Category: zerohedge

After years of being roundly ignored by the mainstream media, and certainly be self-important economists, the issue of labor force participation is suddenly up front and center, especially now that the Fed itself finds itself scrambling to explain the humiliation of hitting its 6.5% unemployment “forward guidance” threshold without proceeding to tighten as it said it would initially when it launched QEternity in December 2012.

Incidentally, we predicted precisely this when we said in December 2012 that “using a simple forecast, based on LTM trends across all key employment metrics reveals something very troubling, for the Fed and stocks that is: the 6.5% unemployment rate will be breached in July 2013! Now granted that is simply idiotic, and there is no way that the US economy could possibly recover that fast, but that is precisely what is implied based on the ongoing collapse in the Labor Force Participation, and the concurrent plunge in the Labor Force Participation rate, which has been the biggest marginal driver for the unemployment rate, far more than the number of people who have jobs, or are unemployed (readers can recreate our calculation on their own in 10 minutes with excel).”

Granted, we were off by six months, but we were spot on about the reason why the unemployment threshold number was hit so quickly, instead of as the Fed has originally predicted, some time in 2015/2016.

So now that absolutely everyone is laser-focused more on the participation print, recently at 35 year lows, than the actual unemployment number which even the Fed has implied is meaningless in the current context, one thing to note is that while the overall number is a blended average across the US, it certainly differs on a state by state basis.

In order to get a sense of which states are the winners and losers in the payroll to participation ratio, we go to Gallup, which conveniently has broken down this number on a far more granular basis.

Gallup finds that Washington, D.C., had the highest Payroll to Population (P2P) rate in the country in 2013, at 55.7%. A cluster of states in the Northern Great Plains and Rocky Mountain regions — North Dakota, Nebraska, Minnesota, Wyoming, Iowa, Colorado, and South Dakota — all made the top 10. West Virginia (36.1%) had the lowest P2P rate of all the states.

As Gallup explains: 

Gallup’s P2P metric tracks the percentage of the adult population aged 18 and older that is employed full time for an employer for at least 30 hours per week.  The differences in P2P rates across states may reflect several factors, including the overall employment situation and the population’s demographic composition. States with large older and retired populations, for example, would have a lower percentage of adults working full time. West Virginia and Florida — both in the bottom 10 — have some of the largest proportions of older residents, with more than half of each state’s adult residents older than 50 (52.9% and 51.5%, respectively), and both states rank in the bottom 10 states on the P2P index. Regardless of the underlying reason, however, the P2P index provides a good reflection of a state’s economic vitality.

Of course, this now defunct demographic explanation does not account for the fact that within the US labor force, the number of people employed aged 55 and over has just hit a record high, as it defeats the demographic explanation. So while one should ignore the rationalization, one should certainly be aware of which states skew the participation distribution on the high and low side.

Mapped, the data looks as follows:

The natural derivative of the participation rate is the underemployment rate in any one given state. Here we learn the following:

As with Payroll to Population rates, states in the Midwest — including North and South Dakota, Minnesota, Nebraska, and Iowa — were among those with the best underemployment rates in 2013.

Gallup’s U.S. underemployment rate combines the percentage of adults in the workforce that is unemployed with the percentage of those working part time but looking for full-time work. While P2P reflects the relative size of the population that is working full time for an employer, the underemployment rate reflects the relative size of the workforce that is not working at capacity, but would like to be.

 

And guess which states were by far the worst offenders when it comes underemployment:

California and Nevada have the highest percentages of their workforces not working at desired capacity. Their rates are about twice those of states at the other end of the spectrum, such as North Dakota (10.1%). Other states hard hit by the recession and declining housing market, including Florida and Arizona, rank among the states with the highest underemployment rates.

Hold on, hold on… Wasn’t it an age issue? Perhaps, instead, as this confirms using the relatively young western states it is a, gasp, ability and/or desire to work issue. Apparently that is precisely that case.

This is also what Gallup’s conclusion shows:

North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa, and Minnesota ranked in the top 10 states on P2P rates in 2013, and in the bottom 10 for underemployment, as well as in the top 10 on Gallup’s Job Creation Index, highlighting the strong job markets in the Midwest.

