title: Axel Witsel

text: On 30 August 2009, Witsel sparked controversy when he broke Marcin Wasilewski's leg by stamping on his ankle during the match between Anderlecht and Standard. Following the tackle, Witsel protested the red card, claiming that it was an accident without intent, before being sent off the pitch. He soon apologised, but was the subject of criticism from several media outlets and numerous death threats from angry Anderlecht and Poland fans. The initial ban until 23 November by the Belgian Football Association, was later reduced on appeal to eight matches.


title: Axel Witsel

text: Witsel signed for Portuguese club Benfica on a five-year deal on 13 July 2011, including a €40 million buyout clause. Witsel scored twice in the 3–1 win against FC Twente, in the Champions League play-off second leg, on 24 August 2011, sending Benfica to the group stages with a 5–3 aggregate victory.


title: Axel Witsel

text: He scored the opening goal in a 4–1 thrashing of Vitória de Guimarães in the Taça da Liga on 9 January 2012. He then assisted Nolito in a 4–1 league defeat of Vitória de Setúbal. Witsel scored his fourth goal against Santa Clara on 18 January in a Taça da Liga match. Benfica reached the final on 14 April against Gil Vicente and Witsel was awarded the Man of the Match award as Benfica claimed their fourth Taça da Liga title with a 2–1 victory.


title: Axel Witsel

text: On 3 September 2012, Witsel signed for Zenit Saint Petersburg for €40 million, after signing a five-year contract. Witsel made his debut in the Russian Premier League on 14 September, replacing Konstantin Zyryanov in the 70th minute as Zenit fell 2–0 to Terek Grozny. He scored his first two goals for the club on 30 November when Zenit brushed aside Spartak Moscow 4–2 at the Luzhniki Stadium. Witsel scored Zenit's winner against Terek Grozny on 30 March 2013, an eighth-minute strike, as his side cruised to a 3–0 league victory.


title: Axel Witsel

text: In Zenit's first match of the 2014–15 UEFA Champions League group stage on 16 September 2014, Witsel scored Zenit's second goal in a 2–0 away victory over former club Benfica. After finishing third in their Champions League group, Zenit were parachuted into the Europa League knockout phase; in the first leg of their Round of 16 clash against Torino on 12 March 2015, Witsel scored on a rebound as Zenit defeated the Italian club 2–0. On 26 April, Witsel scored the game's only goal in the seventeenth minute as Zenit defeated Arsenal Tula in a league match at the Petrovsky Stadium. On Sunday 17 May, Witsel played the full 90 minutes as Zenit drew 1–1 with FC Ufa, earning the point they needed to secure the Premier League crown, the club's fourth overall and Witsel's first with Zenit.


title: Axel Witsel

text: In the 2015 Russian Super Cup on 12 July 2015, Witsel converted his penalty shot in a 4–2 penalty shoot-out victory over FC Lokomotiv Moscow after the match had finished 1–1.


title: Axel Witsel

text: On 3 January 2017, Zenit officially announced that Witsel has moved to Chinese club Tianjin Quanjian.


title: Axel Witsel

text: On 4 March 2017, Witsel made his debut for Quanjian in a 2–0 loss to Guangzhou R&F. A week later he scored the club's first ever goal in the Chinese Super League during a 1–1 draw with Shanghai Greenland Shenhua.


title: Axel Witsel

text: On 6 August 2018, Witsel signed for Bundesliga club Borussia Dortmund and agreed a four-year contract which would last until 30 June 2022. On 21 August, he scored an equalizing goal in the stoppage time to make it 1–1 after coming on as a substitute on his debut for the club against SpVgg Greuther Fürth in the DFB-Pokal first round match and later his side went on to win the match in the extra time with a 2-1 victory. Witsel scored his first Bundesliga goal on his league debut for the club with an overhead kick in a 4–1 victory over RB Leipzig on 26 August.


title: Axel Witsel

text: On 7 July 2022, Atlético Madrid officially announced that Witsel had signed for the club on a one year contract via a free transfer after his contract with Borussia Dortmund expired. Under manager Diego Simeone, Witsel began to play as a defender in the middle of a back three in the 5–3–2 formation.


title: Axel Witsel

text: Prior to making his international debut for the senior side, he played for the under-21 side in 2007 earning nine caps as well as helping his side reach the semi-finals of the 2007 UEFA European Under-21 Football Championship.


title: Axel Witsel

text: On 26 March 2008, Witsel made his international debut during a friendly game against Morocco. The match resulted in a 1–4 loss, but Witsel scored his first goal for Belgium.


title: Axel Witsel

text: Witsel's first goal in a competitive international match came a day short of three years after the Morocco goal, in the sixth minute against Austria in Group A of the UEFA Euro 2012 qualifying process, and his second would come in the second half. However, Belgian hopes of qualifying for UEFA Euro 2012 were dashed on 11 October 2011, by defeat to Germany coupled with Turkey's victory over Azerbaijan.


title: Axel Witsel

text: On 13 May 2014, Witsel was named in Belgium's squad for the 2014 FIFA World Cup. He started in midfield in the team's first game of the tournament, a 2–1 win against Algeria in Belo Horizonte.


title: Axel Witsel

text: Witsel also featured in the Belgian squad at UEFA Euro 2016, announced on 31 May 2016. He scored his first tournament goal during the Championships, in a Group E match against the Republic of Ireland.


title: Axel Witsel

text: He scored twice in 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification, both in wide victories over Gibraltar. Manager Roberto Martínez named him in the squad for the final tournament in Russia.


title: Axel Witsel

text: Witsel has three children. He is of Martiniquais descent through his father. He was a boyhood Arsenal fan.


title: The Office

text: The Office is a mockumentary sitcom created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, first made in the United Kingdom, then Germany, and subsequently the United States. It has since been remade in ten other countries.


title: The Office

text: The original series of "The Office" also starred Gervais as the boss and main character of the show. The two seasons were broadcast on BBC Two in 2001 and 2002, totalling 12 episodes, with two special episodes in 2003, and an extra short spectacular ten years later. A German version titled "Stromberg" ran for 46 episodes over five seasons, starting in 2004, and the follow-up film "Stromberg - Der Film" was released in German cinemas in 2014.


title: The Office

text: The longest-running version of the series, the US adaptation, ran for nine seasons on the NBC Television Network from 2005 to 2013 for a total of 201 episodes. The total overall viewership is in the hundreds of millions worldwide. According to Nielsen Ratings as of April 2019, the US version of "The Office" was the No. 1 streamed show on Netflix in the United States. Extended episodes of the American adaptation have been added to the streaming platform Peacock, in addition to bloopers and extras. The US version features a multitude of catch-phrases, notably, "That's what she said!".


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: Pierre-Emile Kordt Højbjerg (born 5 August 1995) is a Danish professional footballer who plays as a midfielder for Premier League club Tottenham Hotspur and the Denmark national team.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: Højbjerg started his career as a youth for Danish clubs BK Skjold, Kjøbenhavns Boldklub and Brøndby IF before joining German club Bayern Munich in 2012. He made his senior debut for the reserves that year and his professional debut for the first team in April 2013; at 17 he was the club's youngest player in the Bundesliga. He made 25 total appearances for Bayern and won a variety of domestic and international tournaments, also having loans at fellow league teams FC Augsburg and Schalke 04. In 2016, he signed a five-year contract for Southampton for an estimated £12.8 million fee. After making 134 appearances for the Saints, he joined Tottenham Hotspur in 2020 for a reported initial fee of £15 million.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: Højbjerg was a youth international at various levels from under-16 to under-21. He made his debut for the Denmark national team in 2014, and represented the side at UEFA Euro 2020 and the 2022 FIFA World Cup.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: While initially playing for BK Skjold and Kjøbenhavns Boldklub he moved to Brøndby IF as a junior player at age 14. He looks upon Zinedine Zidane as his role model. Aged just 5, Højbjerg began attending training sessions with his six-year-old brother at local club Skjold. He was deployed as a striker by Copenhagen. Starting from his debut, Højbjerg plays as a central midfielder and sometimes right wide midfielder. He has since switched to a defensive midfield role.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: In 2011, Højbjerg was honoured with the title "Danish under-17 player of the year". In 2013, he was honoured with the title "Danish talent of the year" by Spillerforeningen.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: Højbjerg joined Bayern in July 2012 and, at the age of 17 years and 251 days, made his professional debut on 13 April 2013 in the Bundesliga against 1. FC Nürnberg, as a substitute for Xherdan Shaqiri and thus became the youngest player ever to play for the Bayern Munich first team in the Bundesliga. He finished the 2012–13 season with no goals in two matches played for the first team and eight goals in 30 matches played for the reserve team.<ref name="Spieler-Statistik 2012/13"></ref>


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: In December of that year, he was in the Bayern squad which won the 2013 FIFA Club World Cup in Morocco, although he did not enter the field of play during the tournament. On 17 May 2014, Højbjerg started the DFB-Pokal final for Bayern Munich, a 2–0 extra-time win over Borussia Dortmund. He played for a total of 102 minutes before being substituted in the first half of extra time for Daniel Van Buyten. He finished the 2013–14 season with seven Bundesliga appearances and two German Cup appearances for the first team and four goals from 14 appearances for the reserve team.<ref name="Spieler-Statistik 2013/14"></ref>


