Sunday, September 11, 2011

An Impeccable Disaster
What Mr. Trichet and his colleagues should be doing right now is buying up Spanish and Italian debt — that is, doing what these countries would be doing for themselves if they still had their own currencies. In fact, the E.C.B. started doing just that a few weeks ago, and produced a temporary respite for those nations. But the E.C.B. immediately found itself under severe pressure from the moralizers, who hate the idea of letting countries off the hook for their alleged fiscal sins. And the perception that the moralizers will block any further rescue actions has set off a renewed market panic.

Friday, September 09, 2011

Quick Overview

  • Germany Said to Ready Plan to Help Banks If Greece Defaults. The resignation of a key official from the European Central Bank was the latest sign of deepening disagreement over how to solve Europe' economic problems.

  • Canada's economy shed jobs for the first time in five months as the country's unemployment rate rose to 7.3% from 7.2% in July.

  • YoY France budget deficit narrowed to 86.6 billion Euros (119.51 billion U.S. dollars) from 93.1 billion Euros (128.49 billion U.S. dollars)

  • China's industrial value-added output is expected to grow 13.5% YoY
  • China's inflation eased to 6.2% in August

Thursday, September 08, 2011

Quick Overview

  • U.S. Fixed mortgage rates fell this week to the lowest levels in six decades.


  • U.S. weekly applications for unemployment benefits rose 2,000 to 414,000


  • U.S. Trade deficit fell to $44.8 billion in July, down 13.1 % from June


  • P&G says sales will rise by 5 to 9% in the coming year, with double-digit emerging market growth mitigating continued slow growth in the U.S., Europe and Japan.




  • Merkel greeted the verdict from the German constitutional court as pivotal in upholding the legitimacy of her government's Eurozone bailouts package, saying it justifies her policies in dealing with the debt crisis.


  • Trichet warned there are increasing risks for the euro zone’s waning economic recovery and less chance of inflation.

  • HuffPost: Each civilian sent to Afghanistan costs U.S. taxpayers up to $570,000 a year
  • The DOE said:
  • Crude supplies fell by 4 million barrels, or 1.1 percent, to 353.1 million barrels, which is 1.9% below year-ago levels.
  • Gasoline supplies rose by 200,000 barrels, or 0.1 percent, to 208.8 million barrels. That was 7.2% below year-ago levels.
  • Demand for gasoline over the four weeks ended Sept. 2 was 2.9% lower than a year earlier.
  • U.S. refineries ran at 89 % of capacity.
  • Supplies of distillate fuel rose by 700,000 barrels to 156.8 million barrels.
  • The Cass Freight Index for U.S. shipments grew 4.4 percent in August over the same month a year ago, the smallest gain in a year-and-a-half and a sign of fragile demand in the American economy.
  • Bulk freight shipments on major North American railroads rose 1.4 percent last week to the highest level since April 2, with gains across a wide range of cargoes.

Tuesday, September 06, 2011

Quick Overview

  • (Bloomberg) The Swiss central bank imposed a ceiling on the franc for the first time in more than three decades and pledged to defend the target with the “utmost determination,”


  • (Bloomberg)The Conference Board’s Employment Trends Index decreased 0.3 percent to 100.8 from the prior month’s revised reading of 101.0, the New York-based private research group said today. The measure was up 4.1 percent from August 2010.


  • The U.S. Institute for Supply Management’s index of non- manufacturing businesses increased to 53.3 last month from 52.7 in July.


  • Informa forecasts U.S. corn yield at 151 bu. per acre, down from 158 in Aug. The Corn crop is estimated at 12.7 bbu. Soybeans at 3.06, avg yield of 41.5, one bu/a.
    (They are usually high!!)
  • Allendale forecasts U.S. corn production at 12.466 billion bushels and the yield per acre at 147.7 bushels per acre. They estimate this year's U.S. soybean production at 3.007 billion bushels and soybean yield at 40.7 bushels per acre.
  • The above figures are below the corn estimate from the USDA of a 12.914bn-bushel harvest, and a yield of 153.0 bushels per acre. Next USDA forecast Monday.

