WELL, SONA WAS A WASTE OF TIME

 

Presumably this “State of the Nation Address” (SONA) jaw-wag by the Leader to his or her subjects was dreamed up by a clipboard wielding PR executive years ago. This is when the nation’s state was reasonable and critically, far better than the previous year. The fearless leader could don some glad rags, drape himself in awards (if any) and invite an “A” list of tax-eating layabouts (aka other politicians and alleged VIPs) to do the same and come and listen politely. Moments of adulation, awe and reverence could be marked with applause. Their reward is a red-carpet moment followed by the serving of viands and liquor normally only enjoyed by the best connected of the criminal classes. For the last few decades however the nation’s state has been awful and deteriorating and the PR executives must surely have melted into embarrassed obscurity.

The shindig however, marches on. And it took place yesterday. Hopefully only those who had temporarily mislaid the remote might have watched.  There was a lot of bad behaviour, the declaration of a State of Disaster and an increase to the cabinet headcount. Same old same old.

A grizzled old stockbroker such as I, is totally amazed what apparently is allowed when it comes to advertising investment services and products. For example, a slick TV production introduces a would-be investor worrying if the smorgasbord of things to buy is safe. A gorgeous and obviously well-off young lady slides into focus to assure the audience that everything they sell “is licenced””. Wow. Just Wow. A big selling point is often how easy it is to begin buying your first investments. Even the Springbok rugby captain apparently uses his mobile phone to open an account and begin trading! What happened to FICA? That wodge of state sponsored paperwork designed to give the illusion that the government has your back when it comes to investment risk. Has all that “proof of residence” stuff reduced financial crimes? NO?!  But “Why not?”  you cry. “Look! It has a certification no older than 3 months!”

And then there is RICA which supposedly enables government in the name of crime control to link people to their mobile phone numbers? Really? Any cell phone company emporium or “hole in the wall” shoppe will today sell you a “pre-RICAed” SIM card. For a few pennies and no questions asked. This was the week when the national broadcaster claimed to have begun to seek TV licence payments from all users of computer monitors that are TV capable.

Do the big corporates still employ compliance officers? About as useful as the men who install direction indicators on a BMW.

The recent apparent attempt to murder Eskom CEO Andre De Ruyter by poisoning him is bizarre and medieval. His later revelation that the two cops who came along to find out what happened and presumably begin investigating the crime, were totally clueless lends a typical weird and amusing South African theme to the very serious incident. The serious side is it demonstrates the ruthless and dangerous criminal culture that has infiltrated the electricity utility. Or indeed anywhere large sums of state money are loosely controlled. Government, who actually is as clueless as those cops when it comes to running any commercial entity are throwing money at the problem in a not very effective attempt to keep the lights on, the trains running, and the sewage controlled. Of course, the cockroaches are coming out of the dark.  

It is time for this nation to stop thinking it has a permanent lien on the Nobel Peace Prize and start treating the bad guys with less respect. Let’s start with those would-be poisoners and have them behind bars for 10 years before the end of this month. It’s time to go and fetch the Guptas and bring them home overland in the back of a Bedford for a brisk trial with courts working a full 8 hours a day and waffling lawyers silenced. No more Mr Nice Guy and Human “Rights” for these people. Apparently, the Robben Island Jail is deteriorating from lack of maintenance. Perfect. Winter is coming. And disconnect the WiFi.as well as the power --- oh wait!

James Greener

Friday 10^th February 2023

BUT RWANDA ARE PAYING ARSENAL TO DO THE SAME THING

 The US share markets obviously approve of the news that the so-called Tech companies have been firing staff at an unprecedented rate. The Nasdaq index is up almost 20% for the year. Remember when computers were supposed to help everyone get along with fewer staff?  Don’t cry for the nerds though. It has been noted that many of the newly unemployed are finding jobs with Chinese companies. Remember this is the poster child sector for having staff who have no idea where the office is. Even our own All Share is powering upwards despite no good news about how industry are coping with critical shortage of power. And the US have raised interest rates again.

It’s three years since our government gave in to international peer pressure and declared a State of Disaster. Wise men (and women) warned at the time that little good would come of it and in particular, worried that politicians, once they tasted the heady potion of unfettered power, would only come back for more. How right they were.  That time the panic was about  a medical infection event that we were assured  would depopulate the world in weeks.  This time it is a loss of control of the nation’s electrical power supply(or what is left of it)  to criminal elements which only mobilisation of the army can possibly restore! Hang on a minute Cyril. Let’s try a few other things before letting the cabinet loose! Last time they banned liquor and tobacco sales and open toed sandals and take-away food. None of which had any effect on a rather nasty respiratory bug. Now at least start by firing the Prat in the Hat for impersonating a police minister, and please dump the ex-president’s ex-wife who refuses to say what happened last time. Then send the cops in to fix the crime -- it’s their job, isn’t it?

