Next Update April 13

Most everything should be up to date by late Friday

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• U.S. business inventories rose 0.4 % in January 
• U.S. federal government runs 193.5 bln USD deficit in February 
• U.S. initial jobless claims drop to three-month low

• Eurozone to saty becalmed: The current rates of inflation, unemployment and the rate of growth in the Eurozone look set to prevail for the next couple of years –economists. 

• Growth in China's retail sales slowed to 11.8% YoY in the first two months of the year 

• USDA estimates world soybean stocks at 70.64 mmt vs trade expectations of 71.46 and 73.01mmt previous month. 
• USDA puts soybean stocks at 145 mln bu vs trade expecting of 141 and 150 previous month.
•  USDA estimates World corn stocks at 158.47 mmt vs trade expectations of 156.27 and 157.3 mmt last month. 
• USDA has corn ending stocks at 1.456 billion bus vs trade expecting 1.488 bln; 1.481 last month 

• (Telegraph) Japan's first new geothermal power plant in 15 years to open next month: A new chapter in Japan's energy industry begins when a new geothermal power plant taps into the nation's famed seismic activity - opening the floodgates for dozens of similar projects across the country. 

• General Motors said that it had received reports of a safety defect in its cars as early as 2001 — three years earlier than previously disclosed. 

• Qualcomm announced a $5 billion increase to its share repurchase plan and a 20% dividend boost. 

• (Reuters) - The richest Americans are increasing their ranks and putting the recession of 2008 and 2009 behind them, according to an annual study by the Chicago-based Spectrem Group. Total millionaire households in the United States jumped to more than 9.6 million according to Spectrem, an increase of more than 600,000 over the previous year. That is the highest level since the research group started measuring in 2004.Those who have more than $5 million grew to 1.24 million. The 2014 Affluent Market Insights Report aggregates monthly surveys by Spectrem that reach more than 12,000 investors in total. The richest of these rich, or ultra-rich, who have more than $25 million in investable assets (not including a primary residence), increased by 57 percent through the end of 2013, and now number 132,000, up from 84,000 in 2008. 
• (Bloomberg) More than three-quarters of Americans say the bull market has had little or no effect on their financial well-being, according to a Bloomberg National Poll. Seventy-seven percent of respondents dismissed the S&P 500’s gains since the financial crisis, according to the poll, taken March 7-10. Barely one in five -- 21 percent -- said the market’s gains have made them “feel more financially” secure. 

• Buffett’s Berkshire urged shareholders to vote “against” a proposal that it set goals for its energy businesses to reduce greenhouse gas and other emissions. Similar proposals failed in 2011 and 2013.

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• (Bloomberg) The London gold fix, the benchmark used by miners, jewelers and central banks to value the metal, may have been manipulated for a decade by the banks setting it, researchers say. 

• YoY Australia’s Gold production rose 18 metric tons to 273 tons in 2013, the highest annual output since 2003, Melbourne-based Surbiton said. 

• Lower Sugar output in Brazil and India, the second-biggest producer, may spur the first global deficit in five years, F.O. Licht said. 
• Macquarie estimates Sugar production costs in Asia Pacific, Australia and South Africa at 16 cents a pound or more; in Thailand and Central America at at least 18 cents a pound; in Brazil at 17-19 cents a pound; and in the European Union and India at 20-22 cents a pound.

• Eurozone inflation stable at 0.8% in February 

• Eurozone unemployment rate at 12 % in Jan. 
• Eurozone economy grew 0.3 % in Q4

• India's economic growth slows to 4.7% in Q4 
• India’s inflation in Jan. fell to 5% 
• The Indian state of Rajasthan has barred foreign direct investment in supermarkets 
• India plans to withdraw from talks with Vodafone Group Plc to resolve a nearly $2 billion tax dispute. 
• Finnish handset major Nokia warned that its Chennai (India) factory may shut down unless a Rs 21,153 core tax issue is resolved.

• Italy's unemployment rate rose to 12.9% 
• Italy's economy grew by 0.1% in Q4 

• The preliminary reading of the U.S. consumer sentiment index in February held steady at 81.2 
• U.S. industrial production fell 0.3% in January the first decline since July 2013 due to severe weather. 
• Chicago PMI unexpectedly accelerates in February to 59.8 

• Japan's unemployment rate stands at 3.7% in January 
•  Japan's consumer prices rose 1.3 % in January   

• British construction output rose 1.3% in 2013 

• January inflation rose by 0.2 % in Spain 

• Australia's unemployment rate rose to 6.0 % in Jan.

• China's inflation rose 2.5 % in January 
•  China's January PPI fell 1.6% 

• Global soybean ending stocks rose to 73.01 mmt, up from 72.33 mmt in January and above trade expectations of 72.67 mmt 
• Global corn stocks fell to 157.30 mmt, down from 160.23 last month and trade expectations of 159.60 mmt 

• Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc added to his stake in financial giant Goldman Sachs.

•  Kimberly-Clark Corporation (KMB) raised its Quarterly dividend 3.7% to $.84 per share, up from $.81 per share in 2013. This is the 42nd consecutive year Kimberly-Clark has raised its dividend and the 80th straight year the company has paid dividends.

We’re on strike until March 2nd

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• (MarketWatch) U.S. stocks end the week and the month with deep losses following a selloff on Friday, which was prompted by disappointing earnings, renewed fears over deflation in the euro zone and a continuing rout in emerging markets.
• Richard Russell, of Dow Theory Letters fame, notes that every down January since 1950 has been followed by a bear market. (Hulbert's view).

• Cocoa futures rose to a more than 28-month high  on concerns that supplies for the key chocolate ingredient will not keep up with demand this year. Cocoa-bean stockpiles monitored by ICE Futures U.S. dropped 2.9% last week, adding to supply concerns. The current estimates have production 105,000 metric tons smaller than demand in the year started Oct. 1, followed by a shortage of 74,000 tons the next season.

