Last week the whole world appeared to be singing “Happy days are here again” as the eurozone, like US and Japan, too came out of recession. APEC and G20 leaders patted themselves for having successfully staved off the recession.

Michelle Obama merrily doled out advice on dating to young women, telling them to look at the soul and not looks, and on 9th Nov Germans and the world celebrated the razing of the Berlin Wall, an event that ushered in the era of globalisation in the early 1990s, and was perhaps the most remarkable post-war economic event.

The dollar remained close to 1.50 a euro, gold surged past 1100 and oil stayed above 75, while equities markets, with global market cap having risen by $20 trillion since March, were quite comfortable.

Hong Kong has been upgraded by Moody’s, S Korea had a record trade surplus of $35 bn in Jan-Oct, Taiwan, feeling crushed under money inflows, has banned foreigners opening time deposit accounts, and Russia’s Medvedev restated his desire to rid his country of its ‘humiliating’ dependence on commodities exports.

In the US, darners and cobblers are still reporting brisk business and more women are scrambling for jobs. In Italy, Berlusconi wants law to shield all politicians from criminal prosecution, Iceland’s bonds rating has been cut by Moody’s, and euro-zone industrial production rose for the fifth consecutive month in Oct, though UK expects its recovery to be slow.

Kraft Foods has taken its offer directly to Cadbury’s shareholders, and McDonald’s global sales were up 3.3% in October, but sales in US were flat, largely because of Burger King offering double-cheeseburgers at $1. Japanese convenience store operator FamilyMart is buying AM/PM for $111 mn in a move to catch up with larger rival 7-Eleven. In the aftermath of CIT going bankrupt, Wal-Mart is negotiating cheaper credit from Wells Fargo and Citi for its apparel suppliers, demanding that bills accepted by it should be discounted at low rates. Brewer Anheuser-Busch has reported a profit of $1.55 bn for Q3, notwithstanding soft demand for beer.

Google is buying AdMob, which ‘plops’ ads in mobile phones, for $750 mn in stock, and has announced it would include GPS software in its Android mobile phone operating system, which sent shares of GPS devices manufacturers plunging. Motorola, after recording a loss of $4 bn last fiscal, is planning to spin off its handsets unit into a separate entity and may sell its set-top box unit. Dell is due to launch its Mini 3 mobile phone based on Android OS of Google in partnership with China Mobile this month. Liberty Global of John Malone is buying UnityMedia for about $3 bn, in a bid to gain access to cable TV markets in some large German cities.

Sales of DVDs at Best Buy’s 3,700 stores plunged 23% in Q3, HP is buying networking equipment maker 3Com for $2.7 bn, to expand its China presence, and McGraw-Hill has entered into a JV with vocation training provider Ambow Education of China. Bain Capital is to buy Bellsystem24, Japanese telemarketing firm, for $1.34 bn.

Peugeot-Citroën of France expects to break-even in the next quarter and Renault has reportedly been asked to fix Russia’s Lada. Exxon has commissioned its $4.5 bn oil refining and petrochemicals complex in China, and Monsanto, currently losing GM seeds market share to DuPont, is banking on a new corn seed that promises to boost yields over 7%.

Aiful Corp of Japan is close to defaulting on its CDS obligations mostly related to consumer debt, Orion and Century banks of Florida, together having assets of over $3 bn, are being taken over by Iberia Bank, taking the tally of failed US banks to 123, and after having sold its Manhattan office to an Israeli investor last month, HSBC has sold its London HQs building to S Korea’s NPS for $1.29 bn in a sale and lease back deal.

Walt Disney revenue rose 4.5% to $9.87 bn in the latest quarter, though revenue in parks, resorts and cruise lines declined. Finnair is offering plastic surgery in exchange for air miles. UK is making progress in its target of incinerating 15 mn tons of waste a year, to produce about 3,000 mw of electricity at a cost of about 5 Cs a unit.

The US started pressuring China on Yuan’s value once again last week, the view in Washington being that the dollar should remain generally strong but should weaken against the yuan, and support came from Brazil, whose real has appreciated 15% in the last six months. Speculation is strife that China may relent marginally and speculative money has already started flowing towards China which, of course, goes back to the developed world in the form of reserves.

The world moved a tad closer to imposing restraints on ‘financial innovation,’ though differences persist; Uncle Sam doesn’t favor taxing the casinos on the St., though it is actively considering break-up of the too-big-to-fail super banks and may restore segregation of banking and investment banking. Former Citi supremo Reed has apologised for having merged Citi with Travelers in 1998 and says Glass-Steagall should not have been repealed.

Data gathering systems are being questioned by an increasingly large number of economists and analysts, number of women carriers of drugs is growing as the profession is considered more dignified than prostitution, a new NY website has started helping millionaires sell their family jewels, and an Australian study says being sad makes people less gullible. In Rome, even holy water is being treated electronically.

Two US ‘inventors’ want to process a method of hedging weather risks when buying and selling energy, and are getting support from the likes of Amex, Medtronic, Novartis and Accenture, though being opposed by equally powerful Microsoft, BofA, Hartford and Morgan Stanley. The world can only feel amused because the US will gladly patent chopsticks made of wood seasoned in a particular manner and would then impose anti-dumping duties on imports of imitations from China.

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