Ex-Soros Adviser Fujimaki Says Japan May Default by 2017

By Mariko Ishikawa and Yumi Ikeda

Investors should buy assets in U.S. dollars and other currencies of strong developed nations because Japan may default within five years, said Takeshi Fujimaki, former adviser to billionaire investor George Soros.

“Japan is likely to default before Europe does, which could be in the next five years,” the president of Fujimaki Japan, an investment advising company in Tokyo, said in an interview yesterday. Japanese should hold foreign-currency products, such as those denominated in the greenback, Swiss franc, sterling, Australian and Canadian dollars, Fujimaki said.

Should the Japanese government default, the yen may weaken to 400-500 per dollar, and the yields on benchmark 10-year bonds could surge above 80 percent, according to Fujimaki. “I’m buying dollars in case of an emergency,” he said.

The yen rose 0.6 percent to 78.91 per dollar as of 6:07 a.m. in London from its close in New York yesterday. The currency touched the postwar high of 75.35 per dollar on Oct. 31 and has averaged about 103 over the past decade. Japan’s 10-year yields were little changed at 0.855 percent. Rates on June 4 dropped to 0.79 percent, the lowest since June 2003.

Five-year credit-default swaps that insure Japan’s debt from nonpayment were at 90.9 basis points yesterday, up from a seven-month low of 90.1 on March 27, according to CME Group Inc.’s CMA. The contracts pay the buyer face value in exchange for the underlying securities if a borrower fails to meet its debt agreements. A drop signals improving perceptions of creditworthiness, while an increase suggests the opposite.

Ballooning Debt

Japan’s public borrowings, the world’s biggest, will balloon to 245.6 percent of its annual economic output in 2014, up from 67.3 percent in 1984, an estimate by the International Monetary Fund shows. Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda is struggling to gather support for his plan to double the 5 percent sales tax by 2015 to help reduce debt.

“The yen and the JGB market are in a bubble,” Fujimaki said. “With the gigantic debt Japan has accumulated, a thin needle, or even a gentle breeze may pop this. Events in Europe can possibly trigger this to blow up.”

Greeks vote in a general election on June 17 after balloting in May failed to produce a coalition government. The result may determine whether Greece abides by spending reductions imposed upon it to receive two international bailouts and stay in the euro. The euro currency bloc may break up in the next 5 to 10 years, Fujimaki said.

Default or Inflate

“There’s no way out of Japan’s crisis,” Fujimaki said. “The only option left for Japan is either default or print money into hyper-inflation.”

The Bank of Japan left the size of its asset-purchase fund unchanged at a policy meeting today. The central bank kept the fund at 40 trillion yen ($507 billion) and a credit lending program at 30 trillion yen, matching the forecasts of 13 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News.

Fujimaki’s agreement with Soros Fund Management, once the world’s biggest hedge fund group, ended in October 2000. He has since written a book and lectured at Waseda University and Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo. He was born in 1950.

Google, Amazon lead rush for new Web domain suffixes in bids to ICANN

By Hayley Tsukayama and Peter Whoriskey

Amazon and Google are staking claims to large swaths of the Internet under a new system for labeling Web domains, bolstering their ability to control traffic as the Web expands beyond the realms of “.com,” “.gov” and “.org.”

The bids by those companies to acquire new domain names such as “.book,” “.shop” and “.movie” renewed fears among competitors that a powerful few will dominate the Internet marketplace of the future.

A slate of roughly 2,000 new Web suffixes, including “.app” and “.sex,” was revealed Wednesday by the nonprofit organization tasked with regulating domain names, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. The group announced last year that it would take applications for new domain names to foster growth and competition online. The new domains are scheduled to go into effect next year.

“We’re standing at the cusp of a new era of online innovation,” said Rod Beckstrom, president of the group, known as ICANN.

If Internet users embrace the new domains, the companies that control them could bear considerable influence on Web traffic.

Amazon has applied to control the “.book” and “.movie” names, for example, meaning that anyone else selling those items would have to get the company’s permission to be listed within that domain.

The National Retail Federation had urged that oversight of such generic domain names be given to impartial entities rather than individual companies.

“The results for now are as potentially unfair to businesses and consumers as we feared they might be,” said Mallory Duncan, general counsel for the trade group.

For example, if a grocery store controls the “.grocery” suffix, it could theoretically exclude competitors from listing their sites there.

Duncan said consumers may not realize that the new domains are under private control and that the open competition that prevails within the “.com” realm may not exist within, say, “.grocery.”

