Periodic Table’s 7th Period is Finally Complete, IUPAC-IUPAP Officials Say
The 7th period of the periodic table now has four new elements: element 113 (temporarily named as Ununtrium, or Uut), element 115 (Ununpentium, or Uup), element 117 (Ununseptium, or Uus), and element 118 (Ununoctium, or Uuo), says a group of experts from the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) and the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP).
“As the global organization that provides objective scientific expertise and develops the essential tools for the application and communication of chemical knowledge for the benefit of humankind, IUPAC is pleased and honored to make this announcement concerning elements 113, 115, 117, and 118 and the completion of the 7th row of the periodic table of the elements,” said Dr Mark C. Cesa, President of IUPAC.
IUPAP and IUPAC experts have reviewed the relevant literature for elements 113, 115, 117, and 118 and have determined that the claims for the discovery of these elements have been fulfilled:
(i) a team of scientists from the RIKEN Nishina Center for Accelerator-based Science in Japan has fulfilled the criteria for the discovery of element with atomic number Z=113;
(ii) Dubna-Livermore-Oak Ridge collaboration has met the criteria for discovery of the elements with atomic numbers Z=115 and Z=117;
(iii) and the Dubna–Livermore collaboration has fulfilled the criteria for the discovery of element Z=118.
“These groups will be invited to propose permanent names and symbols,” IUPAC/IUPAP experts explained.
The decisions are detailed in two reports accepted for publication in the journal Pure and Applied Chemistry.
“The chemistry community is eager to see its most cherished table finally being completed down to the 7th row,” said Prof. Jan Reedijk, President of the Inorganic Chemistry Division of IUPAC. “IUPAC has now initiated the process of formalizing names and symbols for these elements temporarily named as Ununtrium, Ununpentium, Ununseptium, and Ununoctium.”
“We are excited about these new elements, and we thank the dedicated scientists who discovered them for their painstaking work, as well the members of the IUPAC/IUPAP Joint Working Party for completing their essential and critically important task,” Dr Cesa said.
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Paul J. Karol et al. 2016. Discovery of the elements with atomic numbers Z = 113, 115 and 117. Pure and Applied Chemistry, vol. 88, no. 1
Paul J. Karol et al. 2016. Discovery of the element with atomic number Z = 118 completing the 7th row of the Periodic Table. Pure and Applied Chemistry, vol. 88, no. 1
37-day strike in view for 8,000 City of Montreal workers
The 8,000 white-collar workers of the City of Montreal will be on a rotating strike for 36 days from January 25 to February 29. The various services, offices and boroughs of the city will be affected in turn. This wave will culminate in a general strike day on March 1, the deadline for the payment of municipal taxes. In addition, the white collars will not do any overtime work during this period. However, they will provide all essential services prescribed by law.
With this strike, they are protesting the Coderre administration’s determination to open the floodgates to subcontracting and privatization. They want to raise awareness that this indefensible offensive against internal expertise persists although they have been without a collective agreement for more than four years.
“The work of the Charbonneau Commission and their final report has demonstrated repeatedly that the fight against collusion is impossible without a strong, healthy public service. Instead, the white collars find themselves in the midst of an all-out war with the Coderre administration. The administration wants to eliminate any checks on subcontracting and to reduce the total compensation of white-collar workers by 12 to 14%. We will therefore defend Montreal’s internal expertise with all our might, as long as the Coderre administration refuses to listen to reason,” said Alain Fugère, president of the Island of Montréal white-collar union (CUPE 429).
“The precise words of Recommendation 25 of the Charbonneau Comission are: Internal expertise is an effective bulwark against collusion. Mayor Coderre was elected on the promise that he would strengthen that internal expertise. We want him to explain to Montrealers why he has changed his mind,” added the union president.
Specifically, the City wants to contract out all the work performed by a permanent employee in each of the following sectors: logistics of the purchase and distribution of clothing; information technology; printing; sports and recreation; post offices; parking officers; all or part of the activities already under contract (libraries and public works); and finally, all work carried out by auxiliary workers.
The detailed calendar of the rotating strike is available at http://bit.ly/1Oy6Yq7
With more than 110,000 members in Quebec, CUPE represents about 70% of the province’s municipal employees, who account for 31,000 of the union’s members.
Source: 37-day strike in view for 8,000 City of Montreal workers | Canadian Union of Public Employees
China turmoil pushes global stocks towards worst start to a year in at least 28 years
Global stocks headed for their worst start to a year in at least 28 years, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropping more than 350 points, as turmoil emanating from China spread around the world and billionaire George Soros warned that a larger crisis may be brewing.