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: His first match of the 2014–15 season was the DFL-Supercup on 13 August, playing the first hour and then being substituted for Mario Götze, as Bayern lost 2–0 at Borussia Dortmund. On 8 January 2015, Bayern extended Højbjerg's contract to 2018. He finished the 2014–15 season with no goals from eight Bundesliga appearances, one German Cup appearance, and three Champions League appearances. On 7 January 2015, Højbjerg was loaned to Bundesliga team FC Augsburg for the remainder of the 2014–15 season. He made his debut on 1 February against 1899 Hoffenheim. Højbjerg scored his first Bundesliga goal on 11 April against SC Paderborn 07 in a 2–1 loss. On 9 May, he assisted Raúl Bobadilla for the only goal as Augsburg won away at Bayern, who had already won the league by that point. He finished his loan spell with two goals from 16 Bundesliga appearances.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: On 28 August 2015, Højbjerg joined fellow Bundesliga side Schalke 04 on a season-long loan. He played 30 games for the Gelsenkirchen-based club, including six in the Europa League, and at the end of the season he told Danish newspaper "B.T." that the time had arrived to leave Bayern Munich and become a first-team regular elsewhere.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: On 11 July 2016, Højbjerg joined English club Southampton on a five-year deal for an estimated fee of £12.8 million. He made his debut in the Premier League on 13 August as the season began with a 1–1 home draw with Watford, coming on in the 55th minute in place of James Ward-Prowse. BBC Sport's Neil Johnston wrote that he "injected pace and urgency" into the Saints, "was not afraid to shoot and was hard-working". Although he played all five matches on the way to the 2017 EFL Cup Final, Højbjerg was an unused substitute in the match at Wembley Stadium, which Southampton lost 3–2 to Manchester United.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: Højbjerg scored his first goal for the Saints in his 54th match on 18 March 2018, opening a 2–0 win at League One club Wigan Athletic in the sixth round of the FA Cup, the first match under new manager Mark Hughes. In December that year, Hughes' successor Ralph Hasenhüttl made him the Saints' captain. However in June 2020, Hojbjerg was stripped of the captaincy after publicly speaking about his desire to leave the club, with Ward-Prowse replacing him as captain.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: On 11 August 2020, Højbjerg joined Tottenham Hotspur on a five-year deal, for a reported initial fee of £15 million plus add-ons.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: He made his debut on 13 September in a 1–0 home defeat by Everton. Despite this early setback, Højbjerg soon became a key member of José Mourinho's squad in the central defensive midfield position, earning wide praise for his performance in many games, as well as receiving a nomination as Premier League Player of the Month for November. On 28 January 2021, Højbjerg scored his first goal for Spurs in the Premier League with a 20-yard strike at a 3–1 home loss to Liverpool. He made the most appearances ever by a player in the 2020–21 season (3420 minutes).


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: On 1 November 2022, he scored a goal in the 95th minute in a 2–1 away win over Marseille, in which Tottenham Hotspur finished top of Group D in the 2022–23 Champions League season.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: Højbjerg was born in Denmark to a Danish father and French mother. He was called up to the Denmark senior side for the first time in May 2014 for friendlies against Hungary and Sweden and made his debut against Sweden on 28 May, playing the full 90 minutes. On his third cap on 7 September 2014 he scored his first international goal, equalising as Denmark began their UEFA Euro 2016 qualification campaign with a 2–1 win over Armenia in Copenhagen.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: In May 2018, he was named in Denmark's preliminary 35-man squad for the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia, although he did not make the final 23.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: Højbjerg was named in the Danish squad for the delayed UEFA Euro 2020 in June 2021. In their opening match, a 1–0 loss to Finland, he missed a penalty; the game had been stopped and resumed due to Christian Eriksen's medical emergency.


title: Pierre-Emile Højbjerg

text: Højbjerg was born in Copenhagen and grew up in the Østerbro district of the city. He is the second of three children. Højbjerg was introduced to football when he was five years old. Højbjerg's father Christian died of stomach cancer in April 2014, five days after his first start for Bayern.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite () is an absorbent swelling clay consisting mostly of montmorillonite (a type of smectite) which can either be Na-montmorillonite or Ca-montmorillonite. Na-montmorillonite has a considerably greater swelling capacity than Ca-montmorillonite.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite usually forms from the weathering of volcanic ash in seawater, or by hydrothermal circulation through the porosity of volcanic ash beds, which converts (devitrification) the volcanic glass (obsidian, rhyolite, dacite) present in the ash into clay minerals. In the mineral alteration process, a large fraction (up to 40-50 wt.%) of amorphous silica is dissolved and leached away, leaving the bentonite deposit in place. Bentonite beds are white or pale blue or green (traces of reduced ) in fresh exposures, turning to a cream color and then yellow, red, or brown (traces of oxidized ) as the exposure is weathered further.


title: Bentonite

text: As a swelling clay, bentonite has the ability to absorb large quantities of water, which increases its volume by up to a factor of eight. This makes bentonite beds unsuitable for building and road construction. However, the swelling property is used to advantage in drilling mud and groundwater sealants. The montmorillonite / smectite making up bentonite is an aluminium phyllosilicate mineral, which takes the form of microscopic platy grains. These give the clay a very large total surface area, making bentonite a valuable adsorbent. The plates also adhere to each other when wet. This gives the clay a cohesiveness that makes it useful as a binder and as an additive to improve the plasticity of kaolinite clay used for pottery.


title: Bentonite

text: One of the first findings of bentonite was in the Cretaceous Benton Shale near Rock River, Wyoming. The Fort Benton Group, along with others in stratigraphic succession, was named after Fort Benton, Montana, in the mid-19th century by Fielding Bradford Meek and F. V. Hayden of the U.S. Geological Survey. Bentonite has since been found in many other locations, including China and Greece (bentonite deposit of the Milos volcanic island in the Aegean Sea). The total worldwide production of bentonite in 2018 was 20,400,000 metric tons.


title: Bentonite

text: In geology, the term "bentonite" is applied to a type of claystone (a clay rock, not a clay mineral) composed mostly of montmorillonite (a clay mineral from the smectite group). It forms by devitrification of volcanic ash or tuff, typically in a marine environment. This results in a very soft, porous rock that may contain residual crystals of more resistant minerals, and which feels soapy or greasy to the touch. However, in commercial and industrial applications, the term "bentonite" is used more generally to refer to any swelling clay composed mostly of smectite clay minerals, which includes montmorillonite. The undifferentiated reference to the weathered volcanic rock for the geologist or to the industrial mixture of swelling clays can be a source of confusion.


title: Bentonite

text: The montmorillonite making up bentonite is an aluminium phyllosilicate mineral whose crystal structure is described as low-charge "TOT". This means that a crystal of montmorillonite consists of layers, each of which is made up of two "T" sheets bonded to either side of an "O" sheet. The "T" sheets are so called because each aluminium or silicon ion in the sheet is surrounded by four oxygen ions arranged as a tetrahedron. The "O" sheets are so called because each aluminium ion is surrounded by six oxygen or hydroxyl ions arranged as an octahedron. The complete "TOT" layer has a weak negative electrical charge, and this is neutralized by calcium or sodium cations that bind adjacent layers together, with a distance between layers of about 1 nanometer. Because the negative charge is weak, only a fraction of the possible cation sites on the surface of a "TOT" layer actually contain calcium or sodium. Water molecules can easily infiltrate between sheets and fill the remaining sites. This accounts for the swelling property of montmorillonite and other smectite clay minerals.


title: Bentonite

text: The different types of bentonite are each named after the respective dominant cation. For industrial purposes, two main classes of bentonite are recognized: sodium and calcium bentonite. Sodium bentonite is the more valuable but calcium bentonite is more common. In stratigraphy and tephrochronology, completely devitrified (weathered volcanic glass) ash-fall beds are sometimes also referred to as "K-bentonites" (the illitized clay rock) when the dominant clay species is illite (a non-swelling clay). However, in pure clay mineralogy, the term illite is more appropriate than "K-bentonite" (the "altered K-rock") because it is a distinct type of non-swelling clay while the commercial term bentonite implicitly refers to a swelling clay, a smectite (in the European and UK terminology), or a montmorillonite (in the US terminology).


title: Bentonite

text: Sodium bentonite expands when wet, absorbing as much as several times its dry mass in water. Because of its excellent colloidal properties, it is often used in drilling mud for oil and gas wells and boreholes for geotechnical and environmental investigations. The property of swelling also makes sodium bentonite useful as a sealant, since it provides a self-sealing, low permeability barrier. It is used to line the base of landfills, for example. Bentonite is also part of the backfill material used at the Waste Isolation Pilot Project. Various surface modifications to sodium bentonite improve some rheological or sealing performance in geoenvironmental applications, for example, the addition of polymers.


title: Bentonite

text: Sodium bentonite can be combined with elemental sulfur as fertilizer prills. These permit slow oxidation of the sulfur to sulfate, a plant nutrient needed for some crops like onions or garlic synthesizing a lot of organo-sulfur compounds, and maintain sulfate levels in rainfall-leached soil longer than either pure powdered sulfur or gypsum. Sulfur/bentonite pads with added organic fertilizers have been used for organic farming.


title: Bentonite

text: Calcium bentonite is a useful adsorbent of ions in solution, as well as fats and oils. It is the main active ingredient of fuller's earth, probably one of the earliest industrial cleaning agents. It has significantly less swelling capacity than sodium bentonite.


title: Bentonite

text: Calcium bentonite may be converted to sodium bentonite (termed sodium beneficiation or sodium activation) to exhibit many of sodium bentonite's properties by an ion exchange process. As commonly practiced, this means adding 5–10% of a soluble sodium salt such as sodium carbonate to wet bentonite, mixing well, and allowing time for the ion exchange to take place and water to remove the exchanged calcium. Some properties, such as viscosity and fluid loss of suspensions, of sodium-beneficiated calcium bentonite (or sodium-activated bentonite) may not be fully equivalent to those of natural sodium bentonite. For example, residual calcium carbonates (formed if exchanged cations are insufficiently removed) may result in inferior performance of the bentonite in geosynthetic liners.


