Increased Shipping Rates from China

[PeterSt]

1 hour ago, Shadders said:

As you can see, it is the Chinese regime that is the problem, not the people.

 

Yes, and that should be emphasized.

When writing about these matters I feel fairly guilty towards the A/S readers from China (and a bit beyond).

[Paul R]

4 hours ago, Shadders said:

Hi,

To add to this - there is a current issue in regards to British Steel (was hived off from Tata) in that it has now gone into receivership today. Why did this occur - please see :

 

https://news.sky.com/story/the-surprising-facts-behind-the-declining-steel-industry-11725482

 

The last paragraph states "And yet it is still struggling, amid competition from China, environmental costs and the difficulties of competing against foreign counterparts who get constant support from their governments"

 

So in the UK we have to meet carbon targets, and China doesn't care about those. They are constantly getting help from their governments, where under European Law we cannot help.

 

One aspect is, the Chinese government are wilfully and purposefully driving down the costs of steel to ensure that no other country can compete. The Chinese government are actively and intentionally, harming the other businesses in the world.

 

So, what else can you do, if your ethos and strategy is to create a fair and open trading culture, bound by laws, and another country is determined to undermine you, at the very least ?

 

Whether you like Trump or not, at least he is taking action against aggressive foreign power.

 

Regards,

Shadders.

 

The problem is that this becomes a very fine line indeed. So, British Steel (the Tata born version) was profitable two years ago, and goes into receivership in 2019. Greybull has some explaining to do.

 

If I understand correctly, Greybull would not work with the British Government to save the company. That may or may not be true, as details seem to be sketchy, but what is clear is the government is doing a lot to save those jobs, even offering an indemnity to whoever will be the new owners. That seems like a balanced government response. 

 

As to competition with China, well, it is difficult to compete against companies where people are expected to work 7 days a week for low pay. Versus in the U.K. were salaries are high, vacations are guaranteed, and there are pension plans. Not impossible, but difficult, and dependent upon the financial management. Seems to me Greybull picked up the company with expectations of quick profit, not long term viability. 

 

I am not saying it is right, and I sure empathize with those folks who are facing economic strife if they lose their jobs. But tariffs, which will raise the cost of everything else hurting those workers, while benefiting companies like Greybull Capital - well - you can guess how I feel about that. 

 

As for the tariffs here,  they are not going to protect anyone except the people here who are the equivalent of Greybull Capital there. Not the people the politicians say they are protecting. In some ways, China is more honest about that than any Western country. Not that such economic rape is admirable anywhere. 

 

[DuckToller]

1 hour ago, lucretius said:

LOL!  It would seem that there is an election for which country should be in charge of a planet.

Just running things OK, doesn't imply for me, that they (Netherlands or Switzerland) would be in the running for the New World Order. They were just an example for (rather small) countries that function "not too bad" compared to France. And ... election ... 😂😂😂
Best, Tom

[Shadders]

1 hour ago, Paul R said:

 

The problem is that this becomes a very fine line indeed. So, British Steel (the Tata born version) was profitable two years ago, and goes into receivership in 2019. Greybull has some explaining to do.

 

If I understand correctly, Greybull would not work with the British Government to save the company. That may or may not be true, as details seem to be sketchy, but what is clear is the government is doing a lot to save those jobs, even offering an indemnity to whoever will be the new owners. That seems like a balanced government response. 

 

As to competition with China, well, it is difficult to compete against companies where people are expected to work 7 days a week for low pay. Versus in the U.K. were salaries are high, vacations are guaranteed, and there are pension plans. Not impossible, but difficult, and dependent upon the financial management. Seems to me Greybull picked up the company with expectations of quick profit, not long term viability. 

 

I am not saying it is right, and I sure empathize with those folks who are facing economic strife if they lose their jobs. But tariffs, which will raise the cost of everything else hurting those workers, while benefiting companies like Greybull Capital - well - you can guess how I feel about that. 

 

As for the tariffs here,  they are not going to protect anyone except the people here who are the equivalent of Greybull Capital there. Not the people the politicians say they are protecting. In some ways, China is more honest about that than any Western country. Not that such economic rape is admirable anywhere. 

