Ramanisblog

Tag: Wall street

  • Cable TV Decline Google Facebook Rise

    A  Study has revealed that the local cable TV connections are losing their way to Google and Facebook .

    Though the figures are not alarming, it shows a clear pattern of preference to Online TV watching, provided by Google and Facebook.

    One reason is the cost of the local cable.

    Another is the technology.

    The unlimited channels available Online can not be matched by Cable TV.

    The quality of the videos are so fine that they can not be matched by the Cable TV.

    On the concern side is also the fact that Smart TVs spy on you.

    So are the internet sites.

    Story:

    A recent survey by Wedbush Securities of 2,500 U.S. consumers found 12% had cut premium cable services over the past year, with 7% axing cable altogether. After seeing the trend percolate for several years, market-research firm Parks Associates last December estimated that half a million households had so far cut the cable cord in favor of online-only content.

    Now, the prospect of ESPN streaming live sports via Microsoft Corp.’s MSFT -0.77% Xbox 360, the emergence of alternative TV service Sezmi and the recent relaunch of Apple Inc. AAPL +1.84% ‘s Apple TV box could convince people that the cable bill—which has grown nearly 38% on average over the past 10 years—is an expense they can live without.

    “There’s evidence this is going to happen,” said Forrester Research FORR -0.49% analyst James McQuivey, adding that data show people watch, on average, an extra half an hour of video a day more than a year ago, with much of this attributable to online video.

    Betty Chen, for instance, no longer pays for cable television, but that doesn’t mean she can’t get what she calls her “trashy TV fix.”..

     

    Online TV Watch is increasing.
    TV is Dying? Image source.http://static6.businessinsider.com/image/528a9c3becad04f57f416a2b-960/screen%20shot%202013-11-18%20at%205.59.42%20pm.png

    TVs being unplugged.

    Time Warner Cable, for instance, lost 306,000 TV subscribers in Q3, and 24,000 broadband web subscribers, too.

    And Tom Rutledge, CEO of Charter Communications, told Wall Street analysts he was “surprised” that 1.3 million of his 5.5 million customers don’t want TV – just broadband internet. “Our broadband-only growth has been greater than I thought it would be,” he said.

    The following charts show the evidence that cable TV is dying, and that people are also unplugging from broadband internet service.

    Sources:

    http://www.businessinsider.in/TV-Is-Dying-And-Here-Are-The-Stats-That-Prove-It/articleshow/26323548.cms

     

    http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052748703440004575548083813748368

     

  • Companies That Made Money By Wars I

    Who benefits from Wars?

    Do people of either country or the Countries that participate in a War?

    Do the Nations Profit by War?

    No,

    The Business interests.

    Quote.

    “Some people fight for Idealism and Ninety nine out of hundred ae being conned.

    So are the people  back home who cheer for war.

    We are always Right and they are always wrong.

    In Washington and Beijing,London and Moscow.

    People are being conned.

    Those GIs in Vietnam,do you think they die for Life,liberty,and the pursuit of Happiness?

    They die for the DOW Jones Index in Wall Street and always have.

    …

    World War II Pictures.
    World War II Pictures.

    They were in those lands because their Colonel ordered them there,and he was ordered by The War Office and that was ordered by The

    Cabinet to keep the British Control over the Economies.”

    Unquote.-From The Dogs of War by Frederick Forsyth

    The World War, has costed the United States some $52,000,000,000.

    The normal profits of a business concern in the United States are six, eight, ten, and sometimes twelve percent.

    But war-time profits — twenty, sixty, one hundred, three hundred, and even eighteen hundred per cent — the sky is the limit.

    For the du Ponts, the powder people , the average earnings for the period 1910 to 1914 was $6,000,000 a year.

    Their average yearly profit during the war years, 1914 to 1918. Fifty-eight million dollars a year

    An increase in profits of more than 950 per cent.

    Bethlehem Steel shunted aside the making of rails , girders and bridges to manufacture war materials.

    Their 1910-1914 yearly earnings averaged $6,000,000.

    Their 1914-1918 average was $49,000,000 a year!

    United States Steel.

    The normal earnings during the five-year period prior to the war were $105,000,000 a year.

    The average yearly profit for the period 1914-1918 was $240,000,000.

    Anaconda, for instance. Average yearly earnings during the pre-war years 1910-1914 of $10,000,000.

