“As we reported previously, Obama has found himself on the verge of another environmental scandal now that he has no choice but to redirect the Mississippi river via the Morganza spillway – either lose millions in barrels of daily refined production and potentially the impairment of the Colonial Pipeline, two events which would promptly cause gas prices to soar to new records, or redirect the river via the Spillway, and cause the flooding of millions of acres, and numerous towns and cities, and possibly another New Orelans bases crisis. It seems Obama has picked the lesser of two evils: i.e., protect the oil: “The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said on Friday it anticipates opening the Morganza Spillway on the western bank of the swollen Mississippi River to divert floodwaters into the Atchafalaya River basin and protect Baton Rouge, Louisiana, New Orleans and refineries from flooding.”
Comments »Monthly Archives: May 2011
No Need to Knock Anymore
“INDIANAPOLIS | Overturning a common law dating back to the English Magna Carta of 1215, the Indiana Supreme Court ruled Thursday that Hoosiers have no right to resist unlawful police entry into their homes.
In a 3-2 decision, Justice Steven David writing for the court said if a police officer wants to enter a home for any reason or no reason at all, a homeowner cannot do anything to block the officer’s entry.”
Is Hoosier precedence coming soon ?
Comments »FLASH: MARC FABER INTERROGATES CME EXECUTIVE OVER COMMODITY MARGIN HIKES
Exodus
Jim Rogers: Currency Crisis Coming Over the Next Two Years
“Turmoil in the world’s currency markets will reach crisis levels within two years, legendary commodities investor Jim Rogers says.
“I would expect to see more crises in the currency market, maybe as soon as this fall, or certainly by the fall 2012-13,” Rogers tell Russia Today.
“You’re going to see serious turmoil in the currency market, which is going to force the world and force America to do something about it.”
Read more: Jim Rogers: Currency Crisis Coming Within Two Years
Comments »U.S. Markets Fall 1% + and it’s not just commodities
Today’s downside is being blamed on a reverse of dollar/euro carry trade…it is also note worthy that it is not just commodities moving the market today.
Comments »Niall Ferurson: “The big story of your lifetime is that this period of Western predominance came to an end on your watch,”
“LAS VEGAS—The era of US economic dominance is rapidly coming to an end as an “American Gothic” age sets in and China becomes the new global leader, economic historian Niall Ferguson said.
Four primary factors—some caused by the financial crisis and others stemming from separate geopolitical issues—spell the final stages of the American age, Ferguson told attendees at the Skybridge Alternative Investment (SALT) conference here.
“The big story of your lifetime is that this period of Western predominance came to an end on your watch,” he said. “That happened because the developing part of the world is achieving the Industrial Revolution that the Americans experienced. This period is going to continue until China becomes the biggest economy in the world.”
Comments »El-Erian: Markets Missing Big Picture On Inflation
“Pimco Chief Executive Mohamed El-Erian told CNBC Friday he is disturbed by rising commodities prices and how investors are missing the bigger picture of what that increase means.
“There are two realities out there. When economists and market participants look at [the CPI data] they call it ‘transitory.’ When Main Street looks at this it says, ‘This is not transitory, guys, this is hurting me,'” El-Erian said.
Calling the situation “transitory” makes the market “complacent,” he said. “We have to ask the question, what are the consequences? There are real-life consequences that everybody out there knows about and somehow we as a society have to navigate through it.”
He said investors have to step back every so often and look three to five years down the road at the economy and what its effect will be on markets around the world.”
Comments »Today’s Biggest ETF Losers
No. Ticker % Change
1 ZSL -7.11
2 EDC -6.61
3 DZK -6.18
4 TUR -5.24
5 LBJ -4.87
6 EET -4.05
7 CZM -3.84
8 FAS -3.70
9 TNA -3.70
10 REMX -3.18
11 TYH -3.05
12 UKK -3.04
13 UVT -2.99
14 UYM -2.99
15 DRN -2.93
16 TQQQ -2.92
17 EWP -2.90
18 EWO -2.86
19 THD -2.85
20 GAF -2.82
21 TMV -2.74
22 NUGT -2.73
23 SOXL -2.68
24 LIT -2.64
25 EZA -2.62
Governments selling assets
NEW YORK (AP) — As 2010 drew to a close, the mayor of Newark, N.J., was staring into a budget abyss so deep that he sold 16 city buildings to pay the bills. They included the architecturally significant Newark Symphony Hall and the police and fire headquarters.
In New York, the transit authority may sell its Madison Avenue headquarters, complete with an underground tunnel connected to Grand Central Terminal and air rights to build a skyscraper on top.
And soon, if state legislators have their way, private investors will be able to buy plenty of other municipal treasures: power plants in Wisconsin, prisons in Louisiana and Ohio and municipal buildings in Boston.
The Great Government Tag Sale is on. As states and cities struggle with billions of dollars in shortfalls, elected officials are increasingly selling public assets to cover their costs. Sometimes municipalities sell the buildings to pocket a one-time pile of cash and then lease them back so they can continue to use them.
The rest of this story can be found here.
