Quick Overview

• ADP said U.S. employers cut jobs by a record 742,000 in Feb.

• The Institute of Supply Management's index of manufacturing rose from 35.8 to 36.3 in March

• The National Association of Realtors said its index of pending U.S. home sales rose 2.1% in February
  

• Unemployment rate in the Euro area rose from 8.3% to 8.5% in February

• Australia Feb. Building Approvals rose 7.8% MoM
  
  

• Germany Feb. Retail Sales fell -0.2% MoM and -5.3% YoY
  

• Australia's retail sales fell 2% in February
  

• Japan's Tankan survey of business sentiment fell from -24 to a new record low of -58
  

• China Purchasing Managers Index fell to 44.8 in March from 45.1

• The global container shipping industry is showing signs of improving in the second quarter, United Arab Shipping Company told Emirates Business.

• The U.S. Department of Energy said:
  Supplies of crude oil rose 2.8 million barrels last week to 359.4 million barrels.
  Supplies of gasoline rose 2.2 million barrels
  Supplies of heating oil rose 300,000 barrels.
  Refinery use fell from 82.0% to 81.7%.
  Gasoline demand fell 0.2% YoY
  Distillate demand fell 9.1% YoY.
  

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Quick Overview

• YoY the S&P/Case-Shiller index of U.S. home prices in 20 cities fell 19% in January
  

• The Conference Board's index of consumer confidence rose from 25.3 to 26.0 in March
  

• The Institute of Supply Management's Chicago purchasing managers' index fell from 34.2 to 31.4 in March.
  
  

• Japans jobless rate rose to 4.4% last month from 4.1% in January. Some 77% of jobless people aren’t getting unemployment benefits, the highest figure among Group of Seven nations except Italy.
  

• Canada’s GDP fell 0.7% in January and down 2.4% YoY.
  

• Germany’s unemployment rate rose from 8.0% to 8.1% in March
  

• Consumer confidence in the U.K. improved from -35 to -30,
  
  

• The USDA said March 1st stocks of:
  Corn totaled 6.96 billion bushels, up 1% YoY.
  Soybeans totaled 1.30 billion bushels, down 9% YoY.
  Wheat totaled 1.04 billion bushels, up 46% YoY.
  

• The USDA said, in 2009, U.S. farmers intend to plant:
  84.99 million acres of corn, down 1% YoY.
  76.02 million acres of soybeans.
  58.64 million acres of wheat, down 7% YoY
  8.81 million acres of cotton, down 7% YoY.

Quick Overview

• Global stock markets dived today after the White House denied General Motors and Chrysler multi-billion dollar bailouts and threatened to push the carmakers into bankruptcy.
  
  

• MoM Japanese industrial output fell 9.4% in February
  

• (Bloomberg) -- Japanese companies cut inventories at an unprecedented pace in February and said they would increase production in coming months, indicating the worst of the country’s manufacturing slump may be over.
  

• Economic sentiment in the Euro area fell from 65.3 to 64.6 in March
  

• Australia's new home sales rose 3.9% in February

• Soros said on Saturday it was "conceivable" that Britain would have to resort to a bailout from the International Monetary Fund
  

• The USDA said there were 65.389 million head of hogs on March 1st, down 2.7% YoY.
  

• China's ambassador to the U.K. said Beijing isn't calling for a new global reserve currency to replace the dollar.
  

• The World Bank has given warning of serious social discontent in Russia after delivering a bleak assessment of the country's economy.
  
  
  

Only a united front at the London G20 can save the world from ruin
The risk is that this G20 becomes the defining moment when a disgusted American political class – sorely provoked – turns its back on the open trading system. The US alone has the strategic depth to clear its own path, and might find eager partners in a "pro-growth bloc" – much as Britain led a reflation bloc behind Imperial Preference in the early 1930s. As the world's top exporters, Germany and China should take great care to restrain their body language this week.

Quick Overview

• U.S. personal incomes fell 0.2% in February
  

• U.S. Consumer spending rose 0.2%.
  

