Donie's Ireland daily news BLOG update

Irish household debt decreases by €1.1bn in first quarter of 2016

IRISH HOUSEHOLDS FALL TO FOURTH MOST INDEBTED IN THE EUROPEAN UNION

   

NEW FIGURES FROM THE CENTRAL BANK SHOW IRISH HOUSEHOLD DEBT STOOD AT €31,216 PER CAPITA IN THE FIRST THREE MONTHS OF THE YEAR, THE LOWEST LEVEL SINCE THE FIRST QUARTER OF 2006.

Irish households fell from being the third most indebted in the European Union to the fourth during the first quarter of this year, according to new figures from the Central Bank.

The figures show Irish household debt fell by €1.1 billion to €148.5 billion in the first three months of the year.

This represented a household debt per capita of €31,216, which is the lowest level since the first quarter of 2006.

Household net lending fell to a level of €2.4 billion during the first quarter.

The net worth of households increased by 0.3% to €628.7 billion, mainly driven by a rise in house values, and a decline in household liabilities.

Household net worth has regained two-thirds of the drop that followed the Celtic Tiger’s high-water mark of €718 billion in the second quarter of 2007.

The Central Bank said household debt as a proportion of disposable income now stands at 149.4%, its lowest level since the end of 2004.

Investec said the stock of household liabilities now stands at €148.5 billion, 27% below the all-time high of €203.7 billion reached in the third quarter of 2008. It noted household net worth has increased for 12 successive quarters.

“Notwithstanding external pressures, we expect the Irish economy to continue to turn in some of the strongest growth in the EU both this year and the next, facilitating further improvements in the aggregate balance sheet of Irish households,” said Investec chief economist Philip O’Sullivan.

Irish Parents spend some €450 a month ‘supporting’ students

IRISH LEAGUE OF CREDIT UNIONS DATA SHOWS 87% WILL BACK CHILDREN FINANCIALLY WHILE IN COLLEGE

   

JUST OVER TWO-THIRDS OF STUDENTS WORK THROUGHOUT THE ACADEMIC YEAR TO FUND THIRD-LEVEL EDUCATION, WORKING ON AVERAGE 17 HOURS WEEKLY FOR €12 AN HOUR.

The vast majority of students attending third level institutions will be financially supported by their parents over the next year with the average parent spending €447 each month, a survey has found.

According to a piece of research published by the Irish League of Credit Unions this morning 87 per cent of parents will financially support their children through the academic year with 60 per cent getting into debt to do so.

The research asked both parents and students about how they meet the costs of third level education and the financial challenges facing families. The results highlight the impact of sending children to college (in financial terms) has on spending and budgets as well as the challenges and concerns parents have in relation to finance, debt, accommodation, course choice and job prospects.

All told just under three quarters of parents polled said they would struggle to cover the cost of their child’s third level education. The average amount of debt parents will accrue is put at €4,300 down from €4,670 in 2015.

The piece of research also found that parents save for an average of eight years to cover third level costs for their children and manage to accumulate on average €8,150 over that period.

A WORRY?

The survey also asked parents what they worried about as their children headed off to college. Employment prospects after graduation was the biggest concern for parents with 32 per cent saying it was the thing which worried them the most. Passing exams was in second place with 17 per cent highlight that while concerns over the misuse of drink and drugs has jumped sharply to 17 per cent up from 10 per cent last year.

It is not only parents who have worries ahead of the new term. The poll suggests that just over two thirds of students who need to live away from their family home are “extremely worried” about finding suitable accommodation for the academic year.

Concerns about the availability and affordability of accommodation could be behind a slight increase in the number of students who say they will live at home over the course of the next academic year. The survey says that 65 per cent of students will be living at home compared to 62 per cent in 2015.

The cost of living away from home is laid bare in the study with students living outside the home saying they will spend €1,048 euro per month while those living at home will spend €530 per month

Just over two thirds of students work throughout the academic year to fund third level education working an average of 17 hours per week getting paid an average of €12 per hour.

The survey by iReach was carried out in July using 1,000 responses from over-18s across Ireland.