title: Bentonite

text: Illite is the main clay constituent of potash bentonite (a rock type also known as K-bentonite or potassium bentonite). K-bentonite is a term reserved to volcanic stratigraphy and tephrochronology and is related to the weathered clay rock type only. Illite, the clay mineral, is a potassium-rich phylosilicate formed from the alteration of smectic clay in contact with groundwater rich in ions. Illite is a high-charge "TOT" clay mineral, in which sheets are bound relatively strongly by more numerous potassium ions, and so it is no longer a swelling clay and has few industrial uses. In contrast to the highly hydrated ions which act as "swellers" or "expanders" ions, poorly hydrated ions behave as "collapsers" when exchanging with ions accessible in the interlayers space present between two "TOT" layers. Dehydrated ions are preferentially located in between two face-to-face hexagonal cavities formed by six joined silica tetrahedra present at the surface of the basal plane of a "TOT" layer (see the corresponding figure showing an elementary "TOT" layer). Because dehydrated, these ions are sometimes said to form inner-sphere bonds with the surrounding oxygen atoms present in the hexagonal cavity hosting them. It means there is no water molecule in between the ion and the oxygen atoms attached to the silica tetrahedra (T).


title: Bentonite

text: The main uses of bentonite are in drilling mud and as a binder, purifier, absorbent, and carrier for fertilizers or pesticides. As of around 1990, almost half of the US production of bentonite was used as drilling mud. Minor uses include filler, sealant, and catalyst in petroleum refining. Calcium bentonite is sometimes marketed as fuller's earth, whose uses overlap with those of other forms of bentonite.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite is used in drilling mud to lubricate and cool the cutting tools (drill bit), to remove cuttings, to stabilize the borehole walls, and to help prevent blowouts (by maintaining a sufficient hydraulic pressure in the well). Bentonite also curtails drilling fluid invasion by its propensity for aiding in the formation of mud cake. Much of bentonite's usefulness in the drilling and geotechnical engineering industry comes from its unique rheological properties. Relatively small quantities of bentonite suspended in water form a viscous, shear-thinning material. Most often, bentonite suspensions are also thixotropic, although rare cases of rheopectic behavior have also been reported. At high enough concentrations (about 60 grams of bentonite per litre of suspension, ~6wt.%), bentonite suspensions begin to take on the characteristics of a gel (a fluid with a minimum yield strength required to make it move).


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite has been widely used as a foundry-sand bond in iron and steel foundries. Sodium bentonite is most commonly used for large castings that use dry molds, while calcium bentonite is more commonly used for smaller castings that use "green" or wet molds. Bentonite is also used as a binding agent in the manufacture of iron ore (taconite) pellets as used in the steelmaking industry. Bentonite, in small percentages, is used as an ingredient in commercial and homemade clay bodies and ceramic glazes. It greatly increases the plasticity of clay bodies and decreases settling in glazes, making both easier to work with for most applications.


title: Bentonite

text: The ionic surface of bentonite has a useful property in making a sticky coating on sand grains. When a small proportion of finely ground bentonite clay is added to hard sand and wetted, the clay binds the sand particles into a moldable aggregate known as green sand used for making molds in sand casting.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonites are used for decolorizing various mineral, vegetable, and animal oils. They are also used for clarifying wine, liquor, cider, beer, mead, and vinegar.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite has the property of adsorbing relatively large amounts of protein molecules from aqueous solutions. Consequently, bentonite is uniquely useful in the process of winemaking, where it is used to remove excessive amounts of protein from white wines. Were it not for this use of bentonite, many or most white wines would precipitate undesirable flocculent clouds or hazes upon exposure to warm temperatures, as these proteins denature. It also has the incidental use of inducing more rapid clarification of both red and white wines.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite is also considered an effective low-cost adsorbent for the removal of chromium(VI) ions from aqueous solutions (contaminated wastewater).


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite is used in a variety of pet care items such as cat litter to absorb pet waste. It is also used to absorb oils and grease.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite is used as an inert carrier for pesticides, fertilizers, and fire retardants. It helps ensure that the active agent is uniformly dispersed and that pesticides and fertilizers are retained on the plants.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite is used as a filler in a wide variety of products, including adhesives, cosmetics, paint, rubber, and soaps. It also acts as a stabilizer and extender in these products.


title: Bentonite

text: The property of swelling on contact with water makes sodium bentonite useful as a sealant since it provides a self-sealing, low-permeability barrier. It is used to line the base of landfills to prevent migration of leachate, for confining metal pollutants of groundwater, and for the sealing of subsurface disposal systems for spent nuclear fuel. Similar uses include making slurry walls, waterproofing of below-grade walls, and forming other impermeable barriers, e.g., to seal off the annulus of a water well, to plug old wells.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite can also be "sandwiched" between synthetic materials to create geosynthetic clay liners (GCLs) for the aforementioned purposes. This technique allows for more convenient transport and installation, and it greatly reduces the volume of bentonite required. It is also used to form a barrier around newly planted trees to constrain root growth so as to prevent damage to nearby pipes, footpaths, and other infrastructure. Farmers use bentonite to seal retention ponds and line canals.


title: Bentonite

text: High-purity calcium bentonite is treated with acid for use as a catalyst in cracking heavy petroleum fractions.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite has been prescribed as a bulk laxative, and it is also used as a base for many dermatologic formulas. Granular bentonite is being studied for use in battlefield wound dressings. Bentonite is also sold online and in retail outlets for a variety of indications.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentoquatam is a bentonate-based topical medication intended to act as a shield against exposure to urushiol, the oil found in plants such as poison ivy or poison oak.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite can also be used as a desiccant due to its adsorption properties. Bentonite desiccants have been successfully used to protect pharmaceutical, nutraceutical, and diagnostic products from moisture degradation and extend shelf life. In most common package environments, bentonite desiccants offer a higher water adsorption capacity than silica gel desiccants. Bentonite complies with the FDA for contact with food and drugs.


title: Bentonite

text: The application of clay technology by farmers in northeast Thailand, using bentonite clay, has dramatically reversed soil degradation and resulted in greater economic returns, with higher yields and higher output prices. Studies carried out by The International Water Management Institute and partners in 2002–2003 focused on the application of locally sourced bentonite clays to degraded soils in the region. These applications were carried out in structured field trials. Applying bentonite clays effectively improved yields of forage sorghum grown under rain-fed conditions.


title: Bentonite

text: Bentonite application also influenced the prices that farmers received for their crops. Production costs are higher, but due to higher production and the quality of the food, clay farmers could afford to invest and grow more and better food, compared to nonclay-using farmers.


title: Bentonite

text: ) are used in construction, where the slurry wall is a trench filled with a thick colloidal mixture of bentonite and water.


title: Bentonite

text: A trench that would collapse due to the hydraulic pressure in the surrounding soil does not collapse as the slurry balances the hydraulic pressure. Forms for concrete, and rebar, can be assembled in a slurry-filled trench, and then have concrete poured into the form. The liquid concrete being denser displaces the less-dense bentonite slurry and causes the latter to overflow from the trench. This displaced bentonite slurry is then channeled to a recycling unit from which it can subsequently be reused in a new trench elsewhere on the construction site.


title: Bentonite

text: In addition, because the colloid is relatively impervious to water, a slurry wall can prevent the seepage of groundwater, which is useful in preventing the further spread of groundwater that has been contaminated by toxic material such as industrial waste.


title: Bentonite

text: The clay from which pottery is made is described as "plastic" if it can be stretched without cracking, or "short" or non-plastic if it tends to break up when formed. A small amount of bentonite is often added to make a clay mixture more plastic. This makes the clay more easily formed, by methods such as throwing on a potter's wheel and various hand-building techniques. Short clay, such as a porcelain mixture consisting only of kaolinite and feldspar, can be formed only by a limited set of methods such as pressing and molding, that do not put the clay under tension. However, bentonite typically contains minerals that affect the color of the mix, and its swelling absorbent properties can make such a mix prone to significant shrinkage and potential cracking as it dries.


title: Bentonite

text: Ceramic glazes often contain bentonite. The bentonite is added to slow or prevent the settling of the glazes. It can also improve the consistency of application of glazes on porous biscuit-fired ware. Once a certain amount of glaze water has been absorbed by the biscuit the bentonite effectively clogs the pores and resists the absorption of further water resulting in a more evenly thick coat.


title: Bentonite

text: In 2018, China was the top producer of bentonite, with almost a one-quarter share of the world's production, followed by the United States and India. Total worldwide production was 24,400,000 metric tons of bentonite and 3,400,000 metric tons of fuller's earth.


title: Bentonite

text: Most high-grade natural sodium bentonite is produced from the western United States in an area between the Black Hills of South Dakota and the Bighorn Basin of Wyoming, and the Tokat Resadiye region of Turkey. Mixed sodium/calcium bentonite is mined in Greece, Australia, India, Russia, and Ukraine.


