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While You Were Working – Pre-Mother’s Day Edition

America's anti-motherhood policies, Reforming OTC derivatives, Pain at one bank in Spain, and GE is not all-in on America First

3 min read

Modern Money

General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt

GE boss Jeff Immelt: Do as he says, not as he does on America First - Photo credit: Bill Pugliano

Motherhood and the US economy

Just in time for Mother’s Day (don’t forget to call your mom!), Bloomberg came out with this piece on the evolving role modern motherhood plays in the US economy.

All the familiar data is there about how choosing to leave the workforce to have a baby stunts the career and financial growth of US woman. As is this:

“A unique factor facing American mothers is the U.S.’s lack of paid maternity leave. Almost every developed country guarantees mothers paid time off when they have a child. On average, the 35 countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) offer 18 weeks of paid leave. The U.S. guarantees none.”

Policies represent priorities. Roughly half of all American voters are women. And on days like this Sunday we lionize motherhood. Yet, our policies do so little to make it easier for women to become mothers. SAD!

The understatement of the decade

The New York Fed recently held a two-day conference entitled “Over‑the‑Counter Derivatives and Recent Regulatory Changes.” It sounds like a serious and important topic that definitely deserves the attention of some of the brightest policymakers, academics and market participants. However, this blog post summarizing the event, leads with quite a whopper of an opening sentence:

“The 2007-09 financial crisis highlighted weaknesses in the over‑the‑counter (OTC) derivatives markets and the increased risk of contagion due to the interconnectedness of market participants in these markets.”

Ya think!   

Speaking of interconnected markets …

Wouldn’t it be amazing if there was a country where the banking sector was so diversified – rather than interconnected – that a Top 10 bank could flounder and there was little to no impact on the rest of the sector?

It turns out there is indeed a country where that is a reality. Viva Espana!

Ummm … About that whole “America First” thing

General Electric boss Jeff Immelt is one of President Trump’s favorite execs when it comes time to assemble business leaders to talk about jump-starting the American economy. As we’ve covered in the past, some of these execs have a penchant for exiting those meetings a then heading back to their headquarters and layoff American workers.

Immelt has added a new wrinkle. Not only has he come out in support of NAFTA, Immelt told Mexico’s president that GE is aiming to double its purchases from Mexican suppliers.

An ominous sign for Chinese IPOs on US exchanges

It looks like Chinese fintech firm QuantGroup is planning to hold its IPO in the US. Before diving into the offering, investors might want to weigh this little data point from Bloomberg.

“Six of the eight mainland Chinese firms that priced IPOs in the U.S. over the past 12 months are trading below offer price.”

That bunch is making SNAP looks good!

WYWW Appetizers

  • This is inconvenient for Mr. Mnuchin.
  • Drip … drip … drip goes the Wells Fargo fake account scandal.
  • Don’t forget Mother’s Day!