• The University of Michigan's consumer sentiment index rose from 56.3 to 57.3 in March
  

• Industrial new orders in the Euro area fell 3.4% MoM and down 34% YoY
  

• U.K. GDP was down 1.6% in Q4
  

• YoY Japan retail sales fell 5.8% in February
  

Quick Overview

• U.S. GDP fell at a 6.3% annual rate in Q4.
  

• U.S. Jobless claims rose 8,000 last week to 652,000.
  

• Canada’s lumber production fell 23% YoY
  

• YoY U.K. retail sales rose 0.4% in February
  

• Mary Schapiro told the Senate Banking Committee she is drafting proposals to toughen oversight on everything from money-market funds to investment advisers.

• (Bloomberg) -- Chinese solar stocks rose the most ever in New York trading after China, the world’s biggest greenhouse-gas emitter, introduced a subsidy to promote the use of alternative energy.
  
  
  

Quick Overview

• U.S. Durables orders rose 3.4% in February, stronger than expected . Excluding transportation orders rose 3.9%
  

• The Mortgage Bankers Association said its index of mortgage applications rose 32% last week
  

• The U.K. must do whatever is necessary to resume growth, with deflation the main concern in the short term, Gordon Brown said.
  

• German business sentiment fell from 82.6 to 82.1 in March
  

• YoY Japan's exports fell 50% in February
  

• (WSJ) The 25 highest-earning hedge-fund managers received a combined $11.6 billion in pay in 2008.
  

• (WSJ) California's jobless rate will climb to a staggering 11.9 percent between April and June next year, and double-digit unemployment will linger in the most populous U.S. state at least through 2011, according to a new economic forecast.

Website of the Day

The Big Takeover
..There is a reason it used to be a crime in the Confederate states to teach a slave to read: Literacy is power. In the age of the CDS and CDO, most of us are financial illiterates..

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• The notional value of derivatives held by U.S. commercial banks decreased $6.3 trillion in the third quarter, or 3%, to $175.8 trillion.
  
  Notional Amount: The nominal or face amount that is used to calculate payments made on swaps and other risk management products. This amount generally does not change hands and is thus referred to as notional.

• Fourth quarter U.S. GROSS DOMESTIC PRODUCT = $14,2 trillion

Quick Overview

• The Richmond Federal Reserve's regional index of manufacturing rose from -51 to -20 in March -- better than expected.
  

• YoY U.K.'s consumer prices rose 3.2% in February.
  

• The world outgrew the gold standard decades ago. But a "paper gold" standard might be one way out of the global financial crisis. Zhou Xiaochuan governor of China's central bank said.

• (Bloomberg) -- The Shanghai Futures Exchange will begin trading steel contracts on March 27 after an eight-year preparation, helping steelmakers hedge against financial risks.

Quick Overview

• MoM U.S. existing home sales rose 5.1% at their fastest pace in nearly six years. The inventory of existing homes for sale rose 5.2 percent to 3.80 million. Unsold homes on the market represented 9.7 months’ worth at the current sales pace. YoY the median price fell 15.5% to $165,400.
  
  

• The Obama's administration has unveiled a plan designed to give the ailing economy a boost by luring private investors into taking over up to 1 trillion in "toxic" assets.
  

• Canada’s leading indicators fell 1.1% in February
  

• Construction output rose 1.3% in the Euro area but fell 9.1% YoY.
  

• Argentine farmers plan to halt sales of soybeans/corn for a week to protest against export taxes.

From now on, think of the US as a bigger Zimbabwe
For readers who may not know, Mr Gono is governor of the Central Bank of Zimbabwe. He'll be feeling particularly pious this weekend – as the mighty US has, indeed, just started printing money. We're supposed to call it "quantitative easing", I know. But if Mr Gono can tell it as it is, why can't we?

A gold bubble may well be coming our way
In the stagflationary conditions of 1980, the gold price peaked at $875, the equivalent of $2,300 today. However the rise to 1980’s inflation levels was gradual; monetary policy in the 1970s was only moderately over-expansive and the US fiscal deficit was modest by current standards.

