Australia: Ford is the tip of the crisis

By Houses and Holes — cross-posted from Macrobusiness.com.au

It’s fascinating to watch the exit of Ford shake up commentary alliances and ideology.

The loon pond that dominates Australian business media is out in force with soothing words that Australian car manufacturing needs to be let go gently into that good night.

Bill Scales appears at the AFR to argue:

…..while it will be tempting to see this as a sign of the demise of Australian automotive manufacturing, it’s not. This decision is a direct result of the well-recognised, well-understood and deliberate decisions by Ford in Australia and the US.

However it does have important implications for public policy in Australia. This is a good example why governments should not provide company or industry- specific assistance. Governments and bureaucrats can never understand the strategic or commercial imperatives of individual businesses. So they cannot hope to successfully design company or industry-specific assistance programs that make any fundamental difference to the underlying economics of that company or industry. If the strategic direction or intent of a government policy for any company or any industry is not consistent with the strategic or operational direction of that company or industry, and it rarely is, then money provided to them by governments is likely to be wasted.

High priestess of the pond, Jennifer Hewitt, wants outright liquidation:

The national sympathy and attention given to 1200 Ford workers who will be out of a job in three years’ time shouldn’t obscure economic reality. Car manufacturing in Australia has been living on borrowed time – and permanently borrowed tax-payer money for far too long.

That can never be solved by additional government assistance or new industry plans or emotive rhetoric about how car manufacturing in Australia is so special. This only delays the inevitable.

But the response is part of the national semi-panic about the future of manufacturing in Australia. Both Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott stress the need for Australia to be a place that continues to “make” things. Just what new things should be made remains elusive. What is clear is it is will not be cars long term. That is despite the billions of dollars in government subsidies.

…the end of Ford manufacturing shouldn’t in itself be the sort of national crisis suggested by the massive reaction to the company’s announcement.

The Ford Falcon is an iconic loss rather than an economic one, a dream of the past rather than the future.

The AFR editorial and Judith Sloan at The Australian, card carrying members of the pond, are also happy to see Ford go. However, some of the more sane commentators are as well. Alan Mitchell at the AFR, John Durie at The Australian and Bernard Keane at Business Spectator are all for it.

What is missing, as usual, is the only thing that actually matters to the reader and the nation: context.

In 2009, the US faced an analogous decision about whether to let one of its big three auto-makers go to the wall (there were many differences as well). As the GFC tore its GDP to pieces, the government stepped into the breach and saved Chrysler, bankrupted the company, broke its union contracts, reorganised its cost base, sold much of it to FIAT and the company relaunched. Why did the global home of “free market capitalism” bother?

The cheap answer is to save jobs. But there is more to it than that. It is about productivity and not in the way you might think.

We all know that productivity is the key to national standards of living. Only through productivity growth do we sustainably increase our competitive advantage, capital formation, incomes and employment. But, I hear you ask, propping up dud car companies is bad for productivity, right?

Wrong, or at least, overly simplistic.

The issue is this. Manufacturing accounts for a huge slice of productivity potential in all economies. Without it, any economy will struggle to generate long term high productivity growth. Mechanisation, improved processes, innovation and technical progress are the bread and butter of productivity growth. They simply do not exist to the same extent in services, nor, for the most part, in mining (though the runoff in the boom will be good for the next few years). The following chart from McKinsey makes the point. Manufacturing contributes disproportionately to productivity, innovation and exports:
Productivity
This is the first question that Ford’s departure raises about Australia’s long term economic context. The car industry may or may not survive the shakeout but Australian manufacturing has already declined to only 7% of GDP and is clearly set to plunge further as capex expectations run at levels first seen in the 1980s.

Of the thirty developed economies in the world comprising the OECD, this level of contribution to GDP is last, tied with the tax haven of Luxembourg.

Our elite – the government, mining magnates and the media – have decided that manufacturing will be let go and we will instead rely entirely upon highly priced dirt and houses. Australia’s elite policy makers are engaged in a gigantic experiment that flies in the face of economic history.

The second question is more immediate. What our elite forget or ignore is that selling dirt is a highly cyclical business. Put simply, they never expected the current cycle to end. But it is. Right now. And is about to become a MASSIVE drag on the economy:
Mining Investment/GDP
Manufacturing is supposed to be one of those sectors picking up the slack along with other exports and more houses. Obviously the departure of Ford will damage any upside for a manufacturing bounce and it will also put a sizable dent in consumer confidence, making it harder for other sectors to rebound as well.

