Farmer Diaries

 Unless you are less than 30 you probably don’t know what being called a GOAT means.   Actually, even  Meryl  Streep had no idea when he cast members called her the GOAT which means « greatest in g all time ».  She thought they were calling her an old goat…but she still found it endearing according to Jennifer Lawrence who related the he story some time ago! So back to the Bay where they get this bizarre request to call their customers GOATs.  They assumed they mean « goat » as in the animal.  Strange but what of it! Again, it’s entirely possible that most Quebecers would have no idea as to the meaning of GOAT also who calls all their clients GOATs?   It is both a linguistic and social misunderstanding. But then it Meryl Streep can get it wrong so can the French speaking marketing department of the Bay…I suspect that it lead to great publicity for the store. It also raises the question why everyone can be the GOAT. Since the meaning is that there ...

 So last night I was having dinner at a friend's house and their 17-year-old daughter was both pissed and vocal (it's a thing).  My friend and I were discussing the risk of war in Taiwan and at one point I spoke of China's demographic problem, that the population curve was inverted and this was the first time in history where this happened, and that China's population would over the next 50 years collapse and that there was nothing that could be done about it, the meaning in the conversation is that China had a small window of opportunity to invade Taiwan (in about 3/4 years).   I didn't consider this to be a big issue, but rather a statement of fact, basic math.  Well, my friend's 17-year-old took me to task about this, not entirely sure where she was going with this, but it was a fun evening because I could see a glint in her father's eyes!  I was not family, a was just a random guy (BTW this was our third-ever meeting with the daughter). So she says that...

No one will come out and say but the whole movement against WOKE will have some unintended consequences.  First, most people are unable to define woke, and what it is!  I guess its like pornography; "I know it when I see it".  Still, some random right-wing author was asked what he meant by "woke" -- he had just written (this was on Monday of this week)  a book on the subject, and could not define it... Anyway, teachers!  The US education system is one of the most expensive in the world (per capita) with only Luxembourg being more expensive.  The outcome in the USA has been mediocre, and the PISA scores show it year-after-year, America ranks rather badly.  Lower than most of Europe and worse than Canada, where per capita spending is a fraction of what it is in the US. Despite the overall numbers, it is evident that in many states teachers are poorly paid and rank low on the salary scale, especially in primary and high school.  Now certain states (F...

How is that going to work? In the past, the Americans and their might would bring different groups together and try to hammer a peace accord between the parties.  Sometimes it worked other times it didn't but in most cases, the US had its "imperial might" to back up its negotiations; either economical or physical (Navy). The Chinese are trying to broker a deal in the Middle East between two parties (Saudi Arabia & Iran) who have hated each other for if not millennium for at least centuries.  The Chinese have no physical might, they have limited economic might, aside from a great need for oil products. It's like a consumer trying to resolve a fight between two suppliers but has only its pocketbook available! I admire the Chinese's willingness to walk into that minefield and wish them luck, both the Brits and the Americans never fully committed to such discussions.   Still, it is a reflection of America's interest in the region, that no one in Washington is ...

At the massive Tesla investor conference last week, the company stated that all of it's software had been developed in-house!  From sales, Human resources, management, and inventory, everything has been developed specifically by Tesla for Tesla! A few months ago, Tesla's senior management came to Quebec, looking for a place in Canada for something (I suspect the battery business -- there's a lot of Lithium ore here).  Now, I am sure that they were courted in the "national capital" (that's what Quebec calls the province's capital -- Quebec City) and that there was a fun talk about what Quebec could bring to Tesla (great labor force and cheap energy). I know most of the guys from the Quebec Government who would be part of these conversations, worked with them years ago, good solid, and bright but they probably didn't foresee the problem of software as an issue.  Tesla discussed, at its investor conference, that all its software, including management, was...

 What is going on in the US regional bank sector?  The press as usual got the wrong end of the stick.  In the case of SVB (Silicon Valley Bank), it seems that it was a run on the bank following poor quarterly results.  The FDIC guarantees deposits up to $250,000 so it's not entirely clear why ordinary people were standing in queue to get their money back.  More important is the $11 billion of institutional money that walked out of the door in the past 4 months. Apparently, the average deposit at SVB was $ 5 million... Some say that it's the liquidation of its treasury portfolio that has given rise to the losses, but it's not like the cash usually sits in bank accounts doing nothing.  Moreover, if this was the case, then reserves would have already been set aside for these losses. Something else is afoot here.  There was mention of SVB being one of the banks active in the crypto coin sector, which has seen wild price gyrations and some rather massive fr...

A New York Times correspondent that was recently in Moscow, and knows the country well said that the most surprising thing was how normal everything was in the city.  How life appeared unchanged from his last visit two years ago. Russia has been fighting a war in Ukraine for a year Most of the conscripts are either (a) ex-prisoners or (b) from ethnic minorities.  Very few ethnic Russians have been conscripted (so far). The official death toll still stands at slightly less than 6,000 (unchanged since May 2022).  The Brits estimated that between 50,000 and 60,000 have been killed but that total battlefield losses stand at between 175,000 and 200,000.  The Germans estimated that total losses (injured/dead or missing) stand between 100,000 and 200,000. Ukrainians state that total Russian losses stand at more than 250,000 the vast majority are dead because there is very little field treatment for injured soldiers in the Russian Army -- especially an army of conscripts....

