All about unemployment

- 4 hours and 1 minutes ago

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/66702?ns=guardianpageName=Politics%3A+Darling+ready+to+admit+taxes+must+risech=Politicsc3=The+Guardianc4=Economic+policy%2CAlistair+Darling%2CPoliticsc5=Credit+Crunch%2CNot+commercially+usefulc6=Allegra+Strattonc7=2008_11_22c8=1122290c9=articlec10=GUc11=Politicsc12=Economic+policyc13=c14=h2=GU%2FPolitics%2FEconomic+policy" width="1" height="1" //divpThe chancellor, Alistair Darling, is preparing to admit that tax will need to rise after the next election as borrowing projections emerged showing the public finances in a worse state than previous estimates had shown. Darling will say that "adjustments" will have to be made, though it is unclear whether these will be slated for 2010 or 2011. /ppYesterday the Treasury refused to deny reports that its officials were putting borrowing in the region of pound;120bn - much more than the pound;90bn many thought Darling would announce in his pre budget report on Monday. /ppTreasury officials are reported to have described the effect the pound;120bn would have on the economy as a "mammoth shock" as tax revenues continue to plummet and the costs of increased unemployment are borne by the state. /ppOn Monday, Darling will have to show the government has a strategy for controlling annual borrowing to soothe international markets and remove conditions that might otherwise see the Bank of England feel the need to raise interest rates. /ppLast night it emerged that the chancellor was preparing to admit the government would raise taxes in order to bring the public finances under control. It is still thought the government will announce the heavily trailed fiscal stimulus package of tax cuts and increased public spending./ppThe admission by the chancellor on Monday may also serve to claim for the government some of the intellectual territory the Conservative leader staked this week when he ended a year-old commitment to match Labour party's spending plans for the year 2010-2011. Explaining his position on Tuesday, David Cameron said he believed the British people would be suspicious of tax cuts and public spending programmes without obvious funding./ppIt is not clear what form the tax rises might take but a Treasury aide described as "rubbish" a suggestion that VAT might rise from 17.5% to 22.5%./ppThis week the prime minister's efforts in tackling the economic downturn were reflected in improved polling figures, leading to speculation that No 10 was gearing up to call an election./ppSpeaking on Jeremy Vine's Radio 2 programme yesterday, Gordon Brown refused to be drawn on his improved standing and batted away talk of a election, saying that all speculation could be "discounted"./ppDowning Street has been quick to nip the rumour in the bud, with ministerial special advisers briefed this week by senior No 10 aides that an election was not "remotely on our minds". /ppThey are keen to prevent a rerun of last summer which saw Brown's political standing damaged by his decision not to call an election after weeks of speculation./ppPressure was piled on the Treasury team drawing up Monday's plan by confirmation yesterday of poor October public sector net borrowing figures. Public sector net borrowing increased in the last month by pound;1.4bn. Borrowing was pound;3.1bn higher this year than in October 2007./ppThe figure for public sector net debt rose to pound;640.9bn or 42.9% of GDP largely down to the government's takeover of Bradford Bingley at the end of September. Net borrowing has reached pound;37bn already - nearly as much as the pound;43bn forecast by the Treasury for the whole of the year. Government spending was higher than in the same month a year ago./ppThe prime minister and chancellor have said in the last few weeks that they favour a fiscal stimulus package to help galvanise the British economy. If as expected it is announced on Monday, this could increase public sector net borrowing by pound;15bn-pound;30bn./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/economy"Economic policy/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/alistairdarling"Alistair Darling/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227317660288112201400459684"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Politicscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227317660288112201400459684" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

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mondays,economy,public sector,margins,intellectual