    During the war years 1914-1918 profits leaped to $34,000,000 per year.

    Utah Copper. Average of $5,000,000 per year during the 1910-1914 period.

    Jumped to an average of $21,000,000 yearly profits for the war period.

    Central Leather Company were $3,500,000.

    That was approximately $1,167,000 a year.

    In 1916 ,Central Leather returned a profit of $15,000,000, an increase of 1,100 per cent.

    The General Chemical Company averaged a profit for the three years before the war of a little over $800,000 a year.

    Came the war, and the profits jumped to $12,000,000. a leap of 1,400 per cent.

    International Nickel Company showed an increase in profits from a mere average of $4,000,000 a year to $73,000,000 yearly.

    An increase of more than 1,700 per cent.

    American Sugar Refining Company averaged $2,000,000 a year for the three years before the war.

    In 1916 a profit of $6,000,000 was recorded.

    Listen to Senate Document No. 259.

    The Sixty-Fifth Congress, reporting on corporate earnings and government revenues.

    Considering the profits of 122 meat packers, 153 cotton manufacturers, 299 garment makers, 49 steel plants, and 340 coal producers during the war.

    Profits under 25 per cent were exceptional.

    For instance the coal companies made between 100 per cent and 7,856 per cent on their capital stock during the war.

    The Chicago packers doubled and tripled their earnings.

    And let us not forget the bankers who financed the great war. If anyone had the cream of the profits it was the bankers. Being partnerships rather than incorporated organizations, they do not have to report to stockholders. And their profits were as secret as they were immense. How the bankers made their millions and their billions I do not know, because those little secrets never become public — even before a Senate investigatory body.

       to be continued.

    ack:

    http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/warisaracket.html#c1

  • Occupy Wall Street ,End Corporate GREED- Live Video stream.

    The repressed anger of the people against the Governments being run by proxy by Corporates is  understandable.

    While austerity measures are meant for the ordinary Joe, the Corporates go scot free.Take the instance of Goldman Sach-.The Comany had to be bailed out by the government, but the executives granted themselves Bonus.It required the arm twisting of Obama to make them drop the move.

    By reckless spending the Corporates squander money, borrow outrageous loans from financial institutions with the help of crooked auditors and cooked books,evade taxes,get themselves paid enormously and post losses, which is only in the books.

    Then they approach the Financial Institutions  additional loans to help them pay the original loan.Banks, afraid of losing the original loan advances them more and yet the corporates fail again.

    Then they go the Government ,blackmail them stating that the economy will be ruined and unemployment will rise.

    The Government ,partly because of economic non sense and partly because they need corporates‘ money for election offer a bail out.

    This is the story through out the world.

    Now for a failing airlines owned by Liquor baron in India the Government is arm twisting the banks into lending him with out sufficient security and is also considering a bail out.

    For all this shenanigans the financial institutions are hands in glove with the corporates.

    The Economic ruins of Ireland, Greece and Turkey now is because of this.

    Unless this is checked, ordinary working people will be in the streets.

    These atrocious greed of the corporates makes one ,despite one’s revulsion,to think of Communism as an alternative.

    The Occupy Wall street Movement must be supported by all those who think right and it has to be led properly to end the menace of Corporate greed.

    Live Updates

    • 12:18 pm: triumphant marchers returning to Liberty Square
    • 12:14 pm: global solidarity actions: Occupy LA blocking bridge into financial district;Occupy Portland closes Steel Bridge; 30,000 march in Greece; more updates to come.
    • 11:55 am: one of many video streams, TheOther99, breaks 20K current viewers, nearly 170K total views
    • 11:52 am: counterterrorism agents spotted, appear oblivious to economic terrorism
    • 11:44 am: thousands marching on Wall Street under red and black flag, police rush to erect barricades
    • 11:34 am: sign reads: “Arrest one of us, and two more will appear. You cannot arrest an idea.”
    • 11:32 am: barricades removed from south side of Liberty Square.
    • 11:20 am: Liberty Square re-occupied: Bloomberg, NYPD struggle to quash Occupy Wall Street.

    http://occupywallst.org/

    Related articles

  • Labor’s Coming Class War, a Warning.

