Markets

The recent state visit by Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha to Cambodia represented part of the Thai military government’s uphill diplomatic battle to build and strengthen its legitimacy abroad. This visit occurred amid mounting diplomatic pressures from Europe and the...

1) Oil prices have taken another sharp leg down 2) The People’s Bank of China surprised the markets with rate cuts last Friday 3) Malaysia cut fuel subsidies just days after Indonesia’s new President Joko Widodo took similar measures 4) Nigeria devalued the...

OPEC's decision to roll-over existing quotas sent oil prices sharply lower, pushed European bonds and stocks higher, and generally gave the U.S. dollar a boost.  Today's theme is more consolidative in nature.  At the same time, the dollar's firmer tone...

China is facing a new economic crisis, and it is not about mounting local debt or even a rapidly slowing property market. The crisis in the making is about family business succession in the world’s second-largest economy. This issue may...

State-owned enterprises have played a relatively minor role in the era of investment-driven globalisation that began in the 1970s. As recently as 2007, when annual flows of foreign direct investment by multinational enterprises reached a record US$2 trillion, state-owned enterprises...

When Abe dissolved the lower house on 21 November 2014 and called a snap election for December, top leaders in the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and New Komeito identified keeping 270 seats as the low-water mark, which would represent a...

A sea change is occurring in Sri Lanka’s strategic orientation. Recent developments suggest that Sri Lanka is becoming China’s new best friend and security partner in the eastern Indian Ocean. This would represent a major change in Sri Lanka’s foreign...

Japan's economy and its lost decades are no more news to us. When Japan was hit by its first real estate collapse, little did it know that its revival would take forever. Many criticized the reforms that were taken and...

EC President Juncker is set to unveil a new investment program.  It sounds good:  a fiscal complement to the monetary policy stance of the ECB.  Expectations are running high that the ECB will move to more aggressively expand its balance...

The U.S. dollar remains within recent ranges against the euro, yen and sterling.  The antipodean currencies fell, and that is where the movement is today.  The main impetus is from a downgrade in the Reserve Bank of New Zealand's inflation...

Australia and India have not always been the best of friends. Australia and India have not always been the best of friends.Seven Indian prime ministers from across the political spectrum and spanning three decades have come and gone without paying...

Much energy has been expended on projecting the impact of the rise of Chinese economic power on its political and military might and the strategic contest with the United States. In a conflation of geo-economic and geo-strategic analysis, two camps...

The 2014 APEC leaders’ summit witnessed a string of successes in Chinese trade diplomacy. Key among these successes was the endorsement of China’s signature trade initiative as APEC host: the realisation sooner rather than later of a Free Trade Area...

The huge reversal last week in the underperforming currencies (BRL and RUB) has put some of the bears on the defensive. In addition, the recent political news (except for Mexico) has been positive: Indonesia's increase in subsidized fuel prices was...

A new phase in the markets began this month.  The Federal Reserve ended its QE3+ purchases.  The Bank of Japan unexpectedly and dramatically stepped up its asset purchases under its QQE operations.  The government's largest pension fund announced aggressive portfolio...