title: Bentonite

text: In the United States, calcium bentonite is mined primarily in Mississippi and Alabama. Other major locations producing calcium bentonite include New Zealand, Germany, Greece, Turkey, India, and China.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: The Republic of Pirates was the base and stronghold of a loose confederacy run by privateers-turned-pirates in Nassau on New Providence island in the Bahamas during the Golden Age of Piracy for about eleven years from 1706 until 1718. While it was not a republic in a formal sense, it was governed by an informal pirate code, which dictated that the crews of the Republic would vote on the leadership of their ships and treat other pirate crews with civility.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: The activities of the pirates caused havoc with trade and shipping in the West Indies until newly-appointed Royal Governor of the Bahama Islands Woodes Rogers reached Nassau in 1718 and restored British control. Rogers, a former privateer himself, offered clemency to the pirates of the Bahamas, known as the "King's Pardon", an offer many pirates took advantage of, and though a few would return to piracy in the following years, British control of the Bahamas had been secured.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: The era of piracy in the Bahamas began in 1696, when the privateer Henry Avery brought his ship the "Fancy" loaded with loot from plundering Indian trade ships into Nassau harbour. Avery bribed the governor Nicholas Trott with gold and silver, and with the "Fancy" itself, still loaded with 50 tons of elephant tusks and 100 barrels of gunpowder. This established Nassau as a base where pirates could operate safely, although various governors regularly made a show of suppressing piracy. Although the governors were still legally in charge, the pirates became increasingly powerful.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: The era of true pirate control occurred when a combined Franco-Spanish Fleet attacked Nassau in 1703 and again in 1706; the island was effectively abandoned by many of its settlers and left without any English government presence. Nassau was then taken over by English privateers, who became completely lawless pirates over time. The pirates attacked French and Spanish ships, while the French and Spanish forces burned Nassau several more times. Pirates established themselves in Nassau, and essentially established their own republic with its own governors. By 1713 the War of the Spanish Succession was over, but many British privateers were slow to get the news, or reluctant to accept it, and so slipped into piracy. This led to large numbers of unemployed privateers making their way to New Providence to join the republic and swell its numbers. The republic was dominated by two famous pirates who were bitter rivals – Benjamin Hornigold and Henry Jennings. Hornigold was mentor to pirates such as the famous Edward Teach, known as "Blackbeard", along with Sam Bellamy and Stede Bonnet. Jennings was mentor to Charles Vane, "Calico" Jack Rackham, Anne Bonny, and Mary Read. Despite their rivalries, the pirates formed themselves into the Flying Gang and quickly became infamous for their exploits. The Governor of Bermuda stated that there were over 1000 pirates in Nassau at that time and that they outnumbered the mere hundred of inhabitants in the town. Blackbeard was later voted by the pirates of Nassau to be their Magistrate, to be in command of their republic and enforce law and order as he saw fit.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: Pirate Thomas Barrow declared "that he is Governor of Providence and will make it a second Madagascar, and expects 5 or 600 men more from Jamaica sloops to join in the settling of Providence, and to make war on the French and Spaniards, but for the English, they don't intend to meddle with them, unless they are first attack'd by them." While originally the pirates had avoided attacking British ships, this restraint disappeared over time, and at their height, the pirates could command a small fleet of ships that could take on the frigates of the Royal Navy. The amount of havoc caused by the pirates led to an outcry for their destruction, and finally George I appointed Woodes Rogers as Governor of the Bahamas to bring the piracy to an end, and offered a pardon to all pirates who turned themselves in.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: News of the King's Pardon was brought first from Bermuda, then by Captain Vincent Pearse of , and received a mixed reception, some of those rejecting the pardon being Jacobites. Pearse made a list of 209 pirates on New Providence – fewer than half the pirates on the island – who stated their intention to take the pardon.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: In 1718 Rogers arrived in Nassau with a fleet of several ships, bringing with him the authority to grant the King's Pardon. Among those who accepted was Benjamin Hornigold, and, in a shrewd move, Rogers commissioned Hornigold to hunt down and capture those pirates who refused to surrender and accept the royal pardon. As a former privateer himself, Hornigold was well placed to understand what needed to be done, and he pursued his former comrades with zeal. Although pirates such as Charles Vane and Blackbeard evaded capture, Hornigold did take ten pirates prisoner and on the morning of 12 December 1718, nine of them were executed. This act re-established British control and ended the pirates' republic in the Bahamas. Those pirates who had fled successfully continued their piratical activities elsewhere in the Caribbean in what has become known as the Golden Age of Piracy.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: The pirates ran their affairs using what was called the pirate code, which was the basis of their claim that their rule of New Providence constituted a kind of republic. According to the code, the pirates ran their ships democratically, sharing plunder equally and selecting and deposing their captains by popular vote. Many of the pirates were privateers out of work since the end of the Queen Anne's War and ex-sailors who had revolted against the conditions on merchant and naval ships. Africans could be equal members of the crew, and several people of mixed European and African descent became pirate captains. Some of the pirates were also Jacobites, who had become pirates to help restore the recently deposed Stuart line to the throne. A few female pirates like Anne Bonny and Mary Read were also present.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: In "", fictional character Edward Kenway helps to seize control of Nassau and establish the pirate republic with other major pirates of the Golden Age of Piracy.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: The TV series "Black Sails" is largely based on the history and famous historical pirate inhabitants of Nassau. Several characters' motivations are rooted in the idea of establishing a true "Republic of Pirates" in Nassau.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: The Netflix limited series "The Lost Pirate Kingdom" (2021) is also based on the exploits and rivalries of both the Republic of Pirates as well as the Flying Gang and its members, including Benjamin Hornigold, Sam Bellamy, Henry Jennings, and Blackbeard.


title: Republic of Pirates

text: The 2022 HBO Max series "Our Flag Means Death" features the Republic of Pirates in episode 3, "A Gentleman Pirate".


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Kenneth "Kenny" McCormick is a fictional character and one of the four main characters in the adult animated television series "South Park" along with Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, and Eric Cartman. His often muffled and incomprehensible speech—the result of his parka hood covering his mouth—is provided by co-creator Matt Stone. He debuted on television when "South Park" first aired on August 13, 1997, after having first appeared in "The Spirit of Christmas" shorts created by Stone and long-time collaborator Trey Parker in 1992 ("Jesus vs. Frosty") and 1995 ("Jesus vs. Santa").


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Kenny is a third, later fourth-grade student who commonly has extraordinary experiences not typical of conventional small-town life in his hometown of South Park, Colorado, where he lives with his poverty-stricken family. Kenny is animated by computer to look as he did in the show's original method of cutout animation. He also appears in the 1999 full-length feature film "", in which his true appearance and voice were first revealed, and various "South Park" merchandise.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Kenny has gained a lot of popularity thanks to a running gag most prevalent during the first five seasons of the series, in which Kenny would suffer an excruciating death before returning alive and well in the next episode with little or no explanation. Stan would frequently use the catchphrase "Oh, my God! They killed Kenny!", followed by Kyle exclaiming "You bastard(s)!". Since the show began its sixth season in 2002, the practice of killing Kenny has been seldom used by the show's creators. Various episodes have set up the gag, sometimes presenting a number of explanations for Kenny's unacknowledged reappearances. In the episode "Mysterion Rises," it is found that Kenny actually has the superpower of resurrection, claiming that no matter how many times he's died, he always wakes up in his bed the next day wearing his usual clothes. He also states that none of his peers or family can remember him dying whatsoever. However, in some episodes, the other kids can recall Kenny being killed and mention how he died all the time.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Kenny attends South Park Elementary as part of Mr. Garrison's fourth-grade class. During the first 58 episodes, Kenny and the other main child characters were in the third grade. Kenny comes from a poor household, presided over by his alcoholic, unemployed father, Stuart McCormick. His mother Carol McCormick has a job washing dishes at the Olive Garden. Kenny has an older brother named Kevin. He also has a younger sister who is shown with his family in the season nine episode "Best Friends Forever", but does not reappear until the 15th season episode "The Poor Kid", where her name is revealed to be Karen, whom he loves unconditionally. Kenny is friends with Stan, Kyle, Cartman, and Butters. Kenny is regularly teased for living in poverty, particularly by Cartman.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Kenny's superhero alter ego, Mysterion, first appeared in the Season 13 episode "The Coon", as a rival to Eric Cartman's eponymous superhero alter ego. He unmasks himself at the end of the episode, but his identity is left intentionally ambiguous to the viewer. He is not revealed to be Kenny until the Season 14 episode "Mysterion Rises", the character's third appearance as part of a story arc.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Prior to season six, Kenny died in almost every episode. The nature of the deaths was often gruesome and portrayed in a comically absurd fashion, and usually followed by Stan (or Kyle) respectively yelling "Oh, my God! They killed Kenny!" with Kyle yelling "You bastard(s)!" Shortly afterward, rats would commonly appear and begin picking at his corpse. In a following episode, Kenny would reappear alive and well, usually without any explanation. Most characters appear oblivious or indifferent to the phenomenon, although occasionally one will acknowledge awareness of it. In "Cherokee Hair Tampons", Kenny gets irritated and offended when Stan laments Kyle's critical condition while utterly ignoring Kenny's past demises. Eric Cartman commented on Kenny's deaths in the episode "Cartmanland" when he is being sued for unsafe rides insisting to attorneys representing his family that "Kenny? He dies all the time!" In "Mr. Hankey, the Christmas Poo", as the episode is about to end, the kids point out that "something feels unfinished", and Kenny celebrates as "The End" sign appears; it is the first episode in the series he survives.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Near the end of the production run of the show's fifth season, Parker and Stone contemplated having an episode in which Kenny was killed off permanently. The reasoning behind the idea was to genuinely surprise fans, and to allow an opportunity to provide a major role for Butters Stotch, a breakout character whose popularity was growing with the viewers and creators of the show. In the episode "Kenny Dies", Kenny dies after developing terminal muscular dystrophy, while Parker and Stone claimed that Kenny would not be returning in subsequent episodes. The duo insisted they grew tired of upholding the tradition of having Kenny die in each episode. Stone stated that thinking of humorous ways to kill the character was initially fun, but became more mundane as the series progressed. When they determined that it would be too difficult to develop the character because he was too much of a "prop", Parker and Stone finally decided to kill off Kenny permanently.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: For much of season six, Kenny remained dead, though he still appears to possess Cartman's body, and both Stone and Parker entertained the idea of eventually bringing the character back. According to Stone, only a small minority of fans were significantly angered by Kenny's absence to threaten a boycott of the cable channel Comedy Central, on which "South Park" is aired. For most of the season, Stan, Kyle, and Cartman fill the void left by Kenny by allowing the characters Butters Stotch and Tweek Tweak into their group, paving the way for those characters to receive more focus on the show; nevertheless, Kenny returned from the year-long absence in the season six finale "Red Sleigh Down", has remained the main character since, and has been given larger roles in episodes.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: The first explanation given for Kenny's deaths and reappearances was given in "Cartman Joins NAMBLA", wherein the McCormicks have a baby exactly like Kenny, including the characteristic orange parka, shortly after the former Kenny dies. Mr. McCormick exclaims, "God, this must be the fiftieth time this has happened", to which Mrs. McCormick quickly replies, "Fifty-second". This explanation is expanded upon in the Season 14 episodes "", "Mysterion Rises" and "Coon vs. Coon and Friends", in which Kenny, while playing superheroes with his friends, claims his "superpower" is immortality. He actually dies several times during these episodes—even committing suicide more than once—reawakening alive and unharmed in his bed each time. He is frustrated and angry that no one can remember him dying every time he regenerates and longs to know the source of his power, which he views as a curse. Unbeknownst to him, his parents were previously connected to a Cthulhu-worshipping death cult. After Kenny shoots himself the second time, Mrs. McCormick awakes with a scream, shrieks "It's happening again!", and minutes later, is shown gently placing a newborn Kenny in his bed. "We should never have gone to that stupid cult meeting," she grouses as she and her husband return to bed.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: In "Put It Down", he is killed off-screen by a driver on his phone, as his picture is shown among those of kids killed by a driver on phone texting tribute. In "Bike Parade", Jeff Bezos tells Alexa to kill Kenny, and Cartman hauls his coffin while riding his bike in the parade. "The Pandemic Special" sees Kenny being gunned down by the police when they are equipped with military weaponry to deal with the children breaking free from COVID-19 quarantine.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: In "", as a millionaire scientist in the future finding the cause of COVID-19, McCormick dies due to a time travel experiment that got him a variant named COVID Delta+ Rewards. This death is undone in "" after Stan, Kyle, and Cartman time travel to the past.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: When developing the character, the show's creators had observed that most groups of childhood friends in small middle-class towns always included "the one poor kid" and decided to portray Kenny in this light.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: In a 2000 interview, Parker said that Kenny was based on a childhood friend of his who was also named Kenny and wore an orange parka that muffled his voice. He too was the poorest kid in the neighborhood and often skipped school, causing Parker and his friends to jokingly say he died, only for him to return to school later.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: An unnamed precursor to Kenny first appeared in the first "The Spirit of Christmas" short, dubbed "Jesus vs. Frosty", created by Parker and Stone in 1992 while they were students at the University of Colorado. The character was composed of construction paper cutouts and animated through the use of stop motion. When tasked three years later by friend Brian Graden to create another short as a video Christmas card that he could send to friends, Parker and Stone created another similarly-animated "The Spirit of Christmas" short, dubbed "Jesus vs. Santa". In this short, Kenny is given his first name, and first appears as he does in the series.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Kenny next appeared on August 13, 1997, when "South Park" debuted on Comedy Central with the episode "Cartman Gets an Anal Probe".


