Sharchen

Ideally, a new airport to replace CNX would be built between Chiang Mai and Lamphun. Then you could redevelop that valuable land and dramatically ease traffic congestion caused by routing issues (especially given the military base, which needs to be moved too). But that doesn't seem to be in the cards. Also, I used to live in Hillside 3 and the Thai Airways Boeing 777 to Bangkok would rattle the building.

So if it's going to be two airports, the new one has to be far-enough away from the existing one not to cause air traffic issues, hence Lamphun. Hopefully they will re-designate CNX only fit for smaller planes. 777s are too much!

I've lived in Chiang Mai for a year. When I would mention "old city" to a Thai, I would receive a confused look, then an epiphany that I must be referring to a ruin outside of town. It's "city center" around here, unless there's a new attempt at re-branding for UNESCO purposes.

Advise to expats, sell Thai baht, sit on cash until the crisis passes overhead. You'll come out with a much improved exchange rate and plenty of cheap assets to choose from at the end of the year.

Would that really be a sound advice?

If the finance storms hits globally, what will be different in Thailand than, let's say, in Europe?

Why would THB take a hit and not EUR or USD?

In a crisis, there's always a flight to safety. In 2008-9, despite the financial crisis originating in America, American T-Bills were selling like hotcakes. When you're scared, you run home to momma. That's the US, especially now that the Euro has shown it's underbelly.

Isn't this deal similar to the Russia-China deal to accept each other's currencies?

Having a global reserve currency has advantage - a bit like the way Microsoft standardized the PC - but many countries believe the US is abusing its currency monopoly. The Euro - originally a French idea - was partly meant to be a counter force to to dollar but it has failed. China seems to only power able to offer an alternative.

I think that was more Russia's idea to move the needle toward a petro-Ruble. With the collapse of oil and the Russian economy along with it, I'll bet the Chinese are wincing at having to accept Rubles.

This could be my projection, but I get the sense that this guy is peddling the little girl to take advantage of sympathy from strangers. If he's a down-and-out drug-addict, then she's his meal-ticket and he will not part with her without a fight. The situation is analogous to a parasite attached to a host rather than a father's love for his daughter. Separating the two will likely require the authorities or a baseball bat. Again, this could be my projection.

They should build power plants that use gasification of rice straw/husks and captures the ash. We utilize an energy source that is plentiful and was going to be burned anyway (no additional CO2), we significantly reduce air pollution, and the captured ash has economic value. Triple-win!

http://www.bioenergyconsult.com/tag/energy-potential-of-rice-husk/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Husk_Power_Systems

Does Thailand produce coal or will it be imported ?

I was surprised to learn that Thailand produces more than Great Britain. I don't know if that's enough to avoid imports.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_coal_production

It's ridiculous they're pushing the "Clean Coal" propaganda. There's no such thing. Interesting they said they would switch to LPG if they couldn't do coal when wind costs the same.

That's a good start and it will encourage better recycling. I would suggest adding solar and developing power plants that burn rice straw and capture the soot.

Just went there today for an executive physical. Great experience with great staff/equipment and 30% less than Bumrungrad. Also got a flu shot. Could I have gotten a better value at Ram? Maybe, but I'm happy.

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it's not killing Russia. it's killing smaller shale oil producers in the US who need an oil price at 70-75$ to break even.These are the ones that will stop at such low prices. Russia's producers and also the ones in the Middle East have much lower break even points than current price levels.

At $70 a barrel 40% of the shale producers are loosing money. Do they continue to loose money for the sake of the Motherland? Some will continue to hemorage money as they have land lease payments and equipment rental costs. If they do not keep their experienced workers they will be in trouble when the oil tide turns which it must when operations are shut down. The Saudi's will not cut production they learned last time it does not work as their own OPEC members stabbed them in the back and increased production.

Yes, OPEC has been officially rendered toothless, Russia can't curb production because they desperately need the cash, and oil shale is playing out faster than expected. The world economy will recover, and with it oil prices. This may be our last reprieve to invest in renewables.

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Yes, I agree. I am a Buddhist who has traveled to Buddhist/Hindu sites and ceremonies in India and Nepal for months and I've seen both left and right facing.

What I have never seen is a religious swastika placed in that context. The context appears quite aggressive with entangled jagged lines reminiscent of lightening bolts and barbed wire. It would seem to suggest neo-nazi symbology. Plus, most people who paint or tatoo a religious symbol, place it high on their body out of respect. This was on his calf.

If you consider Karma a law, then sex with another man's wife definitely breaks the law. It's called inappropriate sexual contact and engaging in it can produce repercussions lasting lifetimes. Karma is a relentless cop, judge, and jailer in that you never get away with the crime and you always serve the sentence. Don't go there. You're only creating misery for yourself and others.

Good thing:

Soon a wide range of very cheap houses to choose from, if you have the money and need a house.

Could be, but don't forget that Thais aren't in the habit of lowering the price on anything no matter how long it sits. After 1997 some buildings just sat and rotted.

In a Western country, if a house or care was taken back for default, the bank would have to mark the asset to market. In other words if they were carrying a car on their books as collateral for 1 million baht but it's was reposessed and it's true value was 700K baht, they'd have to write a loss on their books for 300K baht. Enough of that and the bank runs out of its own capital and is bust. That happened in the US and many banks needed bailout loans.

But Thailand refuses to mark to market or sell at market; both of which would trigger a loss of the bank's own capital. I don't know how they get away with it. See the rice scheme and the nearly 1 trillion baht borrowed from the Ag Bank for rice that either doesn't exist or is rotten and no sales have been made. Even if they sold it they paid way above world market value. But they just keep carrying that collateral on their books as it it was there to cover the loans.

I do know they borrowed some money from the IMF after 1997 but I don't know if they paid it back.

All in all I wouldn't put more money in a Thai bank than I needed for next month's expenses.

Thai inflation jumped in 1998 from 5.6% to 8%. I suppose that's one way to mark to market! Then again, inflation plummeted in 1999 to 0.3%, probably because the IMF put the screws to the govt. Inflation was 2.2% last year. My guess is the govt. would let inflation rise if there was a crisis (and no IMF intervention). I noticed the dollar has been creeping up on the baht lately...

Here's a table of household debt in the US going back to 1947. The US topped-out at 95% in Q1 2009 (financial crisis) and has steadily declined over 5 years to 77% (2003 levels), only rising again in Q1 of this year.

http://www.economagic.com/em-cgi/data.exe/var/togdp-householdsectordebt

Trying to find a country-by-country comparison table for household debt (that goes beyond the wealthiest counties). Here's one for domestic credit that puts TH 14th overall last year. Given the recent spike, TH has undoubtedly moved up a few slots.

http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/FS.AST.DOMS.GD.ZS/countries?order=wbapi_data_value_2013+wbapi_data_value+wbapi_data_value-last&sort=desc