The Toronto Stock Exchange lost nearly 2 per cent of its value Thursday morning amid fresh upheaval around the world following another early shutdown of two major Chinese stock markets.
The S&P/TSX composite index was down 222.36 points at 12,504.44 points at 10:30 a.m. after an hour of trading.
The Canadian dollar remained near 12 ½-year lows at 71.13 cents (U.S.) but rose 0.11 cent from Wednesday’s close.
At mid-afternoon, the S&P/TSX composite index had shed 256.14 points at 12,470.66. The Dow Jones Industrial Average had fallen 347.90 points at 16,558.61. The Nasdaq composite index lost 135.56 points at 4,700.20.
The Canadian dollar was trading at 70.98 cents US, down four-100ths from Wednesday’s close.
The world’s financial markets are being tossed by developments in China, where the central bank made a surprise move to adjust its currency rate and two major stock exchanges were closed early Thursday because of a sudden drop in stock prices.
“It is shaping up to be another (wildly) negative day in global equity markets,” said Douglas Porter, chief economist with BMO Financial Group, in a note to clients.
“Panic is at play here, and having the (People’s Bank of China) trying to stem the losses by imposing all sorts of rules and regulations does not help over the longer term.”
In New York, the Dow Jones was initially down more than 300 points but recovered somewhat to 16,711.09, down 195.42 points, or 1.2 peer cent. The S&P 500 index was down 23.42 points, or 1.2 per cent, at 1,966.84 and the Nasdaq fell by 71.36 points or 1.6 per cent at 4,372.62.
On the commodity markets, February contracts for crude oil reduced their earlier losses to 63 cents, trading at $33.34 per barrel, and gold futures rose $14.20 to $1,106.10 an ounce.
Earlier Thursday, trading on China’s Shanghai and Shenzen stock markets were pre-emptively halted for a second time this week after new “circuit breakers” were triggered when a benchmark stock index fell seven per cent.
The circuit breakers also kicked in Monday, the first day of trading since they were introduced on Jan. 1. The China Securities Regulatory Commission said after Thursday’s shutdown that the circuit breaker rule had been suspended.
Chinese markets have lurched up and down as regulators gradually withdraw emergency measures imposed after the main stock index plunged in June following an explosive rise.
A similar price plunge Monday triggered a sell-off on Wall Street and other global markets.
On Thursday, trading was suspended after a market index, the CSI 300, nosedived 7 per cent a half-hour after markets opened, triggering a “circuit breaker” that took effect Jan. 1.
Financial analysts have warned Chinese markets are likely to see extreme volatility for a few more months as they seek a stable level following last year’s rout.
The “circuit breaker” requires a 15-minute pause in trading if the CSI 300 falls 5 per cent within 30 minutes. But Thursday’s decline was so fast that before that could take effect, it hit the 7 per cent limit that ends trading for the day.
“China has a major adjustment problem,” influential investor Soros said Thursday at an economic forum in Colombo, Sri Lanka. “I would say it amounts to a crisis.
“When I look at the financial markets there is a serious challenge which reminds me of the crisis we had in 2008.”
Contagion from China helped wipe $2.5 trillion off the value of global equities in the first six days of this year as the nation’s tolerance for a weaker currency is viewed as evidence that policy-makers are struggling to revive an economy that’s the world’s biggest user of energy, metals and grains. The World Bank cut its global growth forecasts for this year and next as China’s slowdown prolongs a commodity slump and contractions endure in Brazil and Russia. The U.K.’s Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne says a “dangerous cocktail” of global threats faces the British economy this year.
European stocks fell for the third time in four days, mirroring declines that shook global equities in August, as they extended the worst start to a year since 2000 amid a China-fueled selloff in mining and energy shares.
European shares have tumbled 6.4 per cent in the first four days of the year as companies with the most sales in the world’s second-biggest economy bear the brunt of the decline. Anglo American Plc and Glencore Plc tumbled 6 per cent or more today, pushing a gauge of miners to its lowest level since 2009. Carmakers fell to a three-month low.
Equities around the world are in retreat as an eighth day of cuts in the yuan’s reference rate exacerbated concern that growth in China is slowing more than previously forecast. The declines are a setback for European equity bulls who had speculated that central-bank stimulus and a slowly improving economy would insulate the region from stress in Asia and North America.
