Interesting times edition
Just cancelled a trip to Europe in April. Mix of work and perhaps an excess of caution. Our venue for the March RetireJapan event is already emailing me with virus fears (participants must wear masks and wash hands, will be turned away if visibly ill, etc.). And today we saw the first travel ban for people who have been in Japan during the last two weeks.
I’m still agnostic on this whole thing, but seeing towns in Italy getting locked down makes me feel it is not inconceivable to see that here too at some point.
Hope this blows over soon without doing too much damage.
Here are this week’s links
- Howard Marks on gambling: You bet!
- Gloomy. Storm clouds burst: Japan’s economy
- I reckon this has already peaked: Tokyo condo price hits record
- I have yet to show ID at a hotel in Japan (been asked a few times): Bureaucrats are to blame for copy-happy hotel clerks
- Pretty amazing numbers: Some Lessons From 92 Years of Market Return Data
- Seems reasonable. I’m also cancelling non-essential travel (more to avoid crowds than to avoid places): Some Thoughts on Coronaviruses and Seatbelts
- The shape of things to come? China races to contain job losses as coronavirus batters economy
- Good advice: Avoid the zeros
- Just like 3-11 all over again: Staff at hospital and their kids face backlash over coronavirus
- Approximately 70% of Japan currently has cold-like symptoms: Japan PM Abe urges people with cold-like symptoms to avoid work, school
- Good news! Who knew washing hands and staying home if sick could be useful? Influenza wave significantly wanes in Japan
- We are losing and no one cares: THE ONE WAR THAT THE HUMAN SPECIES CAN’T LOSE
- This was a bit reassuring: Will The Coronavirus Cause Stocks To Crash?
- Disgusting behaviour: Medical staff responding to virus bullied in the workplace
Kind of one-dimensional this week unfortunately. Anything good in there?
The current corona virus scare is the big news from my perspective. Thanks for the link about Israel’s entry bans regarding Japan as I was supposed to travel there in a few months. Incredible disruption for business in Asia. The Diamond Princess experiment which was helpfully organized by public health officials in Japan points out that in close quarters in a short time period about 15% will get the virus of whom around half are asymptomatic (but can still infect others). It really looks like we need to realize COVID-19 is like a severe form of influenza where you can’t eliminate transmission and a cure which prevents travel and usual economic commerce is actually worse than the disease. Numbers from the cruise ship experience are in the link below.
https://www.niid.go.jp/niid/en/2019-ncov-e/9407-covid-dp-fe-01.html
The infection rate that Japan is reporting to the World Health Org look a bit weird. 8-12 new people each day (one exception of 25+ one day). It seems too flat when you consider how densely populated the country is and you see what happened on the cruise. A scientist here in Japan told me that it’s possible that Japan is not testing or lacks the resources to test all possible cases. Wasn’t testing on the cruise ship fairly slow as well? Why is Korea testing hundreds, if not thousands a day, and Japan is not? We have a pretty old population here. Seems like there’d be more activity. At least we may be able to buy masks and alcohol wipes tomorrow. Haven’t seem them for over a week here in Tokyo.
Japan is hardly testing at all. One reason is that only one(?) government facility is authorised to do the tests, and each one takes six hours or something. The official advice is to stay at home until day five of having a fever, and only then seek medical advice (which may not result in being tested).
Korea outsourced the testing to private companies, so their capacity is much larger.
So one could assume that Japan’s numbers are artificially small.
Wow! One testing facility? That really sounds like what you talked about previously that the gov’t seem to have given up containing it and now just hoping to have space in hospitals. The actions don’t suggest urgency getting in front of this and with a very old population, this could have a huge impact.
This is all very confusing. Where did you find that recommendation by the way? I’d like to be able to revisit that site if possible in the future to stay appraised.
I found this on NHK and they’re publishing a very different set of infection data that what the WHO is reporting:
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20200226_02/
Whoops whoops whoops, I need to edit that response. The NHK report and WHO are the same. NHK is including the cruise ship total into the overall Japan number. WHO is separating the number from the cruise ship and not including that in the Japan number. My mistake, sorry, not trying to create more misleading information.
Here is the Health Ministry page: https://www.mhlw.go.jp/stf/seisakunitsuite/bunya/kenkou_iryou/dengue_fever_qa_00001.html
The government recommendations are on the news, and I presume they will continue repeating them until the situation improves.
Ben, I’ve also seen that Japan is doing much less testing than other countries, seemingly much less than it is capable of. However, I hadn’t heard there’s only one testing facility in Japan currently doing testing. Do you remember where you found this information? Information in answer #26 of the Health Ministry link you provided (below) seems to indicate that there are a lot of facilities around the country capable of doing testing, with more planned. Could it be related to the fact that Japan hasn’t authorized public health insurance funding of the testing?
Note that I’m typing this right after Abe’s public announcement that he will authorize testing be covered by the public health insurance.
I’m supposed to be taking students to Australia during the spring holiday. At the moment there are no plans to cancel but if the Australian government decides to put a travel ban/compulsory quarantine on people coming from Japan it could put an end to the trip.
I really hope this all blows over soon.
Posting is difficult on this site for some reason. Take 2-3 efforts.
Investment wise, companies associated with China will be affected. P&G is the latest to restate forecasts due to suppliers (300+) being affected by the virus. Look at your portfolio. If you have companies that are influenced by China, directly or indirectly, assess the situation and your investment timeframe. There is likely to be short term impact.