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lanacion.com | Economía | Domingo 13 de setiembre de 2009

Fwd: Elements of Deflation, Part 2 - John Mauldin's Weekly E-Letter

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From: John Mauldin <wave@frontlinethoughts.com>
Date: 2009/9/12
Subject: Elements of Deflation, Part 2 - John Mauldin's Weekly E-Letter
To: ggarcianunez@gmail.com

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Thoughts from the Frontline Weekly Newsletter Elements of Deflation, Part 2 by John Mauldin September 11, 2009
In this issue: Elements of Deflation, Part 2 The Velocity Factor Y=MV Sir, I Have Not Yet Begun to Print There Are No Good Choices Washington DC, San Diego, and New Orleans, etc.
Just as water is formed by the basic elements hydrogen and oxygen, deflation has its own fundamental components. Last week we started exploring those elements, and this week we continue. I feel that the most fundamental of decisions we face in building investment portfolios is correctly deciding whether we are faced with inflation or deflation in our future. (And I tell you later on when to worry about inflation.) Most investments behave quite differently depending on whether we are in a deflationary or inflationary environment. Get this answer wrong and it could rise up to bite you. The problem is that there is not an easy answer. In fact, the answer is that it could be both. Today I got another letter from Peter Schiff, who seems to be ubiquitous. He says the rise in gold is because of rising inflation expectations among investors. Gold is predicting inflation. Maybe, but the correlation between gold and inflation for the last 25-plus years has been zero. I rather think that gold is rising in terms of value against most major fiat (paper) currencies because it is seen as a neutral currency. The Fed and the Obama administration seem to be pursuing policies that are dollar-negative, and they give no hint of letting up. The rise in gold above $1,000 does not really tell us anything about the future of inflation. In fact, it is my belief that if the Fed were to withdraw from the scene of economic battle, the forces of deflation would be felt in short order. The answer to the question "Will we have inflation in our future?" is "You better hope so!" I wrote in 2003, when Greenspan was holding down rates too long in order to spur the economy, that the best outcome or endgame over the course of the full cycle would be stagflation. I still think that is the most likely scenario. The Fed will fight deflation and knows how to do that. They also know what to do when inflation becomes too high. But there is a cost. It is not a matter of pain or no pain; it is a matter of choosing which pain we will face and for how long, and perhaps in what order. As I wrote a few weeks ago, like teenagers, we as an economic polity have made some very bad choices. We are now in a scenario where there are no good choices, just less-bad ones. In a normal world, the amount of monetary and fiscal stimulus we are witnessing would produce inflation in very short order. That is what has the gold bugs of the world excited. It is their moment. They keep repeating that Milton Friedman taught us that inflation was always and everywhere a matter of too much money being printed. The answer to that is that the statement is mostly true, but not always and not everywhere (think Japan). The reality is somewhat more nuanced. Let's review something I wrote last year about the velocity of money, and this time we are going to go into the concept a little more deeply. This is critical to your understanding of what is facing us. The Velocity Factor When most of us think of the velocity of money, we think of how fast it goes through our hands. I know at the Mauldin household, with seven kids, it seems like something is always coming up. And what about my business? Travel costs are way, way up; and as aggressive as we are on the budget, expenses always seem to rise. Compliance, legal, and accounting costs are through the roof. I wonder how those costs are accounted for in the Consumer Price Index? About the only way to deal with it, as my old partner from the 1970s Don Moore used to say, is to make up the rise in costs with "excess profits," whatever those are. Is the Money Supply Growing or Not? But we are not talking about our personal budgetary woes, gentle reader. Today we tackle an economic concept called the velocity of money, and how it affects the growth of the economy. Let's start with a few charts showing the recent high growth in the money supply that many are alarmed about. The money supply is growing very slowly, alarmingly fast, or just about right, depending upon which monetary measure you use. First, let's look at the adjusted monetary base, or plain old cash plus bank reserves (remember that fact) held at the Federal Reserve. That is the only part of the money supply the Fed has any real direct control of. Until very recently, there was very little year-over-year growth. The monetary base grew along a rather predictable long-term trend line, with some variance from time to time, but always coming back to the mean. But in the last few months the monetary base has grown by a staggering amount. And when you see the "J-curve" in the monetary base (which is likely to rise even more!) it does demand an explanation. There are those who suggest this is an indication of a Federal Reserve gone wild and that 