 

Hi,

Greybull purchased the steel works for £1, since Tata wanted to remove them from their company. Greybull were able to turn the company profitable, but only recently, due to Brexit causing lack of orders, and carbon emissions requirements, did it need to borrow money from the government. China did previously dump steel on the market - which had an impact.

 

We in the UK are bound by EU laws which severely restrict supporting industry,although some of the member states ignore the rules.

 

In respect to the workers rights - we have zero hours contracts here, and only recently the minimum wage. Pensions were not compulsory - and again, recently everyone now has to pay into one.

 

We should not support policies that are a race to the bottom - as per my previous post in this thread, the rich are getting richer, and the poor getting poorer in the UK.

 

The US response to China may be incorrect in approach, but China has wilfully attacked the west business by their own behaviour/strategy which is detrimental to us, and its people - i think we just need a fair world to live in.

 

Regards,

Shadders.

[DuckToller]

Shipping rates from the US to Europe are as well PITA ...
Today I wanted to order 1 CD from Brooklyn to France ...
Brass Against - Brass Against,  from their webshop.
Shipping tarif was 18 USD, the CD was 9 USD ...
I feel downloading flac files from international shops has its merits.
I finally ordered the item to someone I know in the City of the Lakes, which was just 5 USD shipping.
Cheers, Tom
 

[DuckToller]

9 hours ago, Shadders said:

So in the UK we have to meet carbon targets, and China doesn't care about those. They are constantly getting help from their governments, where under European Law we cannot help.

 

Shadders,

if you listen to BS' management it does sound differently
"British Steel said on Tuesday it had run into difficulties as a result of the government’s failure to strike a Brexit deal. Business from customers in the EU had “dried up” owing to the lack of clarity around tariffs on steel exports."

You may feel the EU or European Law is responsible for BREXIT and the consequences ... 
I'd rather take the side, that your newspapers/medias (incl. FB) and your upper class politicians are responsible for the somehow less than stellar performance of the UK and  its political executives.

Best, Tom

[Paul R]

3 hours ago, Shadders said:

hina may be incorrect in approach, but China has wilfully attacked the west business by their own behaviour/strategy which is detrimental to us, and its people - i think we just need a fair world to live in.

 

3

 

I hear you brother, but a fair world is the one thing we will never have.  

 

 

[Shadders]

1 hour ago, DuckToller said:

Shipping rates from the US to Europe are as well PITA ...
Today I wanted to order 1 CD from Brooklyn to France ...
Brass Against - Brass Against,  from their webshop.
Shipping tarif was 18 USD, the CD was 9 USD ...
I feel downloading flac files from international shops has its merits.
I finally ordered the item to someone I know in the City of the Lakes, which was just 5 USD shipping.
Cheers, Tom
 

Hi,

I ordered components from Mouser UK, as the total is more often than not, cheaper than Farnell and RS Online. The delivery is free from Mouser - and they ship from the US. For some reason they did not ship 30x surface mount resistors in the large order i placed, and it was later shipped free from Texas, US to London, buy air freight. Mouser must have a very good contract with shipping company.

 

Regards,

Shadders.

[mansr]

11 minutes ago, Shadders said:

I ordered components from Mouser UK, as the total is more often than not, cheaper than Farnell and RS Online. The delivery is free from Mouser - and they ship from the US. For some reason they did not ship 30x surface mount resistors in the large order i placed, and it was later shipped free from Texas, US to London, buy air freight. Mouser must have a very good contract with shipping company.

Digi-Key also offer free shipping to the UK with, like Mouser, a minimum order of ~$40. RS do free UK shipping with no minimum. That can be very useful, even if the price is a little higher (and sometimes they're actually the cheapest).

[Shadders]

3 minutes ago, mansr said:

Digi-Key also offer free shipping to the UK with, like Mouser, a minimum order of ~$40. RS do free UK shipping with no minimum. That can be very useful, even if the price is a little higher (and sometimes they're actually the cheapest). 

