STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Thursday, 24 January 2013

[Tansy_Gold]

[font size=3]STOCK MARKET WATCH, Thursday, 24 January 2013[font color=black][/font]

SMW for 23 January 2013

AT THE CLOSING BELL ON 23 January 2013
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Dow Jones 13,779.33 +67.12 (0.49%)
S&P 500 1,494.81 +2.25 (0.15%)
Nasdaq 3,153.67 +10.49 (0.33%)


[font color=red]10 Year 1.82% +0.01 (0.55%)
30 Year 3.02% +0.01 (0.33%) [font color=black]


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[font size=2]Market Conditions During Trading Hours[/font]
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[font size=2]Euro, Yen, Loonie, Silver and Gold[center]

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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Market Data and News:[/font][/font]
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Economic Calendar
Marketwatch Data
Bloomberg Economic News
Yahoo Finance
Google Finance
Bank Tracker
Credit Union Tracker
Daily Job Cuts
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Economic Blogs:[/font][/font]
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The Big Picture
Financial Sense
Calculated Risk
Naked Capitalism
Credit Writedowns
Brad DeLong
Bonddad
Atrios
goldmansachs666
The Stand-Up Economist
The Automatic Earth
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Essential Reading:[/font][/font]
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Matt Taibi: Secret and Lies of the Bailout


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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Government Issues:[/font][/font]
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LegitGov
Open Government
Earmark Database
USA spending.gov
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Videos:[/font][/font]
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Charlie Rose talks with Roubini
Charlie Rose talks with Krugman
William Black: This Economic Disaster
Bill Moyers with Kevin Drum and David Corn
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[font color=red]Partial List of Financial Sector Officials Convicted since 1/20/09 [/font][font color=red]
2/2/12 David Higgs and Salmaan Siddiqui, Credit Suisse, plead guilty to conspiracy involving valuation of MBS
3/6/12 Allen Stanford, former Caribbean billionaire and general schmuck, convicted on 13 of 14 counts in $2.2B Ponzi scheme, faces 20+ years in prison
6/4/12 Matthew Kluger, lawyer, sentenced to 12 years in prison, along with co-conspirator stock trader Garrett Bauer (9 years) and co-conspirator Kenneth Robinson (not yet sentenced) for 17 year insider trading scheme.
6/14/12 Allen Stanford sentenced to 110 years without parole.
6/15/12 Rajat Gupta, former Goldman Sachs director, found guilty of insider trading. Could face a decade in prison when sentenced later this year.
6/22/12 Timothy S. Durham, 49, former CEO of Fair Financial Company, convicted of one count conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, 10 counts of wire fraud, and one count of securities fraud.
6/22/12 James F. Cochran, 56, former chairman of the board of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and six counts of wire fraud.
6/22/12 Rick D. Snow, 48, former CFO of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and three counts of wire fraud.
7/13/12 Russell Wassendorf Sr., CEO of collapsed brokerage firm Peregrine Financial Group Inc. arrested and charged with lying to regulators after admitting to authorities he embezzled "millions of dollars" and forged bank statements for "nearly twenty years."
8/22/12 Doug Whitman, Whitman Capital LLC hedge fund founder, convicted of insider trading following a trial in which he spent more than two days on the stand telling jurors he was innocent
10/26/12 UPDATE: Former Goldman Sachs director Rajat Gupta sentenced to two years in federal prison. He will, of course, appeal. . .
11/20/12 Hedge fund manager Matthew Martoma charged with insider trading at SAC Capital Advisors, and prosecutors are looking at Martoma's boss, Steven Cohen, for possible involvement.



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[font size=3][font color=red]This thread contains opinions and observations. Individuals may post their experiences, inferences and opinions on this thread. However, it should not be construed as advice. It is unethical (and probably illegal) for financial recommendations to be given here.[/font][/font][/font color=red][font color=black]

[jtuck004]

1. Financial Crisis Suit Suggests Bad Behavior at Morgan Stanley

On March 16, 2007, Morgan Stanley employees working on one of the toxic assets that helped blow up the world economy discussed what to name it. Among the team members’ suggestions: “Subprime Meltdown,” “Hitman,” “Nuclear Holocaust” and “Mike Tyson’s Punchout,” as well a simple yet direct reference to a bag of excrement.

Ha ha. Those hilarious investment bankers

...

The results are explosive. Hundreds of pages of internal Morgan Stanley documents, released publicly last week, shed much new light on what bankers knew at the height of the housing bubble and what they did with that secret knowledge.
...
“While investors and taxpayers all over the world continue to choke on Wall Street’s toxic subprime products, to this day not a single major Wall Street executive has been held accountable for misconduct relating to those products,” said Jason C. Davis, a lawyer at Robbins Geller who is representing the plaintiff in the lawsuit. “They are generally untouchable, but we are pleased that the court in this case is ordering Morgan Stanley to turn over damning evidence, so that the jury will get to see what Morgan Stanley really knew about the troubled nature of its supposedly ‘higher-than-AAA’ quality product.”