title: Kenny McCormick

text: In tradition with the show's animation style, Kenny is composed of simple geometrical shapes and primary colors. He is not offered the same free range of motion associated with hand-drawn characters; his character is mostly shown from only one angle, and his movements are animated in an intentionally jerky fashion. Ever since the show's second episode, "Weight Gain 4000" (season one, 1997), Kenny, like all other characters on the show, has been animated with computer software, though he is portrayed to give the impression that the show still utilizes its original technique.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: The effect of Kenny's speech is achieved by Stone mumbling into his own hand as he provides Kenny's lines. While he originally voiced Kenny without any computer manipulation, Stone now does so by speaking in his normal vocal range and then adding a childlike inflection. The recorded audio is then edited with Pro Tools, and the pitch is altered to make the voice sound more like that of a fourth-grader. As the technique of Kenny's muzzled enunciation frequently implies, many of his lines are indeed profane and sexually explicit, the lengthier of which are mostly improvised by Stone.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: He first appeared unobscured by his hood in "", where it was revealed that he had messy blonde hair. Mike Judge provided the voice for Kenny's one line of uninsulated dialogue: "Goodbye, you guys." On a few occasions during episodes that have originally aired since the film's release, he has been seen without the parka; however, unlike in "Bigger, Longer & Uncut" his entire face has been only seen three times in the television series without being partially obscured or otherwise altered, this being in "The Losing Edge", "The Jeffersons", and "You're Getting Old". He also speaks unmuffled during some of these instances, in which case co-producer Eric Stough provides Kenny's voice. During "The Coon" episodes of seasons 13 and 14, Kenny has his first major speaking role as the character Mysterion.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: While most child characters on the show are foul-mouthed, Kenny is often even more risqué with his dialogue. Parker and Stone state that they depict Kenny and his friends in this manner in order to display how young boys really talk when they are alone. While Kenny is often cynical and profane, Parker notes that there nonetheless is an "underlying sweetness" aspect to the character, and "Time" magazine described Kenny and his friends as "sometimes cruel but with a core of innocence". He is amused by toilet humor and bodily functions, and his favorite television personalities are Terrance and Phillip, a Canadian duo whose comedy routines on their show-within-the-show revolve substantially around fart jokes. Kenny is shown to desire intercourse in the episode "The Ring", when Kenny gets a girlfriend and is overjoyed to find out that she has a reputation as a slut. Kenny is also lecherous, and often portrayed as being eager to do and say disgusting things in an attempt to impress others or earn money. Conversely, his alter-ego Mysterion is seemingly mature, principled, and serious-minded, the only exception being one instance in "Mysterion Rises" in which he takes delight in irritating Cartman. As Mysterion, he convinces his parents to take better care of themselves and their children, as seen by their reaction when he questions them about the cult of Cthulhu. He also uses his disguise to protect his sister Karen (who refers to Mysterion as her "guardian angel"), as revealed in "The Poor Kid"; however, in all of his guises, Kenny is depicted as being uncommonly selfless, dying for the sake of others and spending all of his time working so he could buy his little sister a doll.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: In the trilogy of episodes "Black Friday", "A Song of Ass and Fire" and "Titties and Dragons", in which the boys play-act characters from the TV series "Game of Thrones", Kenny cross-dresses as a fantasy-style princess with a wig and dress similar to the video game character Princess Zelda, and becomes a Japanese-speaking moe anime character at one point. When Cartman complains, "You're never going to be a real princess", Princess Kenny responds (via her translator, Stan) angrily to Cartman, calling him a "ball-licking lesbian".


title: Kenny McCormick

text: This portrayal continues in the video game "" where Cartman notes that playing a "chick" is "just how [Kenny] seems to be rolling right now". Kenny's sister also refers to Kenny as a girl, if you talk to her in the McCormick house. Throughout the game, Kenny posts 'status updates' referring to herself as "the cutest of them all".


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Kenny had a major role in "", the full-length film based on the series, and appeared on the singing (albeit muffled) several lines of the song "Mountain Town" from the film. As a tribute to the Dead Parrot sketch, a short that features Kenny as a "dead friend" being returned by Cartman to a shop run by Kyle aired during a 1999 BBC television special commemorating the 30th anniversary of "Monty Python's Flying Circus". Kenny was also featured in the documentary film "The Aristocrats", listening to Cartman tell his version of the film's titular joke, and in "The Gauntlet", a short spoofing both "Gladiator" and "Battlefield Earth" that aired during the 2000 MTV Movie Awards.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Kenny also appears in six "South Park"-related video games: In "South Park", Kenny is controlled by the player through the first-person shooter mode who attempts to ward off enemies from terrorizing the town of South Park. In "", a user has the option of playing as Kenny when participating in the game's several "minigames" based on other popular arcade games. In the racing game "South Park Rally", a user can race as Kenny against other users playing as other characters, while choosing to place him in any of a variety of vehicles. In "South Park Let's Go Tower Defense Play!", Kenny can be selected as a playable character used to establish a tower defense against the game's antagonists. In "", Kenny (as Princess Kenny) can be selected as a companion over the course of much of the game. In "", Kenny is seen as his alter-ego Mysterion.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Kenny's deaths are well known in popular culture, and was one of the things viewers most commonly associated with "South Park" during its earlier seasons. "IGN" ranked Kenny at #6 on their "The Top 25 South Park Characters" list. The exclamation of "Oh my God! They killed Kenny!" quickly became a popular catchphrase, while both Kenny and the phrase have appeared on some of the more popular pieces of "South Park" merchandise, including shirts, bumper stickers, calendars and baseball caps, and inspired the rap song "Kenny's Dead" by Master P, which was featured on "".


title: Kenny McCormick

text: The running gag of Kenny's deaths in earlier seasons was incorporated into the season 9 (2005) episode "Best Friends Forever" when Kenny, in a vegetative state, is kept alive by a feeding tube while a media circus erupted over whether the tube should be removed and allow Kenny to die. The episode received much attention as it served to provide commentary on the Terri Schiavo case, originally airing just one day before Schiavo died. The episode earned "South Park" its first Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: Kenny's deaths have been subject to much critical analysis in the media and literary world. In the book "", an essay by Southern Illinois University philosophy professor Randall Auxier, entitled "Killing Kenny: Our Daily Dose of Death", suggests that the fashion of the recurring gag serves to help the viewer become more comfortable with the inevitability of their own death. In the book "South Park and Philosophy: You Know, I Learned Something Today", University of Wisconsin–Stevens Point professor Karin Fry wrote an essay concerning the parallels between Kenny's role in the show and the different concepts of existentialism.


title: Kenny McCormick

text: When Sophie Rutschmann of the University of Strasbourg discovered a mutated gene that causes an adult fruit fly to die within two days after it is infected with certain bacteria, she named the gene "Kenny" in honor of the character.


title: Cyberchase

text: Cyberchase is an educational animated sci-fi children's television series that airs on PBS Kids. The series centers around three children from Earth: Jackie, Matt, and Inez, who are brought into Cyberspace, a digital universe, in order to protect the world from the villain Hacker (Christopher Lloyd). They are able to prevent Hacker from taking over Cyberspace by means of problem-solving skills in conjunction with basic math, environmental science, and wellness. In Cyberspace, they meet Digit (Gilbert Gottfried), a "cybird" who helps them on their missions.


title: Cyberchase

text: "Cyberchase" was created by WNET New York and premiered on PBS Kids on January 21, 2002. In 2010, after the season 8 finale, "Cyberchase" went on hiatus, but it returned in 2013 for a ninth season, followed by a tenth season in 2015. The eleventh season premiered on October 23, 2017, and the twelfth season premiered on April 19, 2019.