Including the Fed’s March 18 announcement of further monetary stimulus, monetary and fiscal policies in the US and globally are far more inflationary than in the 1970s. Consequently, there’s a real threat that if inflation returns, it will do so violently.

Quick Overview

• Canada’s retail sales rose 1.9%
  

• Industrial production in the Euro area fell 3.5% in January
  

• Mexico’s cut the lending rate to 6.75%
  

• (Reuters) - U.S. congressional analysts are expected on Friday to forecast even more red ink than expected, a record $1.8 trillion deficit for fiscal 2009..

California February home sales up 42.5 percent February was the eighth straight month that California home sales rose from year-earlier levels and was the first time since May 2007 that the median home price did not decline from the prior month, according to MDA DataQuick

Financial Crisis Caused by a 'Culture of Complicity'
Beyond that, if the situation for the bank is truly hopeless or if the management is truly corrupt, then the incentive is to loot the institution, to take as much money out of it -- e.g. in the shape of bonuses and dividends -- before the true state of the books is discovered.

Naked Short Sales Hint Fraud in Bringing Down Lehman (Update1)
While the commission’s Enforcement Complaint Center received about 5,000 complaints about naked short-selling from January 2007 to June 2008, none led to enforcement actions, according to a report filed yesterday by David Kotz, the agency’s inspector general.

Quick Overview

• March 19 (Bloomberg) -- Citigroup Inc. plans to spend about $10 million on new offices for Chief Executive Officer Vikram Pandit and his lieutenants, after the U.S. government injected $45 billion of cash into the bank.

• U.S. jobless claims fell 12,000 last week to 646,000.
  

• The Philadelphia Federal Reserve's regional index of manufacturing rose from -41.3 to -35.0
  

• U.S. leading indicators fell 0.4% in February
  

• Canada’s consumer prices rose 1.4%.

• The White House is planning up to $5 billion in financing assistance to beleaguered auto-parts suppliers.
  
  

• (Reuters) - General Electric Co expects GE Capital to be profitable this year, though if the economy deteriorates to the Federal Reserve's adverse case, the finance unit could post break-even results, executives said.

Up in arms
..America accounted for 45% of the world's military spending—$1.2 trillion in 2007—more than the next 14 biggest countries combined.

.. 10-Year Treasury Yields Fall Most Since 1962
(Bloomberg) -- U.S. stocks and Treasuries surged and the dollar tumbled after the Federal Reserve unexpectedly announced plans to buy $1 trillion of bonds in an effort to lower consumer borrowing costs and end the recession.

Quick Overview

• (FOMC) ..Moreover, to help improve conditions in private credit markets, the Committee decided to purchase up to $300 billion of longer-term Treasury securities over the next six months.

• U.S. consumer price index rose 0.4% MoM and 0.2% YoY. Excluding food and energy, prices rose 0.2% in February and up 1.8% YoY.

• U.K. unemployment rate rose to 6.5% from from 6.3% a month ago
  

• Japan intends to buy $18 billion of government bonds this month to support the economy.
  

• Chile's central bank says the nation's economy grew by 3.2 % in 2008 down from 4.7 % growth in 2007.
  

• The U.S. Department of Energy said:
  Supplies of crude oil rose 2.0 million barrels to 353.3 million barrels
  Supplies of gasoline rose 3.2 million barrels
  Supplies of heating oil fell 1.0 million barrels.
  Refinery use fell from 82.7% to 82.1% of capacity
  Gasoline demand rose 1.1% YoY

Quick Overview

• U.S. housing starts rose 22% MoM better than expected, but fell 47% YoY.
  

• U.S. producer prices rose 0.1% MoM and fell 1.3% YoY. Excluding food and energy, prices rose 0.2% in February.
  

• Canada’s manufacturing sales fell 5.4% MoM.

Quick Overview

• Ben Bernanke predicts that America's worst recession in decades will likely end this year before a recovery gathers steam in 2010.
  

• U.S. industrial production fell 1.4% in February -- the lowest level in seven years.
  

• U.S. capacity utilization fell to 70.9%.
  

• The New York Fed’s regional index of manufacturing fell from -34.65 to -38.23.
  

