 Free Desktop Applications, Webapps, and Tools We're Most Thankful For

  1. Firefox (see also: Power User's Guide to Firefox 3Top 10 Firefox 3.5 Features)
  2. VLC (see also: Master Your Digital Media with VLCVLC Hits 1.0 with Better Playback and File Support)
  3. CCleaner (see also: Five Best Windows Maintenance Tools)
  4. Dropbox (see also: Use Dropbox for More Than Just File SyncingSync Files and Folders Outside Your My Dropbox Folder)
  5. 7-Zip (see also: Five Best File Compression Tools)
  6. OpenOffice.org (see also: OpenOffice.org 3.1's Usability TweaksOpenOffice.org Screenshots Preview a Ribbon-Like Toolbar)
  7. Google Chrome (see also: The Power User's Guide to Google Chrome, 2009 Edition)
  8. µTorrent (see also: Tweak uTorrent's Settings for Faster DownloadsFive Best BitTorrent Applications)
  9. Notepad++ (see also: Five Best Text EditorsAutoSave Adds Reassurance to Notepad++ Editing)
  10. Gmail (see also: Our full Gmail coverage)
  11. GIMP (see also: Gimp 2.7 Beta Improves Text Editing, Streamlines Saving)
  12. Paint.NET (see also: Paint.NET Releases Big Update, Still a Killer Photoshop Alternative,Paint.NET Plugin Lets You Open Photoshop Files)
  13. Microsoft Security Essentials (see also: Microsoft Security Essentials Free Antivirus App Leaves BetaStop Paying for Windows Security; Microsoft's Security Tools Are Good Enough)
  14. Revo Uninstaller (see also: Lifehacker Pack 2009: Our List of Essential Free Windows Downloads)
  15. Evernote (see also: Evernote 3.5 Beta Brings Tons of Tiny Fixes to WindowsExpand Your Brain with Evernote)
  16. Thunderbird (see also: Thunderbird 3 Release Candidate Available for Download)
  17. Audacity (see also: Geek to Live: Make a ringtone from any MP3)
  18. ImgBurn (see also: Turn Your PC into a DVD Ripping MonsterFive Best CD and DVD Burning Tools)
  19. Picasa (see also: Picasa 3.5 Organizes Your Photos with Facial Recognition)
  20. Skype (see also: Our full Skype coverage)
  21. Pidgin (see also: Ten Must-Have Plug-ins to Power Up PidginFive Best Instant Messengers)
  22. Ubuntu (see also: First Look at Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic KoalaDual-Boot Windows 7 and Ubuntu in Perfect Harmony)
  23. iTunes (see also: iTunes 9 Improves Syncing, Network Sharing, More)
  24. foobar2000 (see also: Screenshot Tour: The beautiful and varied world of foobar2000Hack Attack: Roll your own killer audio player with foobar2000)
  25. Foxit Reader (see also: Five Best PDF ReadersLifehacker Pack 2009: Our List of Essential Free Windows Downloads)
  26. FileZilla (see also: Five Best FTP ClientsBuild a Home FTP Server with FileZilla)
  27. VirtualBox (see also: The Beginner's Guide to Creating Virtual Machines with VirtualBox)
  28. TrueCrypt (see also: Geek to Live: Encrypt your dataFive Best Portable Applications)