title: Cyberchase

text: Motherboard is the "brain of the giant computer system that oversees all of Cyberspace". Her technician computer scientist, Dr. Marbles, kept her functioning properly until his assistant, the Hacker, turned against them. Dr. Marbles drained Hacker's battery and banished him to the Northern Frontier, where he formulated a plan to launch a virus that would attack Motherboard.


title: Cyberchase

text: When Jackie, Matt, and Inez interact with a library map in the real world, they accidentally allow Hacker access to Motherboard, and she becomes infected with the virus. The kids are brought into Cyberspace and join forces with Digit, a creation of the Hacker who escaped his control. Together they protect the world from the Hacker and his clumsy, accident-prone assistants, Buzz and Delete, until they can recover the Encryptor Chip, a device stolen by Hacker that can nullify the virus and bring Motherboard back to full strength.


title: Cyberchase

text: Cyberspace consists of planet-like bodies called Cybersites, with each site having a theme such as Ancient Egypt, the American Old West, Greek mythology, and amusement parks. These sites represent the diversity of websites on the Internet, and reflect the many ecosystems and neighborhoods of the Earth. The Cybersquad travels to many of these locations in order to protect them from Hacker, and each inhabited Cybersite has a unique type of Cybercitizen they interact with.


title: Cyberchase

text: "Cyberchase" has had many guest stars over the years, including Jasmine Guy, Tony Hawk, Al Roker, and Geoffrey Holder. These guest stars appear as citizens of Cybersites, villains, friends, or rulers of the site.


title: Cyberchase

text: Each "Cyberchase" episode is followed by "Cyberchase For Real", a live-action educational supplement linking concepts learned in the show to real life experiences. The actors Bianca DeGroat and Matthew A. Wilson (known as Harry Wilson on the show) are in their 30s, but amusingly act in a manner similar to the age of the target audience. "For Real" is produced by WNET in and around New York City after production is completed on the animated segments. These "For Real" segments are broadcast exclusively on PBS in the United States where the program runs longer and fills the time gap where there might be breaks for "commercials". Some "For Real" segments can also be viewed online. In 2012, "Oh Noah", shorts that teach kids to speak Spanish, were used instead of re-running the "For Real" segments. The "For Real" segment returned in season 9.


title: Cyberchase

text: "Cyberchase" was conceived in 1999 as an educational show that aims to show kids that math is everywhere and everyone can be good at it. The series encourages viewers to see, think, and do mathematics in their world. The show and supporting activities have been designed to support math education and reflect the curriculum standards of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. The show's philosophy is to foster enthusiasm for math, to model mathematic reasoning, to help children improve their problem-solving skills and to inspire all children to approach math with confidence and a "can-do" attitude. Later seasons place less emphasis on math and more on environmentalism and wellness. For example, in season 11, the theme of episode 2 is habitat fragmentation, episode 3 is about the effects of temperature on marine ecology, and episode 4 discusses using plants to improve indoor air quality.


title: Cyberchase

text: Originally, Thirteen produced the show in partnership with Ontario-based Nelvana for PBS Kids. It aired on PBS Kids since 2002, and on V-me (dubbed in Spanish) from 2004 to 2013. Cyberchase has been animated by Pip Animation Services Inc. since season six; Right Path Pictures did post-production, and Curious Pictures did the original character design. Twelfth Root Music produces the sound track for Cyberchase. Thirteen/WNET New York and Nelvana produced the first five seasons, while Thirteen, in association with Title Entertainment and WNET.ORG, produced seasons six and on. Seasons 1 to 5 used traditional animation, while the sixth season onward used Flash animation.


title: Cyberchase

text: On the site "Common Sense Media", the show was for ages 5 and up and rated four out of five stars. The reviewer, Joly Herman, commented that "the adventures aren't scary, violent, or sexually inappropriate" but "require fortitude and brain power". Proposed discussion points sprouting from the series include "Can your child take the skills learned in each episode and figure out how to apply it to everyday life?" Herman noted that the only downside was that the adventures did not take place in the "real world" but added that the "For Real" segments solved this problem. The show was given a rating of three out of five smiley faces under "The Good Stuff" section.


title: Cyberchase

text: Carey Bryson of "About.com" gave the show a rating of four out of five stars. Bryson noted that the series' explanations of "simple mathematical idea[s]" are "usually explained well and woven throughout the story in a fun and interesting way". The review commended the series for its accessibility: "Children can easily learn from the example in the cartoon story" and praised the "Cyberchase For Real segment that follows each episode". Citing an example from the series using codes, Bryson explained how the show could be used to expand upon the curriculum: "Not only did [her five-year-old] learn about codes, but she also got in a ton of spelling practice". Bryson commended the series: "Educationally, "Cyberchase" delivers".


title: Cyberchase

text: "Cyberchase" has been nominated for five Daytime Emmys and won in 2007 in the Outstanding Broadband Program category. "Cyberchase" also won a CINE Golden Eagle in 2006.


title: Christopher Sabat

text: Christopher Robin Sabat is an American voice actor, voice director, ADR engineer, and line producer working for Funimation, and OkraTron 5000. Some of his prominent roles in animations and anime include Vegeta and Piccolo in "Dragon Ball", Roronoa Zoro in "One Piece", All Might in "My Hero Academia" and Daisuke Jigen in "Lupin the Third".


title: Christopher Sabat

text: Sabat has provided voices for English-versions of Japanese anime and video games, including a variety of "Dragon Ball" characters, such as Vegeta, Piccolo, Yamcha, Shenron and others. Besides voicing in "Dragon Ball " he has lent his voice to several other anime characters including Daisuke Jigen in "Lupin the Third", Kazuma Kuwabara in "Yu Yu Hakusho", Alex Louis Armstrong in "Fullmetal Alchemist", Tatsumi Saiga in "Speed Grapher", in "", All Might in "My Hero Academia", Roronoa Zoro in the Funimation dub of "One Piece", Yami Sukehiro in "Black Clover", Elfman Strauss in "Fairy Tail", and Grip in "Assassination Classroom".


title: Christopher Sabat

text: In video games, he voices Alex D in "", Rundas in "", Garland in "," and Captain Smiley and Star in "". He is also the founder and director of OkraTron 5000, an audio production company that provides support for some of Funimation's dubbing titles.


title: Balance of payments

text: In international economics, the balance of payments (also known as balance of international payments and abbreviated BOP or BoP) of a country is the difference between all money flowing into the country in a particular period of time (e.g., a quarter or a year) and the outflow of money to the rest of the world. These financial transactions are made by individuals, firms and government bodies to compare receipts and payments arising out of trade of goods and services.


title: Balance of payments

text: The balance of payments consists of two components: the current account and the capital account. The current account reflects a country's net income, while the capital account reflects the net change in ownership of national assets.


title: Balance of payments

text: Until the early 19th century, international trade was heavily regulated and accounted for a relatively small portion compared with national output. In the Middle Ages, European trade was typically regulated at municipal level in the interests of security for local industry and for established merchants. (Annual fairs would sometimes allow exceptions to the standard regulations.)


title: Balance of payments

text: Beginning in the 16th century, mercantilism became the dominant economic theory influencing European rulers. Local trade regulations were replaced by national rules aiming to harness the countries' economic output. Measures to promote a trade surplus (such as tariffs) were generally favored.


title: Balance of payments

text: The prevailing orthodoxy of the mercantilist age was the (now discredited) notion that the accumulation of foreign exchange or, at that time, precious metals, made countries wealthier, and so countries favored exporting their own goods to run balance of payments surpluses. This viewpoint prevails in "England's Treasure by Foreign Trade" (1664) by Thomas Mun.


title: Balance of payments

text: Economic growth remained at low levels in the mercantilist era; average global per capita income is not considered to have significantly risen in the whole 800 years leading up to 1820, and is estimated to have increased on average by less than 0.1% per year between 1700 and 1820. With very low levels of financial integration between nations and with international trade generally making up a low proportion of individual nations' GDP, BOP crises were very rare.


title: Balance of payments

text: In the essays "Of Money" and "Of the Balance of Trade", Hume argued that the accumulation of precious metals would create monetary inflation without any real effect on interest rates. It is the foundation of what is known in modern economic studies as the quantity theory of money, the neutrality of money and the consideration of interest rates not as a monetary phenomenon, but a real one. Adam Smith built on this foundation. He accused mercantilists of being anti-free trade and confusing money with wealth.


title: Balance of payments

text: David Ricardo based his arguments on Say's Law, developing the theory of comparative advantage, which remains the dominant theory of growth and trade in modern economics.


title: Balance of payments

text: After victory in the Napoleonic wars Great Britain began promoting free trade, unilaterally reducing its trade tariffs. Hoarding of gold was no longer encouraged, and in fact Britain exported more capital as a percentage of its national income than any other creditor nation has since. Great Britain's capital exports further helped to correct global imbalances as they tended to be counter cyclical, rising when Britain's economy went into recession, thus compensating other states for income lost from export of goods.


title: Balance of payments

text: According to historian Carroll Quigley, Great Britain could afford to act benevolently in the 19th century due to the advantages of her geographical location, naval power, and economic ascendancy as the first nation to enjoy an industrial revolution. However, some, like Otto von Bismarck, viewed Great Britain's promotion of free trade as a way to maintain its dominant position.


title: Balance of payments

text: A view advanced by economists such as Barry Eichengreen is that the first age of Globalization began with the laying of transatlantic telegraph cables in the 1860s, which facilitated a rapid increase in the already growing trade between Britain and America.


title: Balance of payments

text: Though Current Account controls were still widely used (in fact all industrial nations apart from Great Britain and the Netherlands actually increased their tariffs and quotas in the decades leading up to 1914, though this was motivated more by a desire to protect "infant industries" than to encourage a trade surplus), capital controls were largely absent.


