Obama to hit ground running

FT Nov 6 /08
--------------
Popular vote landmark
Russian dissonance(不調和）
Republicans（共和党） in cabinet
----------------------

Barack Obama will move swiftly（即座に） to capitalise on the momentum from his historic victory by announcing a sting(刺すこと） of senior appointments aimed at reassuing（安心させる） the markets and ensuring a confident transition(移り変わり） to the presidency in January.

Samsung reports record profit

FT Nov6 2008
--------------
K Korea shipbuilder defies（拒む） gloomy（暗い） outlook
---------------------------------------
Third-quarter earnings climb 23% to $137m
-------------------------------------------
Samsung Heavy Industries, the world's number two shipbuilder by sales, yesterday defied predictions of gloom（陰鬱） for the industry by reporting record third-quarter earnings.
Net profit for the South Korean yard climbed 23percent year-on-year to Won 174.2bn($137m) and sales rose to a record Won2,600bn as Samsung built higher-value, higher-margin vessels.

Much of the fall was due to Won238.4bn of hedging losses after this year's 25 per cent fall in the South Korean currency against the dollar and higher raw material costs.

The cycle has already entered a downturn as new orders are falling amid（最中） the global economic slowdown, which will further reduce global trade and shipbuilding financing, said Jun Jae-chun, analyst at Daishin Securities.

Such yards are more likely to have orders from more financially sable shipowners, which are unlikely to cancel orders because of the market slump.

Such owners are more likely to have arranged all the financing necessary for their orders and face little new risk from worsening credit conditions.

Mr. Jun predicted that earnings at Samsung would not fall much in the next two quarters thanks to order backlogs that will keep the company busy during the next three years.

Hyundai, Samusung, and Daewoo- that have a combined global market share of about 40 per cent.

Detroit's focus must be mobility

FT 5 November 2008
--------------------
There is much debate about whether the US car industry should be bailed out（救済）. Some argue that lame ducks（破産者、役に立たない者） should be left to die.Others point out that if GM, Chrysler or Ford fail, millions of indirect employees could lose their jobs too as the colossal（巨大な） supply industry falters（よろめき）.
So, I would recommend that any bail-outs from Washington be contingent（条件として、付随的な） upon Detroit's re-invention（発明）.
Clearly the 20th-century auto industry business model is broken. Designing, mass-producing and selling cars yields a sad or at best, sporadic（時々起こる） return on investment( unless your name is Toyota or Honda). However , the demand for personal mobility and transportation continues to rise.

Detroit might not be good at heeding（心に留めない） advice but its design and engineering teams are spectacularly（目覚しく） good at developing and manufacturing complex, extremely reliable and durable（丈夫な） products at a very keen price and on massive scale. So imagine how this prowess（武勇） could be utilised to create and build much-needed alternative transportation and infrastructure, such as personal rapid transit systems.

S Korea's reserves fall 11% as Won weakens

FT Nov 5/2008
Government props up（支える local currency
-----------------------------------
Dollar funding situation serious
----------------------------------
South Korea's foreign exchange reserves declined by 27.4bin, or 11 per cent, lats month, an amount greater than the entire reserves of
Asia's fourth largest economy at the time of the 1997 financial crisis.

The decline came as the government aggressively intervened in the currency market to prop up the weaker local currency and provided dollars to local banks suffering from a liquidity crunch.

The reserves fell from 239.7bn in September to 212.3bn in October.

The country had 22.3bn in reserves on the eve of the 1997 crisis.
There won't be a problem in maintaining our external credibility as the current size of these reserves is sufficient to meet external payment requirements in case of emergency
South Korea is the world's sixth-largest holder of foreign exchange but the government's increasingly costly effort to shore up（支える） the won is bringing back memories of its futile battle to defend its currency during the 1997 Asian financial crisis.Korean won has lost almost 30per cent against the dollar this year.

Daimler to make staff cuts in US for first time

FT Nov 4 2008
--------------
Buy-out offers to Alabama workers
--------------------------------
Steep slide oin light-vehicle sales
----------------------------------
Daimler is offering buy-out packages to wrkers at its assemblyplant in Alabama, marking the first staff reductions in the 11 years since the German company began buidling cars in teh US.

Data gloom(暗い） clouds poll race

FT Nov 4/2008
--------------
Manufacturing activity hits 26-year low
---------------------------------------
Opinion polls give Obama advantage
-------------------------------------
Barack Obama and John McCain last night wound up(Wind up　結ぶ、やめる） their presidential campaigns in a whirlwind（旋風、あらし） of rallies and speeches even as new data underlined（強調した） the scale of the economic crisis awaiting the winner.

The much-followed Gallup tracking survey showed Mr.Obama with an 11-point advantage over Mr.McCain among likely（ありそうな、ad.) voters.

Chinese PM says slowdown threatens stability

FT Nov.4.2008
--------------
Wei Jabao, China's prime minister, warned that high growth was needed to maintain social stability as fresh evidence emerged yesterday that China's economy was slowing quickly.

Slowdown fears in China were exacerbated（募らせる、悪化させる） by two surveys of the manufacturing sector which both showed a sharp decline.

The steepest monthly fall and the lowest point since the index was started in 2004.

Stephen Roach , chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia, said the flurry(混乱） of recent announcements could indicate that Chinese authorities knew growth had already dipped（急に下がる） below 8 per cent.