Here is a little scene we would all love to witness. It takes place in the Presidential Suite at the Union Buildings in Pretoria. President Frogboiler is hard at work with his rare cattle bloodstock book. The phone warbles and he answers it. From our side the conversation goes like this. He listens for a long time to what is obviously a very excited woman shrieking. Eventually he manages to slow her down and asks a question: “Totty what Spurs?” The answer does not seem to help and he moves on to another question “How much did you say?” His next question seems to puzzle the other party. “Why?” and there is a bit of a silence. What we all wish to hear next would be a snort of derision and the following. “No. No.  Don’t be silly Lindiwe” “ It’s this Spurfowl Ham outfit that should be paying us. Do you know what English soccer players get paid? Be a good girl and run along and put this nonsense out of your mind and I won’t tell the cabinet about it”. 

It is well known that it is only the supply of diesel fuel to Eskom’s generators is which helps to keep (some) of the lights on. But it is a costly business especially when Petro SA – the state oil company—are reportedly supplying the fuel at a premium price! This seems intrinsically wrong!  Let’s hope that Eskom do at least insist on not  paying the taxes and retail margins.  

Some very dim people have come to the conclusion that pretty much everything we do to make life worth living is heating the planet. They are undoubtedly correct when they point out that heat leaks from ovens and hot plates and indeed all household appliances. In fact when the cooked food is taken out and served it also cools down and can melt glaciers and stuff leading ultimately to “endangering your health”.  But wouldn’t not eating also be rather bad for your health too? After all the amazing scientific and engineering progress of the last few centuries why on earth are so many of us behaving like ignorant morons?

To beat England 2-1 in the ODI series was very satisfactory.  The heat wave has returned to Durban so the Sharks vs Stormers fixture is going to be sweaty tomorrow.

James Greener

Friday 3^rd February 2023

SMOKE GETS IN YOUR EYES

 At 7.25%pa the repo rate is now higher than it was since 2009 and at anytime since the global calamity which was covid. Expensive money is not really the way to help a nation without a  reliable electricity supplyto  keep going and competitive. This week we all discovered just how critical electricity is in the poultry business which most of us fondly picture is mostly about a jovial man in a hat scattering mealies. The nation’s staple meal, KFC, is under threat.

We also learned that that our Defence Force is planning a joint exercise named Operation Mosi - the Tswana word for smoke --  with fleets from both Russia and China. Our contribution is a mere 350 personnel, many of whom will probably be covered in officers’ gold braid and unable to do much harm except peer through binoculars and be on time for meals (if not incapacitated by seasickness). It does, however, signal clearly whose side we are on, and The USA has already reacted by cancelling an agreement involving supplies and parts for our sole nuclear power plant.

Most politicians and others who eagerly and willingly take momentous decisions on our behalf, are clueless ignorant oxygen thieves oblivious to the concepts of embarrassment and humiliation. These characteristics are a global phenomenon, but here in SA they are coated with a thick veneer of racism. The school-leaving exam results were released recently, and it remains clear that this government, who invented the 30% pass mark, still don’t understand that a decade aiming for too easy an educational target has done the nation a grave disservice. No one who uses a calculator to work out the change due from a R50 note tendered for a R20 purchase will be able to aspire to much more than a lifetime of menial labour and with luck, state handouts. But perhaps that’s what the lefties wish for as the future of their nations.  

The agenda of global warming now dominates all debate at every level and in every subject. The thesis is that thoughtless greedy human consumers have adopted or even just aspire to a life style that produces uncontrollable clouds of carbon dioxide which in turn, through a process known as the “greenhouse effect”, is forcing an unprecedented and unsustainable increase to the ambient temperature of the planet.  Which is a very bad thing. 

Tidemarks believes that most of this thesis is nonsense but is in awe of how successful it has been at creating an industry rich in pickings for entrepreneurs, academics, and charlatans (politicians).  It is even giving birth to disciples who claim that they alone know the truth and where to find it. For a fee. Here, for free, is the simple elegant, exciting and satisfying real story. All our energy comes from the sun in the form of light and heat. Once it reaches Earth the glorious biological process, otherwise known as “life”, uses, captures and stores some of this energy in and on our planet. The timescales for some of these conversion processes are unbelievably long and must be measured in millions of years. The longer they are, the greater the concentration of the energy captured.  Coal, oil, gas and biofuels are common descriptions for these commodities.  However, they produce carbon dioxide when burned. This is not a problem if you believe that the properties of this important gas are well understood and not particularly harmful. In fact Nature has stored energy in the nuclei of all the chemical elements, of which Uranium is already known to be very important and reasonably carbon dioxide benign. Green Hydrogen” is trendy but still in need of much more understanding.