Short term and long, cyclically and structurally, this is a crisis, a crisis of our elite’s own making.

ASX 200 & All Ords selling pressure

The ASX 200 is testing medium-term support at 5150. Breakout would indicate a correction to 4900. Reversal of 21-day Twiggs Money Flow below zero — and the longer-term bearish divergence — warn of selling pressure.
ASX 200 Index

* Target calculation: 5150 + ( 5150 – 4900 ) = 5400

The All Ordinaries weekly chart displays a longer-term bearish divergence on 13-week Twiggs Money Flow. Expect a test of the rising trendline at 4900.
ASX All Ordinaries Index
The Large Cap ASX 50 rising faster than the ASX Small Ords confirms this is not a typical bull market. There is a high degree of risk aversion and sentiment of retail (mom+pop) investors is more accurately captured by the Small Caps index which represents the ASX 300 excluding ASX 100 stocks.
ASX 50 Index

Australia: Property risk highest in a long time

Posted by Houses and Holes in Australian Property, May 20th 2013:
Index

MB contributor, Rumpletstatskin, wrote an interesting post on the Australia property cycle this morning. In it he mused that:

The crucial lesson in all this is that Australian nominal asset prices have been supported by fiscal policy during the financial crisis, ongoing monetary policy adjustments, and foreign investment (including in mining infrastructure), which all supported employment and incomes.

This support allowed a slow melt adjustment since the financial crisis. Home prices have fallen, mortgage rates are down, and rents have increased. This means that buying a home is more affordable compared to renting than it has been for 15 years.

My message, if it wasn’t clear, is that if you have been holding off purchasing a home because of the risk of capital losses, then these risks are probably lower now than at any time in the past decade. Maybe prices will be a couple of percent lower at the end of next year, but I have a hard time wrapping my mind around downward price movement more severe than a couple more years of the slow melt, or around 3% in nominal terms. The chances of price gains is also now much higher.

Unfortunately this coming 2 year period is also likely to be economically unstable, with low wage growth and a fragile labour market. That is the catch with trying to time the residential property cycle – it is a game for players with lots of capital.

Cameron argues his post well but I vigorously disagree with these conclusions.

Australian property prices are not affordable on any spectrum that looks beyond the current cycle. Indeed, they remain at nose-bleed levels on any historical comparison.

Yet, prices have held at these high levels for over a decade and there is no saying that they won’t continue to do so. Throughout the GFC and afterwards I argued that the time of reckoning for the Australian housing bubble was not yet at hand. This was based largely upon the assumption that the nation had lots of firepower left in monetary and fiscal policy that would protect the downside. And so it turned out to be.

But each successive challenge has sapped these supports and insurance policies. Monetary policy is at 2.75% and probably has, at best, 1% of cuts left before it is exhausted. Fiscal policy too has limits now that the Budget guarantees bank borrowings. Not to mention the political paralysis preventing spending. We will never see another post-GFC stimulus program.

Most importantly, these limitations are apparent as the Australian economy enters a very serious challenge in the form of declining mining investment. In its editorial this morning the AFR wrote:

If Professor Garnaut is right, Chinese steel use per capita – the great driver of Australia’s resources boom – may not grow much further. He believes Australian resource investment will slide from 8 per cent of gross domestic product to just 2 per cent, effectively taking out about two years’ worth of national economic growth. This is already showing up in a string of profit warnings from mining services companies and an emerging slump in profitability in coal.

Think about that a moment. 6% of Australian GDP disappearing over the next three years before we even start to grow. This is the same forecast currently projected by ANZ and Goldman Sachs. It must be taken very seriously.

If this comes to pass, then it will be very difficult for Australia to avoid a recession and property bust of some kind. There will be very big falls in the dollar and they will protect Australian property prices to an extent. The fall will trap Asian investors already in the market but it will also deter future investors as currency risk becomes the new reality.

But the fall in the dollar is also going to hit consumers, much more quickly than it is going to benefit tradable sectors. Consumers will see purchasing power eroded as high inflation in oil and all imported goods overwhelms income growth. This will keep confidence under the cosh.

More to the point, a 6% draw down in business investment will hit the labour market hard and potentially trigger forced selling in property markets. Perth and Darwin especially are going to be at risk of property busts as the many project labourers on our major mining projects flood back into town with nothing to do. Not to mention the trouble we’ll see in the many sundry industries that have benefited from the mining boom. Brisbane is at risk of this dynamic too but has already corrected sharply so has less downside.