25,000 jobs go in a week, and those are only the ones we know about

Why cheap gas can't save the economy

Bush signs bill extending jobless benefits

Bush Extends Unemployment Benefits

Bush signs law extending unemployment insurance

Repossessions up by 12%

Guardian Unlimited

- 18 hours and 55 minutes ago

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/94775?ns=guardianpageName=Money%3A+Repossessions+up+by+12%25ch=Moneyc3=guardian.co.ukc4=Repossessions+%28Money%29%2CMortgages+%28Money%29%2CBorrowing+and+debt%2CHousing+market+%28Business%29%2CBusiness%2CMoney%2CUK+newsc5=Personal+Finance%2CCredit+Crunch%2CNot+commercially+useful%2CBusiness+Markets%2CProperty+Mortgages+and+Interest+Ratesc6=Hilary+Osbornec7=2008_11_21c8=1121460c9=articlec10=GUc11=Moneyc12=Repossessionsc13=c14=h2=GU%2FMoney%2FRepossessions" width="1" height="1" //divpa href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/repossessions"Repossessions/a jumped by 12% in the third quarter of the year as increasing numbers of homeowners struggled to make their a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/mortgages"mortgage/a repayments, figures showed today./ppA total of 11,300 homes were repossessed between July and September, compared with 10,100 in the second quarter of the year, the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) said./ppThis is the first time the CML has published quarterly statistics so no year-on-year comparison is available. However, it is clear that repossessions are rising as higher living costs and growing unemployment hit consumers. /ppLast year, 26,2000 properties were taken into possession by lenders - so far this year the figure stands at 30,200./ppThe CML said 168,000 mortgage borrowers were now at least three months in arrears on repayments - 8% higher than at the end of June when 156,000 people had fallen that far behind on their loans./ppIt said by the end of the year it expected the number of households at least three months in arrears to exceed its previous forecast of 170,000./ppemMore details soon.../em/pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/repossessions"Repossessions/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/mortgages"Mortgages/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/debt"Borrowing debt/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/housingmarket"Housing market/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Moneycountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227261459521112110021436901"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Moneycountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227261459521112110021436901" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

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second quarter,mortgages,margins,ss,unemployment

Brutal share sell-off in US as oil falls below $50 for first time in 3½ years

Guardian Unlimited

- 1 days and 2 hours ago

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/84645?ns=guardianpageName=Business%3A+Brutal+share+sell-off+in+US+as+oil+falls+below+%2450+for+first+time+in+3%26frac12%3B+yearsch=Businessc3=The+Guardianc4=US+economy+%28Business%29%2CBusiness%2CMarket+turmoil%2CUS+news%2CWorld+news%2CSharesc5=Investments%2CCredit+Crunch%2CNot+commercially+useful%2CBusiness+Markets%2CUS+Economyc6=James+Doran%2CLarry+Elliottc7=2008_11_21c8=1121682c9=articlec10=GUc11=Businessc12=US+economyc13=c14=h2=GU%2FBusiness%2FUS+economy" width="1" height="1" //divpWall Street suffered its biggest battering in more than 10 years last night, while fears of a long and painful economic slump continued to stalk the markets./ppBoth stockmarket indices in the US - the Dow Jones Industrial Average, and Standard Poor's 500 index - closed the day at levels not seen since before the burst of the dotcom bubble