24 hours of economics in 240 words! An economic snapshot number 23

 For January 14^th

1:13 a.m.  A charity, Healthy Planet, has begun encouraging people to give up their unwanted Christmas presents or pick up one for free from their events.

7:44 a.m.  The EU has criticised Standard & Poor’s downgrading of nine Eurozone countries yesterday, calling it “inconsistent”

9:14 a.m.  Tesco has defended a senior executive who sold over £200,000 shares ahead of warnings about the company’s profits, which knocked its value down by £5billion.

9:25 a.m.  FirstGroup has withdrawn all buses from Bury St Edmunds, as the business had “not been commercially viable”

11:48 a.m. Nottinghamshire’s A453 will have to shut for a month of overnights, which nearby residents say “will hurt business”. It is part of The Highways Agency £1.68million project to widen the road into a dual carriageway.

Talks between Greece and the banks have stalled and
the 50% write off seems increasingly unlikely, which was
reflected in the EU stock markets, which fell.

3:44 p.m.  Easyjet has amended its booking charge, introducing a £9 flat administration fee, replacing the £8 one.

3:57 p.m.  Trinity Motors is to make 56 of its 82 work force redundant after the family run car dealership went into administration.

4:22 p.m.  Work has begun on the new heritage railway line between Sharpness and Oldbury, which is predicted to bring new business to the surrounding areas.

6:04 p.m.  Unions have criticised comments made by Ed Ball’s which indicated support for the pay freeze for the public sector workers.

7:42 p.m.  Greece’s talks with banks about a 50% debt write-off have stalled, causing the EU stock markets to fall by 2%.

Twitenomics! The economy according to the people of the Internet.

Another week, another flood of economists, from all walks of life, taking to the Internet to let their voice be heard, about this week’s economic decisions.

We start things off with Facebook and the BBC issued a post about Italy’s struggle with the legacy left behind by Berlusconi.  This, as ever, resulted in posts such as Evlogi Taskov who summarised the story with “Pagliaccio!” roughly translating to “clown!” While Michele Rizzo remarked that Berlusconi “is Goblin and We have not Spiderman help…” which is an interesting analogy, although the grammar could use some work. While Bharat reminded us that “he will always be president of AC Milan which is more well to do than Italy…” which given Italy’s further downgrading today, seems to bear an unnerving amount of truth.

Meanwhile, Twitter was full of the economic buzz. Ed Miliband for instance took his character limit to compliment Caroline Flint, MP, call for “energy firms to cut prices for now and to ensure that over 75’s are on the cheapest tariff.” His main opposition, however, the current Prime Minister, David Cameron, was advertising this new “business zone web chat” designed for those with a new type of business model as well as talking about his two day tour of the UK, talking about he economy, which he’d been doing last week.

On the less political front Duncan Bannatyne was dealing with a trouble customer, a Mr Jamesworts who was complaining that his “security/pariking idiot at Fairfield”, just cost him a member. Needless to say he didn’t take it too well and responded saying “if you call my hard working staff stupid I do not want your business.” Richard Branson was using Twitter, though, to share the special projection for virgin money, which, in his words,  “sum up energy &excitement of our new adventure” It will be interesting to see how Virgin will do at banking which Virgin tried to capture in it’s light show in London, wihc Branson mentioned, numerous times.

More importantly, though, self proclaimed business woman Paris Hilton was launching her new “phpurses handbag collection” a move which is sure to take the markets and the global economy by storm! Or maybe not, depending on how you look at it. 

24 hours of economics in 240 words! An economic snapshot number 22

For January 13^th

0:32 a.m.  There was an 8% rise in Scottish tourist numbers in the first 9 months of last year.

1:09 a.m.  Samsung and LG have both been fined £25.2million after the Fair Trade Commission decided the firms were price fixing some appliances.

6:58 a.m.  China’s inflation data was released revealing CPI was 4.1% in the past month, with an annual rate of 5.4%

7:43 a.m.  Ted Baker has seen a sales rise of 15.7% from a year ago, helped by a 7.3% rise in new retail space, describing it as “excellent”.