2,000-dollar gold and a plummeting dollar are just around the corner. They are looking at that graph and leaping to conclusions. But it is what you don't see that is important. Now, let's introduce the concept of the velocity of money. Basically, this is the average frequency with which a unit of money is spent. Let's assume a very small economy of just you and me, which has a money supply of $100. I have the $100 and spend it to buy $100 worth of flowers from you. You in turn spend the $100 to buy books from me. We have created $200 of our "gross domestic product" from a money supply of just $100. If we do that transaction every month, in a year we would have $2400 of "GDP" from our $100 monetary base. So, what that means is that gross domestic product is a function not just of the money supply but how fast the money supply moves through the economy. Stated as an equation, it is Y=MV, where Y is the nominal gross domestic product (not inflation-adjusted here), M is the money supply, and V is the velocity of money. You can solve for V by dividing Y by M. Now let's dig a little deeper. Y, or nominal GDP, can actually written as Y=PQ, that is, GDP is the Price paid times the total Quantity of goods sold. Therefore, since Y=MV, the equation can be written as MV=PQ. But the point is that Price (P) is tied to the velocity (V) of money. You can increase the supply of money, and if velocity drops you can still see a drop in the "P," or inflation. Now, let's complicate our illustration just a bit, but not too much at first. This is very basic, and for those of you who will complain that I am being too simple, wait a few paragraphs, please. Let's assume an island economy with 10 businesses and a money supply of $1,000,000. If each business does approximately $100,000 of business a quarter, then the gross domestic product for the island would be $4,000,000 (4 times the $1,000,000 quarterly production). The velocity of money in that economy is 4. But what if our businesses got more productive? We introduce all sorts of interesting financial instruments, banking, new production capacity, computers, etc.; and now everyone is doing $100,000 per month. Now our GDP is $12,000,000 and the velocity of money is 12. But we have not increased the money supply. Again, we assume that all businesses are static. They buy and sell the same amount every month. There are no winners and losers as of yet. Now let's complicate matters. Two of the kids of the owners of the businesses decide to go into business for themselves. Having learned from their parents, they immediately become successful and start doing $100,000 a month themselves. GDP potentially goes to $14,000,000. But, in order for everyone to stay at the same level of gross income, the velocity of money must increase to 14. Now, this is important. If the velocity of money does NOT increase, that means (in our simple island world) that on average each business is now going to buy and sell less each month. Remember, nominal GDP is money supply times velocity. If velocity does not increase and money supply stays the same, GDP must stay the same, and the average business (there are now 12) goes from doing $1,200,000 a year down to $1,000,000. Each business now is doing around $80,000 per month. Overall production on our island is the same, but is divided up among more businesses. For each of the businesses, it feels like a recession. They have fewer dollars, so they buy less and prices fall. They fall into actual deflation (very simplistically speaking). So, in that world, the local central bank recognizes that the money supply needs to grow at some rate in order to make the demand for money "neutral." It is basic supply and demand. If the demand for corn increases, the price will go up. If Congress decides to remove the ethanol subsidy, the demand for corn will go down, as will the price. If the central bank increased the money supply too much, you would have too much money chasing too few goods, and inflation would rear its ugly head. (Remember, this is a very simplistic example. We assume static production from each business, running at full capacity.) Let's say the central bank doubles the money supply to $2,000,000. If the velocity of money is still 12, then the GDP would grow to $24,000,000. That would be a good thing, wouldn't it? No, because only 20% more goods is produced from the two new businesses. There is a relationship between production and price. Each business would now sell $200,000 per month or double their previous sales, which they would spend on goods and services, which only grew by 20%. They would start to bid up the price of the goods they want, and inflation would set in. Think of the 1970s. So, our mythical bank decides to boost the money supply by only 20%, which allows the economy to grow and prices to stay the same. Smart. And if only it were that simple. Let's assume 10 million businesses, from the size of Exxon down to the local dry cleaners, and a population which grows by 1% a year. Hundreds of thousands of new businesses are being started every month, and another hundred thousand fail. Productivity over time increases, so that we are producing more "stuff" with fewer costly resources. Now, there is no exact way to determine the right size of the money supply. It definitely needs to grow each year by at least the growth in the size of the economy, plus some more for new population, and you have to factor in productivity. If you don't