in 2000. And the price of oil dropped below $50 a barrel for the first time in 3frac12; years./ppYesterday afternoon, what little confidence remained in the market was sapped by a record rise in US unemployment, and Washington's refusal to offer a financial bail-out to the country's so-called Big Three carmakers./ppIn the final two hours of trading, the sell-off was brutal: the Dow plunged 444.99 points - or 5.6%- to 7552.29. The SP 500 slid 6.7% to 752.44, its lowest close since 1997. Banking shares were perhaps the hardest hit, with Citigroup closing the day down 26%. This latest share collapse left Citigroup - once the biggest bank in the world - with a market value of $25bn. Less than two years ago, the group was worth more than $250bn./ppGM And Ford both closed up but lost massive gains made earlier in the day when the prospect of a bail-out was still on the cards. Their share prices plunged as Paulson revealed his distaste for government intervention in the car market ./pp"No one thinks a failure of any company in [the auto] industry would be a good thing. It's something to be avoided," Paulson said. But: "It doesn't make any sense to put any money in, if there isn't a clear path to viability."/ppThe slumping markets were further buffeted by the worst unemployment data in the US for 16 years. /ppInitial claims for state unemployment benefits were a seasonally adjusted 542,000 in the week to November 15, compared with 515,000 a week before, the biggest weekly increase since 1992. /ppCalifornia had the worst increase, with 15,000 more out of work over the week. New York also posted record gains, with 3,700 newly unemployed people as a large number of layoffs from Wall Street firms such as Goldman Sachs and Citigroup begin./pp"These numbers are rotten," said David Wyss, chief economist at Standard Poor's in New York. He said California's losses were so high because many businesses had been affected by the recent wildfires. America's national unemployment rate is running at 6.5%, while total claims lasting more than one week broke through the 4m mark, to hit a 25-year high./ppTo compound it all, the dollar weakened further still against major currencies. A euro cost $1.2534, up from $1.2526 on Wednesday. /ppIn the oil market, the cost of a barrel of benchmark Brent crude fell by almost $3 to $49.83 on commodity markets. US light crude, which tends to be slightly dearer than Brent, briefly dipped below the $50 level in New York trading./ppThe slump means British motorists are likely to see petrol prices come down by a further 7p a litre before Christmas./ppThe Opec oil cartel is contemplating supply curbs when it meets in Cairo next week, but oil analysts said the prospect of tumbling demand for oil outweighed any possible cut in production. /ppThe RAC said the tumbling cost of crude - dropping almost $100 a barrel since its July peak of more than $147 - would mean that it would be pound;17 cheaper to fill up the average car. But AA spokesman Luke Bodset warned that, while wholesale prices were being pushed down, "they are not necessarily being passed on to the consumer, because the pound has lost a quarter of its value over the last year"./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/useconomy"US economy/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/marketturmoil"Market turmoil/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/usa"United States/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/shares"Shares/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Businesscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227235575618112102461559266"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Businesscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227235575618112102461559266" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