  29. Avast! (see also: Five Best Antivirus Applications)
  30. Defraggler (see also: Five Best Disk Defragmenters)
  31. KeePass (see also: Eight Best KeePass Plug-Ins to Master Your PasswordsHow to Use Dropbox as the Ultimate Password Syncer)
  32. Opera (see also: Opera 10.10 with Unite Media Server Released)
  33. AVG (see also: AVG 9 Free Now Available for Download)
  34. Digsby (see also: Five Best Instant MessengersDigsby Sees the Light, Removes (Some) Bundled Crapware)
  35. Google Reader (see also: Our full Google Reader coverage)
  36. Winamp (see also: Win7shell Adds Windows 7 Jump List Support to Winamp)
  37. Google Earth (see also: Google Earth 5.1 Speeds Up Your World Browsing)
  38. TeraCopy (see also: Five Best Alternative File Copiers)
  39. Launchy (see also: Our full Launchy coverage)
  40. Transmission (see also: Lifehacker Pack 2009: Our List of Essential Free Mac Downloads)
  41. Eclipse IDE
  42. SpyBot Search & Destroy (see also: Five Best Malware Removal Tools)
  43. Adium (see also: Adium Updates with Security Fixes, Better Facebook Integration)
  44. PuTTY (see also: Add Tabs to PuTTY with PuTTY Connection Manager)
  45. Songbird (see also: Songbird 1.0 Release Official, Fixes Bugs, Plays iTunes Purchases,Killer Add-ons Make Songbird So Much Better)
  46. Sumatra PDF (see also: Sumatra 1.0 is a Blazing Fast Replacement for Adobe Reader)
  47. XBMC (see also: Build a Silent, Standalone XBMC Media Center On the CheapCustomize XBMC with These Five Awesome SkinsTurbo Charge Your New XBMC Installation)
  48. Blender (see also: Learn Blender with free e-book)
  49. CDBurnerXP (see also: Five Best CD and DVD Burning Tools)
  50. Everything (see also: Everything Finds Windows Files As You TypeTop 10 Tiny & Awesome Windows Utilities)
  51. HandBrake (see also: HandBrake Updates to 0.9.4 with Over 1,000 Changes, 64-Bit Support)
  52. Rainmeter (see also: Rainmeter 1.0 Brings the Enigma Desktop to Everyone)
  53. AutoHotkey (see also: Turn Any Action into a Keyboard ShortcutHack Attack: Knock down repetitive email with AutoHotKey)
  54. Google Calendar (see also: Our full Google Calendar coverage)
  55. MediaMonkey (see also: MediaMonkey 3.2 Syncs with More Devices, Adds Auto Folder Watching)
  56. Quicksilver (see also: A beginner's guide to Quicksilver)
  57. WinSCP
  58. Google Voice (see also: Make Unlimited Free Calls on Your Cellphone with Google Voice,How to Ease Your Transition to Google Voice)
  59. Boxee (see also: Build a Cheap But Powerful Boxee Media CenterBoxee to Launch Beta with Loads of New Features)
  60. AdBlock Plus (see also: Top 10 Must-Have Firefox Extensions, 2009 Edition)
  61. Media Player Classic (see also: Five Best Video Players)
In case you're curious, here's a broad look at how your votes broke down among the 10 most popular:

The list above represents every application that garnered roughly ten votes or above. The highest vote-earner, Firefox, pulled in a couple hundred. If you're interested in how the full count went down, you can check out a Google Spreadsheet of the results here. Happy Thanksputering!

quarta-feira, 25 de novembro de 2009

How to Try the New Google Search.


Confirmed!!!

The rumors about Google's redesign are true, and you can try it for yourself with a very simple method.

1. Go to Google.com.
2. Once it loads, enter this code into your web browser's URL address field:
javascript:void(document.cookie="PREF=ID=20b6e4c2f44943bb:U=4bf292d46faad806:TM=1249677602:LM=1257919388:S=odm0Ys-53ZueXfZG;path=/; domain=.google.com");
There shouldn't be any http://google.com in front of that. Just that code.
3. Hit enter.
4. Reload or open a new Google.com page and you will have access to the new user interface.

It's fast and sweet, although the changes don't affect all the available sections.
[Thanks Matt Karolian]

Every Line Is A Child Of Mine


Petrobrás - Fato Relevante: Pagamento de Juros sobre Capital Próprio.


Pagamento de Juros sobre Capital Próprio
Rio de Janeiro, 25 de novembro de 2009 – PETRÓLEO BRASILEIRO S/A - PETROBRAS, comunica aos seus acionistas que irá efetuar, em 30 de novembro de 2009, o pagamento da 1ª parcela da distribuição antecipada de remuneração aos acionistas referente ao exercício de 2009. O pagamento será sob a forma de Juros sobre o Capital Próprio, no valor de R$ 0,30 por ação ordinária ou preferencial e com base na posição acionária de 03 de julho de 2009, conforme Fato Relevante divulgado ao mercado em 24 de junho de 2009.
Os juros sobre o capital próprio, corrigidos pela taxa SELIC desde a data do efetivo pagamento até o encerramento do respectivo exercício social, deverão ser descontados da remuneração que vier a ser distribuída no encerramento do exercício social de 2009, conforme previsto nos termos dos decretos nº 2.673/98 e 3.381/00.
Sobre o valor de R$ 0,30 dos juros sobre o capital próprio incidirá a taxa de 15% de imposto de renda, exceto para o pagamento de acionistas imunes e isentos.
1. INSTRUÇÕES QUANTO AO CRÉDITO
O pagamento será efetuado pelo Banco do Brasil S.A., instituição depositária das ações escriturais.
Os acionistas correntistas do Banco do Brasil S.A., ou de outros bancos, que estejam com o cadastro devidamente preenchido, terão seus direitos creditados automaticamente na sua conta bancária na data do pagamento.
Para os acionistas cujo cadastro não contenha a inscrição de “Banco/Agência/Conta Corrente”, os direitos somente serão creditados na data da atualização cadastral nos arquivos eletrônicos do Banco do Brasil S.A., por intermédio de suas Agências.
Para as ações depositadas nas Custódias Fungíveis das Bolsas de Valores, o pagamento será creditado nas respectivas Bolsas que, através das corretoras depositantes, encarregar-se-ão de repassá-lo aos acionistas.
Os acionistas possuidores de ações ao portador deverão comparecer a qualquer agência do Banco do Brasil S.A., munidos do CPF, Carteira de Identidade, comprovante de residência e dos certificados com os respectivos cupons, para que as ações sejam convertidas à forma escritural para posterior recebimento dos proventos. Na oportunidade poderão informar os dados bancários para crédito dos valores em conta-corrente.
Para os American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) negociados na Bolsa de Valores de Nova York – NYSE o pagamento se dará através do JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., banco depositário dos ADRs. A data de pagamento esperada dos ADRs é dia 7 de dezembro de 2009. Informações e esclarecimentos poderão ser obtidas por intermédio do site www.adr.com.
2. LOCAIS DE ATENDIMENTO
Mais informações poderão ser obtidas através da Central de Atendimento BB pelos telefones 4004-0001 (Capitais e áreas metropolitanas) e 0800-7290001 (demais localidades) ou em qualquer agência do Banco do Brasil S.A. bem como na sede da Petrobras na Av. República do Chile, 65 - 2202-B - Rio de Janeiro ou através do telefone 0800-282-1540
3. OBSERVAÇÕES FINAIS
Os Juros sobre o Capital Próprio não reclamados no prazo de 3 (três) anos, a contar da data do pagamento (14/08/2009), prescreverão e reverterão em favor da empresa (Lei 6404/76, art. 287, inciso II, item a).
Lembramos aos acionistas a importância da conversão das ações ao portador em escriturais bem como a atualização dos seus dados cadastrais, pois o pagamento dos rendimentos somente poderão ser efetuados aos acionistas cujos dados cadastrais estejam atualizados junto ao Banco do Brasil S.A. (Instituição que administra o Sistema de Ações Escriturais da Petrobras). Para tanto, deverão comparecer a qualquer agência do Banco do Brasil S.A. de posse de seus documentos pessoais (identidade e CPF regular junto à Receita Federal, comprovante de residência e bancário recentes).