 

In contrast, Mississippi, Florida, New Mexico, Hawaii, Michigan, and North Carolina ranked in the bottom 10 states on P2P rates, and are among the states with the highest underemployment rates. There is more overlap between the top 10 P2P states and low underemployment states than there is among the bottom 10 P2P states and high underemployment states on the two measures. That is mainly because many of the states with low P2P rates also have low workforce participation rates. They still have much room for both job growth and labor force mobilization.

Indeed they do, and since neither CA nor NV have a demographic problem, one can finally turn off the perpetually wrong rhetoric about a demographic crunch. Instead, one needs to structurally address the supply and demand sides of the labor market, because it is this that the US has a massive problem with. Far more so than even an aging workforce, which incidentally has been a boon to the unemployment rate as it is mostly workers aged 55 and older who have been hired over the past 5 years.

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Silver’s 4.4% rise today – back above $21 for the first time in 3 months – is the largest single-day surge in 5 months. While gold has been making the headlines, silver has risen 11.9% with no down days in the last 11. This is the best 2-week run in 6 months as the Gold-to-Silver ratio has collapsed from over 65x to 61x today.

 

Quite a day for silver…

 

Gold-to-Silver ratio back to trend…

 

We suspect the almost record shorts in Silver are feeling the squeeze…

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Submitted by Charles Kennedy via OilPrice.com,

Bill Gates’ Texas energy company has filed for bankruptcy protection as the depressed power market results in untenable financial losses.

The company, Optim Energy (EnergyCo LLC), owned by a Gates investment fund, filed Chapter 11 Bankruptcy papers on Wednesday for its three power plants in eastern Texas, citing their inability to counter growing losses in the current market.

"The current depressed economic environment of the electric power industry – particularly with respect to coal-fired plants – and the debtors' liquidity constraints have resulted in continuing losses that, simply put, have left the debtors without alternatives," media quoted Optim CEO Nick Rahn as saying in court documents.

According to the documents, Optim has $713 million outstanding under a credit agreement with Wells Fargo, while its total estimated assets are worth less than $500 million. For 2013, Optim recorded revenues of $236 million.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Optim said its executives had failed to obtain consent to borrow more money under a credit facility.

Optim is reportedly planning to sell its coal-fired Twin Oaks plant during the bankruptcy, while the other two plants natural-gas fired.

Optim was founded in 2007, and electricity prices began to fall shortly afterwards, hindering the company’s ability to repay borrowed money.

Reductions in natural gas prices have hit power companies hard over the past several years, and Optim is the third to file for bankruptcy recently, following Dynegy Inc and Edison Mission Energy.

Optim notes in its court filings that the price of electricity in the company’s market area has fallen roughly 40% in the past five years, from around $63.24 per megawatt hour in 2008 to around $38 per megawatt hour by December 2013.

Optim’s owner, ECJV Holdings LLC, is owned by Cascade Investment LLC, an investment vehicle for Gates, the Microsoft Corp. co-founder and the world’s richest person, according to Bloomberg.

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1gAuT63 Tyler Durden

Submitted by Charles Kennedy via OilPrice.com,

Bill Gates’ Texas energy company has filed for bankruptcy protection as the depressed power market results in untenable financial losses.

The company, Optim Energy (EnergyCo LLC), owned by a Gates investment fund, filed Chapter 11 Bankruptcy papers on Wednesday for its three power plants in eastern Texas, citing their inability to counter growing losses in the current market.

"The current depressed economic environment of the electric power industry – particularly with respect to coal-fired plants – and the debtors' liquidity constraints have resulted in continuing losses that, simply put, have left the debtors without alternatives," media quoted Optim CEO Nick Rahn as saying in court documents.

According to the documents, Optim has $713 million outstanding under a credit agreement with Wells Fargo, while its total estimated assets are worth less than $500 million. For 2013, Optim recorded revenues of $236 million.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Optim said its executives had failed to obtain consent to borrow more money under a credit facility.