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rac,benchmark,economy,cartels,burst

More job losses darken global economic outlook

Bargains galore as Christmas comes early for shoppers

Guardian Unlimited

- 1 days and 4 hours ago

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/41393?ns=guardianpageName=Business%3A+Bargains+galore+as+Christmas+comes+early+for+shoppersch=Businessc3=The+Guardianc4=Retail+industry+%28Business%29%2CChristmas+%28Life+and+style%29%2CBusiness%2CCredit+crunch+%28Business%29c5=Unclassified%2CCredit+Crunch%2CBusiness+Marketsc6=Julia+Finch%2CMartin+Wainwright%2CPatrick+Barkhamc7=2008_11_21c8=1121628c9=articlec10=GUc11=Businessc12=Retail+industryc13=c14=h2=GU%2FBusiness%2FRetail+industry" width="1" height="1" //divpShoppers were lured back on to the high street yesterday as stores slashed prices in an attempt to kickstart the vital Christmas trading period and shift unsold stock./ppIn the annual game of chicken between consumers and stores, the retailers have blinked first. There may still be 34 shopping days until Christmas, but over the past three weeks sales have fallen off a cliff for many retailers. Faced with what some analysts have warned could be the worst Christmas for 30 years as a result of falling house prices, rising unemployment and rock-bottom confidence, retailers have already resorted to price cuts and promotions./ppIt was Marks Spencer's decision to hold a one-day 20% off "spectacular"- for the first time in four years - that prised many reluctant shoppers out of their homes and offices. /ppBut the shop windows in the West End of London were plastered with posters promising bargains. Debenhams was in the middle of a three-day 25% off sale and there were sale signs up in Jane Norman, Mexx, Clarks, H Samuel, and Sir Philip Green's Arcadia Group chains, including Burton, Dorothy Perkins and Bhs./ppNew figures from the Office for National Statistics suggested retail sales were proving unexpectedly resilient. The ONS said sales dropped by just 0.1% in October, leaving them 1.9% higher than last year. This was way ahead of forecasts in the City, where analysts had been predicting a slump of 0.9%./ppBut in recent months economists and retailers have repeatedly questioned the accuracy of the ONS figures. Even the Bank of England has suggested the data should be treated with caution./ppDavid Tinsley, an economist with nabCapital, predicted the official figures would soon catch up with reality: "The figure will probably crash around November or December."/ppSurprise sales can anger shoppers who have bought items at full price and yesterday some MS customers were certainly planning revenge. One woman, who asked to remain nameless, said several of her friends were buying items at 20% off which they had already purchased and planned to return with their original items another day to get a full refund./ppNevertheless, MS boss Sir Stuart Rose insisted the discounts had given the UK's biggest clothing retailer a much-needed boost: "It seems to have touched the spot. It's a riot."/ppShopper Judith Limbert, who had travelled to Oxford Street from Berkhamsted in Hertfordshire for the MS sale, said consumers were waiting for bargains: "In the runup to Christmas I suspect people are going to hang on and hang on, waiting for sales." /ppLimbert had been planning to buy Christmas presents in MS but had been waiting to see if it would offer reductions. She said her family would definitely spend less this year and would look for bargains on the internet. "We've got less money in that our utility bills are higher and food bills are dearer."/ppA survey yesterday said that 80% of consumers plan to spend less this year and there was more gloom from credit rating agency Moodys, whose chief international economist, Ruth Stroppiana, warned: "Britain's retailing sector is expected to come under increasing pressure in coming quarters as the country's highly indebted households continue to rein in expenditure." /ppOver at the new Westfield shopping centre in west London, in the basement food hall of MS's vast store, trolleys were clattering through the tills./ppWith a recession around the corner, it was clearly time to stock up on champagne. A couple from Dorset were piloting a trolley laden with MS bubbly. They bought 36 bottles - and saved nearly pound;450 on the shelf price. /ppThe champagne was a triple bargain. On top of the 20% off was another 10% discount and a pound;5-a-bottle reduction for buying more than 12 bottles. The result was a pound;26 ticket price slashed to just pound;13 a bottle./ppIsabelle Marsh bought 36 bottles for just under pound;500, compared with the pound;936 full price./ppMarsh runs Bournemouth-based Viva Las Vegas, a fun casino business for private parties, and the champagne will be used as prizes. /ppAt the next till her friends Kay and Roger Brahams, from Surrey, who are also in the casino business, were doing exactly the same. They also had a collection of blue spotted bow ties and waistcoats for their croupiers - four waistcoats, four bow ties and two pairs of black trousers for pound;124, down from pound;155 for one day only. "It's for the business," said Roger Brahams. "It is too good to miss." /ppOn the clothing floor, however, there were many shoppers who had used the discount day to bring forward purchases they were planning to make anyway. Mark, a BBC employee, had popped in to buy an pound;80 coat he had his eye on. "My wife rang me this morning to tell me about