• The U.S. government and leading Internet companies  announced a compromise that will allow those companies to reveal how often they are ordered to turn over customer information in national security investigations.
• U.S. pending home sales fell in December to the lowest level in more than two years, a fresh sign that the housing recovery lost momentum. The NAR said its index of pending home sales, which measures the number of contracts that have been signed but not yet closed for purchasing previously owned homes, fell 8.7% to 92.4 in December, the lowest level since October 2011.
• Representing oil addicts, a U.S. State department study says that the Keystone XL pipeline would have little impact on tar-sands use. A different opinion thinks that the pipeline would probably increasing supply, decrease prices and therefore drive up global oil consumption.
• Ban Ki- moon on Friday announced the appointment of the former New York City mayor Bloomberg as his special envoy for cities and climate change.
• Honda Motor Co expects to sell a record 1.6 million cars in the United States, its biggest market, this calendar year, up 5 percent from 1.525 million sold in 2013.

• Britain’s Office for National Statistics (ONS) is expected on Tuesday to reveal the economy grew by 0.7% in the final three months of 2013 following growth of 0.8% in the third quarter. This would equate to an overall expansion of 1.9% for 2013, much stronger than the 0.3pc expansion in 2012. However, output would remain 1.3pc below its pre-recession peak.

• With the end of QE in the West and changes in Chinese fiscal policies "forcing up the cost of capital across emerging markets asset class" the tide is going out on emerging markets - so warns Fidelity.
• China's PMI for the manufacturing sector dropped to five-month low to 50.5 % in January
• BEIJING (AP) Authorities in eastern China have banned live poultry sales after an increase in the number of people infected with the H7N9 strain of bird flu, state media reported.

• India's central bank raised the repo rate by a quarter point to 8%, citing inflationary threats..

• (MarketWatch) -- Dallas Federal Reserve Bank President Richard Fisher defended the U.S. central bank for charges from overseas that it was recklessly ignoring the impact of tapering on other countries. The Fed's moves have been one factor in a spike of turbulence in emerging markets. "Some believe we are the central bank of the world and should conduct policy accordingly. We are the central bank of America," Fisher said in a speech in Forth Worth, Texas, according to Dow Jones. Fisher added that other nations have their own central banks with their own responsibilities.
• He wants the U.S. central bank to end its economic-stimulus program as soon as possible, but he says the Fed can't go from "Wild Turkey to cold turkey overnight..

• Argentina's government limited monthly dollar purchases by Argentines to $2,000 (Ms Kirchner went missing). .

Neglected Topic’ Winner: Climate Change HERE’S a scary fact about America: We’re much more likely to believe that there are signs that aliens have visited Earth (77 percent) than that humans are causing climate change (44 percent). ..
In 1997, there was no significant gap between Republicans and Democrats in thinking about climate change. These days, 66 percent of Democrats say human activity is the main cause of global warming; 24 percent of Republicans say so.

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• U.S. Consumer sentiment declined in January, falling to a reading of 80.4 from 82.5 in December.
• December U.S. industrial production rose 0.3%
• Construction on new U.S. homes fell 9.8% in December, pulling back after a surge in November

• Jerry Brown  will use a morning news conference in San Francisco on Friday to declare a drought emergency amid one of the driest winters on record

• Intel said the chip giant had "a solid fourth quarter with signs of stabilization in the PC segment," shares were down more than 3% after-hours.
• (MarketWatch) - Intel Corp. was upgraded to overweight from neutral by J.P. Morgan analyst Christopher Danely who said he was "making a leap of faith" on PCs in 2014 and the chip giant's new Chief Executive Brian Krzanich.

• The caffeine equivalent to that in two cups of coffee can boost performance on a memory test.

• The World Bank raised its global growth forecasts as the easing of austerity policies in advanced economies supports their recovery, boosting prospects for developing markets' exports.

• Brussels is demanding that even foreigners who have never worked in Germany should have access to the country's unemployment benefits if they hail from an EU member state. The EU is firing Germany's already overheated immigration debate.

• Confidence in Australia's property and construction industry has surged to a new record high

• (Reuters) - U.S. municipal bond funds reported $103.3 million of net inflows in the week ended January 15, compared with $19 million in outflows in the previous week

• How Bill Gates is helping KFC take over Africa

• YoY China’s M2 Money supply rose 13.6%
• Property prices in China ended 2013 still red hot despite repeated government efforts to cool the sector, but the rises are expected to soften this year as more targeted curbs come into place
• Twenty years ago, China exported six cars. Last year it exported a million.

• Paramount will stop releasing major motion pictures on 35-millimeter film, becoming the first big Hollywood studio to go digital-only.

• Over 250 dolphins are being held captive in a cove on the coast of Japan, waiting for either a life in captivity, or slaughter

• (Reuters) - President Barack Obama banned U.S. eavesdropping on the leaders of close friends and allies on Friday and began reining in the vast collection of Americans' phone data in a series of limited reforms triggered by Edward Snowden's revelations.

• Standard & Poor's raised the outlook on California's ratings to positive from stable and affirmed the state's 'A' long-term rating.

• KINGSTON, Jamaica (AP) A mosquito-borne virus appears to be spreading quickly in the Caribbean during the winter tourism season just weeks after epidemiologists first found local transmission occurring in the French dependency of St. Martin. Scientists said that St. Martin now has as many as 200 cases of chikungunya, a virus found mainly in Africa and Asia that can cause a debilitating but rarely fatal sickness with fever, rash, fatigue and intense muscle and joint pain.

• (Spiegel)It has now been 100 years since the outbreak of World War I, but the European catastrophe remains relevant today. As the Continent looks back this year, old wounds could once again be rubbed raw.

• Italian joblessness has hit a fresh high of 12.7% in November, up from October’s 12.5% and the highest on record. Youth unemployment, at 41.6%, is also at an all-time high.