• OPEC met and decided to keep the official production quota unchanged
  

• OPEC expects world oil demand to total 84.6 million barrels per day in 2009,
  

• In 2008 Canada’s industrial capacity utilization was at 77.8%.
  

• YoY consumer prices in the Euro area rose 1.2% in February.
  

• Obama said he has instructed Geithner to “pursue every single legal avenue” to block bonuses to the ailing AIG insurer’s executives.
  
  

• President Obama announced a permanent ban on the slaughter of cows too sick or weak to stand on their own for use in human food.
  

• China has entered a free trade agreement on service trade with Pakistan.

• Vikram Pandit was paid almost $11 million to lead Citigroup in a year that the troubled US bank required $45 billion in handouts from the taxpayer.
  

• Millionaires who agreed to hefty divorce settlements during the economic boom are seeking to renegotiate the terms of the agreements now that the recession has hit.

AIG names recipients of its bailout money
The list released Sunday of "counterparties" that benefited from the bailout is topped by European banks Societe Generale and Deutsche Bank, which received $4.1 billion and $2.6 billion, respectively.
Wall Street firms Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch round out the top four, receiving $2.5 billion and $1.8 billion, respectively.

Where Did the Money Go?
Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke has resisted calls from Congress that he release the names of the banks that were recipients of the bailout money the Fed gave to AIG to prevent it from collapsing. AIG insured its counterparties against losses from mortgage-backed derivatives. The Fed poured $85 billion into AIG, which paid out $37.3 billion of that money to counterparties that had purchased a certain type of derivative-based protection from AIG, called multi-sector credit default swaps.

The counterparties have never been disclosed but the Wall Street Journal reported that they included Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, UBS and Deutsche Bank.

G20: the summit risks becoming the Kyoto of the economic meltdown
What all these policies assume, however, is that a propensity to borrow and spend still exists in the private sector, among consumers and companies. Borrow and spend (and tax and spend) is the Government's reflex action to any question but life is more complicated in the real world

Quick Overview

• (Bloomberg) -- Goldman Sachs Group Inc. cut its forecast for the global economy for the second time in eight days after predicting a deeper recession in Europe. “Following the reduction of our Euroland growth forecast to minus 3.6 percent in 2009, the world economy is now likely to contract by 1 percent this year,” said London-based Goldman economist Binit Patel.
  
  

• The U.S. trade deficit fell in January to the lowest level in six years. Exports were down 6% while imports were down 7%. The result was $36.0 billion of net imports, less than expected.
  

• The University of Michigan's consumer sentiment index rose from 56.3 to 56.6
  
  

• Canada’s unemployment rate rose to 7.7%
  

• The European car market shrank 18% in February
  

Quick Overview

• U.S. retail sales fell 0.1% in February, not as bad as expected.
  

• U.S. new jobless claims rose 15,000 last week to 654,000.
  

• Japan's GDP fell 3.2% in the fourth quarter of 2008
  

• Australia's unemployment rate rose from 4.8% to 5.2%
  

• Switzerland reduced its interest rate from 0.50% to 0.25%

• China's Premier Wen Jiabao expressed concern over the outlook for the U.S. government debt China holds and said he hopes the U.S. will ensure the safety of those assets.
  
  
  

• S&P lowered GE’s debt ratings one level to AA and raised the outlook to stable.

• Fitch cut Buffett’s Berkshire AAA debt rating to AA+
  

• Liechtenstein said it will relax its tradition of bank secrecy and promised closer cooperation with international tax-evasion probes according to OECD standards.
  

• Madoff pleaded guilty -- the judge ordered jail pending sentencing and revoked bail.
  

• (Bloomberg) -- U.S. household wealth fell by a record $5.1 trillion from October to December, almost twice the decrease in the previous quarter, as home values and stock prices plunged, Federal Reserve figures showed.
  

• U.S. Drought Monitor continues to show dry to severe drought conditions in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas.