“The Chinese economic outlook is getting bleaker,” said Daniel Weston, chief investment officer of Aimed Capital in Munich. “Chinese demand for European exports is weakening and the price of European goods and services is getting costlier for the Chinese. In August, the Chinese said it would be a ‘one off’ devaluation, but now the market knows it is much more than that.”
The Stoxx Europe 600 Index slid as much as 3.6 per cent, the most since August, before trading 3.3 per cent lower at 12:01 p.m. in London. All but seven stocks fell. Germany’s DAX Index lost 3.5 per cent to 9,858.15, trading below 10,000 for the first time since October.
The Stoxx 600 is on track for its worst week since August, when China’s yuan devaluation sparked a selloff that saw Europe’s benchmark plunge as much as 18 per cent from its record. The VStoxx Index measuring volatility expectations in euro-area shares jumped 17 per cent, heading for its biggest weekly advance since April.
The DAX, whose exporters have a greater exposure to China, has tumbled 8.3 per cent this week, heading for its worst loss since August 2011. It’s down 14 percent since a November high. The benchmark entered a bear market at the height of the summer rout, before rebounding as much as 21 percent.
The rout spread to the Middle East. Saudi Arabian stocks led a decline in Middle Eastern markets as the slump in oil prices deepened amid a global equity rout spurred by the financial turmoil in China.
The Tadawul All Share Index slid as much as 5 per cent before paring its decline to 4.8 per cent at 2:58 p.m. in Riyadh. The DFM General Index retreated 3.4 percent, the most in almost two months, to the lowest level since Dec. 15. The Bloomberg GCC 200 Index, a gauge that tracks the 200 largest stocks in the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council, declined for a fifth day to the lowest since January 2013.
China is one of the biggest trading partners of Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil exporter, and the United Arab Emirates, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
Saudi Basic Industries Corp. dropped 4.2 per cent. The company, one of the world’s largest chemicals manufacturers, was trading at the lowest level since September 2009. Three technical indicators were this week suggesting the share may be ready to rebound. The yield on Sabic’s 2.625 percent bonds due October 2018 rose six basis points to highest level since February 2014.
Saudi Cable Company, a Jeddah-based cable and reel manufacturer, was set for the lowest close since March 2003. The company said on Wednesday it expects a 3 percent impact on output costs from Saudi Arabia’s subsidy cuts.
Stocks in the region have been under further strain as relations between Shiite-majority Iran and Arab nations worsened. The Saudis on Saturday executed 47 people accused of terrorism-related activities, including a Shiite cleric, which prompted protesters to attack the kingdom’s embassy in Tehran. In turn, Saudi Arabia and a number of its allies cut diplomatic ties with the Islamic Republic.
“With oil going the way it is and China reacting the way it is reacting and the tension between Iran and Saudi, it was very much expected, long overdue,” Ahmed Shehada, executive director for advisory and institutions at NBAD Securities LLC, said by phone from Dubai. “The market is looking quite bearish.”
The yield on Dubai’s government bond due October 2020 rose eight basis points to the highest level since January 2015. Emaar Properties PJSC, the company with the biggest weighting on the emirate’s main stock index, was the largest contributor to the gauge’s retreat. The developer sank 5.4 percent, the most since Aug. 23.
Qatar’s QE Index slid 3 percent and Abu Dhabi’s ADX General Index lost 3.2 percent, the most since August. Kuwaiti stocks decreased 1.6 percent and Bahraini equities lost 0.7 percent. Oman’s MSM 30 Index dropped 0.5 percent.
Turkey’s Borsa Istanbul 100 Index fell, heading for the lowest level in more than three weeks. The lira weakened for a fifth day against the dollar and was among the worst-performing emerging market currencies on Thursday.
Israel’s TA-25 Index dropped 1.8 per cent. The declines were led by Opko Health Inc. and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd., tracking the losses of their U.S.-traded shares.
—with files from Bloomberg News
Source: China turmoil pushes global stocks towards worst start to a year in at least 28 years | Toronto Star
Oil lurches closer to $20 Goldman Sachs doomsday forecast: ‘The supports are crumbling’
LONDON — When U.S. investment bank Goldman Sachs said last year that oil could fall as low as US$20 per barrel, it assigned a fairly low probability to that scenario.
Fast-forward five months and in some parts of the world the forecast has already proved correct. Canadian physical crude has been selling this week at below US$20 per barrel, less than it costs to extract and transport. Traders in the options market, meanwhile, are taking protection against prices falling below US$25.
