title: Sigurd

text: Sigurd is raised at the court of king Hjálprek, receives the sword Gram from the smith Regin, and slays the dragon Fafnir on Gnita-Heath by lying in a pit and stabbing it in the heart from underneath. Sigurd tastes the dragon's blood and understands the birds when they say that Regin will kill him in order to acquire the dragon's gold. He then kills Regin and takes the hoard of the Nibelungen for himself. He rides away with the hoard and then awakens the valkyrie Brynhild by cutting the armor from her, before coming to king Gjuki's kingdom. There he marries Gjuki's daughter, Gudrun, and helps her brother, Gunnar, to acquire Brynhild's hand from her brother Atli. Sigurd deceives Brynhild by taking Gunnar's shape when Gunnar cannot fulfill the condition that he ride through a wall of flames to wed her; Sigurd rides through the flames and weds Brynhild, but does not sleep with her, placing his sword between them in the marriage bed. Sigurd and Gunnar then return to their own shapes.


title: Sigurd

text: Sigurd and Gudrun have two children, Svanhild and young Sigmund. Later, Brynhild and Gudrun quarrel and Gudrun reveals that Sigurd was the one who rode through the fire, and shows a ring that Sigurd took from Brynhild as proof. Brynhild then arranges to have Sigurd killed by Gunnar's brother Guthorm. Guthorm stabs Sigurd in his sleep, but Sigurd is able to slice Guthorm in half by throwing his sword before dying. Guthorm has also killed Sigurd's three-year-old son Sigmund. Brynhild then kills herself and is burned on the same pyre as Sigurd.


title: Sigurd

text: The "Poetic Edda" appears to have been compiled around 1270 in Iceland, and assembles mythological and heroic songs of various ages. The story of Sigurd forms the core of the heroic poems collected here. However, the details of Sigurd's life and death in the various poems contradict each other, so that "the story of Sigurd does not emerge clearly from the Eddic verse".


title: Sigurd

text: Generally, none of the poems is thought to have been composed before 900 and some appear to have been written in the thirteenth century. It is also possible that apparently old poems have been written in an archaicizing style and that apparently recent poems are reworkings of older material, so that reliable dating is impossible.


title: Sigurd

text: "Frá dauða Sinfjötla" is a short prose text between the songs. Sigurd is born at the end of the poem; he is the posthumous son of Sigmund, who dies fighting the sons of Hunding, and Hjordis. Hjordis is married to the son of Hjálprek and allowed to raise Sigurd in Hjálprek's home.


title: Sigurd

text: In "Grípisspá", Sigurd goes to Grípir, his uncle on his mother's side, in order to hear a prophecy about his life. Grípir tells Sigurd that he will kill Hunding's sons, the dragon Fafnir, and the smith Regin, acquiring the hoard of the Nibelungen. Then he will wake a valkyrie and learn runes from her. Grípir does not want to tell Sigurd any more, but Sigurd forces him to continue. He says that Sigurd will go to the home of Heimer and betroth himself to Brynhild, but then at the court of King Gjuki he will receive a potion that will make him forget his promise and marry Gudrun. He will then acquire Brynhild as a wife for Gunnar and sleep with Brynhild without having sex with her. Brynhild will recognize the deception, however, and claim that Sigurd did sleep with her, and this will cause Gunnar to have him killed.


title: Sigurd

text: The poem is likely fairly young and seems to have been written to connect the previous poems about Helgi Hundingsbane with those about Sigurd.


title: Sigurd

text: The following three poems form a single unit in the manuscript of the "Poetic Edda", but are split into three by modern scholars. They likely contain old material, but the poems themselves appear to be relatively recent versions. The poems also mix two conceptions of Sigurd: on the one hand, he is presented as an intelligent royal prince, on the other, he is raised by the smith Regin and is presented as stupid. It is most likely that Sigurd's youth with the smith, his stupidity, and his success through supernatural aid rather than his own cunning is the more original of these conceptions.


title: Sigurd

text: In "Reginsmál", the smith Regin, who is staying at the court of Hjálprek, tells Sigurd of a hoard that the gods had had to assemble in order to compensate the family of Ótr, whom they had killed. Fafnir, Ótr's brother, guards the treasure now and has turned into a dragon. Regin wants Sigurd to kill the dragon. He makes the sword Gram for Sigurd, but Sigurd chooses to kill Lyngvi and the other sons of Hunding before he kills the dragon. On his way he is accompanied by Odin. After killing the brothers in battle and carving a blood eagle on Lyngvi, Regin praises Sigurd's ferocity in battle.


title: Sigurd

text: In "Fáfnismál", Sigurd accompanies Regin to Gnita-Heath, where he digs a pit. He stabs Fafnir through the heart from underneath when the dragon passes over the pit. Fafnir, before he dies, tells Sigurd some wisdom and warns him of the curse that lays on the hoard. Once the dragon is dead, Regin tears out Fafnir's heart and tells Sigurd to cook it. Sigurd checks whether the heart is done with his finger and burns it. When he puts his finger into his mouth, he can understand the language of the birds, who warn him of Regin's plan to kill him. He kills the smith and is told by the birds to go to a palace surrounded by flames where the valkyrie Sigdrifa is asleep. Sigurd heads there, loading the hoard on his horse.


title: Sigurd

text: In "Sigrdrífumál", Sigurd rides to Hindarfjal, where he finds a wall made of shields. Inside he finds a sleeping woman who is wearing armor that seems to have grown into her skin. Sigurd cuts open the armor and Sigdrifa, the valkyrie, wakes up. She teaches him the runes, some magic spells, and gives him advice.


title: Sigurd

text: Only the ending of "Brot af Sigurðarkviðu" is preserved. The poem begins with Högni and Gunnar discussing whether Sigurd needs to be murdered. Högni suggests that Brynhild may be lying that Sigurd slept with Brynhild. Then Guthorm, Gunnar and Högni's younger brother, murders Sigurd in the forest, after which Brynhild admits that Sigurd never slept with her.


title: Sigurd

text: The poem shows the influence of continental Germanic traditions, as it portrays Sigurd's death in the forest rather than in his bed.


title: Sigurd

text: "Frá dauða Sigurðar" is a short prose text between the songs. The text mentions that, although the previous song said that Sigurd was killed in the forest, other songs say he was murdered in bed. German songs say that he was killed in the forest, but the next song in the codex, "Guðrúnarqviða in fursta", says that he was killed while going to a thing.


title: Sigurd

text: In "Sigurðarkviða hin skamma", Sigurd comes to the court of Gjuki and he, Gunnar, and Högni swear friendship to each other. Sigurd marries Gudrun, then acquires Brynhild for Gunnar and does not sleep with her. Brynhild desires Sigurd, however, and when she cannot have him decides to have him killed. Guthorm then slays Sigurd in his bed, but Sigurd kills him before dying. Brynhild then kills herself and asks to be burned on the same pyre as Sigurd.


title: Sigurd

text: The "Völsunga saga" is the most detailed account of Sigurd's life in either the German or Scandinavian traditions besides the "Poetic Edda". It follows the plot given in the "Poetic Edda" fairly closely, although there is no indication that the author knew the other text. The author appears to have been working in Norway and to have known the "Thidrekssaga", and therefore the "Völsunga Saga" is dated to sometime in the second half of the thirteenth century. The saga changes the geographic location of Sigurd's life from Germany to Scandinavia. The saga is connected to a second saga, "Ragnars saga Loðbrókar", which follows it in the manuscript, by having Ragnar Lodbrok marry Aslaug, daughter of Sigurd and Brynhild.


title: Sigurd

text: According to the "Völsunga saga", Sigurd is the posthumous son of King Sigmund and Hjordis. He died fighting Lyngvi, a rival for Hjordis's hand. Hjordis he was left alone on the battlefield where Sigmund died, and was found there by King Alf, who married her and took the Sigmund's shattered sword. She gave birth to Sigurd soon afterwards, and was raised by the smith Regin at the court of King Hjalprek. One day Regin tells Sigurd the story of a hoard guarded by the dragon Fafnir, which had been paid by Odin, Loki, and Hoenir for the death of Ótr. Sigurd asks Regin to make him a sword to kill the dragon, but each sword that Regin makes breaks when Sigurd proofs them against the anvil. Finally, Sigurd has Regin make a new sword out of Sigmund's shattered sword, and with this sword he is able to cut through the smith's anvil. Regin asks Sigurd to retrieve Regin's part of Fafnir's treasure, but Sigurd decides to avenge his father first. With an army he attacks and kills Lyngvi, receiving the help of Odin.


title: Sigurd

text: Then Sigurd heads to Gnita-Heath to kill the dragon, hiding in a pit that Fafnir will travel over. Sigurd stabs Fafnir through the heart from underneath, killing him. Regin then appears, drinks some of the dragon's blood, and tells Sigurd to cook its heart. Sigurd tests with his finger whether the heart is done and burns himself; he sticks his finger in his mouth and can understand the language of the birds. The birds tell him that Regin plans to kill Sigurd and that he would be wiser to kill Regin first and then take the hoard and go to Brynhild. Sigurd does all of this, coming to where Brynhild lies asleep in a ring of shields and wearing armor that seems to have grown to her skin. Sigurd cuts the armor off her, waking Brynhild. Brynhild and Sigurd promise to marry each other, repeating their promise also at the court of Brynhild's brother-in-law Heimir.


title: Sigurd

text: Sigurd then comes to the court of King Gjuki; queen Grimhild gives him a potion so that he forgets his promise to Brynhild and agrees to marry her daughter Gudrun. Sigurd and Gjuki's sons Gunnar and Högni swear an oath of loyalty to each other and become blood brothers. Meanwhile, Grimhild convinces Gunnar to marry Brynhild, which Brynhild's family agrees to. However, Brynhild will only marry Gunnar if he can cross the wall of fire that surrounds her castle. Gunnar is unable to do this, and Sigurd and Gunnar use a spell taught to them by Grimhild to change shapes. Sigurd then crosses the wall of flames, and Brynhild is astonished that anyone but Sigurd was able to perform this task. Sigurd then lies with Brynhild for three nights with a sword placed between them. Brynhild and Gunnar and Sigurd and Gudrun then marry on the same day.


