The Opening Bell: Where currencies start for Thursday, November 15, 2012

We should look at poor retail sales as a sign that people are reigning in spending and showing some commitment to delevaging debt. People are being more cautious with their spending habbits. A good result for New Zealand is naff Christmas sales which might sound disappointing to the retail sector but is actually what is needed at this present time.  Manufacturing Directors and CEO of companies in NZ that are not doing well need to take a 30%-50% hair cut in their salaries to make their businesses more competitive rather than axe the people that do the manufacturing.  They need to do Greek style austerity to the top paid salaries. 

Grumpy growth, eh?

Always beware comments which slide in the direction of emotives. Bit like surveys of optimism - totally irrelevant if the reality is at odds with those cumulative desires.

Meant to say the other day, Dan should also refrain from commenting on energy matters, if he doesn't know about energy. Touting the IEA 'report', without an appraisal of track record/history, and without a working knowledge of EROEI, is close to selective reporting - spin, in other words.

For the record, the IEA 'reported' future supplies, by tracking demand, projecting the graph, and using that to 'report' future supply. After much hassling from the Peak-Oilers, they did a survey in '08 - first ever. Well hello, Peak Oil was in '06, says Birol. (I'd have said late '05, but won't quibble, merely note he was later than us). They produced a graph - optimistic, of course - with a red wedge labelled 'yet to be discovered oil'. This year, they've even dropped the graph. Back to projections based on any uptick going, ignoring EROEI, same old spin/euphoria.

Interesting that Mike Moore and Dan both seem to need to address the (energy)  issue, though. I thought the economic model just found an alternative at a certain price, that that process went on forever, and that it supported endless exponential growth. Do we sense a little unease, boyos?