“Consumers going to that domain may not realize that all of their shopping is being done with one company instead of a competitive market,” Duncan said.

Google was among the most prolific applicants, seeking to register 101 names at an application cost of $18.7 million. Never lacking in its quest for virtual completeness, the company is seeking to control “.mom,” “.dad” and “.kid.”

Amazon applied for 76 new names, including “.amazon” and “.zappos.”

The expansion of Web domains has the potential to make over how surfers conceive of the Internet. Until now, entities have largely broken down by type of institution: “.gov” for government agencies, “.com” for businesses and “.org” for other groups.

The new suffixes add a potentially confusing array of categories. Among the many that have been formally proposed are “.sucks,” “.rip” and “.vip.” While some might sound like jokes, the fact that the application fee for each is $185,000 tends to keep things serious.

Applicants were heavily concentrated in North America (911), Europe (675) and the Asia-Pacific region (303). There were only 17 applications from Africa, which raised questions about whether the cost of an application was too high to be equitable.

Many of the potential new domain names are being sought by multiple companies. The most popular was “.app” with 13 applications, but even “.sucks” is the prize in a three-way contest.

The applicants must first pass an initial review by ICANN. If groups competing for a domain name cannot reach an agreement among themselves, the names will be auctioned off.

ICANN said it expects the first new address to go live in 2013.

What’s not clear, however, is whether consumers will embrace any of the new names.

“It’s going to present users with a lot of new choices,” said Brian Cute, chief executive of the Public Interest Registry, which runs the “.org” domain. “If you have 50 choices of toothpaste, the average consumer is going to the brands they know. That could be the case here.”

Art Brodsky, a spokesman for Public Knowledge, said: “It’s a matter of changing the ingrained habits of millions of people on the Web. Maybe they can do that, and maybe they can’t.”

Even so, many companies are bracing for potential changes to their business.

Advertisers have criticized ICANN’s proposal, saying their concerns were not adequately addressed during the initial review process. Advertisers and others have raised concerns that companies will have to have several defensive addresses — negative-sounding names that the company purchases to keep a rival from exploiting them — to keep counterfeiters at bay.

Beckstrom said Wednesday that ICANN has added several protective provisions, including the option for rapid takedown when brand holders feel their intellectual property may be threatened. ICANN also reserves the right to take a domain name back if there is significant abuse.

Others, however, are bracing for the giants of the Internet to seize even more power over its commerce.

“It would be wrong on so many levels for Amazon to acquire either the ‘.book’ or ‘.author’ top-level domains,” said Paul Aiken of the Author’s Guild. “Their ambitions to extend their monopoly in bookselling have long been abundantly clear, and with their cash, their technical knowledge, this could be yet another way in which they’ve extended their control over the book market. This really makes no sense.”

Russia accuses US of arming Syrian rebels

By AFP

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Wednesday accused the United States of supplying weapons to Syria's rebels after Hillary Clinton said Moscow was supplying the Assad regime with "attack helicopters".

Russia was supplying "anti-air defence systems" to Damascus in a deal that "in no way violates international laws," Lavrov told a news conference during a brief visit to Iran.

"That contrasts with what the United States is doing with the opposition, which is providing arms to the Syrian opposition which are being used against the Syrian government," he said, in remarks translated from Russian into Farsi by an official interpreter.

It was the first time Moscow has directly pointed the finger at Washington. Previously, it had said unidentified "foreign powers" were arming Syria's opposition.

Lavrov's accusation followed a charge by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Tuesday that she had information Russia was sending to Syria "attack helicopters ... which will escalate the conflict quite dramatically."

Asked in Tehran about the helicopter allegation, Lavrov said only that Moscow was giving Damascus "conventional weapons" related to air defence and asserted that the deal complied with international law.

Russia's deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov told reporters last month that Moscow believed "it would be wrong to leave the Syrian government without the means for self-defence."

Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said at the same news conference with Lavrov that Tehran and Moscow were "very close" on the Syria issue.

Western and Arab nations, he said, "are sending weapons to Syria and forces to Syria, and are not allowing the reforms promised by the Syrian president to be applied."

Reports in Iran allege that Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United States are arming Syria's rebels – termed "terrorists" by Damascus – while US officials claim Iran is giving arms and military advisers to Syria's regime.

Some observers fear the conflict, which the UN's chief peacekeeper agrees now resembles a civil war, could blow up into a struggle between forces helped by outside nations.