title: Sigurd

text: One day, Gudrun and Brynhild fight while bathing in the river over which of them has married the noblest man, and Gudrun tells Brynhild how she was tricked and shows her a ring that Sigurd had taken from her on her first night of marriage as proof. Brynhild is furious and wants revenge. When Sigurd goes to talk to her, the two confess their love for each other and Sigurd proposes divorcing Gudrun to be with Brynhild. Brynhild refuses, and later demands that Gunnar kill Sigurd. Gunnar tells his younger brother Guthorm to kill Sigurd, because he has never sworn loyalty to Sigurd. Guthorm, having eaten wolf's flesh, forces his way into Sigurd's bedchamber and stabs him in the back with his sword. Sigurd manages to kill Guthorm, assures Gudrun that he has always been loyal to Gunnar, and dies. Brynhild commits suicide soon afterwards, and she and Sigurd are both burned on the same pyre.


title: Sigurd

text: The Scandinavian Sigurd tradition lived on in a number of ballads, attested from across the Nordic area. They often have very little in common with the original traditions, only using names found there.


title: Sigurd

text: Several Danish ballads (Danish "folkevise") feature Sigurd (known as Sivard); some also exist in Swedish variants. These ballads appear to have had both Scandinavian and German sources.


title: Sigurd

text: In the ballad "Sivard Snarensvend" (DgF 2, SMB 204, TSB E 49), Sigurd kills his stepfather and rides, with great difficulty, the unbroken horse Gram to his uncle in Bern. In one variant, the ballad ends when Sigurd falls from the horse and dies after jumping over the city walls.


title: Sigurd

text: In the ballad "Sivard og Brynild" (DgF 3, TSB E 101), Sigurd wins Brynhild on the "glass mountain" and then gives her to his friend Hagen. Brynhild then fights with Sigurd's wife Signild, and Signild shows Brynhild a ring that Brynhild had given Sigurd as a love gift. Brynhild then tells Hagen to kill Sigurd, and Hagen does this by first borrowing Sigurd's sword then killing him with it. He then shows Brynhild Sigurd's head and kills her too when she offers him her love.


title: Sigurd

text: In the ballad "Kong Diderik og hans Kæmper" (DgF 7, SMB 198, TSB E 10), Sigurd fights against Diderik's warrior Humlung. Sigurd defeats Humlung, but discovering that Humlung is his relative allows himself to be tied to an oak tree so that Humlung can claim to have defeated him. When Vidrek (Witege) doesn't believe Humlung and goes to check, Sigurd rips the oak tree from the ground and walks home with it on his back.


title: Sigurd

text: In the ballad "Kong Diderik og Løven" (DgF 9, TSB E 158), Sigurd (here as Syfred) is said to have been killed by a dragon; Svend Grundtvig suggests that this character corresponds to Ortnit, rather than Sigurd.


title: Sigurd

text: The Norwegian ballad of "Sigurd Svein" (NMB 177, TSB E 50) tells of Sigurd's selection of the horse Grani and his ride to Greip (Grípir). Although the ballad has many archaic features, it is first recorded in the middle of the nineteenth century.


title: Sigurd

text: On the Faroe Islands, ballads about Sigurd are known as "Sjúrðar kvæði" (CCF 1; "Sjúrður" is the Faroese form of Sigurd); these ballads contain material from the "Thidrekssaga" and the "Völsunga saga". The original form of the ballads likely dates to the fourteenth century, though it is clear that many variants have been influenced by the Danish ballads. The Faroese ballads include "Regin smiður" (Regin the Smith, TSB E 51), "Brynhildar táttur" (the song of Brynhild, TSB E 100), and "Høgna táttur" (the song of Högni, TSB E 55 and E 38). It is possible that "Regin smiður" is based on a lost Eddic poem. The Faroese ballads include Sigurd's slaying of the dragon and acquiring of the hoard, his wooing of Gudrun and Brynhild, and his death. They were not recorded until the end of the eighteenth century.


title: Sigurd

text: There are a number of proposed or confirmed depictions of Sigurd's youthful adventures in Scandinavia and on the British Isles in areas under Norse influence or control. Many of the oldest depictions are very unclear however, and their depiction of the Sigurd legend is often disputed. Attempts to identify depictions of the Sigurd story in Sangüesa (the "Spanish Sigurd"), in Naples (the "Norman Sigurd"), and in northern Germany have all been refuted. There are also no confirmed depictions from Denmark.


title: Sigurd

text: Sigurd's killing of Fafnir can be iconographically identified by his killing of the dragon from below, in contrast to other depictions of warriors fighting dragons and other monsters.


title: Sigurd

text: Surviving depictions of Sigurd are frequently found in churches or on crosses; this is likely because Sigurd's defeat of the dragon was seen as prefiguring Christ's defeat of Satan. It is also possible that he was identified with the Archangel Michael, who also defeated a dragon and played an important role in the Christianization of Scandinavia.


title: Sigurd

text: The Swedish material consists mostly of runestones which can be tentatively dated to the eleventh century. The earliest of these are from Södermanland, the Ramsund carving and the Gök runestone, which appears to be a copy of the former. The stones depict Sigurd killing Fafnir, Regin's headless body surrounded by his smithing tools, Sigurd cooking Fafnir's heart, and the birds advising Sigurd above Grani.


title: Sigurd

text: Two more depictions come from Uppland, the Drävle runestone and a copy of it, the Storja Ramsjö runestone. Both show Sigurd killing Fafnir.


title: Sigurd

text: Three further depictions come from Gästrikland, the Årsund runestone, the Ockelbo runestone, which has been lost, and the Öster-Färnebo runestone. Sigurd is depicted stabbing Fafnir so that his sword takes the appearance of a u-rune. Other scenes on the runestones cannot be identified with the Sigurd legend securely, and the text on the stones is unrelated.


title: Sigurd

text: Four fragmentary crosses from the Isle of Man, from Kirk Andreas, Malew, Jurby, and Maughold depict Sigurd stabbing Fafnir from underneath. The crosses also depict the cooking of Fafnir's heart, Sigurd receiving advice from the birds, and potentially his horse Grani. These crosses possibly date to around 1000.


title: Sigurd

text: There are also a number of depictions from England, likely dating from the period of Norse rule between 1016 and 1042. In Lancashire, the Heysham hogback may depict Sigurd stabbing Fafnir through the belly as well as his horse Grani. It is one of the few monuments on the British Isles that does not appear to have been influenced by Christianity. The nearby Halton cross appears to depict Regin forging Sigurd's sword and Sigurd roasting Fafnir's heart, sucking his thumb. The iconography of these depictions resembles that found on the Isle of Man.


title: Sigurd

text: In Yorkshire, there are at least three further depictions: a cross fragment at Ripon Cathedral, a cross built into a church at Kirby Hill, and a lost fragment from Kirby Hill that is preserved only as a drawing. The first two attestations depict Sigurd with his finger in his mouth while cooking Fafnir's heart, while the third may depict Fafnir with a sword in his heart. There is also a badly worn gravestone from York Minster that appears to show Regin after having been beheaded and Sigurd with his thumb in his mouth, along with possibly Grani, the fire, and the slain Fafnir.


title: Sigurd

text: Numerous Norwegian churches from the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries depict scenes from the Sigurd story on their front portals. The most famous of these is the Hylestad Stave Church, likely from around 1200. It shows numerous scenes from Sigurd's legend: Regin is shown in his smithy, Sigurd fights against and kills the dragon, cooks its heart and sucks his burnt thumb, receives the advice of the birds, kills Regin. The most complete sequence is found in the Vegusdal stave church. In some of the depictions, Sigurd appears beside Old Testament heroes such as Samson (stave churches at Lund and Nes).


title: Sigurd

text: It is difficult to trace the development of the traditions surrounding Sigurd. If the theory that he has his origins in Sigebert I is correct, then the earliest part of the tradition would be his murder as the result of a feud between two women, in real life between his wife Brunhild of Austrasia and Fredegund, in the saga then between his wife Kriemhild/Gudrun and Brünhild/Brynhild. The earliest attested tradition about Sigurd is his slaying of a dragon, however, which supports the notion that he may have a purely mythological origin, or that he represents the combination of a mythological figure with a historical one.


title: Sigurd

text: It is unclear whether Sigurd's descent from the god Odin via Völsung, described only in the "Völsunga saga", represents an old common tradition, or whether it is a development unique to the Scandinavian material. Anglo-Saxon, Frankish, and other West Germanic royal genealogies often begin with Wodan or some other mythical ancestor such as Gaut, meaning that it is certainly possible that Sigurd's divine descent is an old tradition. Wolfgang Haubrichs notes that the genealogy of the Anglo-Saxon kings of Deira has a similar prevalence of names beginning with the element "Sigi-" and that the first ancestor listed is Wodan.


title: Sigurd

text: Sigurd's relationship to Sigmund, attested as Sigurd's father in both the continental and Scandinavian traditions, has been interpreted in various ways. Notably, references to Sigurd in Scandinavia can only be dated to the eleventh-century, while references to Sigmund in Scandinavia and England, including in "Beowulf", can be dated earlier. It is possible that Sigmund's parentage is a later development, as the Scandinavian tradition and the German tradition represented by "Hürnen Seyfrid" locate Sigurd's childhood in the forest and show him to be unaware of his parentage. Catalin Taranu argues that Sigurd only became Sigmund's son to provide the orphan Sigurd with a suitable heroic past. This may have occurred via the story that Sigurd has to avenge his father's death at the hands of the sons of Hunding.


title: Sigurd

text: The Old English tradition of Sigemund (Sigmund) complicates things even more: in "Beowulf" Sigmund is said to have slain a dragon and won a hoard. This may be a minor variant of the Sigurd story, or it is possible that the original dragon slayer was Sigmund, and the story was transferred from father to son. Alternatively, it is possible that Sigurd and Sigmund were originally the same figure, and were only later split into father and son. John McKinnell argues that Sigurd only became the dragon-slayer in the mid-eleventh century. Hermann Reichert, on the other hand, argues that the two dragon-slayings are originally unrelated: Sigurd kills one when he is young, which represents a sort of heroic initiation, whereas Sigmund kills a dragon when he is old, which cannot be interpreted in this way. In his view, this makes an original connection between or identity of the two slayings unlikely.