Nutrition business progress drives Glanbia earnings growth

   

EXCEPTIONALLY STRONG GROWTH IN GLANBIA’S PERFORMANCE NUTRITION BUSINESS HELPED THE IRISH COMPANY TO EARNINGS OF €176.5M IN THE OPENING HALF OF THE YEAR.

Glanbia’s H1 earnings increased by close to 11% compared with the same period last year in what company chief executive Siobhán Talbot described as a “strong set of results”.

That firm’s earnings growth was driven primarily by its performance nutrition (GPN) business which accounted for almost half the company’s earnings.

The performance nutrition business segment’s earnings before interest tax and amortisation (EBITA) totalled €81.7m a 35% increase on H1 2015 on a constant currency basis.

Ms Talbot said she was pleased with the progress of GPN which develops products aimed at the sport and fitness markets, including protein shakes.

Growth would moderate to more modest and sustainable levels over time, she accepted.

“Sales of performance nutrition brands and value-added nutritional ingredients showed good growth in the first half of 2016 delivering on our vision to be a leading nutrition business.

“Our overarching strategy is to continue to get growth across the group. Various dynamics in various periods of the year and indeed full years can accelerate that and we’re very pleased with the 35% that we had in the first half [of 2016].

“We very much look to that long-term sustainable growth rate and we’re obviously not saying that that level of growth will be sustainable but if you take our overall guidance for the year that we’ve reiterated of 8%-10%, growing performance nutrition is an important factor within that,” Ms Talbot said.

GPN’s growth will be increasingly driven by new product innovations rather than breaking into new markets.

Ms Talbot said she expected continued “pull” on pricing in its Irish dairy division after a 4.9% decline in prices in the first half of the year.

Glanbia described Dairy Ireland’s performance as “satisfactory” despite a 3.3% decline in revenue to €356.9m which reflected the continued price drop as well as a 1.1% increase in volumes.

Ms Talbot said conditions for “anybody in the dairy space are a bit challenging” but noted that Dairy Ireland delivered a modest profit increase in the first six months of the year.

The company is dealing with currency headwinds arising from both the relative strength of the dollar and the uncertainty created by the UK’s decision to leave the European Union.

Ms Talbot said the UK is not a particularly big market for Glanbia but like all other corporates, the Irish firm doesn’t like uncertainty and currency volatility caused by the Brexit vote would need to be monitored.

Similarly, Glanbia is “always watching” the dollar-euro exchange rate and is used to managing the associated risk.

The relative strength of the dollar against other currencies can have a marked effect on demand in other markets, such as Brazil, however.

Ms Talbot said the dollar’s strength was actually more of an issue last year than it has been in the opening half of 2016 though.

The company remains on the lookout for potential acquisitions and has a good pipeline of deals.

Ms Talbot said, however, that it is difficult to be prescriptive about how many deals would be completed or when.

Viruses are more dangerous in the morning and so maybe we should all sleep in

   

EARLY MORNING COMMUTERS ON PACKED TRAINS CAN FINALLY FEEL JUSTIFIED IN THEIR AVERSION TO THEIR FELLOW PASSENGERS, AFTER A NEW STUDY FOUND VIRUSES ARE MORE DANGEROUS IN THE MORNING.

A science paper (rivetingly) entitled “Cell autonomous regulation of herpes and influenza virus infection by the circadian clock” found viruses were 10 times more successful at breaking down their host if the infection began in the morning.

The study, by the University of Cambridge, involved infecting mice with either the influenza (the cause of flu) or the herpes virus. Tests showed mice infected in the morning had a viral level 10 times higher than those infected in the evening.

Professor Akhilesh Reddy told the BBC: “It’s a big difference. The virus needs all the apparatus available at the right time, otherwise it might not ever get off the ground, but a tiny infection in the morning might perpetuate faster and take over the body.”

Viruses hijack living cells in order to replicate and proliferate around the body. It is thought the body clock, or circadian clock as per the paper title, is what makes cells more susceptible to viruses at different times.

Bmal1 is the body clock gene scientists in this study identified as the key to this susceptibility and it peaks in the afternoon, increasing resistance to infection. Bmal1 activity is low in the morning however, so we have increased vulnerability.

