Top Trades in Disarray Amid Emerging-Market Rout
Bloomberg
It’s less than a month into 2014 and already currency strategists are seeing their top trade recommendations for the year upended by the rout in emerging markets.
shared by @JohnLothian, @pdacosta, @HamzeiAnalytics
 

Venezuela grapples with 56% inflation
Financial Times
First Venezuela, then Argentina. Both countries devalued last week. But, while Buenos Aires eased some controls to try to tame the plunge of the peso, Caracas tightened controls in a bid to rein in galloping inflation.
shared by @TheStalwart, @vitaliyk, reddit/Economics, @SaraEisen, @ObsoleteDogma
 

ICBC Offers Clients Option to Recoup Funds From Trust
Bloomberg
Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd. said investors in a troubled high-yield trust can recoup their funds, averting a threatened default that underscored concern over the shadow-banking system and helped spur a selloff in emerging markets.
shared by Here Is The City, @JohnLothian
 

China loses its allure
The Economist
Life is getting tougher for foreign companies. Those that want to stay will have to adjust.
shared by @prchovanec, @Noahpinion, @gadyepstein, @niubi, @Ian_Fraser
 

ECB poised for battle to ward off deflation
Financial Times
Mario Draghi has signalled that he would be prepared for the European Central Bank to fight deflation in Europe by buying packages of bank loans to households and companies.
shared by @SonyKapoor, @mhewson_CMC, @ObsoleteDogma, @YanniKouts
 

Deficit Reduction Declines as Policy Priority
people-press.org
For the first time since Barack Obama took office in 2009, deficit reduction has slipped as a policy priority among the public.
shared by @ObsoleteDogma, @MichaelKitces, @TheArmoTrader
 

Michelle Smith, shaping the Fed’s public image
Washington Post
A story about what it’s like to operate out of the public eye but in the upper echelons of the U.S. government.
shared by Marginal Revolution, @reddy, @greg_ip, @tylercowen
 

The Myth of Industrial Rebound
New York Times
Don’t buy the hype about a manufacturing revival. It’s not enough to restore the U.S. economy.
shared by @MParekh, reddit/Economics, @NKingofDC, @Richard_Florida
 

Bank of America’s trading practices have been probed, filing shows
Reuters
The U.S. Department of Justice and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission have both held investigations into whether Bank of America engaged in improper customer front-running.
shared by Naked Capitalism, @BarbarianCap, @nasiripour, @pdacosta, @davidgaffen
 

Bronte Capital: When the hedge doesn’t work
Bronte Capital
How hedge funds hedge, and why it doesn’t always work.
shared by Naked Capitalism, @BarbarianCap, @niubi, @JacobWolinsky
 

HSBC tightens cash withdrawal rules
BBC
HSBC tightens cash withdrawal rules
shared by @retheauditors, reddit/Economics, @JacobWolinsky, @LorcanRK
 

Who’s on the Magic Mountain?
The Economist
Who goes to Davos?
shared by @MichaelKitces, FT Alphaville, @SimoneFoxman, @ReformedBroker
 

Japan-China war of words goes ballistic in Davos
The Telegraph
Anybody who thinks China’s dispute with Japan is subject to rational calculation should have heard the astonishing outburst a few minutes ago by China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi. “We will never allow past aggressors to overturn the verdict of history,” he began. It went downhill from there.
shared by @EconBrothers, @prchovanec, @mhewson_CMC, @edwardnh, @Nouriel, @davidmwessel
 

Gold Mint Runs Overtime in Race to Meet World Coin Demand
Bloomberg
Austria’s mint is running 24 hours a day to meet orders for gold coins, joining counterparts from the U.S. to the U.K. to Australia in reporting accelerating demand boosted by the bear market in bullion.
shared by Naked Capitalism, @AlephBlog, @lucymarcus, @Alea_, @JohnLothian
 

The Gadfly of Greenwich Real Estate
New York Times
Amid dozens of unsold mega-mansions, a real estate agent sees a glut of greed.
shared by @maoxian, @StockJockey, @cate_long, @EpicureanDeal, @mccarthyryanj
 

Inflated worries, part 2 — a different look at the labour-market slack conundrum
Financial Times
As a reminder, the big unknown about the US labour market is the extent to which the demographic-adjusted decline in the labour force participation rate has been caused by cyclical vs structural trends.
shared by @M_C_Klein, @ReformedBroker, @interfluidity, @edwardnh
 

What Drives Success?
New York Times
Culture pushes some groups to achieve. We can learn from them.
shared by @LaurenYoung, reddit/Economics, @Noahpinion, @NKingofDC
 

We Can’t Afford to Leave Inequality to the Economists
HBR
In dealing with exploding high-end incomes, political and moral considerations should probably weigh heavier than economic ones.
shared by @ToddSullivan, @cafreeland, @mccarthyryanj, Naked Capitalism
 

Kleiner Perkins ‘Shocked’ by Co-Founder Comment on Nazis
Bloomberg
Venture capital pioneer Tom Perkins is taking heat from the firm he co-founded and Silicon Valley peers alike after comparing today’s treatment of wealthy Americans to the persecution of Jews in Nazi Germany.
shared by @markgongloff, @danprimack, @kairyssdal, @ObsoleteDogma
 

Watch Steve Jobs’ First Demonstration of the Macintosh
Time
How a memorable part of computer history — which almost didn’t happen — got saved for posterity.
shared by @TimOBrien, @edwardnh, @newsycombinator, @Techmeme, @IvanTheK