• A new memo has emerged that provides clear evidence that in 1976 Kissinger gave Argentina's neo-fascist military junta the "green light" for the dirty war it was conducting against civilian and militant leftists that resulted in the disappearance—that is, deaths—of an estimated 30,000 people.

QUICK OVERVIEW

• The S&P 500 ended the year at an all-time high (but not quite inflation adjusted) – its largest percentage gain since 1997. DJ Industrials are at an all-time high - also inflation adjusted.

• NSA's Secret Toolbox: Unit Offers Spy Gadgets for Every Need. The NSA has a secret unit that produces special equipment ranging from spyware for computers and cell phones to listening posts and USB sticks that work as bugging devices. Here are some excerpts from the intelligence agency's own catalog.

• In an unprecedented ruling, a judge reviewing whether Xcel Energy should invest in new natural gas generators vs. large solar power arrays concluded Tuesday that solar is a better deal.

• From an Associated Press-GfK stock market poll. Of the people polled, 40% think the market will stabilize where it is now by the end of 2014, with 39% predicting that it will drop, but not crash. Only 14 % believe the market will rise and 5 percent think it will crash.

• Pending sales of homes ticked up in November, the first gain in six months, signaling that upcoming activity may rise, the National Association of Realtors reported Monday. The index of pending home sales increased 0.2% last month to 101.7, slightly above a 10-month low of 101.5 in October, but down from 103.3 in November 2012.

• Temperatures in parts of Australia are set to reach almost 50C /122F in the coming days, with total fire bans in place in northern regions of South Australia and a week-long heat wave enveloping Queensland.
• (Reuters) - Many parts of the U.S. Midwest braced for a blast of Arctic air this weekend that could bring some of the coldest temperatures in two decades..

Just 90 companies caused two-thirds of man-made global warming emissions "There are thousands of oil, gas and coal producers in the world," climate researcher and author Richard Heede at the Climate Accountability Institute in Colorado said. "But the decision makers, the CEOs, or the ministers of coal and oil if you narrow it down to just one person, they could all fit on a Greyhound bus or two."

Happy Holidays

             (Updates Resume January 5)

QUICK OVERVIEW

• (Reuters) - Investors in U.S.-based funds pulled $6.5 billion out of stock mutual funds in the week ended Wednesday, marking the biggest weekly outflows this year, on worries the U.S. Federal Reserve could scale back its bond purchases as soon as next week..

• Fu Shou Yuan, a chain of Chinese high-end graveyards, prices its $215m IPO at the top of its range, with the retail investor portion 670 times oversubscribed..
• China's extreme smog is forcing pilots to train for blind landings.

• The European Parliament has approved a series of crucial rules and steps towards the eventual completion of a “Banking” Union designed to close down failed banks in order to prevent banking crises. Under the terms, the cost of closing down a euro zone bank will initially be borne almost fully by its home country, but the obligations of euro zone partners will gradually rise to be shared equitably after 10 years.

• The U.S. household unemployment rate fell to a five-year low of 7 percent and nonfarm payrolls rose by 203,000 in November in a strong jobs report
• The U.S. economy grew at a 3.6% annual rate in the third quarter, faster than first reported and its strongest performance in 1 1/2 years.

• ALEC calls for penalties on 'freerider' homeowners in assault on clean energy In a sign of the influence the network holds with Republicans, it will be addressed by rising stars of the party including US senator Ted Cruz of Texas, who led the push for the recent government shutdown, and the party's budget guru, Paul Ryan of Wisconsin.

• Canada’s household debt rose to 163.7 % of disposable income in Q3, compared with 163.1 percent in the previous quarter. Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz said that household debt represents the biggest threat to the Canadian economy, suggesting that he'd be cutting interest rates if he weren't worried of fueling more borrowing in a time of near record-high levels of household debt and an overheated housing market.

• The ICCO raised the cocoa production deficit to 160,000 from 52,000 tons. "World production of cocoa beans is now expected to be significantly lower than previously envisaged," the ICCO said, cutting its forecast for world output by 55,000 tons to 3.99m tons. Consumption was raised by 54,000 tonnes to 4.05m tonnes.

• Disney (DIS) raised the dividend by 15% to $0.86 Per Share

• Czarnikow said demand for sugar will gain 2.5 % this year, the biggest rate of growth since 2008, when global consumption rose 3.5%.

• In 2002, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service estimated that communication towers kill 4 million to 5 million birds per year, cars kill roughly 60 million, and cats kill hundreds of millions.

• The Chinese government said that it landed an unmanned space probe on the moon, joining the U.S. and Russia as the only nations to accomplish the feat.

• J.P Morgan lowered its forecasts on gold prices by 10% to $1,263 an ounce for 2014 and by 12% to $1,275 for 2015.

Next Update Dec. 15

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• The pending U.S. home sales index fell 0.6% to 102.1 and dropped to its lowest level since last December, the National Association of Realtors said.
• Because of the 16-day republican/tea instigated government shutdown, sales of U.S. Existing Homes dropped 3.2% to a 5.12 million annual rate, the fewest since June.

• Eurozone jobless rate stands at 12.1% in Oct.

• Israeli stock prices rose to another record high last Sunday, ignoring local politicians' comments that a deal to curb Iran's nuclear program was a mistake.

• European Central Bank member Joerg Asmussen said the ECB, which cut interest rates to a record low earlier, was ready to take further action if necessary and instruments at its disposal included negative deposit rates.

• Ukraine bowing to pressure from Russia is the first major defeat for the EU in its eastward march since the fall of Communism.

• Swiss vote down plan to cap salaries of top executives.

• China and Japan appeared to be a step closer to a military confrontation that could drag in the United States, after Beijing extended its air-defense zone over a group of islands that is also claimed by Tokyo..

• Japan's central bank kept its ultra-loose monetary policy in place and says the economy is on track for a "moderate recovery”.
• YoY Japan's consumer prices increased by 0.9% in October, marking the fastest growth in five years and signaling possible exit from deflation.