These factors, along with a generalised stalling in income growth, have the potential to feed bad loans back into the banking system. The majors can absorb serious losses. But how serious? And how much credit rationing would it take to pop the grossly oversupplied Melbourne and Canberra property markets, the latter afflicted with big job losses from a new government as well? Sydney is strong but only so long as credit keeps flowing.

There are of course arguments about high immigration, underlying demand, under supply and rising rents to support the market. And they will play some part. But none of these will matter in the circumstances I’m describing. If there are not enough jobs then people will move in together. Shortage will turn to surplus.

Cameron’s argument that the property cycle could be approaching a turning point will hold if these turn out to be normal times. A moderate retrenchment in mining investment will allow time to rebalance the economy so long as the dollar falls. Even so, things will seem abnormal. Inflation be high and property prices may rise in nominal terms but not so much in real.

But that is far from certain, indeed, may not even be the base case.

I am not saying any of this will happen. But if the mining investment cliff turns out to be precipitous in the next two years then the risk of a property shakeout is higher than at any time I can remember.

Reproduced with kind permission from Macrobusiness Australia.

ASX 200 selling pressure builds as Aussie Dollar falls

The ASX 200 broke resistance at 5200, but bearish divergence on 13-week Twiggs Money Flow continues to warn of selling pressure.
ASX 200 Index

The daily chart also shows a bearish divergence, suggesting a test of support at 5100/5120. Failure would indicate a correction, while respect would confirm an advance to 5400*.
ASX 200 Index

* Target calculation: 5150 + ( 5150 – 4900 ) = 5400

Bipolar behavior of the market is highlighted by comparison of the ASX 50 Large Caps to the ASX Small Ords (ASX 300 – ASX 100). Small Caps tend to outperform Large Caps during a bull market, as can be seen from 2003 to 2007. But the current “bull market” gives out mixed signals, with Large Caps powering ahead while Small Caps remain in a down-trend. Demand for Large Caps seems to have been inflated by international capital flows.
ASX 50 Index
And the falling Aussie Dollar, with a target of $0.96* against the greenback, is likely to lead to retreat of the ASX 50 and ASX 200 indices.
Aussie Dollar

* Target calculation: 1.01 – ( 1.06 – 1.01 ) = 0.96

Forex: Aussie breaks support while Yen soars

The Aussie Dollar broke primary support at $1.015 and is testing parity against the greenback. Parity is not expected to hold and we are likely to see a test of the next major support level at $0.95/$0.96. Narrow fluctuation of 63-day Twiggs Momentum around zero continues to suggest a ranging market.

Aussie Dollar/USD

The euro is retreating, headed for another test of $1.2750. Respect would signal another attempt at $1.37, while failure would indicate a primary down-trend — testing long-term support at $1.20. The failed advance to $1.50 would be bearish; and breach of $1.20 would offer a target of $1.05*.

Euro/USD

* Target calculation: 1.20 – ( 1.35 – 1.20 ) = 1.05

Rapid expansion of the monetary base by the Bank of Japan is fueling inflation fears and weakening the yen. Lars Christensen points out that, with competitive devaluation from all quarters, exports are not likely to play a major part in a Japanese recovery. What is more likely is a consumption and investment boom as households invest in real assets as a hedge against inflation.

The greenback broke resistance at ¥100 against the Japanese Yen — a one-third appreciation from the lows of 2011/2012. Expect retracement to test the new support level, but breach of the long-term declining trendline indicates the 30-year secular bear trend is over. Long-term target for the advance is the 2007 high at ¥125*.

USD/JPY

* Target calculation: 100 – ( 100 – 75 ) = 125

Aussie Dollar shrugs off rate cut

The Aussie Dollar rallied off primary support at $1.015 despite a 25 basis points rate cut by the RBA, to a historic low of 2.75 per cent. Narrow fluctuation of 63-day Twiggs Momentum around zero suggests a ranging market. Follow-through above $1.03 against the greenback would suggest another test of $1.06.

Aussie Dollar/USD

Fall of the Aussie has long been predicted as commodity prices weakened, but capital inflows from investors and central bank diversification of their traditional dollar and euro holdings have shored up the AUD above parity. Capital flows, however, are fickle and will increase the severity of any eventual fall — so don’t grow complacent.

