Why Holiday Shoppers May Be Overspending

There are Grinches everywhere this year.

In Washington, Congress has basically said that fixing the huge debt problem it created over the last decade is somebody else's job, inviting additional downgrades of the U.S. credit rating or worse. In Europe, the outlook is even gloomier, as politicians try desperately to forestall a financial crisis that could doom the 17-nation euro zone and send the financial sector into a tailspin. Employers don't have much cheer to spread, either, since hiring remains weak. Even on Wall Street, year-end bonuses seem likely to plummet. Consumers, however, have been shaking off the blahs and spending as if they're all part of the 1 percent. Spending during the first several days of the critical holiday season rose by double-digits over 2010 levels, a big boost for retailers and a surprising sign of robust consumption. Since economists have been expecting a more modest rise in total holiday sales of 4 percent or so, shoppers are clearly off to a blazing start. Meanwhile, confidence readings took a surprising leap in the latest release, as if consumers are dismissing worries of another recession.

It's gratifying to see beleaguered consumers showing some fighting spirit. There's only one problem: Financial fundamentals suggest a big pullback is coming, either later in the holiday season or early in 2012. he biggest shortfall is income. The latest government data shows that real income, after accounting for inflation, hasn't risen at all over the last year. On a per-person basis, it's actually down by nearly 1 percent. But real spending is up by 2 percent over the last year—and could rise by more than that, if the early increase in holiday sales holds up.

That means consumers are borrowing more, or saving less, or both. Credit-card debt has been falling since 2008, and through September, it was nearly 20 percent below the peak levels of 2008. But with banks loosening up, we may have hit an inflection point, with consumers charging more of their purchases this holiday season. In fact, data from the Federal Reserve shows that consumer applications for credit have picked up, so forthcoming data could show a fresh rise in credit-card balances.Americans have clearly been saving less. The savings rate--which dipped to a record low of nearly 1 percent in 2005—rose to a recent peak of 6.2 percent in 2009, as panicked consumers rebuilt their finances. But since then, it's fallen back to 3.8 percent, which many economists feel is too low to pay off considerable debt loads that remain.

Ordinarily, a temporary gap between income and spending growth wouldn't be worrisome. It might even be good for the economy, since spending tends to generate economic activity that makes companies more willing to hire. But, as you've no doubt heard before, these aren't ordinary times, and consumers who overreach now might soon regret it.

For one thing, Congress may decide not to renew a temporary tax break that expires at the end of this year and puts about $75 of extra spending money in the average worker's pocket each month. That might sound like small change--until the money suddenly disappears. Congress may also decide not to renew federal jobless benefits that have helped sustain several million unemployed people over the last couple of years. Combined, the loss of those two subsidies could hurt growth enough to threaten another recession. Even if Washington does renew those tax breaks, the problems in Europe are profound and likely to hit a boiling point before long, perhaps in early 2012. That won't necessarily mean a collapse of the U.S. economy, but it's a good bet that hiring won't pick up until companies feel sure that there won't be another recession Meanwhile, oil and gasoline prices have been rising again, even though they usually fall when the economy weakens, especially in the winter. And home prices continue to tumble, eroding middle-class wealth, with a renewed surge of foreclosures likely in 2012.

Yeah, it's a depressing list of woes that Scrooge would be hard-pressed to top. But consumers have been aware of these trends all year, and behaved with predictable frugality. So why are they suddenly spending like it's, well, 2005? Here are three possible explanations:

Holiday spending patterns are changing. It seems quite plausible that consumers are spending more money earlier, which means they might spend less as Christmas gets closer. Retailers have been more aggressive than ever with post-Thanksgiving discounts, plus the hype of Thanksgiving-night store openings seems to have worked, and drawn a surge of shoppers.    

It's also clear that more shoppers are shifting to online purchases, which might boost early spending numbers if people unwilling to brave the mayhem at the mall went online instead of waiting to hit the stores later in the season. The test will come in mid-December. If sales tail off more than usual, retailers seem ready to tempt reluctant shoppers with even deeper discounts. Still, if holiday sales remain strong throughout the season, spending might collapse during the first months of 2012. Consumers can't resist reckless spending. It's also possible that shoppers are simply fed up with frugal living and are splurging for a few weeks, while they can. Data from Gallup, for example, shows that consumers spent more in the three days after Thanksgiving this year than they have over the same period since 2007. At the same time, however, their economic confidence was far below levels of 2009 and 2010, and just a bit higher than it was during the meltdown year of 2008. That suggests an unusual new optimism gap, characterized by consumers who are spending more than usual even though they're deeply worried about their financial future. And while other confidence measures have improved, they still show that consumers' outlook for the future is very pessimistic. So if recent spending patterns hold, it might signal a new kind of doomsday mentality, in which consumers are willing to spend even though they know tough times lie ahead.