then deflation will appear. But if the money supply grows too much, then you've got inflation. And what about the velocity of money? Friedman assumed the velocity of money was constant. And it was from about 1950 until 1978 when he was doing his seminal work. But then things changed. Let's look at two charts, the first from Stifel Nicolaus Capital Markets. Here we see the velocity of money for the last 109 years. The left side of the chart shows the velocity of money using both M2 and M3 (measures of the money supply.) Notice that the velocity of money fell during the Great Depression. And from 1953 to 1980 the velocity of money was almost exactly the average for the last 100 years. Lacy Hunt, in a conversation that helped me immensely in writing this letter, explained that the velocity of money is mean reverting over long periods of time. That means one would expect the velocity of money to fall over time back to the mean or average. Some would make the argument that we should use the mean from more modern times since World War II, but even then mean reversion would mean a slowing of the velocity of money (V), and mean reversion implies that V would go below (overcorrect) the mean. However you look at it, the clear implication is that V is going to drop. In a few paragraphs, we will see why that is the case from a practical standpoint. But let's look at the first chart. Y=MV And then let's go back to our equation, Y=MV. If velocity slows by 30% (which it well has in terms of M3 – and it is down more than 15% in terms of M2) then money supply (M) would have to rise by that percentage just to maintain a static economy. But that assumes you do not have 1% population growth, 2% (or thereabouts) productivity growth, and a target inflation of 2%, which mean M (money supply) would need to grow about 5% a year, even if V were constant. And that is not particularly stimulative, given that we are in recession. And notice in the chart below that M2 has not been growing that much lately, after shooting up in late 2008 as the Fed flooded the market with liquidity. Bottom line? Expect money-supply growth well north of what the economy could normally tolerate for the next few years. Is that enough? Too much? About right? We won't know for a long time. This will allow armchair economists (and that is most of us) to sit back and Monday morning quarterback for many years. But this is important. The Fed is going to continue to print money as long as they are not confident deflation is no longer a problem. They can't tell us what that number is because they don't know. My guess is if they did tell us the markets would simply throw up, especially the bond market, which would of course make the situation from a deflation-fighting point of view even worse. Sir, I Have Not Yet Begun to Print Remember the story of John Paul Jones? An American naval officer during the American Revolution (the French gave him a medal, although the British referred to him as a pirate), he engaged a larger British ship off the coast Yorkshire. He literally tied his boat to the larger ship and they shot cannons and guns at point blank range. Legend has it that he was asked to surrender, as his ship was sinking. He is supposed to have replied, "Sir, I have not yet begun to fight!" When faced with the possibility of deflation, I can almost hear Bernanke saying, "Sir, I have not yet begun to print!" When will they know when enough is enough? When the velocity of money stops falling. When we see two quarters in a row where the velocity of money is rising, then it is time to start investing in inflation hedges. Now, why is the velocity of money slowing down? Notice the significant real rise in velocity from 1990 through about 1997. Growth in M2 was falling during most of that period, yet the economy was growing. That means that velocity had to have been rising faster than normal. Why? It is financial innovation that spurs above-trend growth in velocity. Primarily because of the financial innovations introduced in the early '90s, like securitizations, CDOs, etc., we saw a significant rise in velocity. And now we are watching the Great Unwind of financial innovations, as they went to excess and caused a credit crisis. In principle, a CDO or subprime asset-backed security should be a good thing. And in the beginning they were. But then standards got loose, greed kicked in, and Wall Street began to game the system. End of game. What drove velocity to new highs is no longer part of the equation. The absence of new innovation and the removal of old innovations (even if they were bad innovations, they did help speed things up) are slowing things down. If the money supply had not risen significantly to offset that slowdown in velocity, the economy would already be in a much deeper recession. The Fed has more room to print money than most of us realize. How much more? My bet is that we'll find out. Will they print too much at some point? Probably. There Are No Good Choices What we are looking at in our near future is not inflation. We are in a period where the Fed is in the process of reflating, or at least attempting to do so. They will eventually be successful (though at what cost to the value of the dollar one can only guess). One can have a theoretical argument about whether that is the right thing to do, or whether the Fed should just leave things alone, let the banks fail, etc. I find that a boring and almost pointless argument. The people