Sunday, May 22, 2016

21/5/16: Manipulating Markets in Everything: Social Media, China, Europe


So, Chinese Government swamps critical analysis with ‘positive’ social media posts, per Bloomberg report: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-19/china-seen-faking-488-million-internet-posts-to-divert-criticism.

As the story notes: “stopping an argument is best done by distraction and changing the subject rather than more argument”.

So now, consider what the EU and European Governments (including Irish Government) have been doing since the start of the Global Financial Crisis.

They have hired scores of (mostly) mid-educated economists to write, what effectively amounts to repetitive reports on the state of economy . All endlessly cheering the state of ‘recovery’.

In several cases, we now have statistics agencies publishing data that was previously available in a singular release across two separate releases, providing opportunity to up-talk the figures for the media. Example: Irish CSO release of the Live Register stats. In another example, the same data previously available in 3 files - Irish Exchequer results - is being reported and released through numerous channels and replicated across a number of official agencies.

The result: any critical opinion is now drowned in scores of officially sanctioned presentations, statements, releases, claims and, accompanied by complicit media and professional analysts (e.g. sell-side analysts and bonds placing desks) puff pieces.

Chinese manipulating social media, my eye… take a mirror and add lights: everyone’s holding the proverbial bag… 

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