90 seconds at 9 am with BNZ: Obama pledges to cut US budget deficit by US$4 trln by 2022; Why it matters for NZ; Rental supply outstrips demand

Sounds like what some of us have been saying for some time:

The 'biggest economy' (can you call it that with the debt added?) is in permanent trouble.

2020 ia Mad Max territory in energy-to-do-something terms - too late to be relevant.

Of course it'll "cascade onto slower growth globally" - I could have told you that would be the case about now, and I could have told you in 1975:

http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/3550

of the course the common sense solution is to cut spending and raise income, but Washington is so hopelessly capture by vested interests i'd be surprised if anything meaningfull happens.

It is all a fools game really.

Something I have never heard disputed is that GDP=Energy, or growth = a growth in energy consumption.

So if peak oil is a reality then all the debt will likely never be paid back. 

Sooner or later everyone will realise this and the only solution to contracting growth is to reduce spending. 

If debt is to be repaid, the only way for this obtain a surplus is for spending to be cut below a contracting GDP.

Obama is a man of promises.....nothing else!

Meanwhile The Fed continues exporting inflation to the rest of the world via QE, driving up stock markets and raw material prices and our local media spends the majority of the week reporting increases in milk and bread prices, lord forbid they dip their toe into trying to explain why!!!! Meanwhile this leaves joe average kiwi thinking the local farmers and bakers are ripping us off, not realising the deeper issues in the world and how our purchasing power is being debased by US greed.

All the while in the background the oil supply issues (yes PDK, I sit slightly on your side of the fence) continue to fester away quietly just waiting to destroy any resurgent global "growth". Still at least the European bond issue has gone quiet for a while, just keep the bailouts rolling boys and make hay while the sun shines.

I'm off to work. 

FYI The BusinessNZ BNZ Performance of Manufacturing Index (PMI) for March shows the sector barely expanding at 50.1%, down a bit from 53.6 in January. 50% is the threshold for expansion or retraction.

More detail here.

Bank of New Zealand’s Senior Economist, Craig Ebert, said that the stalling in the March PMI, from its robust reading early this year, was understandable, as it is the first survey post February’s devastating

earthquake. Still, there remained enough positive aspects, including robust employment intentions, to suggest the manufacturing will continue to recover, overall, having rebounded well in Q4 of last year>

http://www.businessnz.org.nz/file/2070/PMI%20Main%20Release%20FINAL.pdf

And here's our interactive chart here

http://www.interest.co.nz/charts/confidence/pmi-index

cheers

 "Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully said the money would go, through the International Federation Red Cross, to helping those affected by the fighting in the north African country." stuff

Ok but why ...when there are at least a dozen other conflict zones where people are in the same if not worse situation...why ?

and what's to stop the money ending up in gadafi's pocket?

Last of the cheap wine.....!

 "IT’S bad news for wine connoisseurs and party time for cheapskates: new research has shown that £4-a-bottle plonk tastes just as good as the top vintages.

Confirming something many drinkers have long suspected, the study shows that quality is all in the mind."

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/wine-test-proves-quality-is-all-in-the-mind-1.1096275#

"hic"

fx volumes in the NZ$ rose in March 2011 to their highest levels in two years

http://www.interest.co.nz/charts/exchange-rates/foreign-exchange-trading-volumes

with a big jump in fx swaps. Overall transaction volumes exceeded $10.3 billion per working day, or almost $280 billion for the month. In the past 12 months, trading volumes have exceeded $2.6 trillion.

Big numbers, eh.