The developments reflect growing concerns that a market already awash in too much oil is now suffering the double-whammy of a sharp slowdown in U.S. and Chinese demand.
For the past 18 months, oversupply has been the main factor responsible for dragging down prices by two-thirds, after Saudi Arabia pushed OPEC to ramp up exports to fight for market share with higher-cost producers such as U.S. shale firms.
Low prices spurred global demand to multi-year highs, saving oil from a further collapse and encouraging producers to hope that the market might recover later in 2016.
But just as Saudi Arabia was about to start celebrating its first tactical victories, with U.S. output declining under pressure from low prices, signs are emerging that demand in the United States, China and Europe is much weaker than anticipated.
Estimated demand from China, the world’s second largest consumer and the engine of global economic growth since the commodities boom started in the early 2000s, fell in both September and November, compared to the same months of 2014.
U.S. demand, the world’s largest, began falling from October, according to the latest available data, despite low gasoline prices, while U.S. distillate demand slid to its lowest for more than a decade towards the end of 2015.
Demand in the European Union turned flat in October, having surprised on the upside throughout most of the year.
“2015 started off with a spectacular growth in demand. But in the last quarter of 2015, things seem to have changed,” said Abhishek Deshpande, an analyst at banking and investment group Natixis.
“SUPPORTS CRUMBLING”
Goldman’s drastic scenario was based on the logic that the market might have to undergo a US$20 per barrel price shock in order to force an acceleration in the shutdown of unprofitable production.
That no longer seems fanciful.
“Oil has been under pressure as of late, and downside risks of a dip into the US$20s have grown,” Bank of America Merrill Lynch said on Thursday.
The same day, Brent and WTI futures fell briefly to their lowest levels since 2004, near US$32 per barrel, as a sliding yuan and an emergency halt in Chinese stock market trading left Asian markets in turmoil.
Oil has been under pressure as of late, and downside risks of a dip into the US$20s have grown
For oil prices to fall as much as 5 per cent in early and usually calm Asian trading hours is very rare, and even veteran chart-watchers are now struggling to draw a line under the biggest rout in decades.
“The supports are crumbling… There is not a winning long in the market – maximum pain is lower. It is not advised to be long,” said Robin Bieber of brokers PVM.
He said there would not be much to stop oil falling into the mid-US$20s if WTI crude fell below the US$32.40 a barrel support level. Minutes later, WTI fell as low as US$32.10, although prices slightly recovered towards US$34 per barrel later in the day.
NEGATIVE OIL
Over the past year, the world has been producing 1.5 million bpd more oil than it consumes. OPEC and the International Energy Agency expect global demand growth to slow in 2016 to around 1.20-1.25 million barrels per day from a very high 1.8 million bpd in 2015.
That means that for most of 2016 the world will still be producing more than it can consume, adding to record stockpiles already exceeding 3 billion barrels.
The options market is showing that fears are indeed on the rise that futures could fall further. The Chicago Board Options Exchange’s oil volatility index has risen 20 per cent so far this year.
Implied volatility in ICE Brent options – including the US$30/barrel and US$25/barrel Feb 16 option – has spiked in recent weeks. Some investors are protecting themselves by acquiring put options giving them the right to sell at US$25, anticipating that Brent will fall below that.
“There has been more interest in buying options like US$25 puts and open interest has increased. Volatility has been rallying. The action that we have seen shows that people have a bearish slant,” said a senior options trader at a major bank.
But while the futures market is only preparing for a dip below US$30 per barrel, prices in the physical markets – where oil producers sell and refiners buy actual barrels – have already fallen much further.
The price of an OPEC basket of 13 crude grades fell to US$29.71 a barrel on Wednesday, according to calculations from the cartel.
Most shocking was the outright price of Canadian heavy crude, which dropped below UA$20 a barrel.
Northern Alberta’s vast oilsands hold the world’s third-largest crude reserves but carry some of the highest production costs globally — up to US$50 a barrel — because of the energy-intensive production process.
Most Canadian and U.S. companies will likely keep producing to pay bills and loans, even if the crude price does not cover cash operating costs such as extraction, blending and transportation.
“There is a high risk a lot of these companies could fold, but really speaking we are looking at more consolidation and potential restructuring,” Natixis analyst Deshpande said.
© Thomson Reuters 2016
Andrew Phillip Chernoff 