Here.

Yet one more in a list of docs that say the banks knew exactly what they were doing as they stole from the people.

[Demeter]

2. Of course they did

Don't take it too hard that the government cannot or will not see fit to prosecute...it's fighting City Hall.

[Fuddnik]

4. What were they supposed to prosecute?

According to some deranged folks out in Jonestown, There were no crimes committed. I guess that's easy to say when they never looked for any.

[tclambert]

44. First you buy some legislators who make your crimes technically legal.

Next buy some regulators who let you regulate yourself. Then report back, "While I was regulating myself, I didn't see myself committing any crimes at all. Maybe you should prosecute my victims, der, I mean customers."

[just1voice]

3. No one is held accountable in a system where the elites are above the law

That's why torture camp creators, WMD conspirators, CIA outing traitors and wiretapping felons walk freely among us. But hey, you can trust government economic numbers, they'd never lie, LOL!

[Fuddnik]

5. Don't forget about prosecutions of whistleblowers.

You know the ones who told us about the crimes that were never committed.

[kickysnana]

6. They are too busy terrorizing 5 year olds and other school children

WTF: Cops Nab 5-Year-Old for Wearing Wrong Color Shoes to School

(Mississippi)

http://news.yahoo.com/wtf-cops-nab-five-old-wearing-wrong-color-203600800.html

Keeping with the theme of magic marker crime:

OKC Teen Arrested For Using Permanent Marker In Class
http://www.news9.com/Global/story.asp?S=13728873

(Oklahoma)

[jtuck004]

43. From the link: "He faces charges of possession of a permanent marker on private property. "

(...and they all moved away from me on the bench...) <-a line from Alice's Restaurant

According to an Oklahoma City ordinance, possession of an aerosol spray paint container or a broad-tipped indelible marker on private property is prohibited without consent of the property owner.

I wonder if that kid depends on food stamps and free lunches to eat. They like them weak because they are easier to manipulate after a few months. But you do have to use the small handcuffs for their tiny little wrists.

I wonder if they changed into brown shirts before they dragged him out?

[Demeter]

7. 8F and the Big Chill Continues

Last time the Alberta Clipper came through, it lasted 3 weeks.

I don't know if I could stand that again.

[DemReadingDU]

8. Movie: The Big Chill

The Big Chill
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085244/



just 8 degrees here, feels like -3

BRRRRRRRRR


4 layers again today, double socks too

[Demeter]

35. If I wore 4 layers, I wouldn't be able to move!!

As it is, I'm waddling around in three.

[westerebus]

10. 23F and a light dusting.

We will be around 35F for the high today, maybe some snow on Friday. Winter in Virginia has moved up a month or so. Used to be Thanksgiving week it felt like winter that rolled forward to Christmas week, now it's late January. All in the course of twenty years. I blame Al Gore. If he hadn't invented the internet, this would never have happened.

[DemReadingDU]

9. Money printing 'amounts to theft from our children'

1/23/13 Money printing 'amounts to theft from our children'

Money printing is theft from our children and may merely be storing up problems for an even bigger crisis, top economists and investors have warned.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Davide Serra, founder of leading hedge fund Algebris, and Nouriel Roubini, the head of Roubini Economics known as Dr Doom for predicting the financial crisis, set out the case against those who think quantitative easing (QE) and low rates are benign policy tools.

“When governments borrow, they are taking money from our children. QE is the same – we are lowering returns for future generations. QE creates an inter-generational dilemma,” Mr Serra said.

Mr Roubini warned that central bankers need to think about turning off the cheap money tap or risk creating another, possibly even worse, bubble.

He argued that policymakers have encouraged markets and individuals to take on crippling levels of debt by leaving asset bubbles unchecked in a boom and coming to borrowers’ rescue in a crisis.

"Ten years ago we had the Greenspan put, now we have the Bernanke put. What are the long term economic consequences?" he asked.

more...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/davos/9822372/Money-printing-amounts-to-theft-from-our-children.html

[DemReadingDU]

11. The central bankers who saved the world economy are now being told they risk hurting it.

1/23/13 The central bankers who saved the world economy are now being told they risk hurting it.

Even as the International Monetary Fund cuts its global growth outlook, a flood of stimulus is running into criticism at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos. Among the concerns: so-called quantitative easing is fanning complacency among governments and households, fueling the risk of a race to devalue currencies and leading to asset bubbles.