So should we all be locking ourselves in quarantine in the mornings for fear of microscopic germ warfare? Well no, but the findings could be helpful in preventing the spread of disease during a viral pandemic.

“In a pandemic, staying in during the daytime could be quite important and save people’s lives – it could have a big impact if trials bear it out,” said Professor Reddy.

One thing is clear – we’ve all been given one more reason to hit that snooze button tomorrow…

Zebra finches sing to eggs to prepare babies for global warming ahead

THIS COULD BE ONE WAY BIRDS LEARN TO SURVIVE THE HEAT

    

Zebra finches program their offspring to prepare for global warming by singing to eggs before they hatch. In especially hot areas, finch parents make a special call to incubating eggs, basically telling them it’s really hot outside and they better not grow too big. The hatchlings listen and this mechanism might explain how birds learn to adapt, and survive climate change.

Many bird species sing to their eggs. These calls have been shown to do everything from improving learning to synchronizing hatching times. When it comes to the Australian zebra finch, we already know that they make a specific call when it’s unusually hot outside, which in this case means over 79 degrees Fahrenheit no matter what season it is.

Finch parents start making these calls about five days before the eggs are supposed to hatch and the calls become more frequent the closer it gets to hatch time. This suggests the calls are a way to tell the soon-to-be-born finches about the world outside, and not just the parents complaining about the heat.

But how do we know if it’s just a coincidence? Mylene Mariette and Katherine Buchanan at Australia’s Deakin University figured out a way to test this. For a study published today in Science, they put a bunch of zebra finch eggs in an incubator that created a temperature around 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Mariette and Buchanan then played the “global warming” call for some of the eggs and not others.

Next, the scientists waited to see if there were significant differences between the two groups. If there were, it was probably because of the difference in the calls they heard.

After the eggs hatched, the baby finches were raised in an environment where the temperature varied naturally. By day 13 after hatching, nestlings that heard the “heat” calls were smaller than the ones who didn’t. This seems to confirm that the embryos in the eggs really do listen to the calls and then change how they grow.

All this makes sense because other research tells us that animals end up smaller when it gets hotter because the smaller size makes it easier to cope with high temperatures. Mariette and Buchanan also found that birds who were smaller in hot conditions produced more fledglings during their first breeding season, showing that this is a good evolutionary strategy after all.     

Donie's Ireland daily news BLOG

Some €200 billion to be invested in homes for sale and rent in Ireland

Some €200 million it to be put into an Infrastructure Housing Activation Fund in Ireland aimed at opening up large sites in areas where people need homes. This is to relieve critical infrastructural blockages to allow for the delivery of homes on key sites and to improve the economic viability and purchaser affordability of new housing projects and deliver 20,000 new homes by 2020. The Irish Government has also announced under its Housing Action Plan that €5.35 billion will be allocated to the development of social housing with the aim of building 47,000 more social housing units by 2021. There will also be changes to planning to allow large scale residential development planning applications to be fast tracked. The Government said it will legislate to allow for larger housing development applications of 100 plus units to be made directly to An Bord Pleanala, the country’s independent planning body. An Bord Pleanala is also set to prioritise the determination of all planning appeals for large scale developments. This is to be done within an 18 to 20 week period and the roll-out of e-planning is also being looked at. The action plan also includes increasing the supply of home to rent and support for a stable rental sector. A national policy for appropriate on and off-campus accommodation for students will also be developed. The Housing Agency will be allocated €70 million to acquire suitable portfolios of vacant properties to be let under a national vacant housing reuse strategy. A register of vacant properties across the country will be drawn up and the planning rules for change of use of vacant commercial units to a residential units will be reviewed. However, according to the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland (SCSI) critical skills shortages across all sectors of the housing market in Ireland will urgently need to be addressed to deliver the scale of housing delivery needed. Claire Solon, SCSI president, said that a National body with real authority and mandate is needed not just for housing, but also for national infrastructural planning. ‘It’s clear from the Action Plan that in several areas, it’s the need for projects like road completions, or water and drainage schemes that are actually preventing the delivery of housing,’ she pointed out. ‘The industry has shown itself be to resourceful following many difficult years, but there needs to be significant investment now to address the skills shortage in all sectors, professional, technical and trades,’ she explained. ‘We will be asking the Minister of Finance to specifically resource our sector in the upcoming Budget for training of apprentices, graduates and to help encourage workers from other sectors to transfer to construction and property roles. The industry plays a vital role in our economy and after many years of underinvestment, negative reporting and poor output, it needs radical intervention to upscale and deliver what could be one of the most important development stages in the history of our country,’ she added. The SCSI also believes that the rental sector needs radical legislative overhaul to develop a more mature, stable relationship between landlords and tenants, with security of tenure and responsibilities clearly defined. ‘Renting was previously a stepping stone between living with your parents and home-ownership, but for some, renting is a strategic choice; giving them flexibility and the freedom to move. Our members are embedded in the rental and property management services sector and will contribute their expertise to develop new policy which better captures the wants and needs of all parties,’