title: Balance of payments

text: A gold standard enjoyed wide international participation especially from 1870, further contributing to close economic integration between nations. The period saw substantial global growth, in particular for the volume of international trade which grew tenfold between 1820 and 1870 and then by about 4% annually from 1870 to 1914. BoP crises began to occur, though less frequently than was to be the case for the remainder of the 20th century. From 1880 to 1914, there were approximately eight BoP crises and eight "twin crises" – a twin crisis being a BoP crisis that coincides with a banking crisis.


title: Balance of payments

text: The favorable economic conditions that had prevailed up until 1914 were shattered by the first world war, and efforts to re-establish them in the 1920s were not successful. Several countries rejoined the gold standard around 1925. But surplus countries didn't "play by the rules", sterilising gold inflows to a much greater degree than had been the case in the pre-war period. Deficit nations such as Great Britain found it harder to adjust by deflation as workers were more enfranchised and unions in particular were able to resist downwards pressure on wages. During the Great Depression most countries abandoned the gold standard, but imbalances remained an issue and international trade declined sharply. There was a return to mercantilist type "beggar thy neighbour" policies, with countries competitively devaluing their exchange rates, thus effectively competing to export unemployment. There were approximately 16 BoP crises and 15 twin crises (and a comparatively very high level of banking crises).


title: Balance of payments

text: Following World War II, the Bretton Woods institutions (the International Monetary Fund and World Bank) were set up to support an international monetary system designed to encourage free trade while also offering states options to correct imbalances without having to deflate their economies. Fixed but flexible exchange rates were established, with the system anchored by the dollar which alone remained convertible into gold. The Bretton Woods system ushered in a period of high global growth, known as the Golden Age of Capitalism, however it came under pressure due to the inability or unwillingness of governments to maintain effective capital controls


title: Balance of payments

text: Imbalances caused gold to flow out of the US and a loss of confidence in the United States ability to supply gold for all future claims by dollar holders resulted in escalating demands to convert dollars, ultimately causing the US to end the convertibility of the dollar into gold, thus ending the Bretton Woods system. The 1945–71 era saw approximately 24 BoP crises and no twin crisis for advanced economies, with emerging economies seeing 16 BoP crises and just one twin crisis.


title: Balance of payments

text: The Bretton Woods system came to an end between 1971 and 1973. There were attempts to repair the system of fixed exchanged rates over the next few years, but these were soon abandoned, as were determined efforts for the U.S. to avoid BoP imbalances. Part of the reason was displacement of the previous dominant economic paradigm – Keynesianism – by the Washington Consensus, with economists and economics writers such as Murray Rothbard and Milton Friedman arguing that there was no great need to be concerned about BoP issues.


title: Balance of payments

text: In the immediate aftermath of the Bretton Woods collapse, countries generally tried to retain some control over their exchange rate by independently managing it, or by intervening in the foreign exchange market as part of a regional bloc, such as the Snake which formed in 1971. "The Snake" was a group of European countries who tried to retain stable rates at least with each other; the group eventually evolved into the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) by 1979. From the mid-1970s however, and especially in the 1980s and early 1990s, many other countries followed the US in liberalizing controls on both their capital and current accounts, in adopting a somewhat relaxed attitude to their balance of payments and in allowing the value of their currency to float relatively freely with exchange rates determined mostly by the market.


title: Balance of payments

text: Developing countries who chose to allow the market to determine their exchange rates would often develop sizable current account deficits, financed by capital account inflows such as loans and investments, though this often ended in crises when investors lost confidence. The frequency of crises was especially high for developing economies in this era – from 1973 to 1997 emerging economies suffered 57 BoP crises and 21 twin crises. Typically but not always the panic among foreign creditors and investors that preceded the crises in this period was usually triggered by concerns over excess borrowing by the private sector, rather than by a government deficit. For advanced economies, there were 30 BoP crises and 6 banking crises.


title: Balance of payments

text: A turning point was the 1997 Asian BoP Crisis, where unsympathetic responses by western powers caused policy makers in emerging economies to re-assess the wisdom of relying on the free market; by 1999 the developing world as a whole stopped running current account deficits while the U.S. current account deficit began to rise sharply.


title: Balance of payments

text: This new form of imbalance began to develop in part due to the increasing practice of emerging economies, principally China, in pegging their currency against the dollar, rather than allowing the value to freely float. The resulting state of affairs has been referred to as Bretton Woods II. According to Alaistair Chan, "At the heart of the imbalance is China's desire to keep the value of the yuan stable against the dollar. Usually, a rising trade surplus leads to a rising value of the currency. A rising currency would make exports more expensive, imports less so, and push the trade surplus towards balance. China circumvents the process by intervening in exchange markets and keeping the value of the yuan depressed."


title: Balance of payments

text: According to economics writer Martin Wolf, in the eight years leading up to 2007, "three-quarters of the foreign currency reserves accumulated since the beginning of time have been piled up".


title: Balance of payments

text: In contrast to the changed approach within the emerging economies, US policy makers and economists remained relatively unconcerned about BOP imbalances. In the early to mid-1990s, many free market economists and policy makers such as U.S. Treasury secretary Paul O'Neill and Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan went on record suggesting the growing US deficit was not a major concern. While several emerging economies had intervened to boost their reserves and assist their exporters from the late 1980s, they only began running a net current account surplus after 1999. This was mirrored in the faster growth for the US current account deficit from the same year, with surpluses, deficits and the associated buildup of reserves by the surplus countries reaching record levels by the early 2000s and growing year by year. Some economists such as Kenneth Rogoff and Maurice Obstfeld began warning that the record imbalances would soon need to be addressed from as early as 2001, joined by Nouriel Roubini in 2004, but it was not until about 2007 that their concerns began to be accepted by the majority of economists.


title: Balance of payments

text: Under a fixed exchange rate system, the central bank accommodates those flows by buying up any net inflow of funds into the country or by providing foreign currency funds to the foreign exchange market to match any international outflow of funds, thus preventing the funds flows from affecting the exchange rate between the country's currency and other currencies. Then the net change per year in the central bank's foreign exchange reserves is sometimes called the balance of payments surplus or deficit. Alternatives to a fixed exchange rate system include a managed float where some changes of exchange rates are allowed, or at the other extreme a purely floating exchange rate (also known as a purely "flexible" exchange rate). With a pure float the central bank does not intervene at all to protect or devalue its currency, allowing the rate to be set by the market, the central bank's foreign exchange reserves do not change, and the balance of payments is always zero.


title: Balance of payments

text: The current account shows the net amount of a country's income if it is in surplus, or spending if it is in deficit. It is the sum of the balance of trade (net earnings on exports minus payments for imports), factor income (earnings on foreign investments minus payments made to foreign investors) and unilateral transfers. These items include transfers of goods and services or financial assets between the home country and the rest of the world. Private transfer payments refer to gifts made by individuals and nongovernmental institutions to foreigners. Governmental transfers refer to gifts or grants made by one government to foreign residents or foreign governments. When investment income and unilateral transfers are combined with the balance on goods and services, we arrive at the current account balance. It is called the "current" account as it covers transactions in the "here and now" – those that don't give rise to future claims.


title: Balance of payments

text: The capital account records the net change in ownership of foreign assets. It includes the reserve account (the foreign exchange market operations of a nation's central bank), along with loans and investments between the country and the rest of world (but not the future interest payments and dividends that the loans and investments yield; those are earnings and will be recorded in the current account). If a country purchases more foreign assets for cash than the assets it sells for cash to other countries, the capital account is said to be negative or in deficit.


title: Balance of payments

text: The term "capital account" is also used in the narrower sense that excludes central bank foreign exchange market operations: Sometimes the reserve account is classified as "below the line" and so not reported as part of the capital account.


title: Balance of payments

text: Expressed with the broader meaning for the "capital account", the BoP identity states that any current account surplus will be balanced by a capital account deficit of equal size – or alternatively a current account deficit will be balanced by a corresponding capital account surplus:


title: Balance of payments

text: The "balancing item", which may be positive or negative, is simply an amount that accounts for any statistical errors and assures that the current and capital accounts sum to zero. By the principles of double entry accounting, an entry in the current account gives rise to an entry in the capital account, and in aggregate the two accounts automatically balance. A balance isn't always reflected in reported figures for the current and capital accounts, which might, for example, report a surplus for both accounts, but when this happens it always means something has been missed – most commonly, the operations of the country's central bank – and what has been missed is recorded in the statistical discrepancy term (the balancing item).


title: Balance of payments

text: An actual balance sheet will typically have numerous sub headings under the principal divisions. For example, entries under Current account might include:


title: Balance of payments

text: Especially in older balance sheets, a common division was between visible and invisible entries. Visible trade recorded imports and exports of physical goods (entries for trade in physical goods excluding services is now often called the "merchandise balance"). Invisible trade would record international buying and selling of services, and sometimes would be grouped with transfer and factor income as invisible earnings.


title: Balance of payments

text: The term "balance of payments surplus" (or deficit – a deficit is simply a negative surplus) refers to the sum of the surpluses in the current account and the narrowly defined capital account (excluding changes in central bank reserves). Denoting the balance of payments surplus as BoP surplus, the relevant identity is


title: Balance of payments

text: The balance of payments takes into account payments for a country's exports and imports of goods, services, financial capital, and financial transfers.


title: Balance of payments

text: It is prepared in a single currency, typically the domestic currency for the country concerned. The balance of payments accounts keep systematic records of all the economic transactions (visible and non-visible) of a country with all other countries in the given time period. In the BoP accounts, all the receipts from abroad are recorded as credit and all the payments to abroad are debits. Since the accounts are maintained by double entry bookkeeping, they show the balance of payments accounts are always balanced. Sources of funds for a nation, such as exports or the receipts of loans and investments, are recorded as positive or surplus items. Uses of funds, such as for imports or to invest in foreign countries, are recorded as negative or deficit items.