“Central banks can buy time, but they cannot fix issues long-term,” former Bundesbank President Axel Weber, now chairman of UBS AG, said in the Swiss ski resort yesterday. “There’s a perception that they are the only game in town.”

The warnings, louder this year than last, come as U.S. stocks hit the highest since late 2007, London house prices jump and junk bond yields fell below 6 percent for the first time. The challenge for policy makers in Davos and beyond is to decide whether it’s time to act on those moves now or to keep pushing measures to shore up a still-ailing global economy.

“When you buy time it’s what you do with it that matters,” said Davide Serra, a managing partner at London-based Algebris Investments LLP, who says central banks need to work harder to push governments into cutting bloated budgets.

more...
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-01-23/weber-in-davos-joins-dimon-to-spotlight-easy-money-danger.html

[AnneD]

29. Axel Weber......

was the gentleman I was listening to yesterday. He was really talking sense and was talking about too many taking the short term approach.

Dimon of course was opposing banking transparency when he spoke. He was whining like a child at the grownup's table. It was an embarrassment. He was out gunned and out classed.

[Demeter]

36. Saved the World Economy?

Not in my books. Are the rabid banks unwound and the banksters jailed? Are speculation and control fraud eliminated from the markets...ALL markets? Hell, not even a one.

They saved their asses and their jobs and their bonuses. They didn't save one person outside that.

[Egalitarian Thug]

46. +1 Well put.

Saved their own fortunes and the system of corruption that made them.

[DemReadingDU]

12. Nokia to Omit Dividend for First Time in 143 Years

1/24/13 Nokia to Omit Dividend for First Time in 143 Years

Nokia Oyj (NOK1V) will omit a dividend for the first time in at least 143 years as the struggling Finnish mobile-phone maker retains cash for its comeback attempt.

The company announced the decision as it reported its first net income in seven quarters and an increase in net cash. Even the World Wars and the breakup of the Soviet Union, a major buyer of Nokia’s networking gear, didn’t stop the company returning cash to investors.

Nokia is trying to claw back business after sales plunged and combined losses had reached almost 5 billion euros ($6.7 billion) since early 2011. Chief Executive Officer Stephen Elop has cut more than 20,000 jobs and is conserving cash to challenge Apple Inc. (AAPL) and Google Inc. (GOOG) with devices running Microsoft Corp. software.

The dividend omission “is a very important step because it shows management is conscious of the work that is ahead,” said Eric Beaudet, an analyst at Natixis Securities in Paris. “It’s clearly a strong signal to the market that says ’Don’t worry about our balance sheet, we’ll do what it takes.’”

more...
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-01-24/nokia-to-omit-dividend-for-first-time-in-143-years.html

[bread_and_roses]

13. Hey, Obama - how 'bout we get rid of that "bleakest poverty?"

I have been depressed since that much-gushed-over inaugural ... not that I watched it, I didn't. But one couldn't avoid the snippets on the NPR news shows, and I couldn't resist scanning a lot of the analysis.

And that line (oh, that oh-so-heart-wrenching-line!)

"when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the same chance to succeed as anybody else, because she is an American, she is free, and she is equal, not just in the eyes of God but also in our own."

Oh, the sweet little girl! God! Freedom! Equality!

Too bad that while taking kid-killer Johnson as his model abroad, Obama didn't at least take channel his War on Poverty as well. But nooooooo.... we must "work harder!" As if US worker's productivity had not already out-stripped their wages by some appalling factor I can't remember at the moment ...

I just read Josh Eidelson's take on the speech - linked, I think, from Commondreams? Anyway, a site I've never seen before but looks worth exploring

http://jacobinmag.com/2013/01/obama-to-america-work-harder/

Obama’s speech was a far cry from the message of the modern Republican Party. But much of it would fit snugly in a handbook from Human Resources: Discrimination will not be tolerated. Active citizenship is everyone’s responsibility. Work harder.

That's our President. Trite (and hypocritical) sentiment clothed in anodyne rhetoric.

[DemReadingDU]

14. KBR Secret Indemnity Agreement Signed By Army Chief Tainted In Enron Scandal

1/24/13 KBR Secret Indemnity Agreement Signed By Army Chief Tainted In Enron Scandal

WASHINGTON -- The Army official who signed a secret agreement that military contractor KBR claims should burden taxpayers with the bill for the company's negligent poisoning of U.S. soldiers in Iraq resigned from the military in 2003 after a tenure marked by questions about his ties to Enron Corp.

Thomas E. White, named secretary of the Army in 2001, signed an indemnity agreement protecting KBR, the military's largest contractor, from legal liability on March 19, 2003. KBR had asked for the agreement as part of its contract to rebuild Iraq oilfields destroyed in the U.S. invasion. White resigned a month later, on April 23, under fire for his previous role as a senior Enron executive and after clashing with former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld over his advocacy for a multi-billion dollar artillery system.

