ALJAZEERA - (English) Worldwide PC sales keep sliding

ALJAZEERA - (English) Worldwide PC sales keep sliding

Lenovo (China) Top PC Maker???

Bad news for everyone, except China as they take the leadership position in another market that has long been dominated by American makers for decades. Who do we blame this on? Management? Tablets? Consumers? Or China's low cost producer strategy for an industry where products are becoming commoditized, as it really does not take that much to do the reverse engineering. Again China is following a "national business strategy" much like Japan did from the 60's onwards in automotive and consumer electronics.

But the real issue is what good is the WTO? How does it ensure that everyone is on an equal playing field when labour, environmental, and health standards are barbaric is contrast to North America. Add to all that a fixed currency to the US dollar and this game becomes a one horse race.

But who loses big time? North American and European union and salaried workers. In fact, in America the real hourly wage, according to St Louis, FED statistics have not risen much since 1982! So, where are the unions???

Beyond all this meaning more doom and gloom for the ordinary American worker, here 's list of PC makers facing tougher times as this saturated market begins to consolidate. Smaller players will be forced to merge or simply fade away into the sunset - while margins face continued presures from commoditization.

TOP Five PC Makers

  41% (est) Market Share

Lenova

Hewlett Packard

Dell

Acer

Asus

INVESTORS' INSIGHTS
First Financial Insights
July 16, 2013 

Those were the days - "in our home towns... and they ain't coming back"

- Bruce Springstein

MARKET ALERT - Financial Times - Portugal's Bonds Soar 7.9% - MORE Euro Troubles

MARKET ALERT

Europe shifts back into the spotlight this week, as Euro bond yields could soar higher and then reverberating around the globe as jittery traders push the button. Bond Vigilante's may be in for an early Christmas Bonus - long before the.summer is over. It is unlikely that equity markets can protect themselves if the bonds decide to take cover. Safety first, and every man for himself.

First Financial Insights
July 12, 2013

Financial Times - Portugal's Bonds Soar 7.9% -  MORE Euro Troubles  

Just add another country to the list of European nations that are seeking "national salvation" as 10 year bonds rose to 7.9% this past Friday, settling back to 7.27% - up 53 basis points. Again the neo-classical economists have no solutions and no plan, other than to print money and provide bail-outs. Nor do they even remotely understand that the underlying issues stem from physical economic constraints - too many people and too few resources. So the economic cancer that came to the forefront in Greece, is masticating around the continent, remember Cyprus just a few short months ago . 

Here's the real problem - as Europe falls apart and bond yields move to 10% and higher in these "thinly traded markets," the fears will begin to take hold and grip the global markets as well. At the same time, the European economies are also starting to slip into one of the profoundest depressions ever to be experienced, as asset prices deflate and consumer disposal spending is over-burdened with huge increases in debt service costs. A One - Two body blow.

This could be the snowball that plunges the bond markets into a long bear-cycle. Expect the turmoil in Europe, to test the nerves of jittery bond traders in Asia and North America this week. And this could also trigger long over due downside actions in the equity markets around the world next week.

Seems like there is no where to run; no where to hide.For now.

INVESTORS INSIGHTS

First Financial Insights

July 11, 2013

Who will pull the trigger?

THE JIM ROGERS BLOG - Rogers: More Money has been lost in GOLD Mining Shares

THE JIM ROGERS BLOG - Rogers: More Money has been lost in GOLD Mining Shares than any other industry in America 

We agree for the most part, except JIM you forgot one important aspect of mining, that is many mines are polymetallic, so they extract many other minerals including gold in their process. Should gold gravitate to zero, these mines will treat it as a by-product, and thus only assign the incremental costs associated with the ore or even  possibly leave it unprocessed for a period of time. If gold is a by-product then the full weight of production costs will not be attributed.So even at $50 an ounce, some miners may still be able to produce it on a break-even cash basis  because the cost assignments are arbitrary.

Anyway we are happy you enoyed our article - "Gold is a Psychotic Placebo - NOT AN INVESTMENT." And by the way, we confirm that old story about gold mines - 99% of all stock mining ventures end up being worthless. And yes, it will be very hard for these sociopaths to attract capital in the future. That's one good thing for the greater cause - our future generations!

INVESTORS' INSIGHTS

First Financial Insights

July 10, 2013

Somewhere Under A Rainbow