STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Friday, 20 January 2012

[Tansy_Gold]

[font size=3]STOCK MARKET WATCH, Friday, 20 January 2012[/font]

SMW for 19 January 2012

AT THE CLOSING BELL ON 19 January 2012
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Dow Jones 12,623.98 +45.03 (0.36%)
S&P 500 1,314.50 +6.46 (0.49%)
Nasdaq 2,788.33 +18.62 (0.67%)


10 Year 1.98% +0.05 (2.59%)
30 Year 3.04% +0.04 (1.33%)







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

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Financial Sector Officials Convicted since 1/20/09 = [/font][font color=red]12[/font]


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

[hamerfan]

1. Gas up 12 cents/gallon overnight

And I guess I can't complain because the Midwest has some of the cheapest gas in the USA, but still...
Regular unleaded now $3.27/gallon.

[Ghost Dog]

3. Do you reckon Obama will endorse more offshore drilling during this campaign?

Offsetting Keystone?

There's been a steep rise in diesel prices here in Spain (where diesel consumption is higher than that of gasoline), and on top of that commercial users are losing their discount/subsidy, the new government announced as part of its package of 'austerity' (ie. deflationary) measures. So that will have knock-on effects.

[Demeter]

6. I'm expecting a lot of "deer-in-the-headlights" moments

as his carefully constructed delusion crumbles about those signature ears....

[newfie11]

26. I thought the oil from Keystone was not being used in America

It was to be shipped out once refined. So yes that would have helped other countries but I don't see how it would help here in America.

[Demeter]

30. That's what I heard, too

Why sell it here, when you can ship in cheap Middle-east oil and ship out expensive US oil, and profit both ways?

[Fuddnik]

46. As of last week, gasoline was our biggest export.

It's selling for higher prices abroad, so we're shipping it out. Double whammy because it raises prices here, creating bigger profits on less supply.

[Ghost Dog]

64. That's down to refinery capacity, then?

[Po_d Mainiac]

38. Another rig blows up..2 dead

Hercules Offshore has just reported that one of their liftboats was caught in the fire that originated from Chevron’s KS Endeavor jack-up yesterday offshore Nigeria. Two contractors on board the KS Endeavor are still not accounted for. All 27 crew of the liftboat, Mako, are accounted for. No word on the possible environmental damage as of yet however Chevron says it has deployed well control specialists and drilling experts to the scene.



http://gcaptain.com/nigeria-jack-up-fire-update-hercules-liftboat-caught-in-fire-two-still-missing-from-chevron-rig/?37759

[Ghost Dog]

2. "Irrelevant how quickly Bank of England buys government bonds": Squid Tentacle.

9.05am: Ben Broadbent, who sits on the Bank of England's monetary policy committee, said the committee is not pre-committed to more quantitative easing in February and it is irrelevant how quickly the Bank buys government bonds, known as gilts.

In an interview with Market News International, Broadbent indicated that the Bank is not trying to stagger its gilt purchases, and would have announced more QE if it had thought it necessary. He rejected the idea that a "speed limit" on QE - the assumption that if the Bank stepped up the pace of gilt purchases, it would create liquidity problems - has had any influence on his policy decisions. He believes the MPC is free to announce as much QE as needed to meet its inflation target without being distracted by concerns over gilt market supply...



... Broadbent, who joined the MPC last year having worked as an economist at Goldman Sachs, also said: "It is clear that the [UK] economy is broadly flat and therefore growing less than its potential rate." But he also sees some positive trends emerging which make a pick-up in the economy in the second half a "reasonable" forecast. He added that the European Central Bank's recent actions appear to have lowered downside risks for the UK economy.

The Bank is widely expected to announce more QE next month, after pumping £75bn into the economy in October...

/... http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/jan/20/eurozone-debt-crisis-live-imf-slahes-growth-forecast

[Demeter]

4. They are all over, aren't they

When employment by Goldman goes from a cachet to the mark of Cain, we will have overcome.

I see us as ancient physicians, carefully plotting the course of a mysterious disease, in hopes that enough data will point to a cure....but the only cure is death of the disease-carrying vermin and destruction of their nests...

[Ghost Dog]

35. I'm happy to see you're feeling a bit better, Demeter. Here's a 100-min video

on the bubble machine (msm), for when you've time & inclination, if not already seen. Looks like it's from around 2003 or 2004.

http://thoughtmaybe.com/video/orwell-rolls-in-his-grave

+ Plenty of other good stuff at the site.