• U.S. regulators are considering whether to give banks more time to comply with the Volcker rule, which bans them from gambling with their own money, Fed Vice-Chair Janet Yellen said.

• The equation is simple: (more U.S. imports) = (fewer U.S. jobs) A report by the Economic Policy Institute estimates that America's trade deficit with China between 2001 and 2011 eliminated a net 2.7 million U.S. jobs.

• India's July-Sept. GDP grew 4.8 %

• Bloomberg forecasts China to pass India in Gold purchases and projects a 29% growth in Chinas gold purchase for 2013.

• GE turns to 3D Printers for plain parts

Next Update Dec. 1

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• The European Commission has exercised historic new EU powers allowing it to revise national budgets for the first time.

• (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives passed a controversial bill on Tuesday that would delay two government regulators from adopting rules requiring stock brokers and retirement account financial advisers to put their customers' interests ahead of their own.

• (USA Today) Most Americans say past global warming has been caused largely by human activities — ranging from a low of 65% in Utah to a high of 92% in Rhode Island. Most also back government curbs on greenhouse gas emissions from power plants — from 62% in Utah to 90% in New Hampshire.

• (Reuters) - Carbon dioxide injected into oil and gas wells may have caused a series of minor earthquakes in Texas long before the adoption of current hydraulic fracking.

• Deforestation in the Amazon increased by nearly a third over the past year, according to Brazilian government figures released on Thursday.

• The Environmental Protection Agency proposed to reduce the amount of ethanol in the nation's fuel supply for the first time. December corn fell 4.5 cents, or 1.1 percent, to $4.22 a bushel.

• Australia’s central bank left its benchmark interest rate unchanged at a record low and said a lower currency will be needed to achieve balanced growth.

• Crime rates will soar, economies will stagnate and Europe's social fabric will deteriorate if policymakers do not act to address youth unemployment, World Economic Forum report warns.

• General Electric Co (GE) will spin off its credit card business next year into a separately traded company as it tries to reduce its exposure to unpredictable financial businesses and return to its manufacturing roots.

• In Q3 Windows Phone accounted for nearly 10 % of all Smartphone sales in the EU 5 (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom), research firm Kantar Worldpanel ComTech said. That's a double YoY - largely due to sales of Nokia's Lumia handsets.

• The board of directors of Kimberly-Clark (KMB) has proposed a spin-off of its healthcare business in order to focus on its consumer and professional brands.

Next Update Nov. 17

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• Southern Europe is on a precipice Ambrose Evans-Pritchard 

• The Chicago purchasing managers index rose to 65.9% in October, the best performance since March 2011.

• At $680 billion, the U.S. federal government's latest annual deficit is the smallest since 2008.

• Globalstar (GSAT) NPRM To Enable Terrestrial Broadband Network in Licensed MSS Spectrum

• U.S. home prices posted their strongest gain in August for more than seven years, according to S&P/ Case-Shiller Home Price Indices the 10-City and 20-City Composites posted a 12.8% growth rate YoY, the highest increases since February 2006.

• Starbuck’s raised its quarterly dividend 24% to 26 cents a share.

• Eurozone's CPI is at a 4-year low in September

• Spain Retail Sales (YoY) improves to 2.2% in September from -4.5% in August

• Iran's inflation hits 36.2%

• YoY Indonesia's inflation eases to 8.32% in Oct

• World Bank: ‏Over the next 20 yrs, South Asia countries will add 1 million new people to the global labor force every month.

• YoY Asia's cocoa grindings rose 12% to 161,097 tonnes in Q3, while North American cocoa grindings rose 8.25% to their highest since at least 2009.

Next Update Nov. 3

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• (NYT) China has become shrill in its criticism of the fiscal train wreck in the United States, arguing that the answer to a potential government default is to begin creating a “de-Americanized world.”..
• Fitch placed the triple A credit rating of the US on negative watch.
• One-month Treasury bills maturing on October 31 shot up 21 basis points to a new debt ceiling peak of 53 bps

• Brazil raised rates for fifth straight time since April bringing it close to double digits.

• The International Cocoa Organization is lifting its forecast for a Cocoa  deficit to 86,000 tons. It warned, "We are going to be in a deficit for the next four years, but closer to 50,000 to 60,000 tons".

• Accepting USDA's soybean numbers puts stocks to use at 4.5%; one of the tightest on record, with a very tight 2013-14 balance sheet

• Microsoft received 37,196 requests for user data from law enforcement agencies during the first six months of 2013.

• (Esquire} The War on Drugs Is Over. Drugs Won "The war on drugs could not have been a bigger failure. To sum up their most important findings, the average purity of heroin and cocaine has increased, respectively, 60% and 11% between 1990 and 2007. Cannabis purity is up a whopping 161% over that same time"

Next Update October 15/16

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• Obama urged Republican/Tea to stop political brinkmanship on gov't funding and debt limit in order to avert self-inflicted wounds to economy.

• The Dow and S&P 500 set record highs on Fed's "no taper" decision.

• MoM existing U.S. Home Sales Beat Expectations rising 1.7% September

• US Philly Fed business index 22.3vs 10.0 exp

• (Reuters) - China could import 20-30 million tonnes of corn a year to cover growing supply shortages, a researcher with a government think tank said on Thursday, as much as four times current levels.

• (Bloomberg) Global cocoa demand will outstrip supply by 209,000 metric tons in the season ending Sept. 30, estimates KnowledgeCharts, a unit of Commodities Risk Analysis in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. That is bigger than the 52,000-ton deficit forecast by the International Cocoa Organization in London. The shortage next season will amount to 188,000 tons.

• 27% of Americans say now is a good time to find a quality job, up from 21 % in August. The figure is the highest since January 2008. At the same time, lower-income Americans' optimism has faded; with 19% saying now is a good time to find a quality job.

• Argentina’s economy grew 8.3% in Q2.

• The US National Security Agency (NSA) has posted an ad for a "Civil Liberties & Privacy Officer".