title: Balance of payments

text: When all components of the BoP accounts are included they must sum to zero with no overall surplus or deficit. For example, if a country is importing more than it exports, its trade balance will be in deficit, but the shortfall will have to be counterbalanced in other ways – such as by funds earned from its foreign investments (but not the investments themselves, since foreign investments are deficit items), by running down currency reserves or by receiving investments or loans from other countries.


title: Balance of payments

text: While the overall BoP accounts will always balance when all types of payments are included, imbalances are possible on individual elements of the BoP, such as the current account, the capital account excluding the central bank's reserve account, or the sum of the two. Imbalances in the latter sum can result in surplus countries accumulating wealth, while deficit nations become increasingly indebted. The term "balance of payments" often refers to this sum: a country's balance of payments is said to be in surplus (equivalently, the balance of payments is positive) by a specific amount if sources of funds (such as export goods sold and bonds sold) exceed uses of funds (such as paying for imported goods and paying for foreign bonds purchased) by that amount. There is said to be a balance of payments deficit (the balance of payments is said to be negative) if the former are less than the latter. A BoP surplus (or deficit) is accompanied by an accumulation (or decumulation) of foreign exchange reserves by the central bank.


title: Balance of payments

text: Economics writer J. Orlin Grabbe warns the term "balance of payments" can be a source of misunderstanding due to divergent expectations about what the term denotes. Grabbe says the term is sometimes misused by people who aren't aware of the accepted meaning, not only in general conversation but in financial publications and the economic literature.


title: Balance of payments

text: A common source of confusion arises from whether or not the "reserve account" entry, part of the "capital account", is included in the BoP accounts. The reserve account records the activity of the nation's central bank. If it is excluded, the BoP can be in surplus (which implies the central bank is building up foreign exchange reserves) or in deficit (which implies the central bank is running down its reserves or borrowing from abroad).


title: Balance of payments

text: The term "balance of payments" is sometimes misused by non-economists to mean just relatively narrow parts of the BoP such as the trade deficit, which means excluding parts of the current account and the entire capital account.


title: Balance of payments

text: Another cause of confusion is the different naming conventions in use. Before 1973 there was no standard way to break down the BoP sheet, with the separation into invisible and visible payments sometimes being the principal divisions. The IMF have their own standards for BoP accounting which is equivalent to the standard definition but uses different nomenclature, in particular with respect to the meaning given to the term "capital account".


title: Balance of payments

text: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) use a particular set of definitions for the BoP accounts, which is also used by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and the United Nations System of National Accounts (SNA).


title: Balance of payments

text: The main difference in the IMF's terminology is that it uses the term "financial account" to capture transactions that would under alternative definitions be recorded in the "capital account". The IMF uses the term "capital account" to designate a subset of transactions that, according to other usage, previously formed a small part of the overall current account. The IMF separates these transactions out to form an additional top level division of the BoP accounts. Expressed with the IMF definition, the BoP identity can be written:


title: Balance of payments

text: The IMF uses the term "current account" with the same meaning as that used by other organizations, although it has its own names for its three leading sub-divisions, which are:


title: Balance of payments

text: The balance of payments is important in international financial management for the following reasons:


title: Balance of payments

text: First, the balance of payments is a factor in the demand and supply of a country's currency. For example, if outflows exceed inflows, then the demand for the currency in the domestic market is likely to exceed the supply in the foreign exchange market, all else being equal. One can thus infer that the currency would be under pressure to depreciate against other currencies. On the other hand, if inflows exceed outflows, then its currency would be likely to appreciate.


title: Balance of payments

text: Second, a country's balance of payments data may signal the country's potential as a business partner for the rest of the world. A country grappling with a major balance of payments difficulty may not be able to expand imports from the outside world. Instead, the country may impose measures to restrict imports and discourage capital outflows in order to improve the balance of payments situation. On the other hand, a country with a significant balance of payments surplus would be more likely to expand imports, offering marketing opportunities for foreign enterprises, and less likely to impose foreign exchange restrictions.


title: Balance of payments

text: Third, balance of payments data can be used to evaluate the performance of the country in international economic competition. A country that is experiencing trade deficits year after year may be a signal that the country's domestic industries lack international competitiveness.


title: Balance of payments

text: While the BoP has to balance overall, surpluses or deficits on its individual elements can lead to imbalances between countries. In general there is concern over deficits in the current account.


title: Balance of payments

text: Countries with deficits in their current accounts will build up increasing debt or see increased foreign ownership of their assets. The types of deficits that typically raise concern are


title: Balance of payments

text: The "Washington Consensus" period saw a swing of opinion towards the view that there is no need to worry about imbalances. Opinion swung back in the opposite direction in the wake of the financial crisis of 2007–2009. Mainstream opinion expressed by the leading financial press and economists, international bodies like the IMF – as well as leaders of surplus and deficit countries – has returned to the view that large current account imbalances do matter. Some economists do, however, remain relatively unconcerned about imbalances


title: Balance of payments

text: and there have been assertions, such as by Michael P. Dooley, David Folkerts-Landau and Peter Garber, that nations need to avoid the temptation to switch to protectionism as a means to correct imbalances.


title: Balance of payments

text: Current account surpluses coincide with current account deficits of other countries, the indebtedness of the latter therefore increasing. According to Balances Mechanics by Wolfgang Stützel this is described as surplus of expenses over revenues. Increasing imbalances in foreign trade are critically discussed as a possible cause of the financial crisis since 2007. Many Keynesian economists consider the existing differences between the current accounts in the eurozone to be the root cause of the Euro crisis, for instance Heiner Flassbeck, Paul Krugman or Joseph Stiglitz.


title: Balance of payments

text: There are conflicting views as to the primary cause of BoP imbalances, with much attention on the US which currently has by far the biggest deficit. The conventional view is that current account factors are the primary cause – these include the exchange rate, the government's fiscal deficit, business competitiveness, and private behaviour such as the willingness of consumers to go into debt to finance extra consumption.


title: Balance of payments

text: An alternative view, argued at length in a 2005 paper by Ben Bernanke, is that the primary driver is the capital account, where a global savings glut caused by savers in surplus countries, runs ahead of the available investment opportunities, and is pushed into the US resulting in excess consumption and asset price inflation.


title: Balance of payments

text: In the context of BoP and international monetary systems, the reserve asset is the currency or other store of value that is primarily used by nations for their foreign reserves. BoP imbalances tend to manifest as hoards of the reserve asset being amassed by surplus countries, with deficit countries building debts denominated in the reserve asset or at least depleting their supply. Under a gold standard, the reserve asset for all members of the standard is gold. In the Bretton Woods system, either gold or the U.S. dollar could serve as the reserve asset, though its smooth operation depended on countries apart from the US choosing to keep most of their holdings in dollars.


title: Balance of payments

text: Following the ending of Bretton Woods, there has been no "de jure" reserve asset, but the US dollar has remained by far the principal "de facto" reserve. Global reserves rose sharply in the first decade of the 21st century, partly as a result of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis, where several nations ran out of foreign currency needed for essential imports and thus had to accept deals on unfavourable terms. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates that between 2000 and mid-2009, official reserves rose from $1,900bn to $6,800bn.


title: Balance of payments

text: Global reserves had peaked at about $7,500bn in mid-2008, then declined by about $430bn as countries without their own reserve currency used them to shield themselves from the worst effects of the financial crisis. From Feb 2009 global reserves began increasing again to reach close to $9,200bn by the end of 2010.


title: Balance of payments

text: , approximately 65% of the world's $6,800bn total is held in U.S. dollars and approximately 25% in euros. The UK pound, Japanese yen, IMF special drawing rights (SDRs), and precious metals also play a role. In 2009, Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of the People's Bank of China, proposed a gradual move towards increased use of SDRs, and also for the national currencies backing SDRs to be expanded to include the currencies of all major economies.


title: Balance of payments

text: While the current central role of the dollar does give the US some advantages, such as lower cost of borrowings, it also contributes to the pressure causing the U.S. to run a current account deficit, due to the Triffin dilemma. In a November 2009 article published in "Foreign Affairs" magazine, economist C. Fred Bergsten argued that Zhou's suggestion or a similar change to the international monetary system would be in the United States' best interests as well as the rest of the world's. Since 2009 there has been a notable increase in the number of new bilateral agreements which enable international trades to be transacted using a currency that is not a traditional reserve asset, such as the renminbi, as the settlement currency.


title: Balance of payments

text: A BoP crisis, also called a "currency crisis", occurs when a nation is unable to pay for essential imports or service its external debt repayments. Typically, this is accompanied by a rapid decline in the value of the affected nation's currency. Crises are generally preceded by large capital inflows, which are associated at first with rapid economic growth. However a point is reached where overseas investors become concerned about the level of debt their inbound capital is generating, and decide to pull out their funds. It sometimes takes only one or two large investors pulling out to trigger a mass panic due to herd effects. The resulting outbound capital flows are associated with a rapid drop in the value of the affected nation's currency. This causes issues for firms of the affected nation who have received the inbound investments and loans, as the revenue of those firms is typically mostly derived domestically but their debts are often denominated in a reserve currency. Once the nation's government has exhausted its foreign reserves trying to support the value of the domestic currency, its policy options are very limited. It can raise its interest rates to try to prevent further declines in the value of its currency, but while this can help those with debts denominated in foreign currencies, it generally further depresses the local economy. Lower-income countries are more exposed to suffer this type of crisis, while economic growth and foreign-exchange piling are particularly useful to prevent them.


title: Balance of payments

text: One of the three fundamental functions of an international monetary system is to provide mechanisms to correct imbalances.


title: Balance of payments

text: Broadly speaking, there are three possible methods to correct BoP imbalances, though in practice a mixture including some degree of at least the first two methods tends to be used. These methods are adjustments of exchange rates; adjustment of a nations internal prices along with its levels of demand; and rules based adjustment. Improving productivity and hence competitiveness can also help, as can increasing the desirability of exports through other means, though it is generally assumed a nation is always trying to develop and sell its products to the best of its abilities.