Hi,

Yes - they were very much cheaper for some power transistors if you purchased 25x.

Regards,

Shadders.

[Ralf11]

On 5/21/2019 at 2:15 PM, DuckToller said:

Ralf,
Which is your perspective on how France is running things???
2 bottles of Huet and everything is looking ok from your veranda? 
I'd say, for an example,  Switzerland or Netherlands are running (most) things ok, their economic/social/political coordinates are much less problematically than the same facts for France. La France has as well a presidential system, where parliament and goverment have effectivly only a small impact on decision making, which in turn feeds the need of other forces (like SNCF/Gilets Jaunes/Students/Farmers) to make their interest being heard/manifested in their particular ways. There is no effective social balancing by the state in F..
How should that France find an equilibrium for the world ?

Cheers, Tom

 

Well... I left out the smaller countries in my original post.

 

Also, I was born in a former French colony and my Huet collection is too young & not yet ready.... but aside from those sources of bias, I see the le Pen phenomenon en France as similar ot right-wingery rising all over (most of) the world, and a lot of that is driven by immigration and terrorism/insatiability, which in turn is driven in part by climate change.  So... I expect it to get worse.

 

Macron is a technocrat and not a politician - he should have a front guy to sugar coat what is needed.

 

But my original colonisation post is really based on a joke by a comedian from India (I forget his name) who went thru the familiar litany of how the Brits effed everything up and then said "but we did get this kick ass railway system."   I then started thinking about colonization by:

Germans - efficient (too efficient) & the food sux

Brits - sense of lawfulness, decency, can run things, but the food sux

Italians - good food but totally dis-organized

Spain - brutal, food not spicy enough (sorry M. Feran!)

French - good food, not too dis-organized, so best (or least worst)

 

Portugal was also a big colonizer but I don't know them too well

[rickca]

So the USA asks Canada to arrest the Huawei CFO for extradition to face charges of violating Iran sanctions.  And the CFO is the CEO's daughter.  Now we have the Huawei equipment ban and US companies can't sell key products to Huawei without an export license.  The USA is planning to give money to the rural telecom companies to help them replace Huawei equipment.

 

This is about as radical as it gets, targeting the premier Chinese communications technology company.  You have to expect China to retaliate.  They can't just go after Apple.  The Foxconn factory in Zhengzhou employs 350,000 people and produces half the world's iPhones.

 

If this move is just for negotiating leverage with China on the trade deal, it sure is causing a lot of havoc.  Officially, of course, it's about national security.

 

Trump continues to claim that China is paying the tariffs.  Right.  Just like Mexico is paying for the border wall.

 

 

[MetalNuts]

14 hours ago, lucretius said:

 

I don't see how another country becoming an economic threat/power is a bad thing, unless the US develops a dependency on one trading partner (or cartel of partners colluding against the US). Trade benefits both sides. Restricting trade for national security or human rights  reasons is another thing.

Politicians may think differently.  So if a country is to make an ally, which country will it choose?  A weak one or a strong one, not necessary in the sense of military but will also consider its economy.  Which country is willing to lend money with better and favourable terms and will not intefere with the borrowing country's affairs?   

[MetalNuts]

1 hour ago, rickca said:

So the USA asks Canada to arrest the Huawei CFO for extradition to face charges of violating Iran sanctions.  And the CFO is the CEO's daughter.  Now we have the Huawei equipment ban and US companies can't sell key products to Huawei without an export license.  The USA is planning to give money to the rural telecom companies to help them replace Huawei equipment.

 

This is about as radical as it gets, targeting the premier Chinese communications technology company.  You have to expect China to retaliate.  They can't just go after Apple.  The Foxconn factory in Zhengzhou employs 350,000 people and produces half the world's iPhones.

 

If this move is just for negotiating leverage with China on the trade deal, it sure is causing a lot of havoc.  Officially, of course, it's about national security.

 

Trump continues to claim that China is paying the tariffs.  Right.  Just like Mexico is paying for the border wall.

 

 

The purpose of trade or initially barter is for the buyer to buy/get what they lack and the seller to sell/get rid of their surplus.  With this trading mechanism, it minimize people or countries to use the barbarian method of obtaining what they lack. 

