> ENRON was an American energy company based in Houston, Texas. Before
> its bankruptcy in late 2001, Enron employed around 22,000 people
> (McLean & Elkind, 2003) and was one of the world's leading
> electricity, natural gas, pulp and paper, and communications
> companies, with claimed revenues of $111 billion in 2000.
>
> Fortune named Enron "America's Most Innovative Company" for six
> consecutive years. At the end of 2001 it was revealed that its
> reported financial condition was sustained mostly by
> institutionalized, systematic, and creatively planned accounting fraud
> (see: Enron scandal). Enron has since become a popular symbol of
> willful corporate fraud and corruption.
>
>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enron
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Merrill Lynch , Goldman Sachs , UN all warn of impending " reality
> check " for the USA economy.
>
> I notice more good news every day
>
> Perhaps it may have been best if they admitted in 2001 they were
> bankrupt and avoided a war to try and save the USA and Israel , now
> its time to start facing he grim reality
>
> Now they are in real deep shit
>
> Bankrupt AND defeated in 2 wars
>
> I knew they were in real trouble when they started pouring hundreds
> of billions
> into the banks , an act of desperation , The USA is like one giant
> Enron
>
> Nothing can save the USA or Israel now , they are desperate to sign a
> treaty with Palestine before the people discover the USA is DOOMED
>
> kanga
> =====
>
> Banks, UN warn of impending recession
>
> Posted Thu Jan 10, 2008 7:37am AEDT
>
> Another big investment company in the US is warning of an impending
> recession in the American economy, while the United Nations (UN) has
> warned US economic problems could trigger a world recession.
>
> Goldman Sachs says the American housing and credit woes suggest the US
> economy "is falling into recession".
>
> In a research note to clients the investment giant says it expects
> economic activity to contract modestly this year, followed by a
> gradual recovery next year - and it says the weakening economy will
> force the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates to 2.5 per cent by
> the third quarter.
>
> Earlier this week Merrill Lynch said a recession was a present day
> reality for the world's biggest economy.
>
> UN warnings
>
> Meanwhile, the United Nations has warned of "clear and present
> dangers" of the world economy coming to a near standstill this year
> because of US housing and credit problems and the weak dollar.
>
> In an annual report, the world body forecast global economic growth at
> 3.4 per cent for 2008, only slightly lower than last year, but said
> that under a pessimistic scenario, if US difficulties were acute, it
> could be just 1.6 per cent.
>
> The bursting of a housing bubble in the United States last year and a
> crisis over subprime mortgages has caused uncertainty across financial
> markets around the world, said the World Economic Situation and
> Prospects 2008.
>
> The US problems "could trigger a worldwide recession and a disorderly
> adjustment of global imbalances," the report said.
>
> "The recent global financial turmoil has heightened these risks and
> shown them to be clear and present dangers."
>
> A senior UN official, Jomo Kwame Sundaram, says there is about a 50
> per cent chance of recession.
>
> "We are all hoping very much that it can be slowed down and that there
> will a number of adjustments, which can be moderate adjustments,
> rather than meltdown situation, which could have catastrophic and
> unpredictable consequences," he said.
>
> - ABC/Reuters
================================================================================
http://www.thetimes.co.za/PrintEdition/BusinessTimes/Article.aspx?id=677725
COMMENT: The baton of world economic power is being passed eastward
THE SUNDAY TIMES, LONDON Published:Jan 13, 2008
'There may be a nasty sting in the tail from the Chinese dragon'
AS WE enter 2008, the countdown is well under way for August's Olympic
Games in China. Yet, months before the Olympic torch sparks into life
in Beijing, China and its fellow Asian nations have already raced into
a position of global leadership.
This year, emerging-market nations, led by Asia, will overtake the
rich countries of the developed world to become the most important
collective engine for global growth.
As the mighty US economy falters and once so-superior Europe stumbles,
China, for the first time since the early 19th century, will become
the largest national contributor to world economic
This danger is compellingly spelled out in a new analysis by Stephen
King, chief economist at HSBC. In the past, the global weight of the
West's demand usually meant that when its big economies slowed,
commodity prices would drop. Now, however, King finds that this
relationship is breaking down as Asia's immense appetite for resources
prevents commodity costs subsiding, even as growth falls in developed
economies.
The implications are ominous. The clear threat is that G7 central
banks, fighting to protect growth in the West, are liable to find
their scope to cut interest rates badly hampered by commodity-driven
inflation imported from emerging markets. The passing of the torch of
global growth to Asia may yet leave the West's hands badly singed.
And, at 100 a barrel, oil is funnelling vast sums of money from the
consumers to the producers, mainly in the Middle East, Russia and
Venezuela.
The value of the producers' oil exports has rocketed. They are now
worth 750-billion a year to the Middle East. Governments there have
paid off debts, invested in new industries and are building vast new
infrastructures. The Gulf property boom makes Britain's housing market
look like a backwater.
Saudi Arabia is building four new cities, including the 27-billion
King Abdullah Economic City, said to be three times the size of
Manhattan.
"The oil producers have got a lot more absorptive capacity -- they can
use a lot more wealth," said David Butter, Middle East expert at the
Economist Intelligence Unit. "If you look at Saudi Arabia, it is
investing a lot back into oil, gas and petrochemicals. Others are
building up other sectors of their economies."
Middle Eastern oil producers, and the booming economies of Asia, now
have so much cash sloshing around that they are buying large stakes in
Western assets. Their so-called "sovereign fund" investments are
estimated at 2000-billion and could reach 12 000-billion by 2012,
according to the International Monetary Fund.
When Citigroup, the US bank, found itself in need of help because of
America's subprime mortgage crisis, it turned to Abu Dhabi's
Investment Authority. UBS tapped the Saudi royal family. Other
troubled banks have looked to China or Singapore.
Should this be cause for concern? Willem Buiter, former chief
economist of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, has
warned: "As agents of the state, these funds are always potential
instruments of foreign policy."
It is not just in the Middle East that oil money is being used to buy
power and influence. Hugo Chavez, Venezuela's erratic president, has
been offering cheap oil and low-cost loans throughout Latin America.
High oil prices have transformed Russia from an economic basket case
into a powerful force that allows President Vladimir Putin to strut
his stuff on the world stage.
For some, the return of Russian power is the most alarming aspect of
the energy price boom.
"Putin's whole ethos is that if Russia can't be a military superpower,
it can project economic power," said James Nixey, from the Royal
Institute of International Affairs.
Gazprom, Russia's state-owned energy giant, is trying to strike a deal
to give it access to vast energy reserves in Nigeria, which has
previously dealt mainly with Western energy companies.
It all adds up to a significant shift of financial, economic -- and
ultimately political -- power, say some experts.
China, India and the other fast-growing economies of Asia are not
immune from high oil prices but have sufficient momentum for it not to
slow them in their tracks. They also have growing financial muscle and
are using it to invest strategically in the advanced economies.
It is these advanced economies, however, that are struggling under the
weight of the credit crunch, high energy prices and their own
indebtedness. The economic baton is being passed on, it appears, and
high oil prices are accelerating the process.
Niall Ferguson, the historian, sees the present record oil prices and
the global credit crunch as analogous to the '70s -- not the 1970s, but
the 1870s, when the once mighty Ottoman empire lost economic,
financial and, finally, political power.
"Then the shift was from the ancient oriental empires to Western
Europe," he said. "Today the shift is from the US