Optim is reportedly planning to sell its coal-fired Twin Oaks plant during the bankruptcy, while the other two plants natural-gas fired.

Optim was founded in 2007, and electricity prices began to fall shortly afterwards, hindering the company’s ability to repay borrowed money.

Reductions in natural gas prices have hit power companies hard over the past several years, and Optim is the third to file for bankruptcy recently, following Dynegy Inc and Edison Mission Energy.

Optim notes in its court filings that the price of electricity in the company’s market area has fallen roughly 40% in the past five years, from around $63.24 per megawatt hour in 2008 to around $38 per megawatt hour by December 2013.

Optim’s owner, ECJV Holdings LLC, is owned by Cascade Investment LLC, an investment vehicle for Gates, the Microsoft Corp. co-founder and the world’s richest person, according to Bloomberg.

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1gAuT63 Tyler Durden

Just as we saw yesterday, US equities have decoupled from FX carry but not long after POMO started something very odd happened… at 1035ET, shorts started piling on…

 

 

So what happens next? Manufacture a short squeeze which lifts the S&P 500 to unchanged for 2014 (aroun 0.75% higher from here) or so the indices catch down to FX carry weakness?

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"Our bearish view on the S&P 500 is wrong," remarks BofAML's Macneil Curry, as yesterday's close above 1,823 points to the larger uptrend resuming. However, despite the equity strength, Curry says "stay bullish Treasuries" as price action points to further gains. The USD's bullish trend is at risk and pressured by silver strength.

 

Via BofAML's Macneil Curry,

Our bearish S&P500 view is wrong. Further gains in store. 

Up until yesterday we had been bearish risk assets and the S&P500.Yesterday's close above 1823 (top of the daily cloud) says that view is WRONG and that the larger uptrend has resumed. Indeed the daily Bullish Engulfing Candle against the pivotal 50d avg (1811) provides further bullish evidence for a test of the mid-Jan highs at 1851, through which opens 28m channel resistance at 1872. Back below the 50d on a closing basis points to a more choppy environment than currently thought. 

Stay bullish Treasuries

Despite the turn higher in equities, the price action in Treasuries says STAY BULLISH. Looking specifically at 5yr yields and TYH4, the impulsive moves from Feb-03 extremes at 1.582% & 125-03 say that the month to date correction is finished and that the larger bull trend is resuming. Further supportive of this view is the fact that the overnight pullback in TYH4 from 125-31 (and 1.482% in 5yr yields) has unfolded in a counter trend manner. NOW, watch key resistance in 5yr and 10yr yields at 1.470% & 2.692%, respectively. Below these levels provides further evidence that the bull trend is resuming. In TYH4 we would like to see a daily close above the overnight high at 125-31. Through these levels target a test and break of the 200d in 5s (1.380%), 126-25 (Oct-30 high in TYH4) and 2.544% in 10s. our bullish view is wrong thru 1.582% (5s), 125-03 (TYH4) and 2.788% (10s).

The US $ is at risk, especially against £

We have been bullish the US $ Index, looking for topping in both £/$ and €/$. That bullish US $ view is NOW on the ropes as the repeated failure of the US $ to stage a rally warns off significant underlying weakness. Indeed a DXY break of 79.68 (Dec-27 low) and a €/$ break of 1.3737 (Dec-27 high) would invalidate our bullish US $ view. However, probably the most important level to watch is the £/$ Apr'11 high at 1.6748. With daily RSI breaking out a closing break of 1.6748 would clear the way for the Aug'09 highs at 1.7044 

The Silver breakout adds to the US $ woes

Adding to the US $ woes is the recent strength in precious metals. 1st it was gold, now it is silver. Today's spot silver break of 3m range highs and 7m pivot between 20.62/20.51 points to a medium term base and further gains to 22.40/23.09

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1jhuqpV Tyler Durden

"Our bearish view on the S&P 500 is wrong," remarks BofAML's Macneil Curry, as yesterday's close above 1,823 points to the larger uptrend resuming. However, despite the equity strength, Curry says "stay bullish Treasuries" as price action points to further gains. The USD's bullish trend is at risk and pressured by silver strength.