• The China National Grain and Oils Information Center expects the country's output of grains in 2009 to be lower for the first time in six years.
  It projects wheat output to be down 1.3% to 111 million metric tons
  It projects corn output to be down 1.5% to 163 million tons
  It projects soybean output down 3.2% to 15 million tons
  
  

Quick Overview

• (FT) Democrats in the US Congress are drawing up plans for a second stimulus bill amid fears the first 787bn package was not enough.
  

• Canada’s new home prices fell 0.8% YoY
  

• Consumer sentiment in Australia fell from 85.8 to 85.6 in March
  

• The USDA's 2008-2009 U.S. ending crop report estimate for:
  Corn was lowered from 1.79 to 1.74 billion bushels.
  Soybeans were lowered from 210 to 185 million bushels.
  Wheat was raised from 655 to 712 million bushels.
  Sugar was reduced from 1.066 to .981 million tons.
  Cotton was reduced from 7.7 to 7.3 million bales.
  

• The USDA's 2008-2009 world ending stocks estimate for:
  Corn was raised from 137 to 145 million tons.
  Soybeans unchanged at 50 million tons.
  Wheat was increased from 150 to 156 million tons.
  Cotton was increased from 62 to 63 million tons.
  

• The USDA predicts 2009 U.S. beef production down 0.7% YoY
  

• The USDA predicts 2009 pork production down 1.4% YoY.
  
  

• The USDA predicts 2008-2009 Florida orange crops at 158 million boxes, down from 170 YoY.
  
  

• The U.S. DOE said that:
  Supplies of crude oil rose 700,000 barrels last week to 351.3 million barrels
  Supplies of gasoline fell 3.0 million barrels
  Supplies of heating oil rose 1.3 million barrels.
  Refinery use fell from 83.1% to 82.7% of capacity
  Gasoline demand rose 1.6% YoY
  Distillate demand fell 6.1% YoY.
  

• The U.S. is protesting to Israel over restrictions on deliveries to the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip of harmless goods such as soap and toilet paper.
  
  

Quick Overview

• Citigroup said the company showed an $8.3 billion operating profit in the first two months of this year. Pandit said his bank is having the best quarter since 2007, when it last posted a profit.
  

• U.S. wholesale sales fell 2.9% in January
  U.S. wholesale inventories fell 0.7%.
  

• MoM U.K. industrial production fell 2.6% in January and 11.4% YoY.
  

• China's consumer prices fell 1.6% in February.

• YoY China’s exports fell 25.7%

• China's February auto sales rose 25% -- after tax cuts

• Brazil's economy shrank a larger-than-expected 3.6% QoQ
  

• The USDA said 63% of the winter wheat crop in Texas and 43% in Oklahoma are rated poor to very poor.
  

• The International Coffee Organization reduced its guess of 2008-2009 world coffee production from 133.4 to 127.8 million bags
  

• (Reuters) - Iran lacks weapons-grade highly enriched uranium and has not yet made a decision on whether to produce any, U.S. intelligence officials told Congress on Tuesday.

Time to examine emotions? Alarmed? Shocked? Desolate?

Quick Overview

• YoY Japan’s exports fell 46% in January
  

• Merck said it would acquire Schering-Plough Corp for $41.1 billion

Thanks to the Bank it's a crisis; in the eurozone it's a total catastrophe
As it is we have seen industrial production collapse in every region. The drops in January were: Japan (-31pc), Korea (-26pc), Russia (-16pc), Brazil (-15pc), Italy (-14pc), Germany (-12pc). Falls that took two years from late 1929 have been compressed into five months.

Quick Overview

• U.S. unemployment rate rose to 8.1% in February with a net loss of 651,000 jobs -- no worse than analysts had predicted.
  

• YoY U.K. Producer prices rose 3.1% in February.
  

• Residents of two northern Japanese villages have received the first $65 per person, from the government's controversial Y2 trillion cash handout scheme aimed at boosting consumer spending.

China's stimulus package looks like it's stimulating
Yet official data suggest the money being pumped through the economy is already putting some juice back into China's industrial sector. New orders to the industrial sector rose in January, driven by heavy industry. Growth in bank loans has also shot up. Both look like early signs that the stimulus is stimulating.

