Day: January 11, 2019

Uganda’s growing debt is sustainable, and the country is not at risk of losing state assets to China, the country’s finance minister, Matia Kasaija, said this week.

Uganda’s auditor-general warned in a report released this month that public debt from June 2017 to 2018 had increased from $9.1 billion to $11.1 billion.

The report — without naming China — warned that conditions placed on major loans were a threat to Uganda’s sovereign assets. 

It said that in some loans, Uganda had agreed to waive sovereignty over properties if it defaults on the debt — a possibility that Kasaija rejected.

“China taking over assets? … in Uganda, I have told you, as long as some of us are still in charge, unless there is really a catastrophe, and which I don’t see at all, that will make this economy going behind. So, … I’m not worried about China taking assets. They can do it elsewhere, I don’t know. But here, I don’t think it will come,” he said.

China is one of Uganda’s biggest country-lenders, with about $3 billion in development projects through state-owned banks.

China’s Exim Bank has funded about 85 percent of two major Ugandan power projects — Karuma and Isimba dams. It also financed and built Kampala’s $476 million Entebbe Express Highway to the airport, which cuts driving time by more than half. China’s National Offshore Oil Corporation, France’s Total, and Britain’s Tullow Oil co-own Uganda’s western oil fields, set to be tapped by 2021.

Economist Fred Muhumuza says China’s foot in Uganda’s oil could be one way it decides to take back what is owed. 

“They might determine the price, as part of recovering their loan,” he said. “By having a foot in there they will say fine, we are going to pay you for oil. But instead of giving you $60 a barrel, you owe us. We’ll give you $55. The $5 you are paying the old debt. But we are reaching a level where you don’t see this oil being an answer to the current debt problem.”

China’s reach

Uganda’s worries about China seizing national assets are not the first in Africa.

A leaked December report in Kenya showed China was promised parts of Mombasa Port as collateral for financing a $3 billion railway it built from the port to Nairobi. Both Chinese and Kenyan officials have denied that the port’s ownership is at risk.

Reports in September that China was taking over Zambia’s state power company over unpaid debt rippled across Africa, despite government denials.

But the fear of a Chinese takeover of a sovereign state’s assets over debt is not completely without merit. Struggling to pay back loans to state-owned Chinese firms, Sri Lanka in 2017 handed over a strategic port.
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Despite the U.S. stock market recovery, Macy’s and American Airlines’ revised revenue forecasts for 2018 have sent their stock prices spiraling. Other retail stocks fell, too, including J.C. Penney, Nordstrom and Kohl’s. The reports come amid news of another iconic department store, Sears, fighting for survival. But U.S. trade and financial officials say the U.S. economy is on solid ground and will continue to grow for years to come. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports.
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The 800,000 federal workers who are not being paid or are working without pay during the partial government shutdown were the first to feel its impact. But as Anna Kook reports, other segments of the economy are also being hurt, especially in Washington, home to the largest number of federal workers in the country.
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U.S. officials expect a visit from China’s top trade negotiator this month in Washington, signaling that higher-level discussions are likely to follow this week’s talks with midlevel officials in Beijing as the world’s two largest economies try to reach a deal to end a tit-for-tat tariff war.

“The current intent is that the Vice Premier Liu He will most likely come and visit us later in the month and I would expect the government shutdown would have no impact,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told reporters Thursday in Washington. “We will continue with those meetings just as we sent a delegation to China.”

The U.S. government is in the 20th day of a partial shutdown with President Donald Trump, a Republican, and congressional Democrats feuding over funding and Trump’s desire for a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.

People familiar with the talks in Beijing said Thursday that hopes were mounting that Liu would continue talks with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Mnuchin.

Higher level, key decisions

Talks at that level are viewed as important for making the key decisions to ease a festering trade war, which has disrupted trade flows for hundreds of billions of dollars worth of goods and roiled global markets.

Trump has demanded better terms of trade with China, with the United States pressing Beijing to address issues that would require structural change such as intellectual property theft, forced technology transfers and other non-tariff barriers.

On Thursday Trump said the United States was having “tremendous success” in its trade negotiations with China. A spokeswoman for Lighthizer’s office declined to comment.

​Few details on progress

More than halfway through a 90-day truce in the U.S.-China trade war agreed on Dec. 1 when Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping met at the G20 summit in Argentina, there have been few details provided of any progress made.

Trump has vowed to increase tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports March 2 if China fails to take steps to protect U.S. intellectual property, end policies that force American companies to turn over technology to a Chinese partner, allow more market access for U.S. businesses and reduce other non-tariff barriers to American products.

Ambitious timeline and hope

The timeline is seen as ambitious, but the resumption of face-to-face negotiations has bolstered hopes of a deal.

“We have the two sides back at the table. That’s encouraging,” said Myron Brilliant, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s head of international affairs, while speaking to reporters at an event Thursday.

China’s commerce ministry said Thursday that additional consultations with the United States were being arranged after the Beijing talks addressed structural issues and helped establish a foundation to resolve U.S. and Chinese concerns.

Commerce ministry spokesman Gao Feng told reporters the two sides were “serious” and “honest.”

Asked about China’s stance on issues such as forced technology transfers, intellectual property rights, non-tariff barriers and cyber attacks, and whether China was confident it could reach agreement with the United States, Gao said these issues were “an important part” of the Beijing talks.

“There has been progress in these areas,” he said without elaborating.