KBR's indemnity agreement, obtained by The Huffington Post through a Freedom of Information Act request, was classified as secret until Dec. 21, 2012, the month after a federal jury in Oregon decided the company should pay $85 million for negligence that allowed a dozen soldiers to be exposed to a cancer-causing chemical sodium dichromate at the Qarmat Ali water treatment plant in Iraq.

The agreement, never made public until now, is crucial because KBR claims it means taxpayers have to pay both the verdict and the company's $15 million in legal expenses. The company faces a separate lawsuit filed by national guardsmen from both Indiana and West Virginia, as well as troops from the U.K. The military has said it believes the agreement doesn't shield KBR from paying for the lawsuits.

more...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/24/kbr-indemnity-agreement_n_2536876.html

[Demeter]

37. Cronyism, the System that Keeps on Giving

[DemReadingDU]

15. Book readers - The Problem With HFT via Themis Trading

1/24/13 The Problem With HFT

By now you have read Broken Markets (except for one of you, located on the West Coast – you know who you are!). By now you have read Scott Patterson’s Dark Pools. Perhaps you have also read Jim McTague’s Crapshoot Investing, and have even ventured into the most excellent book by Senator Ted Kaufman’s former aide Jeff Connaughton – The Payoff – Why Wall Street Always Wins. If you have, you have ventured into the land of stock market plumbing, in exchanges and in dark pools. If you have, you kind-of understand what we have been saying for years about uneven playing fields, unfair advantages, strange and curious order types, and the for-profit exchange model.

If you have read the above works you have the foundation to take it to the next step. You have the foundation to engage in the surprisingly easy-to-understand “deep dive” into how modern high frequency trading works. It is time to indulge in the quick-reading The Problem Of HFT, by Haim Bodek. Bodek clearly and concisely takes you into a world where some stock exchanges have created little-known order types and advantages for only certain types of market players:

“Modern HFT wasn’t a paradigm shift because its innovations brought new efficiencies to the marketplace. HFT was a paradigm shift because its innovations proved that anti-competitive barriers to entry could be erected in the market structure itself to preference one class of market participants above all others.”

Bodek is no defender of old-school markets, mind you. His book instead explains why a type of scalping activity, which should have arbitraged itself away quickly long ago, had not done so. Instead, he explains why this scalping activity has flourished and been amplified since REG NMS.

“The problem with HFT is that these strategies shouldn’t work at their current scale and volume, and have only come to dominate the market through the carefully crafted advantages provided by the electronic exchanges for these specific HFT strategies – advantages such as special order types and preferred order engine matching practices.”

This book needs to be on your reading list. While some market structure specialists will continue to defend our market structure, and continue to proclaim that our problems are media-created, you as traders know better. You know what you see on the battlefield day in and day out. And after reading the above books, and finishing with Bodek’s book, you will undoubtedly resent their proclamations – that is if you do not already. After reading the above books, you will know that they should know better as well.

http://blog.themistrading.com/the-problem-with-hft/

[xchrom]

16. practicing for the weekend party at Fuddniks

[bread_and_roses]

26. LOL, good one!

I'd like to go to that party

[xchrom]

27. right?

[AnneD]

30. I'll be...

undressed in my finest. Would a tiara be too much?

[xchrom]

32. i think a Tiara for the Traditional Running Naked with Torches

would be a Sublime touch.

[AnneD]

39. You can get hurt...

carrying a pitchfork, and tar can spill (ouch) so a tiara is my best bet.

[xchrom]

40. !

[Demeter]

38. What IS That?

And I'm not asking in order to use it for a Weekend Theme...

But, the Weekend approacheth, and I am at a loss. "I Hate January" doesn't lend itself to the occasion.

[xchrom]

41. Some new age pagan party in Scotland. Nt

[bread_and_roses]

17. "The Extremist Cult of Capitalism"

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/01/21

1. Extremes of Income

By sitting on their growing investments, the richest five Americans made almost $7 billion each in one year. That's $3,500,000.00 per hour. The minimum wage for tipped workers is $2.13 per hour.

... 5. Extremes of Justice

William James Rummel stole $80 with a credit card, then passed a bad check for $24, then refused to return $120 for a repair job gone bad. He got life in prison. Christopher Williams is facing over 80 years in prison for selling medical marijuana in Montana, a state which allows medical marijuana. Patricia Spottedcrow got 12 years for a $31 marijuana sale, and has seen her children only twice in the past two years. Numerous elderly Americans are in prison for life for non-violent marijuana offenses.

Banking giant HSBC, whose mission statement urges employees "to act with courageous integrity" in all they do, was described by a U.S. Senate report as having "exposed the U.S. financial system to 'a wide array of money laundering, drug trafficking, and terrorist financing'" in their dealings with Mexico's Sinaloa cartel, which is considered the deadliest drug gang in the world.