Consumer optimism is reigniting the economy. Could it be? The U.S. economy is still dominated by consumer spending, which accounts for two thirds of GDP. Prior to the 2008 recession, the irrepressible American shopper showed a determination to spend and keep the economy humming, paying no heed to signs warning that they should rein it in. Economists have viewed the last few years as a kind of reckoning, when past debts finally came due and familiar shopping habits became unsustainable.

The math behind that view seems irrefutable, since people can't spend money they don't have, and banks, burned by millions of defaults, have become extremely stingy with loans. But it's possible that beneath the gloom, consumers are flexing their muscles in a way that could pump up demand for goods and services and give the whole economy a boost. If so, shoppers might be giving themselves a holiday gift. Or at least rationalizing their spending that way. 

Rick Newman- http://www.usnews.com 

Relativity of Alfred Marshall's Psychological Research and Economics

İstek, gayret, emel, tatmin her biri ruhsal olgulardır. Bu tanım Marshall ilkeleri olarak bilinmektedir. Marshall herbir çeşit isteğin sınırlı olduğunu ve sahip olunan şeyin her bir miktar artışında alınan hevesin azaldığını, çünkü sonsuz türde isteklerin bulunduğunu ancak her bir bireysel isteğin limiti olduğunu ve bunun neredeyse evrensel bir kanun olduğunu dile getirmiştir. Arzunun bu analizi Marshall'ın Principles kitabının ikinci baskısından sonra " azalan fayda kanunu" olarak adlandırılmıştır.

Naoki Matsuyama

(Detaylı Bilgi İçin: http://room409-1.ih.otaru-uc.ac.jp/~yss2009/papers/Matsuyama%2020090325.pdf )

Technical Analysis Defined

The Technical approach to investment is essentially a reflection of the idea that prices move in trends that are determined by the changing attitudes of investors toward a variety of economic, monetary, political and psychological forces. Therefore, technical analysis is based on the assumption that people will continue to make the same mistakes they have made in the past...

Martin J. Pring

The world at seven billion

The world's population is expected to hit seven billion in the next few weeks. After growing very slowly for most of human history, the number of people on Earth has more than doubled in the last 50 years. Where do you fit into this story of human life? Fill in your date of birth below to find out.

                          http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-15391515

As the world population reaches seven billion people, the BBC's Mike Gallagher asks whether efforts to control population have been, as some critics claim, a form of authoritarian control over the world's poorest citizens.

The temperature is some 30C. The humidity stifling, the noise unbearable. In a yard between two enormous tea-drying sheds, a number of dark-skinned women patiently sit, each accompanied by an unwieldy looking cloth sack. They are clad in colourful saris, but look tired and shabby. This is hardly surprising - they have spent most of the day in nearby plantation fields, picking tea that will net them around two cents a kilo - barely enough to feed their large families.

Vivek Baid thinks he knows how to help them. He runs the Mission for Population Control, a project in eastern India which aims to bring down high birth rates by encouraging local women to get sterilised after their second child.

As the world reaches an estimated seven billion people, people like Vivek say efforts to bring down the world's population must continue if life on Earth is to be sustainable, and if poverty and even mass starvation are to be avoided.

There is no doubting their good intentions. Vivek, for instance, has spent his own money on the project, and is passionate about creating a brighter future for India.

But critics allege that campaigners like Vivek - a successful and wealthy male businessman - have tended to live very different lives from those they seek to help, who are mainly poor women.

These critics argue that rich people have imposed population control on the poor for decades. And, they say, such coercive attempts to control the world's population often backfired and were sometimes harmful.

Population scare

Most historians of modern population control trace its roots back to the Reverend Thomas Malthus, an English clergyman born in the 18th Century who believed that humans would always reproduce faster than Earth's capacity to feed them.

Giving succour to the resulting desperate masses would only imperil everyone else, he said. So the brutal reality was that it was better to let them starve.

Rapid agricultural advances in the 19th Century proved his main premise wrong, because food production generally more than kept pace with the growing population.

But the idea that the rich are threatened by the desperately poor has cast a long shadow into the 20th Century.