Almir Guilherme Barbassa
Diretor Financeiro e de Relações com Investidores
Petróleo Brasileiro S.A. – Petrobras

GoogleGoogleGoogleGoogle


GoogleGoogleGoogleGoogle

TECH BUZZ Now you can search for four things at once. I'm gonna wait for googlegooglegooglegooglegoogle to come out, so I can finally get some real searching done, but this is a nice start.


Agora você pode procurar quatro coisa de uma vez. Eu vou esperar o googlegooglegooglegooglegoogle sair, assim finalmente vou poder procurar alguma coisa de verdade, mas é um bom começo. 

A Year-End Rally?

By: Doug Fabian | Editor, Successful Investing | President, Fabian Wealth Strategies

This time of year, we normally can count on the market being in full-rally mode. There is a term that I use in my book "Maverick Investing" to describe this time of year. I call it the growth season, and it's from Nov. 1 through April 30. Historically, this is the time when the market grows three times faster than it does from May 1 through Oct. 31.

As we've been pointing out for weeks now, the current rally does not have widespread participation from the small-cap segment, nor has it included a rally in financial stocks. If we look at the chart below of the S&P 500 Index, we see that while this broad-market measure of stocks is trading near new highs, we haven't yet seen a really strong breakout from the psychologically and technically significant 1,100 mark.



Moreover, if we look at stocks in the small-cap segment via the iShares Russell 2000 Index (IWM), we can see that this area of the market is well below its October highs.


The Russell now is trading below its 50-day moving average (blue line), a sign that the growth season has yet to kick into high gear for small caps.



So, are we going to see a year-end rally in stocks?

I suspect we could; however, I also think we may see a lot of profit taking in the coming weeks. Profit taking after the year we've had is to be expected, so don't be surprised if you see stocks get really volatile as we head into the final month of this remarkable year.

The possibility for a less-than-robust, year-end rally means you must have an exit strategy in place that protects your gains and allows you to weather any kind of year-end storm.

Keep in mind that nearly every investor who held on and rode out the 2008-2009 bear has likely seen his or her portfolio recover sizably since this rally began in earnest back in March. I don't want anything to happen to that recovered money, and the only way to protect those gains is to have a plan in place that gets you out of the market with your profits intact.

My Successful Investing advisory service has just such a plan firmly in place, so if you are looking for a way to protect your 2009 bull market gains, then I invite you to check it out.

terça-feira, 24 de novembro de 2009

Government Debt Spirals

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/ambroseevans_pritchard/
Government Debt Spirals

Greece tests the limit of sovereign debt as it grinds towards slump

By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, The Telegraph

Greece is disturbingly close to a debt compound spiral. It is the first developed country on either side of the Atlantic to push unfunded welfare largesse to the limits of market tolerance.

Euro membership blocks every plausible way out of the crisis, other than EU beggary. This is what happens when a facile political elite signs up to a currency union for reasons of prestige or to snatch windfall gains without understanding the terms of its Faustian contract.

When the European Central Bank's Jean-Claude Trichet said last week that certain sinners on the edges of the eurozone were "very close to losing their credibility", everybody knew he meant Greece.

The interest spread between 10-year Greek bonds and German bunds has jumped to 178 basis points. Greek debt has decoupled from Italian debt. Athens can no longer hide behind others in EMU's soft South.

"As far as the bond vigilantes are concerned, the Bat-Signal is up for Greece," said Francesco Garzarelli in a Goldman Sachs client note, Tremors at the EMU Periphery.

The newly-elected Hellenic Socialists (PASOK) of George Papandreou confess that the budget deficit will be more than 12pc of GDP this year, four times the original claim of the last lot. After campaigning on extra spending, it will have to do the exact opposite. "We need to save the country from bankruptcy," he said.

Good luck. Communist-led shipyard workers have already clashed violently with police. Some 200 anarchists were arrested in Athens last week after they torched streets of cars in a tear gas battle.

Mr Papandreou has mooted a pay freeze for state workers earning more than €2,000 a month. This has already set off an internal party revolt. "There is enormous denial," said Lars Christensen, emerging markets chief at Danske Bank. "They don't seem to understand that very serious austerity measures are needed. It is a striking contrast with Ireland," he said.

