adp

Consumer confidence ticked upward for the first time since 2007. Around the world, consumers are becoming more comfortable with the prospect of shelling out some cash, even if they're still approaching the notion with caution.

According to a survey conducted by The Nielsen Company between September 28 and October 16, 2009, consumer confidence was highest in India, with Indonesia and Norway following. Japan, Latvia, Portugal, and South Korea were at the other end of the spectrum, though South Korea did show a significant quarterly improvement.

The clean technology wave just got a little bigger. This tends to be a side-effect of interest from billionaire investor George Soros. And, as usual, it's more than just money; it's more than just a return. Soros, yet again, is trying to save the world. Interestingly, the bold move was announced at a meeting on climate change sponsored by Project Syndicate – an international association consisting of 430 newspapers from 150 countries (and thus with clear ties to the past, rather than future).

The investor and founder of Soros Fund Management LLC is planning to put $1 billion into clean-tech opportunities using what he calls "rather stringent criteria," which involves being "profitable but should also actually make a contribution to solving the problem [i.e., of clean technology adoption and proliferation]." Soros didn't provide any other details on the nature or scope of his investments.

"The steel stocks tend to go through boom and bust cycles depending on global economic activity; they have been pummeled over the last year, as the global economy slowed," notes turnaround expert George Putnam.

In his The Turnaround Letter, he explains, "But the news about steel is not all bad." Indeed, he believes some steel companies are poised for a turnaround. Here's his review of 6 leading steel production companies.

"Weakness in two big steel consuming industries, autos and construction, has been particularly troublesome for the steelmakers.

"However, there is evidence that steel inventories are gradually being worked off to low levels. There are also signs that economic activity in China, which is a huge consumer of steel, will not fall off as far as some economists initially feared.

Brendan Coffey is a specialist on "green" investing; in his The Cabot Green Investor, he looks to alternative energy firm American Superconductor (NASDAQ: AMSC).

Here's his review of the company, which is a player both in wind power and energy efficient wiring that can play a role in improved power grid systems.

"Long an R&D company, focusing on highly conductive wiring, American Superconductor made a game-changing purchase of an Austrian wind company, Windtec, in early 2007.

The G 20 countries wrapped up their ground breaking summit with amazing cooperation among members. The tackled a wide range of problems and were able to agree on just about every key issue.

Let's look at some specific policies that the G 20 members agreed upon:

• Regarding the matter of stimulus, they agreed to boost the International Monetary Fund's lending power to around $750 billion.
• They also unveiled a $250 billion expansion of the IMF's reserve currency, referred to as "special drawing rights." This will boost liquidity in the global financial system by expanding member countries' foreign exchange reserves.
• They agreed to selling gold to help poor countries.

The European Union (EU) has always been a complex structure, but now it is becoming more so. Economic activity varies widely from country to country. For example, the more established economies of Germany, France and Italy are the strongest at this moment with the economies that were part of the Soviet Union, such as Romania, Hungary and the Czech Republic are much weaker. The EU discussed this matter recently and agreed to help Eastern European countries on a country by country basis.

European leaders of the Group of 20 took the first step in market regulation. The leaders said that all financial products, including hedge funds must be regulated.

The leaders also said that the resources of the International Monetary Fund must be doubled to $500 billion. British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, said that the increased funds should be used to help Eastern European economies.

Members who were polled agreed that "all financial markets, products and participants including hedge funds and other private pools of capital which may pose systemic risk must be subjected to appropriate oversight and regulation."

When we say Europe, the countries of Germany France and Britain immediately come to mind. When we say emerging markets we often think of India and China. Yet in the heart of Europe we have a group of European emerging markets. Included here are the countries of Hungary, the Czech Republic and Poland.

Like the rest of Europe, these countries are suffering from the worldwide economic downturn. However the extent of the damage to their economies has been much worse than the rest of Europe. Much of the growth in these economies has come from foreign investment, thereby creating large foreign exchange debts.

Such is the case with the Polish zloty. The zloty hit its weakest level since joining the European Union. This is especially disappointing since plans are underway for Poland to adopt the euro in 2012.

So far this year the zloty has fallen 14% against the euro amid fears that Poland will find it difficult to finance its current account deficit. The situation is further aggravated because Poland is an export driven economy and exports have fallen off sharply.

The world's emerging markets are falling with amazing speed. This has caught everyone off guard. Let's look at some statistics that show the severity of this plunge:

• Taiwan's exports plunged 44% from the same month last year.
• Brazil's industrial production plunged 12.4% in December from the previous month.
• The Russian ruble and the Hungarian forint have dropped about 14% against the dollar.
• The South Korean currency, the won, has shed 8% of its value against the dollar and South Korea's industrial output dropped to its lowest level on record.
• The Mexican peso is at an all time low against the dollar.
• South Korea's exports fell more that 30% in January.