HSBC received a fine equivalent to four weeks' profits. The bank's CEO said, "we are profoundly sorry."

More at link ... nothing we all don't know, still enraging read in any summary ....

When I think of the hundreds of thousands sitting in some stinking jail ...

[AnneD]

31. Federal Prison....

the Average Americans New Retirement Plan. Three hots and a cot.

[xchrom]

18. Goldman Sachs and Shell win Public Eye ‘shame’ awards at Davos

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/01/24/goldman-sachs-shell-win-public-eye-shame-awards-at-davos/




Campaigners at Davos on Thursday awarded their annual Public Eye shame awards to Goldman Sachs and Shell “for particularly glaring cases of companies’ greed for profit and environmental sins”.

At an “award ceremony” on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, the Swiss chapter of Greenpeace and the Berne Declaration said Goldman Sachs had won the jury prize, while Shell had been chosen by online voters for the public award.

Goldman Sachs “is a key player in financially driven globalisation, which pays for profits of a few with exploding inequality and the impoverishment of broad strata,” the groups said in a statement.

They highlighted the investment bank’s role in the Greek debt crisis.

[Ghost Dog]

19. Companies are rethinking their offshoring strategies; now "reshoring" or "onshoring".

Here, there and everywhere: After decades of sending work across the world, companies are rethinking their offshoring strategies, says Tamzin Booth
Jan 19th 2013 | From the print edition: Special report http://www.economist.com/printedition/2013-01-19
http://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21569572-after-decades-sending-work-across-world-companies-are-rethinking-their-offshoring

... The original idea behind offshoring was that Western firms with high labour costs could make huge savings by sending work to countries where wages were much lower (see article). Offshoring means moving work and jobs outside the country where a company is based. It can also involve outsourcing, which means sending work to outside contractors. These can be either in the home country or abroad, but in offshoring they are based overseas. For several decades that strategy worked, often brilliantly. But now companies are rethinking their global footprints.

The first and most important reason is that the global labour “arbitrage” that sent companies rushing overseas is running out. Wages in China and India have been going up by 10-20% a year for the past decade, whereas manufacturing pay in America and Europe has barely budged... Second, many American firms now realise that they went too far in sending work abroad and need to bring some of it home again, a process inelegantly termed “reshoring”... Choosing the right location for producing a good or a service is an inexact science, and many companies got it wrong. Michael Porter, Harvard Business School’s guru on competitive strategy, says that just as companies pursued many unpromising mergers and acquisitions until painful experience brought greater discipline to the field, a lot of chief executives offshored too quickly and too much. In Europe there was never as much enthusiasm for offshoring as in America in the first place, and the small number of companies that did it are in no rush to return...

... Third, firms are rapidly moving away from the model of manufacturing everything in one low-cost place to supply the rest of the world. China is no longer seen as a cheap manufacturing base but as a huge new market. Increasingly, the main reason for multinationals to move production is to be close to customers in big new markets. This is not offshoring in the sense the word has been used for the past three decades; instead, it is being “onshore” in new places... Companies now want to be in, or close to, each of their biggest markets, making customised products and responding quickly to changing local demand...

...Under this logic, America and Europe, with their big domestic markets, should be able to attract plenty of new investment as companies look for a bigger local presence in places around the world. It is not just Western firms bringing some of their production home; there is also a wave of emerging-market champions such as Lenovo, or the Tata Group, which is making Range Rover cars near Liverpool, that are coming to invest in brands, capacity and workers in the West... As in manufacturing, the labour-cost arbitrage in services is rapidly eroding, leaving firms with all the drawbacks of distance and ever fewer cost savings to make up for them. There has been widespread disappointment with outsourcing information technology and the routine back-office tasks that used to be done in-house. Some activities that used to be considered peripheral to a company’s profits, such as data management, are now seen as essential, so they are less likely to be entrusted to a third-party supplier thousands of miles away...

... That offers a huge opportunity for rich countries and their workers to win back some of the industries and activities they have lost over the past few decades. Paradoxically, the narrowing wage gap increases the pressure on politicians. With labour-cost differentials narrowing rapidly, it is no longer possible to point at rock-bottom wages in emerging markets as the reason why the rich world is losing out. Developed countries will have to compete hard on factors beyond labour costs. The most important of these are world-class skills and training, along with flexibility and motivation of workers, extensive clusters of suppliers and sensible regulation...

/... http://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21569572-after-decades-sending-work-across-world-companies-are-rethinking-their-offshoring

[xchrom]

20. Unemployment hits yet new record high at the end of 2012{spain}

http://elpais.com/elpais/2013/01/24/inenglish/1359031668_393742.html

Unemployment in Spain reached record highs in the last quarter of 2012 as the recession deepened due to the government’s austerity drive to trim the public deficit.