 

The factory are now built or expanded to meet with the demand and all or a sudden they have to store the surplus or to produce less.  It is not only a waste to build such huge establishment for the manufacturing but also a waste of the products already manufactured.  Digital products have a very short life cycle and those surplus products which were ordered by China will be kept in store and later become obsolete.   

 

To share the technology with others will efficiently direct the resources for developing other technologies and mankind will benefit.  It is again a waste of resources for different people and different countries competing to research and develop the same technology.  We should use the duplicate resources to save the planet and the mankind.  Recent National Geography programs already reviewed the critical situation of climate change in various continents and it will get worse and faster and if the countries/people do not act now to slow down or revert the situation, there may not be a place on earth suitable for living anymore.

[GregWormald]

20 hours ago, MetalNuts said:

<snip>

Recent National Geography programs already reviewed the critical situation of climate change in various continents and it will get worse and faster and if the countries/people do not act now to slow down or revert the situation, there may not be a place on earth suitable for living anymore.

 

But at least the desolation will be OURS!  😢

[rickca]

On 5/23/2019 at 12:38 AM, rickca said:

This is about as radical as it gets

I stand corrected.  Trump just announced tariffs up to 25% on imports from Mexico.  This is supposed to fix illegal immigration!  Thanks, Donald!  I'm sure we'll get that new trade agreement with Mexico now!

 

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/stock-futures-tumble-as-trump-slaps-tariffs-against-all-imports-from-mexico-2019-05-30?mod=mw_theo_homepage

 

I guess I better take it easy on audio purchases.  A lot more of my money is going to pay for tariffs on my clothing (China) and produce (Mexico).

[BrokeLinuxPhile]

Targeting Huawei isn't that radical of a concept.  Re-read a few pages back on how quickly Huawei rose and how quickly Nortel fell.  This is not a coincidence. 

 

Considering Nortel was if not the biggest, one of the biggest employers in the country of Canada, no surprise they would play ball with us on warrants/detentions.  Were we supposed to let Huawei continue laughing at us like we are idiots?  Because that was what was happening before we started issuing warrants.  We had to do something.

 

Tariffs won't work, arresting execs might wake some folks up though.  Although I find the irony of USA refusing to hold execs of US based companies criminally liable for anything to be just downright hilarious.

[PeterSt]

I tried to write a couple of times (but always scratched my due post) that Trump will be the only one who knows in advance what will happen to global shares, just because he knows about the news coming up (his own tweets). He should soon be the richest man on earth. That is, if I were him, I'd go short on shares of concern prior to the news and go long on them again when a next "softening" tweet is due.

 

I didn't count really, but this could be the tenth time or so that I am pretty sure that he is just influencing the value of shares (remember when I told that Elon Musk is not allowed to tweet such influencing matters - nobody is).

 

In this occasion he managed to tear down the S&P500 with something like 0.5% (I didn't really look) in the 10 minutes of after hours trading left, after his tweet. It took me an hour this (my) morning to believe what I saw, instead of thinking that all computer systems must have gone bananas.

 

This does not look good ... (and the real merit of it all will start in just over 2 hours of time - pre hours trading).

[PeterSt]

On 5/6/2019 at 5:43 AM, PeterSt said:

Musk can't tweet what he likes. Trump can ?

 

I now see I am actually quite slow with this.

 

 

[rickca]

So now Trump plans to put a 10% tariff on the remaining $300 billion of goods the US imports from China.  This includes sneakers, consumer electronics and toys.  Effective 9/1.  Merry Christmas, Donald!

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/trump-overruled-his-advisers-on-new-tariffs-against-china-2019-08-04?mod=mw_latestnews

[opus101]

CNY has now dropped below 7 to the USD, it'll offset some of the tariffs.

[John Dyson]

6 hours ago, opus101 said:

CNY has now dropped below 7 to the USD, it'll offset some of the tariffs.