• The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed limits on carbon pollution from new fossil fuel (coal) power plants. The move, if successful, would be the first major step by the U.S. to limit greenhouse gas emissions from this sector.

• The Czech Republic became the latest EU member to denounce subsidies for clean but costly renewable energy and pledged to double down on its use of fossil fuels.

• Results from a referendum in the southern Swiss canton of Ticino showed that 65% of the electorate backed a proposal to forbid the covering of faces in public areas by any group.

• The Sunday Assembly—the London-based “Atheist Church” grew at 3,000% since January, a rate that might make this non-religious Assembly the fastest growing church in the world”.

Next Update  Sep. 15   Sep. 22

Jerry Brown's Tough-Love California Miracle "He preceded Al Gore," says Tom Hayden, the counterculture icon whom Brown appointed as the first chairman of his solar-energy council. "He's out there with solar beanies and rooftop collectors, and it's 1974 and people think he's a lunatic."

   “But I’ m not habituated – I disrupt my own thought pattern every day. I have learned to disbelieve almost everything I think!”

QUICK OVERVIEW

• MoM U.S. consumer sentiment declined to 82.1 from July’s 85.1.
• Chicago PMI rose to 53.0 from 52.3 in July.
• Consumer spending barely rose in July, the first month of the third quarter, indicating little change in the U.S. economy's mild pace of growth.

• China returning to full speed? China official manufacturing PMI rises to 51 in August a 16 month high.

• The United States' High Plains Aquifer — a vast underground reservoir that stretches through eight states, from South Dakota to Texas, and supplies 30 percent of the nation's irrigated groundwater — could be used up within 50 years, unless current water use is reduced, a new study finds.

• NSA Says It Can’t Search Its Own Emails The NSA is a "supercomputing powerhouse" with machines so powerful their speed is measured in thousands of trillions of operations per second… But ask the NSA, to do a seemingly simple search of its own employees' email? The agency says it doesn’t have the technology…
• However, a document seen by SPIEGEL reveals that the NSA  spied successfully on the French Foreign Ministry and news broadcaster Al Jazeera - the technology worked fine.

• The Most Efficient Health Care Systems in The World: among the 48 countries included in the Bloomberg study, the U.S. ranks 46th, outpacing just Serbia and Brazil - worse than China, Algeria, and Iran.

• Radiation levels around Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant are 18 times higher than previously thought, Japanese authorities have warned.

• (MarketWatch) -- August was the worst outflow month in more than three years for U.S. exchange-traded products, according to preliminary data from No. 1 ETFs provider BlackRock Inc. U.S. ETFs saw $16.1 billion in redemptions through Thursday, representing the biggest outflow in one month since $17.1 billion exited in January 2010. The largest ETF was the main driver, as the SPDR S&P 500 endured $13 billion in August outflows, BlackRock said.

• (Guardian) General patterns suggest that internet users in the UK deliberately access online pornography more frequently than they access all social networking sites put together..

• (Reuters) - British manufacturers are planning the fastest increase in capital investment in the year ahead since before the financial crisis, a survey showed, suggesting the economy could be heading for a more balanced recovery.

QUICK OVERVIEW

• Purchases of new U.S. homes fell 13.4 % in July, the most in more than three year.

• Consumer confidence in both the euro area and the European Union (EU) rose in August, from minus 17.4 in July to minus 15.6.

• German economy expanded by 0.7% in Q2 of 2013 compared with the previous.

• QoQ Britain's GDP rose by 0.7 % Eurozone PMI rises to 51.7 in August

• Soybeans are focused on current weather forecasts (dry) and the perceptions that US production potential is sliding. More upside potential exists, but it is based on weather development.

• On 8/12/13 Kochi Japan hit 41C (105.8F). That's the hottest temperature ever recorded in Japan.

• India’s July exports rose 11.6% YoY

• The Singapore-based Cocoa Association of Asia said that processing rose 2% to 153,792 metric YoY. Analysts and traders expected a decrease.
• The European Cocoa Association said on July 15 that grindings rose 6.1% in Q2. Cocoa Demand will exceed output by 119,000 metric tons in the 12 months starting in October, the first shortage in four years, according to Macquarie Group. However, hedge fund bets on higher prices are near a five-year high..

• The World Gold Council sees Q2 Global gold demand at 856.3 tons - down 12% YoY to a 4-year low on liquidation from gold ETFs.

• (Spiegel) Most in Britain seem unconcerned about the mass surveillance carried out by its intelligence agency GCHQ. Even the intimidation tactics being used on the Guardian this week have caused little soul-searching. The reason is simple: Britons blindly and uncritically trust their secret service.

Next Update July 25

Wall Street's Biggest Institutions Are Testing Quantitative Software for Non-Quants

"You literally press a button, say 'run the study,' and then [Robotrage] uses cloud computing capacity – it allocates to you that capacity – and it runs the study for you,

QUICK OVERVIEW

• The US economy added 162,000 jobs in July, slightly below expectations, but the unemployment rate fell to 7.4 %.
• U.S initial claims for jobless benefits fell by 19,000 to 326,000, the fewest since January 2008, from a revised figure of 345,000 for the previous week.
• U.S. economy grew 1.7% in Q2 U.S. personal income rose 0.3 % in June, after a 0.4 % gain in May
• U.S. personal consumption expenditures rose 0.5 % in June, after an increase of 0.2 % in May.
• U.S. savings rate, personal saving as a % of disposable personal income, edged down to 4.4% in June from 4.6% in the previous month, but remained well above the 2.1% average savings rate for all of 2007 before the financial crisis.

• The United States Trade Representative (USTR), to whom the White House has delegated the authority to veto ITC rulings, has decided to veto an early-June ITC ruling, which would otherwise have taken effect on Monday, to ban the importation of older iPhones and iPads into the United States market over a Samsung declared-essential patent

• China's PMI for the manufacturing sector improved slightly to 50.3% in July from 50.1% in June, above the boom-bust line of 50% for 10 months in a row.
• China's non-manufacturing PMI rebounds to 54.1 % in July

• An advanced computer numerical control (CNC) machine tool was shipped to Germany from China in the country's first export of cutting-edge equipment to a developed economy.

