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The World’s Richest People Lost Another $124 Billion on Monday
The global rout continues
Tom Metcalf
August 25, 2015 — 6:10 AM MYT
Another $124 billion was wiped off the collective fortunes of the world’s 400 richest people today as the global selloff pushed the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index into its first correction in nearly four years.
Twenty-four billionaires saw their wealth fall by more than ten figures on Monday, including Bill Gates who dropped $3.2 billion and Jeff Bezos, who fell $2.6 billion, according to data compiled by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Mexico's Carlos Slim lost $1.6 billion as his fortune fell to its lowest level since the Index began in 2012.Sliding markets worldwide have resulted in Chinese shares sinking the most since 2007, Germany's DAX falling into a bear market, and commodities reaching a 16-year low, as Brent crude plunged below $45 a barrel.
Last week’s declines had already seen the world’s 400 richest people lose $182 billion. A decline of $76 billion on Friday had put their fortunes into the red for the year-to-date.
The Bloomberg Billionaires Index takes measure of the world’s wealthiest people based on market and economic changes and Bloomberg News reporting. Each net-worth figure is updated every business day at 5:30 p.m. in New York and listed in U.S. dollars.
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The Independent - UK
News>Business>Business News>Frontpage
FTSE 100 loses £104 billion in value in one day as China stock slide prompts global selloff
HAZEL SHEFFIELD
Monday 24 August 2015
The FTSE 100 shed £104 billion at its lowest point on Monday, after severe losses in Chinese markets prompted a global sell-off.
Monday’s bloodbath marked the tenth day of consecutive losses on the FTSE 100, the longest straight period of decline since 2003. The index has lost around £218 billion in value in that time.
Many expected the Chinese government to take measures such as cutting interest rates or injecting liquidity to stop further losses after the Shanghai Composite Index fell nearly 12 per cent last week. No action prompted further losses of 9 per cent on Monday.
The Dow Jones also plummeted more than 1000 points on opening Monday, before rebounding slightly. The S&P 500, another US stock market index, dropped 99 points, or 5 per cent.
While plunging stock indices were attributed to lack of action in Beijing, Monday’s selloff follows months of poor data. Last week, activity in Chinese factories was shown to have dropped sharply.
Declining commodity prices continue to weigh oil giants. Glencore, Shell and Rio Tinto, which are all listed on the FTSE 100, suffered the worst declines on Monday.
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$10 Trillion Gone UPDATE: Actually It Was More Like $3 Trillion
Matt Vespa | Aug 24, 2015
Editor's Note: It was originally reported that $10 trillion had been erased, but it's been revised to $3 trillion. The post has been updated.
Monday got off to a disastrous start for the world economy.
The Dow Jones plunged 1000 points–or 6.5 percent–upon the opening bell thanks to the volatile economic situation in China.
As Cortney wrote earlier today, the market recovered roughly half of its losses by the time trading was suspended for the day.
The New York Times compiled the butcher’s bill–and it was quite steep. $3 trillion was erased from the global stock market since the June 3 peak, the Chinese Shanghai Index lost all of the gains it has made this year, European stocks dropped 5 percent or more, and the U.S. S&P 500 closed four percent down.
At the same time, many analysts knew a recalibration of our bull market bearings was due. Right now, all eyes are on government policy:
“Everything is going to be dictated by government policy,” said Kevin Kelly, the chief investment officer of Recon Capital Partners.
“Whatever noise is coming from policy makers is going to determine the next couple weeks."
”The conversation about government policy is playing into a broader debate about the global economy’s ability to continue growing without the sort of extraordinary stimulus that has become the norm in recent years."
Investors’ worries over China’s economic slowdown and a souring view of emerging economies have rattled financial markets around the world in recent days, and showed no signs of letting up.
“There was a huge amount of negative sentiment built in this morning,” said Dan Greenhaus, the chief global strategist at BTIG.
Many analysts have said that a correction to stock market valuations was overdue after a long bull market. And it is too early to say how the financial market slump will affect the underlying global economy where goods and services are actually produced and consumed.
Many of the world’s central bankers will have a chance later this week to compare notes and discuss whether new policy steps are needed when they gather, along with finance ministers and academics, in Jackson Hole, Wyo., for the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City’s annual conference.