 

Via BofAML's Macneil Curry,

Our bearish S&P500 view is wrong. Further gains in store. 

Up until yesterday we had been bearish risk assets and the S&P500.Yesterday's close above 1823 (top of the daily cloud) says that view is WRONG and that the larger uptrend has resumed. Indeed the daily Bullish Engulfing Candle against the pivotal 50d avg (1811) provides further bullish evidence for a test of the mid-Jan highs at 1851, through which opens 28m channel resistance at 1872. Back below the 50d on a closing basis points to a more choppy environment than currently thought. 

Stay bullish Treasuries

Despite the turn higher in equities, the price action in Treasuries says STAY BULLISH. Looking specifically at 5yr yields and TYH4, the impulsive moves from Feb-03 extremes at 1.582% & 125-03 say that the month to date correction is finished and that the larger bull trend is resuming. Further supportive of this view is the fact that the overnight pullback in TYH4 from 125-31 (and 1.482% in 5yr yields) has unfolded in a counter trend manner. NOW, watch key resistance in 5yr and 10yr yields at 1.470% & 2.692%, respectively. Below these levels provides further evidence that the bull trend is resuming. In TYH4 we would like to see a daily close above the overnight high at 125-31. Through these levels target a test and break of the 200d in 5s (1.380%), 126-25 (Oct-30 high in TYH4) and 2.544% in 10s. our bullish view is wrong thru 1.582% (5s), 125-03 (TYH4) and 2.788% (10s).

The US $ is at risk, especially against £

We have been bullish the US $ Index, looking for topping in both £/$ and €/$. That bullish US $ view is NOW on the ropes as the repeated failure of the US $ to stage a rally warns off significant underlying weakness. Indeed a DXY break of 79.68 (Dec-27 low) and a €/$ break of 1.3737 (Dec-27 high) would invalidate our bullish US $ view. However, probably the most important level to watch is the £/$ Apr'11 high at 1.6748. With daily RSI breaking out a closing break of 1.6748 would clear the way for the Aug'09 highs at 1.7044 

The Silver breakout adds to the US $ woes

Adding to the US $ woes is the recent strength in precious metals. 1st it was gold, now it is silver. Today's spot silver break of 3m range highs and 7m pivot between 20.62/20.51 points to a medium term base and further gains to 22.40/23.09

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1jhuqpV Tyler Durden

Those of our readers focused on the state of the housing market will undoubtedly remember this chart we compiled using the data from the largest mortgage originator in the US, Wells Fargo. In case there is some confusion, as a result of rising interet rates (meaning the Fed is stuck in its attempts to push rats higher), the inability of the US consumer to purchase houses at artificially investor-inflated levels (meaning housing is now merely a hot potato flipfest between institutional investors A and B), and the end of the fourth dead-cat bounce in housing (meaning, well, self-explanatory), the bank’s primary business line – offering mortgages – is cratering.

So what is a bank with a limited target audience for its primary product to do? Why expand the audience of course. And in a move that is very much overdue considering all the other deranged aspects of the centrally-planned New Normal, in which all the mistakes of the last credit bubble are being repeated one after another, Reuters now reports that the California bank “is tiptoeing back into subprime home loans again.“

And so the circle is complete.

For those  who may have forgotten the joys of a subprime lending bubble, here is a reminder from Reuters.

The bank is looking for opportunities to stem its revenue decline as overall mortgage lending volume plunges. It believes it has worked through enough of its crisis-era mortgage problems, particularly with U.S. home loan agencies, to be comfortable extending credit to some borrowers with higher credit risks.

 

The small steps from Wells Fargo could amount to a big change for the mortgage market. After the subprime mortgage bust brought the banking system to the brink of collapse in the financial crisis, banks have shied away from making home loans to anyone but the safest of consumers.

 

Any loosening of credit standards could boost housing demand from borrowers who have been forced to sit out the recovery in home prices in the past couple of years, but could also stoke fears that U.S. lenders will make the same mistakes that had triggered the crisis.