From the 1960s, the World Bank, the UN and a host of independent American philanthropic foundations, such as the Ford and Rockefeller foundations, began to focus on what they saw as the problem of burgeoning Third World numbers.

The believed that overpopulation was the primary cause of environmental degradation, economic underdevelopment and political instability.

Massive populations in the Third World were seen as presenting a threat to Western capitalism and access to resources, says Professor Betsy Hartmann of Hampshire College, Massachusetts, in the US.

"The view of the south is very much put in this Malthusian framework. It becomes just this powerful ideology," she says.

In 1966, President Lyndon Johnson warned that the US might be overwhelmed by desperate masses, and he made US foreign aid dependent on countries adopting family planning programmes.

Other wealthy countries such as Japan, Sweden and the UK also began to devote large amounts of money to reducing Third World birth rates.

'Unmet need'

What virtually everyone agreed was that there was a massive demand for birth control among the world's poorest people, and that if they could get their hands on reliable contraceptives, runaway population growth might be stopped.

But with the benefit of hindsight, some argue that this so-called unmet need theory put disproportionate emphasis on birth control and ignored other serious needs.

"It was a top-down solution," says Mohan Rao, a doctor and public health expert at Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University.

"There was an unmet need for contraceptive services, of course. But there was also an unmet need for health services and all kinds of other services which did not get attention. The focus became contraception."

Had the demographic experts worked at the grass-roots instead of imposing solutions from above, suggests Adrienne Germain, formerly of the Ford Foundation and then the International Women's Health Coalition, they might have achieved a better picture of the dilemmas facing women in poor, rural communities.

"Not to have a full set of health services meant women were either unable to use family planning, or unwilling to - because they could still expect half their kids to die by the age of five," she says.

In 1968, the American biologist Paul Ehrlich caused a stir with his bestselling book, The Population Bomb, which suggested that it was already too late to save some countries from the dire effects of overpopulation, which would result in ecological disaster and the deaths of hundreds of millions of people in the 1970s.

Instead, governments should concentrate on drastically reducing population growth. He said financial assistance should be given only to those nations with a realistic chance of bringing birth rates down. Compulsory measures were not to be ruled out.

Western experts and local elites in the developing world soon imposed targets for reductions in family size, and used military analogies to drive home the urgency, says Matthew Connelly, a historian of population control at Columbia University in New York.

"They spoke of a war on population growth, fought with contraceptive weapons," he says. "The war would entail sacrifices, and collateral damage."

Such language betrayed a lack of empathy with their subjects, says Ms Germain: "People didn't talk about people. They talked of acceptors and users of family planning."

Emergency measures

Critics of population control had their say at the first ever UN population conference in 1974.

Karan Singh, India's health minister at the time, declared that "development is the best contraceptive".

But just a year later, Mr Singh's government presided over one of the most notorious episodes in the history of population control.

In June 1975, the Indian premier, Indira Gandhi, declared a state of emergency after accusations of corruption threatened her government. Her son Sanjay used the measure to introduce radical population control measures targeted at the poor.

The Indian emergency lasted less than two years, but in 1975 alone, some eight million Indians - mainly poor men - were sterilised.

Yet, for all the official programmes and coercion, many poor women kept on having babies.

The BBC's Fergus Walsh finds out whether the numbers will rise or fall in the future

And where they did not, it arguably had less to do with coercive population control than with development, just as Karan Singh had argued in 1974, says historian Matt Connelly.

For example, in India, a disparity in birth rates could already be observed between the impoverished northern states and more developed southern regions like Kerala, where women were more likely to be literate and educated, and their offspring more likely to be healthy.

Women there realised that they could have fewer births and still expect to see their children survive into adulthood.

Total control

By now, this phenomenon could be observed in another country too - one that would nevertheless go on to impose the most draconian population control of all.

The One Child Policy is credited with preventing some 400 million births in China, and remains in place to this day. In 1983 alone, more than 16 million women and four million men were sterilised, and 14 million women received abortions.

Assessed by numbers alone, it is said to be by far the most successful population control initiative. Yet it remains deeply controversial, not only because of the human suffering it has caused.

A few years after its inception, the policy was relaxed slightly to allow rural couples two children if their first was not a boy. Boy children are prized, especially in the countryside where they provide labour and care for parents in old age.

But modern technology allows parents to discover the sex of the foetus, and many choose to abort if they are carrying a girl. In some regions, there is now a serious imbalance between men and women.