• Eurozone jobless rate remains at record high of 12.1% in June
• Eurozone consumer price inflation stays at 1.6% in July

• The British economy to grow 1.2% in 2013

• Indonesia's economy grows by 5.81 % in Q2

• The Danish Meteorological Institute is reporting that on Tuesday, July 30, the mercury rose to 25.9 C (78.6 F) at a station in Greenland, the highest temperature measured in the Arctic country since records began in 1958.

• Saudi website editor gets 7 years in prison and 600 lashes.

• FBI can remotely activate Android and laptop microphones, reports WSJ

• A Swedish sociology professor named Stefan Svallfors has nominated NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden for a Nobel Peace Prize.

James Galbraith on Social Breakdown and Financial Stress in Europe  JG: I think that ultimately the decision on the future of Europe will be made in Germany, and Germany has to decide, does it want it or not? If it wants it, it has to take minimal steps to stabilize it on the same principles on which they stabilized the East, and on which they built the Federal Republic in the first place. And if they don’t want it, well, it will go away.
RS: I think even if they want it, they’re not going to stabilize it.
JG: In which case they’ll lose it, and then we can see what is left. But when it’s lost, Germany’s going to have the problem it had before of an appreciating currency, and an industry that quickly loses competitiveness, and there’ll be higher unemployment. And its markets will have collapsed and its debts won’t get paid.
Germany is not going to escape the consequences of this. Again, it’s a choice that Germans can, and I’m sure, will make. But what is necessary is to state clearly what the choice actually is.

Next Update Aug. 4

Goldman Sachs aluminum scandal could roil financials and commodity prices this week ..Goldman and other financial players has cost American consumers more than $5 billion over the last three years..

Rolls-Royce Revives Age of Sail to Beat Fuel-Cost Surge: Freight Rolls-Royce Holdings Plc (RR/), best known for powering planes from Concorde to the Airbus superjumbo, is working on a modern-day clipper ship as it bets on emissions curbs to jack up bunker-fuel costs and herald a new age of sail.

QUICK OVERVIEW

• The Group of 20 nations pledged on Saturday to put growth before austerity, seeking to revive a global economy.
• The Group of Twenty (G20) nations will back a global taxation reform, which will help avoid double taxation.

• German austerity chief, finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble has warned Greek leaders not to play with fire by pressing for fresh debt-relief. He urged Greeks not to back track from their painful austerity and reform path. What’s the problem? You Greek’s don’t like 28.2% unemployment - too high?

• Investors, fearing that the end of the commodity super cycle of ever-rising prices are heightened by China’s slowdown, are heading for the exits.

• U.S. Fed chief emphasizes bond purchases could yet be accelerated if economic recovery shows signs of faltering. Bernanke said there are three main reasons for the rise in longer-term interest rates, which he thought was relatively low. He cited better economic news as the first reason. "As investors see brighter prospects ahead, interest rates tend to rise," Second reason is probably the "unwinding of leverage, and the third reason, is related to the Fed's communications and market interpretations of Fed policy. "But I want to emphasize that none of that implies that monetary policy will be tighter at any time within the foreseeable future," he said.

• Moody's Investors Service lifted its outlook on the U.S. government bond rating to stable from negative and reaffirmed the U.S. government's Aaa rating.

• (FT) US banks have lost billions of dollars of paper profits on their securities portfolios as market interest rates rise. Data released by the Federal Reserve on Friday showed unrealised gains in these portfolios had plummeted from more than $40bn at the beginning of the year to about $6bn

• The U.S. home builder sentiment index gained 6 points to 57 this month, the highest level since January of 2006, according to the National Association of Home Builders Any reading over 50 indicates that more builders view sales conditions as good rather than poor.
• U.S Privately-owned housing starts in June dropped 9.9% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 836,000, its lowest level since August last year.

• Wildfires are chewing through twice as many hectares a year on average in the US compared with 40 years ago, US Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell told a Senate hearing.

• U.S. Automakers are thriving – Detroit however files for bankruptcy: U.S. automaker General Motors Co. said that it sold 4.85 million vehicles globally in the first half of 2013, up 3.9% YoY. "Can we help Detroit? We don't know," Vice President Joe Biden said in response to a reporter's question about a possible federal rescue.

• Chinas Industrial Output rose 8.9% YoY
• China Q2 GDP up 7.5 % YoY

• Spain's public debt rose to 89.6% of GDP in May

•  (Pritchard) If you think, China's Communist Party fully understands the mess it has created by ramping credit to 200pc of GDP and running the greatest investment bubble know to man, read its shockingly complacent response to warnings from the International Monetary Fund.

Next Update July 21

With its 41-megapixel camera, (NOK) Nokia’s Lumia 1020 absolutely brings the wow factor, proving that Nokia can innovate with the very best - that it is a mobile force to be reckoned with!


Go to 37:30 of the presentation and check out the needle-in-a-haystack – Remarkable!

QUICK OVERVIEW

• Markets have overreacted to the likelihood that the U.S. Federal Reserve will taper its quantitative easing policy, or QE, HSBC said in its quarterly equity insights research released on Friday. "The lesson of history is that the first tightening in a cycle -- as long as it comes because risks to growth have diminished, not because of inflation or structural worries -- typically causes only a short-lived correction in stocks," the bank said.

• The US figures showed the economy had gained nearly 200,000 jobs in June, and a revision of previous low estimates saw an extra 70,000 added in April and May. However, the unemployment rate stays unchanged at 7.6%.

• Marine Le Pen vows to smash the existing order of Europe and break-up the Euro if she wins the next election.

• Ukraine anticipates a 25% increase in wheat output this year

• The European system of carbon trading has practically collapsed as politicians prioritize the economy over the environment.

