Tag: Indonesia

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News

The G20 Summit in Rome, Italy

Who attended?

These past few days, the political leaders of the G20 member countries met in Rome to discuss a handful of issues. Some of the politicians who were present are: 

  • Alberto Fernandez (Argentina)
  • Scott Morrison (Australia)
  • Jair Bolsonaro (Brazil)
  • Justin Trudeau (Canada)
  • Xi Jinping (China)
  • Emmanuel Macron (France)
  • Angela Merkel (Germany)
  • Mario Draghi (Italy)
  • Narendra Modi (India)
  • Joko Widodo (Indonesia)
  • Manuel Lopez Obrador (Mexico)
  • Moon Jae-in (South Korea)
  • Vladimir Putin (Russia)
  • Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (Saudi Arabia)
  • Cyril Ramaphosa (South Africa)
  • Recep Tayyip Erdogan (Turkey)
  • Boris Johnson (United Kingdom)
  • Joe Biden (United States)

Joining these political leaders was the President of the European Commission of the European Union, Ursula von der Leyen, and President of the Council of the European Union, Charles Michel. Antonio Guterres, general director of OMS, specifically discussed financial issues relating to the health of the world population.

What was discussed?

So, first and foremost I want to say my thoughts on the possible solutions that will be discussed in the hopes of resolving some of the world’s current Economics problems.

  1. The European Union will invest in the eco-transaction for social enterprises, which are present in nations like Germany and Netherlands, but not in Turkey or in the United States at the moment. Mario Draghi was noted as saying that the Turkish president did not consider the political circular economy. Therefore, there will be no equality in the sense of financial economics in the future, and as a result there will be more discrepancies in terms of environmental sensibility. 
  2. The markets will be more open to Artificial Intelligence. This is especially important as AI is now considered fundamental for new inventions and innovations. 
  3. The United States will invest more on the prototype of financial democracy. In general, it has been noticed that Biden’s government is more concerned with solving population problems than Trump’s government. 
  4. China will be the first world power nation. Compared with all other international markets, China is one of the best markets for social capital that Chinese companies can invest with and also for AI (Artificial Intelligence).

Conclusion

In general, I believe there will be considerable investments in innovation, but I also think there will be areas that will see more progress than others.

I believe the central areas will be capital growth, new health solutions and eco transactions, with a greater focus on the rights of employees. Meanwhile , I think that the semi-peripheral areas will be capital growth, new health solutions but also more consideration of people’s rights on goods and services and on working issues of industries. In my opinion, the periferica areas will be debts and stagflation. It is also possible that there will be problems about having credits as paying back debts may become difficult to do. However, also inflation and financial stagnation are likely to lead to many problems, meaning that no investments will be made into sustainable finance. 

Let’s hope there will be a graduating consideration of nations that are in critical situations, like Perù, Mexico, Spain, and many African countries.

Sources

  1. https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/
  2. di Taranto, Giuseppe. “The History of Economics.” (2012)
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Weekly Summaries

17th of May – 23rd of May

Israel and Gaza reach a cease-fire

At the beginning of last week, Israel continued to conduct airstrikes on the Gaza Strip while Hamas fired rockets at Israel from the Gaza Strip. Some say that such levels of violence were last seen in 2014. During a phone call with President Netanyahu of Israel, President Biden reportedly expressed “support for a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas,” according to the New York Times. Furthermore, Egypt has been continuously working with the United Nations, in the hopes of reaching a cease-fire. Foreign ministers of the European Union have also called for an “immediate cease-fire.” A cease-fire appears to now have finally been reached after 11 days of fighting, coming into effect at 2 am local time on Friday. Both sides claimed victory and there were celebrations both in Gaza and in the West Bank.

Other News

  • In “Nowhere Land” on Mars China has successfully been able to land a rover, even releasing the first photos that were shot of Mars this week
  • Around 8,000 people crossed the border from Morocco to Spain, with Spain reacting by troops, military trucks, and helicopters into Ceuta
  • In Indonesia, a lawsuit pursued by citizens aims to force the government to address the pollution in the metropolitan area of Jakarta
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Analysis

A look into the Big Mac Index

Introduction

The Big Mac Index is an informal measurement of PPP which was developed by The Economist in 1986. Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) is a method of comparing price levels in different countries and compares different currencies through a “basket of goods” approach. However, taking a basket of goods is quite an inaccurate way to represent the average prices of all goods and services in a country because each country has drastically varying baskets and a multitude of factors that can impact this very basket. Therefore, The Big Mac Index allows us to take a fairly standardized good — an example is a McDonald’s Big Mac, which is available in most countries — and use it to evaluate and compare currency exchange rates. 

The theory of PPP states that in the long run, exchange rates should naturally adjust and move towards the rate that would make the price of the market basket, or in this case a Big Mac, equal in both countries. You can see all the latest data for the Big Mac Index in different countries here. 

Calculations

The way these values are calculated are as follows:

  • Divide the price of one Big Mac in one country (in its currency) by the price of a Big Mac in another country (in its currency); eg. Indonesia = 34,000 IDR & United States = 5.66 USD ∴ the implied exchange rate or PPP = 34,000/5.66 = 6007.07 
  • Compare this value with the actual exchange rate; eg. 14,125 → The difference between this and the implied exchange rate from our calculation suggests the Indonesian rupiah is 57.5% undervalued. 

“Undervalued” and “overvalued”

So what exactly do these terms “undervalued” or “overvalued” mean? An undervalued currency, for example, the Indonesian rupiah, means that the currency is worth less than its market value. This essentially indicates that the price of goods and services is lower in the target country, Indonesia, than in the base country, the United States. An overvalued currency, on the other hand, means that the currency is worth more than its market value and the exchange rate exceeds what the market is willing to pay; goods are relatively more expensive in that country. Overvalued exchange rates make imports cheaper than domestically produced goods and therefore tend to discourage domestic demand and encourage spending on imported goods. According to The Economist’s data for 2021, the countries with overvalued currencies when compared to the USD (not adjusted for GDP) are the Swedish krona, Norweigan krone, and Swiss franc. 

Problems with the Big Mac Index

Although the Big Mac Index provides a simple and casual method to assess currencies and their relative values against each other and the global market, it is not without its flaws. Firstly, the Big Mac is not available in all countries, which limits the ability for global comparisons and has subsequently caused the rise of alternative indices, such as the KFC Index for African countries. Other factors which can limit the extent to which the Big Mac Index can serve as an accurate representation of currency values include demand, accompanied by the price elasticity of demand, of Big Macs. In certain countries, it is inevitable that the demand for a product like the Big Mac would be significantly lower than its demand in the United States. The index can also be impacted by the purchasing power of domestic consumers, how many hours they must work in order to afford a Big Mac, rates of taxation, domestic competition, factor input costs, and so on.

An interesting example to note is how the Russian ruble is calculated by the BMI as one of the most undervalued currencies as the Russian Big Mac is one of the cheapest. However, Moscow is one of the most expensive cities in the world! This could be due to the fact that although domestic food factor inputs are relatively cheap, restaurants suitable for business dinners with English-speaking staff are expensive.

Conclusion

All in all, the Big Mac Index is an insightful and easy-to-understand method for learning the basics of currency valuation and why it is important in global markets. However, it is worthwhile to note that this data must definitely be taken with a grain of salt, or perhaps a pinch of it, for your fries…? 

Sources