Moreover, since Chinese fertility was already in decline at the time the policy was implemented, some argue that it bears less responsibility for China's falling birth rate than its supporters claim.

"I don't think they needed to bring it down further," says Indian demographer AR Nanda. "It would have happened at its own slow pace in another 10 years."

Backlash

In the early 1980s, objections to the population control movement began to grow, especially in the United States.

In Washington, the new Reagan administration removed financial support for any programmes that involved abortion or sterilisation.

 “Start Quote

if you give women the tools they need - education, employment, contraception, safe abortion - then they will make the choices that benefit society”

Adrienne Germain

The broad alliance to stem birth rates was beginning to dissolve and the debate become more polarised along political lines.

While some on the political right had moral objections to population control, some on the left saw it as neo-colonialism.

Faith groups condemned it as a Western attack on religious values, but women's groups feared changes would mean poor women would be even less well-served.

By the time of a major UN conference on population and development in Cairo in 1994, women's groups were ready to strike a blow for women's rights, and they won.

The conference adopted a 20-year plan of action, known as the Cairo consensus, which called on countries to recognise that ordinary women's needs - rather than demographers' plans - should be at the heart of population strategies.

After Cairo

Today's record-breaking global population hides a marked long-term trend towards lower birth rates, as urbanisation, better health care, education and access to family planning all affect women's choices.

With the exception of sub-Saharan Africa and some of the poorest parts of India, we are now having fewer children than we once did - in some cases, failing even to replace ourselves in the next generation. And although total numbers are set to rise still further, the peak is now in sight.

China promoted birth control before implementing its one-child policy

Assuming that this trend continues, total numbers will one day level off, and even fall. As a result, some believe the sense of urgency that once surrounded population control has subsided.

The term population control itself has fallen out of fashion, as it was deemed to have authoritarian connotations. Post-Cairo, the talk is of women's rights and reproductive rights, meaning the right to a free choice over whether or not to have children.

According to Adrienne Germain, that is the main lesson we should learn from the past 50 years.

"I have a profound conviction that if you give women the tools they need - education, employment, contraception, safe abortion - then they will make the choices that benefit society," she says.

"If you don't, then you'll just be in an endless cycle of trying to exert control over fertility - to bring it up, to bring it down, to keep it stable. And it never comes out well. Never."

Nevertheless, there remain to this day schemes to sterilise the less well-off, often in return for financial incentives. In effect, say critics, this amounts to coercion, since the very poor find it hard to reject cash.

"The people proposing this argue 'Don't worry, everything' s fine now we have voluntary programmes on the Cairo model'," says Betsy Hartmann.

"But what they don't understand is the profound difference in power between rich and poor. The people who provide many services in poor areas are already prejudiced against the people they serve."

Work in progress

For Mohan Rao, it is an example of how even the Cairo consensus fails to take account of the developing world.

"Cairo had some good things," he says. "However Cairo was driven largely by First World feminist agendas. Reproductive rights are all very well, but [there needs to be] a whole lot of other kinds of enabling rights before women can access reproductive rights. You need rights to food, employment, water, justice and fair wages. Without all these you cannot have reproductive rights."

Perhaps, then, the humanitarian ideals of Cairo are still a work in progress.

Meanwhile, Paul Ehrlich has also amended his view of the issue.

If he were to write his book today, "I wouldn't focus on the poverty-stricken masses", he told the BBC.

"I would focus on there being too many rich people. It's crystal clear that we can't support seven billion people in the style of the wealthier Americans."

Mike Gallager is the producer of the radio programme Controlling People on BBC World Service

Asian Suppliers and Rivals React to Jobs's Death

HONG KONG–While many Asian technology companies expressed sadness over Steve Jobs's death, investors in Asia reacted differently, with major technology companies rising in Thursday's morning session following the news.

For competitors in Asia, any fall-off in Apple's marketing prowess could spell an opportunity.

"Jobs's demise raises uncertainties to the future innovations of Apple. The big question is whether Apple can continue living up to consumer's high expectations," said HSBC analyst Jenny Lai.

Apple's product launches acted as a catalyst across Asia, leading competitors like Samsung Electronics Co. and Lenovo Group Ltd. to launch similar devices to compete. The race to grab more market share has also led to a global patent dispute between Apple and Samsung.

Samsung Electronics Co., Apple's major competitor in smartphones and tablets, but also a key supplier of chips and liquid crystal displays to Apple, said in statement Thursday it is saddened to hear about Mr. Jobs' passing. Samsung's shares were up 4% at KRW878,000, while LG Display Co., which makes LCD panels for iPads, rose 11% to KRW20,250.