I keep thinking about trying to compete with Chinese working conditions and horrible history with the environment.  A lot of people here aren't as old as I am -- I remember the cities in the US being almost dark with pollution, etc.  No matter what people say about US policy, it has done wonders, and recently even decreased its carbon footprint greater than most other countries (without extreme regulation.)

 

Dealing with a country that spurts carbon all over the place, creates dangerous pollution as bad (worse) than the US at its worst, makes workers work long days, mostly difficult conditions,  with poor vacation policy (worse even than the US vs. places like France -- who are maybe too generous), there needs to be some kind of equalizing factor.

 

The cool thing about the tarrifs is that the economics will readjust (like any kind of feedback system), but us mere peons might not understand the eventual effects -- I'll bet you that the whole package of policies will tend to benefit the US.  The US has gone from totally stupid economic policies (politicians only believing the US to be industructiable, and insanely disadvantageous policies won't hurt us) to maybe being a little too protective.  The various systems will correct themselves, but hopefully we won't over-compensate too much.

 

It isn't fair when the US has practiced relatively 'free' trade when certain other countries are very protectionist -- sometimes hiding under a 'developing' umbrella, while participating with the US destroying its own economic advantages.  Most previous US presidents (no matter the party) should be wearing 'I am with stupid' T-shirts (esp the more recent ones, after China's emergence.)  The IP issues are insane -- and probably one of the biggest reasons for China's hold out on agreement.  The draining of US IP has to be part of the plan for weakening the US  -- this eventually starts becoming a military issue.  (A small window on the problem -- not miiltary, but in the same arena -- using non-employees/contractors to write important parts of new 737's software -- I have seen the same quality problems in the auto industry...)   The idea of 'taking care' of your IP has fallen by the wayside -- we (I mean, all IP owning countries/companies) need to again understand the value of their IP and those who embody their knowledge -- the employees.

 

(Probably too far off topic, and I do NOT intend on disparaging anyone from any country -- just stating the self-damage perpetrated by the US over the years.)

John

[rickca]

On 5/5/2019 at 11:52 PM, Superdad said:

Excuse me, China is not paying that, we are.  I have $10K worth of FedEx tariff receipts to prove it.

Following today's 75 point drop in the S&P, more great news.

 

Trump said 25% tariffs on $250 billion in Chinese products would rise to 30% starting Oct. 1.

Separately, the remaining $300 billion in imports will be tariffed at 15% instead of 10% on Sept. 1.

 

This guy has no clue what he is doing.

[Ralf11]

Alternatively, Putin's Puppet is doing anything he can to destroy America and the Western Alliance...

 

 

oh wait, OT

 

lemmee see...  the tax cut for the rich allows us to buy fancy AC power cables, and the trade war will bring manf. of them closer to, or in the US

[John Dyson]

1 hour ago, rickca said:

Following today's 75 point drop in the S&P, more great news.

 

Trump said 25% tariffs on $250 billion in Chinese products would rise to 30% starting Oct. 1.

Separately, the remaining $300 billion in imports will be tariffed at 15% instead of 10% on Sept. 1.

 

This guy has no clue what he is doing.

The problem with China isn't just the money, it is the coercion of intellectual property, spying, moles, involvement with the PLA and the general way that they do business.  This whole thing is not based upon the convenience for spoiled children to purchase $300 55" TV sets.

 

I'd suspect that China would privately cave on every issue other than their effective 'right' to all intellectual property in the world.  Geesh, the US tries to protect itself from Huewei(sp), like all businesses in China effectively being an arm of the PLA, then the US business people selling chips whine about it.

 

Too bad that holding back chips isn't that much of a threat to China any more -- they have already stolen or coerced the intellectual property.  It is becoming useless for the US to innovate anymore -- China will capitalize on it with their super cheap labor, almost no employee protection, and total destruction of the environment.  How can a responsible country compete with the PLA -- oh, I mean the Chinese business community -- given their horrible environmental track record?*

* PS -- please don't talk about the US and carbon issues -- the US is one of the few countries who is effectively doing something about their own carbon production.  Everyone else 'talks' about it.   Of course, China is REALLY GOOD and effective at producing carbon dioxide.

 

John