And in a world in which the new Wells Fargo is the old Wells Fargo, surely there will be companies willing to be the new New Century. Sure enough:

So far few other big banks seem poised to follow Wells Fargo’s lead, but some smaller companies outside the banking system, such as Citadel Servicing Corp, are already ramping up their subprime lending. To avoid the taint associated with the word “subprime,” lenders are calling their loans “another chance mortgages” or “alternative mortgage programs.”

Also, remember when lenders swore they were very conservative with who they make loans to, and their strict loan standards? Yup: that particular lie is also back.

Lenders say they are much stricter about the loans than before the crisis, when lending standards were so lax that many borrowers did not have to provide any proof of income. Borrowers must often make high down payments and provide detailed information about income, work histories and bill payments. Wells Fargo in recent weeks started targeting customers that can meet strict criteria, including demonstrating their ability to repay the loan and having a documented and reasonable explanation for why their credit scores are subprime.

Uh, there is a reason those borrowers are subprime. And it is: because they traditionally do not pay back their loans! But this appears to be one of those rocket surgery things that a strapped C-Suite has no choice but to confuse as it scrambles to compensate for structural revenue losses, and is willing to boost short-term revenues by offering anyone “who can fog a mirror” a mortgage. Surely, by the time the bank’s balance sheet implodes, it will be some other CEO’s problem.

It is looking at customers with credit scores as low as 600. Its prior limit was 640, which is often seen as the cutoff point between prime and subprime borrowers. U.S. credit scores range from 300 to 850.

But don’t worry, this time it’s different. Really

Subprime mortgages were at the center of the financial crisis, but many lenders believe that done with proper controls, the risks can be managed and the business can generate big profits.

Naturally, once Wells opens the floodgates, every other bank will promptly follow:

With Wells Fargo looking at loans to borrowers with weaker credit, “we believe the wall has begun to come down,” wrote Paul Miller, a bank analyst at FBR Capital Markets, in a research note.

 

Lenders have an ample incentive to try reaching further down the credit spectrum now. Rising mortgage rates since the middle of last year are expected to reduce total U.S. mortgage lending in 2014 by 36 percent to $1.12 trillion, the Mortgage Bankers Association forecasts, due to a big drop in refinancings.

The only missing pillar of the next subprime crisis is the spin that makes subprime lending seem not only ok, but in fact, necessary.

Some subprime lending can help banks, but it may also help the economy. In September 2012, then Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said housing had been the missing piston in the U.S. recovery.

 

A recent report from think tank the Urban Institute and Moody’s Analytics argued that a full recovery in the housing market “will only happen if there is stronger demand from first-time homebuyers. And we will not see the demand needed among this group if access to mortgage credit remains as tight as it is today.”

The straw on the camel’s back: just like last time, when this subprime bubble bursts, it will once again drag down Fannie and Freddie. Because humans apparently have a genetic inability to recall any historical lessons older than five years.

Wells Fargo isn’t just opening up the spigots. The bank is looking to lend to borrowers with weaker credit, but only if those mortgages can be guaranteed by the FHA, Codel said. Because the loans are backed by the government, Wells Fargo can package them into bonds and sell them to investors.

 

The funding of the loans is a key difference between Wells Fargo and other lenders: the big bank is packaging them into bonds and selling them to investors, but many of the smaller, nonbank lenders are making mortgages known as “nonqualified loans” that they are often holding on their books.

And not only the GSE: any and all idiots who buy subprime exposure direct, deserve all they get:

Citadel Servicing Corp, the country’s biggest subprime lender, is trying to change that. It plans to package the loans it has made into bonds and sell them to investors.

 

Citadel has lent money to people with credit scores as low as 490 – though they have to pay interest rates above 10 percent, far above the roughly 4.3 percent that prime borrowers pay now.

No story about subprime would be complete without the human touch, and one person’s story.

As conditions ease, borrowers are taking notice. Gary Goldberg, a 63-year-old automotive detailer, was denied loans to buy a house near Rancho Cucamonga, California. Last summer he was forced to move into a trailer park in Las Vegas.

