An Influx to EC From a So. American Country Where It's All Gone Wrong

pensionado wrote:

I generally try to stay away from the expat scene, especially in Cuenca, where the majority of the American expats are looking to replicate what they left behind, very few have bothered to learn Spanish so I am often asked to "host" their ventures into the mercado or side viajes.

It is not difficult to stay away from the Cuenca expat scene when you don´t live there.

Watch out there pensionado, Ecuador's self-proclaimed "money train" seems to be upset with you! (too funny!!!)

James wrote:

Watch out there pensionado, Ecuador's self-proclaimed "money train" seems to be upset with you! (too funny!!!)

I am actually the Ecuador forum´s money train which makes me immune from power trips by low level moderators masquerading as experts.

Fellow members of Ecuador forum: Don't you think it's wiser to ignore the troll?

Admins: Why do you continue to allow Woodward to get away with this sort of behavior?

James wrote:

Somebody comes along and speaks the TRUTH, something they dread more than death itself....So, you my friend are now probably on their hit list too, simply because you have spoken up, and worse still given moral support to me.... wjwoodward who they've declared their dire enemy. 

And thus does James's mask come off, to reveal his original alter ego, WJWoodward...Nemesis of EC Expats!

The only thing missing from his super-villain-style soliloquy was a threat to destroy Gotham City's water supply.

The earlier attack-strategy of calling a poster a "twit" (silly or foolish person) simply was beneath the "dire enemy" who aspires to Joker-Riddler-Brainiac-Lex Luthor status.

Do not disavow your true persona, WJW, for it is a crowd-pleaser.

Pardon us for the moment as we put in a call to the Justice League of America.

Ecuador Expats, cowering in "the bubble"


                                                                .

James wrote:

The only thing that EC expats on this forum take seriously, or in fact even care about is themselves....they have come to think that THEY are the real owners of Ecuador and the Ecuadoran people have somehow, mysteriously ended up on THEIR land....I suppose you'll soon be demanding that the other 99.1 percent of the country abandon the Spanish language and begin speaking English just to make you guys happy too.

Top 10 Words and Phrases Used by WJWoodward in the Past 8 Days to Describe Ecuador's USA Expats

10. Xenophobic

9. Loud and Ostentatious

8. Invaders of Ecuador

7. Warped

6. Twit

5. Narrow minded

4. Short sighted

3. Bitching

2. Whining

And the number-one word that Woodward used to describe Ecuador's USA Expats:

1. Cry-babies


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mugtech wrote:

pensionado wrote:

- we are all looking forward to cheaper places to retire.

Looking for, but not the absolute defining characteristic for many.  I could live cheaper in Ecuador than I do in the USA, but to me it is not worth the cultural changes involved.  Why should I give up living less than 2 miles from Iron Pigs baseball, Phantoms hockey, Musikfest, Levitt Pavilion 3 free concerts a week 5/15 to 9/15 every year.  I even have a casino available plus a free public bus pass that does not include overcrowding and pickpockets.  A $13  150 minute bus ride gets me to NYC and $10 cab gets me on a cruise ship, none of which is available in Ecuador.  And I don't have to learn a new language.  It is very difficult for people 60 and over to learn a new language, not to mention the time and expense involved.  Its the ones who expat to Ecuador mainly because of the money they save that wind up returning.

I hear you about things that are nearby and cheap for me too. The weather sucks but there are other affordable places in the US yet to be discovered. EC can't be all things to all people.

Please gentlemen let's stop rising to the bait. It's going nowhere fast

j600rr wrote:

Stocks go up, and they go down. Hopefully people have some good ones that will be long term winners, and not the opposite, but there is no guarantee you'll be a winner. Plenty of people have lost, and lost big time in the stock market. That's just the nature of the beast. Always have winners, and losers.

Just read a Bloomberg report on MSNBC saying the USA production of oil next year could be higher than any year since 1972.  Since profits in the past were poured into capital improvements, most oil companies are cutting back on improvements while the efficient wells they already have working might as well keep working with crude still selling at over $50 a barrel while the cost to extract is $20 to $25.  Even something like the 800,000 barrels destroyed in a Libya refinery disaster sent the price up only .4%.  The loss was a little more than 2 days of oil production in Libya, while the ruble falls and Russia had a decrease in GDP over last year in the third quarter.  None of this bodes well for Ecuador or Venezuela.

mugtech wrote:

Just read a Bloomberg report on MSNBC saying the USA production of oil next year could be higher than any year since 1972.  Since profits in the past were poured into capital improvements, most oil companies are cutting back on improvements while the efficient wells they already have working might as well keep working with crude still selling at over $50 a barrel while the cost to extract is $20 to $25.  Even something like the 800,000 barrels destroyed in a Libya refinery disaster sent the price up only .4%.  The loss was a little more than 2 days of oil production in Libya, while the ruble falls and Russia had a decrease in GDP over last year in the third quarter.  None of this bodes well for Ecuador or Venezuela.