 More than 20 years ago, I spent a weekend in Yogyakarta, the main town closest to the volcano.  We had stayed at the Grand Hyatt near that town, and it was simply beautiful.  The Indonesian, with the Thai, are some of the loveliest people I have ever met. It was the first time I saw a volcano up close and personal.  Of course, then it was not active, but the sight of the volcano in the rising sun of the morning shrouded in lower wisps of clouds reminded me of cover art for Sci-Fi novels of my youth. In fact, it is the rich soil that comes from the volcanic eruption that makes the region around the volcano prime agricultural land. Tonight my thoughts are with these people, because going through the eruption of a volcano is nothing fun, in fact, its one of the scariest things, with earthquakes to live through.

 4:04 that's how long the investor meeting lasted.  Shortly thereafter the stock price of Tesla tanked by about 5%, standard stuff, "buy the rumor, sell the news".  The information that was given to the investors was mind-blowing and has huge implications for the car industry. What is clear is that Musk and his team understood the message that Henry Ford gave the world, refine and rethink the process until you achieve your goal.  What was fundamental to the presentation is that through better manufacturing processes, Tesla believes that it can cut its manufacturing costs by half.  This doesn't mean that Tesla will cut the price of its vehicle by half, it means that Tesla's margins will grow again (they were 40% in 2022).  Tesla's p/e is 48 (the average for the ICE OEM is around 12), but in view of the news here, it would seem that it's more than justified. A few weeks ago, Tesla cut the price of its entire fleet of vehicles by $5,000 -- the cuts were immed...

 First, you have to understand that Tesla lies all the time.  It is a function of the company, but their lies are not what you think.  Tesla understates the performance of its vehicles.  For example, the Tesla Y has a state range of 360 miles...the truth is that it's closer to 420 miles. Telsa announce late week that its new motors would not incorporate any rare earth metals...a huge issue since the vast majority are processed in China.  What Tesla didn't announce was that for the past six months, its rotors no longer used copper, rather they are made of aluminum. A Tesla Model 3 manufactured in 2017 and a Tesla Model 3 manufactured in 2023 look identical, open the hood look at the specs, look at the seats everything looks the same as it did in 2017, the magic is inside, fewer components mean lower costs.   Who benefits? Well, first and foremost the customers who have not seen a massive increase in the cost of Tesla but so does Tesla.  By the end ...

Article in the Financial Times about how local governments in China are making ends meet: Step 1:  local government announces that a parcel of land is available for sale. Step 2:  Local government sets up a private government-owned land-owning company on which it guarantees the debts and provides limited capital -- effectively a captive finance company backed by loans from the large Chinese banks Step 3:  Auction off the land for development.  The local government already owns the land! Step 4:  The company that the local government set up borrows 100% of the cost of buying the land from the local government.   Step 5:  Local government pockets the proceeds from the sale of the land, and uses part of the proceeds as "normal income" and the rest of the sales proceeds to meet interest and principal repayment. Step 6:  Hope no one notices Step 7:  Once they notice, set up a better hidden New Land owning company, buy the land from the first ...

In April 2023, SpaceX will be launching its new heavy-load rocket.  Fully re-usable the projected cost per launch will be around US$ 10  40 million.  ULA (which is now for sale from Boeing and Lockheed) cost per launch is US$ 4 billion -- that's 1 4 00 times more than Space X -- it gets worse.  Space X's payload is 8 metric tons or nearly 40% more than ULA rockets. Five years ago, Musk created the Boring company with the simple goal to reduce the cost of drilling tunnels by 10 fold.  The Boring Company's achievement:  reduced the cost from US$ 1 billion per Km to US$ 7 million per km (excluding stations).   Some people say that it's terrible that Musk is so rich, but few people on earth have ever created so much value for the human species.  Taxing Musk's vast wealth (which he doesn't appear to use for any luxury -- although he apparently has nine children) would be a crime against humanity. Moreover, he is continually innovating. P.S. I was ...

One of my favorite demographers is Peter Ziehan, an American thinker who has for the past decade been right more than he has been wrong.  His most important contribution is to the impact of history and demography on economic and political power. In a nutshell, his conclusions are that China, Russia, Korea, and Germany are in deep trouble, but that France, the UK, and the US are well positioned. The failure points for China and Germany are the same -- demographic collapse and energy shortage.  Of course, both countries face different specific challenges but the reality is that both are energy dependent for their growth, both have plummeting birthrates, and both rely on the American security umbrella to succeed, and provide cheap transport. The Americans no longer need the rest of the world, already the US has withdrawn the 6th fleet from the Middle East, and has only about 1,000 advisors left in the region.  It is estimated that by the end of 2023, the US will have no skin...