In the meantime supporters of so called wind and solar (the latter through direct heating or via photovoltaic  conversion of light energy) try hard to disguise the fact that they are  just modern day versions of perpetual motion machines. This effort is made because it is well funded. Puzzling but true. “

The Blitzbokke really have lost their way. But the SA20 is unearthing all kinds of talent.

James Greener

Friday, 27^th January 2023

 

 

 

JUST PAY YOUR TAXES AND SHUT UP

Apparently the US government has debt totalling USD 38.4 trillion. This is a big number and it is up against  a self-imposed limit that has to be reset upwards from time to time following a bizarre ritual that takes place when the elected representatives of Congress sort of pretend that they never saw this coming and mutter things like “My goodness me, that’s a lot of money”. “But let’s agree to increase the limit this time and we will really do something about it next time.” Unless or until the lenders stop accepting freshly minted US Dollar notes with the ink still wet, this show can go on indefinitely, just like Disney Land.

The time was when the World Economic Forum was a hot ticket to have. Especially if you thought of oneself as a bit of an expert in the world of investing. The trick of course was to get someone who made the decisions and controlled the purse strings to agree with this self-assessment. And bingo, there you were among the good and great trying to pretend that one’s South African winter clothes were stylish and adequate for the snows of Switzerland. Discussions on grave topics would take place. But as with all conferences it was the networking that counted. In the days before digital cameras and selfies one had to rely on the photographers to capture the moment when you were offering Warren Buffet advice. But these days the WEF has morphed into something vile and threatening. Delegates are openly proclaiming that they are a select group of human beings “almost extra-terrestrial” in their skills and foresight on “saving the planet” Elon Musk nailed it with the comment that “WEF is increasingly becoming an unelected world government that the people never asked for and don’t want.”

Loyal readers know that Tidemarks' antipathy towards electrically powered vehicles began with doubtful scepticism, progressed through scientific dismissal and is now unalloyed schadenfreude. The You Tube motoring channels are today filled with master classes in a new psychiatric condition called range anxiety. Simply because their new cars display ridiculously accurate estimates of how far their sleek chariot will travel before the batteries are depleted, they foolishly believe it. Add to this is the fact that recharging is currently a bit of a gamble with uncertainty of location, accessibility and time to charge and you have the ingredients for a full scale fret. It’s rather odd when you recall that motorists are quite used to interpreting the quite ludicrously lackadaisical liquid fuel tank gauges with a needle that drifts between F to E and not much else. Most drivers have become adept at judging where to stop to satisfy firstly passenger bathroom and biltong needs and then a tank top up. But today’s EV motorist has become totally unhinged by the theoretical superior accuracy of the range gauge and the power source reliability. This for smug-inducing TV.

Surely it has been irrevocably proven and accepted that there is absolutely no medical or clinical benefit to wearing a simple gauze mask.  By contrast there is plenty of evidence for psychological damage, especially to children, caused by masks. It is therefore very alarming that mandatory masking is back for consideration. If our government wanted to demonstrate a real and valid effort to reduce unnecessary deaths in this country, then road traffic control is the area where actual effects will quickly be seen. Merely tracking down those responsible for  the half dozen terrifying road incidents posted on the Internet every day and processing them with due despatch will make a difference.

The world of sport is settling back to normality after the hullabaloo that was the soccer world cup. And The Dakar Rally. Except that there are so many fresh new faces in the old favourites like the Aussie Open Tennis. Do the organisers operate a play room with building blocks and other toys to keep the contestants amused while they wait for their matches to start? The Sevens Rugby has a tournament in Hamilton this weekend which might not be easy watching for Blitzbokke fans. The local version of a cricket T20 shoot ‘em up is doing remarkably well in attracting spectators.

James Greener

Friday 20^th January 2023

DARKNESS FALLS ON THE SOUTHERN TIP

We are probably not supposed to notice but there are bulls stampeding all over the share and bond markets. Buyers can’t currently see an indicator that makes them fearful. In the US, the yield curve is rarely as inverted as it is now.– short term interest rates are well above long term interest rates – so that’s another old favourite “please panic now” signal shot to bits. But guess what? The gold price is also bullish and may soon set new highs in most currencies. Barbarous relic! Bring on the crypto currencies. What’s that? Someone stole them? Oh dear. But aren’t they all block chained into unbreakable security?