Meanwhile: –

Cash only house sales in Ireland reach 60% of total transactions for 2013-14

CENTRAL BANK REPORT SHOWS THAT SALES TO CASH BUYERS NOW AT LEVELS LAST SEEN IN THE EARLY 2000’S

   

NEARLY 60% OF HOUSE SALES WERE BY CASH BUYERS IN 2013 AND 2014 ACCORDING TO A REPORT BY THE RESIDENTIAL PROPERTY SECTOR IN IRELAND QUARTERLY.

Almost 60% of house purchases were by cash buyers in 2013 and 2014, according to a research paper by the Central Bank.

It said that the number of cash transactions in the market had now returned to levels seen in the early 2000’s.

The report said the increase in the share of cash buyers over the past couple of years reflected a number of factors, including the fall in the number of mortgages drawn down and low levels of residential construction.

The authors estimated that the current volumes of cash-only sales were “not entirely out of step with equivalent volumes in the early 2000s, albeit that cash buyers in prior years were operating in a more competitive, vibrant market”. They found that 23,000 properties were bought for cash in 2013 and 29,000 in 2014.

While cash buyers had increased as a proportion of total transactions, the report said this also reflected the reduction in the volume of mortgage-based transactions.

In total, the authors – Dermot Coates and Joe McNeill of the Central Bank and Brendan Williams of UCD – estimated that there were over 150,000 transactions at the peak of the market in 2006, falling to 25,000 in 2010. The total rose to around 50,000 in 2014. This still represented only around 2 per cent of the total housing stock – around half the turnover of 4 per cent in a normally functioning market.

LUMP SUMS.

The report’s authors noted the composition of the cash-buyer cohort had changed.

The term cash buyer can potentially include older households opting to downsize, private investors using property as an alternative to low-yield deposits and those in receipt of pension lump sums.

“Whilst it is true that cash sales have been a feature of this market for many years, in more recent times we have seen a greater role being played by institutional and international investors including acquisitions by speculative international asset management groups,” said the report.

“This change will also have implications for cross-border funding flows into Ireland.”

Online Irish passport renewals set to start early in 2017 says Passport Office

PASSPORT OFFICE SAYS ALL IRISH CITIZENS WILL BE ABLE TO RENEW FROM ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD

    

CURRENTLY NO PASSPORT APPLICATIONS CAN BE PROCESSED ONLINE WITH THE MAJORITY BEING MADE BY POST.

Irish citizens will soon be able to renew their passports online from anywhere in the world under a new service to be introduced shortly.

The Department of Foreign Affairs has confirmed plans for an online applications service, which forms part of a major €18.6 million reform programme announced for the passport service late last year.

It is envisaged that a service allowing for passport renewals could be in operation as early as the first quarter of 2017 with the roll-out of a full service available for all applicant types by early 2019.

The department recently issued two request-for-tender notices for technology solutions to facilitate the new online application process.

The move comes as the Passport Office was recently forced to take on hundreds of additional temporary staff to deal with a sharp rise in applications in the wake of Britain’s vote to leave the European Union.