 

Going from 2,000 square feet to 200 – along with his wife and two German shepherd dogs – was tough. He longed to buy a house. But a post-crash bankruptcy of his detailing business had torched his credit, taking his score from the 800s to the 500s.

 

“There was no way I was going to get a mortgage,” said Goldberg. “No bank would touch me.”

 

But in December, he moved into a 1,000-square-foot one-story home that he paid $205,000 for. His lender, Premiere Mortgage Lending, did not care about his bankruptcy or his subprime credit score. That is because Goldberg had a 30 percent down payment and was willing to pay an 8.9 percent interest rate.

Why what can possibly go wrong. Oh wait, we know: maybe the fact that Wells picked the absolutely worst moment to go in subprime – just as the broader housing market is about to take yet another steep plunge for the worse, as the recent foreclosure report from RealtyTrac confirmed, when it reported a dramatic 57% increase in California foreclosure starts from a year ago.

From RealtyTrac: “The monthly increase in January foreclosure activity was somewhat expected after a holiday lull, but the sharp annual increases in some states shows that many states are not completely out of the woods when it comes to cleaning up the wreckage of the housing bust,” said Daren Blomquist, vice president at RealtyTrac. “The foreclosure rebound pattern is not only showing up in judicial states like New Jersey, where foreclosure activity reached a 40-month high in January, but also some non-judicial states like California, where foreclosure starts jumped 57 percent from a year ago, following 17 consecutive months of annual decreases.”

In short – the party is over, and the banks are once again scrambling to delay the day of reckoning as much as possible.

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1jhlqRy Tyler Durden

Submitted by Lance Roberts of STA Wealth Management,

 

"If we are creating between 150,000 and 200,000 jobs a month, how could we be at peak employment?"

The point is very valid and made me realize that a more apropos title would have been "Have We Reached Peak Employment GROWTH."  While it is very true that we are creating 150-200,000 jobs a month, it is also important that the working age population is growing each month either through natural births or immigration.  The chart below shows employment versus population growth.

Over the last 12 months, employment, as reported by the BLS has averaged 186,500 jobs per month while the working age population (16-54 years of age) has grown by 187,700 jobs.  In other words, employment is being created only by the incremental demand increases caused by population growth.

The issue of population growth is consistently overlooked when evaluating isolated jobs numbers.  By accounting for population growth, the monthly employment report is put into a contextual framework.  The chart below illustrates my point.

Prior to the turn of the century, employment accelerated faster than population growth.  However, beginning in 2000 the structural shift in employment began in earnest.  Outsourcing, increased productivity and technological innovations have contributed to slower rates of employment growth as the drive for profitability surged.

While my previous post generated many questions, the point was that there is a limit to employment growth in any given economic cycle.  It is also important to remember that economies do cycle.  Therefore, could the stagnation of employment growth be indicating a mature stage of the current economic cycle?

The Job Opening Labor and Turnover Survey (JOLTS) may provide some additional evidence to support the idea of "peak employment growth."  The chart below shows the ratio of job openings to hires.

As you would expect, there is an equilibrium where the number of individuals being hired matches the number of job openings.  At 90%, or above, the economy may be pushing the limits of full employment. 

The next chart shows Net Hires (new hires less total separations) versus employment growth.

Again, as you would suspect, there is an equilibrium point where employment is "full" and job openings and hires are simply matching job separations caused by quits, discharges and layoffs.  This also brings up the point of "labor hoarding" as it relates to initial jobless claims.

Employers have slashed labor costs to the bone in order to maximize profitability.  This is why corporate profits are at their highest levels on record while wage and employment growth lag.  However, there is a point where businesses simply cannot cut any further and they begin to "hoard" what labor they have.  The focus then turns to maximizing the labor force's productivity (increase output with minimal increases in labor costs) and hire additional labor only when demand, such as through population growth, forces expansion.