ASX 200 meets resistance

The ASX 200 is testing resistance at 5200. Breakout would signal an advance to 5400*. Reversal below 5100 is unlikely but would warn of a bull trap.  As would reversal of 21-day Twiggs Money Flow below zero.
ASX 200 Index

* Target calculation: 5150 + ( 5150 – 4900 ) = 5400

The Energy Sector XEJ recently completed an inverted head and shoulders reversal over six weeks, signaling an advance to 137. Bullish divergence on 13-week Twiggs Money Flow indicates long-term buying pressure. Breakout above 137 would offer a long-term target around 150*.
ASX 50 Index

* Target calculation: 135 + ( 135 – 120 ) = 150

Are Australian banks really sound?

Business Spectator reports:

In a statement APRA chairman John Laker said that, in implementing the Basel III liquidity reforms, the authority’s objectives were to improve its ability to assess and monitor ADIs’ liquidity risk and strengthen the resilience of the Australian banking system.

“APRA believes ADIs are well-placed to meet the new liquidity requirements on the original timetable and doing so will send a strong message about the soundness of the Australian banking system,” he said.

If you repeat misinformation often enough, people will believe it is true. Australian banks face two risks: liquidity risk and solvency risk. Addressing liquidity risk does not address solvency risk. Australian banks report risk-weighted capital ratios which are misleading if not downright dangerous. Risk-weighting encourages banks to concentrate exposure in areas historically perceived as low risk, such as residential mortgages. When all banks are over-weight the same asset, the risk profile changes — as Eurozone banks discovered with government bonds.

If we remove risk-weighting, as proposed in the US Brown-Vitter bill, the four majors in Australia would have capital ratios of 3 to 4 percent. Not much of a capital buffer in these uncertain times.

Urban sprawl isn’t to blame: unsustainable cities are the product of growth fetish

By Brendan Gleeson, University of Melbourne

In a recent article on The Conversation Robert Nelson argues we are all morally culpable for unsustainable urban sprawl. He goes on to suggest we fix this by taking advantage of opportunities for higher density development in sparsely populated inner suburbs.

But his argument is based on a false opposition: mounting evidence shows that high density development in inner areas performs very poorly in terms of resource consumption and greenhouse emissions. The idea that outer suburbs are inherently less sustainable than inner ones doesn’t bear scrutiny.

The key question is not where we accommodate growth; it’s our slavish pursuit of growth itself.

Urban accumulation

The metro fringe is expected to accommodate 40% of our national population increase in the next 15 or so years. Australia has for some time been experiencing record population growth, cheered on by business lobbies, and rationalised by the expertise they buy. Not all of it is corporate conception, or undesirable: the fertility spike and commitment to a humane migration program are also contributors.

The urban sustainability crisis betrays not bad consumption patterns but the awesome success of accumulation. Our cities express the ceaseless economic expansion imperative and its politico-cultural expression, which Clive Hamilton has memorably described as the “growth fetish”.

We have sprawl in every possible physical form – from low density suburbia to the vertical sprawl produced by market driven compaction. It is a fallacy to describe the latter as sustainable.

The existing urban footprint simply cannot absorb the human increase. It is a physical, social and political impossibility. And the underlying imperative of accumulation will drive excessive urban expansion in its various forms.

Risky business

The physical form of cities and suburbs has little influence on overproduction and its social and ecological consequences.

We are, as Nelson correctly implies, in the tightening grip of a species crisis. As the German sociologist Ulrich Beck describes it, we live in a World at Risk – from climate warming, resource depletion, economic default, and social breakdown. The ecological crisis may be the gravest of these as it appears to be moving with wild speed and threatens to upend the planetary order entirely. But it cannot be divorced from the other calamities which all derive from a human modernity that, as Beck states, is devouring itself.

The looming human catastrophe is not a moral crisis or a consequence of ethical failure. It is the product of a political economy that has defined, if not always exclusively, the process of modernisation through the past five or so centuries. The long haul of capitalist accumulation has brought us to the abyss of species threat.

It is wrong to explain this historical process in moral terms. This merely distracts attention from the role of capitalism as a driver of growth. As the philosopher Slavoj Žižek put it recently, “The point of emphasising morality is to prevent the critique of capitalism”.

Capitalism is a force for ceaseless accumulation driven by valorisation (value creating value). It is hard-wired to expansion, and can never be reconceived or reformed as a “steady state” economic order. It expands or it dies.

And therein lays its marvellous, terrifying power. It is a human order set in epic contest with the natural order, scaling ever upwards the heights of risk. One day it will reach the precipice of possibility and a structural transformation will ensue. Humanity will survive this, as it has all other historical transformations, but we do not know what new social dispensation will be possible in its wake.