  • YoY Australia’s GDP rose to 1.4% in 2Q


  • Bank of Japan says post-quake recovery intact, keeps policy rate unchanged at 0%-0.1%

Monday, September 05, 2011

Ready for the fall

Euro-zone governments have effectively spent the past year making a departure from the euro zone ever more attractive, and therefore vastly more likely.
  • Baltic Dry Index is looking quite positive http://is.gd/3sQ34N



  • European markets are showed a growing concern that the sovereign debt crisis is worsening.



Friday, September 02, 2011

Quick Overview

  • The U.S. jobless rate held at 9.1%. Private sector firms added 17,000 jobs while state and local governments continued to shed workers. The average workweek dropped by 0.1 hour, and average earnings also fell by 3 cents. The unemployment rate for black Americans is at 16.7% in August, up from 15.9% the previous month.

  • MoM The PPI picked up by 0.5 % in the Eurozone.

  • U.S. sues 17 big banks over mortgage-backed securities

  • 186 million Americans are currently breathing in unhealthy levels of smog. Caving Obama, citing the nation's struggling economy, asked the Environmental Protection Agency to withdraw a key air-quality standard. 
  • The EPA  noted that while compliance with the new rule would cost polluters between $19 billion and $90 billion a year by 2020, the benefits to human health will be worth between $13 billion and $100 billion every year.
  • Lanworth estimates corn 143.3 (+/-3bpa) beans 40 (+/- 1.2bpa).

  • In 2011, through Aug. 31, some 243 — nearly half of the companies in the S&P 500 — have either increased or initiated a dividend payment.

  • British Police have so far arrested more than a dozen people this year as part of the probe into alleged voicemail interception and corrupt payments to police by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. James Murdoch says he's turning down $6 million bonus (may take one later, though.) Rupert is keeping his.

  • After prison lobbyists and execs donated generously Texas Gov. Perry floated a proposal to privatize the state's prison health care network.

Thursday, September 01, 2011

Quick Overview

  • The U.S. advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims for jobless benefits was 409,000 in the week ending August 27, fell 12,000 from the previous week's figure.

  • France's unemployment rate inched down by 0.1% to 9.1 % in Q2 of 2011 .

  • Global iron ore production growth needs to be at a rate of at least 100 million tons a year over the next eight years to meet rising demand, the world's mining giant Rio Tinto said on Thursday.

  • (FT) U.S. Defense Contractors have wasted or lost to fraud as much as $60 Billion over the past 10 years.

  • (MSFT) said its Windows Phone operating system may capture more than 20 percent of the smartphone market over the next two to three years with the help of hardware manufacturers and increased marketing efforts.

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Quick Overview

  • Ukraine raised its forecast for exports of grains by 1 million metric tons to 25 million tons

  • The amount of cargo handled at the port of Maputo between January and July of 2011 totaled 6.4 million tons, which was a YoY rise of 1.6 million tons or 33%.

  • India's crude oil imports in July rose 2.6% YoY to 13.58 million metric tons, or 3.21 million barrels a day.

  • YoY the S&P/Case-Shiller index of property values in 20 cities fell 4.5%, after a 4.6% YoY drop in May.

  • U.S. Consumer confidence fell to 44.5 in August -- the lowest reading since April 2009.

  • U.S. road freight growth has exceeded truck driver volume in the year so far and is likely to inflate salaries by as much as 30 per cent by 2014.The three-year deficit of drivers, which number 300,000 full-time posts, matches 2004 vacancies that remained unfilled for a year, said freight transport consultancy FTR Associates head Noel Perry.
Attention Governor Perry: Evolution is a fact
The population of the United States is more than 300 million and it includes some of the best and brightest that the human species has to offer, probably more so than any other country in the world. There is surely something wrong with a system for choosing a leader when, given a pool of such talent and a process that occupies more than a year and consumes billions of dollars, what rises to the top of the heap is George W Bush. Or when the likes of Rick Perry or Michele Bachmann or Sarah Palin can be mentioned as even remote possibilities.

Graphics Gallery: The Most Important Facts about the Global Debt Crisis

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Quick Overview

  • (WSJ) Widely grown corn plants that Monsanto Co. genetically modified to thwart a voracious bug are falling prey to that very pest in a few Iowa fields, the first time a major Midwest scourge has developed resistance to a genetically modified crop.