According to the Active Population Survey (EPA) for the fourth quarter, released Thursday by the National Statistics Institute (INE), the number of people out of work fell just short of six million at 5.965 million as the jobless rate rose from 25.02 percent to 26.02 percent, both records for the current historical series, which dates back to 1976.

The number of unemployed in the quarter increased by 187,300 from the previous three months, and by 691,700 for the full year. The economy shed 363,300 jobs in the three months and 850,000 for the 12 months, the second-worst year in the crisis since the height of the previous recession in 2009, when 1.2 million jobs were lost. The size of Spain’s active population shrank to 16.957 million, the lowest level since 2003, representing about one-third of the population.

The Bank of Spain on Wednesday estimated that the pace of the downturn in activity accelerated to 0.6 percent on a quarterly basis from 0.4 percent in the previous three months as GDP shrank 1.3 percent for the year.

[xchrom]

21. This year will be even worse for the Spanish economy, IMF says

http://elpais.com/elpais/2013/01/23/inenglish/1358958190_726061.html


The IMF on Wednesday said it had revised its economic growth forecast for Spain slightly downward for this year, predicting that the recession in 2013 would be wider than in 2012, with Spain missing out on what is expected to be a gradual global upturn.

In an update of its World Economic Outlook, the Washington-based agency said it now expects GDP to shrink 1.5 percent this year, against a forecast contraction last fall of 1.4 percent. The government expects output to shrink by only 0.5 percent, a figure at odds with most experts. The IMF estimated activity shrank 1.4 percent last year, which compares with a figure released Wednesday by the Bank of Spain of 1.3 percent.

By contrast, the International Monetary Fund expects the global economy to grow 3.5 percent this year, while activity in the euro area is forecast to contract by 0.2 percent.

Spain is expected to see a timid recovery in 2014 when the IMF estimates output will rise 0.8 percent, well behind growth of 4.1 percent forecast for the global economy and 1.0 percent for the euro area.

[antigop]

22. Greetings, marketeers!

Remember how I kept posting about securities lending some time ago?

Well, finally, the practice is getting some exposure.

Wall Street Journal:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324442304578235892062924114.html

BlackRock's willingness to manage money for such a minuscule fee shows how profitable index funds can be to run. One reason: Managers earn extra fees by lending some portfolio holdings to hedge funds and other firms that borrow stocks and bonds to execute trading strategies.

Mr. Long says all the TSP funds do securities lending and that the fees are "beneficial" to the funds' returns.

In the exchange-traded funds it runs, BlackRock generally pays 65% of securities-lending fees back to the funds and keeps the rest for itself. Its ETF investors put up with this, but maybe they shouldn't. Rival Vanguard Group pays 100%, while State Street, STT +0.14% another ETF giant, pays 85%. Securities-lending revenue at BlackRock totaled $397 million from all clients in 2011, or 4% of its total revenue.
.....
Even if you can't get the TSP funds, you can copy them. Read the footnotes of the fund's annual report to see much securities-lending revenue, which rightfully belongs to the fund, is going to the fund's manager instead;..

And the Motley Fool:
http://www.fool.com/investing/mutual-funds/2013/01/15/is-securities-lending-stealing-your-money.aspx

Great title:
Is Securities Lending Stealing Your Money?

Fund investors, though, are at the mercy of their fund management. Often, managers retain the right to keep a portion of securities lending proceeds, essentially pocketing cash that investors are entitled to. For instance, a recent Wall Street Journal article cited figures stating that BlackRock keeps 35% of securities lending revenue for itself, while State Street hangs on to a more modest 15% and Vanguard pays everything back to its ETFs. With securities lending providing 4% of BlackRock's total revenue in 2011, those proceeds are serious business -- and fund shareholders can't afford to let that money move into managers' pockets unnoticed.

Take care, everyone!

[xchrom]

23. Nouriel Roubini And Ian Bremmer Talk About A Bunch Of Stuff That They're Worried About

http://www.businessinsider.com/roubini-says-eurozone-less-worse-2013-1



Here's the full transcript courtesy of Bloomberg TV:

On the definition of a G-0 world:

Roubini: It was never G-7. We pretend it's G-10. It was always G-1. The leader, Germany, was to provide the global public goods, security, free trade. Now this power is declining in terms of relative terms of the United States. We have rising powers like China, Brazil, India and so on. We live in a balance of power. The balance of power with conflicts of interest with goals being very different, you cannot reach agreement on fundamental economic and geopolitical issues. It is a more fragile economy because interdependence implies that problems are global, but policies are national. Coordinating among different countries will be increasingly difficult. It leads to political, economic and financial tensions like currency wars that can lead eventually into protectionism.

