Good morning, New York…
FT ALPHAVILLE
If you tolerate this, more holdout lawsuits will be next: It’d been a weird week in the pari passu saga, writes Joseph. An order from the Second Circuit on Thursday denied an unusual request filed on Monday by the Italian retail investors who count themselves among Argentina’s holdouts. But looking back at it, was it unusual or just ahead of the curve?
Alphaville’s Podcast: In our latest episode, Izzy, Cardiff and David meander from gold and bitcoin, via the Bank of Japan all the way to Slovenia. Stream or download it in this post. It’s also available in iTunes.
Deep thoughts on civilisation: If you submit to theoretical physicist Geoffrey West’s urban development theories, then you’re probably aware of the idea that humanity is set to face a critical crunch point soon enough (if not already). And by crunch point, we mean — either humanity throws everything it’s got at speeding up technology to ensure its resource consumption-to-population footprint becomes manageable, or we wither away. It’s the sort of thing deep thinker Jeremy Grantham of GMO seems to be contemplating at the moment as well. In fact, Grantham is out with one of his deepest notes yet, entitled “The race of our lives”. Click through to this post for more.
NEWS
JPMorgan re-reshuffle: Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, reshuffled his executive team on Sunday in the latest in a series of turbulent management changes, promoting Matt Zames to chief operating officer. The latest move came after Frank Bisignano, co-chief operating officer at JPMorgan, opted to take over as chief executive of First Data Corp, the payments processor. (Financial Times)
Strong capital inflows into Asia have increased the risks stemming from rapid credit growth and rising asset prices, the International Monetary Fund said on Monday. In its annual report on Asia, the IMF sounded an optimistic tone on the economic outlook for the region, which it expects to lead a “global three-speed recovery” with growth of 5.75 per cent this year. (Financial Times)
High-frequency traders are facing “speed limits” for the first time on a major trading platform, under a proposal that is being touted as a template for a regulatory clampdown on computer-driven activity. EBS, one of the two dominant trading platforms in the foreign exchange market, is suggesting scrapping the principle of “first in, first out” trading, which it says gives an unfair advantage to the fastest computers and has led to an arms race of spending on technology. (Financial Times)
Chat apps such as WhatsApp and Apple’s iMessage have overtaken the text message as the favourite way to tap out a note to friends, undermining the traditional SMS cash cow for mobile operators. The data, collected for the Financial Times by telecoms and media consultancy Informa, highlights the rapid rise of a technology that did not exist five years ago but is seen by some as a potential challenger to Facebook’s dominance in social networking. (Financial Times)
The Ark gala has been put on ice. The once lavish pinnacle of London’s boomtime financial social scene, which earned notoriety for scaling the heights in outrageous ostentation and financial largesse, has been quietly mothballed by Ark’s trustees according to two people familiar with the charitable organisation. (Financial Times)
Markets: Stocks and the euro are firmer as investors welcome the end of political deadlock in Italy, but industrial commodities are mixed as underlying concerns about global growth get the week off to a tentative start. Countering the caution is the succour provided by the central banks’ monetary comfort blanket, particularly the ongoing asset purchase programmes of the Federal Reserve and Bank of Japan. (Financial Times)