  • U.S. Rough rice stocks in all positions on August 1, 2011 rose 37% YoY

  • Bloomberg: Chinese industrial companies’ profits rose 28.3 percent in the first seven months from a year earlier, helping to support the expansion of the world’s fastest-growing major economy.

  • German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said that the world risks a 7-year recession due to slowdown and debt troubles in America, Europe and Japan, urging debt-ridden countries resort to drastic austerity.

  • The Russian Ministry of Economic Development expects Russia's 2011 GDP to grow by 4.1, lower than a previous forecast of 4.2%.

  • Spain's economy grew 0.2% QoQ

  • JOHN Fredriksen’s flagship tanker operator Frontline is urging other owners in the very large crude carrier market to take a $500m gamble and scrap 50 older double-hull vessels to help ease oversupply.

Thursday, August 25, 2011

Quick Overview

  • Betting on a bailout again? Buffett is investing $5 billion in B of A -- and plans to hold a Sept. 30 fundraiser in New York City to benefit President Barack Obama’s re-election bid. (See Matt Taibbi below)

  • Investors are betting Germany will ban short selling.

  • China was the third highest filer of patents in 2010, just behind the U.S., which registered 326,945 and Japan with 337,497.

  • Thailand intends to pay farmers Bt 15,000 a tonne for unmilled paddy rice, over 50 % more than the current rate.

  • South Korea's consumer confidence fell to a 5-month low of 99 in August, down 3 points MoM.

  • German business confidence fell from 112.9 in July to 108.7 in August.

  • Rabobank lowered its estimate for the world sugar inventories in 2011-12 by 300,000 tonnes to 9.5m tonnes.

  • CME raises COMEX gold margins by 27%.

  • England: people aged 16 to 24 not in Education, Employment or Training number 16.2% in 2009.

  • U.S. Delinquency rates on one-to-four-unit properties are currently at 8.4%.

  • Japan's July CPI rose 0.1% vs. forecasts for 0.1% drop
Obama Goes All Out For Dirty Banker Deal
Why? My theory is that the Obama administration is trying to secure its 2012 campaign war chest with this settlement deal. If Barry can make this foreclosure thing go away for the banks, you can bet he’ll win the contributions battle against the Republicans next summer.
Which is good for him, I guess. But it seems to me that it might be time to wonder if is this the most disappointing president we’ve ever had.



Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Obama Administration Pressures Prosecutors To Drop Criminal Investigations Of Banks Over Mortgage Fraud Various organizations have denounced the actions of the Obama Administration as caving into this powerful lobby — as it has caved into the oil/gas lobby on offshore drilling, pharmaceutical lobby on health care legislation, and telecom lobby on immunity from privacy lawsuits.





Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Quick Overview

  • YoY U.S. Truck tonnage rose 3.9% in July American Trucking Associations said.

  • U.S. new home sales fell 0.7% in July -- near expectations.

  • Moody's downgraded Japanese Government Debt to AA3 from AA2

  • China passed the US as the largest market for personal computers in Q2

  • Japan creates $100 billion credit line as a step to cope with yen's recent spike

  • Austrian woman Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner became the1st woman to conquer all 14 8,000-metre summits without oxygen http://is.gd/Y8wQ2i

Monday, August 22, 2011

Quick Overview

  • Early warning sign: GLD overtakes SPY (S&P) as world’s largest ETF.

  • U.S. feedlots placement at 2.15m cattle last month is up 22% YoY.
Torture in Bahrain Aided by Nokia Siemens The toolbox allows more than the interception of phone calls, e-mails, text messages and Voice Over Internet Protocol calls such as those made using Skype. Some products can also secretly activate laptop webcams or microphones on mobile devices. They can change the contents of written communications in mid-transmission, use voice recognition to scan phone networks, and pinpoint people’s locations through their mobile phones. The monitoring systems can scan communications for key words or recognize voices and then feed the data and recordings to operators at government agencies.



E-mails Suggest Bear Stearns Cheated Clients Out of Billions

Wall Street Aristocracy Got $1.2 Trillion in Secret Fed Loans

..as much as $1.2 trillion of public money, about the same amount U.S. homeowners currently owe on 6.5 million delinquent and foreclosed mortgages. The largest borrower, Morgan Stanley (MS), got as much as $107.3 billion, while Citigroup took $99.5 billion and Bank of America $91.4 billion, ..