Roubini: I say they are less worse than last summer in euro zone. Tail risk has been reduced…The fundamental problem is, look at look at the unemployment numbers in Spain today, rising even further. They are really shocking numbers. The fundamental problems in the euro zone is the lack of grown, continued recession, of debt sustainability, lack of competitiveness, remain.
On the political risk in the United States:

Bremmer: The political risk in The U.S. is that unlike the fiscal cliff that we weren't going to go over by virtue of removing the debt limit and kicking that down the road, you have actually made it more likely you have a real smaller crisis on sequester.


Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/roubini-says-eurozone-less-worse-2013-1#ixzz2Iu8GgVJb

[Egalitarian Thug]

47. The "Masters of the Universe" are on the verge of realizing their dream of global

domination. The problem is that there are too many of them and they have no idea of what to do with it once they've got it.

The bastardized version of capitalism that they all worship lacks the vision to deal with a one-world humanity, and the very limited mechanism and goals it is comprised of cannot cope with the diversity of those they wish to rule. All they/it can do is capture all the money.

If only they were half as smart as they believe they are.

[xchrom]

24. Apple Has Piled Up ~$100 Billion In Cash In Four Years

http://www.businessinsider.com/apples-has-piled-up-100-billion-in-cash-in-four-years-2013-1

Asymco's Horace Dediu made this chart following Apple's Q4 earnings report yesterday:

[xchrom]

25. Undercover Mole Has Implicated Another Former SAC Capital Trader In An Insider Trading Scheme

http://www.businessinsider.com/sacs-patel-implicated-in-insider-trading-2013-1



Dipak Patel, a former SAC Capital portfolio manager, has been fingered by a mole, says the WSJ.

The undercover informant has told federal investigators that she passed confidential information to the trader for years.

Patel, who was a technology stock manager for Steve Cohen's hedge fund, has yet to be charged with any wrongdoing. He left SAC Capital in 2010.

Investigators have been concentrating their efforts on SAC Capital in a big way for years. The heat has been especially intense since last November, when federal prosecutors wrote that SAC CEO Steve Cohen interacted with alleged insider trader, Mathew Martoma in a complaint. Six former SAC employees have been convicted of or pleaded guilty to insider trading since 2009


Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/sacs-patel-implicated-in-insider-trading-2013-1#ixzz2IuBt7adq

[xchrom]

28. CHART OF THE DAY: $2.1 Trillion Powder Keg Near The Heart Of The Chinese Banking System

http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-chinese-wealth-management-product-2013-1

In December, Fitch warned that Wealth Management Products (WMPs) were creating growing risks in the Chinese banking sector.

Chinese investors took to the streets to protest that month when the WMPs they bought from Huaxia Bank didn't pay out the 11 percent returns that were promised.

WMPs issued by banks have grown extremely popular in China over the last few years. There were reportedly over 13 trillion yuan (or around $2.1 trillion) of WMPs outstanding at the end of 2012, a 50 percent year-over-year increase, according to Fitch.

First let's understand what a WMP is. This chart from GMO analysts Edward Chancellor and Mike Monnelly shows the make-up of a wealth management product pool and how it operates. WMPs essentially are securities that yield on average 2 percentage points higher than bank deposits, though banks are free to set interest rates.

[xchrom]

33. This week women are 66% harder to find at Davos than anywhere else

http://qz.com/46894/this-week-women-are-66-harder-to-find-at-davos-than-anywhere-else/

?w=1024&h=750

The World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos has brought together more than 2,600 invitees from around the world to discuss business, politics, economics, justice, and policy. Yahoo CEO Marissa Meyer and PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi are in attendence. They are joined by fewer than 500 other women.

A spokesman for the forum confirmed that only 17% of the participants this year are women. Quartz corroborated this number using a preliminary participant list. (Our earlier analysis of the list, including a searchable version, is here.)

The male bias exists about as much in the delegations of industrialized countries as of developing ones. Only 21% of participants domiciled in the United States are women. Women traveling from India represent 17% of that nation’s attendees, according to our analysis.

Comparing the conference’s gender bias to that of the world population–49.7% women–means that one is 66% less likely to encounter a female participant at Davos than almost anywhere else in the world.

[xchrom]

34. China Manufacturing Expands at Fastest Pace in Two Years

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-01-24/hsbc-china-jan-flash-pmi-at-51-9-vs-est-51-7.html

China’s manufacturing is expanding at the fastest rate in two years, according to a private survey of companies, bolstering prospects that economic growth will accelerate for a second straight quarter.

The preliminary reading of a Purchasing Managers’ Index (SHCOMP) was 51.9 in January, according to a statement from HSBC Holdings Plc and Markit Economics today. That compares with the 51.5 final reading for December and the 51.7 median estimate of 17 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg News.