the sale," he explained. He paid pound;64 and walked away very pleased. /ppIn Sheffield city centre, Carolyn Bowler had nipped out in her lunch break to buy a box of Christmas crackers, but by the time she had heaved her way out of MS she had three of them, plus a new dressing gown./pp"You've to shop carefully these days," she said, as three women marched past with purple Debenhams balloons and leaflets promising "25% off plus look inside for half-price bonus deals"./pp"These offers are bringing people out, no question," said another lunchtime shopper called Marion - "please don't print my surname in case my children read the paper and it spoils their Christmas surprise". The surprise is that Marion is making them clothes herself this year, instead of buying new ones./pp"You've got to cut back at times like these," she said. "We certainly have anyway, because my husband's not had a job since the summer. No one knows what the future holds any more."/ppIt was all music to the ears of Ian Fleming, who was supervising Debenhams balloon women. Enticing punters with the likes of a shimmer bow back dress reduced to pound;37.50 from pound;75, he said: "Shoppers will never get tired of good value and a bargain. This is working. It's even better out at the Meadowhall shopping centre."/ppThat, however, was impossible to check: reporters were barred from doing interviews in the sprawling complex beside the M1 because of the current spate of gloomy stories./ph2Key tactics for shoppers to cash in on stores' price war/h2pIt is the year of the tactical shopper, according to one retail expert, with yesterday's "flash" or "guerilla" sales at MS and Debenhams marking the start of what is likely to be a long and protracted war between high street stores. But for the savvy shopper hoping to secure the ultimate bargain, where and when is the time to strike? /ppIn order to secure the best bargain this Christmas, shoppers should look around and keep an eye out for promotional vouchers, said Lauretta Roberts, editor of Drapers magazine. /pp"My advice to shoppers is shop late. It's a buyers market out there and it is not going to be too difficult to find a bargain."/ppAnother way of saving money is to hit the shops before the official sale. "Even though they don't advertise the fact, many of the big department stores like Selfridges or Harvey Nichols discount their products from December 24. You get the best choice, unlike post-Christmas, when there often little left."/ppA further wave of price cuts can be expected from Boxing Day onwards, with January sales slashing 50% off many products immediately, she said. There are lots of other ways for shoppers to maximise their funds over the festive period. But it requires commitment and tactical thinking, said Martin Lewis, founder of moneysavingexpert.com. /pp"This is the year of the targeted and tactical shopper. As well as promotional sales we are seeing a rash of big discount shopping vouchers," he said. Vouchers currently featured on the website include 30% off at Gap, 40% off at Threshers and 20% off Shudoo, who sell Ugg boots, set to be a Christmas favourite. /ppAnother way of getting the best deal is to use price comparison websites, such as shopping.com, kelkoo.co.uk and pricerunner.co.uk, he said. For example, one Christmas must-have, a Wii Console + Sports Pack, costs pound;184.99 at Dixons, but on tdgstore.co.uk can be found for pound;179.99./pp"Different comparison websites are better for different products," said Lewis, who recommended find-dvd.co.uk for dvds and bookbrain.co.uk for books. /ppOnce the cheapest product has been identified, shoppers should try to buy it through a cash-back website, such as topcashback.co.uk, he added. "Cashback websites are paid 5% for sending you to a particular site, but instead of pocketing that cash they share the proceeds with their users by discounting products further."/ppHe also advises shoppers to use cash-back credit cards, such as American Express, which offers 5% back on purchases for three months. Using a credit card for expensive purchases also protects buyers, he added./ppIn 2007 the average British family spent pound;840 on Christmas. Choosing carefully this year, they could save 5% to 50%, said Lewis. /ppDoesn't all this calculating detract from the joy of the impulse buy? No way, he said. /pp"We are entering a recession, and there are two ways you can deal with it. Stop spending or make the money that you have got go further."br /strongAlexandra Topping/strong/ppstrongBargains/strong/ppstrongGap/strong/ppUltra-low rise jeans was pound;39.50 now pound;9.99br /Saving 75%/ppstrongDebenhams/strong/ppFour Royal Doulton crystal goblets was pound;80 now pound;32br /Saving 60%/ppstrongCurrysdigital/strong/ppLogik DAB digital radio was pound;139.99 now pound;59.99br /Saving 57%/ppstrongHouse of Fraser/strong/ppChristy Sorrento bath towel was pound;22 now pound;11br /Saving 50%/pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/retail"Retail industry/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/christmas-xmas"Christmas/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/creditcrunch"Credit crunch/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Businesscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227227727742112100421654622"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Businesscountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227227727742112100421654622" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

