αντιο κοκα κολα!

Translated as, "Goodbye Coca Cola", this post is in reference to an article I saw on Bloomberg News. As a Classics Major, and a Hellenist at that, I am always interested in what I see regarding Greece. I was lucky enough to visit for 2 weeks in 2008 on a school trip and fell in love with not only the language and culture, but now also the land, people and everything else about the country.

The article is all about the enormous affect that one MNC can have on a country's market. The Coca Cola Hellenic Bottling Co. is leaving the Athens stock exchange for London next year, and is projected to shrink the total market cap of Greece's stocks by a little over $8 billion dollars (from 39.2 to 31 billion). Coca Cola HBC happens to be the largest company in Greece in terms of market value, and managing director of Attica Wealth Management in Athens goes so far as to say the loss of just this one company on the Athens Stock Exchange is likely to make Greece resemble a developing country economically. Shockingly enough, Coca Cola HBC operates in almost 30 countries and does 95% of its business outside of Greece.

The company cites its decision to move as a result of downgrades from both S&P and Moody's, both of which were based on concern about the Greek economy and the surrounding crisis. They are going to list on the London Stock Exchange and are relocating to Switzerland due to both "economic and regulative stability", and to benefit their shareholders and make borrowing easier.

With the absence of this company, the National Bank of Greece will return to its position as largest stock on the ASE (Athens Stock Exchange). The Greek government will have to work hard to keep other companies on the ASE. This single company switch alone put the Greek market below the market value of Vietnam.

I'm personally not sure the significance of the value of Vietnam as a benchmark, but think that a percentage may have been a more effective measurement tool. Although this is what made the headlines, this was possibly the least shocking part of the whole article. At this point, in 2012, I did not expect Greece to be far above Vietnam so am wondering if they specifically found a random country's value and just said "yep, this was a number involved with the difference of the value of Greek equities" or if there is a relationship between Greece and Vietnam that I do not know about.

Interesting article, nonetheless. Here's the link if you'd like more specifics: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-15/coca-cola-quitting-athens-leaves-market-trailing-vietnam.html

Speaking of China...

This is inherently humorous and so typical of Trump. I follow him because the majority of his tweets are over-the-top/ opinionated/ unprofessional and I sometimes burst out laughing just at the tone of them. He kind of sounds like a competitive soccer mom trashing his 12 yr old daughter's opponents.

Before I make fun of someone...

I was clicking around on nytimes.com and found an article written by Thomas Friedman about China. Titled, "China Needs Its Own Dream", I was assuming that this article would be about the talk of China in the upcoming election or even about Chinese encroaching on intellectual property or being "cheaters", or perhaps even another apocalyptic article about the education race and how China is going to take over the world fast. I expected lots of the usual panic (which I poked fun of him for in class), and then realized that the article is very closely linked to my first essay. I am now wondering if I have been poking fun at my own writing style and paranoia this whole time!

This article is all about the upcoming Congress of the Communist Party in China, and what the key issues will be there. The key issue that Friedman discusses is the undoubtable monstrous growth in the Chinese population (particularly the middle class) and how that will lead to overconsumption. He  points to studies that show the Chinese will quickly (I believe the number was seven years for Shanghai) begin to deplete their resources- such as water. He is very wary of the concept of the "American Dream" and what that means in terms of consumption, and argues that the Chinese must alter this dream of success to decrease consumption.

The Chinese are currently holding meetings, forums and are educating citizens on how to design a new culture that would create an emphasis on efficiency. This efficiency includes sharing, city planning and new technologies to improve life without adding to the quantity of resources and space taken up. There is a new sense of innovation that is tackling these two issues, particularly targeted at the youth of Shanghai.  China's current five year plan intends to cut consumption of water and energy compared to its GDP, but it does not seem to have a great plan in mind for educating the average consumer on sustainability.

He ends the article with the paradox that Xi Jinping will face that has not been faced by any of his predecessors. He is hoping for increased population to stabilize party control, but at the same time will need to find a way to sustain this growth in terms of resources. Finally, he says that the new "Chinese Dream" must intertwine the concepts of success and happiness with environmental consciousness.