[Demeter]

52. Are you sure?

Thinking of Spartacus now.

[Demeter]

60. Or at least, 99% of us

Of course, I am 100%

[Ghost Dog]

68. A propósito:

If there is any American "industry" ripe for widespread discrediting, it is the U.S. Corporate Media--the six corporations that own most of the media outlets the conventional American sees, hears and reads.

This week's theme is You Can't Fool Mother Nature For Long, and this is how it plays out in MediaLand:

When the disconnect between the actual economy and what the American people are told is factual and true about the U.S. economy and its Financial Elites by their Corporate Media widens to surrealism, then the conventional American who has passively accepted propaganda in place of reality will finally abandon belief in the "fairness and integrity" of the Mainstream Media, and see it for what it is: a corporate house of prostitution, where everything is for sale to the highest bidder...

... The Corporate Media's first and most critical line of propaganda is that if America's Financial and Political Elites fall, so too does the nation.

This is of course false. The nation would be infinitely better off if its current crop of craven, corrupt Financial and Political Elites were revealed as financially and ethically bankrupt and delivered from great power into ignominious disgrace.

A truly independent media would have been highlighting this reality daily since the financial house of cards began collapsing in 2007. Instead, the Corporate Media has presented the saving of the financial and political Status Quo Elites as the equivalent of saving the nation itself...

/... http://www.zerohedge.com/news/guest-post-you-cant-fool-mother-nature-long-mainstream-media

[Demeter]

5. All the little bloodsuckers and rent collectors

[Demeter]

11. HUMOR, UNINTENTIONAL: UK admits to deploying ‘spy rock’ in Russia FROM THE LAND OF MONTY PYTHON

Last edited Fri Jan 20, 2012, 10:24 AM - Edit history (1)

Propaganda gift for Putin after ex-Blair aide says Moscow’s 2006 allegations that British diplomats used a fake rock to transmit secret data were true

Read more >>
http://link.ft.com/r/LVA6WW/VLZ39G/WH2F8/R3HMYX/EX3NK5/ZH/t?a1=2012&a2=1&a3=20

MORE FROM UK

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/19/fake-rock-plot-spy-russians

Britain was behind a plot to spy on Russians with a device hidden in a fake plastic rock, a former key UK government official has admitted.

Jonathan Powell, former chief of staff to prime minister Tony Blair, admitted in a BBC documentary that allegations made by the Russians in 2006 - dismissed at the time - were in fact true.

"The spy rock was embarrassing," he said in the BBC2 documentary series, Putin, Russia and the West. "They had us bang to rights. Clearly they had known about it for some time and had been saving it up for a political purpose."

VIDEO OF ROCK IN ACTION http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2012/jan/19/uk-spy-russia-rock-video

[Demeter]

7. BofA swings to $2bn profit in fourth quarter; BofA earnings rise on loan growth

Bank of America reported improved fourth-quarter net income of $2bn and pledged to accelerate the pace of capital building

Bank of America reported fourth-quarter net income of $2bn on Thursday, celebrating strong loan growth from corporate America even as its investment bank fell into a loss.

Earnings of 15 cents a share compared with a loss of $1.2bn, or 16 cents a share, in the same period in 2010. Revenue rose 11 per cent to $25.1bn.

Read more >>
http://link.ft.com/r/VKY5JJ/AMJVYN/87I64/B5YU7B/QN06VP/PJ/t?a1=2012&a2=1&a3=19


Read more >>
http://link.ft.com/r/S4XZQQ/KQHYNT/A5Q0X/L93C55/5VIYVI/JY/t?a1=2012&a2=1&a3=20

[Demeter]

8. Italy’s banks tap ECB for €50bn

Special ECB three-year lending facility saw UniCredit the biggest user, says Morgan Stanley report

Read more >>
http://link.ft.com/r/S4XZQQ/KQHYNT/A5Q0X/L93C55/8Z9QZG/JY/t?a1=2012&a2=1&a3=20

[Demeter]

9. Credit Suisse wins $7bn AIG securities auction

NY Fed says the sale to the Swiss bank ‘substantially reduces’ the Maiden Lane II portfolio of ex-AIG mortgage-related securities

Read more >>
http://link.ft.com/r/S4XZQQ/KQHYNT/A5Q0X/L93C55/97S97B/JY/t?a1=2012&a2=1&a3=20


I'LL BETCHA THEY'VE JUST BEEN PLAYED FOR FOOLS, AGAIN.

