Chaos Is Taking a Sabbatical in Indonesia
Bad news can be good for Indonesia. A slowdown in economic growth and the prospective hit from US tariffs may be imposing some discipline on President Prabowo Subianto's government. It's a welcome change.
The former general is only seven months into his term and some of the toughest decisions probably still lie ahead. Nonetheless, the sense of chaos that characterized the very start of the administration has abated. Markets approve the return of normalcy: The rupiah has gained this quarter after disappointing last year, and a recent bond auction was well received. Offshore investors are warming to the nation's stock market after seven months of outflows.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Forbes
an hour ago
- Forbes
Remaining Nimble In Times Of Upheaval
The ground keeps shifting beneath our feet. In the span of 48 hours last week, I had a government contract for a program on crisis communications cancelled, reinstated, and cancelled again. I don't dare remove the program from my calendar in case it gets reinstated again. Fortunately, government contracts make up a small fraction of my work, so this isn't a crisis for me. But for all of us, the uncertainty in the business world can suck up precious time and mental energy, as well as cause us to hold off making decisions. Here are some suggestions for helping you steady the ship and move forward as you're buffeted by shifting headwinds and powerful waves of change. Reinforce for yourself and your team your core identity. We can't pivot if we don't have a starting point. A basketball player pivots effectively because she keeps one foot planted. She knows her starting point. If your team or your entire organization is threatened with external, arbitrary change, in your next meeting, remind everyone what you all stand for. Publicly articulating both your values and your mission will help you remember the underlying principles that will guide your decisions as you're caught up in the maelstrom. When Covenant House, a non-profit organization that houses young people experiencing homelessness, was instructed by various government agencies to limit the number of youth in its shelters during the Covid epidemic, the senior leadership could have frozen or panicked. Instead, they reminded themselves of the organization's mission to never turn away a kid in need. Knowing that remaining open is essential to their identity gave them the starting point for their decision-making. Since denying shelter to someone was not an option, the alternative was to turn offices, conference rooms, and other spaces into sleeping quarters. Knowing their mission also helped spur the creativity they needed when addressing how to feed, educate, and address medical needs of their residents. Remind yourself of the limits within which your organization operates. Although some groups are good at ignoring the rules of the game, most of us don't have that luxury, or that chutzpah. We're not only a nation of laws, but a business community bound by certain rules and regulations. Sometimes, those rules feel like restrictions. But sometimes, legal limits on our behavior make our decisions easier by taking certain actions off the table. When asked to take certain actions, being able to respond with, 'We're simply not allowed to do that,' can shift the conversation. When the pandemic struck, shuttering restaurants and cafeterias across the country, Dot Foods, Inc., the nation's largest food redistributor, found itself with massive amounts of food stuck in a supply chain that had ground to a halt. Some of their inventory is perishable and can't be sold beyond a particular date. Part of their corporate ethos is to minimize waste and support the communities in which they operate. The combination of knowing their limits and knowing themselves allowed them to pivot quickly and increase their donations to food pantries across the country. Gather ideas from outside the normal team. Your organization has a lot of talent. How well are you tapping into it? The demands some are faced with these days are not only novel, but they are also shockingly contrarian to the way we have always operated. Your immediate team is practiced at thinking and communicating a certain way. In times of upheaval, we need not only new ideas, but new ways of thinking. You may be well served by bringing different voices into the conversation. That doesn't mean opening up your Executive Committee to the entire firm. It means asking each person on your leadership team to reach out to people they may not normally interact with to understand the perspectives of those on the ground. If your leadership team communicates directly with voices and perspectives from which they are normally insulated, your team's ability to brainstorm new approaches expands dramatically. Many public-private partnerships exemplify the increased ability to tackle problems better by leveraging a variety of perspectives in the conversation. The Emerging Leaders Program – Bronx – is the classic example of this type of success. ELP-Bx works with six high schools in the South Bronx to expose young scholars to leadership skills and careers and help them see new paths for success in life. The organization is thriving because of the significant involvement of senior leaders in state and local government as well as at firms like JPM Asset Management and Brookfield Properties, among others. John Garibaldi, ELP Bx founder, says, 'Obviously, financial support from corporate sponsors and individual donors is essential to our success. But equally important are the ideas and perspectives that our partners in education, government, and business share in our consultation discussions. We couldn't accomplish all we have if we limited our conversations to people from one discipline, regardless of how smart they are. The plurality of perspectives is essential.' Stay humble. Learning requires humility. Changing course requires acknowledging mistakes. That's not failure; that's bravery. Ask yourself two questions: On a scale of 0-10, how much of a perfectionist am I? On a scale of 0-10, how hard am I on myself when I make a mistake? In business decisions, accept that there is no perfect answer. There are a dozen great answers, any one if which will present its own set of challenges but will still work. As a leader, accept that you will make mistakes. The American writer and philosopher George Saunders once paraphrased Descartes by saying, 'I think, therefore I am wrong.' Accepting that we won't always get it right allows us to remain creative and open to new ideas. Summary In short, as we continue to need to adapt in an ever-changing business landscape, we'll be more successful if we remind ourselves of our mission, see our limits as guideposts rather than hurdles, gain insight from a variety of perspectives, and acknowledge that we won't get everything right the first time.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Sidheshwar Shirsath, centre, sits with his wife, Manisha, and their son, Soham, 6, as they examine gold jewelry in their Mumbai home. Shirsath, who works as a driver, began buying the jewelry nine years ago as a solid investment for his family's future. In recent months, the price of gold has skyrocketed.
