Some Confederation Cup Related Thoughts

The Brazilians may dislike this, but the football fans worldwide are waiting eagerly for the final on June 30^th. Violent protests were inefficient to suppress the football fans and FIFA from holding the match in Brazil. The FIFA headquarter in Zurich went ahead with its decision of Confederation Cup venue being in Brazil who are also the defending champions. The Secretary General for FIFA Mr Jerome Valcke clearly opposed Brazil sports minister Aldo Rebelo’s revelation that so many other countries has expressed the willingness to be the host of confederation cup 2013 in an open stage.

Divided into 2 groups A and B, the host country Brazil came out to be the first semifinalist by beating Uruguay for a 2-1 rate. The next semifinal is going to be between Spain and Italy and the world is waiting to see whether the bullfighter’s race ahead or Il Canto degli Italiani will be played.

The highlight of this Confederation Cup was Team Tahiti group B member winners of the OFC, getting highly appreciated even though they were beaten up by Spain for a tremendous score of 10-0. This is the record victory in the history of FIFA and the earlier record was in the name of Brazil taking over Saudi for 8 -2 in 1999 semi finals.

Among the semifinalist countries other than Uruguay all the other 3 countries are hit by recession but their football spirit is alive even the midst of this recession. Football being the national sport of Italy, Uruguay, Brazil nothing can quench the zeal for this sport in these countries. Bullfighting may be the national sport of Spaniards but football being the popular sport no one can write them off in this game

Looking at the Olympic history, Italy won the Olympic football Gold in 1936 Berlin and this is the only Olympic gold in Italy’s name for football but they have won gold in World cup in the years 1934, 1938, 1982 and 2006

 

The Spaniards won the World Cup in 2010 and they were winners in the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, they were runners up in the 1920 Olympics held in Antwerp, Belgium and in the 2000 Sydney Olympics as well. Brazilians have much advantage in Confederation Cup as they were the winners of 1997, 2007 and 2009 Confederation cup matches. Amazingly they never won any Olympic gold but remained runners up in 1984 in Los Angeles, 1988 in Seoul, 2012 in London. In the 1958, 1962, 1970, 1994, 2002 world cup matches they won the gold.

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Uruguay may be out of this Confederation Cup but they were the Olympic gold medal winners in 1924 Paris and 1928 Amsterdam. They even won the World cup in 1930 and 1950. Among the semifinalist teams only Brazil has ever won a Confederation Cup but that may not be the ruling factor this time. More and more Brazilians protesting against this match and violent riots at Rio DI Geniro may or may not affect the psychology of the Brazilian team.

Absence of previous Confederation Cup winners like France, Argentina, Denmark and Mexico has obviously lessened the spirit of this cup but the football fans all over the world are discussing about the matches, forecasting and waiting impatiently for the finals on 30 June 2013 at Estádio do Maracanã , Rio DI Geniro

The Top 10 Safest Banks in the World

The financial safety of the banks is highly scrutinized these days as the concern over the finance and related issues increases day by day. The Global Finance released a report on the safest banks in the world. The report has 50 banks which are rated as highly stable and considered as the best.

KfW  the German, government owned bank topped the list for being the safest bank in the world. Formed in 1948 and based in Frankfurt, 80% of the bank is owned by the Federal Republic of Germany and 20% of ownership vests with States of Germany. Bank Nederlandse Gemmeenten is the second best bank in this list. This is the 4 th bank in the Netherlands on the base of assets. BNG lends finance only to semi-public organizations.

Third best bank is a Swiss bank Zurcher Kantonalbank with total asset of CHF 110 billion. Landwirtschaftliche Rentenbank is the 4^th bank in this list which is headquartered in Frankfurt. This bank focuses on lending in agriculture and food industry. L-Bank which is also a German bank holds the 5^th position is a parent company for three commercial banks and was formed in January 1999 functions under public law.

Nederlandse Waterschapsbank ie, the Netherland Waterboard Bank provides funds for the water board is in the 6^th position functioning under the trade name NWB. It is a private financial institution. At number 7 is the French Bank Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations which was founded in 1816. German bank NRW.Bank comes at 8th position in this list.

The bank Banque et caisse d'épargne de l'État based in Luxembourg founded in 1856  holds the 9^th position. The 10^th place is for Rabo Bank which is in Netherlands and headquartered in Utrecht. They provide finance for the agribusiness and food is the core industry they finance.