in control don't buy Austrian economics. It makes for nice polemics but is never going to be policy. My friend Ron Paul is not going to be allowed to make monetary policy, although he might get a bill through that actually audits the Fed. I am much more interested in learning what the Fed and Congress will actually do and then shaping my portfolio accordingly. A mentor of mine once told me that the market would do whatever it could to cause the most pain to the most people. One way to do that would be to allow deflation to develop over the next few quarters, thereby probably really hurting gold and other investments, before inflation and then stagflation become (hopefully) the end of our perilous journey. Which of course would be good for gold. If you can hold on in the meantime. Is it possible that we can find some Goldilocks end to this crisis? That the Fed can find the right mix, and Congress wakes up and puts some fiscal adults in control? All things are possible, but that is not the way I would bet. While there are some who are very sure of our near future, I for one am not. There are just too damn many variables. Let me give you one scenario that worries me. Congress shows no discipline and lets the budget run through a few more trillion in the next two years. The Fed has been successful in reflating the economy. The bond markets get very nervous, and longer-term rates start to rise. What little recovery we are seeing (this is after the double-dip recession I think we face) is threatened by higher rates in a period of high unemployment. Does the Fed monetize the debt and bring on real inflation and further destruction of the dollar? Or allow interest rates to rise and once again push us into recession? (A triple dip?) There will be no good choice. The Fed is faced with a dual mandate, unlike other central banks. They are supposed to maintain price equilibrium and also set policy that will encourage full employment. At that point, they will have to choose one over the other. There are no good choices. I can construct a number of scenarios. All end with the same line: there are no good choices. Washington DC, San Diego, and New Orleans, etc. It is time to hit the send button. I have struggled through this letter with a very upset stomach. I rarely eat pizza, but my son and his friends ordered and I ate half of a very good pizza with everything, which I very rarely do. It really kicked my gut. Maybe that is why I am a little more bearish than normal tonight. I fly to Washington, DC on Sunday and will have dinner with good friend Neil Howe (of Fourth Turning fame). I am really looking forward to that. Neil is a very interesting dinner partner. I do some consulting on Monday and then catch a long night flight to San Diego. I will be at the Schwab conference on Tuesday, September 15. If you are going to be there, look me up. I will be at the Altegris booth at the first break and then the Gemini booth with my partners from CMG, where we will be talking about the new mutual fund. (You can learn more about it by reading a report I have prepared, entitled "How to Deal with Volatility in Extraordinary Markets - Introducing the CMG Absolute Return Strategies Fund." Simply click here.) And there will be books there! That is my only trip in September. But then it gets interesting. I celebrate my 60th birthday the first weekend of October, then fly to New Orleans to be at the annual New Orleans Conference, October 8-11. The speaker line-up is better than ever. I find this to be one of the best conferences I go to very year. I have been attending on and off for over 25 years. You should think about this one. http://www.neworleansconference.com/speaker-eblast-JohnMauldin/ Then I will spend the next weekend in Detroit, then probably go to New York, then Philadelphia for a CMG conference October 20, then down to Houston, over to Orlando, stop to change clothes and pack at home, and then fly off on a whirlwind trip to Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay, speaking at a series of CFA conferences. Denver and Orlando in mid-November, and nothing else so far. Switzerland and London in January. Trey came home tonight a little discouraged, with four of his friends. He had been at his first school dance (8th grade). "Dad, I got a Bohac." This is bad. Mr. Bohac is a very reasonable, pleasant enough fellow. However, he is also the vice-principal, and as such is the nemesis of 8th-grade boys. When you get called down for whatever reason, you get what they call a Bohac, which means you have to go to his office. I grimaced. What had he done? A fight? Girls? My mind went through a dozen bad scenarios in about 3 seconds. My stomach, already roiled, immediately got worse. As it turns out, he simply wore the wrong kind of shorts to the dance. Seems he didn't know the dress code for the dance here in Highland Park. He evidently was not the only one. When he changed and all the kids left the house, I must confess I did not see any difference. Oh well. With any luck, this will be his only Bohac this year. And Dad can live with that. I'll leave you with this thought I gleaned from a newsletter from Australia called The Privateer (www.the-privateer.com). "In 1909, the US federal government had an annual budget of $US 0.8 Billion. With this it governed a population of just over 90 million people. The cost of government was about $9 per capita. In 2009, the US federal government has an annual budget of $US 