PROBLEMS EVERYWHERE

All other prices are skyrocketing so far and so fast that another hike of a mere 25basis points in the repo rate was hardly noticed. Big important banks will now pay 4.25% pa to borrow cash from the Reserve Bank. This lowest rate in the money market, signals that this transaction is maybe the least risky in the nation. Interest rates rise for loans which are considered to be riskier. Near the top of the scale are loans perhaps between a “loan shark” and an individual with no collateral. The loan of R100 for a day (common in street vendor markets) may attract a R200 repayment. This translates into an interest rate of 100%!   Perhaps the most watched interest rate in the world is the price of US 10year money which currently at 2.4%pa is soaring through three-year highs. This rise is an expected response to the very recent doubling by the US Federal Reserve of the Fed Funds rate to 0.5%pa. If nothing else, this displays a drawback of manipulating administered rates to unrealistically low levels.  In the absence of letting the market set these short-term interest rates, no one really knows what the economy could bear.

Markets are on the move everywhere. And few are as positive as the SA Rand. Just why our wee “runt” is being used as a haven while a nasty war is developing is unclear and puzzling. Are we suddenly being re-evaluated because we mine gold? Or is it our BRICS relationship with some bad boys that’s making a difference? Dozens of “woke” limp-wristed heads of state who have taken a break from pontificating on climatology and virology and are trying their hand at the real and really hard task of international statesmanship. So far the West have yet to produce any plausible hard men (or women) who seem capable of getting the measure of Putin.  

The suggestion is that our fearless leaders and their medical advisors might lift the State of Disaster in April. About time too. There really is scant evidence to suggest that there is any state of disaster in South Africa at the present. Or at least one arising from a respiratory infection. There are indeed disasters getting worse by the day in almost every other area of where the state is trying to control our activities. Newest of these is apparently the port system that is reportedly so dysfunctional that export volumes of everything we need to sell and deliver overseas are falling steadily. Businesses dependant on imported components are in deep trouble also.  Every day there are revelations of how incompetence and ignorance are grinding down what remains of functioning government services.  However, lurking in the background to take effect once the State of Disaster is repealed, is a raft of regulation which fails to consider almost anything learned about Covid in the last 2 years. Why for example waste ink on the nonsense about reducing social distancing from 1,5m to 1m, except when queuing to enter a shop! The fact is that the public appetite for having their daily behaviour stipulated is now zero. None of it worked much and it is distressing to see that only those who never missed a single paycheque these past 2 years can’t recognise that fact.

For a number of reasons, the forthcoming important national conference of the ANC, the nation’s alleged ruling party will probably be held as a virtual gathering. Which raises several points, not least the question that in the absence of throwing chairs, how will delegates know when a session is over?  Has anyone had a word with the team at the Reserve Bank who are working on developing a digital currency for South Africa? Will that not cause great difficulties for the practitioners in that other important party conference skill? The slick and seamless transfer of brown envelopes stuffed with folding money. Promising an EFT and obtaining banking details is so so …public! Especially if one has forgotten how the “Mute” button works.

Two interesting issues for consideration. The Proteas Women are in with a decent chance at their World Cup. And the science of automotive aerodynamics is far from solved. Just don’t ask Mercedes how to spell “porpoising”.

James Greener

25^th March 2022

NKOSAZANA’S CALENDAR APP

Two years ago, policy makers in the US (followed soon by others elsewhere) thought that cheap money would help the fight against the unknown and terrifying new respiratory disease sweeping the globe. Whether that turned out to be the case is hard to say. Despite low interest rates, economies were utterly hollowed out by this and whatever other measures such as the lethal lockdown that the leaders imposed. Commodity prices and inflation are now sweeping majestically upwards and the usual remedy to these ills, push interest rate up, are being applied. It doesn’t help that people who should know way better are trying to prod each other into war. This Democracy system honestly doesn’t place the wisest in the positions of most power, does it? In fact, it seems deliberately to  identify the worst suited to the job of running nations.

The selection of the new Chief Justice of the Republic was a scrappy affair. Right down to the congratulatory elbow bump (instead of a handshake) between the deserving Judge Zondo and President Frogboiler. Presumably Justice Mandisa Maya – the sole female candidate and short-odds winner --  has been comforted by the news that Zondo is close to retirement.