    A chart showing illegal firings in union elect...
    Image via Wikipedia

     

    That the public sector unions form a vote bank and help politicians who to retain their seat, accommodate them with scant regard for economy .
    Workers in the unorganized sector,say electricians , plumbers etc,. have their grievances unheard,
    In India politicians have descended to another level,that of offering freebies like electricity to sections of Society without bothering about economic repercussions or the unease it creates among the other sections of the society
    Blue collar r workers like IT professionals have no forum to represent their problems ;their problems in the private sector is as bad as in camp labor,only thing being they get paid substantially without having the time to eat or relax which has resulted in depression ,suicides,murders,marital disharmony and high rate of Divorce.
    Sociologists need to pay attention to both these problems along with governments,
    Also now that Communism is laid to rest, workers do not have effective forum to voice their grievances.
    Imperative that a responsible forum is in to represent the problems of those affected objectively.
    Private companies and public sector companies’ unions represent extreme views and they need to be regulated.
    If both remain unchecked a revolution on the scale of the French Revolution is not afar

    Story.

    The notion that Wall Street and Main Street are fundamentally at odds with one another remains a popular orthodoxy. So much so that we may be missing the first stirrings of a true American class war: between workers in government unions and their union counterparts in the private sector.

    In theory, of course, organized labor is all about fraternal solidarity. For many years, it is true, private-sector unions supported collective-bargaining rights and better benefits for government workers, while public-employee unions supported the private-sector unions in their opposition to legislation such as the North American Free Trade Agreement in the 1990s.

    Suddenly, it’s a different world. In this recession, for example, construction workers are suffering from unemployment levels roughly double the national rate, according to a recent analysis of federal jobs data by the Associated General Contractors of America. They are relearning, the hard way, that without a growing economy, all the labor-friendly laws and regulations in the world won’t keep them working.

    What’s more, “blue-collar union workers are beginning to appreciate that the generous pensions and health benefits going to their counterparts in state and local government are coming out of their pockets,” says Steven Malanga, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. “Not only that, they are beginning to understand the dysfunctional relationship between collective bargaining for government employees and their own job prospects.”

    ….

    These days the two types of worker inhabit two very different worlds. In the private sector, union workers increasingly pay for more of their own health care, and they have defined contribution pension plans such as 401(k)s. In this they have something fundamental in common even with the fat cats on Wall Street: Both need their companies to succeed.

    By contrast, government unions use their political clout to elect those who set their pay: the politicians. In exchange, these unions are rewarded with contracts whose pension and health-care provisions now threaten many municipalities and states with bankruptcy. In response to the crisis, government unions demand more and higher taxes. Which of course makes people who have money less inclined to look to those states to make the investments that create jobs for, say, iron workers, electricians and construction workers.

    Some of these folks are beginning to notice.

    http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704111504576060092978223976.html?mod=WSJ_comments_mostrecommended&mg=cmy-wsj&url=http://online.wsj.com/community/integration/leaderboard.html?mod=WSJ_comments_mostrecommended#articleTabs%3Darticle%26commentId%3D1927358

  • Dubai Debt Troubles Push Down Stocks in U.S. and Asia

    A country which is a thinly veiled totalitarian State,to which world has turned a blind eye because of oil,a country where Human Rights violations can not even be voiced because of monetary clout,a place where people flocked to to work for a people who do not know what to do, a Head of the country who is not accountable to any one, where economic transactions are limited to family coterie, with generous doles to foreign corporations, where ordinary citizens have been led to believe building skyscrapers could lead to their happiness, has burst.
    Worst is yet to come.
    Story:
    Wall Street turned lower on Friday, as traders scrambled to play catch-up after downturns in Asian and European markets over the Thanksgiving holiday.

    Investors were spooked by reports that Dubai World, the emirate’s investment vehicle, was seeking to suspend repayments on all or part of its $59 billion in debt. That pushed shares down more than 3 percent on European markets on Thursday; Asia markets posted similar declines on Friday.

    Immediately after the markets opened, the Dow Jones industrial average fell about 230 points, but shares then started to regain ground. In the last 40 minutes of trading, the Dow was down 1.3 percent or 133 points. The broader Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index fell 1.5 percent or 16 points, and the technology-dominated Nasdaq slipped 1.3 percent or 28 points. The stock markets will close at 1 p.m. Friday after being closed Thursday for Thanksgiving. The bond markets close at 2 p.m.