The data suggest that China’s expansion at the start of 2013 will equal or exceed its 7.9 percent clip in the fourth quarter. Sliding Japanese exports and below-forecast growth in South Korea reported today underscore Asian economies’ dependence on China as austerity measures in Europe limit demand.

“Despite the still-tepid external demand, the domestic- driven restocking process is likely to add steam to China’s ongoing recovery in the coming months,” Qu Hongbin, HSBC’s chief China economist in Hong Kong, said in a statement.

[Demeter]

42. Wonderful new job opportunities for women today

blowing your fellow human to bits, or being blown to bits yourself.

I guess they're running out of stupid or desperate men.

And think of the benefits....all that rape that the brass can't account for.

The 1% world must be going completely crazy. Their little dreams of Empire crumbling to bits.

[AnneD]

45. Actually,

it is an acknowledgement by the military that there has not been a line was since WWI. When I was in the military, I saw many jobs declared 'combat' and automatically closed to women even though the odds that you would be in combat are remote. I was slated to go into a chemical warfare unit but it was made 'combat' in the 80's and off limits to me. I was relegated to accounting. They closed down many jobs in the 70's and 80's as more women started to enlist. Unless you were planning to make a career of the military, it was impossible to move up the ranks unless you have combat experience.

My argument was that a Nurse sees plenty of service, gets shot at just like the guys and yet you are supposed to be behind combat lines. Now women are everywhere and there is no line. They should get the credit for their careers. Maybe women may not be Rangers or Seals, but I the military is foolish if they refuse to consider it. I say this because my Dad had his wing mechanic's job because he was small enough to fit into tight quarters that most guys couldn't.

Women have been serving with distinction and honor in Iraq and Afghanistan. And yet, that doesn't count as combat for them. If that is the career they love, go for it. I face plenty of discrimination as a woman. I will never forget the young pup that kept bucking me (I had rank and was over him, and it galled him.) I will never forget then time we were talking about women in combat. He asked me what I would do if I were in a foxhole and my partner's head was blown off. I paused for a second and said, "I'd take his ammo clip-he wouldn't need it. God rest his soul." I don't think that was the answer he expected.

My military service ended with the birth of my daughter. I figured it was more important to raise a decent human being and I had done my part for God and country. But again, that was my choice. You should be free to make the choice that is right for you.

FYI did you know that on a percentage basis, Native American women participate in a larger numbers than other minorities in the military. I met quite a few sisters during my service.

PS...I would never serve today, they have gutted our once proud military.

[westerebus]

48. So how is this helpful?

The powers that be just increased the eligibility pool to 80% of the population between the ages of 18 and 35 for combat operations. This is not a good thing.

[AnneD]

49. But women ARE currently serving in combat operations....

this is basically an acknowledgement of that fact. Of all of the highly ranking officers in the services, over 80% have a combat patch. Your chance of being a woman and making it through that brass ceiling is slightly better than 0%. A lawsuit by two senior most women had been presented on behalf of all women officers (as more junior officers were afraid of blow back).


Most of the complaining has been done by non military folk and some military men. I have yet to hear complaints from women in the military. If they can do the job, they should get the credit. Getting a fair shake is all the women in the military are asking.

[westerebus]

50. I did some years in the army reserves, no local Marine unit.

Long story short, they could not figure out why I didn't have a (CIB) Combat Infantry Badge. Any Marine or sailor who saw combat from 1961 onward was awarded a (CAR) Combat Action Ribbon. What you did did not matter, that you engaged the enemy in combat was and is the only requirement. Male or female does not matter. Behind the lines, between the lines, across the lines, in the air, at sea, on the river or in the swamp and up the mountain doesn't matter.

You see all Marines are Riflemen.

I do have concerns with women in front line combat units. Marine combat units are not coed. That change is going to be rough on a lot of people.

My complaint is that opening up a draft to include women is next on the agenda. The mission of the US Military is not going to change for the better any time soon. Having a larger resource pool to draw from, only makes the logistics slightly more complicated for the planners.

My advice to those thinking about joining the military is to go into the Navy or Air Force and get a skill set you can use later in life. While you are in to take advantage of online college courses and see parts of the world on uncle sam's dollar. Most of all try not to put yourself in a position that can get you killed.

If they have the overwhelming desire to go into combat, they will get that opportunity in either the Army or Marines. The better the unit the better your chances of getting home alive. Consider you may be missing parts and will carry wounds no one will ever see let alone understand. In which case, the advice is stay low, shoot fast and haul ass because being a grunt has absolutely nothing to do with equal opportunity.

They can change the way promotion and opportunity are dispersed any fucking time they want to. They just don't want to.

I apologize for the vulgarity.