Word: rates
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...climate negotiations, but attempts at a deal that works for both Washington and China have met with repeated failures. The problem is clear: before it commits to reductions, the U.S. wants China to agree to limits - but the Chinese, who said this week they were ready to reduce the rate of growth of emissions by a "notable margin," rightly point out that Kyoto spares China and all developing nations from binding emissions-cuts targets unless they are compensated...
Right now the interest rate on a 10-year Treasury bond is about 3.5%. That could go lower - in fact, it did go lower at the height of the panic last fall, to just above 2%. But the likeliest future path for Treasury yields, Atteberry figures - on the basis of history and the fact that rates have been kept low this year by Federal Reserve purchases, investor demand and other factors - is up. If you own a 10-year Treasury bond yielding 3.5%, interest rates rising to 4% or 5% or higher mean your bond (with its rate stuck...
Most bondholders, though, will find it hard to avoid losses. And what will retail investors do once bonds have burned them too? Atteberry thinks many will just put their money in the bank. The trade-off there is a measly return: the highest savings-account rate in the land is currently just 1.83%, according to Bankrate.com and most banks pay far less. Less than inflation. But hey, at least the money's safe...
...years ago, the Germany-based Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International (FLO), which sets worldwide prices and standards, raised the minimum per-pound price of nonorganic coffee 9¢, to $1.35 (a dime of which goes to social programs like scholarships for growers' children). That's 15¢ higher than the current market rate. And yet, according to Fair Trade researcher Christopher Bacon of the University of California, Berkeley, the per-pound price that's needed for farmers to rise above subsistence is really more than $2. Farmer advocates are urging the FLO to consider raising the price that much. But because such...
...foresaw this dilemma a decade ago, when coffee prices, which had been falling since the end of the Cold War, dropped to as low as 45¢ per lb. Fair Trade was the small farmer's savior during that crisis, paying twice the going rate. Starbucks joined the cause and this year has pledged to double the amount of Fair Trade coffee it buys, to 40 million lb., 40% of the Fair Trade beans the U.S. imports. The company declined to comment on whether Fair Trade's benefits fall short of its vision or how much it would need to raise...