[Demeter]

10. Greek PM urges backing for reforms

Lucas Papademos warns fractious coalition that lack of political commitment could result in Athens losing access to a new €130bn bail-out package

Read more >>
http://link.ft.com/r/LVA6WW/VLZ39G/WH2F8/R3HMYX/GDUPI1/ZH/t?a1=2012&a2=1&a3=20

[Demeter]

12. China set to buy stake in Thames Water

A Chinese sovereign wealth fund is poised to buy a stake in the water network that serves London, in what would be the fund’s first acquisition in the UK following investment talks with British politicians

Read more >>
http://link.ft.com/r/YIQXNN/C4FZD0/T10SH/082E9B/B5RSB0/LE/t?a1=2012&a2=1&a3=19

----------

[Demeter]

13. Google drops 10% after surge in costs

Google shocked Wall Street on Thursday with news of another jump in costs in its latest quarter, while also disclosing an unexpected slump in pricing in its core search advertising business.

The news led to an immediate 10 per cent drop in its share price in after-hours trading, putting paid to growing optimism on Wall Street in recent quarters that the recent build-up in operating costs at the internet search giant was starting to pay in higher revenue growth and success in a wider range of advertising markets.


Read more >>
http://link.ft.com/r/XYEWFF/YB5PR3/B49CK/HYJ8RE/AMJ9TZ/9A/t?a1=2012&a2=1&a3=19


ANOTHER FAULTY BUSINESS MODEL GOING "BLOOEY" ?

[Demeter]

14. The Daily Reckoning Presents: Getting out of Dodge

An Interview with Doug Casey (Conducted by Louis James, Editor, International Speculator)
http://dailyreckoning.com/getting-out-of-dodge/

Louis: Doug, a lot of readers have been asking for guidance on how to know when it’s time to exit center stage and hunker down in some safe place. Few people want to hide from the world in a cabin in the woods while life goes on in the mainstream, but nobody wants to get caught once the gates clang shut on the police state the US is becoming. How do you know when it’s time to go?

Doug: Well, the first thing to keep in mind is that it’s better to be a year too early than a minute too late. David Galland recently read They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45, by Milton Mayer. He quoted a passage in his column of last Friday. It goes a long way in explaining why Americans appear to be such whipped dogs today. They’re no different from the Germans of recent memory. For those who missed it, let me quote it:

“You see,” my colleague went on, “one doesn’t see exactly where or how to move. Believe me, this is true. Each act, each occasion, is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next. You wait for one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join with you in resisting somehow. You don’t want to act, or even talk, alone; you don’t want to ‘go out of your way to make trouble.’ ... In the university community, in your own community, you speak privately to your colleagues, some of whom certainly feel as you do; but what do they say? They say, ‘It’s not so bad’ or ‘You’re seeing things’ or ‘You’re an alarmist.’

“These are the beginnings, yes; but how do you know for sure when you don’t know the end, and how do you know, or even surmise, the end? On the one hand, your enemies, the law, the regime, the Party, intimidate you. On the other, your colleagues pooh-pooh you as pessimistic or even neurotic... the one great shocking occasion, when tens or hundreds or thousands will join with you, never comes. That’s the difficulty. If the last and worst act of the whole regime had come immediately after the first and smallest, thousands, yes, millions would have been sufficiently shocked... But of course this isn’t the way it happens. In between come all the hundreds of little steps, some of them imperceptible, each of them preparing you not to be shocked by the next. Step C is not so much worse than Step B, and, if you did not make a stand at Step B, why should you at Step C?”

The fact is that the US has been on a slippery slope for decades, and it’s about to go over a cliff. However, our standard of living, while declining, is still very high, both relatively and absolutely. But an American can enjoy a much higher standard of living abroad...On the other hand, if I were some poor guy in a poverty-wracked country with few opportunities, I’d want to go where the action is, where the money is, now. Today, that means trying to get into the United States. The US is headed the wrong direction, but it’s still a land of opportunity and a whole lot better than some flea-bitten village in Niger.

L: By the time things get worse than some Third-World dictatorship in the US, such a person could have remitted a whole lot of cash back home.