Brussels says Greece's public debt will rise from 99pc of GDP in 2008 to 135pc by 2011, without drastic cuts. Athens has been shortening debt maturities to trim costs, storing up a roll-over crisis next year. Some €18bn comes due in the second quarter of 2010 (IMF).

Modern economies have reached such debt levels before, and survived, but never in the circumstances facing Greece. "They can't devalue: they can't print money," said Mr Christensen.

The tourist trade is withering, down 20pc last season by revenue. Turkey was up. It is hard to pin down how much is a currency effect, but clearly Greece has priced itself out of the Club Med market. Wages rose a staggering 12pc in the 2008-2009 pay-round alone (IMF data), suicidal in a Teutonic currency union. Greece has slipped to 71st in the competitiveness index of the World Economic Forum, behind Egypt and Botswana.

Greece has long been skating on thin ice. The current account deficit hit 14.5pc of GDP in 2008. External debt has reached 144p (IMF). Eurozone creditors – German banks? – hold €200bn of Greek debt.

A warning from Bank of Greece that lenders must wean themselves off the ECB's emergency funding has brought matters to a head. Default insurance on Greek debt jumped 40 basis points last week.

Greek banks have borrowed €40bn from the ECB at 1pc, playing the "yield curve" by purchasing state bonds. This EU subsidy has made up for losses on property, shipping, and Balkan woes.

The banks insist that they are in rude good health. EFG Eurobank has halved reliance on ECB funding. "Greek banks are very liquid: we maintain billions in extra liquidity," it said. Yet markets are wary. Recession has come late to Greece, but will bite deep in 2010. It takes three years for defaults to peak once the cycle turns.

David Marsh, author of The Euro: The Politics of The New Global Currency, said the danger for EMU laggards is that the ECB will begin to tighten before they are out of trouble. It is German recovery that threatens to stretch the North-South divide towards breaking point.

Athens squandered its euro windfall. For a decade, EMU let Greece borrow at almost the same cost as Germany. It was a heaven-sent chance to whittle down debt. Instead, the country dug itself deeper into a hole by running budget deficits near 5pc of GDP at the top of the boom.

Like Labour under Brown, idiot leaders mistook a bubble for their own skill. But the consequences in EMU are more dreadful. Austerity may prove self-defeating, without the cure of devaluation. Greece risks grinding deeper into slump.

The EU can paper over this by transfering large sums of money to Greece. But will Berlin, Paris – and London, also on the hook – feel obliged to bail out a country that has so flagrantly violated the rules of the club, not least by holding Eastern Europe's EU entry to ransom over Cyprus? That is neither forgotten, nor forgiven.

During the panic last February, German finance minister Peer Steinbruck promised to rescue any eurozone state in dire trouble. He is no longer in office. The pledge was, in any case, a bounced political cheque even when he wrote it. Greece can assume nothing.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/ambroseevans_pritchard/6630117/Greece-tests-the-limit-of-sovereign-debt-as-it-grinds-towards-slump.html


Wave of Debt Payments Facing U.S. Government

By Edmund L. Andrews, the New York Times

WASHINGTON — The United States government is financing its more than trillion-dollar-a-year borrowing with i.o.u.'s on terms that seem too good to be true.

But that happy situation, aided by ultralow interest rates, may not last much longer.

Treasury officials now face a trifecta of headaches: a mountain of new debt, a balloon of short-term borrowings that come due in the months ahead, and interest rates that are sure to climb back to normal as soon as the Federal Reserve decides that the emergency has passed.

Even as Treasury officials are racing to lock in today's low rates by exchanging short-term borrowings for long-term bonds, the government faces a payment shock similar to those that sent legions of overstretched homeowners into default on their mortgages.

