1 US economy stays fragile (Khaleej Times) Orders for long-lasting US
manufactured goods excluding transportation unexpectedly rose last month as did
a gauge of business spending plans, but that will probably not change views
that factory activity is slowing. Other data showed an unexpected increase in
the number of Americans filing new applications for unemployment benefits last
week. The run-up in claims, however, likely does not signal a fundamental shift
in labor market conditions.
The
Commerce Department said durable goods orders excluding transportation rose 1.1
per cent, the largest increase since May, after falling 1.9 per cent in
December. Data such as industrial production and regional factory surveys have
suggested that manufacturing hit a soft patch in recent months. A plunge in
aircraft orders at Boeing and a drop in motor vehicles orders saw orders for
transportation equipment falling 5.6 per cent in January.
In a separate report,
the Labour Department said initial claims for state unemployment benefits
increased 14,000 to a seasonally adjusted 348,000. Economists polled by Reuters
had forecast first-time applications for jobless benefits slipping to 335,000
in the week ended February 22, which included the Presidents Day holiday.
2 Cry for me, my name is Argentina
(Roger Cohen in The New York Times) A century ago,
Argentina was richer than Sweden, France, Austria and Italy. It was far richer
than Japan. It held poor Brazil in contempt. Vast and empty, with the world’s
richest top soil in the Pampas, it seemed to the European immigrants who
flooded here to have all the potential of the US (per capita income is now a
third or less of the US level). They did not know that a colonel called Juan
Domingo Perón and his wife Eva (“Evita”) would shape an ethos of singular
delusional power.
“Argentina is a unique
case of a country that has completed the transition to underdevelopment,” said
Javier Corrales, a political scientist at Amherst College. In psychological
terms Argentina is the child among nations that never grew up. Responsibility
was not its thing. Why should it be? There was so much to be plundered, such
riches in grain and livestock, that solid institutions and the rule of law seemed
a waste of time.
The Argentina I
covered in the 1980s was just emerging from the trauma of military rule. If I
have a single emblematic image of the continent then it is of the
uncontrollable sobbing of Argentine women clutching the photographs of beloved
children who had been taken from them for “brief questioning” only to vanish.
The region’s military juntas turned “disappear” into a transitive verb. It is
what they did to deemed enemies — 30,000 of them in Argentina.
Cry for me, my name is
Argentina and I am too rich for my own good. Twenty-five years ago I left a
country of hyperinflation (5,000 percent in 1989), capital flight, currency
instability, heavy-handed state interventionism, dwindling reserves,
uncompetitive industry, heavy reliance on commodity exports, reawakening
Peronist fantasies and bottom-of-the-world complexes.
Coming ashore at
Ushuaia on Argentina’s southern tip, the first thing I saw was a sign saying
that the “Malvinas” islands were under illegal occupation by the United Kingdom
since 1833. The second was a signpost saying Ireland was 13,199 kilometers away
(no mention of Britain). The third was a packet of cookies “made in Ushuaia,
the end of the world.” The fourth was a pocket calculator used by a shopkeeper
to figure out dollar-peso rates. Hope is hard to banish from the human heart,
but it has to be said that Argentina does its best to do so.
3
Lego turns world’s top toy maker (Rupert Neate in The Guardian) It is a brand name familiar to children around the world,
but a decade ago Lego was in
crisis. Sales were collapsing at a rate of 26% a year, it lost 1.4bn Danish
kroner (£150m) in 2003 and private equity firms were circling the 82-year-old
family-owned Danish company.
Now, after a series of job cuts
and the ending of the family's management of the company, the plastic brick
business has rebuilt itself into the world's most profitable toy maker ahead of
Barbie's Mattel. The company, which has been headquartered in the small Danish
town of Billund (population 6,155) since 1932, has reported "another
record breaking year" of sales and profits growth – for the ninth
consecutive year.
Its high
profitability comes from its ability to turn each kilogram of raw material
plastic – which costs less than $1 – into sets that sell for more than $75 per
kg. Annual profits increased by almost 10% to 8.2bn kroner (£900m) – about the
same as the profit Facebook turned in last year. Sales jumped 10% to 25.3bn
kroner (£2.8bn).
Lego
chief executive Joergen Vig Knudstorp said Lego's success was due to constant
innovation and the creation of 60-70 new products every year, including Harry
Potter, Star Wars and SpongeBob SquarePants ranges. But he admitted it is still
a "major innovation challenge" to "stay on the top of children's
wish lists" against competition from iPads and computer games. "We
need to constantly become better, or otherwise there will be someone out there
who will catch up to us," he said.
The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the 65-year-old Mr. Roy be arrested and presented before the court on March 4. The court was not happy that Mr Roy had failed to show up in court that day for a hearing of the case in which the Sahara Group is accused of failing to comply with a 2012 court order to return money to its bond investors. Mr. Roy turned himself in on Friday after police failed to find him at his sprawling home in the northern city of Lucknow on Thursday.
Mr. Roy’s group is one of the few big businesses in Lucknow, and has interests in real estate and media and even owns a Formula One team. It is best known for sponsoring India’s national cricket team. Sahara Group employs 1.2 million workers and has tens of millions of investors, according to the company.
In 2012, the Supreme Court ruled that a sale of bonds by two Sahara companies violated India’s securities laws, and that the company repay around 174 billion rupees ($2.8 billion) to these investors via the Securities and Exchange Board of India. While Sahara says it has already paid investors directly, SEBI does not agree.
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