WTI Crude fell below $53 a little while ago. Is hovering a little over $53 now. Don't have a Brent Crude chart in front of me. Not sure what that's trading at right now, but is usually a few bucks more than WTI.

The unknown variable which is widely speculated upon, but not really known is just how low can the U.S. companies, or some of the better companies keep pumping oil out at a profitable price? At one time it was thought to be very costly to drill for shale. Thanks to OPEC's past desire for high oil prices, it has allowed the U.S. shale companies to invest heavily, and create the new technologies to allow them to be efficient, and profitable at a much lower price.

Yes, newer, and poorly run U.S. shale companies will go bust. Better run companies will stop investing so much in the newer technology, upgrades, and so on. Including some layoffs, and other all around cuts. However, it's beginning to look like several of the better run companies can still be profitable at much lower prices than anyone thought. It will be interesting to see how everything plays out over the next 6 months to year.

All in all, is quite possible the U.S. is in much better shape, and can maintain lower oil prices for longer than the majority of OPEC members initially thought.

Interesting article about how things could play out for OPEC members if things don't exactly work out for them. Unfortunately countries like Ecuador could easily be huge losers once all is said and done. Hopefully as some have suggested Ecuador is not as reliant on oil as many think, but I still have my doubts about that. Time will tell. Would be glad to be wrong.

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2014/12/24/ … lion-2015/

j600rr wrote:

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2014/12/24/oil-price-decline-could-cost-opec-257billion-2015/

Good info
Down $257 billion in one year sounds like a lot of belt tightening.

News today from Holly Elyatt on CNBC is that Venezuela's Pres Nicolas Maduro does not blame OPEC or Saudi Arabia of OPEC for the falling oil prices, he blames, can you guess?, the USA for trying to cause harm to Russia and Venezuela.
Analysts now think that the efficiently producing Saudis are targeting some less efficient Shia regimes closer to home, Syria, Iraq and Iran.  Supposedly the break even point for Venezuela is $160/barrel, while in Iran it is $120/barrel.

Here's an interesting article about sand, oil, Venezuela, and the guarantee of government mismanagement of virtually everything:

"It's probably Milton Friedman's most famous saying: “Put government in charge of the Sahara desert and in five years you'll have a shortage of sand.”

What sand is to the Sahara, petroleum is to Venezuela. Venezuela has the largest oil reserves in the world. More than Saudi Arabia. It has proved reserves of 297 billion barrels.

But now Venezuela, an oil exporter for almost a century, can't even meet its domestic oil needs.

Venezuela has begun importing oil."


Read the rest,
http://www.moneyandmarkets.com/im-glad- … GW8x7l0zIU

mugtech wrote:

News today from Holly Elyatt on CNBC is that Venezuela's Pres Nicolas Maduro does not blame OPEC or Saudi Arabia of OPEC for the falling oil prices, he blames, can you guess?, the USA for trying to cause harm to Russia and Venezuela.

Well that's a shocker ha? Of course, the country was having run away inflation, shortage of basic staples, was broke, had protests, so on, and so on. Ans this was when oil was at record prices. As the saying goes "you can't fix stupid."

gardener1 wrote:

"Venezuela has begun importing oil."


Read the rest,
http://www.moneyandmarkets.com/im-glad- … GW8x7l0zIU

Talk about irony!

And the punchline is in the next paragraph, which explains that Ven --
having nationalised the industry and confiscated the assets of "joint venture partners like Exxon Mobil and Conoco -- now finds that others are unwilling to risk investing in production deals there."  So Ven is importing oil from Algeria and Russia and such.

Kudos to Top Cat for finding this article, which was written by "Libertarian" talk-show host and podcaster Charles Goyette -- whose writing I had not encountered before.  He has a marvelous talent for simplifying these issues for easy understanding by the layman.

He writes occasionally about events in Ven and Argentina, he states, "because these places are like laboratory experiments" in off-the-wall politics "and crackpot economic theory."

It's a small jump from seeing that Ven's options closed due to those asset confiscations...to seeing how Ecuador ended up mortgaging the house (of oil) to the Chinese after El Supremo reneged on EC's loans six years ago.

FYI, Charles Goyette also is author of a book titled "The Dollar Meltdown," about how gold and oil can be used to survive the supposed coming meltdown in the currency that the U.S. and Ecuador share.

cccmedia in Quito

cccmedia wrote:

Charles Goyette (has) a marvelous talent for simplifying these issues...