Doug: And you’d have a whole lot of experiences that would give you a competitive edge back where you came from, or in the next place you go to. The one-eyed man is king in the valley of the blind. People have to lose that backward, peasant mentality that ties them to the land of their birth. Sad to say, although the average American has somewhat more knowledge of the world — mainly due to television — his psychology is just as constrained as that of some serf from central Asia or some primitive villager in Africa. It’s all a matter of psychology.

But if you’re not poor, you want to go someplace that is safe, nice — whatever that means to you — and with a lower cost of living.

BECAUSE PAYING FOR THE SINS OF THE PAST IS NOT FOR THE WEALTHY! GOD FORBID THEY SHOULD HAVE TO CLEAN UP THE MESS THEY MADE.

[Demeter]

15. FDIC releases bank stress test proposal

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/17/us-fdic-banks-idUSTRE80G16A20120117

Bank regulators on Tuesday voted to release a proposal for how banks with more than $10 billion in assets should conduct stress tests annually to determine whether they can withstand a financial shock. The tests are required by the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial oversight law, which has established stress tests as a key component of how regulators will gauge the health of the banking industry. The largest U.S. banks are facing several regulatory tests of their operations. The Federal Reserve, for instance, has to establish stress tests for bank holding companies with more than $50 billion in assets and the agency released a proposal for this requirement in December. The Fed is also currently putting banks with more than $50 billion in assets through separate tests to gauge whether they have enough capital. The results of these tests are expected in March. Regulators have said they will attempt to coordinate the different testing requirements as much as possible.

On Tuesday the board of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp voted to 4 to 0 to approve the proposal for banks with more than $10 billion in assets. It will be out for 60 days for public comments. "It's an important forward looking mechanism for institutions to identify risks and act accordingly," acting FDIC Chairman Martin Gruenberg said. FDIC staff said it is not yet clear whether the first of these tests will be held in 2012 or 2013. The timing will depend on the comments received and when the Fed finalizes its December proposal for stress testing the largest banks.

The tests are intended to give banks and regulators a better idea of whether banks can weather a crisis and what steps they may have to take to strengthen their operations. Under Tuesday's proposal, regulators each year would provide banks with stress scenarios in November. The banks would run the tests and report back to regulators in January. Banks would be required to publish the results of the tests 90 days after submitting them to regulators in January. A key difference between this testing regime and what the Fed is required to do for the largest banks is that the Fed itself will run the tests on banks larger than $50 billion. The Fed and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency will also have to issue a proposal for stress testing banks with more than $10 billion in assets for which they are the primary regulators. Tuesday's release only technically cover institutions overseen by the FDIC. Officials said the Fed and OCC proposals will closely mirror what was approved by the FDIC board.

Right now, banks are most focused on the capital tests currently being conducted by the Fed because they will determine whether dividends can be increased this year, a key issue for investors. Banks submitted information to the Fed in early December and the agency plans to inform institutions of the results in March. Also on Tuesday the FDIC approved a final rule that requires insured depository institutions with more than $50 billion in assets to write "living wills" detailing how they can be liquidated if they fail. The final rule made some technical changes to an interim final rule that was already in effect.

CORDRAY DEBUT

Tuesday marked new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Richard Cordray's first FDIC board meeting.


I DOUBT B OF A WILL EVEN MAKE IT THAT FAR....NO MATTER HOW THEY TRY, THEY CAN'T CHANNEL AN AVALANCHE

[Demeter]

16. World Bank Cuts Global Growth Forecast as Euro Region Contracts

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-18/world-bank-cuts-global-growth-outlook-as-europe-threatens-emerging-markets.html

The World Bank cut its global growth forecast by the most in three years, saying that a recession in the euro region threatens to exacerbate a slowdown in emerging markets such as India and Mexico.

The world economy will grow 2.5 percent this year, down from a June estimate of 3.6 percent, the Washington-based institution said. The euro area may contract 0.3 percent, compared with a previous estimate of a 1.8 percent gain. The U.S. growth outlook was cut to 2.2 percent from 2.9 percent.

“Even achieving these much weaker outturns is very uncertain,” the World Bank said in its Global Economic Prospects report released today in Asia and yesterday in the U.S. “The downturn in Europe and weaker growth in developing countries raises the risk that the two developments reinforce one another, resulting in an even weaker outcome.”

China, the world’s second-biggest economy, reported today that foreign direct investment declined in December by the most since July 2009, underscoring the World Bank’s warning that developing economies should “prepare for the worst.” Home prices fell in 52 of 70 cities in December from November, statistics bureau data showed.