title: Sigurd

text: The slaying of the dragon is attested on the eleventh-century Ramsund carving in Sweden, and the Gök Runestone, which appears to be a copy of the carving. Both stones depict elements of the story identifiable from the later Norse myths. In both the German and the Scandinavian versions, Sigurd's slaying of the dragon embues him with superhuman abilities. In the Norse sources, Sigurd comes to understand the language of the birds after tasting the dragon's blood and then eating its heart. In the German versions, Siegfried bathes in the dragon's blood, developing a skin that is as hard as horn (Middle High German "hürnen").


title: Sigurd

text: In the continental sources, Sigurd's winning of the hoard of the Nibelungen and slaying of the dragon are two separate events; the "Thidrekssaga" does not even mention Sigurd's acquiring the hoard. In the Norse tradition, the two events are combined and Sigurd's awakening of Brunhild and avenging of his father are also mentioned, though not in all sources. It is likely that the Norse tradition has substantially reworked the events of Sigurd's youth. Sigurd's liberation of a virgin woman, Brynhild/Brünhild, is only told in Scandinavian sources, but may be an original part of the oral tradition along with the slaying of the dragon, since the "Nibelungenlied" seems to indicate that Siegfried and Brünhild already know each other. This is not entirely clear, however. It is possible that Siegfried's rescue of Kriemhild (rather than Brünhild) in the late-medieval "Lied vom Hürnen Seyfrid" reflects the tradition that Sigurd liberated a virgin.


title: Sigurd

text: The origin of the hoard as a cursed ransom paid by the gods is generally taken to be a late and uniquely Scandinavian development.


title: Sigurd

text: Also attested on the Ramsund Carving, and thus at an early date, is that Sigurd was raised by a smith. While absent in the "Nibelungenlied", the "Rosengarten" and late-medieval "Lied vom Hürnen Seyfrid" show that this tradition was present in Germany as well.


title: Sigurd

text: On the basis of the poem "Atlakviða" it is generally believed that Sigurd was not originally connected to the story of the destruction of the Burgundians by Attila (Old Norse "Atli", Middle High German "Etzel"). The earliest text to make this connection is the "Nibelungenlied" (c. 1200); the combination appears to be older, but it is difficult to say by how much. In the German tradition, this connection led to the change of the role of Sigurd's widow from avenger of her brothers to avenger of her husband on her brothers, again, sometime before the composition of the "Nibelungenlied".


title: Sigurd

text: Siegfried remained a popular figure in Germany via "Das Lied vom Hürnen Seyfrid" and its prose version, the "Historia vom gehörnten Siegfried", the latter of which was still printed in the nineteenth century. The prose version was popular enough that in 1660 a sequel was written about Siegfried's son with "Florigunda" (Kriemhild), Löwhardus. The "Nibelungenlied", on the other hand, was forgotten until it was rediscovered in 1755.


title: Sigurd

text: The majority of the Scandinavian material about Sigurd remained better known through the early modern period to the nineteenth century due to the so-called "Scandinavian Renaissance", which resulted in knowledge of Eddic poems influencing the popular ballads about Sigurd in Scandinavian folklore.


title: Sigurd

text: Originally, modern reception of Siegfried in Germany was dominated by a sentimental view of the figure, shown in the many paintings and images produced in this time depicting Siegfried taking leave from Kriemhild, the first encounter of Siegfried and Kriemhild, their wedding, etc. A nationalist tone and attempt to make Siegfried into a national icon and symbol was nevertheless already present in attempts to connect Siegfried to the historical Arminius, who was already established as a national hero in Germany since the sixteenth century. The Norse tradition about Sigurd, which was considered to be more "original" and Germanic, in many ways replaced direct engagement with the German "Nibelungenlied", and was highly influential in the conception of the Siegfried figure in Richard Wagner's opera cycle "Der Ring des Nibelungen" (1874). Wagner's portrayal of Siegfried was to influence the modern public's view of the figure immensely.


title: Sigurd

text: With the founding of the German Empire (1871), the German view of Siegfried became more nationalistic: Siegfried was seen as an identifying epic figure for the new German Empire and his reforging of his father's sword in the Nordic tradition was equated with Otto von Bismarck "reuniting" the German nation. Numerous paintings, monuments, and fountains of Siegfried date from this time period. Following the defeat of imperial Germany in the First World War, Siegfried's murder by Hagen was extensively used in right-wing propaganda that claimed that leftist German politicians had stabbed the undefeated German army in the back by agreeing to an armistice. This comparison was explicitly made by Adolf Hitler in "Mein Kampf" and by Paul von Hindenburg in his political testament. Nazi propaganda came to use Siegfried "to symbolize the qualities of healthy and virile German men." Siegfried's murder by Hagen was further used to illustrate Nazi racial theories about the inherent evilness of certain "non-German" races, to which Hagen, typically depicted as dark, was seen as belonging.


title: Sigurd

text: Outside of Germany and Scandinavia, most of the reception of Sigurd has been mediated through, or at least influenced by, his depiction in Wagner's "Ring".


title: Economy of Australia

text: Australia is a highly developed country with a mixed-market economy. As of 2022, Australia was the 14th-largest national economy by nominal GDP (Gross Domestic Product), the 20th-largest by PPP-adjusted GDP, and was the 22nd-largest goods exporter and 24th-largest goods importer. Australia took the record for the longest run of uninterrupted GDP growth in the developed world with the March 2017 financial quarter. It was the 103rd quarter and the 26th year since the country had a technical recession (two consecutive quarters of negative growth). As of June 2021, the country's GDP was estimated at 1.98 trillion.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The Australian economy is dominated by its service sector, which in 2017 comprised 62.7% of the GDP and employed 78.8% of the labour force. At the height of the mining boom in 2009–10, the total value-added of the mining industry was 8.4% of GDP. Despite the recent decline in the mining sector, the Australian economy had remained resilient and stable and did not experience a recession from 1991 until 2020.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The Australian Securities Exchange in Sydney is the 16th-largest stock exchange in the world in terms of domestic market capitalisation and has one of the largest interest rate derivatives markets in the Asia-Pacific region. Some of Australia's largest companies include Commonwealth Bank, BHP, CSL, Westpac, NAB, ANZ, Fortescue Metals Group, Wesfarmers, Macquarie Group, Woolworths Group, Rio Tinto, Telstra, Woodside Energy, and Transurban. The currency of Australia and its territories is the Australian dollar, which it shares with several Pacific nation states.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Australia's economy is strongly intertwined with the countries of East and Southeast Asia, also known as ASEAN Plus Three (APT), accounting for about 64% of exports in 2016. China in particular is Australia's main export and import partner by a wide margin. Australia is a member of the APEC, G20, OECD and WTO. The country has also entered into free trade agreements with ASEAN, Canada, Chile, China, South Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, Japan, Singapore, Thailand and the United States. The ANZCERTA agreement with New Zealand has greatly increased integration with the economy of New Zealand and in 2011 there was a plan to form an Australasian Single Economic Market by 2015.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Australia's average GDP growth rate for the period 1901–2000 was 3.4% annually. As opposed to many neighbouring Southeast Asian countries, the process towards independence was relatively peaceful and thus did not have significant negative impact on the economy and standard of living. Growth peaked during the 1920s, followed by the 1950s and the 1980s. By contrast, the late 1910s/early 1920s, the 1930s, the 1970s and early 1990s were marked by financial crises.


title: Economy of Australia

text: From the early 1980s onwards, the Australian economy has undergone intermittent economic liberalisation. In 1983, under prime minister Bob Hawke, but mainly driven by treasurer Paul Keating, the Australian dollar was floated and financial deregulation was undertaken.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The early 1990s recession came swiftly after the Black Monday of October 1987, as a result of a stock collapse of unprecedented size which caused the Dow Jones Industrial Average to fall by 22.6%. This collapse, larger than the stock market crash of 1929, was handled effectively by the global economy and the stock market began to quickly recover. But in North America, the lumbering savings and loans industry was facing decline, which eventually led to a savings and loan crisis which compromised the well-being of millions of US people. The following recession thus impacted the many countries closely linked to the US, including Australia. Paul Keating, who was treasurer at the time, famously referred to it as "the recession that Australia had to have." During the recession, GDP fell by 1.7%, employment by 3.4% and the unemployment rate rose to 10.8%. However, the recession did assist in reducing long-term inflation rate expectations and Australia has maintained a low inflation environment since the 1990s to the present day.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Mining has contributed to Australia's high level of economic growth, from the gold rush in the 1840s to the present day. The opportunities for large profits in pastoralism and mining attracted considerable amounts of British capital, while expansion was supported by enormous government outlays for transport, communication, and urban infrastructures, which also depended heavily on British finance. As the economy expanded, large-scale immigration satisfied the growing demand for workers, especially after the end of convict transportation to the eastern mainland in 1840. Australia's mining operations secured continued economic growth and Western Australia itself benefited strongly from mining iron ore and gold from the 1960s and 1970s which fueled the rise of suburbanisation and consumerism in Perth, the capital and most populous city of Western Australia, as well as other regional centres.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The World Bank expected Australia's GDP growth rate to be 3.2% in 2011 and 3.8% in 2012. The economy expanded by 0.4% in the fourth quarter of 2011, and expanded by 1.3% in the first quarter of 2012. The growth rate was reported to be 4.3% year-on-year.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The International Monetary Fund in April 2012 predicted that Australia would be the best-performing major advanced economy in the world over the next two years; the Australian Government Department of the Treasury anticipated "forecast growth of 3.0% in 2012 and 3.5% in 2013", the National Australia Bank in April 2012 cut its growth forecast for Australia to 2.9% from 3.2%., and JP Morgan in May 2012 cut its growth forecast to 2.7% in calendar 2012 from a previous forecast of 3.0%, also its forecast for growth in 2013 to 3.0% from 3.3%. Deutsche Bank in August 2012, and Société Générale in October 2012, warned that there is risk of recession in Australia in 2013.