Sidheshwar Shirsath, who lives in the suburbs of India's financial capital, Mumbai, first started buying gold when he got married nine years ago. Shirsath, 35, works as a driver and earns about 55,000 rupees ($889 Cdn) a month. He decided that gold might be a good way to build a nest egg for his family's future. Whenever he had some cash to spend, he purchased gold jewelry, including rings and bangles, and he now has about 130 grams of gold, worth more than one million rupees ($16,000 Cdn). "Sometime after I first bought gold, the rates started increasing, so my interest in investing in it also grew," Shirsath said. In recent months — to his delight — the price has skyrocketed. Gold globally was trading at $3,298 US an ounce on Friday morning, up more than 25 per cent since the start of the year, and up 42 per cent compared with a year ago. Gold's value globally has surged amid global economic uncertainty and geopolitical tensions, including concerns about the impact of U.S. President Donald Trump's tariff policy. The precious metal is often seen as a "safe haven" asset that investors flock to during periods of economic turbulence. In India, the price has risen even more sharply and is up 30 per cent since the beginning of the year — with the additional increase driven by the rupee's depreciation against the American dollar. But for many Indians, like Shirsath, gold is more than an investment. "Gold is very close to Indian women," he said, his wife, Manisha, sitting next to him in their modest home, adorned with a heavy gold choker and gleaming bangles. "They need gold — especially for festivals and weddings." In India, gold is primarily purchased it in the form of jewelry because it can be a way of showing off one's wealth and status. The precious metal also holds enormous religious and cultural significance. It is part of the dowry in weddings, for example, and it is considered to be auspicious to buy gold during certain Hindu festivals. "India is a very unique market for gold ," said Sachin Jain, regional CEO, India, for the World Gold Council, a global industry association. "Gold is a part of the social fabric, and you don't need to be in any particular economic strata to consume gold. "We all in India have a family doctor, so to say, and we have a family jeweller." In rural India, where most of the country's 1.4 billion people still live — and with many not having easy access to bank accounts — gold is a popular way of storing savings, Jain said. All of this means that India is one of the world's largest consumers of gold, with the country's demand for the precious metal hitting about 800 tonnes a year. The steep price, however, is having an impact on the quantity of the metal that people are buying. "With jewelry consumption, whenever the price of gold goes up, the consumer waits and watches," Jain said. "The moment it gets a bit settled, we see consumers come back." The World Gold Council's data shows that demand for gold in India in the first three months of this year stood at 118.1 tonnes, down by 15 per cent compared with the first quarter of last year. But because the price is up, the value of the country's gold demand — which is the quantity of gold that is bought or invested — in the first quarter of this year actually rose by 22 per cent, to reach 940 billion rupees ($15.1 billion Cdn). "People are buying lower quantities," said Colin Shah, managing director of Kama Jewelry, a Mumbai-based manufacturer. "They all have budgets. If someone has $2,000 to spend, they'll spend that and buy a lower volume." But, he said, that gold has by no means lost its shine, despite its high price. "In India, there is a culture of gold, and nobody is going to stop buying gold because of pricing," Shah said. "Actually, they'll have more confidence in the category due to the return they are making on their money." With Indians' appetite to own gold showing no signs of easing, the government in recent years has taken a series of steps to try to ensure that gold is brought into the formal economy. These include lowering the import duty on gold last year to six per cent from 15 per cent, partly as a way of making it less attractive for people to smuggle gold into the country to avoid paying high taxes. The government also offers sovereign gold bonds as an alternative to physical gold. The World Gold Council's Jain said that Indians are increasingly investing in gold digitally, for example, through exchange-traded funds (ETFs) — and the price surge has only encouraged people to look at these options. "The young generation is getting more and more savvy, and with the ease of technology, we believe that investment into gold and gold assets is going to get a little more digital," he said. Gold investment demand, including ETFs, rose by seven per cent in India to 46.7 tonnes in the first quarter, according to the World Gold Council. JPMorgan forecasts that the price of gold could hit $4,000 US an ounce next year. Shirsath said that he and his family have more than enough jewelry now, but he still wants to keep buying gold. "My next plan is to buy gold coins or go for bonds." WATCH | Big box stores offer gold to customers as its popularity heats up: Sign in to access your portfolio
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Economics reporter reveals uncertainty of end goal for Trump tariffs from sources
President Trump announced a pledge to raise tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum imports, saying he'll double them from 25% to 50%. Axios senior economics reporter Courtenay Brown joins Alex Witt to discuss this impact and Trump's economic agenda.