Turmoil in European still has the potential to trigger a global financial crisis reminiscent of 2008, according to the World Bank.

[xchrom]

17. oy -- what a morning. petunia mistakenly thought she had guard duty last night.

all night.

i'll need a lot of this today

[Demeter]

23. Ever try one of those bark-suppression collars?

Training a dog to behave is not an affront to its nature...

[xchrom]

27. no, you're right about training a dog.

i haven't tried a one of those -- and i may if she gets habitual with this.

some of this is her being a teenager now -- she has found her stubborn streak, her willful streak, her i know better than you streak.

fortunate they don't last as long as people's do.

you have to stay on them all the time -- but they grow out of it.


*** how's your grandpuppy?

[Demeter]

29. Oh, she's YOUNG

Grandpuppy is all grown up. He's pretty mellow, unless somebody comes to the door. He's got a lot of guard dog in him...I didn't think labs or beagles had that in them.

Certainly not the lab we had...he would only have stopped a burglary by tripping up the burglar as he brought all his toys out.

[xchrom]

33. LOL! Great description!

Petunia only guards against vague things out there some where.

Neither Effie or Petunia bark if some one comes to the door.

[Po_d Mainiac]

41. Confused petunias

I have one blooming....And it ain't being forced under glass.

[xchrom]

43. LOL! i'm not the only one with a confused petunia...

[Demeter]

53. I had a pansy in a pot until it went down to 4F last night

and the snowdrops are now under a bit of snow, in full bloom.

[Po_d Mainiac]

56. let me guess

Its got dark petals.

From personal observations, plants with blossoms that are colored at the low end of the spectrum seem to be very rugged..those at the upper end, not so much.

[Demeter]

57. a nice blue

those siberian pansies, they don't kid around.

[Demeter]

18. Greek Debt Deal Falls Short of What’s Needed to Save Euro

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-20/greek-debt-agreement-falls-far-short-of-what-s-needed-to-save-euro-view.html

At some point, possibly in the next several weeks, Europe will run into a major flaw in its plan to shore up the region’s finances: Some euro-area governments, such as Greece, simply aren’t going to be able to pay their debts. The sooner Europe’s leaders recognize this and take appropriate action, the less expensive the solution will be...This week’s main event in Europe has been a standoff between Greece and its private creditors over the terms of a “voluntary” debt-relief deal. Agreement is crucial to avert a Greek default on a 14.4 billion euro payment due March 20, and to keep open the financing spigot from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. Whatever the outcome of those negotiations, though, it won’t solve Greece’s debt problem. The European Central Bank, the IMF and other official creditors aren’t taking part in the deal, so it will affect only private creditors. They hold about 200 billion euros of Greece’s 338-billion-euro net government debt. In other words, even the 50 percent writedown Greece is seeking will reduce its debt burden by only 100 billion euros, or less than 30 percent.

That’s not enough. Any country’s solvency is a function of its debt load, interest costs, growth rate and fiscal policy. In Greece’s case, assuming an interest rate of 4 percent (the rate it may get out of the debt talks) on its remaining 238 billion euros in debt, and using the IMF’s projections of economic growth, the government would have to run a primary budget surplus (not counting interest payments) of 3.2 percent of gross domestic product indefinitely just to keep its debt burden stable. Don’t count on that happening. Greece has managed to run a primary surplus that large in only six of the past 24 years, when economic growth was much stronger. To meet such a goal now, it would have to reduce its deficit by some 10 billion euros a year, the equivalent of about two-thirds of its spending on social programs.

Portugal, which is not currently in line for debt relief, faces a similarly daunting task. To maintain a stable debt burden, it would have to run a primary surplus of 2 percent of GDP, something it has done in only two of the past 16 years.
The dire state of the two governments’ finances raises a troubling question at a time when German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy are trying to fast- track a new fiscal compact for the 17-nation euro area: How can the agreement, which seeks to toughen budgetary discipline, restore confidence in Europe’s finances if at least two of its signatories are insolvent from day one? It’s possible that Merkel and her ideological soul mates at the ECB are hoping that, by keeping strapped governments dependent on official financing, they’ll have more power to push through austerity measures. Problem is, heavy debt loads are making the budget-cutting measures much more painful than they need to be -- and probably too painful to put in place. The likely result: slower growth, greater dependence on official creditors and bigger losses for European taxpayers down the road. Not to mention the deleterious effect the ongoing uncertainty will have on the finances of core euro-area countries, European banks and ultimately the ECB itself. At any moment, doubts about the euro’s survival could trigger a financial catastrophe.

