“WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Capital One Financial agreed to pay $210 million to resolve charges by U.S. banking regulators that its call-center representatives misled consumers into paying for extra credit card products.”
Comments »Monthly Archives: July 2012
Public Pensions are Some $4.6 Trillion Under Funded
“U.S. public pensions are $4.6 trillion short of the amount of assets needed to cover projected liabilities, an advocacy group said, more than twice what Moody’s Investors Service estimated this month.
The average plan is 41 percent funded, State Budget Solutions said in a report today. The Alexandria, Virginia, group’s partners include the American Legislative Exchange Council, which advocates “conservative public policy solutions,” the Freedom Foundation and the State Policy Network, which is composed of “free-market think tanks.”
Comments »The Economy Was Beige in June
Walmart “Gives” Away Free Stuff to Worthy Mob
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94INAruvOrA
Comments »Today’s Heat Map and A/D Lines
U.S. and European Market Update
U.S. equities opened directionless, but soon gained momentum as Bernanke started his second day of testimony with members of congress. U.S. equities did have some decent earnings and good housing starts to help out the rally that is developing.
As a result Europe went from the flat line to a full fledged rally of over 1% in most cases. Germany’s DAX led the charge closing up over 1.5%
[youtube://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBnSWJHawQQ 450 300] Comments »Real Time Tax Revenues Collected by the Federal Government DO NOT SPELL ECONOMIC SLOWDOWN
“The mainstream consensus has lately been that the economy is slowing. Based on my tracking of federal revenues in real time, I suspect that that view is incorrect. Instead the recent data reflects only normal oscillations within the ongoing slow growth trend.
Total federal tax collections, including withholding taxes, are available to us with just a one day lag in the US Treasury’s Daily Treasury Statements, which makes them an excellent analytical resource. Withholding is mostly for compensation, and thus it is a good measure of the economy’s strength. However, it is extremely volatile day to day so I rely more on a monthly moving average of the 10 day total collections, comparing that with the prior year. Smoothing sacrifices a bit of timeliness to get a clearer picture of the trend without losing too much of the edge that the daily data provides. Unfortunately, I have found even the 10 day total data too noisy for meaningful comparison so I’ve had to resort to additional smoothing. As a result the smoothed data is a little slow, so I also look at raw month to date data after mid month.
As of July 11, the 4 week average of the 10 day total of withholding taxes is now up 4.0%..”
Comments »EL-ERIAN: The Risk Of Collateral Damage And Unintended Consequences Caused By The Fed Is Material And Growing
“Mohamed El-Erian, CEO of PIMCO, is out with his latest criticism of the Federal Reserve’s efforts to bolster the economy.
“The Fed increasingly finds itself in a large and deepening policy dilemma,” he wrote in The Financial Times.
El-Erian notes that “the Fed has no choice but to consider another mix of unconventional measures – specifically, additional purchases of securities, a lower interest rate on excess reserves, an even more aggressive communication policy, and enhanced access to the discount window.”
Comments »Fun With the FDA
[youtube://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-KQ4bJjn6k 450 300]
Comments »Watch The Remake of Animal House at $WMT
Fun times…
[youtube://http://www.youutbe.com/watch?v=94INAruvOrA 450 300] Comments »Your Tax Dollars at Work
West Coast Faces More Toxic Fukushima Fallout Than First Estimated
“It’s been over a year since natural disaster ravaged a nuclear plant in Fukushima and interrupted the lives of millions of Japanese. Scientists now fear though that contaminated water is on course to America, and it could be more toxic than thought.
Researchers have released the findings of an intense study into the aftermath of last year’s Fukushima nuclear disaster and warn that the United States isn’t exactly spared just yet. In fact, scientists now fear that incredibly contaminated ocean waters could be reaching the West Coast of the US in a matter of only five years, and the toxicity of those waves could eventually be worse than what was seen in Japan.”
Comments »Stocks on the Move This Morning
Retirement Savings Raided by 35% of Laid-Off Workers
Compton May Face Bankruptcy Next in CA
“(Reuters) – The City of Compton, a city of 93,000 people located on the outskirts of Los Angeles, must decide by September 1 whether to seek bankruptcy, according to its two most senior financial officials.
Such a move would see it join a growing number of deficit-hobbled California cities that have used the filing to restructure onerous debt loads.”
[youtube://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MrQtOoQRpc 450 300] Comments »Still Approaching the S&P Death Cross
“the S&P is on the verge of an “ultimate” death cross. And what, pray tell, is that? A 50-200 moving average crossover, based on months, not days (or even weeks).”
Comments »ROUBINI: If Everything Goes Wrong, The Fed Will Start Buying Stocks
“Nouriel Roubini thinks things could get bad after the U.S. presidential elections in November.
The NYU economist – known as “Dr. Doom” and the forecaster of the “global perfect storm” for the world economy in 2013 – told Reuters’ Chrystia Freeland in an interview that the Fed may not be able to prevent the next stock market plunge.
Roubini told Reuters that the Fed could even try to buy stocks to keep things afloat at some point:
“There might be a weak rally because people are being cheered by more quantitative easing by (Chairman Ben) Bernanke and the Fed, but if the economy is weakening, that is going to put downward pressure on earnings growth,” said Roubini.
Roubini said the Federal Reserve may be pushed toward unconventional policy options as the stimulative effect of successive waves of quantitative easing – effectively printing money to buy government bonds – diminishes over time.”
Comments »Andreessen: US on Verge of Consumer-Electronics Renaissance
America is on the verge of a consumer electronics renaissance, thanks to the development of smartphones, asserts venture capitalist Marc Andreessen.
Even though smart phones are generally manufactured overseas, their software is created in the United States and those profits stay in America, Andreessen told Fortune magazine.
“I think the fact that software is becoming so important is leading to a hardware renaissance,” he said, according to Fortune.”
Comments »Schiff Does Schiff
“The U.S. economy is headed for a meltdown much more severe than the Great Recession of 2007-2009, says Peter Schiff, CEO of Euro Pacific Capital.
“We’ve got a much bigger collapse coming, and not just of the markets, but of the economy,” Schiff tells Yahoo. “It’s like what you’re seeing in Europe right now, only worse.”
Comments »Volcker: Bernanke Doesn’t Have ‘Magic Bullet’ to Fix Economy
“Former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker said the central bank doesn’t have a “magic bullet” to solve economic woes caused by too much borrowing.
“I don’t believe we’re headed back into a recession, but we’ve been for some years now stuck in a kind of slow-growth pattern,” Volcker said in a Bloomberg Television interview.
“We have inherited a very difficult situation, not unique to the United States.”
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