title: Economy of Australia

text: While Australia's overall national economy grew, some non-mining states and Australia's non-mining economy experienced a recession.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In September 2020, it was confirmed that due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Australian economy had gone into recession for the first time in nearly thirty years, as the country's GDP fell 7 per cent in the June 2020 quarter, following a 0.3 per cent drop in the March quarter. It officially ended at the beginning of December 2020.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The following table shows the main economic indicators in 1980–2021 (with IMF staff estimates in 2022–2027). Inflation under 5% is in green.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Australia's per-capita GDP is higher than that of the UK, Canada, Germany and France in terms of purchasing power parity. Per Capita GDP (PPP) Australia is ranked 18th in the world (CIA World Factbook 2016). The country was ranked fifth in the United Nations 2022 Human Development Index and sixth in "The Economist" worldwide quality-of-life index 2005. In 2014, using constant exchange rates, Australia's wealth had grown by 4.4% annually on average after the financial crisis of 2007–2008, compared with a 9.2% rate over 2000–2007. Australia's sovereign credit rating is "AAA" for all three major rating agencies, higher than the United States of America.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The emphasis on exporting commodities rather than manufactures underpinned a significant increase in Australia's terms of trade during the rise in commodity prices since 2000. However, due to a colonial heritage a lot of companies operating in Australia are foreign-owned and as a result, Australia has had persistent current account deficits for over 60 years despite periods of positive net merchandise exports; given the net income outlay between Australia and the rest of the world is always negative. The current account deficit totalled AUD$44.5 billion in 2016 or 2.6% of GDP.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Inflation has typically been between 2 and 3% and the pre-GFC cash rate typically ranged between 5 and 7%, however, partly in response to the end of the mining boom the cash rate has recently been steadily falling, dropping from 4.75% in October 2011 to 1.5% in Aug 2016, then to 1.25% in June 2019 and 1.0% in July 2019. The service sector of the economy, including tourism, education and financial services, constitutes 69% of GDP. Australian National University in Canberra also provides a probabilistic interest-rate-setting project for the Australian economy, which is compiled by shadow board members from the ANU academic staff.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Rich in natural resources, Australia is a major exporter of agricultural products, particularly wheat and wool, minerals such as iron ore and gold, and energy in the forms of liquified natural gas and coal. Although agriculture and natural resources constitute only 3% and 5% of GDP, respectively, they contribute substantially to Australia's export composition. Australia's largest export markets are Japan, China, South Korea, India and the US.


title: Economy of Australia

text: At the turn of the current century, Australia experienced a significant mining boom. The mining sector's contribution to overall GDP grew from around 4.5% in 1993–94, to almost 8% in 2006–07. The services sector also grew considerably, with property and business services in particular growing from 10% to 14.5% of GDP over the same period, making it the largest single component of GDP (in sectoral terms). This growth has largely been at the expense of the manufacturing sector, which in 2006–07 accounted for around 12% of GDP. A decade earlier, it was the largest sector in the economy, accounting for just over 15% of GDP.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2018 Australia became the country with the largest median wealth per adult, but slipped back to second highest after Switzerland in 2019. Australia's total wealth was estimated to be AUD$10.9 trillion as of September 2019.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Between 2010 and 2013, much of the economic growth in Australia was attributed to areas of the country where mining- and resource-based industries and services are mostly located. Western Australia and the Northern Territory are the only states that have economic growth. During 2012 and 2013 Australian Capital Territory, Queensland, Tasmania, South Australia, New South Wales and Victoria experienced recessions at various times. The Australian economy is characterised as a "two-speed economy". From June 2012 to March 2013 Victoria experienced a recession. In 2012 the Government of Victoria cut 10% of all jobs in the public service. The period since has seen these trends reversed with Western Australia and Northern Territory, who are heavily dependent on mining, experience significant downturns in GDP while the eastern states returned to growth, led by strong upturns in NSW and Victoria.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Taxation in Australia is levied at the federal, state, and local government levels. The federal government raises revenue from personal income taxes and business taxes. Other taxes include the goods and services tax (General Service Tax), excise and customs duties. The federal government is the main source of income for state governments. As a result of state dependence on federal taxation revenue to meet decentralised expenditure responsibilities, Australia is said to have a vertical fiscal imbalance.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Besides receipts of funds from the federal government, states and territories have their own taxes, in many cases as slightly different rates. State taxes commonly include payroll tax levied on businesses, a poker-machine tax on businesses that offer gambling services, land tax on people and businesses that own land and most significantly, stamp duty on sales of land (in every state) and other items (chattels in some states, unlisted shares in others, and even sales of contracts in some states).


title: Economy of Australia

text: The states effectively lost the ability to raise income tax during the Second World War. In 1942, Canberra invoked its Constitutional taxation power (s. 51 (ii)) and enacted the "Income Tax Act" and three other statutes to levy a uniform income tax across the country. These acts sought to raise the funds necessary to meet burgeoning wartime expenses and reduce the unequal tax burden between the states by replacing state income taxes with a centralised tax system. The legislation could not expressly prohibit state income taxes (s. 51(ii) does not curtail the power of states to levy taxes) but the federal government's proposal made localised income tax extremely difficult politically. The federal government offered instead compensatory grants authorised by s. 96 of the Constitution for the loss of state income ("State Grants (Income Tax Reimbursement) Act 1942").


title: Economy of Australia

text: The states rejected Canberra's regime and challenged the legislation's validity in the First Uniform Tax Case ("South Australia v Commonwealth") of 1942. The High Court of Australia held that each of the statutes establishing Commonwealth income tax was a valid use of the s. 51(ii) power, in which Latham CJ noted that the system did not undermine essential state functions and imposed only economic and political pressure upon them.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The Second Uniform Tax Case ("Victoria v Commonwealth" (1957)) reaffirmed the court's earlier decision and confirmed the power of the federal government's power to make s. 96 grants conditionally (in this case, a grant made on the condition that the recipient state does not levy income tax).


title: Economy of Australia

text: Since the Second Uniform Tax Case, a number of other political and legal decisions have centralised fiscal power with the Commonwealth. In "Ha vs. New South Wales" (1997), the High Court found that the "Business Franchise Licences (Tobacco) Act 1987" (NSW) was invalid because it levied a customs duty, a power exercisable only by the Commonwealth (s.90). This decision effectively invalidated state taxes on cigarettes, alcohol and petrol. Similarly, the imposition of a Commonwealth goods and services tax (GST) in 2000 transferred another revenue base to the Commonwealth.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Consequently, Australia has one of the most pronounced vertical fiscal imbalances in the world: the states and territories collect just 18% of all governmental revenues but are responsible for almost 50% of the spending areas. Furthermore, the centralisation of revenue collection has allowed Canberra to force state policy in areas well beyond the scope of its constitutional powers, by using the grants power (s.96) to mandate the terms on which the states spend money in areas over which it has no power (such as spending on education, health and policing).


title: Economy of Australia

text: Local governments (called "councils" in Australia) have their own taxes (called rates) to enable them to provide services such as local road repairs, local planning and building management, garbage collection, street cleaning, park maintenance services, libraries, and museums. Councils also rely on state and federal funding to provide infrastructure and services such as roads, bridges, sporting facilities and buildings, aged care, maternal and child health, and childcare.


title: Economy of Australia

text: According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) seasonally adjusted estimates, the unemployment rate decreased by 0.1 percentage points to 3.4% in October 2022 while the labor force participation rate was steady at 66.6%. The participation rate for 15- to 24-year-olds decreased by 0.5 points to 71.1% while the unemployment rate for this group decreased by 0.4 points to 7.95%. According to the ABS, in October 2022, the underemployment rate remained at 6.0%, while the underutilisation rate (the unemployed plus the under-employed) remained at 9.4%.


title: Economy of Australia

text: According to Roy Morgan Research the unemployment rate in April 2019 was 8.9%, while Australian workers who were considered either unemployed or underemployed was estimated to be 17.7% (2.381 million) in the same month. Around 4.219 million were estimated to be in part-time employment.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2007, 228,621 Newstart unemployment allowance recipients were registered, a total that increased to 646,414 or 5.3% of the total labour force by March 2013. As of December 2018, the number of Newstart recipients stands at 722,923 or 5.4% of the labour force.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The accuracy of official unemployment figures has been brought into question in the Australian media due to discrepancies between the methods of different research bodies (Roy Morgan versus the ABS), differing definitions of the term 'unemployed' and the ABS' practice of counting under-employed people as "employed".


title: Economy of Australia

text: According to the Australian Graduate Survey done by "Graduate Careers Australia", full-time employment for newly qualified professionals from various occupations (around four months after the completion of their qualifications) experienced some declines between 2012 and 2015. Some examples are:


title: Economy of Australia

text: The Graduate Careers Survey 2014 explained, "However, GCA's Beyond Graduation Survey (BGS) indicates that the middle- and longer-term outlook is very positive, with the employment figures for 2010 graduates growing by 14 percentage points three years later." The Beyond Graduation Survey 2013 included 12,384 responses and the Graduate Careers Survey 2014 survey included 113,263 responses ("59.3 per cent of the almost 191,000 Australian resident graduates who were surveyed responded to the AGS.")


title: Economy of Australia

text: The professional associations of some of these occupations expressed their criticism of the immigration policy in 2014.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2019, the country was the 2nd largest world producer of gold; 8th largest world producer of silver; 6th largest world producer of copper; the world's largest producer of iron ore; the world's largest producer of bauxite; the 2nd largest world producer of manganese; 2nd largest world producer of lead; 3rd largest world producer of zinc; 3rd largest world producer of cobalt; 3rd largest producer of uranium; 6th largest producer of nickel; 8th largest world producer of tin; 14th largest world producer of phosphate; 15th largest world producer of sulfur; in addition to being the 5th largest world producer of salt. The country is also a major producer of precious stones. Australia is the world's largest producer of opal and is one of the largest producers of diamond, ruby, sapphire and jade. In non-renewable energies, in 2020, the country was the 30th largest producer of oil in the world, extracting 351.1 thousand barrels / day. In 2019, the country consumed 1 million barrels / day (20th largest consumer in the world). The country was the 20th largest oil importer in the world in 2018 (461.9 thousand barrels / day). In 2015, Australia was the 12th largest world producer of natural gas, 67.2 billion m3 per year. In 2019, the country was the 22nd largest gas consumer (41.9 billion m3 per year) and was the 10th largest gas exporter in the world in 2015: 34.0 billion m3 per year. In the production of coal, the country was the 4th largest in the world in 2018: 481.3 million tons. Australia is the 2nd largest coal exporter in the world (387 million tons in 2018)