Someone really needs to get hold of Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma’s smart phone and remove the entry that reminds her every month to extend the National Sate of Disaster that has been in place for two years. As usual her excuse for the blatantly obvious misuse of her power is that the extension will “give the government and organs of state time to augment legislation to ensure the continued management of the Covid-19 pandemic after the state of disaster”. Now, what metrics is she is using to decide when this augmentation is complete? And when does she expect to complete it? What we all know, is that she and the National Coronavirus Command Council have nothing useful or necessary left to do. It is moot whether they in fact ever achieved any significant impact, since most of the measures recommended and implemented by the NCCC these past 24 months have long since lapsed into irrelevance and ridicule. The truth is that very simply, those granted powers by the State of Disaster” have become fond of those powers and are loath to relinquish them. For example, the prat in the hat cant wait for another opportunity to harass and arrest a pretty girl in a bikini for the crime of using a beach that was closed. Because Covid!  

A developing story that merits careful attention is that powerful people are appearing who believe that other powerful people were responsible for the riots which all but destroyed the country last July. The word treason has been used. Hmm. Interesting.

 The first race of this year’s Formula 1 season takes place this weekend. The last one of 2021 ended rather acrimoniously, with rule books being waved about and lawyers being threatened. – never a good thing in sport – or indeed anything. It remains to be seen if the lighter paint work of the champion’s Number 1 has an impact. Tidemarks has whined before about the effort required to keep track of all the sports, tournaments and matches on the sporting calendars. Compilers of these lists should be clearer about which are the woman’s fixtures. My remarkable 99-year-old mother-in-law is adamant that certain sports have no place on the distaff calendar. Woman’s rugby is indeed intriguing

Cricket SA is one of sports’ most annoying and corrupt ruling bodies. However, their decision to allow local players to accept IPL invitations is perhaps wise. The most noticeable consequence is that the selectors have been forced to cast their nets wide for the forthcoming tour by Bangladesh. The newest members to the awesome list of those who have played for South Africa will, I’m sure, apply themselves to defending the Proteas’ rankings. And we surely soon will have new household names to boast about. Maybe even tonight in Centurion.  

James Greener

Friday 18^th March 2022

 

JUST A FEW TOO MANY RUSSIAN VISAS IN THEIR PASSPORTS

 Uneasiness is appearing in all sorts of markets. The price of money (interest rates) in SA is rising  while share prices in the US  and other big equity markets are sagging – by as much as 10% this year. This is not happening in SA where alarmingly weaker rand is keeping local prices  firm. Especially the price of petrol and other fuels. Interestingly, consumers appear simply to be sucking up these record fuel prices. A betting man would have expected commuters to have taken to the streets by now. Crypto currency prices remain – for this scribe – baffling.

A common topic in the markets commentaries is a shrinking JSE where the number of listed companies has been falling significantly and those who survive are suffering from vanishingly low liquidity. Obviously the collapsing GDP, which was entirely due to the lockdown strategies are mostly to blame. It’s extremely disappointing that the levers of power are still in the hands of those who caused this in the first place. They can be easily identified as the elites who have never been required to forego a single pay day since this nonsense began.  

Ukraine is a very big country  with a surprisingly  high ranking on numerous tables about many diverse commodities. In particular, Ukraine ranks first in the world in the production of sunflowers and sunflower oil, first in Europe in arable land area and also Uranium ores. Their population of spectacularly beautiful women should also not be ignored. But presumably it’s the second last of these which attracts Russian leader Putin’s attention. Reportedly it was platinum which was frequently discussed whenever a Brics meeting brought our previous President Jacob Zuma into the same room as Vladimir. And presumably it is that firm friendship which is preventing South Africa from throwing its hat into the ring on the side of Ukraine in the current unhappy spat that is already claiming lives. Really it is a dispute in which we should have no part to play. Not only is this a political observation but if you have seen the amusing video clip of some of our overweight troopies failing to get aboard the transport, it is also a strategic one. We must among few nations where XXXXX…L is a standard size in the quartermaster’s stores.

The Bosasa leg to the corruption story broke only later on in the Zondo Commission deliberations and yet reportedly fills the whole of volume 3 of the report. Now that Judge Zondo has been overlooked for the Constitutional Court, it seems that Volume 4 is now on the way too.

When it comes to admitting to the naughty stuff, SA is champion. And probably incorrigible and unstoppable. Just scratch the surface of a civil service thief and the flow never stops. What an unutterable mess.

Even though retired I don’t have enough time to follow all the sports that now stream across my smart phone screen. Supersport can deliver almost every soccer and rugby and cricket league you can imagine and then in Women flavour! Motorsport comes in a huge variety of power trains  and bicycles in many shapes and types of wheel. All of which can be seasoned with the politics du jour for omissions and exclusions. Whew. Not to mention tennis and golf and the Boat Race. And Vice-Presidential Surgery. Among the more prominent sponsors of the particularly costly and risk-rich “sports” are the so-called energy drinks. Do they enjoy an exceptional profit margin?  Interesting.

James Greener

Friday 4^th March 2022