"Chairman Steve Jobs introduced numerous revolutionary changes to the information-technology industry and was a great entrepreneur. His innovative sprit and remarkable accomplishments will forever be remembered by people around the world," Samsung Chief Executive Choi Gee-sung said in a statement.

Most of Apple's key suppliers are based in Asia, raising questions about business continuity. Asian component makers have benefitted from a boost in sales as Apple's products such as the iPhone and the iPad tablet computer lifted demand for their components such as memory chips, flat-panel displays and touch-screen panels.

But Ms. Lai said suppliers in Taiwan won't be impacted in the near term as Apple's product roadmap is already set for a least one year.

Shares in Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., which assembles Apple's products, rose 3.7% to NT$70.10, while Catcher Technology Co. Ltd., which makes metal casings for Apple devices, rose 2.6% to NT$175.50. Wintek, which makes touch panels, rose 7% to NT$24.50.

Lenovo, the world's third-largest PC maker by revenue, said Steve Jobs' achievements are "unmatched in our time."

"Today, the world lost one of its greatest innovators and visionaries with the passing of Steve Jobs...while we will all feel this enormous loss, I am confident that this industry will take to heart the lessons Steve taught us about innovation," Lenovo Chief Executive Yuanqing Yang said in a statement.

Howard Stringer, chairman, chief executive and president of Sony Corp. of Japan said: "the digital age has lost its leading light, but Steve's innovation and creativity will inspire dreamers and thinkers for generations."

Taiwan-based Quanta Computer Inc., which manufactures Apple's Macbooks, expressed confidence on maintaining its relationship and growth with Apple and called the death of Mr. Jobs a tragedy. Quanta is the world's largest contract maker of notebook PCs by shipments. Quanta shares rose 1.7% to NT$59.50.

"Steve had an immeasurable and positive impact on the lives of people around the world and the global electronics industry is all the better for the many contributions he made to ensuring that technology is understandable, beautiful, and, most importantly, accessible to people from all walks of life," Hon Hai said in a statement.

Shares in HTC Corp., which competes with Apple in smartphones and offers phones based onGoogle Inc.'s Android operating system and Microsoft Corp. software, rose 2.4% to NT$692.00. Analysts said the stock is getting a boost after lukewarm reception to Apple's iPhone 4S which was unveiled in the U.S. on Wednesday.

—Lorraine Luk in Taipei, Owen Fletcher in Beijing, Daisuke Wakabayashi in Tokyo and Alastair Gale in Seoul contributed to this article.

 Paul Mozur  and Yun-Hee Kim

http://online.wsj.com/article

Without Jobs, Apple's gap with rivals could narrow

The death of Apple's inspirational leader is likely to have a deep impact on the maker of the iPod, iPhone and iPad, giving major rivals a greater chance to catch up with the technology giant.

Steve Jobs' creative spirit was so closely tied to the fortunes of Apple that his death at 56 raises questions about the company's ability to keep its pipeline of transformational products running at such a fast pace.

"As a technology analyst, I am sorry for his death. It was Jobs' Apple, not Apple's Jobs," said Kim Young-chan, an analyst at Shinhan Investment in Seoul.

The CEOs of rivals including Samsung Electronics , Amazon , Google and Sony mourned the death of Jobs, a sign of the respect they held for the Silicon Valley legend.

Investors had known about Jobs' long battle with pancreatic cancer. In August, the man known for minimalist design and marketing genius handed the reins to long-time operations chief Tim Cook.

"Apple no longer has someone as creative and ambitious as Jobs that they can rely on," said Simon Liu, deputy investment officer of Polaris Group's fund unit.

In Asia, the fortunes of Samsung are most closely tied to Apple.

Analysts have said the South Korean conglomerate is one of the best placed companies to deliver something fresh and exciting to rival Apple. Samsung produces the closest competitor to Apple's iPad tablet computer.

The two companies are scrapping for top spot in the smartphone market, having overtaken Nokia , the market leader for the past decade, in the second quarter.

Apple is also Samsung's biggest customer through the sale of mobile chips and display screens.

The relationship and rivalry has helped Samsung become a top global brand over the past decade with a stock market value of $115 billion -- still modest compared with Apple's $345 billion.

But the relationship has also produced tensions as Samsung emerged as a credible challenger to Apple's mobile devices. The two companies have sued each other in 10 countries involving more than 20 cases since April.