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one woman,rogers,house prices,angers,sports

Larry Elliott: Don't fear for the pound

Guardian Unlimited

- 1 days and 4 hours ago

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/76892?ns=guardianpageName=Comment+is+free%3A+Don%27t+fear+for+the+poundch=Comment+is+freec3=The+Guardianc4=Recession+%28UK%29%2CEconomics+%28Business%29%2CCurrencies+%28dollar%2C+pound+etc%29%2CBusiness%2CEconomic+policy%2CPolitics%2CMoneyc5=Personal+Finance%2CCredit+Crunch%2CNot+commercially+useful%2CBusiness+Marketsc6=Larry+Elliottc7=2008_11_21c8=1121547c9=articlec10=GUc11=Comment+is+freec12=blogc13=c14=Comment+is+freeh2=GU%2FComment+is+free%2Fblog%2FComment+is+free" width="1" height="1" //divpThis is the crisis with just about everything. Failing banks, the drying up of credit, crashing house prices, rising unemployment, weakening growth and - as the official figures showed yesterday - a ballooning budget deficit. Students of economic crises will detect only one thing is missing from this litany of woe - a sterling crisis of the sort that Britain went through in 1967, 1976 and 1992./ppThe expectation is that a run on the pound will not be long in coming; one of the playground spats between the government and opposition this week was over whether the shadow chancellor, George Osborne, was being unpatriotic by predicting sterling would hit the skids as a result of plans to cut taxes in Monday's pre-budget report./ppThere are many reasons to be afraid - very afraid - about the state of the world, but a sterling crisis is not one of them. Unless there is a catastrophic loss of confidence in the government's economic and financial management, the pound is likely to stabilise close to current levels; the risk of it falling should certainly not deter the Bank of England from cutting interest rates aggressively./ppWhy? Because there has already been a marked depreciation over the past year. Sterling is at a record low against the euro, has dropped by 40% against the yen, and has fallen by 20% against the dollar since the summer - a more rapid descent than in the aftermath of Black Wednesday. Anybody who decided this summer to take advantage of the $2 pound with a winter shopping spree in Manhattan is in for a shock./ppThat decline was justified given the UK's unique exposure to turmoil in the financial markets and its absurdly overblown property market. But after such a precipitous fall, the downside potential is limited - especially since the outlook in the US, eurozone and Japan looks just as bleak. News from across the Atlantic has been dire, with Ford and General Motors on the point of collapse and the stockmarket down 45% this year. Germany is suffering from weaker demand for exports, Italy is suffering from a chronic lack of competitiveness, and Spain, like the UK, is grappling with a housing boom-bust. Japan also relies heavily on exports, but reported its third successive seasonally adjusted monthly trade deficit yesterday./ppIt is important to identify why the pound has been under pressure in recent months. Investors were concerned that not enough was being done to prevent a painful recession; the currency was falling, in other words, because interest rates were too high, not too low. The dollar has been rising on foreign exchanges this year because of anticipation that aggressive and early cuts in borrowing costs from the Federal Reserve would mean it would beat the rest of the developed world out of recession. That optimism looks misplaced, but it is indicative of a climate where investors are more concerned about growth potential than interest rates./ppThat's not to say the pound won't fall further, since currencies tend to overshoot. But sterling looks undervalued against the dollar and cheap against the euro. That may depress UK tourists looking to clean up on 5th Avenue but it is good news for the economy./ppSince 1997, an overvalued currency has made imports cheaper and exports dearer; there has been a silent sterling crisis that encouraged speculation while making manufacturing less profitable. The economy needs a competitive level for the pound that helps cut the trade growth and so create the conditions for more balanced growth. Its depreciation, coupled with the likely prolonged squeeze on consumers when they have to start paying back Monday's tax cuts, means there is a better chance of tackling the structural imbalances in the economy than there has been for years./ppa href="mailto:larry.elliott@guardian.co.uk"larry.elliott@guardian.co.uk/a/pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/recession"Recession/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/economics"Economics/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/currencies"Currencies/a/lilia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/economy"Economic policy/a/li/ul/divdiv class="guRssAdvert"a href="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/click.ng/richmedia=yessite=Commentisfreecountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227227727885112100421654622"img src="http://ads.guardian.co.uk/image.ng/richmedia=yessite=Commentisfreecountry=(none)spacedesc=rsssystem=rsstransactionID=1227227727885112100421654622" border="0" //a/diva href="http://www.guardian.co.uk"guardian.co.uk/a copy; Guardian News Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our a href="http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html"Terms Conditions/a | a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/webfeeds/1,,1309488,00.html"More Feeds/a

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Mossberg Says Innovation is the Key to Success During the Econaclypse