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2014–15 mineral extraction in Australia was valued at 212 billion Australian dollars. Of this, coal represented 45,869 million, oil and natural gas 40,369 million, iron ore 69,486 million, gold ore 13,685 million, and other metals 7,903 million.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Coal is mined primarily in Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria. Fifty-four per cent of the coal mined in Australia is exported, mostly to East Asia. In 2000–01, 258.5 million tonnes of coal was mined, and 193.6 million tonnes exported. Coal provides about 85% of Australia's electricity production. In fiscal year 2008–09, 487 million tonnes of coal was mined, and 261 million tonnes exported. Australia is the world's leading coal exporter.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Rio Tinto's Argyle mine in Western Australia is the second-largest diamond mine in the world. The Argyle mine opened in 1983 and has produced more than 95 per cent of Australia's diamonds, including some of the world's most valuable pink and red diamonds. Due to the depletion of ore, Argyle is forecast to close in 2021—the closure is expected to reduce Australia's yearly diamond output from 14.2 million carats to 134.7 thousand carats.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The manufacturing industry in Australia has declined from 30% of GDP in the 1960s to 12% of GDP in 2007.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2008, four companies mass-produced cars in Australia. Mitsubishi ceased production in March 2008, followed by Ford in 2016, and Holden and Toyota in 2017.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Until trade liberalisation in the mid 1980s, Australia had a large textile industry. This decline continued through the first decade of the 21st century. Since the 1980s, tariffs have steadily been reduced; in early 2010, the tariffs were reduced from 17.5 per cent to 10 per cent on clothing, and 7.5–10% to 5% for footwear and other textiles.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2019, the value added from agriculture, fishing and forestry combined made up approximately two-point-one per cent of Australia's GDP. Sixty per cent of farm products are exported. Irrigation is an important and widespread practice for a country where many parts receive low rainfall. Agriculture, forestry and fishing was the second-strongest industry from 2013 to 2015, with the number of employees growing from 295,495 in February 2013 to 325,321 in February 2015.


title: Economy of Australia

text: IT-related jobs (such as computer systems design and engineering) are defined as Professional, Scientific and Technical Services by the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations of Australia. IT job creation occurs mostly in the state capital cities of Australia.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Australia's "big four banks" (National Australia Bank, Commonwealth Bank, Australia and New Zealand Banking Group and Westpac) are among the 'World's 50 Safest Banks' as of April 2012.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Between 1991 and 2013, 36,720 mergers and acquisitions with a total known value of US$2,040 billion with the involvement of Australian firms have been announced. In the year 2013, 1,515 transactions valued at US$78 billion had been announced which was a decrease in terms of numbers (−18%) and value (−11%) compared to 2012. The largest takeover or merger transaction involving Australian companies was the 2007 takeover of the Coles Group by Wesfarmers, totalling A$22 billion.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In the financial year 2017/18, tourism represented 3.1% of Australia's GDP contributing A$57.2 billion to the national economy. Domestic tourism is a significant part of the tourism industry, representing 73% of the total direct tourism GDP.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In calendar year 2018, there were 9.3 million visitor arrivals. Tourism employed 646,000 people in Australia in 2017–18, 5.2% of the workforce. About 43.7% of persons employed in tourism were part-time. Tourism also contributed 8.0% of Australia's total export earnings in 2010–11.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Growing importance is being given to the economic contribution of the creative industries to the national economy. The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) recompiles statistics about the export and import of goods and services related to the creative industries. The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has assisted in the preparation of national studies measuring the size of over 50 copyright industries around the world. According to the WIPO compiled data, the national contribution of Creative industries varies from 2% to 11% depending on the country.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The Australian Copyright Council (ACC) has been consistently compiling reports using the WIPO-guided framework on the impact of the copyright-based industries to Australia's economy in 2011, 2012, and 2014. In the most up-to-date WIPO-supported study published in 2017, the copyright industries contributed $122.8 billion to the Australian economy in 2016 amounting to 7.4% of Australia's total economic output. The 2016 figure represented an increase of $8.5 billion compared to 2011, with a growth in value added growing at 1.4% per annum (since 2011). Further, it found that these industries generated more economic output than the manufacturing, health care and mining sectors in 2016, and moved from being the 7th largest industry in 2011 to the 3rd in 2016.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2018, Australia was ranked 19th out of 180 countries in accordance to press freedom. The media industry is highly consolidated, with News Corp Australia and Nine Entertainment publishing the majority of popular newspapers, owning multiple television and radio stations, and providing the two major Australian streaming services, Binge and Stan. Other major media companies include Ten Network, Seven West Media and the national broadcasters ABC and SBS.


title: Economy of Australia

text: School attendance is compulsory in Australia, from the age of 5 up until approximately 16 (although it varies between each state and territory). Australia also has an adult literacy rate that was estimated to be 99% in 2003.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In the Programme for International Student Assessment, Australia regularly scores among the top five of thirty major developed countries (member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development). In 2018 there were 525,054 international students in Australia, comprising a market of 32,2 billion A$.


title: Economy of Australia

text: There are many forms of transport in Australia. Australia is highly dependent on road transport. There are more than 300 airports with paved runways. Passenger rail transport includes widespread commuter networks in the major capital cities with more limited intercity and interstate networks. The Australian mining sector is reliant upon rail to transport its product to Australia's ports for export.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The Australian economy is dependent on imported crude oil and petroleum products, the economy's petroleum import dependency is around 80%—crude oil + petroleum products.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In the second half of the 20th century, Australian trade shifted away from Europe and North America to Japan and other East Asian markets. Regional franchising businesses, now a $128 billion sector, have been operating co-branded sites overseas for years with new investors coming from Western Australia and Queensland.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In the late 19th century, Australia's economic strength relative to the rest of the world was reflected in its GDP. In 1870, Australia had the highest GDP per capita in the world due to economic growth fuelled by its natural resources. However, as Australia's population grew rapidly over the 20th century, its GDP per capita dropped relative to countries such as the US and Norway. However, the Australian economy has been performing nominally better than other economies of the OECD and has supported economic growth for over 20 consecutive years. According to the Reserve Bank of Australia, Australian per capita GDP growth is higher than that of New Zealand, US, Canada and The Netherlands. The past performance of the Australian economy has been heavily influenced by US, Japanese and Chinese economic growth.


title: Economy of Australia

text: From 2014 to 2018, the total value of exports from Australia to Armenia comprised US$ 23 million, whilst the full value of exports from Armenia to Australia was US$ 697000. The peak for exports from Australia to Armenia was in 2014, with a total value of US$ 9 million. The imports to Australia from Armenia reached their peak in 2016, comprising US$ 214000.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Steel or iron cloth was one of the top ten imports to Armenia from Australia and comprised 20% of total imports, the value of which was US$ 3 million. At the same time, one of the top ten products exported from Armenia to Australia was Leather Footwear which constituted 30%. The value estimated was around US$ 206000. With regards to food and drinks, Australia exported to Armenia around US$ 1.15 million in value, which comprised 5% of the total value of exports from 2014 to 2018. The biggest food export from Australia to Armenia was butter (40% of food imports to Armenia) and 2% of total imports to Armenia. The value comprised US$ 460000. On the second line is milk which included 20% of food imports and 1% of total imports. The value of the import of milk was estimated to be US$ 238000.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The exports from Armenia to Australia, in the food and drinks category, comprised US$ 266000 in value. The total value of the exports of food and drinks from Armenia to Australia is 38%. The hugest food import to Australia from Armenia was hard liquor which consisted the 33% of food exports and 13% of total exports and had a value of US$ 89000. In the second place of exports from Armenia to Australia are nuts and fruits(jams, pickles, and dried fruits are not considered). This comprised 26% of food exports and 10% of total exports and represented a value of approximately US$ 70000.


title: Economy of Australia

text: According to the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade(DFAT), Australia is the 55th importer of Armenia, and Australia's exports to Armenia constitute 0.1% of imports to Armenia. Whereas from Australia's side, Armenia is on the 168th line in terms of exports and 155th in terms of imports.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Australia's net external debt exceeded $1 trillion in April 2017 as a result of Australia's structural current account deficits. Although these deficits have narrowed over the last decade due to an increase in net merchandise trade, this effect has been partly offset by the return of Australian government debt; net federal debt was estimated at $326.0 billion in the 2016–17 federal budget of which 60% is owed to foreigners. The entirety of the debt has been accumulated through ten straight budget deficits as Australia had negative net government debt (i.e. The Australian government had net positive bond holdings) a decade earlier in the 2006–07 fiscal year.


title: Economy of Australia

text: There is substantial export to China of iron ore, wool and other raw materials, and over 120,000 Chinese students study in Australian schools and universities. China is the largest purchaser of Australian debt. In 2009, offers were made by state-owned Chinese companies to invest $22 billion in Australia's resource extraction industry.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The Signing of the China-Australia Free-Trade Agreement, signed November 2014, has the potential to drastically increase Chinese Investments as agriculture and services become more lenient.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Australia's special investor visa program introduced in 2012 encouraged Chinese investment. The visa program fast-tracks visas and eases the residency requirement for a permanent visa for those ready to invest over five million Australian dollars into state government bonds, specific infrastructure and property investments. Wealthy Chinese interested in direct investment began looking to Australia after Canada started scaling back its investment visa program in 2012 and eliminated its main investor visa program in 2014. In early 2014 it was reported that the Australia's special investor visa was granted to 65 mostly Chinese millionaires who brought over $440 million into the country. By 2017, almost 90% of the more than 1,300 foreigners who used Australia's special investor visa program were from China. Australia also has an investor visa program with a required investment of one million Australian dollars but with more restrictions and a lengthier period of time to get a permanent visa.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2017, it was reported that Australia is the third-most popular destination for Chinese to invest wealth offshore, with a 7% increase in Chinese private wealth flowing into Australia while interest in the top two investment destinations, Hong Kong and the United States, fell by 18% and 3%, respectively. In 2017 there were 1.6 million high-net-worth Chinese (with at least 10 million Chinese yuan to invest) and 24 per cent of the 3,000 wealthy Chinese surveyed had private investments in Australia. Migration was one of the top three reasons for Chinese investment offshore.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2018, in the Lowy Institute poll there had a sharp rise in the proportion of the Australian population who say the Australian government is "allowing too much investment from China".


title: Economy of Australia

text: In trade terms, the Australian economy has had persistently large current account deficits (CADs) for more than 50 years. One of the factors that undermines balance of payments is Australia's export base, making it highly vulnerable to the volatility in the prices of commodity goods. In addition, due to a colonial heritage a lot of companies operating in Australia are foreign-owned and, as a result, Australia's net income outlay between it and the rest of the world is always negative; this results in persistent current account deficits even when there is a positive export.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Dependent upon commodities, the Australian government endeavoured to redevelop the Australian manufacturing sector. This initiative, also known as microeconomic reform, helped Australian manufacturing to grow from 10.1% in 1983–1984 to 17.8% in 2003–2004.