Samsung's Galaxy range of smartphones and tablet computers running on Google's Android operating system are seen as the main competitor to Apple's game-changing iPhones and iPads.

The competition was "flummoxed" by the iPad, Jobs declared in March when he took the stage to unveil Apple's latest tablet.

"They went back to the drawing boards. They tore up their designs because they weren't competitive," Jobs said.

Lee Seung-woo, technology analyst at Shinyoung Securities, said Apple had transformed the industry, but its influence would wane without Jobs at the helm of the company.

"Under Jobs, Apple consolidated segmented IT sectors into one big consumer market and claimed so many victims," Lee said. "Without Jobs, Apple's rivals now have some time to step up and majors such as Google, Samsung, Microsoft and Facebook will try to fill the gap."

ICONIC PRODUCTS

Jan Dawson, chief telecoms analyst at research consultancy Ovum, said Apple would do well in the short term as the company would roll out products Jobs had a hand in.

The iPhone -- introduced in 2007 with the touchscreen template now adopted by its rivals -- is the gold standard in the booming smartphone market, and its sales have dealt a blow to ambitious plans of many competitors.

"The question is whether it can continue to launch iconic and successful products without him (in the longer term)... In the longer term, Apple risks becoming a more ordinary company without him."

Jobs' influence was underlined by the outpouring of tributes from executives of the world's biggest companies.

"Chairman Steve Jobs introduced numerous revolutionary changes to the information technology industry and was a great entrepreneur," Samsung Chief Executive G.S. Choi said in a statement.

Howard Stringer, the chief executive of Sony Corp said: "The digital age has lost its leading light, but Steve's innovation and creativity will inspire dreamers and thinkers for generations."

SYMBOLIC

Jobs' death comes after Apple this week launched the latest version of its iPhone, in what was Cook's first big product introduction.

However, the iPhone 4S failed to wow fans and investors and some analysts said the rare loss of momentum could give rivals room to push their products.

"Jobs was an outstanding CEO and his successor Tim Cook faces a test (as to) whether Apple will be able to lead the global market as it was before," Lee Jun-hyuck, a fund manager at Dongbu Asset Management.

On Thursday, Samsung's shares rose 3.9 percent, LG Electronics advanced 6.6 percent and Sony rose 3.6 percent as part of broad gains in Asian markets.

Phones based on Google's Android, which is available for free to handset vendors such as Samsung, HTC, LG and Motorola , have a greater combined market share than Apple's iPhone, which is still the world's No. 1 selling smartphone.

"Apple faces big challenges with the loss of Jobs and that will offer other technology companies opportunities to challenge its supremacy," said Lee at Shinyoung. (Additional reporting by Rafael Nam in HONG KONG and Faith Hung in TAIPEI; Writing by Anshuman Daga; Editing by Neil Fullick)

By Miyoung Kim and Hyunjoo Jin
http://www.reuters.com/article

10 Products that defined Steve Jobs' career

Apple's co-founder and former CEO Steve Jobs dies; father of Mac, iPhone, iPad was 56.

Steve Jobs had no formal schooling in engineering, yet he's listed as the inventor or co-inventor on more than 300 U.S. patents. These are some of the significant products that were created under his direction:

1. Apple I (1976) -- Apple's first product was a computer for hobbyists and engineers, made in small numbers. Steve Wozniak designed it, while Jobs orchestrated the funding and handled the marketing.

2. Apple II (1977) -- One of the first successful personal computers, the Apple II was designed as a mass-market product rather than something for engineers or enthusiasts. It was still largely Wozniak's design. Several upgrades for the model followed, and the product line continued until 1993.

3. Lisa (1983) -- Jobs' visit to Xerox Corp.'s research center in Palo Alto inspired him to start work on the first commercial computer with a graphical user interface, with icons, windows and a cursor controlled by a mouse. It was the foundation for today's computer interfaces, but the Lisa was too expensive to be a commercial success.

4. Macintosh (1984) -- Like the Lisa, the Macintosh had a graphical user interface. It was also cheaper and faster and had the backing of a large advertising campaign behind it. People soon realized how useful the graphical interface was for design. That led "desktop publishing," accomplished with a Mac coupled to a laser printer, to soon become a sales driver.

5. NeXT computer (1989) -- After being forced out of Apple, Jobs started a company that built a powerful workstation computer. The company was never able to sell large numbers, but the computer was influential: The world's first Web browser was created on one. Its software also lives on as the basis for today's Macintosh and iPhone operating system.