3,550 Billion. With this it governs a population of just over 300 million people. That's a cost of about $11,675 per capita." Are we 1200 times better off? Have a great week. With all my flying, I might make it through a few books on my desk this week. I will let you know if anything should be on your radar screen. Your trying to Muddle Through analyst, John Mauldin John@FrontLineThoughts.com Copyright 2009 John Mauldin. All Rights Reserved Note: The generic Accredited Investor E-letters are not an offering for any investment. It represents only the opinions of John Mauldin and Millennium Wave Investments. It is intended solely for accredited investors who have registered with Millennium Wave Investments and Altegris Investments at www.accreditedinvestor.ws or directly related websites and have been so registered for no less than 30 days. The Accredited Investor E-Letter is provided on a confidential basis, and subscribers to the Accredited Investor E-Letter are not to send this letter to anyone other than their professional investment counselors. Investors should discuss any investment with their personal investment counsel. John Mauldin is the President of Millennium Wave Advisors, LLC (MWA), which is an investment advisory firm registered with multiple states. John Mauldin is a registered representative of Millennium Wave Securities, LLC, (MWS), an FINRA registered broker-dealer. MWS is also a Commodity Pool Operator (CPO) and a Commodity Trading Advisor (CTA) registered with the CFTC, as well as an Introducing Broker (IB). Millennium Wave Investments is a dba of MWA LLC and MWS LLC. Millennium Wave Investments cooperates in the consulting on and marketing of private investment offerings with other independent firms such as Altegris Investments; Absolute Return Partners, LLP; and Plexus Asset Management. Funds recommended by Mauldin may pay a portion of their fees to these independent firms, who will share 1/3 of those fees with MWS and thus with Mauldin. Any views expressed herein are provided for information purposes only and should not be construed in any way as an offer, an endorsement, or inducement to invest with any CTA, fund, or program mentioned here or elsewhere. Before seeking any advisor's services or making an investment in a fund, investors must read and examine thoroughly the respective disclosure document or offering memorandum. Since these firms and Mauldin receive fees from the funds they recommend/market, they only recommend/market products with which they have been able to negotiate fee arrangements.
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You have permission to publish this article electronically or in print as long as the following is included: John Mauldin, Best-Selling author and recognized financial expert, is also editor of the free Thoughts From the Frontline that goes to over 1 million readers each week. For more information on John or his FREE weekly economic letter go to: http://www.frontlinethoughts.com/learnmore To subscribe to John Mauldin's E-Letter please click here: http://www.frontlinethoughts.com/subscribe.asp To change your email address please click here: http://www.frontlinethoughts.com/change.asp If you would ALSO like changes applied to the Accredited Investor E- Letter, please include your old and new email address along with a note requesting the change for both e-letters and send your request to wave@frontlinethoughts.com To unsubscribe please refer to the bottom of the email. PAST RESULTS ARE NOT INDICATIVE OF FUTURE RESULTS. THERE IS RISK OF LOSS AS WELL AS THE OPPORTUNITY FOR GAIN WHEN INVESTING IN MANAGED FUNDS. WHEN CONSIDERING ALTERNATIVE INVESTMENTS, INCLUDING HEDGE FUNDS, YOU SHOULD CONSIDER VARIOUS RISKS INCLUDING THE FACT THAT SOME PRODUCTS: OFTEN ENGAGE IN LEVERAGING AND OTHER SPECULATIVE INVESTMENT PRACTICES THAT MAY INCREASE THE RISK OF INVESTMENT LOSS, CAN BE ILLIQUID, ARE NOT REQUIRED TO PROVIDE PERIODIC PRICING OR VALUATION INFORMATION TO INVESTORS, MAY INVOLVE COMPLEX TAX STRUCTURES AND DELAYS IN DISTRIBUTING IMPORTANT TAX INFORMATION, ARE NOT SUBJECT TO THE SAME REGULATORY REQUIREMENTS AS MUTUAL FUNDS, OFTEN CHARGE HIGH FEES, AND IN MANY CASES THE UNDERLYING INVESTMENTS ARE NOT TRANSPARENT AND ARE KNOWN ONLY TO THE INVESTMENT MANAGER. John Mauldin is the President of Millennium Wave Advisors, LLC (MWA) which is an investment advisory firm registered with multiple states. John Mauldin is a registered representative of Millennium Wave Securities, LLC, (MWS) an NASD registered broker-dealer. MWS is also a Commodity Pool Operator (CPO) and a Commodity Trading Advisor (CTA) registered with the CFTC, as well as an Introducing Broker (IB). Millennium Wave Investments is a dba of MWA LLC and MWS LLC. All material presented herein is believed to be reliable but we cannot attest to its accuracy. Investment recommendations may change and readers are urged to check with their investment counselors before making any investment decisions. Opinions expressed in these reports may change without prior notice. John Mauldin and/or the staffs at Millennium Wave Advisors, LLC may or may not have investments in any funds cited above. John Mauldin can be reached at 800-829-7273. EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://www.frontlinethoughts.com/unsubscribe.asp Or send an email To: wave@frontlinethoughts.com This email was sent to ggarcianunez@gmail.com Thoughts from the Frontline 3204 Beverly Drive Dallas, Texas 75205