title: Economy of Australia

text: There are other factors that have contributed to the extremely high current account deficit in Australia such as lack of international competitiveness.


title: Economy of Australia

text: However, as Australia's CAD is almost entirely generated by the private sector, as outlined in Professor John Pitchford's 'Consenting Adults Thesis' in the early 1990s, there is an argument that the CAD is not a significant issue. Historically, Australia has relied on overseas capital to fill the gap between domestic savings and investment, and many of these investment opportunities could not have been pursued if Australia did not have access to foreign savings. This suggests that Australia's apparently low savings level and CAD are not necessarily a significant problem. As long as the investment that is being funded by overseas capital inflow generates sufficient returns to pay for the servicing costs in the future, the increase in foreign liabilities can be viewed as sustainable in the longer term.


title: Economy of Australia

text: According to the 2011 Credit Suisse Global Wealth report, Australia's wealth per adult had quadrupled over the past decade, and its total wealth was US$6.4 trillion. In the report Australia was the second-wealthiest country in the world behind Switzerland based on average wealth per adult, and had the highest median wealth in the world (US$222,000, nearly four times the amount of each US adult) and a proportion of people with wealth above US$100,000 that was eight times the world average. This was attributed to a resilient Australian dollar, property ownership levels and a strong labour market. Compared to the rest of the world, very few Australians had a net worth of less than US$1,000, which was attributed to relatively low credit card and student loan debt. In 2013, Australia was identified by the Credit Suisse as retaining its 2012 position as the nation with the second-highest average wealth per adult (US$403,000); however, the nation's poverty rate was also reported to have increased from 10.2% in 2000–01 to 11.8% at the time of the 2013 report on global wealth.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Despite the economic slowdown, in the 2014 Credit Suisse Global Wealth Report, Australia continued to have the second-highest average wealth per adult (US$430,800) and the highest median wealth (US$225,400), with a total wealth of $7.2 trillion. The average level of real assets (US$319,700) was the second-highest in the world after Norway and 60% of gross household assets. The report explained that this partly reflects a large endowment of land and natural resources relative to population, and also high urban real estate prices. Only 6% of Australians had a net worth below US$10,000, compared to 29% in the US and 70% for the world as a whole. The average debt was 20% of gross assets. The proportion of people with wealth above US$100,000 was the highest in the world (eight times the world average). Australia had 3.8% (1,783,000 people) of the top 1% of global wealth holders while having 0.4% of the world's adult population. The wealth share by Australia's top decile was 51.1% in 2000, 50.7% in 2007, and 51.1% in 2014. In 2016, Australia continued to be the second-wealthiest nation in terms of wealth per adult.


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2017, Australia was the world's top destination for millionaires, beating the United States for the second consecutive year. An estimated 11,000 millionaires moved to Australia in 2016, compared with the 10,000 who moved to the United States. Australia was especially attractive to Chinese millionaires due to its relative proximity, cleaner environment, political and economic stability, and investor visa programs. Also, the primary reason for millionaires leaving China is top schools abroad that will give their children a better education and career connections.


title: Economy of Australia

text: All in all over 43,150 deals have been completed national, inbound or outbound Australia. This cumulates to an overall value of US$2,554 billion. There was a strong upward trend between 1989 and 2007. In this peak year almost 3,100 deals took place, which is almost 60% more than in 2017, the current low. Australian companies are particularly investing in the fields of metals and minerals (15% of all deals from Australia into foreign countries). Runner-up is the oil and gas industry with only 6.4%.


title: Economy of Australia

text: Here is a list of the top 10 deals with participation of Australian companies as the acquirer or target company:


title: Economy of Australia

text: In 2020 ACOSS released a new report revealing that poverty is growing in Australia, with an estimated 3.2 million people, or 13.6% of the population, living below the internationally accepted poverty line of 50% of a country's median income. It also estimated that there are 774,000 (17.7%) children under the age of 15 that are in poverty.


title: Economy of Australia

text: There were 105,237 people experiencing homelessness in Australia on census night in 2011. This equated to 1 in 200 Australians, and represented an increase of 17% from the 2006 census, with the rate of homelessness increasing from 45 per 10,000 to 49 per 10,000.


title: Economy of Australia

text: The number of homeless people in Australia jumped by more than 14,000—or 14 per cent—in the five years to 2016, according to census data. The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) said 116,000 people were homeless on census night in 2016, representing 50 homeless people per 10,000.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: A Fish Called Wanda is a 1988 heist comedy film directed by Charles Crichton and written by Crichton and John Cleese. It stars Cleese, Jamie Lee Curtis, Kevin Kline, and Michael Palin. The film follows a gang of diamond thieves who double-cross one another to find stolen diamonds hidden by the gang leader. A barrister becomes a central figure as "femme fatale" Wanda uses him to locate the loot.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: "A Fish Called Wanda" premiered in New York City on July 7, 1988, and in Los Angeles on July 13, 1988, and was released theatrically on July 15, 1988, by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to critical and commercial success, grossing over $188 million worldwide, becoming the seventh-highest-grossing film of 1988. The film received three nominations at the 61st Academy Awards: Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and, with Kline winning, Best Supporting Actor. A spiritual sequel, "Fierce Creatures," was released in 1997. The British Film Institute ranked "A Fish Called Wanda" the 39th-greatest British film of the 20th century.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: London-based gangster George Thomason plans a jewel heist with his right-hand man, Ken Pile, an animal lover with a stutter. They bring in two Americans: con artist Wanda Gershwitz and weapons expert Otto West, an ignorant and mean-spirited anglophobe. Wanda and Otto are lovers, but pretend to be siblings, so Wanda can work her charms on Ken and George. The heist succeeds and the gang escapes with a large sum in diamonds, which they hide. Wanda and Otto then betray George to the police and he is arrested. They return to collect the loot, with Wanda planning to double-cross Otto as well, but it is gone: George had also returned, and moved it to a safe deposit box, giving Ken the key. Wanda finds it in Ken's fish tank and hides it in her locket.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: Wanda decides to seduce George's barrister, Archie Leach, in hopes of learning where the safe deposit box is. Archie is in a loveless marriage and quickly falls for Wanda, but Otto's jealous interference causes their liaisons to go disastrously wrong. Wanda accidentally leaves her locket at Archie's house; his wife, Wendy, delightedly assumes that the "W" on it means it is a gift for her.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: Inventing a reason, Wanda demands that Archie retrieve the locket, but Wendy will not give it up. He finally fakes a robbery at his own home in order to explain its disappearance. Just then, Otto arrives there to apologise to Archie for earlier insults, and decides to help Archie by knocking the burglar unconscious. Archie does get the locket and returns it to Wanda at their next tryst, but they are interrupted. He subsequently telephones her to call off their affair as he now realizes she only wants a rich man. Otto arrives at Archie's house again to apologise, but Wendy overhears their conversation and learns about Archie and Wanda.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: George asks Ken to kill the Crown's only eyewitness to the robbery, the elderly Eileen Coady, who owns three small dogs. Ken repeatedly tries to kill her, but each time accidentally kills one of the dogs instead, causing him great distress. But he succeeds when the last dog's death gives her a fatal heart attack. With no witness, George seems poised to be released. He gives instructions to Ken, revealing the location of the diamonds. When Otto learns that Ken knows this, he tortures Ken into revealing it by eating Ken's various pet fish, leaving Ken's favourite, named Wanda, until last. Ken reveals that the diamonds are at the Cathcart Towers Hotel near Heathrow Airport, but does not know that Wanda has the key.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: With Otto's knowledge and Wanda's key, the two want George to remain in prison. At his trial, Wanda, as a defense witness, unexpectedly gives evidence incriminating him. Archie is stunned by her statements and flubs his questioning, inadvertently calling her "darling". Wendy, watching from the public gallery, declares their marriage over.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: With his career and marriage ruined, Archie resolves to cut his losses, steal the loot himself and flee to South America with Wanda. Promising less prison time, Archie asks George about the diamonds and learns of Otto and Wanda's complicity and that Ken knows their location. Archie sees Wanda fleeing the court and they race to Ken's flat together. As they arrive, Otto steals Archie's car, taking Wanda with him. While Ken stutters uncontrollably, Archie painstakingly gets him to reveal the location of the safe deposit box. They then set out for Heathrow on Ken's moped.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: Otto and Wanda recover the diamonds, but Wanda double-crosses Otto and leaves him unconscious in a broom cupboard at Heathrow. She reluctantly boards her flight to Rio de Janeiro without Archie. Otto recovers, steals a boarding pass, and makes his way to the tarmac, where he is confronted by Archie. Otto is about to kill Archie, but Archie stalls him by taunting Otto about America's defeat in Vietnam. Ken arrives, driving a steamroller, seeking vengeance for his fish. Otto finds he has stepped in wet concrete and cannot move; he is run over, but survives. Archie and Wanda board the plane while Otto, clinging to the window outside, curses them until he is blown off during takeoff.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: Cleese and Crichton had attempted to make a film together in 1969. Although the project never entered development, they promised each other that they would eventually collaborate on a film. In June 1983, the two began writing the script for "Wanda", and, for the next two and half years, they met three times a month to work on the script. According to Crichton, "We had a week of rehearsals and then a gap of two weeks in which to incorporate any new ideas which had been thrown up and to polish the script." According to Michael Palin, the original title was "A Goldfish Called Wanda."


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: Cleese told an interviewer that he called his character Archie Leach, the late actor Cary Grant's real name, because "I feel this film is as near as I'll ever get to being Cary Grant." While in character as Archie Leach, Cleese recited a longer passage from Mikhail Lermontov's poem "Молитва" ("Prayer").


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: Cleese, admitting in press interviews that he had no knowledge of how to direct a film, served as co-director, since the studio executives at MGM were worried about Crichton's age—he was 78 years old at the time. On the set, Crichton wore a T-shirt presented to him by Cleese and inscribed "Age and treachery will always overcome youth and skill".