6. iMac (1998) -- When Jobs returned to Apple in 1996, the company was foundering, with an ever shrinking share of the PC market. The radical iMac was the first step in reversing the slide. It was strikingly designed as a bubble of blue plastic that enclosed both the monitor and the computer. Easy to set up, it captured the imagination just as people across the world were having their eyes opened to the benefits of the Internet and considering getting their first home computer.

7. iPod (2001) -- It wasn't the first digital music player with a hard drive, but it was the first successful one. Apple's expansion into portable electronics has had vast ramifications. The iPod's success prepared the way for the iTunes music store and the iPhone.

8. iTunes store (2003) -- Before the iTunes store, buying digital music was a hassle, making piracy the more popular option. The store simplified the process and brought together tracks from all the major labels. The store became the largest music retailer in the U.S. in 2008.

9. iPhone (2007) -- The iPhone did for the phone experience what the Macintosh did for personal computing -- it made the power of a smartphone easy to harness. Apple is now the world's most profitable maker of phones, and the influence of the iPhone is evident in all smartphones.

10. iPad (2010) -- Dozens of companies, including Apple, had created tablet computers before the iPad, but none caught on. The iPad finally cracked the code, creating a whole new category of computer practically by itself.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news

Trading or investing: The many faces of technical analysis

Both traders and investors use technical analysis. So what’s the difference between a trader and an investor? Most people consider that a trader is someone who holds securities for only a short period of time, anywhere from a minute to a year. An investor is someone who holds securities anywhere from many months to forever, depending on whom you ask. Holding period is not the only factor, though. You may think of an investor as someone who also seeks income from dividends or bond coupon payments, and the timing of those payments influences the investor’s holding period, too. Actually, the dividing line between trader and investor isn’t fixed (except for purposes of taxation). Be careful not to fall into the semantic trap of thinking that a trader is a wild-eyed speculator while an investor is a respectable guy in a pinstriped suit. I use the word trader in this book, but don’t let it distract you. People who consider themselves investors use technical methods, too. You can use technical methods over any investment horizon, including the long term. If you’re an expert in Blue Widget stock, for example, you can

add to your holdings when the price is relatively low, take some partial profit when the price is relatively high, and dump it all if the stock crashes. Technical analysis has tools for identifying each of these situations. You can also use technical tools to rotate your capital among several securities, allocating more capital to the ones delivering the highest gains. At the other end of the investment horizon spectrum, you can use technical analysis to spot a high-probability trade and execute the purchase and sale in one hour.

Barbara Rockefeller

Technical Analysis for Dummies

Wiley Publishing, Inc.

Confidence to improve only slightly in Sept.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Consumers' confidence in the economy, which plummeted in August, is expected to show only slight improvement in figures being released Tuesday.

Shoppers haven't yet cut their spending compared with last year, and forecasts for the winter holidays point to slightly higher sales than a year ago. But the gloomy consumer mood isn't good news heading into the crucial winter holidays.

Economists surveyed by FactSet expect that the Conference Board, a private research group, will report Tuesday that its consumer confidence index rose to 46 in September from 44.5 in August. The August reading was the lowest since April 2009, and it was almost 15 points below July's reading of 59.2.

A reading above 90 indicates the economy is on solid footing; above 100 signals strong growth.

Economists watch the number closely because consumer spending -- including major items like health care -- accounts for about 70 percent of U.S. economic activity.

The report on September's mood is to be released at 10 a.m. EDT.

The Conference Board bases its index on results of a survey it conducts the first half of each month with 5,000 of randomly selected households nationwide.

August's reading was skewed by consumer anxiety stemming from Standard & Poor's downgrade of federal debt on Aug. 5, four days into the survey. Renewed concern about the health of European banks didn't help.

Not much has changed since, although the stock market's swings are modulating. Concern persists about a potential crisis in Europe, and traditional worries about jobs, rising costs and the sluggish housing market continue in the U.S.

Net job creation came to a halt in August in the U.S. The official unemployment rate stayed at 9.1 percent. And consumers are spending more for everything from food to clothing as retailers compensate for higher labor and materials costs.

Nevertheless, back-to-school shopping went well for stores, though a weak job market and higher basic household costs are driving a wider wedge between spending among households with incomes over $100,000 and those below, says Alison Paul, vice chairman of Deloitte LLP.

A retail analyst, Paul said shoppers will remain focused on deals into the winter holidays but could spend a little more than last year, barring catastrophic events.