Weathering the storm

It is simply impossible to dramatically change the urban form in the timescales of looming climate and resource emergencies. Absent war or massive calamity, cities resist sudden change. We cannot design our way out of a crisis generated by the underlying political economy that has driven modernisation for centuries.

However, good planning and design are vital to the project of making our cities as safe and resilient as possible. Elsewhere I have urged us to reconceive cities as lifeboats that will carry an increasingly urbanised humanity through the storms that lie inevitably in our path.

It is only fair that we break from our long habit of malign neglect and cut the outer suburbs an appropriate share of national resources. The investment should be in a massive suburban overhaul to realise the latent environmental potential of the low density form. In quest for resilience, households should be assisted towards self-sufficiency in water, energy and food production.

Paul Mees’ important Australian book, Transport for Suburbia, shows decisively that good public transport is possible in the low density form. We must lament the intellectual and political idiocy that has convinced us that it cannot be made to work in the suburbs.

The outer suburbs simply aren’t the source of our mounting environmental problems. And neither is social delinquency a helpful way of thinking about what is a long run failing of the market economy. We have to prepare the lifeboats for what lies ahead.

Brendan Gleeson does not work for, consult to, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has no relevant affiliations.

The Conversation

This article was originally published at The Conversation.
Read the original article.

Colin Twiggs:

I agree with Brendan Gleeson’s defense of suburbia, but what concerns me is the focus on sustainability in terms of energy usage and a critique of the economic system. No doubt these are important, but I would like to see more attention given to the health dangers of high-density living, both physical and psychological — from the impact on childhood obesity to feelings of isolation, increased aggression and pathological behavior in inner city environments. Biologists as far back as Konrad Lorenz (Civilized Man’s Eight Deadly Sins) have warned of the dangers of over-crowding and their impact on aggression levels.

Lorenz also warned of the ‘avalanche’ effect of positive feedback from technological development and how this could create an environment where humans struggle to cope. Prof. Gleeson I believe is trying to make a similar point when he refers to a ‘growth fetish’.

Capitalism is a force for ceaseless accumulation …… It is hard-wired to expansion, and can never be reconceived or reformed as a “steady state” economic order. It expands or it dies.

To lay the blame for this ceaseless expansion at the foot of Capitalism is I believe misguided. Capitalism covers the full spectrum from intense competition in cities like New York to peaceful co-existence in rural communities such as Pennsylvania or the Outer-Hebrides. And we find a similar spectrum in Communist or Socialist societies. The underlying cause of the malaise appears to be the impact of high-density living — no matter what economic system — and the consequent breakdown of the individual’s sense of community and belonging. A study (can anyone recall the name?) done in Australia several years ago found that Australians living in small to medium-sized towns (10,000 to 50,000) enjoyed greater psychological well-being than their city or rural counter-parts. These towns seem to offer balance between community (belonging) and the spectrum of opportunities only normally available to larger communities. More effort should be made to identify the underlying causes of that well-being and attempt to replicate the benefits in both rural and city environments. Economic and energy efficiency are important, but first and foremost we need to create cities that are healthy to live in — from both a physical and psychological aspect.

How Bureaucrats and Politicians Conspire to Rip Off Taxpayers | International Liberty

Dan Mitchell discusses a new National Bureau of Economic Research working paper entitled “Shrouded Costs of Government: The Political Economy of State and Local Public Pensions.”

….The politicians give the bureaucrats excessive compensation. But they make it difficult for taxpayers to figure out how they’re getting robbed by concentrating a big share of the excess in harder-to-measure fringe benefits.

Another advantage of that approach, by the way, is that the bill for all the retiree benefits doesn’t come due until some point in the future, by which time the politicians who put taxpayers on the hook often have retired or moved on to some other position.

Generous benefits for government employees are a neat way for politicians to avoid accountability. They do not appear in the budget and are a hidden liability of the government. For a start we need to prevent politicians from creating unfunded future liabilities not just for government employee benefits, but for Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid funding. At present these are a hidden iceberg as they do not appear on the government balance sheet. It is too easy for politicians to kick the can down the road, failing to address any future funding shortfall. These unfunded future liabilities should be reflected on the balance sheet in order to improve accountability. If the actual liability is uncertain, then actuarial estimates can be used — in much the same way as used by insurance companies.

Read more at How Bureaucrats and Politicians Conspire to Rip Off Taxpayers | International Liberty.