Economics-Entry 16

Asian stocks and currencies join sell-off after Bernanke comments

Financial Times, June 20th, 2013
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/d2139184-d950-11e2-84fa-00144feab7de.html?ftcamp=published_links%2Frss%2Fmarkets%2Ffeed%2F%2Fproduct#axzz2Wj8CcxZz

Summary

The decision of Ben Bernanke seems to have great impact on the world economy. His remark of pushing for the selling of U.S. bonds led out significant reduction in most of Asian stock market. Bernanke's plan for halting purchase of U.S. bonds seems to last till next year or till a year after, when the U.S. unemployment rate finally goes down, and the multiplier effect of pulling out money in the U.S. seems to be quite great to Asian economy that just went through great upheaval due to Abenomics. Analysts say that Fed's decision may be detrimental to globally emerging market, especially developing countries, and many countries seem to bear more pain until bond selling ends.

My Thoughts

Even though America is facing significant economic stagnation, giving additional harm to Asian market was not a desirable action. Recently, some Asian economic powers, including China, Korea, and Taiwan, got a serious economic impact due to Abenomics, and this happening forced these countries to reduce interest rate. Just the moment after these countries seemed to resolve the problem, U.S. is giving another economic threat to Asia again. Though it is unavoidable choice for the U.S., I hope the U.S. to consider the following effect of its decision on other country and alleviate negative impacts.

Economics-Entry 15

Apple refreshed Macs and iOS, unveils iTunes Radio

CNN, June 11th, 2013
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/06/10/tech/innovation/apple-wwdc-2013/index.html?hpt=ibu_c2

Summary

Apple took a huge leap in software and hardware enhancement. Apple redesigned and added new features for iOS 7 that will be released in following fall. Despite some critics argue that there was no groundbreaking evolution in mobile device software, the newly released design and features had received compliments from some experts and users. In addition to software, Apple also released new Macbook Air with 12 hours long battery. However, there was no "groundbreaking innovation," and many people are grieving that there is no such "innovations" that Jobs had made in the past years.

My opinion

Apple's new items may be attractive; however, it would be still far to catch up the consumers who already turned their face toward Samsung and other Android devices. Especially in Korea, Apple's popularity (Mac and iPhone) is shrinking very fast, and Apple would not able to regain its fame unless it takes an outstanding leap as Jobs has done. Anyway, Apple's constant recession may be good for Korean companies since they can sell more cellphones to other countries while the number of cellphones imported to Korea is decreasing. (Kinda trade surplus in cell phone?)