"I think we are going to have an OK Christmas," she said. "What shoppers say and what they do are two different things. Shoppers continue to sound down, but they still show up at the stores."

Deloitte expects stores' revenue to grow 2.5 percent to 3 percent for the period from November through January. Last year, it rose 5.9 percent.

ShopperTrak and the International Council of Shopping Centers trade group are on the same wavelength. For November and December combined, they expect a gain of 3 percent, compared with a 4.1 percent increase in 2010. ShopperTrak measures foot traffic in 25,000 stores in the U.S. and blends those figures with economic data.

And all those holiday predictions are rosier than the actual gain of 2.6 percent on average that the National Retail Federation measured for the last 10 years.

The National Retail Federation, the nation's largest retail trade group, is to offer its revenue forecast next month.

http://finance.yahoo.com/ 

Greece's debt crisis odyssey

Greece and its lenders are locked in discussion. The "Troika" of lenders - the European Union, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank - say Greece must take more painful steps to cut its borrowing. But Greece faces riots and mass protests on the streets of Athens. The government could lose its grip on parliament - only 155 of 300 MPs backed the last round of austerity in June. At stake is the next 8bn euro tranche of bailout money, which Greece desperately needs to avoid total crisis. Starting from the top, follow the decision tree to decide what happens next.

• Does Greece meet the Troika's austerity demands?
  YES or NO
• Recession deepens: Greece has to cut its borrowing to a target set by the Troika. But austerity deepens Greece's recession. Along with mass tax evasion and strikes by tax collectors, this has already made Greece over-shoot its target twice.
  Does Greece miss its borrowing target again?
  NO YES
• Impasse: Greece has failed to deliver promised austerity and the Troika has threatened to stop releasing bailout loans. But without the cash, Greece faces a crisis.
  Does the Troika release the bailout money?
  YES NO
• Greece has a funding shortfall: Despite the austerity, Greece still needs more cash. The Troika can lend it, or else Greece has to make more cuts.
  Should the Troika...
  demand more austerity?
  or give another bailout?
• Greece has a cash crisis: The government does not have enough money to pay for public services and must choose which payments to skip.
  Does Greece stop repaying its debts?
  YES NO
• Austerity succeeds: After years of painful cuts Greece does not need to borrow any more to fund government spending. But Greece still has huge debts to repay.
  Does Greece renegotiate its debts?
  YES NO
• The Troika blinked: Greece has won the stand-off. The Troika is evidently too afraid of the conse- quences to let Greece go bust.
  Does Greece continue with austerity?
  YES or NO
• Banking crisis: Default leaves Greek banks bust and risks a Europe-wide banking crisis.
  Does the Troika bail Greece out?
  YES or NO
• Severe cash crisis: The government cannot make basic payments like employee wages, benefits and public services, and risks major civil unrest.
• Greek banks collapse. Even after halting debt repayments, the government still can not pay all its bills.
• Economic collapse:Speculation may rise that Greece will leave the euro, prompting a run on the Greek banks.
  Does Greece exit euro?
  NO YES

• PYRRHIC VICTORY
  Greece forces its lenders to write off most of its debts, which probably bankrupts the Greek banks (its biggest lenders), meaning they must be nationalised. Greece still may face years of low growth as its economy is uncompetitive inside the euro.
• DEPRESSION
  Greece may face years of grindingly low growth as its economy is uncompetitive inside the euro. In addition, the government probably has to pass even more growth-sapping austerity to cover the cost of its debt repayments.
• MORAL HAZARD
  Greece has its lenders over a barrel, earning kudos with the Greek public, and allowing it to slow down painful austerity. But Italy and other high-debt countries may copy Greek tactics. Germany - which is now seen as on the hook for bailing out the entire eurozone - may find it much more expensive to borrow, and may consider leaving the euro.
• POLITICAL TURMOIL
  The Greek economy may face total collapse, with banks closed and the government unable to pay for basic public services. This is likely to cause massive civil unrest and a collapse of the government. Greece has already seen rioting and the takeover of government offices. The CIA has warned of a possible military coup.
• GLOBAL MELTDOWN
  Switching back to the drachma leads to a huge financial and legal mess. Italy and Spain may be unable to borrow and face a run on their banks amid fears they may also leave the euro. Major European banks could collapse sparking another global financial crisis. In Greece the drachma is likely to plummet in value, boosting the economy, but causing painfully high inflation.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/