For the past several months I have been working with a new group, in fact, old colleagues from my aerospace days -- funny enough none of us are involved in that anymore.  Still, this acquisition came around in a strange way.  Several months ago, I friend of a friend inquired if I was available to do some consulting work, On the side, as he called it.   The work was defense-related, very "hush hush" as the Brits would say, with no cell phones in the office or computers, which were provided by the client.  We came into their office clean and it was an eye-opener, in terms of security.   These guys were not kidding.  Years ago, I had worked for a defense contractor and they all used "old software" because none of the virus codes were written for their systems...until that didn't work anymore.  This was different.   Anyway, this consulting firm had a lean 2021 and early 2022, and it's a small firm.  So my contract was for an initia...

The BAD NEWS:  The CIA and the FBI said last week that they had " low confidence " that Covid originated from a lab leak.  That means that they don't know that the Wuhan lab was involved but they either feel strongly or have some form of "secret" intelligence that leads them to that conclusion.  The bottom line information is weak.  If Covid emerged out of the virology lab based in Wuhan that would have been better news!  If this was man-made, then you can say it's some evil design that created the virus.  There are plenty of labs all over the world, and if it was carelessness on the part of the lab workers.  If this was the truth, it would be positive news, since you can create protocols for this not to occur again.   If it's from the wet markets then the news is bad!   It means it will happen again (Maybe not in Wuhan but in other wet markets -- which still exist in China everywhere).  Lab escape would have been preferable to...

So after a Netflix series and a book, and interviews with Oprah Harry and Megan get kick-out of their Frogmore (sp) estate in the UK, which they used once in the past two years (Covid) and they now live in the US.  Apparently, they are furious, although in the images I saw of them this morning, they didn't look furious.  The real story is that apparently, they didn't actually own that cottage, it was leased from the King's estate -- a "wedding gift" from the Queen, a bit like your parents giving you a leased car for a few years, at the end of the lease it returns to the owner... They had actually lent the cottage to their cousins, but they too decamped from the UK and are apparently happily living in Spain now! My guess, is Harry and Megan were probably looking for an elegant way to not attend the coronation...invitations are not out yet (don't know why) but are leaving the Palace in a few days.  I'm guessing there will not be an invitation for Harry and M...

 So I was reading about something called Clarkson's Farm, an Amazon Prime series based on the travail of Jeremy Clarkson who purchased several years ago 1,000 acres farm in the Cotswold.  It came to my attention by coincidence because someone had defaced a sign to his Farm store in a way that was crude.  It is evident that Clackson is not liked in the village where he and his girlfriend live. It seems that the council continues to thwart Clarkson's attempt at making his farm a profitable enterprise.  Go figure, it also seems that many villages (from what I read and it could be BS too) think that failure is the best thing that could happen -- that I can believe after the Brits love failure!  It's a thing, like a badge of honor to them.  Never really trying and if it failed, "its all right old boy..." Anyway, I was reading about Clarkson's difficulties with the local council (don't forget he operates his 1,000 acres farm) with regard to his new on-site resta...

 A recently divorced engineer friend of mine wanted a new start in life.  His kids are grown and he was basically looking for "something new to do".  His company was desperate to have a senior engineer in China to oversee the production of some of their goods until it is relocated to Mexico... yes that's happening. It is a 5-year contract, the first two will be in China and the last three will be in Mexico.  After the Covid lockdown went away a few weeks ago, he was ready to leave (He's had four shots against Covid already), and he arrived about three weeks ago. He was first in a Holiday Inn hotel, but he is now renting an apartment.  Hence the story.  It is well known that in china apartments that are for investment purposes are "unfinished" this is intentional it's a Chinese thing, still, in the big cities there are apartments for rent.  In this case, someone had died and the apartment was available. This is a newish building dating back to maybe 201...

 A few weeks ago I was watching a German reporter visiting part of his wife's family in the Russian far North, places where in the winter the thermometer is often below -50c.  He was asking pointed questions about how the Ukraine war was affecting them directly, and their answer was that they were mostly unaffected.  Moreover, some products (such as lubrication oil) that had disappeared during the early days of the war were back on the shelves. this seemingly unimportant piece of social news just went in the back of my head, and I assumed that things in Russia were hard but not that hard.  But thinking further it would seem to be some type of error.  First, the lubricant was from Shell, a company that has stopped supplying Russia for nine months now, moreover, lubricants are not high-tech stuff.  So in terms of soft propaganda, it would seem to show that things are normal-ish in Russia which is consistent with the Russian government's statement that GDP was...

 Over the past 30 years, Asians of all forms have been investing in Canada.  The vast majority have been buying apartments in Vancouver and Toronto.  This provided two things; (a) right of entry into the country, (b) savings in Canada -- instead of China or Taiwan.  The logic is solid, even if they lost part of the capital they are still ahead because they have a place to call home that is safe. For Chinese/Taiwanese the bet has been excellent since they have seen massive capital appreciation over the past 30 years, so not only do they have a home but their savings have multiplied and done rather well.  Eventually, they even began investing in Montreal, where we speak the wrong language... For now, that door is closed, some enterprising fellow will find a way to re-open that door and the government of Canada will have to adapt future legislation to keep the housing price reasonable.  In fact, something similar will have to be done soon with medication, whic...