China has repeatedly played down complaints about intellectual property abuses, and has rejected accusations that foreign companies face forced technology transfers.

‘Cordial standoff’

Discussions on those issues were an extensive part of the talks, said people in Washington familiar with the discussions.

Chinese officials listened “politely” to U.S. grievances, they said, but responded by saying that the Americans had some issues wrong and misunderstood others, but that some other issues could be addressed.

“It was a cordial standoff,” said one person familiar with the discussions. China has said it will not give ground on issues that it perceives as core.

On Wednesday, the U.S. Trade Representative’s office said officials from the two sides discussed “ways to achieve fairness, reciprocity and balance in trade relations,” and focused on China’s pledge to buy a substantial amount of agricultural, energy, manufactured, and other products and services from the United States.”

The U.S. trade agency said the talks also focused on ways to ensure enforcement and verification of Chinese follow-through on any commitments it makes to the United States.

Steps taken

U.S. and Chinese officials made more progress on straightforward issues such as working out the details of Chinese pledges to buy a “substantial amount” of U.S. agricultural, energy and manufactured goods and services, sources said.

Since the Trump-Xi meeting, China has resumed purchases of U.S. soybeans. Buying had slumped after China imposed a 25 percent import duty on U.S. shipments of the oilseed on July 6 in response to U.S. tariffs.

China has also cut tariffs on U.S. cars, dialed back on an industrial development plan known as “Made in China 2025” and told its state refiners to buy more U.S. oil.

Earlier this week, China approved five genetically modified crops for import, the first in about 18 months, which could boost its overseas grains purchases and ease U.S. pressure to open its markets to more farm goods.
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Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell on Thursday stressed again that the U.S. central bank can be patient in approving any further rate increases as officials gauge whether the U.S. economy will slow this year, as some in financial markets worry, or continue motoring ahead as the Fed itself expects.

Powell’s second appearance in less than a week generated a subdued response in financial markets, a sign he may have found his footing in how to describe central bank policy without surprising investors. Several of his recent appearances have generated large market swings in both directions.

With no sign of excessive inflation or outsized risk in financial markets, Powell said the Fed would be “waiting and watching” in coming months.

“Especially with inflation low and under control, we have the ability to be patient and watch patiently and carefully as we … figure out which of these two narratives is going to be the story of 2019,” Powell said at the Economic Club of Washington.

WATCH: Despite Volatility in Retail Stocks, US Officials Predict Continued Growth

The S&P 500 edged up 0.45 percent on Thursday, while yields on Treasury securities were unchanged. In contrast, his remarks in his three previous appearances since late November moved stocks an average of 2.4 percent in either direction, and his comments last Friday spurred the largest market reaction yet to any of his 17 public appearances since taking office last February.

The S&P gained 3.43 percent, and the yield on the 10-year Treasury note rose 11 basis points.

In that appearance Powell emphasized the Fed’s flexibility and patience in evaluating data, easing expectations of steady rate hikes in a message amplified by a half dozen other Fed officials in recent days.

Bullard is blunt

In remarks at an appearance in Little Rock, Arkansas, on Thursday, St. Louis Fed President James Bullard was blunt, saying that the central bank had reached the “end of the road” in its current rate increase cycle.

Powell and others have been less demonstrative and noted that economic data remains strong, particularly after a recent payroll report that showed more than 300,000 jobs added in December. 

The central bank’s vice chairman, Richard Clarida, said later on Thursday that if the global slowdown and tightening of financial markets persists, the Fed would take policy steps to offset that. It would not want to wait too long to see overseas weakness affect the U.S. economy, he added.

Powell on Thursday also reiterated that, separate from what happens with interest rates, the Fed would continue allowing its nearly $4 trillion portfolio of bonds to shrink each month, to a level “substantially smaller” than it is now.

The monthly reductions, effectively running on autopilot, have been criticized by some as a steady tightening of financial conditions the Fed should reconsider.

New narrative 

 Still, Powell’s comments and those of other officials “are developing a new narrative … Big picture: they don’t have that much further to go and they don’t have to go there fast,” said Robert Tipp, chief investment strategist with PGIM Fixed Income in Newark, New Jersey.

Part of that message is meant to downplay the significance of the policy projections that officials issue every three months. The latest forecasts issued in December suggested rates could rise by a median of two more times in 2019, but Powell said it was a mistake to construe that as any sort of official forecast or “plan.”

“There is no such plan,” Powell said. “That was conditional on a very strong outlook for 2019,” which may or may not materialize, with the Fed adjusting policy accordingly.

The U.S. central bank raised rates four times last year in the face of robust economic growth and unemployment that touched its lowest level in half a century.

Fed officials and many forecasters expect growth to slow in 2019, but to remain strong enough to continue generating jobs and keeping the unemployment rate near its almost 50-year low.

No evidence of recession

While markets may be concerned about global trade tensions and slower growth overseas, Powell said there is no evidence of a U.S. recession on the horizon. If conditions weaken, the Fed would react.

“There is no pre-set path for rates … particularly now,” he said. If global growth slows more, “I can assure you … we can flexibly and quickly move policy, and we can do so significantly if that’s appropriate,” he added. 

The Fed chief was also asked about the partial U.S. government shutdown. He said an “extended” shutdown would show up in economic data “pretty quickly” and, since it shutters some agencies that provide economic data, it would also make the picture of the economy less clear for the Fed.
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