China can afford more later, if need be. The package so far will leave a fiscal deficit of under 3pc of GDP - high for China, but frugal by today's international standards. Total government debt as a percentage of GDP sits in the teens, a minimal level. And Beijing can always green-light projects while telling them to find finance on a commercial basis.

Quick Overview

• U.S. factory orders fell 1.9% in January, not as weak as expected

• U.S. jobless claims fell 31,000 last week to 639,000.
  

• U.S. productivity fell 0.4%.

• No stimulus package from China. Instead, it reaffirmed its belief that the current package will do the job.
  

• The Bank of England cut its interest rate from 1.00% to a record low 0.50%,
  

• The ECB cut rates from 2.00% to a record low 1.50%, as expected.
  

• GDP in the Euro area fell 1.5% in Q4, but rose 0.8% for all of 2008.

• Mortgage delinquencies rose to a 7.88% of all loans, the highest on record since 1972

• General Electric's GE Capital will be profitable for the first quarter and full year and won't need fresh capital except under an unlikely disaster scenario, the company's financial chief said.

• Shares of US Bancorp (USB) have bounced on reports that Rep. Barney Frank has said it and Northern Trust (NTRS) will give back their TARP funds.

Quick Overview

• The U.S. Institute of Supply Management index of services fell from 42.9 to 41.6

• (Reuters) - The Obama administration on Wednesday launched a $75 billion foreclosure relief plan, as new data showed one in five U.S. homeowners with mortgages owe more than their house is worth.
  

• Australia’s GDP fell 0.5%
  

• The U.S. DOE said:
  Supplies of crude oil fell 700,000 barrels 350.6 million
  Supplies of gasoline rose 200,000 barrels
  Supplies of heating oil rose 900,000 barrels.
  Refinery use rose from 81.4% to 83.1% of capacity.
  Gasoline demand rose 2.2% YoY
  Distillate demand fell 4.5% YoY.
  

• The Vietnam Coffee and Cocoa Association lowered its estimate of this year's coffee harvest from 17 to 16 million bags.
  

• The number of containerships sitting idle worldwide is said to have soared to an historic high of 453 ships, that is 1.35 million TEU or 10.7 per cent of the world's box tonnage, AXS-Alphaliner News reports.

• (Reuters) - Switzerland's largest bank held its ground on Wednesday in a dispute with the U.S. government, refusing to disclose the names of tens of thousands of rich American clients suspected by U.S. authorities of using secret Swiss bank accounts to dodge U.S. taxes.

• The collapse of the Historical Archive of Cologne on Tuesday buried more than a millenium's worth of documents under tons of rubble. Archivists and historians hope something can be salvaged, but the future of the city's past is grim.

EU pledges eurozone rescue Europe's financial authorities have revealed the existence of a contingency plan to rescue eurozone states at risk of default, giving the first clear assurance that the EU will mount a defence if monetary union comes under speculative attack.

China May Announce New Stimulus Measures Tomorrow (Update3)
March 4 (Bloomberg) -- Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao may announce new stimulus measures tomorrow, adding to a 4 trillion yuan ($585 billion) spending plan as the government tries to revive growth in the world’s third-biggest economy.

Quick Overview

• U.S. pending home sales fell 7.7% in January, weaker than expected.
  

• Australia kept rates unchanged at 3.25%
  

• Canada reduced its interest rate from 1.0% to .50%
  

• Fed Chairman Bernanke said policy makers may need to expand aid to the banking system beyond the $700 billion already approved.
  

• (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve lifted executive- compensation limits for sponsors of asset-backed securities accepted under a new $1 trillion loan program.
  

• The International Cocoa Organization expects world cocoa production down 5% in 2008-2009, and a supply deficit of 193,000 tons.

• Ford reports February sales fell 48.4%.

• Canada’s largest lumber producer, said it would expand shutdowns of sawmills

• (Bloomberg) -- Chinese state stockpiling of copper may mean the withdrawal of about a quarter of the metal held in warehouses

• CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico (Reuters) - Hundreds of heavily armed soldiers fanned out across Mexico's bloodiest drug war city on Tuesday, trying to prevent a collapse in law and order just south of the U.S. border.