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Fwd: Macroperu Interesante

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: bruno seminario <lbseminario@gmail.com>
Date: 2009/9/12
Subject: Macroperu Interesante
To: macroperu@yahoogroups.com

 

Dos buques abren una nueva ruta entre Europa y Asia por el Ártico

El deshielo acorta un 27% el tránsito de mercancías de Seúl a Rotterdam

RAFAEL MÉNDEZ - Madrid - 12/09/2009

 

Vota

Resultado  87 votos

  

El Ártico está cada vez más transitado. Conforme el hielo se retira en verano -atribuido al calentamiento global- empresarios y gobiernos miran al norte. Esta vez ha sido un armador alemán el que ha utilizado el hasta ahora intransitable paso del Noreste -la ruta que une Asia y Europa a través de Siberia- para llevar en dos de sus buques material para una central de gas que Rusia construye allí. Los cargueros iban escoltados por dos rompehielos (le quita mérito, pero había que asegurar la carga) aunque los propietarios afirman que su presencia no hubiera hecho falta, que sólo un día encontraron hielo en el 40% de la superficie.

La noticia en otros webs

• webs en español
• en otros idiomas

La temperatura en el Polo Norte es la mayor en 2.000 años

La firma Beluga Group, con sede en Bremen, recibió a principios de año el encargo de General Electric de transportar dos turbinas de gas entre la bahía de Ulsan (Corea del Sur) y Surgut, en Siberia. "En abril de 2009 solicitamos permiso a las autoridades rusas para cruzar el paso del Noreste", explica la portavoz de la empresa en un correo electrónico. "La autorización fue aprobada el 21 de agosto después de que el ministerio ruso de Agricultura, el de Defensa y el servicio secreto comprobaran varios cientos de documentos". No debían de estar acostumbrados a expedir un permiso así. Aunque la ruta la habían utilizado antes buques rusos ayudados por rompehielos, según la empresa, sus buques Fraternity y Foresight son los primeros cargueros en completar el paso.