The lack of coverage about China’s economic woes is due to the fact that Tom Brady’s deflated footballs were deemed much more newsworthy. After analyzing a month’s worth of broadcasts, the Media Research Center discovered that “deflategate” received five times more coverage on the Big Three–ABC, NBC, and CBS, than China’s struggling economy:
In a month of coverage, from July 18 to Aug. 18, China’s economic situation was discussed for just 3 minutes and 11 seconds on the network evening news programs.
That coverage was entirely on CBS and ABC and even included a political story about Donald Trump that made a passing mention of China’s currency devaluation.
In contrast, ABC, CBS and NBC spent 18 minutes and 21 seconds on Brady’s appeal and courtroom appearances: more than five times more.China devalued its currency, called the Yuan, in what ABC World News Tonight with David Muir referred to as “a surprise move” on Aug. 11.
That send the Dow Jones Industrial Average down more than 200 points that day. The entire story was a mere 11 seconds long.
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The Independent - UK
TUESDAY 25 AUGUST 2015
News>UK>UK Politics Frontpage
Stock up on canned food for stock market crash, warns former Gordon Brown adviser
JON STONE Monday 24 August 2015
A former adviser to Gordon Brown has urged people to stock up on canned goods and bottled water as stock markets around the world slide.
Damian McBride appeared to suggest that the stock market dip could lead to civil disorder or other situations where it would be unreasonable for someone to leave the house.
“Advice on the looming crash, No.1: get hard cash in a safe place now; don't assume banks and cashpoints will be open, or bank cards will work,” he tweeted.
“Crash advice No.2: do you have enough bottled water, tinned goods & other essentials at home to live a month indoors? If not, get shopping.
“Crash advice No.3: agree a rally point with your loved ones in case transport and communication gets cut off; somewhere you can all head to.”
Mr McBride credited his former boss Gordon Brown with preventing a cataclysm by nationalising the banking system during the 2008 crash.
“We were close enough in 2008 (if the bank bailout hadn't worked),” he said. “and what's coming is on 20 times that scale”.
Financial markets are unstable and periodically suffer crises which can have devastating consequences for the wider economy.
China's "Black Monday" has plunged the global financial markets into chaos.
The Shanghai Composite Index, China’s most important stock market index, was down 8.45 per cent, erasing a year’s gains in a day’s trading.
The FTSE100 fell 4.5 per cent, hoping £60bn off the price of UK shares, and the Dow Jones in the US fell by over a thousand points in its first minute of trading.
Some analysts have suggested that the stock market slide could be the start of a new global financial crisis.Mr McBride’s suggestions about stocking up on canned goods, setting rally points and stocking up on bottled water were ridiculed by some users on Twitter as over the top, however.
Mr McBride was special adviser to Gordon Brown and head of communications at the Treasury for a period during the last Labour government.
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A blog about business and economics.
Aug. 24 2015 9:59 AM
China’s Stock Market Is Melting Down—and It’s Taking Markets Everywhere With It
By Alison Griswold
Friday was a rout in the stock markets; Monday is already looking worse. The Shanghai Composite index tumbled 8.5 percent—erasing the last of its gains for the year in its biggest single-day loss since 2007. European stocks have plunged nearly 5 percent. U.S. stocks nosedived at the opening bell:
The S&P 500 fell 99.1 points or 5.03 percent, the Dow sank 991 points or 6.02 percent, and the Nasdaq pitched 335 points or 7.12 percent. There is only one word for all of this, and it is yikes. Brent crude, the benchmark for oil prices worldwide, is trading below $45 a barrel for the first time in six years. Even gold, so often a “safe haven” commodity that investors pour money into during periods of economic uncertainty, is being weighed down
Despite climbing all spring, the Shanghai Composite has now erased its gains for the year. (Yahoo Finance)
What’s behind the apparent panic in the global economy?
Mostly China.
Over the past two weeks, China’s currency fell in value more than it did in the previous two decades. On top of that, all the recent economic data coming out of China seems to fundamentally contradict official reports of the country being on track for 7 percent growth. Investors and analysts have long questioned the accuracy of economic statistics produced by the Chinese government, so seeing those figures can’t have been entirely surprising.