The top 10 safest banks are located in the European  countries which these top 10 banks are located are not seriously affected by the economic crisis.KfW, Landwirtschaftliche Rentenbank, L-Bank, NRWBank are the 4 banks from Germany which is in the top 10 bank’s list. Germany is considered as the strongest economy among the EU union and recently the German Chancellor came up with the statement that Germany will not take the burden of uplifting EU crisis.

There are 8 Asian banks in this top 50 list where 3 of them are from Singapore and 2 from China and 1 from Taiwan and 2 from South Korea and 4 banks from the middle east ie, 1 from Abudabi, 1 from Qatar and 2 from Saudi Arabia. 5 US banks are also in the list but the absence of them from the top 10 list is noticeable.  

A Short Note on Global Risk Report 2013 by World Economic Forum

The Global Risk Report 2013, released by the World Economic Forum is a detailed study on the risk which will affect the world in the near future. This Blog keeps the vision to promote awareness about that crucial report. In the introduction Mr Klaus Schwab Founder and Executive Chairman of World Economic Forum has invited our attention towards these risks and requested to debate on these threats

This year’s meeting of the World Economic Forum was held at Davos, Switzerland on the theme Resilient Dynamism. This particular theme was raised to bring and spread awareness about the risks which will affect the whole world without the country barrier. These risks are divided into three categories such as 1) preventable risks 2) strategic risks 3) external risks or global risks. This report is based on this years’ Global Risk Perception Survey performed by more than 1000 experts from various sectors including industry, government, academics and civilians.

Economic Risks

Finance is very complex and economic risks will be higher in the future. The major economic risk will be Severe Income Disparity and the financial system failure arising  from that. Throughout the centuries the rich-poor indifference was the root cause of all rebellion.

Many philosophers envisaged the importance of equality and socialism but these ideologies never culminated as a permanent solution. The future will witness an increase in the financial gap between rich and further consequences.

Chronic Fiscal Imbalances will make the government  a failure in redressing the huge amount of debt. The government’s future development plans and related borrowing may not go hand in hand with the income generated in the respective countries. This report throws light on the volatility in energy and agricultural prices as another risk which is likely to happen. Hard Landing of an emerging economy has also been predicted. This happens due to the tightening of the monetary policy the central governments of those respective countries as happened in the US. Chronic labor market imbalances may be the other general risk comes in this category.

Environmental Risks

The second category of major risk is related to the environment. Increased Green House Gas Emissions. will be the major threat. The governments and industries will focus on to the expansion of carbon sinks to fight these greenhouse gases. All over the world climate is changing rapidly and this will be another risk and adapting to the changes will not be an easy task that may even fail. The Failure in Climate Change adaptation will be a great risk. Mismanaged Urbanization also comes as one of the environmental issues. The number of urban population in search of a better asylum is exceeding than rural due to the rural exodus  less people are remaining to work in the agriculture  segment which should be the base industry of any economy!

A collapse in the ecosystem is well predicted due to the Over Exploitation of the Species

This species overexploitation will lead to the destruction of the biodiversity. Another risk forecasted is the Persistent Extreme Weather. Land and Waterway use Mismanagement is another risk in the environment category, Misuse of the waterway and land will have severe consequences which will adversely affect the ecosystem leading to a collapse.

Geopolitical Risks

The report calls it Pervasive Entrenched Corruption; the major threat among the geopolitical risks. Corruption, which is a worldwide phenomenon, will increase day by day, the abuse of power will be extended for the personal gain and the rulers will be biased for the lobbies. Global Governance Failure which will be the result of the weak governing institutions, the treaties will fail to get accomplished; world governance together will fail to address the global issues or risks and the governments will hesitate to collaborate. Third risk will be Terrorism which is already deep-rooted in many countries will cause severe human and material damage and in the coming days society will be more capitulated towards terrorism. The number of international conflicts will increase due to the Failure in the Diplomatic Conflict Resolution. This risk will lead the world to be a battlefront and a difficult place to live. Entrenched Organized Crime will be a great risk and this will be organized by agile global networks. Illicit Trade is another risk this will include people as well as goods.

Societal Risks

There are 4 major risks which are likely to happen in the next ten years. Water Supply Crises will lead to the shortage of fresh water. Population ageing due to the rising life expectancy or declining birth rates and its Population Ageing Mismanagement will be the

other risk in societal category. The next risk is Rising Religious fanaticism which will divide the society to different poles causing tensions. The Food Shortage Crisis will be another major risk.