Comments »Today’s Biggest ETF Winners
No. Ticker % Change
1 AGQ 5.08
2 EDZ 4.96
3 EEV 3.29
4 SLV 2.94
5 PSLV 2.62
6 FAZ 2.58
7 SKF 1.74
8 FXP 1.46
9 TZA 1.24
10 DRV 1.22
11 SRS 1.19
12 SPXU 1.14
13 BGZ 1.08
14 QID 1.06
15 TWM 0.98
16 VXX 0.94
17 DXD 0.84
18 TLT 0.82
19 OIH 0.76
20 SMN 0.76
21 SDS 0.75
22 DTO 0.72
23 PTY 0.69
24 EUO 0.63
25 SIL 0.50
Crack Spreads Rebound
Up 4.5% right now, nearing $29—still at historic levels.
Comments »FLASH: Citigroup is Resuming Their Dividend
is it a whole penny?,,,,developing
Comments »Q1 Conference Call Analysis by David Kostin of Goldman Sachs
“From Q1 earnings calls, Goldman’s David Kostin says these were the four big themes:
- General positive sentiment about current business.
- Concern about rising input prices.
- International profits driving the majority of growth.
- Companies are cautiously getting back into hiring and capex.”
The Number of People Applying for Jobs Has Dropped from 6.9 to 4.3
“Whether or not it’s of any comfort to the millions of American who have been out of work for months or even years, the number of people currently competing for available employment has shrunk.
As of March, an average of 4.3 jobseekers vied for each open position, according to new data released by the Department of Labor. This ratio is the lowest in more than two years. The ratio hit its bad news peak in July 2009, when there were 6.9 workers per opening.
Back in December 2000, there was almost one job for every person who was unemployed, and as recently as mid-2007 the ratio was only about 1.5 to 1.
Four Workers for Every Job Opening (by Catherine Rampell, New York Times)”
Comments »Easy Money Fuels Corporate Stock Buy Backs
A reason to be bullish some say….
“Forget fundamentals, here’s another reason to be bullish.
WJB Capital Group points out that in just the last few weeks, there’s been a massive surge in S&P 500 stock buybacks coinciding with a boom in corporate bond issuance. In other words, companies continue to take advantage of uber-cheap lending to reduce their share counts.
This is truly a stunning chart. When buyback announcements hit $100 billion in the last quarter, we pronounced that companies had now put themselves in the driver’s seat in terms of being the major buyer of stocks, just as they did in the last bull market.
And yet, stock investors still don’t want to believe it. Most of Wall Street’s resources go to examining fundamentals or the behavior of other stock investors. Almost no analysis goes into corporate purchases of stocks, despite their importance. As a result, with shares set to shrink 5% or more a year, earnings per share estimates three years out may be 15% too low!…”
Comments »Top or Not ?
“The market is giving distinct signs that the previously strong rally is fading and that investors and speculators alike are paying greater attention to the headwinds that we have been discussing in these comments for the last few months.
Last week we pointed out how suddenly everything that was going up turned sharply down and that everything that was going down moved up. On a more gradual basis we note that stocks have made no progress now for almost three months.
The S&P 500 reached 1344 on February 18th and today closed virtually at the same level—1348. Since investors invariably try to buy on dips what they most recently missed, some bouncing around is likely as the market forms a top. Nevertheless we believe the groundwork for a big decline is now being set at a time when the vast majority is still bullish. The following sums up our concerns….”
Comments »Rail Traffic Economic Indicator
A mixed report…
“The Association of American Railroads (AAR) today reported mixed results in weekly rail traffic with U.S. railroads originating 281,860 carloads for the week ending May 7, 2011, down 2.6 percent compared with the same week last year. Intermodal volume for the week totaled 232,178 trailers and containers, up 11.2 percent compared with the same week in 2010.
Six of the 20 carload commodity groups posted increases from the comparable week in 2010. Commodity groups posting significant increases are grain, up 19.9 percent, and metals and products, up 13.1 percent. Groups posting a notable decrease are: primary forest products, down 19.5 percent; nonmetallic minerals, down 16.3 percent, and waste and nonferrous scrap, down 13.7 percent.
Weekly carload volume on Eastern railroads was down 0.1 percent compared with the same week last year. In the West, weekly carload volume was down 4.2 percent compared with the same week in 2010.
For the first 18 weeks of 2011, U.S. railroads reported cumulative volume of 5,233,086 carloads, up 3.4 percent from last year, and 4,002,923 trailers and containers, up 8.9 percent from the same point in 2010.”
Comments »John Taylor: ‘Risk Rally’ is Coming to an End
“May 12 (Bloomberg) — John Taylor, founder of the world’s largest currency-hedge fund, said the rally in higher-yielding assets is coming to an end with Europe’s sovereign debt crisis resurfacing, growth sluggish and banking systems unsteady.
“This is the end of the nice slow moving risk rally that has lulled us pleasantly to sleep since the first half of 2009,” Taylor, chairman of New York-based FX Concepts LLC, said in an interview. “This warning is worthy of a brass band and bright lights as the other side of this low volatility rally will most likely be a scary descent that will have a very negative impact on markets. Our statistical models say we are about at the end of the road for risk.”
Higher-risk assets, such as equities, the euro and emerging market currencies, have either peaked or will do so by end of July, according to Taylor, who manages about $8.5 billion and uses statistical models to help predict future movements in assets. Global investors have tempered their optimism about the U.S. and world economies and plan to put more of their money in cash and less in commodities over the next six months, a Bloomberg survey released today found.”
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