Callousness: Lottery Winner Still Utilizing Food Stamps

What a loser statement to make…..

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“General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE) is reaffirming its plan for continued double-digit sales gains in 2012 at Wednesday’s investor meeting discussing its global outlook and long-term global growth plans.  As far as the double-digit growth, this is listed as “continued double-digit revenue growth in its global growth regions in 2012 and 2013.”

The company has doubled revenues in twenty-seven countries in five years and it now notes that global revenue accounts for more than 55% of its total industrial revenues.

About 66% of GE’s $200 billion backlog comes from global markets, and over half of the total is from GE’s growth regions.

GE even gave a target that the global growth markets will constitute 50% of world GDP by he year 2025.

GE anticipates 20% to 25% growth in Resource Rich regions such as Latin America, Australia & New Zealand, the Middle East and Africa. GE sees 10% to 15% growth in Rising Asia – China, India and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

In 2011, GE’s revenue grew in China by 29%, in Latin America by 36%, in Sub-Saharan Africa by 14%, and in Australia & New Zealand, by 67%.

GE still plans to grow its dividend at roughly the same rate as income.”

“The AARP put out a remarkably complex research paper that shows, among other things, that the costs that people over 50 paid for commonly used drugs rose 25.6% between 2005 and 2009. The data used in the AARP Public Policy Institute research was based on the retail prices of the 469 most used prescription drugs among people over 50. To make matters worse, the price for the 441 most common drugs for treatment of chronic disease rose 46.7%. The findings beg the question of who is minding the drug price store.

The AARP, the primary lobbying group for older Americans, has a stake in the drug price battle. Its millions of members expect the association to help them live affordable lives. That is part of the reason these people pay dues to the AARP. That does not make the data any less compelling.

Much of the focus on bringing down health care costs has been on doctors, hospitals and affordable insurance. These sectors of the health care business involve hundreds of thousands of transactions a year, because of the large numbers of doctors and hospitals and the complex insurance pricing systems. Drug costs are another matter. It is not terribly hard for the federal government to monitor what consumers pay for several hundred drugs and to ask pharmaceuticalcompanies why those prices have risen so fast. In some cases, the reasons may be adequate. Among the reasons are the prices that companies pay for drug ingredients….”

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P is down 24%

“HONG KONG – Citigroup is gearing up to issue its own credit cards in China this year, the latest push by a Western bank to attract Asian consumers with a growing appetite for borrowing.

In February, Citigroup (C) became the first Western institution to receive regulatory approval to offer credit cards without having to team with a local bank. Citigroup previously partnered with Shanghai Pudong Development Bank to issue plastic in China.

In striking out on its own this year, Citigroup will expand in a country that analysts expect to soon become the world’s largest credit card market, and potentially, one of the most lucrative in the future. In 2010, China’s credit card industry turned profitable for the first time, according to Lafferty Group, an industry consultant.

“When it comes to credit cards, China is a virgin market with vast opportunity,” says Michael Lafferty, chairman of U.K.-based Lafferty Group, who predicts that China will become the world’s largest credit card market by 2015…”

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WOOF

Usury upon the people after they bailed them out…

“Just hours before Apple is due to unveil what many think will be a new version of its best-selling iPad tablet, Samsung has tried to steal a little thunder by filing a lawsuit against the Cupertino company over patent violations in the newest models that Apple has on the market as of this morning, the iPhone 4S and the iPad 2. The suit was filed in Samsung’s home market of Korea.