Sarkozy has reasons to look worried as France has had its
AAA rating downgraded!

9:13 a.m.  Invensys shares have plunged 22%, to 176.90 pence, after delays on it’s eight nuclear systems set up were forecast to cause profits to fall by £40million.

9:45 a.m.  Solway Structural Steel has announced plant closures, which are to affect 80 staff.

10:23 a.m. Novartis is to cut 1,960 jobs after the loss of one of its primary patents and lower sales.

1:14 p.m.  Apple has ended its iPhone 4S sales in China, for the time being, as large crowds disrupted its launch event.

3:40 p.m.  Npower is to cut the price of its gas by 5% from the 1^st of February.

4:51 p.m.  ITV Studios will close its base at Norwich, resulting in the loss of 35 jobs.

5:21 p.m.  SAP’s profits rose 10% in the 4^th quarter, higher than expected.

10:57 p.m. France has lost its AAA rating after Standard & Poor’s review downgraded many EU governments, including Cyprus, Portugal, Spain and Italy.

24 hours of economics in 240 words! An economic snapshot number 21

For January 12^th

0:00 a.m.  JPMorgan, revealing their fourth-quarter results, kicks off bank earning season.

3:35 a.m.  China’s inflation rate was down slightly with a CPR of 4.1%, down from 4.2%, after a stable inflation rate of 5.4% in 2011.

4:40 a.m.  Infosy, India’s second-largest computer software company, reported 33% profits, despite a weak rupee exchange.

Today marked the beginning of the Bank Earning Season!

5:28 a.m.  Hong Kong has remained top spot of world’s freest economy according to the Heritage Foundation.

7:58 a.m.  India’s industrial output has rebounded with factory output growing 5.9%, turning around from a 4.7% loss the previous month.

8:59 a.m.  Nike has agreed a $1million payment for Indonesian workers doing over time; it’s to be spread across the 4,500 workers at a PT Nikomas plant.

9:50 a.m.  Energy costs have pushed German inflation up to 2.3%.

10:05 a.m. HRG, owner of Argos and Homebase, has cut its dividend following a sales fall of 8.8%

11:23 a.m. UK industry output fell 0.6% in November, following a downwardly revised 1%.

2:49 p.m.  Wrexham market traders rent has been cut by 25% in a bid to help them during a winter slow-down.

3:14 p.m.  Ocardo shares are up after a sales growth jump of 22% to 405,700.

3:56 p.m.  UK interest rates have been on hold at 0.5% record low!

5:37 p.m.  Tesco was disappointed by its UK Christmas trades with its shares tumbling 16%!

5:39 p.m.  RBS is to cut 3,500 jobs, coming on top of it’s 2,000 cuts, being split internationally and in the UK.

A quick update

Since I am now back at school I will be unable to keep up the regular schedule, but will try to keep it as similar and thorough as I can. As a result, so far, I have decided to stop doing the economic problem for dummies on wednesdays. I don't know whether that will still be too much for me to cope with but I will try it and see if I'm able to maintain the schedule.
Thank you,
David

24 hours of economics in 240 words! An economic snapshot number 20!

For January 11^th

0:25 a.m.  Web domains are to get a new custom name overhaul when a new top level of domains is introduced.

0:33 a.m.  People about to retire this year are to expect their pensions to be considerably lower than those who’ve retired in the last 4 years.

1:13 a.m.  Nissan and Renaut’s alliance record a record sales increase of 10%, despite tough year.

With the new ability for single brand retailers to open stores
in India, shops like this may become more common place!

6:05 a.m.  Orange juice has hit a record price high of, $2.12 a pound, rising 25%.

7:50 a.m.  The Indian government has allowed single-brand foreign retailers to open stores in India, allowing for Starbucks and other companies to invest beyond the previous ownership limit of 51%.

8:33 a.m.  Toyota is seeking to increase exports from North America due to the Japanese Currency, yen, rising nearly 10%.

9:46 a.m.  Superdry firm see a Christmas sales boost of 5.8%!

9:58 a.m.  UK’s oil industry has hit a record high of £7.5billion in 2011.