But it’s only recently become clear how big the gap between official reports and China’s economic reality might be. And the bigger that gap, the greater the ramifications could be worldwide. In recent years, China has accounted for up to half of global growth, though it makes up just 15 percent of global output.
Per the Wall Street Journal, China is looking into stimulus measures:
The expected move to free up more funds for lending—by reducing the deposits banks must hold in reserve—is directly aimed at countering the effects of a weaker currency, which could send more funds away from Beijing’s shores.
The moves reflect an economy increasingly failing to cooperate with Chinese leaders’ playbook to control the world’s No. 2 economy.The Journal says this could happen by the end of August or in early September, most likely via a half-percentage-point reduction in reserve-requirement ratios for banks.
Another possibility is to just loosen the reserve requirements for banks that lend primarily to small and private businesses. China’s entrepreneurs have been stifled by the risk-averse tactics of many banks, which prefer to lend to state-owned companies than private, potentially higher-growth enterprises.
Theoretically, stimulating that kind of private-sector growth would be better for China in the long run than falling back on exports, its traditional economic mainstay. (The leading theory for why China’s central bank devalued the yuan is that it was trying to prop up exports.)
At the same time, as the Journal notes, these new “would-be drivers of the economy—high technology and entrepreneurship—aren’t filling the gap quickly enough.” In the meantime, expect a lot of turbulence in the global markets.Alison Griswold is a Slate staff writer covering business and economics.
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AUGUST 22, 2015 9:00 PM
ECONOMY GLOBAL INSECURITY (Bloomberg)
The world’s 400 richest people lost $182 billion this week from their collective fortunes as weak manufacturing data from China and a rout in commodities sent global markets plunging.
The weekly drop for the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, a group that includes Warren Buffett and Glencore Plc’s Ivan Glasenberg, was the biggest since tracking of the expanded list began in September 2014. The combined net worth of the index members fell by $76 billion on Friday alone, when the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index of U.S. stocks ended its worst week since 2011.
“For them that’s a fractional percentage, even though $182 billion is a big number,” said John Collins, director of investment advisory at Aspiriant, which oversees more than $8 billion for high net worth clients. “A week like this feels really bad, but when you take a step back, in a big picture view it’s not a disaster by any means.”
Friday’s losses put the world’s richest 400 into the red for the year to date. They’re now down $74 billion in 2015, with a collective net worth of $3.98 trillion.
The week’s largest setback in dollar terms was experienced by Buffett, who saw his fortune drop by $3.6 billion as Berkshire Hathaway Inc. slipped more than 5 percent. The investor is the world’s third-wealthiest person, with a fortune of $63.4 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
The slump in oil, which had its longest weekly losing streak since 1986 amid signs of an extended supply glut, contributed to $15.2 billion in losses for the world’s wealthiest energy billionaires. Continental Resources Inc. Chairman Harold Hamm saw $895 million, or 9 percent of his net worth, vanish this week.
Glencore’s Glasenberg
Glasenberg, chief executive officer of mining company Glencore Plc, lost $237 million during the week as commodity prices slid to their lowest levels in 13 years. Glencore reached a record low in London on Friday, down more than 8 percent from a week earlier, after the trading house reported its profit sank 56 percent in the first half of the year. Glasenberg’s fortune has decreased more than 40 percent in 2015, to $3.1 billion.
China’s 26 wealthiest people, pummeled by Hong Kong’s bear market and a weaker yen, lost $18.8 billion during the week. Wang Jianlin of Dalian Wanda Commercial Properties Co. was hit hardest, losing $3.5 billion.
Eleven billionaires added to their fortunes in spite of the market turmoil. The week’s biggest dollar gainer was Sun Pharmaceuticals’ Dilip Shanghvi. The world’s 39th-richest person became $467 million wealthier, elevating his net worth to $18.9 billion.
The Bloomberg Billionaires Index takes measure of the world’s wealthiest people based on market and economic changes and Bloomberg News reporting. Each net-worth figure is updated every business day at 5:30 p.m. in New York and listed in U.S. dollars.