Given how these patent suits have come to represent almost as much in public mindshare as they have in terms of actual licensing deals (and, more loftily, questions of originality in device design), this could be seen as a well-timed and key move by Samsung. But it also appears to be a reversal of strategy…”

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The problem with the latest hare-brained scheme in Europe, namely to organize Greek bondholders among the various institutions that for 2 years did everything in their power to dump said Greek bonds in the open market, is that said institutions end up having no Greek bonds in inventory just at the time when they are supposed to have Greek bonds, 24 hours ahead of the Greek PSI deadline. As a reminder, participation in the PSI has to be 75%, with a CAC threshold of 66%,  and according to some interpretations even 50% of Greek bondholders voting for the PSI will be sufficient. Which means that with the PSI conclusion just around the corner, or 8 pm Athens time time tomorrow, the IIF, which is the consortium of entities that have every interest in perpetuating the status quo (i.e., do not have Europe ransom demands) and more than happy to “volunteer” for a 70%+ haircut, the IIF only has…

• IIF SAYS MEMBERS PLEDGING SECURITIES EQUAL TO 39% OF EU206 BLN
• IIF SAYS MEMBERS AMOUNTING TO EU81 BLN TO TAKE PART IN SWAP

So according to the IIF itself, 24 hours ahead of the deadline, it does not even have a majority of bondholders accounted for, let alone the plurailty needed for CAC trigger activation. Where are the other €145 billion in Greek bondholders? Why just call up Jeff Sabin at Bingham at 212.705.7747 and find out first hand….”

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Gapping up

DSCO +30.1%, AMTG +7.5%, SLTM +6.5%, GTIV +5.4%, MAKO +4%, MBLX +3.5%, RIO +1.7%, BBL +1.6%, CY +1.6%, MT +1.2%, BHP +1%,

LULU +2.2%, PCX +4.9%, JRCC +4.1%, ANR +1.6%, ACI +1.1%,  AUY +1.3%, GOLD +0.6%, SLV +0.3%, GLD +0.3%, GDX +0.3%,

IRE +3.5%, UBS +2.6%, DB +2%, BCS +1.9%, RY +1.6%, BAC +1.6%, CS +1.4%, IBN +1.3%, C +0.9%, HBC +0.8%, CIEN +6.8%, CTIC +5.6%, MBLX +3.5%

Gpping down

P -21.5%, ASTX -12%, AVAV -1.8%, UAN -1.4%,  MFB -12%,  CSIQ -10.7%, PLCE -4.6% ,  BWS -3.6%, AYR -4.7%, KFT -0.4%

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ConAgra Foods Inc. (CAG) : The food manufacturer said it completed its acquisition of Del Monte Canada from an affiliate of Sun Capital Partners Inc. Financial terms weren’t disclosed.

Cypress Semiconductor Corp. (CY) : The maker of computer chips for video-game consoles and mobile phones cut it’s first- quarter revenue forecast to no more than $190 million, falling short of the average analyst estimate of $205.9 million, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Discovery Laboratories Inc. (DSCO) : The biopharmaceutical company won approval from the Food and Drug Administration for its treatment to prevent respiratory distress in high-risk premature infants.

Mako Surgical Corp. (MAKO) : The medical device company reported fourth-quarter revenue of $32.9 million, beating the average analyst estimate by 7 percent, data compiled by Bloomberg show.

Pandora Media Inc. (P) (P US): The Internet radio pioneer forecast first-quarter results that missed analysts’ projections because of a seasonal lull in advertising sales.

Source 

Apple, Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) named Bull of the Day and raised to Outperform with $654 target at Zacks.

Automatic Data Processing, Inc. (NASDAQ: ADP) Raised to Focus List at Credit Suisse.

Express Scripts, Inc. (NASDAQ: ESRX) Raised to Outperform at Macquarie.

General Growth Properties (NYSE: GGP) Started as Neutral at Citigroup.

Kraft Foods Inc. (NYSE: KFT) Cut to Hold at Jefferies.

Lululemon Athletica Inc. (NASDAQ: LULU) Raised to Outperform at Credit Suisse.

MedcoHealth Solutions Inc. (NYSE: MHS) Cut to Neutral at Macquarie.

Moody’s Corporation (NYSE: MCO) Started as Neutral at UBS.

Pandora Media, Inc. (NYSE: P) Cut to Market Perform at Raymond James; Cut to Neutral at Citigroup.

Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG) Raised to Overweight at JPMorgan.

Verisk Analytics, Inc. (NASDAQ: VRSK) Started as Neutral at UBS.