With the national debt now topping $12 trillion, the White House estimates that the government's tab for servicing the debt will exceed $700 billion a year in 2019, up from $202 billion this year, even if annual budget deficits shrink drastically. Other forecasters say the figure could be much higher.

In concrete terms, an additional $500 billion a year in interest expense would total more than the combined federal budgets this year for education, energy, homeland security and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The potential for rapidly escalating interest payouts is just one of the wrenching challenges facing the United States after decades of living beyond its means.

The surge in borrowing over the last year or two is widely judged to have been a necessary response to the financial crisis and the deep recession, and there is still a raging debate over how aggressively to bring down deficits over the next few years. But there is little doubt that the United States' long-term budget crisis is becoming too big to postpone.

Americans now have to climb out of two deep holes: as debt-loaded consumers, whose personal wealth sank along with housing and stock prices; and as taxpayers, whose government debt has almost doubled in the last two years alone, just as costs tied to benefits for retiring baby boomers are set to explode.

The competing demands could deepen political battles over the size and role of the government, the trade-offs between taxes and spending, the choices between helping older generations versus younger ones, and the bottom-line questions about who should ultimately shoulder the burden.

"The government is on teaser rates," said Robert Bixby, executive director of the Concord Coalition, a nonpartisan group that advocates lower deficits. "We're taking out a huge mortgage right now, but we won't feel the pain until later."

So far, the demand for Treasury securities from investors and other governments around the world has remained strong enough to hold down the interest rates that the United States must offer to sell them. Indeed, the government paid less interest on its debt this year than in 2008, even though it added almost $2 trillion in debt.

The government's average interest rate on new borrowing last year fell below 1 percent. For short-term i.o.u.'s like one-month Treasury bills, its average rate was only sixteen-hundredths of a percent.

"All of the auction results have been solid," said Matthew Rutherford, the Treasury's deputy assistant secretary in charge of finance operations. "Investor demand has been very broad, and it's been increasing in the last couple of years."

The problem, many analysts say, is that record government deficits have arrived just as the long-feared explosion begins in spending on benefits under Medicare and Social Security. The nation's oldest baby boomers are approaching 65, setting off what experts have warned for years will be a fiscal nightmare for the government.

"What a good country or a good squirrel should be doing is stashing away nuts for the winter," saidWilliam H. Gross, managing director of the Pimco Group, the giant bond-management firm. "The United States is not only not saving nuts, it's eating the ones left over from the last winter."

The current low rates on the country's debt were caused by temporary factors that are already beginning to fade. One factor was the economic crisis itself, which caused panicked investors around the world to plow their money into the comparative safety of Treasury bills and notes. Even though the United States was the epicenter of the global crisis, investors viewed Treasury securities as the least dangerous place to park their money.

On top of that, the Fed used almost every tool in its arsenal to push interest rates down even further. It cut the overnight federal funds rate, the rate at which banks lend reserves to one another, to almost zero. And to reduce longer-term rates, it bought more than $1.5 trillion worth of Treasury bonds and government-guaranteed securities linked to mortgages.

Those conditions are already beginning to change. Global investors are shifting money into riskier investments like stocks and corporate bonds, and they have been pouring money into fast-growing countries like Brazil and China.

Articles in this series will examine the consequences of, and attempts to deal with, growing public and private debts.

The Fed, meanwhile, is already halting its efforts at tamping down long-term interest rates. Fed officials ended their $300 billion program to buy up Treasury bonds last month, and they have announced plans to stop buying mortgage-backed securities by the end of next March.

Eventually, though probably not until at least mid-2010, the Fed will also start raising its benchmark interest rate back to more historically normal levels.

The United States will not be the only government competing to refinance huge debt. Japan, Germany, Britain and other industrialized countries have even higher government debt loads, measured as a share of their gross domestic product, and they too borrowed heavily to combat the financial crisis and economic downturn. As the global economy recovers and businesses raise capital to finance their growth, all that new government debt is likely to put more upward pressure on interest rates.