Technological Risks

As China is known for its Cyber Attacks, the state owned organized Cyber attacks will be the greatest risk which is likely to take place in the next ten years. These attacks will be with terrorist or criminal backing. Private lives are under scrutiny and the Massive Data Theft will be another major risk.. This data extraction will deleterious for the personal and official security of the people as well as nations.

The Global Risk Report 2013 is a result of detail study and it clearly indicates us  to abate the risk even though it is not a clairvoyant report. This blog is based on the risks which are more likely to happen. It teaches us how important is for us to abstain from hurting the world we live.

Some Shocking Data from the Middle East

Middle East is rather known for its battles, civil uprisings, and immense amount of oil which supports the region. An interesting study on the Middle East countries done by ICAEW with focus on the UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Kuwait, Egypt, Iran, Iraq and Lebanon revealed a lot of information on growth and employment of this region.

The Middle East economy is expected to be stronger by 3.9% in this year than the world economy. The whole GCC‘s GDP growth is assessed to be 4.8%. The growth rate of GCC was higher by 6% in 2012 than the current rate in 2013. This is much above the growth rate of western countries.

The tremendous growth in population is outpacing the European countries. The maximum number of youth under 30 is in the Middle East region and from 1990-2010 the population grew by 52 % when the population growth rate of the world was only 30%! One amazing fact is that the population growth rate in the EU countries in the same period was only 2.5%!!!!!! With 60% of youth population less than 30, Middle East has the highest number of youths in the world.

Finding proper employment for this youth population will be the major issue which Middle Eastern countries are going to face. More than GCC countries, Non-GCC countries will be affected more by unemployment. Among Non-GCC countries, Iraq and Egypt will have more population in which Iraq’s population has grown by 75% than 2010. The population of Kuwait which is a GCC country has grown by 47% whereas the growth rate in Non-GCC countries including Iran and Lebanon is much lower.

The Middle East is preparing their way for their youth; this is visible from the recent Nitaqat issues from Saudi Arabia and problems in Kuwait. The youth population burst in this region will definitely lead to severe unemployment issues. The present unemployment rate in the Middle East and North Africa is the highest in the world which is 28.1%, i.e., three out of ten people were unemployed in 2012 The youth under the age of 24 is four times more likely to be unemployed than the adults. In 2008, 94.3% of Qatar’s labor forces were foreigners and 66.9% of GCC’s workforce also was immigrants!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Resurrection of Zombies: A Nigerian Saga

The Japanese Crisis in 1993 paved the way for many banks to be in the Zombie Bank status. The term Zombie Bank was coined by Mr. Edward Keyne and it applies to those banks with net worth zero yet operating on government bailouts. The 10 years of Japanese Crisis is also described as the Lost Decades which witnessed Japanese Asset Price Bubble collapsing within the Japanese economy.

According to the FDIC Problem Bank List there are around 844 banks which are almost like Zombies, in the US itself. The list has been kept confidential. The threat of Zombie banks is becoming universal and countries are finding ways to bring these banks back to action.

Most prominently EU banks are debating about recapitalizing their Zombie Banks. According to the recent speech of Mr Klass Knot, Dutch Central Bank President and The European Central Bank Governing Council member, revival of the banks will vitalize the depressed economy and is inevitable in the current scenario.

The main strategies in revitalizing could be Blanket Guarantees, Liquidity Support, Recapitalization, and Nationalization. For the process of revitalization, it’s important for the banks to be transparent about their losses so that effective strategies could be made to improve their balance sheets.

While EU countries debate on stress tests and recapitalizing their Zombie Banks, Nigerian Banks are showing a high growth rate. Nigerian economy which had a boom in 2006 through the changes in the bank laws and consolidation efforts got a severe blow in 2009 due to the enormous amount of bad loans and over lending. Their stock market collapsed by 70% in the same year.

The Central Bank of Nigeria came up with a canny strategy of recapitalization to revive the 8 banks which included 5 zombie banks which were Union Bank, Oceanic Bank, AfriBank, FinBank and Intercontinental Bank. The failed banks were imputed to NDIC.

The Bank of Nigeria shelled out £2.5 billion to the ailing banks, the leadership of 8 banks were changed and they were asked to stick on to the ethics and to practice high professionalism

According to The Nigerian Banking Sector Outlook 2013: At the start Of A New Cycle, which was published in March 2013 Nigerian banks are expected to show a high growth rate even though the economy has threats due to the volatility in oil prices because the foreign currency lending and the loan business are concentrated in the oil and gas sectors.

The EU has Nigerian banks as a great example with pragmatic results and they should not be procrastinating their decision in revitalizing their ailing zombie banks.