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- 1 days and 7 hours ago

pimg alt="dow_jones_venturewire_Nov_08.jpg" src="http://www.readwriteweb.com/dow_jones_venturewire_Nov_08.jpg" width="160" height="43" /a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/05/14/070514fa_fact_auletta"Walter Mossberg/a, who has been reviewing technology since 1991 for the a href="http://online.wsj.com/public/us"Wall Street Journal/a in his weekly "a href="http://ptech.allthingsd.com/"Personal Technology/a" column, is convinced the companies that succeed in this type of a href="http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/category/econaclypse/"econaclypse/a, as a href="http://allthingsd.com/"AllThingsD/a has dubbed the economy, will be those that focus on innovation. "It has been my observation that while things do slow down in bad times, they don't stop," Mossberg said.br / br / Speaking to a packed room this week at the a href="http://showcase.dowjones.com/"Dow Jones VentureWire Technology Showcase/a in Redwood City CA, Mossberg, the "a href="http://www.time.com/time/digital/cyberelite/50.html"Most Influential Computer Journalist/a" according to Time Magazine, described the trends that excite him right now as happening both in computer hardware and computer software: strongoutside the browser Web applications, service in the cloud, and hand held computers/strong./p p align="right"emSponsor/embr /a href='http://d.openx.org/ck.php?n=12665amp;cb=12665' target='_blank'img src='http://d.openx.org/avw.php?zoneid=861amp;cb=12665amp;n=12665' border='0' alt='' align="right" //a/p pMuch like during the mid to late eighties, when we saw advances in the personal computer, Mossberg explained we are once again witnessing advances in hardware innovation. This time however, we are not getting excited about the a href="http://www.pc-history.org/comm.htm"Commodore/a, a href="http://www.robert.to/reports/trs80rsc3.html"Radio Shack/a and a href="http://apple2history.org/"Apple II/a devices; instead, a new model of computer is energizing the world of consumer technology. The super smart phones or hand held computers as Mossberg prefers to call them: the a href="http://www.apple.com/iphone/"iPhone/a, the a href="http://www.t-mobileg1.com/"G1/a, and the a href="http://ptech.allthingsd.com/20081119/blackberrys-storm-presses-into-the-touch-phone-fray/"soon to be released BlackBerry Storm/a./p pIn much the same way, this time also reminds Mossberg of the mid to late nineties as we are once again observing a swell of Internet innovation; this one happening on the software front with widgets/Web apps and service in the cloud./p pWith so much information available on the Internet, and the instant gratification demanded by consumers today, the melding of these products is inevitable. Mossberg, who believes widgets will flourish on hand held computers, suggested that while the new class of mobile devices offer better browsing than their predecessors, it is in the apps that he sees competition, innovation and ideas fermenting. "We don't necessarily need to go through a browser," he said./p pThe problem of course is replicating data across devices in a smooth, cohesive manner to ensure that data available on the Internet is available on the handheld. And that's where service in the cloud comes in. While corporate America has enjoyed technologies such as a href="http://na.blackberry.com/eng/services/server/"BlackBerry Enterprise Server/a, a href="http://www.microsoft.com/EXCHANGE/default.mspx"Microsoft Exchange/a, and a href="http://www-01.ibm.com/software/lotus/products/notes/"Lotus Notes/a that have enabled data to be replicated between devices [servers, desktops, laptops and handhelds], according to Mossberg, nobody has yet been "wildly successful" in bringing this technology to the wider consumer world via the cloud. /p pAnd so the race begins. While Mossberg has always claimed he is not responsible for business coverage of tech companies, the fact remains that for the past 17 years, a href="http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.05/mossberg.html"the star of the Wall Street Journal/a has accurately assessed innovation within the consumer tech market. Given his insights this week, the only questions that remain are: who will bring cloud services to the masses, and will it happen during the econaclypse? /p pemRead the transcript of Mossberg's keynote below./p pstrongWalter Mossberg: Dow Jones VentureWire Technology Showcase 2008/strong/p pstrongEffects of the economy/strong/p pI think it's obvious to everybody that we're in for a serious recession. The question is only how serious. Barack Obama probably had thirty seconds of feeling happy and now has a whole lot to worry about./p pAt AllthingsD.com, our website, we have coined a term for the economy; we're calling it the 'econaclypse' and I think we are in kind of an econaclypse./p pMy observation, and I have been writing about tech for 17 years, I don't fund anything, but I do get pitched like VCs do./p pI see all kinds of new companies, sometimes many months, sometimes over a year before their product ships. And it has been my observation that while things do slow down in bad times, they don't stop.br / br / There is a digital tidal wave in the world, all kinds of digital products, whether they are hardware products, software products, services, web 2.0, whatever the hypesters are going to call the next phase of the Web. That stuff doesn't stop. It slows down a little, but doesn't stop/p pAnd the companies obviously that can hold together and continue to work on their innovation, whether it's business model innovation, but especially if it's product innovation, those are the companies that come out of these things strongest. /p pObviously this is not a typical company and I realize the model is different when you have 25 billion dollars in cash in the bank and no debt - which is what this person has - but Steve Jobs said, it was about a month ago or three weeks ago, Steve Jobs jumped on their a href="http://theappleblog.com/2008/10/22/apples-quarterly-earnings-call-summary/"earning call/a - he rarely deigns to be on their earnings call as many of you know - and he jumped on their earning call and said: in the last recession, that's when we opened our Apple stores, that's when we did... and he mentioned a