It may be the holiday break, but in the rest of the world, business goes on. Here is a quick snapshot of some key news and data overnight.
A big international impact: more than one third of the world's steelmaking coal is disrupted by the Queensland floods. Sugar exports are affected too. And more rain is on the way. New Zealand coal miners are looking pretty.
Dubai rescheduled its debt repayments in 2009 and 2010 - but those repayments still need to be made, and soon. A new crunch is coming.
The Europeans are looking at forcing bank bondholders to take real pain if their bank fails. One current idea is to force bondholders to convert their holding to shares, rather than be paid out by taxpayers. Might make the ability of European banks to raise bond funding interesting.
American factory orders rebounded significantly in November, and US car makers report strong sales in December. Australian manufacturing is going the other way.
California would be the world's tenth largest country if it was independent. It might also be the largest 'nation' to default on its debt. It faces enormous budget problems, and a man-from-the-past has been elected to deal with it.
China's investment in New Zealand government bonds is understood to be rising but just how much it holds remain a mystery, according to the Treasury.
| 8 am | --- 52 week -- | |||||||
| Today | yesterday | high | low | |||||
| -------- | -------- | --------- | --------- | |||||
| FX rates | NZ$1=US$ | 0.7665 | 0.7745 | 0.7964 | 0.6584 | |||
| NZ$1=AU$ | 0.7627 | 0.7612 | 0.8212 | 0.7408 | ||||
| Gold | in US$ | 1,389 | 1,406 | 1,421 | 1,058 | |||
| in NZ$ | 1,812 | 1,825 | 1,877 | 1,507 | ||||
| Copper | in US$ | 9,740 | 9,465 | 9,740 | 6,091 | |||
| in NZ$ | 12,707 | 12,305 | 12,707 | 8,951 | ||||
| Crude oil | in US$/bl | 88.84 | 89.34 | 91.45 | 70.15 | |||
| in NZ$ | 115.90 | 116.15 | 121.36 | 101.30 | ||||
| US Treasuries | 30 yr bond | 4.39% | 4.41% | 4.78% | 3.61% | |||
| Dow | DJIA 30 | 11,659 | 11,569 | 11,671 | 9,614 | |||
We hope you had a safe and happy New Year's eve, and are having a great holiday break.
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4 Comments
Who said Spanish Govt BS was not up to scratch!
"Warren Buffet. Berkshire Hathaway has recently sold $1.5 billion worth of fixed rate debt in order to put to death $1.5 billion in variable rate debt. You'd only do that if you were worried that interest rates could rise quickly and ruinously." the daily reckoning
it's coming!
Goldmoney Sachs has injected $US 450 million into Facebook , allowing the company to remain privately owned , for longer . An ironic reversal from 12 years ago , when anything with .com tacked onto the end of it's title listed ASAP , to capture hot money from the clamerous throng on the Nasdaq .
Digital Sky Technology of Russia have added a further $US 50 million to Facebook's balance sheet , bringing DST's stake to $US 900 million .
Facebook was estimated to be worth just $US 10 billion in mid 2009 . A mere 18 months later , that figure has ballooned to $US 50 billion .
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