Even a small increase in interest rates has a big impact. An increase of one percentage point in the Treasury's average cost of borrowing would cost American taxpayers an extra $80 billion this year — about equal to the combined budgets of the Department of Energy and the Department of Education.

But that could seem like a relatively modest pinch. Alan Levenson, chief economist at T. Rowe Price, estimated that the Treasury's tab for debt service this year would have been $221 billion higher if it had faced the same interest rates as it did last year.

The White House estimates that the government will have to borrow about $3.5 trillion more over the next three years. On top of that, the Treasury has to refinance, or roll over, a huge amount of short-term debt that was issued during the financial crisis. Treasury officials estimate that about 36 percent of the government's marketable debt — about $1.6 trillion — is coming due in the months ahead.

To lock in low interest rates in the years ahead, Treasury officials are trying to replace one-month and three-month bills with 10-year and 30-year Treasury securities. That strategy will save taxpayers money in the long run. But it pushes up costs drastically in the short run, because interest rates are higher for long-term debt.

Adding to the pressure, the Fed is set to begin reversing some of the policies it has been using to prop up the economy. Wall Street firms advising the Treasury recently estimated that the Fed's purchases of Treasury bonds and mortgage-backed securities pushed down long-term interest rates by about one-half of a percentage point. Removing that support could in itself add $40 billion to the government's annual tab for debt service.

This month, the Treasury Department's private-sector advisory committee on debt management warned of the risks ahead.

"Inflation, higher interest rate and rollover risk should be the primary concerns," declared the Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee, a group of market experts that provide guidance to the government, on Nov. 4.

"Clever debt management strategy," the group said, "can't completely substitute for prudent fiscal policy."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/23/business/23rates.html?_r=1&hp

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John F. Mauldin
johnmauldin@investorsinsight.com

domingo, 22 de novembro de 2009

Earth Destroyed By Large Hadron Collider; Martian Questioned

http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2009/11/earth-destroyed-by-large-hadron-collider-martian-questioned/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+wiredgeekdad+(Blog+-+GeekDad)&utm_content=Google+Reader


from Wired: GeekDad by Matt Blum

Maximilien Brice; Michael Hoch; Joseph Gobin, © CERNMaximilien Brice; Michael Hoch; Joseph Gobin, © CERN
In a stunning piece of astronomical news, the planet Sol III — better known as “Earth” — has been completely obliterated. In connection with this sudden catastrophe, authorities have questioned a resident of neighboring planet Sol IV (Mars), who is known to have made threats against Earth in the past. This questioning is thought by many to be a formality, as most sources indicate that the destruction was caused by a foolhardy group of scientists in central Europe.
Rumors of the dangers inherent in the scientists’ project, known as the “Large Hadron Collider” or LHC,  began to circulate over a year ago amongst the population of Earth, though such concerns were widely denigrated by reputable scientists. The projects’ repeated failures to get properly going were met with suggestions that an elementary particle, which the LHC was meant to discover, wasaffecting the experiment retroactively through time-travel. This is highly unlikely, of course, as the Time Police detected no eddies in the space-time continuum that would provide evidence of such tampering, though it is possible that this “Higgs boson” (as it was known to earthlings) is too crafty to leave traces. In any event, the LHC did in fact start back up several Earth days ago, and evidently in spite of the infinitesimal chance of anything going seriously awry, the Earth has possibly been swallowed by a newly-minted black hole.
While the diminutive Martian claims to have no culpability in the Earth’s destruction due to the theft of his Illudium Pu-36 Explosive Space Modulator, investigators are questioning him thoroughly due to troubling comments reported by a tall big-eared earthling, which have since been confirmed by the discovery of the video seen below. Perhaps investigators believe the Martian to have staged the destruction in such a way to divert attention from himself. Attempts to reach the Martian through his K-9 secretary were unsuccessful.
Anyone with information about the destruction of Earth is asked to please leave a comment on this blog post. (Anyone who takes this article seriously could use a little assistance.)

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