Also of interest:  in the article, Goyette compares the U.S. Fed to a South American banana republic.

He writes that the Fed's policies have encouraged the fiscal authorities to continue their "buying and spending ways" while U.S. national debt has climbed 80 percent in the past six years, to $18 billion.

Writes Goyette:

"Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher said the other day that we will not know for some time whether Quantitative Easing, 'the Grand Experiment in Modern Monetarism, is a smash hit or a bomb or something in between.'

"They don't know.  Like some South American banana republic, they have been playing roulette with the value of the currency.

"These things usually end badly.  That's why I'm glad to see gold and silver prices lower."

cccmedia wrote:

He writes that...U.S. national debt has climbed 80 percent in the past six years....

The percentage of increase was correct, according to Goyette's figures, but the U.S. national debt should have been cited at $18-trillion.

What's a few "ceros" among friends....

The Cheese Desk regrets the error.

cccmedia in Quito

The US Commerce Department announced that the USA will be exporting light crude oil for the first time since the 1970's oil embargo.  This is just another step in flooding the world market and driving prices down, free market capitalism at its best, keeping the US shale boys in production.

mugtech wrote:

The US Commerce Department announced that the USA will be exporting light crude oil for the first time since the 1970's oil embargo.  This is just another step in flooding the world market and driving prices down, free market capitalism at its best, keeping the US shale boys in production.

Not an outright appeal of the oil export ban, but the door has been opened making things more transparent, and easier to now export. Here's an article that outlines some of the guidelines.

http://www.insidefutures.com/article/13 … %20Forgot? The Energy Report 12/31/14.html

cccmedia wrote:

FYI, Charles Goyette also is author of a book titled "The Dollar Meltdown," about how gold and oil can be used to survive the supposed coming meltdown in the currency that the U.S. and Ecuador share.
cccmedia in Quito

A few articles that counterbalance Mr. Goyette's views. Not implying either side is right, or wrong. There is as usual is a ton of variables involved, and the truth is probably somewhere in the middle. On a side note. Am not personally wild about the U.S. spending, nor was I a fan of Quantitative Easing, but I don't fall into that doom and gloom crowd either.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall … -the-hole/http://www.forbes.com/sites/pascalemman … -not-ever/

Back on topic of Venezuela. Here is some even more encouraging news facing that country (being sarcastic). When it rains it pours.

http://www.financialsense.com/contribut … rinflation

j600rr wrote:

Back on topic of Venezuela.

http://www.financialsense.com/contribut … rinflation

Ven government subsidies have gasoline at just six cents a gallon, while Caracas 'burns'!

What's that all about...

cccmedia wrote:

j600rr wrote:

Back on topic of Venezuela.

http://www.financialsense.com/contribut … rinflation

Ven government subsidies have gasoline at just six cents a gallon, while Caracas 'burns'!

What's that all about...

I suppose it is cheap to flee the country with a full tank of gas.
Those inflation figures and exchange rates are outrageous.
There will be nothing to buy at any price
There will be a true humanitarian crisis.

We were once off on a middle east adventure and a well traveled friend of mine added this wisdom before we left, 'In a lot of countries gas is cheaper than water.' And he was right. In those places water for living was dear, and oil related products were cheap.

Too bad you can't wash your hands or brush your teeth or boil your noodles with petrol products.

Humanitarian crisis indeed.

mugtech wrote:

I suppose it is cheap to flee the country with a full tank of gas.
Those inflation figures and exchange rates are outrageous.
There will be nothing to buy at any price
There will be a true humanitarian crisis.

How many times are countries, and leaders going to keep trying to implement a system that has failed miserably time after time during the course of history? Are all of the people who have been so pro Venezuela, pro 21st century socialism going to try and rationalize that everything is still fine, and it's only western propaganda trying to tear the country apart?

"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." Winston Churchill

A Venezuelan on Twitter posts these many photos of empty store shelves. Difficult times. Venezuela seems to be on the fasttrack downward. Very fast. Terrible times for the people, then I don't know what happens next.

https://twitter.com/hashtag/AnaquelesVa … a?src=hash

My Spanish is pretty deplorable if anyone wants to comment on the text messages.

gardener1 wrote:

A Venezuelan on Twitter posts these many photos of empty store shelves. Difficult times. Venezuela seems to be on the fasttrack downward. Very fast. Terrible times for the people, then I don't know what happens next.

https://twitter.com/hashtag/AnaquelesVa … a?src=hash

My Spanish is pretty deplorable if anyone wants to comment on the text messages.