"There is a real risk of it sliding into a proxy war as certain states support the regime or 'the opposition'," one Western diplomat told AFP, speaking on condition on anonymity.

"The conflict in Syria certainly appears to be getting more brutal – and not just on one side," the diplomat warned.

Monitors say at least 14,100 people have been killed in the 15-month uprising against the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Russia came under fierce criticism from Western and Arab countries for vetoing two UN Security Council resolutions that would have sanctioned Assad for his use of force.

Since then, it has sought to distance itself from Assad while continuing to support his regime. "We do not support any individual or government, we support the people of Syria," Lavrov said.

Moscow is now trying to organise an international conference on Syria that would include several nations with influence over the conflict, including Iran. The United States, Britain and France, though, object to Iran taking part.

"We want the support of all the players," Lavrov said.

"All sides in the conflict need to stop operations ... Any player with leverage should apply pressure to stop the violence and facilitate negotiations," he said.

World Bank Urges Developing Countries to Brace for Long Term Volatility

The World Bank is urging developing countries to brace for the possibility of more economic turmoil in Europe. In its Global Economic Prospects Report, the bank advises emerging market economies to strengthen fiscal positions and develop medium-term strategies to protect their economies.

Emerging market economies may have weathered the 2008 financial crisis better than more advanced countries, but the World Bank warns -- it could happen again.

Senior bank economist Andrew Burns says anything is possible right now in Europe.

"Although we don't see it as a baseline scenario, it certainly is possible that the situation in high-income Europe deteriorates significantly. And if it did, that would have very serious impacts for developing countries," Burns said.

With borrowing costs still rising in Spain and Italy, and an upcoming Greek referendum that could forever alter the Eurozone -- Burns predicts a bumpy ride.

But even with the most recent bailout in Spain - economist Peter Morici says the problems facing Greece and Spain are very different.

"Spain's problem is one of a banking crisis. Greece's problem is one of a government crisis," Morici said.

Either way, Morici says the crisis has the potential to plunge the world into another recession, reducing global trade and exports dramatically.

The World Bank says developing nations need to focus on enhancing domestic productivity and boosting infrastructure development -- while reducing debt.

"What we suggest is that countries take the time now to try and replenish some of those cushions, some of those buffers they used in 2008 - 2009 so successfully to recover from that crisis. Try and rebuild those now by bringing policy to a more neutral stance, reducing fiscal deficits so that they have the ammunition to respond if a crisis, a second crisis, announces itself," Burns said.

Despite an over-abundance of caution, Burns is optimistic about a full-fledged global recovery - one led by emerging economies in Central Asia, the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa.

Why rock music 'brings out the animal in us'

Rock music such as Jimi Hendrix-style electric guitar excites us because it recreates the sound of primal distress calls and "brings out the animal in us", scientists claim

By Nick Collins, Science Correspondent

Sudden, jarring changes in pitch and frequency play on the same emotional mechanisms as the signals which animals use to alert one another of danger, a study found.

When animals cry out in distress they force a large amount of air through their voice box very quickly, producing a discordant effect designed to grab the attention and provoke an emotional response in other animals.

Hearing similar sound patterns, like Hendrix's distorted version of Star Spangled Banner at Woodstock in 1969, sends a shiver down our spine because we are programmed to react strongly to the harsh noise, researchers said.



The same goes for discordant music associated with horror films – such as the screeching soundtrack to the shower scene in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho – but not for generic "elevator music" which lacks jolting changes in sound or volume.

Researchers also found that while dissonant music stirs up strong emotions, these are usually linked to negative feelings like fear or sadness rather than happy ones.

Greg Bryant, assistant professor of communication studies at the University of California, Los Angeles and one of the study authors, said: "This study helps explain why the distortion of rock-and-roll gets people excited: It brings out the animal in us.

"Composers have intuitive knowledge of what sounds scary without knowing why. What they usually don't realise is that they're exploiting our evolved predispositions to get excited and have negative emotions when hearing certain sounds."

The scientists tested their theory by composing several 10-second pieces of original music which were either designed to be generic and emotionally neutral throughout, or to begin in "easy listening" style before suddenly becoming distorted.

Student volunteers who listened to both types of music found the distorted music more exciting and more charged with negative emotion, the researchers reported in the Biology Letters journal.

In a follow-up study the same compositions were set to emotionally neutral video clips such as people walking or taking a sip from a coffee cup.

A separate group of volunteers did not find the jarring music more arousing, but perceived it to be more negative, showing that the bland film "did not trump the emotional content of the music", researchers said.