A quicker and more honest reckoning would stand a better chance of stopping the rot and creating the conditions for a successful fiscal union. We have advocated writing down the debts of Greece and Portugal by 70 percent and 40 percent, respectively, leaving them with the much more realistic task of achieving primary surpluses of about 1 percent of GDP. This can be done only if official creditors take losses alongside their private counterparts. With all euro-area governments on a solvent footing, the ECB could then step in with credible guarantees to recapitalize banks and calm market jitters. All these elements will eventually be needed if the euro is to survive. Enacting them now would dramatically increase the chances of success.

[Demeter]

19. The visible hand

http://www.economist.com/node/21542931

The crisis of Western liberal capitalism has coincided with the rise of a powerful new form of state capitalism in emerging markets, says Adrian Wooldridge

(THE CRISIS OF WESTERN LIBERAL "CAPITALISM" COINCIDED WITH THE MASSIVE FRAUD AND LOOTING THAT WESTERN "CAPITALISTS" UNLEASHED ON THE WORLD)

BEATRICE WEBB grew up as a fervent believer in free markets and limited government. Her father was a self-made railway tycoon and her mother an ardent free-trader. One of her family’s closest friends was Herbert Spencer, the leading philosopher of Victorian liberalism. Spencer took a shine to young Beatrice and treated her to lectures on the magic of the market, the survival of the fittest and the evils of the state. But as Beatrice grew up she began to have doubts. Why should the state not intervene in the market to order children out of chimneys and into schools, or to provide sustenance for the hungry and unemployed or to rescue failing industries? In due course Beatrice became one of the leading architects of the welfare state—and a leading apologist for Soviet communism...The argument about the relative merits of the state and the market that preoccupied young Beatrice has been raging ever since. Between 1900 and 1970 the pro-statists had the wind in their sails. Governments started off by weaving social safety nets and ended up by nationalising huge chunks of the economy. Yet between 1970 and 2000 the free-marketeers made a comeback. Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher started a fashion across the West for privatising state-run industries and pruning the welfare state. The Soviet Union and its outriggers collapsed in ruins.

The era of free-market triumphalism has come to a juddering halt, and the crisis that destroyed Lehman Brothers in 2008 is now engulfing much of the rich world. The weakest countries, such as Greece, have already been plunged into chaos. Even the mighty United States has seen the income of the average worker contract every year for the past three years. The Fraser Institute, a Canadian think-tank, which has been measuring the progress of economic freedom for the past four decades, saw its worldwide “freedom index” rise relentlessly from 5.5 (out of 10) in 1980 to 6.7 in 2007. But then it started to move backwards...The crisis of liberal capitalism has been rendered more serious by the rise of a potent alternative: state capitalism, which tries to meld the powers of the state with the powers of capitalism. It depends on government to pick winners and promote economic growth. But it also uses capitalist tools such as listing state-owned companies on the stockmarket and embracing globalisation. Elements of state capitalism have been seen in the past, for example in the rise of Japan in the 1950s and even of Germany in the 1870s, but never before has it operated on such a scale and with such sophisticated tools. State capitalism can claim the world’s most successful big economy for its camp. Over the past 30 years China’s GDP has grown at an average rate of 9.5% a year and its international trade by 18% in volume terms. Over the past ten years its GDP has more than trebled to $11 trillion. China has taken over from Japan as the world’s second-biggest economy, and from America as the world’s biggest market for many consumer goods. The Chinese state is the biggest shareholder in the country’s 150 biggest companies and guides and goads thousands more. It shapes the overall market by managing its currency, directing money to favoured industries and working closely with Chinese companies abroad.

State capitalism can also claim some of the world’s most powerful companies. The 13 biggest oil firms, which between them have a grip on more than three-quarters of the world’s oil reserves, are all state-backed. So is the world’s biggest natural-gas company, Russia’s Gazprom. But successful state firms can be found in almost any industry. China Mobile is a mobile-phone goliath with 600m customers. Saudi Basic Industries Corporation is one of the world’s most profitable chemical companies. Russia’s Sberbank is Europe’s third-largest bank by market capitalisation. Dubai Ports is the world’s third-largest ports operator. The airline Emirates is growing at 20% a year.