11:01 a.m. Scotland’s law firms are continuing to be affected by difficult market conditions, according to a new report.

2:18 p.m.  EDF energy is to cut its prices of gas by 5%, £38.

3:52 p.m.  Germany’s GDP is likely to have shrunk 0.25% in the last quarter.

4:28 p.m.  Report urges UK films to be more mainstream

7:45 p.m.  Wonga has stopped targeting its loans at students after it was branded “irresponsible”.

8:57 p.m.  The Paisley Daily Express is to move its office from Paisley to Glasgow, after closing 5 offices.

24 hours of economics in 240 words! An economic snapshot number 19

For January 10^th

Kodak's shares rose dramatically after it announced
plans to become a major digital player after having
been criticised for continue to support old fashioned
photography

0:00 a.m.  Google revealed it’s profiting from adverts for illegal products, like Fake IDs and drugs.

1:04 a.m.  The BCC’s survey revealed a UK recession isn’t inevitable.

6:28 a.m.  Housing market is not due to pick up in the coming months according to the RICS!

8:58 a.m.  Figures have revealed that 13 Scottish councils have areas where over a third of children live in poverty.

11:55 a.m. Swatch is predicting sales growth of up to 10% in 2012, last year it rose 21.7%!

0:36 p.m.  M&S has reported a small rise in UK sales over Christmas with strong food sales offsetting weaker trading.

2:35 p.m.  The Migration Advisory Committee has claimed that for every 100 immigrants there were only 23 UK jobs.

3:14 p.m.  Fitch revealed it’s likely to downgrade Italy by the end of January.

3:25 p.m.  A new Ferry service, from Dover to Calais, staffed by 300, has been announced.

3:58 p.m.  Former Olympus chief executive has called for a board clear-out.

4:02 p.m.  Shares in Flybe have slumped by 20% after the airline warned that weak UK sales would lead to it not meeting its revenue targets.

5:54 p.m.  Unison and GMB are going to continue negotiations regarding public sector pension schemes.

8:14 p.m.  Kodak’s stocks have reportedly risen 45% following their new business plan designed to evolve the company into a digital player!

10:21 p.m. Plans for a £33billion high-speed rail network have seen mixed reactions with businesses welcoming it and residents condemning it.

an economic Problem for Dummies! Todays problem: The Social Network's business prospects!

What’s with all of the Buzz around the Social Hive?

The recession has hit the world’s economy hard. Except on area seems to have slipped the net, that is the social network. Sites like Twitter and Facebook are on the rise and it seems there is no stopping them! With Facebook looking to raise over $10billion for just a small portion of it’s shares when it begins its flotation on the stock market this year, the initial bedroom project of a teenage student seems set to take the world’s largest banks to school. Although, what does this new craze have in store for the world’s economy?

Mark Zuckerberg the teenage visionary behind
Facebook has big plans for the future of social networking!

The rise of social networking is set to have profound impacts on the world of business with, aside from the many advertising opportunities, its ease of sharing making opinions on firms widespread in seconds. This allows for boycotts or promotions of all sorts through the consumers themselves. It’s like a personal recommendation on a global scale. Now liking Coca Cola is telling people that that’s your soft drink of choice and will in turn influence your friends, who will influence theirs and so on.

The like feature, among others, allows firms to break down the walls between them and their customer base, they can target them directly with the use of their info, which is the main form of Facebook advertising, and when someone does like a company they are allowing the company to bombard them with info. Barriers aren’t just broken down in the sales department but also the customer service, now companies can search for their name and see in what context it’s being used in. They can then respond to this accordingly. It’s also got potential for large scale polls and questions with millions of users it’s essentially potentially a way into the internet literate world! There are company’s who embrace this, like Best Buy, who have a team dedicated to responding to whingeing tweets, essentially giving a public demonstration of customer service, something that was normally on a person to person basis, now the world can see how they handle the situation.

An Example of Facebook advertising at its most subtle!

