Wherever we’re going, are we there yet? Nope! But we’re getting there. That is, America is sleepwalking its way into poverty. China is performing a kind of financial alchemy. And Australia finds itself subject to American-style problems, but benefitting from China’s Grand Economic Strategy.

But how about those powerful idealists on U.S. markets? Both the S&P 500 and the Dow were up nearly three percent. If you can believe it, they were led by financial stocks and retailers. Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) finished up 9.9% after Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) put it on its “conviction buy” list. Home hardware retailer Lowes was up 8.1% after a survey of U.S. homebuilder confidence surged.

By the way, what the hell is a “conviction buy” list? Does that mean you can only recommend stocks in which the executives have been convicted of a crime? And if it means a share you can buy with

...

Nigeria’s oil-rich Niger Delta has long been plagued by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), a rebel group whose attacks against oil infrastructure and personnel have slashed Nigerian oil output by a fifth (the country is the world’s eighth-largest oil exporter). Now, Reuters reports that “insecurity in northern Niger, where Tuareg rebels are fighting government forces, is stifling investment in the vast desert nation’s mining industry.” Niger is one of the world’s top uranium producers and has handed out 127 mining exploration permits over the last three years in order to attract more investment. Interest in uranium for nuclear power generation has increased in recent years due to high oil prices and concerns about global warming. In fact, U.S. President Barack Obama’s energy secretary, Steven Chu, has repeatedly stated that nuclear power must play a …

Guinea's constitution has been suspended following the death of President Lansana Conte in a military coup. The self styled National Council for Democracy and Development claim they will put in place a government of national unity.br /br /The military officers criticized the government’s inability to revise contracts with mining companies. Guinea is a big Bauxite producer. Guinea is a member of the West African Economic and Monetary Union (UEMOA) established in January 1994, and comprising eight West African countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Mali, Niger, Senegal, Togo, including Guinea) and capital markets are covered by the Regional Stock Exchange (BRVM) in Abidjan.

We unveiled one of our favorite 4PM pastimes back in April: called The Correlation Game, the steps are simple:

Step One: Point your browser at Yahoo Finance, Marketwatch, or whatever mainstream financial media portal suits your fancy. Step Two: Scan the top headline, which is typically of the form, “Markets move x on news that y.”  If the headline includes a dubious assumption or inference about causation, take a drink. Step Three: the next player moves to the next headline and/or media outlet, and repeats step two. The last player to fall over or to refuse to believe that some shots fired in the air in the Niger delta have any intrinsic relationship whatsoever to the price of West Texas Intermediate Crude, wins.

Let it be noted for the record that this is not a game to be played every day.  Why?  Well,

...

This post is really a supplement to Claus's post Thailand at the Crossroads, and a complement to Manuel's election coverage. Now Claus points out that Thailand is in the middle of its ongoing Demographic Transition, and at the high point of that favourable moment when what has become known to economists as the Demographic Dividend process is at its height.The demographic transition is - in simple language - a movement upwards in population median ages. Societies (one after another) move steadily from being high fertility, low life expectancy, low median age ones (think Niger, or Mali, or Uganda right now), to low fertility, high life expectancy, high median age ones (think Germany, Japan and Italy) in a more or less steady and ongoing fashion. We know of course what the starting point of this transition is (the above mentioned high fertility societies have a ...