• The Standard & Poor’s Case-Shiller home price index showed a 12% increase in prices in 20 cities from April 2012 to April 2013, the largest gain since early 2006, when home values began to level off in advance of the market collapse.

• The IMF is preparing to suspend aid payments to Greece by the end of next month unless Eurozone leaders plug a €3bn-€4bn shortfall that has opened up in Greece’s €172bn rescue program.

• Bernanke says US central bank could start slowing asset-purchase scheme later this year and end it by mid-2014.

• Car sales are down 10% in Austria, France and Germany, and 47% in Romania. The European market has contracted by a quarter from its heyday before the debt crisis and the fiscal squeeze.

• China's shadow banking system is out of control and under mounting stress as borrowers struggle to roll over short-term debts, Fitch Ratings has warned.

• The CBO concludes that immigrants will generate additional tax payments over the next decade and reduce the U.S. deficit…

• Several former Bank of America employees filed declarations in a federal court claiming the mortgage lender told them to lie to customers seeking loan modifications...

• The flash HSBC China Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index fell to 48.3 in June from 49.2 in May, the weakest in nine months.

• Brazilian Finance Minister Guido Mantega said that the government will trim its 2013 budget by 15 billion reales (or 6.7 billion U.S. dollars).

• According to the Italian central bank, national public debt reached 127% of gross domestic product (GDP) last year, up from 120.8% in 2011, placing the country second in the European Union (EU) after Greece.

• A mother of seven, Ursula von der Leyen is Germany's labor minister and a role model for women juggling demanding careers with family commitments. In an interview, the 54-year-old has some advice for young people struggling to find work. How best to solve Europe's youth unemployment crisis? Make young people learn English.

Nex Update July 7

QUICK OVERVIEW

• (FT) Markets often put a different slant on central bankers’ words than was intended, thus when Mr. Bernanke said ‘tapering’ the markets heard ‘tightening’

• The IMF on Friday urged the US to repeal sweeping federal budget cuts that will be a severe drag on economic growth this year. (Teabags not listening)

• U.S. producer prices up 0.5% in May and 1.7% YoY

• U.S. Industrial production was unchanged in May. The sector has seen little growth since the turn of the year, the Fed said

• The troubled city of Detroit will stop making payments on a portion of its unsecured municipal bond debt Friday, according to a report in the WSJ.

• China worried that tightening could trigger capital flight and set off debt crisis, says Ambrose Evans-Pritchard.

• The World Bank cut its global growth forecast for this year after emerging markets from China to Brazil slowed more than projected, while U.S budget cuts and slumping investor confidence in Europe’s are not helpful.

• Emerging markets risk an interest rate shock once the US Federal Reserve and other Western authorities start to withdraw global liquidity, the World Bank has warned.

• U.S. Banks repossessed 38,946 homes, an increase of 11% MoM. The number of homes hit with default notices for the first time grew by 4% (US housing might not be as strong as advertised)

• Fed's Beige Book business survey shows "modest to moderate growth" across U.S

• The Dow Transports, adjusted by the CPI, are in new high ground. Industrials, S&P etc are still lagging.

•  (FT) Gabon is planning to take assets back from three international oil companies including a subsidiary of China’s Sinopec in a sign of Africa’s growing assertiveness as competition intensifies for its natural resources.

• (Spiegel) There are more journalists in prison in Turkey than in any other country.

• Germany's high court made clear that it was skeptical of the ECB's program to buy unlimited quantities of sovereign bonds from struggling euro-zone member states. It could strike down the most successful tool in combating the crisis.

• The USDA trimmed corn production just 1%, to 14.005 billion bushels, well ahead of the market consensus. Traders had expected a drop of 2.2%. Ending stocks also surpassed market expectations. The USDA pegged 2013/14 corn ending stocks at 1.95 billion bushels, down from May but still the largest in eight years, and more than 8 % larger than the 1.8 billion traders expected.

• This year the world will eat 112m tonnes of pork. Around half will be munched in Chinese mouths, according to the Agricultural Outlook report from the FAO and the OECD, a rich country club. The Chinese have been the world's biggest meat-eaters for over two decades. Pork is their favourite: each person scoffs about 38kg a year, compared with 28kg swallowed by Americans.

• (FT) Sharp drop in availability of scrap copper has caught the attention of some hedge funds and traders, making them bullish about the red metal

Gangsta Government by WILLIAM O'CONNOR“I’ll let you have the $10,000 for three points. That’s only because I know you.” I’m listening to Tony yak, my Shylock. Yak, yak has earned the moniker. He never gives his mouth a rest. Yak’s giving me the loan at street price: $30 for every $1,000. That’s “juice.” Every week I’ll pay $300, but nothing comes off the top.

Elizabeth Warren’s QE for Students by ELLEN BROWN On July 1, interest rates will double for millions of students – from 3.4% to 6.8% – unless Congress acts

Next Update June 16

QUICK OVERVIEW

• YoY U.S. House prices rose 10.9% in March, the biggest increase since the height of the housing boom in 2006, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller index. MoM the Case-Shiller index rose 1.1 % in March. Phoenix and San Francisco led the YoY gains, up 22.5% and 22.2%, respectively.

• I am very recently retired from an Intel (INTC) position as chip design engineer with more than 30 years of varied experience in a wide swath of technologies and companies, and I have been a part of at least six startups. I have 27 US patents to my name..Without further ado, I can state with certainty that the new mobile oriented processors coming from Intel later this year will capture the processor space for the leading smartphones and tablets.

• Wolfgang Schäuble sounded almost like a new convert extolling the wonders of heaven as he raved about his latest conclusions on the subject of saving the euro. "We need more investment, and we need more programs," the German finance minister announced.

• The preliminary or "flash" version of the HSBC Purchasing Managers' Index for China fell to a seven-month low of 49.6, down from April's final reading of 50.4. A result below 50 signals contraction.