INCREASE IN APPLICATIONS?

The Passport Office saw a 10% increase in applications for the period January to June with numbers spiking recently as British citizens eligible for an Irish passport rushed to apply for them following the Brexit vote.

While Brexit led to a rush of applications, demand had been climbing in the years before the vote. The number of passports issued jumped from 388,000 in 2000 to 670,000 last year. More than half of all applications received annually are from citizens wishing to renew their passports.

Currently, no passport applications can be processed online with the majority being made by post.

Some €4 million was secured in Budget 2016 to help the Department of Foreign Affairs achieve its aim of reshaping how Irish passports are delivered and ensuring better security.

A new credit-card style passport card was introduced that is valid for travelling to 30 European countries. The card, which can be processed online, is open to citizens with a valid passport book at a cost of €35.

The department recently warned of the need for urgent changes to the passport application system as concern about fraud has increased. Briefing notes produced for Minister for Foreign Affairs Charlie Flanagan and seen byThe Irish Times last month urged investment in the latest anti-fraud technology and techniques to protect the “integrity and international standing of the Irish passport”.

The department said in the note that the Irish passport had become a “preferred device for money-laundering and other criminal activities”.

In case you’ve forgotten, the world is scheduled to end this Friday??????

      

WITH A GLOBAL EARTHQUAKE SOFTENING US ALL UP BEFORE A REALLY ANGRY JESUS COMES BACK TO WIPE OUT HIS CREATION.

Well, unless you’re a devout Christian who watches a lot of YouTube videos – in which case you’ll be off to play harp on a cloud with your grandpa!

So, in other words, the end of the world IS coming and just not on Friday?

But questions have now been raised about a video predicting the end of the world this Friday (which has been watched four million times) – with apocalypse believers claiming that their video has been ripped off and re-uploaded.

John Preacher of Armageddon news said, ‘Someone is re-uping our videos and saying that the end of the world is July 29th. Nothing is going to happen on July 29th. We have never claimed such a thing, this date is just another false date being promoted online.

‘We in no way promote that anything will happen on July 29th. There are a number of prophecies which must be fulfilled first, including the conquest of Jerusalem by the surrounding Arab nations, which lasts for 42 months (Rev 11:2), before the Second Coming and global earthquake/reeling occurs.

This prediction, by End Time Prophecies, is just one of several doomsday prophecies for this year – including that an asteroid would hit us on May 6 (it didn’t), and a prediction that Barack Obama would reveal he is the Antichrist in June (he didn’t).

This one is studded with Bible verses, and a lot of very dubious science – as well as some truly awesome CGI graphics.

End Times Prophecies says – in that computer voice favoured by all good YouTube nutters, ‘This is Armageddon News. In this broadcast we’ll discuss the second coming of Jesus Christ, which occurs at the same time as a magnetic polar flip and catastrophic global earthquake.

‘On the day which Jesus returns, there will be a polar reversal.

There was a violent earthquake, and the Sun became black like coarse black cloth, and the moon turned completely

‘The stars fell down to the Earth, like ripe figs falling from the tree when a strong wind shakes it. Every mountain and island is moved from its place.

The polar flip will make the stars race across the sky, and the vacuum createrd by the reeling of the Earth will pull the atmosphere along the ground, trying to catch up.

‘The global earthquake will be so bad that every hill and mountain will crumble

Revelations 6:15 says, ‘The kings of the Earth, the Princes, the commanding officers, the rich, the strong and every slave and free person hid themselves… from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb.’

Scientists in race to test CRISPR gene-editing technique on cancer

FIRST HUMAN TRIALS ARE PENDING

      

THE COMPUTER GRAPHIC ABOVE DEPICTS THREE T CELLS (WHITE) ATTACHED TO A CANCER CELL.

Kelly Crowe is a medical sciences correspondent for CBC News, specialising in health and biomedical research. She joined CBC in 1991, and has spent 25 years reporting on a wide range of national news and current affairs, with a particular interest in science and medicine.

A novel gene-editing technique with potential to revolutionise cancer treatment has scientists in a race to test it on humans.

