John Faraclas
The BDI dives further amid an expected landslide Tories victory…
The BDI (Baltic Dry Index) lost its 1,400 points threshold and now stands at 1,388 points. Let’s hope, all of us all over Planet Ocean that Boris Johnson’s outright win will be for the benefit, primarily of the British People, then for the …dilapidated European Union and all at Planet Ocean. John Faraclas’ daily recap:
With minus 72 points the pre-Christmas period looks blur as the BDI, thanks to yet another triple-digit loss by the Capes sunk…
The Capes’ BCI lost 285 points and its now below the 2,600 point threshold – at 2,598 begins to cause problems…
The Panamaxes’ BPI was the only dry index heading upwards; with 16 points plus the BPI now stands at 1,459 points.
Minor losses for both the Supras and Handies’; the BSI was down three points at 835 and the BHSI just one at 509 respectively…
So all in all a falling Dry Market and once again we repeat our view that one size’s rise or fall doesn’t constitute a Market!
The Wets falling; the last published BDTI (Dirties) and BCTI (Cleans) stood at 1,419 – plus five and 879 – plus 25 points respectively…
The WTI was slightly up above the US$ 59.00 at US$ 59.18…
The Geopolitics still with the issues mentioned last night and with all focused on the British snap election today, a pre-Christmas unusual development following a messy parliamentary environment creating uncertainty all over Planet Ocean. As these lines are being written the exit polls give a landslide victory for Boris Johnson’s Conservative party with 388 MPs; our belief is for a maximum 368 but nothing above that. As for the Labour party the Exit polls say 191, we believe it might surpass the 200 MPs, but only just. Jo Swinson’s Lib Dems is expected to gain 15 MPs, we believe due to the fierce battle in Scotland the Lib Dems will have no more than 13… The SNP in Scotland is poised to turn things upside down and it’s projected for 55 MPS; we believe 47 is within their range. The other parties will have the odd +/- and will try to keep their MPs… A difficult night with an easy knockout from Boris Johnson; tomorrow as the songs says: It is another day…
Elias Spirtounias introducing the event
On another tone and note we had three events today worth mentioning:
The first one in Athens’ Grande Bretagne Hotel with “New tendencies with the illegal/illicit trade of cigarettes in need of alliances strengthening” with KPMG “Project Stella” on “Illicit cigarette manufacturing in the EU”; excellent timing for whatever it takes to communicate with all stakeholders and smash this epidemic! Well done to the Hellenic-American Chamber of Commerce who organised the event its General Manage Elieas Spirtounias who introduced the event as well as its president Nicholas Bakatselos. Two interesting key notes speeches by Giorgos Pitsilis from the IAPI on how to tackle illicit cigarettes trading and Charlie Simpson, a partner from KPMG’s Global Strategic Group on the new “Project Stella” with respect the illegal cigarette factories in the EU”.
Charlie Simpson
An excellent panel of five speakers on the “Roles of Persecution Authorities and the PPI’s in tackling illegal trading” was successfully moderated by Yiannis Mastrokostas with Panagiotis Stampoulidis, Brigadier Emmanouil Dourvetakis, Commander (HCG) Evangelos Boulakakis, Aggeliki Matsouka and Iakovos Kargarotos. The final speaker was the deputy Minister for Economics, Tax Policy and Public Assets Apostolos Vesiropoulos on “Illegal Trading in the economy”. There were five Questions from the audience including ours as a point/ statement on how to tackle the issue of the arrested means of illegal trading such as ships for example or cars or trucks and TEUs/FEUs insisting on scrapping / recycling everything all together given the fact that when ship in particular is sold or auctioned, the buyers are gangs under cover as these vessels are converted to accommodate drugs, cigarettes you name it! The proceeds from all these illicit business ends up in the hands of Terrorists!
An interesting network followed during the mild buffet luncheon which followed!
H.E. The President of the Hellenic Republic Procopis Pavlopoulos – photo credits IKN
At the same time the second day of the Economist’s Conference on “The Demographic Crisis in Greece – a powder keg obstructing prosperity?” at the Grand Hyatt Athens Hotel. Well done for Hazlis & Rivas. The event was inaugurated by H.E the president of the Hellenic Republic Procopis Pavlopoulos.
The current demographic crisis in Europe , not just in the European Union, the demographic map of Greece, optimistic and pessimistic future scenarios and low birth rate links to the economic crisis, gender relations and the evolution of family as an institution, brain drain, labour issues, pensions, the contribution of medicine to infertility, but also to geopolitical challenges that arise were examined in this well timed event. Welcome remarks by John Andrews the consulting editor of The Economist.
Other welcome remarks by Panagiotis Theodorikakos, the Greek minister of the Interior, Ioannis Vourtsis, minister of Labour and Social Affairs, Olga Kefalogianni, former minister of Tourism; this remarks session was moderated by Nikos Chatzinikolaou publisher of the Real News newspaper. Worth mentioning that the event was in association with Hope Genesis. Will revert with a full report from the organisers.
A full house
Finally we had the exceptional British Hellenic Chamber of Commerce Christmas AND(!) UK Election Party once again at SORRiSO, north of Athens with a strong 100 guests in jovial mood, excellent dips and drinks – including Johnny Walker’s drinks and cocktails, lots of networking and discussions on this very important election.
The two presidents Anna Kalliani and Alex Turner with Lina Dede, Louisa Stefa and Marina Sourbeou from the secretariat of the BHCC did their best together with the personnel of SORRiSO to entertain us. Many Congratulations!
Anna Kalliani flanked by co-president Alex Turner (l) and Nicholas Faraclas (r)
Good to see many good old friends from London and Athens – some of them after many years and make new ones. Lia Panagopoulou from Tsavliris Group with her husband Dr. George Panagopoulos, managing partner from ReedSmith’s office in Athens, Chryssa Voulgaridou from CrisisLabs, Law, Dimitris Starogiannis, Zeta Gioti from NBG, Marianna Lourba from Apolyto Creative Spot, lawyer Yiannis Tsamichas, Fotini Emiris from AURORA, Lawyer Theoni Fotopoulou, Lawyer Antigoni Vafeidou, and many others.
That’s all for tonight, have a nice evening and continue to remain on guard from actions emanating from Pirates, Terrorists, Criminals and Business Hooligans whatsoever wherever you are on Planet Ocean.