Vermillion, Inc. (NASDAQ: VRML) Cut to Sell at Ladenberg Thalmann.

In Play

On the Wires

“Billionaire investor Ken Langone warns that the United States faces “hardcore unemployment” as high as 13 percent because President Barack Obama’s “punitive” view of business is dividing the country by punishing those who work hard and succeed with excess regulations.

The Home Depot co-founder told CNBC he is “bothered by the fact that we aren’t creating a massive number of jobs in America. I think we are going to have a hardcore unemployment in America, and what do you do about that?”

Langone says the unemployment rate is higher than the official figure of 8.3 percent because of the many people who have given up looking. If those people were included, the unemployment rate could be as high as 13 percent, he said….”

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“A combination of joblessness due to the Great Recession and welfare reform meant to encourage work has led to more than a doubling of “extreme” poverty in the United States, a new study has found.

Using a World Bank definition usually applied to developing countries, the National Poverty Center found that the number of households getting by on less than $2 per person, per day increased to 1.46 million households in 2011 from 636,000 in 1996, a climb of more than 129 percent.

Welfare reform in the late 1990s eliminated the sole cash entitlement program for poor families with children, replacing it with time-limited cash assistance that required able-bodied people to seek work. Children were the hardest hit: The tapering off of assistance has doubled the numbers of children in extreme poverty households, to 2.81 million from 1.38 million….”

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“Pimco CEO Mohamed El-Erian says Bloomberg’s new index of billionaires illustrates competing social forces.

“The launch of the Billionaires Index could be yet another illustration that certain segments of society remain tone deaf when it comes to social realities,” El-Erian writes in the Huffington Post.

“Indeed, some could view it as a sign of how information disseminators and opinion leaders are overly interested in metrics that say little about the underlying health and well-being of society.”

“This is clearly a risk. Fortunately there are countervailing forces.”

El-Erian notes that a growing number of politically and financially influential people are recognizing that, in today’s highly interconnected world that is trying to overcome anemic growth and an unemployment crisis, the well-being of the rich cannot (and should not) be viewed in isolation.

“To use one of my favorite real estate analogies, it is hard to be a great house in a weakening neighborhood—which leads to the upside of the new data releases,” he says.

This is where the potential upside comes in, says El-Erian, because Bloomberg’s daily identification of the top billionaires could reinforce a trend where these individuals allocate a growing portion of their wealth in a manner that helps society as a whole.

“In this way, the appeal of the index would prove to be less about what has happened and more about the responsibility that the rich share to help the least and less fortunate members of our global society,” El-Erian says.

Bloomberg reports that its Billionaires Index is a daily ranking of the world’s 20 richest people.

“In calculating net worth, we strive to provide the most transparent estimates available,” a Bloomberg article said. “Each Bloomberg Billionaire profile contains a detailed analysis of how that person’s fortune has been tallied.”

Unit labor cost chart

A narrow win over Santorum 

We should have some real concrete answers on the swap by tomorrow afternoon. Here is what could happen if the deal goes awry.

“We are now just over two months into that oft-dreaded year of 2012, and the economic and financial projections/assumptions by public and private institutions across the world have noticeably worsened. These are the same institutions (i.e. politicians, bureaucrats and executives) that have everything to lose by painting an accurate portrait of their position in the global economy, so it’s an extremely safe bet that they are still over-estimating their prospects. Nevertheless, the fact that their inflated, yet worsening projections completely destroy the myth of an economic recovery is telling.

The Chinese government just lowered its 2012 growth projection to 7.5%, which is the lowest it has been since 2004. As Ilargi recently noted here, that lowered projection itself is based on assumptions of stabilized exports, rising domestic consumption and no “hard landing” from the collapse of its unprecedented property/infrastructure bubble. Once we factor all of those things in, along with a potential 150% public debt/GDP ratio in 2011, the one and only remaining driver of the global growth story becomes much more of a liability than a boon.

Moving on to Europe….”

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