But with great power comes great responsibility, and sure enough it was social network sites that helped organize the England riots last year, which was responsible for thousands of pounds of loss for many firms nationwide. It was also responsible to a lot of the revolutions in many dictator controlled countries last year, with it being a way outside of national control to organize protests with one another. This same principle can be applied to most businesses. Boycotts and protests against certain companies can be organised in seconds and one’s opinion can be seen by their thousand odd friends and in turn influence them. Now rumours and bad press have an even wider effect. Plus, this is only set to increase with Zuckerburg’s 2012 aim to get the world sharing even more!

Basically, social networks will become increasingly important and firms will adapt with the times, aiming to seek out the benefits, increased advertising, customer service and good public opinion, while trying to drown out the negative opinions and public outcries caused by the army of regular consumers. Now the world is getting less controlled by large corporate giants and more by the average person on the street and it’s exciting to see whether this is a good thing or something terrible!

p.s. sorry these last few posts have been a bit late, but I am back at school now so am struggling to keep up the regular posts, so will probably make them less regular.

24 hours of economics in 240 words! An economic snapshot number 18

For January 9^th

0:01 a.m.  New rules have been implemented to free up credit unions and allow them to compete with banks.

3:23 a.m.  Camera-maker Olympus is set to possibly sue directors over a cover up of $1.5billion in losses.

7:37 a.m.  Sales in Rolls-Royce have his a new record of 3,538 cars sold in 2011!

8:24 a.m.  Manganese Bronze has issued warnings, reporting that it didn’t make any profit in 2011!

10:48 a.m. Fraud levels rose by 50% according to the BDO, in 2011.

Philipp Hildebrand (right) has resigned after claims
that his wife (left) used prior knowledge of Franc cap
to make money.

10:58 a.m. Morrisons has reported a Christmas sales slowdown, with sales rising 0.7%, down from last year’s 2.4% growth.

2:24 p.m.  Merkel has urges a deal over Greece’s second bailout, worth £107billion, to be done soon.

3:51 p.m.  SeaFrance has had to cut 127 Dover jobs after it was liquidated in a French court.

5:00 p.m.  A strike over the elimination of a fuel subsidy has brought Nigeria to a stand still.

5:23 p.m.  Chairman of Swiss National Bank, Philipp Hildebrand, has resigned after a revelation of his wife buying $504,000 prior to the cap was placed on the Swiss Franc.

5:48 p.m.  Council Staff, another public sector staff, have joined the list of professions rejecting the government’s pension plan.

5:55 p.m.  Two of the company’s going into administration, Blacks and La-Senza, have found buyers, with Blacks Leisure selling for £20million.

6:36 p.m.  HMV have reported a sales slump of 16.6% in total sales, during the Christmas period!

24 hours of economics in 240 words! An economic snapshot number 17

For January 7^th

0:09 a.m.  Road closures in Shandwick Place are due to happen on the 14^th when the Edinburgh tram project is set to resume. The project was suspended during the festive season.

0:51 a.m.  Hong Kong Airlines have purchased $3.8billion worth of Airbus A380, at list prices, a relief for the European plane manufacturer as disagreements between China and the EU, over the carbon emissions tax, threatened to derail negotiations.

3:20 a.m.  Teaching unions have decided to reject the new pension plan changes, wihc aims to introduce less generous schemes from 2015.

Edd Miliband has come out today, both
defending his Labour strategy and offering up
his solution to high salaries!

10:59 a.m. Edd Miliband has defended his party leadership, claiming to have a “clear plan” for the Labour party, despite following comments by Lord Glasam that the party had “no strategy”

1:50 p.m.  The Labour party has called for more “responsible and better” capitalism, in order to tackle excessive executive pay, with the shadow business secretary saying it was the key to addressing high salaries.

2:40 p.m.  The sending of postcard invitations to foreigners for the Olympic games is being encouraged, with Jeremy Hunt saying that it was time to “bang the drum for British interest”

4:03 p.m.  Hawkin’s Bazaar has had to close another 14 shops, loosing 123 of it’s 380 staff employed across the firm’s 65 stores.

4:50 p.m.  Unilever workers are to strike for up to 12 days, from January 17^th.

10:27 p.m. Edinburgh’s bike co-operative is set to create 140 jobs, with plans to boost turnover by £20million!