Last year ended with the damp squib of an Elective Conference which at the very least we uninformed naive analysts expected to see fisticuffs and rolling heads. But no, even the traditional displays of flying chairs failed to take place.  Delegates merely ticked the boxes they were and slithered back under their rocks to await the general election in 2 years’ time.

Astonishingly Cyril is going to the annual Davos shindig next week. Why? Did Comrade Gwede Mantashe pay for the ticket perhaps? There are just so many reasons for President Frog Boiler to be at home, not least of which, is the fact that the nation’s electricity supply has dwindled to a useless soul-destroying trickle, for which Eskom has the gall and impertinence to apply for (and even get!)  a 30% odd tariff increase! Another is that he never seems to bring back anything of value from these jaunts. Like reasons why we don’t need a State Bank. Or the news that he has been arrested at Customs on charges of money laundering and couch abuse.

Sufficient time has now elapsed since the start of the Covid incident to enable the coarse-grained data (monthly and longer) to reveal the extent of the damage that  the state’s response caused in the economic landscape. One such data set is the government’s deficit. That is, the gap between what taxes bring in and the amount of spondulix the lads and lasses in charge are spending. The decade before Covid, this shortfall, which has to be covered with borrowings, ran at an already eye-watering and unsustainable average of just less than R200bn a month. In April 2021 it peaked at almost R600bn. Lockdown tripled the deficit! But things have not recovered very much and at present the average monthly deficit is a tad over R300bn.With this number hanging over their heads it’s hard to understand the near triumphal tone used by officials who announced that half the population is totally dependant on state handouts for their existence.

Despite queuing at the Traffic Department for almost three hours I failed to encounter actor Tom Cruise who allegedly is in town to make a movie to be entitled Mission Impossible 8 - Renewing a South African Driver’s Licence.  I did eventually get the 3 minutes of attention required from an inexplicably calm official in order to collect a new driver’s licence.

These and other similar earlier experiences in this “renew your licence” saga did reveal an interesting feature about a new role for white-skinned South Africans as human place holders in these unending waits. In rough agreement with the national demographic, about 1 in 20 people on average in a queue at a state facility is white and they are quickly singled out by the darker fellow supplicants for service, who see no reason to stand in the sun when a mlungu will meekly perform that task. Whenever the official line shuffles forward to the point where a place holder approaches a chair, the shade or some other small milestone of comfort, the wise men reappear and reclaim their positions around the white man. Rarely does a true and blatant queue jumper appear although an occasionally suspiciously sprightly grey-hair turns up  with an obviously little used walking stick. In general we are as a nation respectful of old age.

I really must make up my mind whether to follow the SA20 Cricket tournament or one of those overseas rugby contests that SA teams did so well in last year. The team names in the former are just so uninspiring. But watching rugby from the pool bar seems very odd. Just a few days of the Dakar left.

James Greener

Friday 13^th January 2023.

THE OPENING OVER

There is an organisation called the Johannesburg Roads Agency. It probably occupies a very confused space as multiple nationally owned and administered roadways traverse its territory. This is fertile ground for “Not my Job” excuses. Its most recent quarterly report almost cheerfully admits that the status of the 12 000km road network it does care for, ranges from poor to very poor and requires rehabilitation or reconstruction. Its own scorecard records 45 000 pot holes in need of filling.  It further notes that 68 city bridges need urgent repair. This is not good news, and you would think that the organisation works ceaselessly to do something about this. You would be wrong. Its CEO, who styles himself “Hon. Dr Tshepo Mahanuke”, reportedly spends much of his time keeping a lookout for any sign of disrespect for his qualifications. Greetings or communication not addressing him appropriately are ignored and returned unread. The best part of this story, however, is that most of these honourifics, qualifications and titles are bogus, or fake, having been issued by dodgy and in some cases non-existent institutions! Joburgers need not expect their potholes to be fixed any time soon. Tshepo is busy getting his newest certificate as a member of the Mickey Mouse club framed.