couple of different innovative and expensive projects they'd taken on during the downturn, and he says we're going to try and keep innovating our way out of it. /p pObviously on a smaller scale and without the 25 billion in cash, and maybe with a little debt that he doesn't have, still I think it's the right thing to do. And even if you don't manage to do that, somebody else will./p pJust because the market is in the eight thousands instead of the eleven thousands or unemployment - which is actually the more serious number in my opinion for gauging the length of the recession - is 8.5 percent, which it might get to rather than 4 percent, it doesn't mean people stop working on new ideas, particularly in tech and particularly in consumer tech./p pstrongMossberg's take on consumer technology today/strong/p pLet me talk about what I think is going on, kind of the big picture of where we are and then we'll do some QA if you want./p pThis period we're in right now if we put the econaclypse off to the side for a minute, this period we're in right now, to me reminds me a lot of the mid to late eighties and the mid to late nineties at the same time. And here's what I mean. It reminds me a little bit of the mid to late 90's because we have another wave of Internet innovation going on. /p pThere is obviously a million different things going on in the Internet but there are two categories I look at - and you've got to remember I don't write about, and I don't pay any attention to corporate technology, or niche technology. I also don't ever use the word enterprise, because the least enterprising and least entrepreneurial part of the entire economy are these giant bloated corporations to whom that term is often applied. I don't see anything enterprising about Ford Motor Company I just call them big corporations or big government agencies or whatever they are. Fine with me that they buy technology - it's great that they buy technology, and sure there is wonderful technology being produced for those folks, but it's not my job to write about them. So everything I say is in the context of consumer/p pSo what do I mean when I talk about things going on on the Web that are to me as exciting and there is as much fervor and ferment and intellectual energy as there was when the Web was getting going in the mid to late nineties?/p pThere are two buckets.br / br / One is outside the browser - it's these widgets, web apps, whatever you want to call them, that did start on the PC and Mac. Actually in a funny way, some of them were tried in Windows 95 with what was called a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_desktop"Active Desktop/a. Unfortunately the way that Microsoft presented it to the world was as sort of selling your personal computer desktop to Disney and Warner brothers, which allowed me to write a couple of great fulminating columns, and not just me./p pBut it was kind of this idea. And then the next instantiation of any importance, of any sort of economic clout was when Apple put this dashboard aspect into the Mac OS and then Microsoft followed with the sidebar in Vista. But really the place where I think it flourishes is on handhelds. Hand held computers, the iPhone class of computers of which there are now about to be three, and I'm going to get to that in a minute./p pSo, that's the first bucket, and I think there is colossal developer energy, intellectual energy, going into this question of "okay we have the Web out there, the Internet out there, it's just full of all kinds of information; commerce engines, and search opportunities, and entertainment opportunities, but we don't necessarily need to go through a browser - we can go through an app that takes advantage of the processing power and the graphics engine and all that on the computer that is narrowly focused on whatever it is. /p pHow many people here have an iPhone or an iPod Touch? I'm talking about everything from the simple stock widget on there, to the now over 7000 apps for that phone - for that hand held computer. That's since 11th July. Two million downloads and 7000 apps for that phone, for that hand held computer. So that's one big area of excitement.br / br / The other one, of course, is trying to take what has been true in corporate America for a long time, which is a sort of service in the cloud - whether it's the Blackberry Enterprise Server, or Microsoft Exchange or Lotus products that replicate data across devices and, push e-mail and other data out and bring that to the wider consumer world. /p pYou see Google making some effort, you see Microsoft making some effort, you see Apple with a href="http://ptech.allthingsd.com/20080723/apples-mobileme-is-far-too-flawed-to-be-reliable/"Mobile Me/a making some efforts - that so far hasn't been successful. Nobody has really been wildly successful. Even a href="http://www.rim.com/"RIM/a - much of the RIM effort has been focused - and when I talk about the consumer space most of the RIM, distributed computing through the cloud, is still out of the enterprise - although that is changing with their customer profile./p pSo those are the two big exciting areas that I see. I'm not talking about business models for those things. I understand that there has been some debate in some of the sessions about the viability of the advertising model versus other kinds of models, and I share some skepticism about relying solely on advertising. /p pBut without regard to business model for a minute, I think those are two huge pools of excitement./p pAnd then, complementing that and this is what makes me think of the mid to late eighties as opposed to mid to late nineties. What was happening in the mid to late eighties?/p pRemember the personal computer; the mass market personal computer appeared in 1977. /p pYou had three of them; one of the most important of the three was the Apple II, but you also had a Radio Shack and Commodore. And those were the first machines where somebody without an engineering degree could actually take it out of the box and do something with it. And on the Apple II in particular, that's where business began to adopt personal computers because a href="http://www.bricklin.com/default.htm"Dan Bricklin/a and a href="http://www.frankston.com/"Bob Frankston/a wrote a program called a href="http://www.bricklin.com/visicalc.htm"VisiCalc/a.