MUCH MORE AT LINK-- MUST READ

[Demeter]

21. Fixing Capitalism Means Taking Power Back From Business (TIME MAGAZINE?!!)

http://business.time.com/2012/01/19/command-and-control/

Newt Gingrich’s latest attack on fellow Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s leadership of a private-equity firm goes to the heart of today’s biggest debate in politics and economics. “If we identify capitalism with rich guys looting companies, we’re going to have a very hard time protecting it,” he said. Protecting—or, more particularly, fixing—­capitalism will be a big topic at the World Economic Forum in Davos this month. With the global economy still sputtering and governments unable to successfully address big issues like income inequality, unemployment and growing debt, it’s a subject that’s front and center not only in the U.S. but also throughout Europe, Asia and the rest of the world.

A key part of fixing capitalism will be reconciling the large and growing imbalances between the public and private sector. National governments have, over the past several decades, seen the most basic pillars of their power erode. Globalization has undermined their efforts to manage their borders. The ability to control their own currency has been lost for all but a handful of major powers. Fewer than two dozen have the ability to sustainably project force beyond their borders. Meanwhile, corporations play nation-states against one another as they venue-shop for more attractive tax or regulatory regimes. This arbitrage undermines nations’ ability to enforce their own laws. Indeed, the rise of big stateless corporations, which now rival many countries in terms of ­economic and political clout, poses special new challenges to governments.

When early corporations were established by royal charters almost a millennium ago, there was no mistaking their purpose. They had been created by the state to serve its interests. But over the centuries, they took advantage of their special status, which allowed them to achieve enormous scale and buy political favor. The result: They helped shape the development of laws that further tipped the balance of power in their favor. Corporations have morphed from legal entities designed to ensure an enterprise could survive the death of its owners to institutions possessing more rights than people. The 14th Amendment, established in the late 19th century, granted citizens equal protection under the law. Yet most of the times it has been invoked since its adoption were on behalf of corporate rights. Corporations have used the 14th Amendment to do things like block taxes levied “without due process” and define advertising copy as protected free speech. More recently, the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark 2010 decision in favor of the conservative organization Citizens United—which relaxed campaign-finance limits on corporations and labor unions and spawned so-called super PACs (political action ­committees)—equated money spent on political campaigns with constitutionally protected speech. The practical effect has been that those with money can crowd the airwaves with their message.

The biggest companies—the Walmarts and Exxons of the world—have financial resources and political reach that rival all but a few dozen states. Even the 2,000th largest company on the planet is at the center of more economic activity than scores of small countries like Mongolia or Haiti. As borderless supercitizens, global corporations have changed the international order, yet our rules and approaches to governance remain the same. We have also lost sight of the philosophical ideas that historically gave national governments their authority. The current argument that larger government impinges on rather than protects or advances individual liberties is a far cry from the ideas that fueled England’s Glorious Revolution and the American Revolution. It ignores the fact that the void created by smaller government is often not filled by “liberty.” When matters like the global environment or regulation of derivatives trading are left entirely to market forces, for instance, outcomes tend to serve the most powerful because markets neither have a conscience nor do they ensure opportunity. Rather, they seek efficiency, and efficiency loves scale, and enterprises that grow to scale become elephants stamping out opportunities around them. This was well understood by the father of capitalism, Adam Smith. He condemned the abuses of the megacompanies of his day, like the British East India Co., calling them “nuisances in every respect,” since the monopolies they fostered inevitably led to profit-destroying corruption. We’ve seen imbalances between commerce, government and other powerful institutions before. In each case, new technologies that increased communication and travel and changed the ways products were made disrupted the status quo. It happened during the Thirty Years’ War in Europe, when battles between church and state resulted in today’s world of nation-states. It happened during the Enlightenment, as new technologies of mass communication linked and elevated average people, enabling them to challenge monarchies. Later it helped undo the mercantile system and colonialism. Each of these phases was marked by unrest and uncertainty. And each came with philosophical ­revolutions, leading to the development of ideas like separation of church and state, the notion that the legitimacy of the state is linked to the consent of the governed, and the ideological contest between socialism and capitalism. It is still happening. High-speed transportation has made it possible to produce goods anywhere, communications technologies have created 24-hour global markets, and markets in cyberspace have moved beyond the reach of national tax laws or regulators.

Today’s contest is not so much between capitalism and another ideology but between competing forms of capitalism...