Tidemarks has been very quiet recently because his granddaughter – remember I told you about the most beautiful one on the planet – has been visiting from Edinburgh. And as grandparents know, these creatures require nearly unlimited attention and entertaining. Normally ice cream and beach can satisfy much of the demand but this year it has been hard to make a case for either. Firstly, the weather has quite frequently been below “Durban at Christmas Time” specification, And then sea water pollution has been dreadful. Although the daily official measurements of sea water contamination for certain beaches in the area have caused All Clear signs to go up, the colour and odour of the ocean is uninviting. Importantly users are not convinced and people with sensitive noses are staying away. Indoor venues such as Ushaka Marine World and  the large and glitzy shopping malls are however well attended showing that there is pent up demand and certainly some disposable cash is knocking about. 

Increasingly though, more and more vendors and venues are refusing cash and accepting only electronic payments. One wonders to what extent this development is being tapped into and taken note of by supporters of things like state controlled digital currency. Mind you it seems that South Africa remains a key point is the money laundering business so the Leopard and the Buffalo my be with us for a while still.

Meanwhile many organisations are using this time of reduced attention to slip possibly controversial news releases into the public domain. For example, The World Bank seeks to expand its lending capacity to address climate change and other global crises. These changes will require additional staff and budget resources, which have declined by 3% in real terms over the past 15 years. Another case of good money after bad. The only useful aspect of the huge cold weather system that punished much of the northern hemisphere recently is that some more folk may have begun to join those of us who are unconvinced that there is much meaning or point to “Net Zero”.  

Man but That Dakar Rally is a tough ne?

James Greener

Friday 6^th January 2023

 

SOME OF THE LADY OFFICIALS WERE REALLY CUTE

The task of being an investment analyst comes down to choosing a few prices and indicators that interest you and then making them your own. Then ensuring that when the press need an opinion and quote about them, yours is the name that they think of.  If by some incredible luck, a reasonable number of consecutive forecasts prove correct, one becomes a guru and gets to wear a bowtie or some other notable gaudy trademark for TV appearances. This week one particularly over-analysed and hyped indicator – the US consumer prices inflation statistic -- was published and turned to be just one significant figure lower than expected. A hullaballoo ensued and some share prices went up. The talking heads declared the end of all that was bad and horrible in share investing. Which of course it's not. It never is. Every single day each of the numbers either goes up or down or nowhere.  At the moment we are all very keen to be able to declare that the covid monster and its impact on our lives, especially on our economic status has gone. Unfortunately, a significant sized cohort are calling the exact opposite.

The story about the Russian cargo ship, Lady R, calling silently into port at Simonstown, loading a secret cargo in complete darkness and slipping back over the horizon without ever showing up on any marine monitoring services is fascinating. But unlikely to be regarded as friendly towards most of the rest of the world. I doubt President Frogboiler was told any more than the rest of us. After all he regards his sofa to be a secret hiding place, We are probably way out our depth here. I wonder who scored the biggest kickback?

The final whistle at the Soccer World Cup will blow on Sunday and the folk who ran around and kicked the ball will all go home. Then the real serious sport will now begin as the lawyers squabble about who owes what money to whom. The more interesting of these skirmishes will surely involve Budweiser, the holders of the exclusive right to sell alcoholic beer in the stadiums. This is one of the costliest concessions offered by FIFA, the organisers of the tournament. But this year, just days before the tournament began, the Qatari hosts changed their mind and decided that the activity of selling beer to football fans would offend many people. And so, they reneged on the agreements.  Budweiser thinks this unexpected decision cost them almost USD50 million and are looking for someone to sue. Surely not! The other rather amusing sight has been the luxurious individual seating provided above the half-way line for the great and good. The individual armchairs are so wide that conversation with one’s fellow spectators was mostly impossible, and communication is limited to waving and smiling.

It has at last dawned on the Durban City Grandees that the attractions of the city they are supposed to run, are the long clean golden beaches with the sparking waters of the Indian ocean crashing on to them. But the current situation has, since the massive floods in April this year, has been far from this idyllic scene. The floods caused massive damage to untold millions of rands worth of infrastructure – the pumping stations designed to lift the sewage away from the coast and over to treatment plants behind the sand dunes. Whatever the excuse for failing to carry out the repairs or in many cases even begin them, the tourists and visitors – especially ones with both money and a working knowledge of the pathogeny of that nasty little critter eColi – are staying away.  The most visible and hilarious response to this utter calamity has been a splash party comprising a selection of city officials decked out in swimsuits, goggles and in some cases wet suits. The pictures from this photo op showed that the guinea pigs were far from convinced that they were safe. It is still a nasty smelly mess and some recent heavy rain has unfortunately reinforced the present closure of the beaches.

James Greener

Thursday 15^th December 2022 (Dingaans Day Public Holiday tomorrow)