    The dollar was just below $1.50 to the euro, and crude oil prices fell $3.08 to $74.88 in New York trading. Treasury prices rose.

    Analysts said they thought Thursday’s declines might be overdone, and that a true picture of the market’s reaction would emerge next week as buyers return from the holiday and as more details on the Dubai situation come out.

    “I don’t think it’s devastating at all,” said Jeffrey Saut, chief investment strategist at Raymond James. “Nobody knows the collateral damage, but it is clear that our banks have exposure to European banks.”

    A research note Friday from Credit Suisse estimated that European banks may be the hardest hit if Dubai World cannot meet its obligations, with total exposure estimated at 13 billion euros ($19.6 billion). European banks on Friday played down their exposure.

    “Dubai is really a symptom, a legacy, from the previous boom, rather than symptomatic of a start of a whole new set of issues that are going to create a systemic crisis in emerging markets,” Kevin Grice, senior international economist at Capital Economics in London, said. “Markets assume the worst-case scenario.”

    The uncertainty in Dubai did not suggest a coming collapse of the global real estate market, Mr. Grice said.

    European markets closed slightly higher. The FTSE 100 in London was up 52 points, or 1 percent, while the DAX in Frankfurt rose 71 points or 1.3 percent. In Paris, the CAC-40 increased 42 points or 1.2 percent.

    In Europe, investors were concerned about the state of public finances and possible credit rating downgrades in Greece and Ireland.

    Asian markets fell. The Hang Seng index in Hong Kong declined 4.8 percent and South Korea’s key market gauge, the Kospi, dropped 4.7 percent. The Nikkei 225 index in Japan and the Taiex in Taiwan both sagged 3.2 percent. The market turmoil was touched off by Wednesday’s announcement from Dubai, one of the seven members of the United Arab Emirates, that it was asking banks to allow Dubai World to suspend its debt repayments for six months.

    Dubai’s move — the global high-finance equivalent of a homeowner asking the bank to allow six months of skipped mortgage payments because of a shortage of cash — sowed fear of a contagion of instability that could roil markets that are only now recovering from the near cataclysm of the last year.

    “This has sent shockwaves through the markets, even though the problems in Dubai have been known about for two years,” Emil Wolter, a Hong Kong-based strategist the Royal Bank of Scotland, said by phone from Paris.

    “But it is not the trigger for a brand-new crisis. Yes, the magnitude of the situation is dramatic for Dubai. But Dubai is not America — and a property crisis in Dubai will not cause the same global crisis as a property crisis in the States.”

    Some market experts noted, for instance, that while banks that have lent money to Dubai World could suffer significant losses if the company were to default on all or part of its debt, worries about the sovereign debt of oil-rich Middle Eastern countries were unfounded.

    Paul Schulte, head of multi-strategy research at Nomura in Hong Kong, commented in a note on Friday: “Dubai was a carbon copy of Thailand’s disastrous foray as an ‘international financial center’ in the 1990s. Happily, the U.A.E. has oil. Thailand did not.”

    Like many Western consumers during the good times, Dubai gorged on debt and borrowed too much to finance a building boom that has gone bust in the downturn.

    “Dubai was fairly much the worst example of overextension. It had the worst debt per capita in the world by far,” Christopher Davidson, an expert in Gulf politics at Durham University in Britain, said Thursday. “I would like to put it down as a really enormous white elephant that doesn’t have much in common with the regular economy of a regular state.”

    When credit markets froze last year, Dubai, like Iceland, found itself overextended. But Dubai, which has little oil, was backed by its Arab emirate neighbors, especially oil-rich Abu Dhabi — or so investors had assumed.

    Saud Masud, head of research at UBS in Dubai, said Thursday that negotiators would feel pressure to reach some kind of deal to present to the markets before trading in the region resumes next week after the Eid holiday. The Dubai government’s total debt is estimated at about $80 billion, of which, Mr. Masud estimated, about two-thirds is held by local investors.

    Mr. Schulte of Nomura commented in his note that, in his view, “it is not a matter of when but at what price Abu Dhabi will bail out Dubai.”

    Mr. Wolter of RBS said he too believed Abu Dhabi would have no choice but to ultimately come to Dubai’s rescue. Until that becomes clear, though, he said, markets would remain extremely nervous.
    http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/28/business/28markets.html?_r=1&hp&emc=na