• EU officials voted to impose a duty on biodiesel imports from the U.S. to counteract a U.S. tax credit.

• California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has called on world leaders to stop "whining and complaining" about the economic slowdown.
  
  

Quick Overview

• U.S. Personal incomes rose 0.4% in January
  

• U.S. consumer spending rose 0.6% -- snapping six months of declines.

• U.S. Construction fell 3.3% MoM -- the 13th consecutive month of declines.
  

• The U.S. Institute of Supply Management's index of manufacturing rose from 35.6 to 35.8
  

• Canada’s GDP fell 0.8% in Q4
  

• U.K.’s manufacturing index fell from 35.8 to 34.7 in February, the 10th consecutive month of declines.
  

• YoY Japan’s auto sales fell 32% in February.
  

• AIG, the walking dead insurance giant is back in the government trough for another $30 billion.

Buffett Says Economy ‘In Shambles,’ Promises Better Days Ahead
“The economy will be in shambles throughout 2009 -- and, for that matter, probably well beyond,” said Buffett. “Though the path has not been smooth, our economic system has worked extraordinarily well over time. It has unleashed human potential as no other system has, and it will continue to do so.”

New 'Iron Curtain' will split EU's rich and poor
The spectacular collapse of some of the post-communist tiger economies led to demands at an EU summit in Brussels for a rescue fund of €190 billion (£170 billion) to stop social collapse in the Eastern nations spilling over into the rest of Europe.

We need shock and awe policies to halt depression Factory output is collapsing at the fastest pace everywhere. The figures for the most recent month available are, year-on-year: Taiwan (-43pc), Ukraine (-34pc), Japan (-30pc), Singapore (-29pc), Hungary (-23pc), Sweden (-20pc), Korea (-19pc), Turkey (-18pc), Russia (-16pc), Spain (-15pc), Poland (-15pc), Brazil (-15pc), Italy (-14pc), Germany (-12pc), France (-11pc), US (-10pc) and Britain (-9pc). Norway sails blissfully on (+4pc). What do they drink up there?

Quick Overview

• U.S. GDP contracted at a 6.2% annual rate in Q4
  
  

• The University of Michigan's consumer sentiment index fell from 61.2 to 56.3 in January
  

• Chicago's purchasing managers' index rose from 33.3 to 34.2 in February
  

• Unemployment in the Euro area rose from 8.1% to 8.2% in January.
  

• Consumer prices in the Euro area rose 1.1% YoY
  

• Japan's factory output fell 10.0% in January
  Japan’s household spending fell 5.9% YoY
  

• India’s GDP grew 5.3% YoY
  

• The U.S. government will boost its equity stake in Citigroup to 36%.
  

• Sweden’s GDP contracted 10% on an annualized basis.

• General Electric Co. will cut its quarterly dividend to 10 cents a share from 31 cents, according to CNBC.

Exclusive: Derivatives for Dummies by The Other Katherine Harris
Imagine being able to insure a car that you don’t own or use. Imagine it’s the car your neighbors will let their teenage son drive, when he gets his license in a few weeks — and you know the kid is a reckless brat.
Now imagine that, by using financial derivatives called swaps, you can purchase as many insurance policies on this car as you can afford to pay premiums on.

BERNIE & THE DOMINOS
3 MORE 'SCAMS' EXPOSED
"There are potentially hundreds of millions of other dollars, and we have no idea where that money is," Klein said, adding that there could be more than 350 victims.

Las Vegas Running Out of Water Means Dimming Los Angeles Lights
In Asia, developing giants are battling pollution as their populations grow. China, home to 21 percent of the world’s people last year, has just 7 percent of the water. Nine in 10 Chinese-city groundwater systems are fouled by industrial toxins, pesticides and human waste..

..In India, with 1.2 billion people, three-quarters of the surface water is contaminated, that country’s government said in September.

The Iran-Israel nuclear endgame is now much closer
In recent days, four key developments have clicked in to edge Iran and Israel much closer to a military denouement ..