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a 96% approval rating, based on 67 reviews, with an average rating of 8.1/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Smartly written, smoothly directed, and solidly cast, "A Fish Called Wanda" offers a classic example of a brainy comedy with widespread appeal." On Metacritic, the film holds a score of 80 out of 100, based on 17 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews." According to CriticsTop10, "A Fish Called Wanda" appeared on over 60 critics' top ten lists, making it the fifth most acclaimed film of 1988. Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: After six weeks of wide release in the United States, it reached number one at the box office. It eventually grossed $62.5 million in the United States and Canada. It was the highest-grossing British film of all time with a gross of £12 million. Outside of the US (including the UK), it grossed $126.1 million, for a worldwide total of $188.6 million. It was the number one rental video in the US in 1989.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: Kline won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance. Cleese and Crichton received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay. Crichton was also nominated for Best Director, Cleese won a BAFTA for Best Actor in a Leading Role and Curtis received nominations for Best Actress in a Leading Role at the Golden Globes and BAFTA awards. Michael Palin won a BAFTA for Best Actor in a Supporting Role and Maria Aitken received a BAFTA nomination for Best Actress in a Supporting Role.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: In 2016, "Empire" magazine ranked "A Fish Called Wanda" 35th on their list of the 100 best British films, with their entry calling it "a must-own for any British comedy fan", adding, "it made possible Richard Curtis's later Brit-com oeuvre by establishing that British eccentricism can sell, revived the world's interest in Ealing comedies, and allowed a character with Cary Grant's real name – Cleese's bumbling lawyer Archie Leach – to live again on the big screen."


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: During the initial run of the film, a Danish audiologist named Ole Bentzen died while laughing during a screening, which led newspapers to report that he had died from laughter. The official cause of death was heart fibrillation, which may have been caused by an increased heart rate due to extended laughter. Cleese considered using the event for publicity, but ultimately decided it was in too bad taste.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: The film is number 27 on Bravo's "100 Funniest Movies". It is also included in the "Reader's Digest" "100 Funniest Films" list.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: In 1999, it was voted 39th on the BFI Top 100 British films list compiled by the British Film Institute


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: Also in 2000, the American Film Institute placed the film on its 100 Years...100 Laughs list, where it was ranked number 21. Then in 2003, AFI nominated Otto West as a villain from this film for AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes & Villains.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: James Berardinelli of "ReelViews" awarded the film four out of four stars in his review; it is also number 10 on his "Top 100" list.


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: The principal cast reunited in 1997 for "Fierce Creatures" (dubbed an "equal" rather than a sequel or prequel, by Kline), playing different roles. "Fierce Creatures" was not as well received by critics or audiences as "A Fish Called Wanda".


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: The novelization of "Fierce Creatures", written by Iain Johnstone, who co-wrote the film, begins with a letter from Archie (John Cleese's character in the first film) to his brother Rollo. According to the letter:


title: A Fish Called Wanda

text: In 2008, it was reported that John Cleese and his daughter, Cynthia (who played his screen daughter, Portia), had started to work on a stage musical version of the film.


title: The Neon Demon

text: The Neon Demon is a 2016 psychological horror film directed by Nicolas Winding Refn, co-written by Mary Laws, Polly Stenham, and Refn, and starring Elle Fanning. The plot follows an aspiring model in Los Angeles whose beauty and youth generate intense fascination and jealousy within the fashion industry. Supporting roles are played by Karl Glusman, Jena Malone, Bella Heathcote, Abbey Lee, Desmond Harrington, Christina Hendricks, and Keanu Reeves.


title: The Neon Demon

text: An international co-production between France, Denmark, and the United States, the film competed for the Palme d'Or at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival, the third consecutive film directed by Refn to do so, following "Drive" (2011) and "Only God Forgives" (2013). In the United States, the film was released theatrically on June 24, 2016 by Amazon Studios and Broad Green Pictures. It opened to polarized reviews, and ultimately grossed a little over $3 million against a $7 million budget.


title: The Neon Demon

text: Following the death of her parents, sixteen-year-old aspiring model Jesse has just moved from small-town Georgia to Los Angeles. She meets photographer Dean, who does her first shoot, and makeup artist Ruby, who introduces fellow older models Sarah and Gigi, who are interested in her physical appearance and her sexual activities, which Jesse feigns to have.


title: The Neon Demon

text: Jesse is signed by Roberta Hoffman, the owner of a modeling agency, who tells her to pretend she is nineteen and refers her to a test shoot with notable photographer Jack McCarther. The shoot is successful, and Gigi and Sarah envy Jesse's youth. Jesse goes to a casting call for fashion designer Robert Sarno where Sarah is also present. Sarno pays no attention to Sarah but is entranced by Jesse. A distraught Sarah asks her how it feels to be the one everyone admires. Jesse admits, "It's everything" and Sarah lunges toward her, subsequently cutting Jesse's hand on glass. Sarah sucks the blood from Jesse's hand and Jesse rushes back to her motel and faints, hallucinating abstract imagery.


title: The Neon Demon

text: At Sarno's fashion show, Gigi tells Jesse about the cosmetic surgery. As Jesse is closing the show, she hallucinates abstract triangular shapes and reflections of herself. After the show, a visibly-changed Jesse goes out with Dean to a bar, where Sarno negatively compares Gigi to Jesse, saying Gigi is not truly beautiful because of her surgery while Jesse is naturally beautiful. Dean, who disputes Sarno's opinions, requests Jesse to leave, who refuses and now espouses a narcissistic persona.


title: The Neon Demon

text: Jesse has a nightmare of being forced by Hank, the lecherous motel owner, to sexually swallow a knife. She wakes up to hear someone fidgeting with her door lock. She quickly turns the deadbolt, but is left to listen as the intruder breaks into the next room and assaults the thirteen-year-old female occupant inside. Terrified, she calls Ruby, who invites Jesse to her home. Ruby makes sexual advances towards Jesse but is rejected by Jesse, revealing herself to be a virgin. Ruby then leaves for her second job as a makeup artist at a morgue, where she pleasures herself with a female corpse.


title: The Neon Demon

text: Ruby returns home and finds Jesse now unabashed in her narcissism. Jesse encounters Sarah and Gigi, who attack her and chase her to Ruby, who pushes her into an empty swimming pool, breaking her leg and causing her blood to flow. The women then approach her with knives. After they butcher Jesse and consume parts of her body, they all bathe in her blood. Ruby is revealed to have occult tattoos. She lies in Jesse's unmarked grave, and later, nude in her house as a torrent of blood gushes from her genitals as she urinates.


title: The Neon Demon

text: The next day, Sarah and Gigi attend one of Jack's shoots with another model named Annie. Jack is suddenly enthralled with Sarah and fires Annie. In the midst of the shoot, Gigi falls ill and leaves. Sarah watches Gigi vomit up one of Jesse's eyeballs. She screams with regret, "I need to get her out of me", and stabs herself with a pair of scissors. Sarah watches Gigi die and eats the regurgitated eyeball before returning to the shoot.


title: The Neon Demon

text: On October 22, 2013, it was announced that Refn's new film after "Only God Forgives" would be a Miami- or Tokyo-set "all-female horror" with "lots of sex" called "I Walk with the Dead", with Carey Mulligan attached to star and Polly Stenham writing the script. On November 3, 2014, Refn's production company Space Rocket Nation alongside its co-financiers Gaumont Film Company and Wild Bunch announced that Refn's next film would be titled "The Neon Demon", to be filmed in Los Angeles in early 2015. Refn commented on the conception of the project: "I woke up one morning a couple of years ago and was like, 'Well, I was never born beautiful, but my wife is,' and I wondered what it had been like going through life with that reality," he says. "I came up with the idea to do a horror film about beauty, not to criticize it or to attack it, but because beauty is a very complex subject. Everyone has an opinion about it."


title: The Neon Demon

text: In January 2015, "Dazed" reported that the script for the film was inspired by Elizabeth Báthory. In discussing the script, which Refn co-wrote with Mary Laws, he stated: "I decided that I'd made enough films about violent men, and I wanted to do a film with only women in the film, and so I did this story because my wife would only go to L.A. if we had to travel out of Copenhagen. She's like, 'I'm done with Asia. I will only do Los Angeles.' And so I came up with an idea and went to L.A., and I cast this woman called Elle Fanning who is absolutely fantastic, and she played the lead." In subsequent interviews, Refn stated that he visualized the film as an "adult fairy tale."


title: The Neon Demon

text: On January 6, 2015, Elle Fanning joined the film to play an aspiring model, caught in a world of beauty and demise. Fanning came to Refn's attention because of his wife, who had been impressed by her performance in an earlier film. On January 29, Abbey Lee was added to the cast to play the role of Sarah. On February 5, more cast was added to the film, including Keanu Reeves, Christina Hendricks, Jena Malone and Bella Heathcote. On March 17, 2015, Karl Glusman was set to star in the film. Desmond Harrington was added to the cast on March 30, 2015.


title: The Neon Demon

text: Principal photography on the film began in Los Angeles on March 30, 2015. Locations included downtown Los Angeles, while the motel sequences were shot on location at a real motel in Pasadena.


title: The Neon Demon

text: Composer Cliff Martinez, who collaborated with director Refn on "Drive", stated the films have similar styles, musically speaking, noting that for "The Neon Demon" he sought a "sparse electronic score." He stated in an interview that the first half of the film resembles "a melodrama like "Valley of the Dolls", and the second half is like "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre"." According to Refn and Martinez the soundtrack was influenced by Giorgio Moroder, Goblin, Kraftwerk, Vangelis and Tangerine Dream.


title: The Neon Demon

text: The soundtrack for the film was released on June 24, 2016, physically and through digital download, before being released on vinyl on July 8, 2016, by Milan Records. Sia composed an original song for the film titled "Waving Goodbye". On May 24, 2016, at the Cannes Soundtrack 2016 awards, Cliff Martinez was recognized best composer of the Cannes film festival for his soundtrack to "The Neon Demon".


title: The Neon Demon

text: Refn's nephew (and actress Brigitte Nielsen's son) Julian Winding contributed two tracks: "Demon Dance" and "Mine", the latter performed by his band Sweet Tempest.


title: The Neon Demon

text: In November 2015, Amazon Studios acquired distribution rights to the film in the United States, in partnership with Broad Green Pictures. The Jokers distributed the film in France. Scanbox Entertainment distributed the film in Denmark.