Los cargueros dejaron la bahía coreana de Ulsan el 23 y el 28 de julio y se reunieron en Vladivostok. El 31 de agosto, ya entrando en el Ártico, se les unieron los rompehielosRossia y Let Polbey y el lunes pasado llegaron a Novy Port, en la costa de Siberia. La carga total del convoy era de 44 contenedores de 200 toneladas. El Fraternity descargó allí y prosiguió viaje el jueves hacia Rotterdam. El Foresight se encuentra descargando actualmente en las barcazas que llevarán su destino final a Surgut, donde se construye una central de gas en ciclo combinado de 800 megavatios.

Que dos cargueros hayan llegado a Novy Port desde Corea es un orgullo para sus armadores pero es, sobre todo, un símbolo de cómo ante nuestros ojos el mundo está cambiando rápidamente.

Walt Meier, científico del centro nacional del Hielo de EE UU (NSIDC, por sus siglas en inglés), explica por teléfono que la evidencia es irrefutable. "En los últimos 30 años [desde que los satélites de EE UU miden cada dos días el hielo ártico] la tendencia es muy clara. Hay menos hielo y es más fino. Hay variaciones naturales y repuntes, pero el descenso sólo se explica con el aumento de las temperaturas que muchos científicos han ligado a la emisión de gases de efecto invernadero de origen humano". Las palabras de Meier demuestran que los científicos cada vez con menos reparos vinculan el calentamiento global con los bruscos cambios observados en el Ártico. Un estudio de otro centro oficial estadounidense y publicado en la revista Science el pasado 4 de septiembre concluyó que la última década ha sido la más cálida en la zona en 2.000 años.

El Ártico es especialmente sensible al calentamiento. Al ser en la mayor parte agua que se hiela y se funde -no como la Antártida, que tiene tierra bajo el hielo- una leve subida se nota y genera una espiral negativa. Cuando el hielo se retira deja paso al agua, que a su vez absorbe radiación solar que antes era reflejada por el hielo. Como resultado, el Ártico se calienta más y más.

Aunque la extensión mínima de hielo se dio el 16 de septiembre de 2007, el verano 2009 será el tercer año con menos hielo. "Ha habido un repunte y hay oscilaciones, pero la tendencia es muy clara", insiste Meier. Si el año pasado se abrió el paso del Noroeste (la ruta por Canadá) este año ha quedado libre de hielo la del Noreste (Siberia).

El profesor de Relaciones Internacionales de la Universidad Pompeu Fabra y experto en el Ártico, Pablo Pareja, explica que el Paso del Noreste es especialmente interesante para Japón y Rusia. "Japón importa el 80% de su energía a través del Mar Meridional de China, unas aguas que se disputan China, Taiwan, Vietnam y Filipinas y que están infestadas de piratas. Para ellos tener una ruta alternativa es crucial. También es importante para Rusia, porque controlaría una importante ruta marítima a través de la cual podría dar salida a sus materias primas de Siberia".

Hay más ventajas. La ruta entre Japón y Hamburgo es un 27% más corta si se hace por el Ártico que por el Canal de Suez, y también evita los piratas de Somalia. La empresa Beluga asegura que prepara nuevos buques para aprovechar las entre seis y ocho semanas que calcula que el paso será navegable en verano los próximos años. En unos días, el hielo volverá a ganar terreno y a cerrar el paso.

El deshielo abre paso también a los yacimientos de gas y petróleo que esconden las aguas árticas y las disputas entre los países por controlar un territorio hasta ahora sin dueño. Todos los países ribereños han reclamado a la ONU su soberanía hasta casi el polo, Rusia plantó una bandera en el lecho marino bajo el Polo Norte y Canadá planea instalar una base militar en pleno paso del Noroeste para mostrar sus intenciones.

El ministro danés de Exteriores, Per Stig Moller, explicaba a este diario el pasado mayo que también hay riesgos: "En unos años podemos tener un vertido como el Exxon Valdez en el Ártico. Tenemos que prepararnos".

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