It is this issue of "labor hoarding" which explains the sharp drop in initial weekly jobless claims.  In order to file for unemployment benefits, an individual must have been first terminated, by layoff or discharge, from their previous employer.  An individual who "quits" a job cannot, in theory, file for unemployment insurance.  However, as companies begin to layoff or discharge fewer workers the number of individuals filing for initial claims will decline.  This is shown in the chart below which shows the 4-month average of layoff and discharges versus the 4-week average of initial jobless claims.

The "good news" is that for those that are currently employed – job safety is high.  Businesses are indeed hiring; but prefer to hire from the "currently employed" labor pool rather than the unemployed masses.  The "bad news" is that full-time employment remains elusive and wages remain suppressed due to the high competition for available work.

While the Federal Reserve's interventions continue to create a wealth effect for market participants, it is something only enjoyed primarily by those at the upper end of the pay scale.  For the rest of the country, the key issue is between the "have and have nots" – those that have a job and those that don't. 

While it is true that the country is creating jobs every month, the data may be suggesting it is "as good as it gets."  Of course, this is a very disappointing statement when you consider that roughly 1 in 3 people sit outside of the workforce, 20% of the population uses food stamps, and 100 million people access some form of welfare assistance.  The good news is, we aren't in a recession?

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Days before Tokyo won its bid to host the 2020 Olympics last September, Japanese PM Shinzo Abe stated that Fukushima contaminated water was “under control.” Now, as Reuters reports,  the nation’s nuclear watchdog has uncovered that, following  “uncertainty about the reliability and accuracy of the September strontium reading,” which prompted a re-examination of samples, levels of Strontium-90 were five times the levels previously recorded. The Japanese NRA blasted TEPCO, “We did not hear about this figure when they detected it last September. We have been repeatedly pushing TEPCO to release strontium data since November. It should not take them this long to release this information.” One can only wonder why – when the promise of $500 million of government support is on the line… and new cracks are appearing.

 

Via RT,

Japan’s Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) is again in the midst of controversy for failing to timely report on record radiation levels at the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant. It is now blasted for holding back strontium measurements since September.

 

TEPCO on Wednesday revealed that it detected 5 million becquerels per liter of radioactive Strontium-90 in a groundwater sample taken some 25 meters from the ocean as early as last September, Reuters reports. The legal limit for releasing strontium into the ocean is just 30 becquerels per liter.

 

Although the reading was alarmingly five times the levels taken at the same spot two months prior to that, TEPCO decided not to immediately report it to the country’s nuclear watchdog. That is despite Strontium-90 being considered twice as harmful to people as Cesium-137, which was also released in large quantities during the meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi plant in March 2011 caused by powerful earthquake and tsunami.

 

According to a TEPCO spokesman cited by Reuters, the decision was due to “uncertainty about the reliability and accuracy of the September strontium reading,” which prompted the plant’s operator to reexamine the data.

 

However, Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) officials say no data came up until now despite repeated demands to TEPCO.

 

“We did not hear about this figure when they detected it last September. We have been repeatedly pushing TEPCO to release strontium data since November. It should not take them this long to release this information,” Shinji Kinjo, head of the NRA taskforce on contaminated water issues at Fukushima, told the agency.

 

Top NRA officials, including the watchdog’s chairman, have lashed out at TEPCO for “lacking a fundamental understanding of measuring and handling radiation” while responding to the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster.

 

“This is not an appropriate way to deal with the desire of the public [for transparency] and in particular, the regulator, which is now very closely regulating issues related to public health, the environment and so on,” Martin Schulz, a senior research fellow at the Fujitsu Research Institute, has said.

 

On Thursday, fears of new leaks surfaced in Japanese media, as Asahi Shimbun reported two cracks in a concrete floor of the stricken Fukushima No. 1 facility near radioactive water storage tanks. Some contaminated water from the melting snow may have seeped into the ground through the cracks stretching for 12 and 8 meters, TEPCO said.

 

Earlier last year, TEPCO came under criticism for letting radioactive water leak from a tank at Fukushima and also concealing the fact for some time.

Days before Tokyo won its bid to host the 2020 Olympic Games last September, Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe claimed that contaminated water at Fukushima was “under control” and vowed to provide some $500 million to help contain it.

Unbelievable!!

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