As the scientific journal Nature announced last week: “Chinese scientists to pioneer first human CRISPR trial.”

But wait. On the same page, there’s a link to another story from a month ago: “First CRISPR clinical trial gets green light from U.S. panel.”

So who will be first in the race to use CRISPR in humans — the U.S. or China? And what are they using CRISPR to do?

If you haven’t heard about CRISPR yet then all of this might seem  underwhelming. But for scientists like Jason Moffat, at the University of Toronto, it’s amazing news.

“That’s fast,” he said. “They’re pushing the technology really hard.”

“That’s fast. They’re pushing the technology really hard.” – Jason Moffat, University of Toronto

CRISPR is a revolutionary genetic editing technique that has been rocking the world of biology ever since researchers first realized they could use it to edit the genome of any species with ease and precision never possible before.

CRISPR gene-editing tool has scientists thrilled — but nervous

At U of T, Moffat is using CRISPR to identify the set of genes that are essential for cell survival.

“It gives you the tools to ask questions about what things are doing that we could never do before,” he said. “It’s really exciting.”

Scientists are now using CRISPR in a range of wild experiments. They’ve already designed a mechanism that could wipe out mosquitoes. And they’re also toying with using it to bring the woolly mammoth back to life.

It’s a tool so powerful, it could be used to permanently alter the human genome in a way that could be passed on to future generations.

Earlier this year, scientists from around the world gathered for an unprecedented summit in Washington, D.C., and agreed to avoid using CRISPR for human genetic engineering

CRISPR AGAINST CANCER

But what can CRISPR do in research on cancer? That’s the question that will be asked in these human trials.

 CRISPR IS NOT A THERAPY ON ITS OWN. IT’S A TOOL.

But because of its precision, researchers are hoping it will be able to make genetic edits that are more effective than the traditional gene-editing techniques, to trigger a patient’s immune system to kill cancer cells.

‘These first tests, if done properly, are going to pave the way for how to use CRISPR to treat disease,’ says University of Toronto cancer researcher Jason Moffat. (CBC)

Both the U.S. and the Chinese teams intend to use CRISPR in similar ways, but on different cancers. The Chinese will target non-small-cell lung cancer; the U.S. team will work on melanoma, sarcoma and myeloid cancers.

They will harvest a type of immune cell, known as T cells, from a patient’s blood and then use CRISPR to tinker with a particular gene in a way that will activate the T cells to attack cancer cells. And then they will put the CRISPR-ed cells back into the patient’s body to destroy tumours.

“These first tests, if done properly, are going to pave the way for how to use CRISPR to treat disease,” said Moffat.

What risks getting lost in the excitement over these first CRISPR trials is the sobering fact that it might not work. There is the ever-present risk of unintended consequences, including CRISPR’s tendency to make unpredictable genetic edits in unwanted places.

And experiments to genetically alter cells and reprogram the immune system are inherently risky. There’s a danger of triggering a catastrophic immune response known as a cytokine storm that can fatally overwhelm the body. And by unleashing T cells against cancer, it’s also possible they’ll start attacking normal tissue, too.

Gene therapy tragedy in 1999.

In this illustration of CRISPR-CAS9, the Cas9 nuclease protein (white) uses a guide RNA (pink) sequence to cut DNA (green).

For years, the entire field of gene therapy was haunted by an experiment that went tragically wrong in 1999. That’s when an Arizona teenager died suddenly, after volunteering to be part of a gene therapy trial to correct a genetic defect that, in his case, was not life-threatening. Many believe the death set back gene therapy research for years.

And last month, a clinical trial testing the same T cell approach, but without using CRISPR, was shut down by the FDA after several patients died. The trial has since been allowed to resume.

The Chinese scientists have secured all the necessary approvals and are scheduled to begin their trial using CRISPR-edited cells in 10 lung cancer patients next month. The U.S. team still needs FDA approval, and they expect to start their trial on 18 patients later this year.

Another caveat: These are Phase 1 trials only. That means the scientists are studying toxicity and side-effects and basic biological responses. Even if all goes well, the trials to see if the approach actually works against cancer are still many years away.