Interesting Reading 14 March 2018
Bank Scam
RBI bans letters of undertaking for seeking overseas loans
Too little too late?
China’s Own Goal: An Unnecessary and Counterproductive (on-budget) Fiscal Consolidation
Brad Setser talks about how Chinese demand and savings affect global demand and savings. Interesting read as usual. He has clarified this issue many times before but read this article as it gives details on Chinese central government debt and savings.
B.R. Ambedkar in the time of farmer protests
China’s US Treasury holdings in focus amid trade tensions
This seems like a fallacy. China would rather use the forex reserves to buy assets globally or in US than just dump them. With countries restricting acquisitions by China [Recently US government vetoed Singapore based Broadcom's bid for Qualcom] things could get nasty but dumping treasuries may not be part of the deal. In case situation worsens however China may use it as an offensive tool. From China's point of view those dollars should be written off already.
Other Interesting
Mining data on cab rides to show how business information flows
The Economist has a story on how taxi data was mined around Fed meetings to study what is the potential impact of the policy being announced. The Economist raises some questions about information leakage between policy announcement and release of minutes of meeting where there is no blackout.
My suggestion is that every politician or bureaucrat when he meets with outsiders the meeting should be live streamed with audio on their website. And no meetings should be allowed on outside. Thus when an official meets outsider in a coffee shop or so, a presumption of law may be attributed to that being "illegal" meeting.
Blockchain Revolution Without the Blockchain
A sensible article about what the block-chain is and what to expect. This comes from Bank of Canada courtsey Amol Agarwal.
Addressing the Dark Side of the Crypto World
Christine Lagard weighs in on risk of Crypto World. Gives you flavour of what international policy is heading for.
Something Mysterious Is Killing Captive Gorillas
Gut bacteria is very important. Some principles of Ayurveda are coming back to mainstream.
World War Watch
A challenging time for the Indo-Pacific
Brahma Chellaney does a superb post. Must read.
Remember Indian ocean is strategic - it has access to two choke points on trade routes - The gulf of Aden (towards suez canal) and Strait of Malacca (Singapore strait towards pacific). China is trying to get its feet into areas where it feels it can be choked -oil transport routes.
Forget Trade Wars. Trump's ‘Taiwan Card’ Is China's Real Worry
Game Theory Scowls at Trump-North Korea Talks
Tyler Cowen explains the North Korea-US talk in game theory perspective. North Korea is in position of significant advantage. The question is there are some options that are not known to us lay people but known to US security experts. That is the hope.
Most of China experts believe that North Korea is headache for China. However, I don't think so. There is/must be some tacit understanding between China and North Korea. I feel China is playing US through North Korea. This game is not being played by Kim alone. The behaviour of China & North Korea just don't add up.
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