title: The Neon Demon

text: The film had its world premiere at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival on May 20, 2016, before it was released in France on June 8, 2016. The film was then released in Denmark on June 9, followed by the wide release in the United States on June 24, 2016.


title: The Neon Demon

text: "The Neon Demon" received a mixed response from critics. Much like Refn's previous film, "Only God Forgives", the film received both boos and a standing ovation during its premiere at Cannes Film Festival. It holds a 58% approval rating on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 260 reviews, with an average rating of 6/10. The site's consensus reads, ""The Neon Demon" is seductively stylish, but Nicolas Winding Refn's assured eye can't quite compensate for an underdeveloped plot and thinly written characters." On Metacritic, the film has a score of 51 out of 100, based on 45 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".


title: The Neon Demon

text: Writing a four star review in "The Guardian", Mark Kermode said it was "a film driven by the same guilty pleasures that have long underpinned Refn's work", and had particular praise for the performance of Malone. Robbie Collin of "The Daily Telegraph" gave the film five out of five stars, stating, "When the film reaches its logical end point, Refn just keeps pushing, and eventually lands on a sequence so jaw-dropping – almost certainly a sly, glossy-magazine refashioning of Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dali's groundbreaking surrealist short "Un Chien Andalou" – that all you can do is howl or cheer." Tirdad Derakhshani, writing for "The Philadelphia Inquirer", called Refn a "bold visionary artist... able to revel in the culture of instant gratification while also subjecting it to critique", giving the film three and a half out of four stars and calling it a "brutal masterpiece". Rene Rodriguez of "The Miami Herald" wrote positively of the film's visuals and experimental filmmaking, writing, "To complain that "The Neon Demon" lacks substance or that it doesn't have anything to say about our cultural obsession with beauty is to miss the crazy, cracked pageant unfolding in front of you. Not all movies are intended to be read like books; some are meant to be experienced," going on to call it a "film that is guaranteed to elicit strong reactions." He awarded the film three out of four stars. The writer Natasha Stagg interpreted the film through René Girard's theory of mimetic desire, and speculated that its box office failure was due to its substance being "too close to its own target".


title: The Neon Demon

text: Owen Gleiberman of "Variety" gave the film a mixed review: "A horror film is what "The Neon Demon" is (sort of). It’s set in the Los Angeles fashion world, and it’s the kind of movie in which models look like mannequins that look like slasher-film corpses, and corpses look like love objects. Beauty mingles with mangled flesh, and each fastidiously slick image seems to have come out of "" or "The Shining" or a very sick version of a Calvin Klein commercial. Every scene, every shot, every line of dialogue, every pause is so hypnotically composed, so luxuriously overdeliberate, that the audience can't help but assume that Refn knows exactly what he's doing – that he's setting us up for the kill. He is, but not if you're on the lookout for a movie that makes sense. (Oh, "that".)" Todd McCarthy of "The Hollywood Reporter" gave the film a negative review and called it "[a] stultifyingly vapid, ponderously paced allegorical critique of the modeling world whose seethingly jealous inhabitants can't wait to literally chew each other up and spit each other out". Glenn Kenny of "The New York Times" criticized the film as "ridiculous and puerile," and opined, "Mr. Refn composes striking images, but they're all secondhand: faux Fellini, faux David Lynch and so on." "The Telegraph"s Tim Robey deemed "The Neon Demon" the "most offensive film of the year," specifically citing its necrophilia sequence as exploitative, though he conceded it is not "any fault of Malone’s, who commits herself utterly to making it an anguished, desperate, if inevitably revolting minute or so of screen time. It’s a question of context, and how this scene – which stands alone, advancing nothing in the overall arc of the story, and is one of very few not to feature Fanning – slots into the film’s overall thesis."


title: Pericarditis

text: Pericarditis is inflammation of the pericardium, the fibrous sac surrounding the heart. Symptoms typically include sudden onset of sharp chest pain, which may also be felt in the shoulders, neck, or back. The pain is typically less severe when sitting up and more severe when lying down or breathing deeply. Other symptoms of pericarditis can include fever, weakness, palpitations, and shortness of breath. The onset of symptoms can occasionally be gradual rather than sudden.


title: Pericarditis

text: The cause of pericarditis often remains unknown but is believed to be most often due to a viral infection. Other causes include bacterial infections such as tuberculosis, uremic pericarditis, heart attack, cancer, autoimmune disorders, and chest trauma. Diagnosis is based on the presence of chest pain, a pericardial rub, specific electrocardiogram (ECG) changes, and fluid around the heart. A heart attack may produce similar symptoms to pericarditis.


title: Pericarditis

text: Treatment in most cases is with NSAIDs and possibly the anti-inflammatory medication colchicine. Steroids may be used if these are not appropriate. Symptoms usually improve in a few days to weeks but can occasionally last months. Complications can include cardiac tamponade, myocarditis, and constrictive pericarditis. Pericarditis is an uncommon cause of chest pain. About 3 per 10,000 people are affected per year. Those most commonly affected are males between the ages of 20 and 50. Up to 30% of those affected have more than one episode.


title: Pericarditis

text: Substernal or left precordial pleuritic chest pain with radiation to the trapezius ridge (the bottom portion of scapula on the back) is the characteristic pain of pericarditis. The pain is usually relieved by sitting up or bending forward, and worsened by lying down (both recumbent and supine positions) or by inspiration (taking a breath in). The pain may resemble that of angina but differs in that pericarditis pain changes with body position, where heart attack pain is generally constant and pressure-like. Other symptoms of pericarditis may include dry cough, fever, fatigue, and anxiety.


title: Pericarditis

text: Due to its similarity to the pain of myocardial infarction (heart attack), pericarditis can be misdiagnosed as a heart attack. Acute myocardial infarction can also cause pericarditis, but the presenting symptoms often differ enough to warrant diagnosis. The following table organizes the clinical presentation of pericarditis differential to myocardial infarction:


title: Pericarditis

text: The classic sign of pericarditis is a friction rub heard with a stethoscope on the cardiovascular examination, usually on the lower left sternal border. Other physical signs include a person in distress, positional chest pain, diaphoresis (excessive sweating); possibility of heart failure in form of pericardial tamponade causing pulsus paradoxus, and the Beck's triad of low blood pressure (due to decreased cardiac output), distant (muffled) heart sounds, and distension of the jugular vein (JVD).


title: Pericarditis

text: Pericarditis can progress to pericardial effusion and eventually cardiac tamponade. This can be seen in people who are experiencing the classic signs of pericarditis but then show signs of relief, and progress to show signs of cardiac tamponade which include decreased alertness and lethargy, pulsus paradoxus (decrease of at least 10 mmHg of the systolic blood pressure upon inspiration), low blood pressure (due to decreased cardiac index), (jugular vein distention from right sided heart failure and fluid overload), distant heart sounds on auscultation, and equilibration of all the diastolic blood pressures on cardiac catheterization due to the constriction of the pericardium by the fluid.


title: Pericarditis

text: In such cases of cardiac tamponade, EKG or Holter monitor will then depict electrical alternans indicating wobbling of the heart in the fluid filled pericardium, and the capillary refill might decrease, as well as severe vascular collapse and altered mental status due to hypoperfusion of body organs by a heart that can not pump out blood effectively.


title: Pericarditis

text: The diagnosis of tamponade can be confirmed with trans-thoracic echocardiography (TTE), which should show a large pericardial effusion and diastolic collapse of the right ventricle and right atrium. Chest X-ray usually shows an enlarged cardiac silhouette ("water bottle" appearance) and clear lungs. Pulmonary congestion is typically not seen because equalization of diastolic pressures constrains the pulmonary capillary wedge pressure to the intra-pericardial pressure (and all other diastolic pressures).


title: Pericarditis

text: In the developed world, viruses are believed to be the cause of about 85% of cases. In the developing world tuberculosis is a common cause but it is rare in the developed world. Viral causes include coxsackievirus, herpesvirus, mumps virus, and HIV among others.


title: Pericarditis

text: Pneumococcus or tuberculous pericarditis are the most common bacterial forms. Anaerobic bacteria can also be a rare cause. Fungal pericarditis is usually due to histoplasmosis, or in immunocompromised hosts Aspergillus, Candida, and Coccidioides. The most common cause of pericarditis worldwide is infectious pericarditis with tuberculosis.


title: Pericarditis

text: Laboratory values can show increased urea (BUN), or increased blood creatinine in cases of uremic pericarditis. Generally, however, laboratory values are normal, but if there is a concurrent myocardial infarction (heart attack) or great stress to the heart, laboratory values may show increased cardiac markers like Troponin (I, T), CK-MB, Myoglobin, and LDH1 (lactase dehydrogenase isotype 1).


title: Pericarditis

text: The preferred initial diagnostic testing is the ECG, which may demonstrate a 12-lead electrocardiogram with diffuse, non-specific, concave ("saddle-shaped"), ST-segment elevations in all leads except aVR and V1 and PR-segment depression possible in any lead "except aVR"; sinus tachycardia, and low-voltage QRS complexes can also be seen if there is subsymptomatic levels of pericardial effusion. The PR depression is often seen early in the process as the thin atria are affected more easily than the ventricles by the inflammatory process of the pericardium.


title: Pericarditis

text: Since the mid-19th century, retrospective diagnosis of pericarditis has been made upon the finding of adhesions of the pericardium.


title: Pericarditis

text: When pericarditis is diagnosed clinically, the underlying cause is often never known; it may be discovered in only 16–22 percent of people with acute pericarditis.


title: Pericarditis

text: On MRI T2-weighted spin-echo images, inflamed pericardium will show high signal intensity. Late gadolinium contrast will show uptake of contrast by the inflamed pericardium. Normal pericardium will not show any contrast enhancement.


title: Pericarditis

text: Pericarditis can be classified according to the composition of the fluid that accumulates around the heart.


title: Pericarditis

text: Depending on the time of presentation and duration, pericarditis is divided into "acute" and "chronic" forms. Acute pericarditis is more common than chronic pericarditis, and can occur as a complication of infections, immunologic conditions, or even as a result of a heart attack (myocardial infarction), as Dressler's syndrome. Chronic pericarditis however is less common, a form of which is constrictive pericarditis. The following is the clinical classification of acute vs. chronic:


title: Pericarditis

text: The treatment in viral or idiopathic pericarditis is with aspirin, or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs such as ibuprofen). Colchicine may be added to the above as it decreases the risk of further episodes of pericarditis.