• Minutes from the U.S. central bank's latest policy-setting meeting showed that a "number" of Fed officials were willing to taper QE as soon as the next meeting in June.

• Forget environmental concerns: When it comes to fracking, Germans are worried about how it might affect beer quality. In a letter to several ministries in Berlin, brewers expressed concern that the exploitation of shale gas could contaminate water supplies and thus violate the beer purity law of 1516.

• (FT) An aggressive EU attempt to combat unfair competition from China was seriously undermined when Germany led a majority of the bloc’s members to oppose punitive duties on imported Chinese solar panels.

• Hong Kong-based Shuanghui International agreed to pay $7.1bn (a 31% premium to the closing price on Tuesday) for America's Smithfield Foods, in a deal aimed at US supplies for the growing demand of pork by China's increasingly wealthy consumers..

Next Update June 3

QUICK OVERVIEW

• (Bloomberg) Americans’ confidence in the economy climbed in May to the highest level in almost six years as rising real estate values and record stock prices boosted household wealth.
•  The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan preliminary index of consumer sentiment rose to 83.7, the highest since July 2007.
• U.S. housing starts were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 853,000 last month. The level was 16.5% below the revised March estimate, but was 13.1% higher than the level in April 2012.
• U.S. Leading indicators rose 0.6% last month after falling a revised 0.2% in March

• Japans GDP rose by 0.9% in the three months to March, or 3.5 % YoY (Bloomberg) --

• The U.S. budget deficit will shrink by the end of fiscal 2013 to $642 billion, the smallest shortfall in five years,
• U.S. Household debt, as a proportion of income, declined from 130% in 2007 to 105 % at the end of 2012.

• In the same period, Eurozone household debt has risen from 100% to almost 110%.

• French GDP shrank 0.2% in the three months through March, following a revised 0.2% contraction in the previous quarter.

• Yields on 10-year U.S. Treasury notes have backed up a bit of late, but at 1.9% they are still just over one -third the 5.4% earnings per share yield of the S&P 500.

• South Koreas Unemployment rate was 3.25 in April, down 0.3% point from a month earlier.

• YoY German CPI rose by 1.2% last month.
• The German economy, Europe’s largest, narrowly avoided recession expanding a measly 0.1% in Q1.

• France, the second-largest economy in the euro zone, is back in recession - contracting 0.2%.

• Greek unemployment hits new record high of 27% in February.

• Advanced Cell Technology (ACTC) confirmed that the vision of a patient enrolled in a clinical investigation of the company’s retinal pigment epithelial cells derived from human embryonic stem cells has improved from 20/400 to 20/40 following treatment.

Next Update May 19

Along the road of idiocy

QUICK OVERVIEW

• U.S. nonfarm payrolls rose by 165,000 last month and the jobless rate fell to a four-year low of 7.5 %.

• American International Group (AIG) investors hoping for a dividend and a buyback this year may be in luck, though the dividend seems more likely. CEO Robert Benmosche repeats on the company's first-quarter conference call that the dividend is something that could happen after AIG completes the sale of its plane-lease unit in coming weeks

• India cut  the benchmark lending rate by 0.25 points to 7.25%
• India's government reserves may soon be deposited with commercial banks to boost lending.

• The European Central Bank cut its main refinancing rate by a quarter of a percentage point to 0.5 per cent.

• YoY Japans household spending rose 5.2 % in March, in price-adjusted real terms a nine year high, as "Abenomics" gains momentum.

• At the end of 2012, U.S. household wealth rose to $66.1 trillion, close to the pre-recession peak of $67.4 trillion.

• Europe will enforce the world's first continent-wide ban on widely used insecticides (neonicotinoid pesticides) linked to serious harm in bees.

• U.K. avoids triple-dip recession as economy expands by 0.3% in Q1

• U.S. Pending Home Sales Index rose 1.5% to 105.7.
• Existing U.S. Home Sales fell 0.6 % to a 4.92 million annual rate.
• U.S. Feb. S&P/Case-Shiller home prices rose 9.3%

• YoY U.S. April consumer confidence index rose to 68.1 from 61.9

• The U.S. Labor Department said that the number of people who applied for new unemployment benefits last week fell by 16,000 to 339,000.

• As recession continues to sap the Eurozone and wider EU, the Eurostat data agency reported an extra 62,000 people joining unemployment queues in just four weeks in the 17-nation Eurozone as the jobless rate climbed for the 23rd consecutive month -- hitting 12.1% in March.

• Germany will grow by a meager 0.5% this year, the government said

• A bunch of weak manufacturing data from America, Europe and Asia has cast serious doubts on the strength of the global economy

• ARM Holdings ( ARMH) reported Q1 better-than-expected revenue, up 26% YoY

• (YUM) Yum Brands Inc., owner of Pizza Hut, Taco Bell and KFC, reported its first-quarter profit fell 27% to $337 million, or 72 cents a share. (China’s avian/chicken flue problem)

• ATT  (T) said that earnings rose 3% for Q1.

• Costco (COST) raised the quarterly dividend 12.7% to $0.31 from $0.275 per share

• Chevron (CVX) increased its quarterly dividend for the 26th year in a row, to $1 a share, up 11% from 90 cents, for a 3.4% yield.

• Akamai (AKAM) earned $0.51 a share on revenue of $386 million. That was better than the consensus estimates for $0.46

• Qualcomm (QCOM) said its second quarter earnings would be lower than analyst forecasts, as the company faces stiffer competition from smaller rivals, especially in Asia.

• UPS profit rose 7 % in the quarter.

• China Wireless Technologies said it will pass Samsung Electronics and Lenovo Group to become China's leading cell phone company.  

• Taiwan reported the first case of bird flu outside mainland China.

• Russia, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan bought gold just before it plummeted.

• Brazil's unemployment rate rose to 5.7% in March

Next Update May 5

More  on Rogoff & Reinhart  from Harvard - Harvard I tell ya

..They have  done a great deal of damage to the world!

And thank you Mr. Herndon!