A lot of the messages are in English. Haven't gone through them all, but here is one link from one of the tweets. Think the article and pictures sum things up pretty well.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-01-0 … -venezuela

j600rr wrote:

"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." Winston Churchill

Yes, many in the USA claim to hate socialism while living on SS benefits and Medicare medical coverage.  Of course the USA used to be even more socialistic with a military draft, but that has been replaced with an all volunteer armed forces.

mugtech wrote:

j600rr wrote:

"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." Winston Churchill

Yes, many in the USA claim to hate socialism while living on SS benefits and Medicare medical coverage.  Of course the USA used to be even more socialistic with a military draft, but that has been replaced with an all volunteer armed forces.

The U.S. has always had a socialist element to it. From people to policies. Nothing wrong with that at all. Is when an individual/country/leader decides to implement socialistic practices into every single aspect of life, and business that major problems occur. Can point to many things that was forced down U.S. citizens throats, and that they had no choice in the matter that turned out alright. Of course you can also point to a lot of things that wound up being disasters. Most recent example is Obamacare. Might, in the long run, with a few tweaks wind up being great. It also might wind up being a complete, and utter failure.

Does anyone here really think that when Chavez reformed Venezuela that it was going to end well? What you are seeing now is pretty much the end result.

j600rr wrote:

Does anyone here really think that when Chavez reformed Venezuela that it was going to end well? What you are seeing now is pretty much the end result.

Agree

Hello everyone.

Once again let me remind you that political topics are not welcome on the forum. We do not have the required knowledge on the subject.

Thank you.
Christine

Christine wrote:

Hello everyone.

Once again let me remind you that political topics are not welcome on the forum. We do not have the required knowledge on the subject.

Thank you.
Christine

Agreed, total lack on knowledge
What about the Canadian drumming up money to bring a case in Canada against existing supposedly unconstitutional laws?  If that's not politics, then what is it?

Christine wrote:

Hello everyone.

Once again let me remind you that political topics are not welcome on the forum. We do not have the required knowledge on the subject.

Thank you.
Christine

The original point is how the Venezuela melt down could harm Ecuador with an influx of non-USA economic refugees.
In addition, a similar, though not as drastic, situation could occur in Ecuador.

mugtech wrote:

[
The original point is how the Venezuela melt down could harm Ecuador with an influx of non-USA economic refugees.
In addition, a similar, though not as drastic, situation could occur in Ecuador.

Many entities wish to separate politics and government from economics (which of course is laughably impossible) in order to keep the conversational peace. And of course to preserve the status quo.......

But common sense says that if politics rule economics, and money rules the decision making of everyone on the planet; then economics [i.e. politics] cannot be excluded from genuine expat evaluations and conversations.

"As President Maduro decries the loss of $100 oil stability, vowing to return oil prices to their rightful places."

Good luck on that one buddy. WTI crude just fell below the $50.00 mark a few seconds ago. Again Brent trades a bit higher, but things aren't looking good for $100 prices anytime soon.

j600rr wrote:

"As President Maduro decries the loss of $100 oil stability, vowing to return oil prices to their rightful places."

Good luck on that one buddy. WTI crude just fell below the $50.00 mark a few seconds ago. Again Brent trades a bit higher, but things aren't looking good for $100 prices anytime soon.

And this does not bode well for Ecuador either.
(this is economics, not politics)

mugtech wrote:

j600rr wrote:

"As President Maduro decries the loss of $100 oil stability, vowing to return oil prices to their rightful places."

Good luck on that one buddy. WTI crude just fell below the $50.00 mark a few seconds ago. Again Brent trades a bit higher, but things aren't looking good for $100 prices anytime soon.

And this does not bode well for Ecuador either.
(this is economics, not politics)

Todays paper indicates a 1.4 billion cut to the 2015 budget, although Correa is in China this week tryng to secure additional financing:

http://www.elcomercio.com/actualidad/ec … roleo.html

Nards Barley wrote:

Todays paper indicates a 1.4 billion cut to the 2015 budget, although Correa is in China this week tryng to secure additional financing:

http://www.elcomercio.com/actualidad/ec … roleo.html

Not a great surprise. Low oil prices clearly aren't going to help Ecuador. One of the big questions, in regards to Ecuador, is just how dependent they are, or are not on oil prices? Either way there will be some difficult, or down times with low oil prices. If it is true as some have claimed that Ecuador is still the beneficiary of large private capital and investments from various countries, and that the private sector, and other sectors are doing well, then the blow from low oil should be cushioned a bit, and while perhaps not ideal conditions Ecuador should still come out relatively ok.

Of course if none of the above is true as some sources have implied. Well, you do the math. Might wind up being a pretty bad situation for the future growth and development of Ecuador.