PARSING THE DIFFERENT FORMS OF RAPE

[Ghost Dog]

40. THE MASSIVE FRAUD AND LOOTING THAT WESTERN "CAPITALISTS" UNLEASHED ON THE WORLD

has been eliminated as a topic of polite conversation by the msm and is therefore unspeak and preferably unthink.

[Demeter]

54. Oh

sorry....

[xchrom]

20. Working and Poor in the USA

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/01/19-4

“Our nation, so richly endowed with natural resources and with a capable and industrious population, should be able to devise ways and means of insuring to all our able-bodied men and women, a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work.” Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1937

Millions of people in the US work and are still poor. Here are eight points that show why the US needs to dedicate itself to making work pay.

One. How many people work and are still poor?

In 2011, the US Department of Labor reported at least 10 million people worked and were still below the unrealistic official US poverty line, an increase of 1.5 million more than the last time they checked. The US poverty line is $18,530 for a mom and two kids. Since 2007 the numbers of working poor have been increasing. About 7 percent of all workers and 4 percent of all full-time workers earn wages that leave them below the poverty line.

Two. What kinds of jobs do the working poor have?

One third of the working poor, over 3 million people, work in the service industry. Workers in other occupations are also poor: 16 percent of those in farming; 11 percent in construction; and 11 percent in sales.

Three. Which workers are most likely to be working and still poor?

Women workers are more likely to be poor than men. African American and Hispanic workers are about twice as likely to be poor as whites. College graduates have a 2 percent poverty rate while workers without a high school diploma have a poverty rate 10 times higher at 20 percent.

[Demeter]

22. Germany Mulls European Union-Wide Stamp Tax to Win U.K. Support

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-19/germany-mulls-european-union-wide-stamp-tax-to-win-u-k-support.html

German Chancellor Angela Merkel may revise her call for a financial transaction tax by backing a U.K.-style, European Union-wide stamp duty on share purchases to lure Prime Minister David Cameron back into the European fold.

Germany sees adoption of a stamp duty as a means to win U.K. support for a levy that covers the whole EU, German Economy Minister Philipp Roesler said today in an advance copy of an interview with the Rheinische Post newspaper. Germany has a “special interest” in having Britain involved, he said.

“In the context of the current negotiations, special attention will certainly be paid to talks with the British side,” German Deputy Finance Minister Hartmut Koschyk said in an interview in Berlin. Germany wants an agreement to include all 27 EU member states, he said.

An EU-wide tax on share transactions, like that in force in the U.K., would help Merkel appease voters frustrated with the role of banks in the financial crisis and end a conflict with her Free Democratic Party coalition partner, which has resisted a levy in the EU that doesn’t include the U.K.

[Demeter]

24. ECB mulling alternatives to bond-buy plan

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/17/ecb-nowotny-idUSL6E8CH0ZG20120117

The European Central Bank is exploring alternatives to its controversial bond-purchase programme (LIKE WHAT? NATIONAL SUICIDE?) but has yet to decide on any replacement policy tool, ECB Governing Council member Ewald Nowotny told a German website in comments published on Tuesday. Nowotny, who is also Austria's national central bank chief, said there was scepticism on the policymaking Council about the bond-buy programme "because we fear the market imperfections that we want to correct with this could emerge in another area...We are discussing possible alternatives. But this discussion is not so far developed that we can dispense with the SMP (bond-buying programme)," Nowotny told the Wall Street Journal's German website. He declined to say what direction the talks were heading in, adding only: "That is a discussion that encompasses the whole monetary policy spectrum."

"The need for some type of intervention is widely recognised," he said.

[Demeter]

58. European banks prepare to shrink

http://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2012/01/european-banks-prepare-to-shrink/

Although the headlines are quiet at the moment there is still quite a bit occurring behind the scenes in Europe. Obviously everyone is still waiting for a resolution of the Greek situation and that story is changing by the hour...As I have been reporting over the last few weeks there is mounting pressure on the European banks re-capitalise as to meet the requirement of core tier 1 capital ratio of 9 percent over risk weighted assets by June 30, 2012. This is now coming to a head with banks required to deliver a “credible” plan to European banking authority as to how this is to be achieved by Friday. Banks have several options to find the capital required. They can retain earnings, shrink their loan book, convert hybrid debt into equity, buy back their own debt, sell assets, cut expenses (including staff salaries ) and/or cut dividend payments to shareholders.

The authorities appear to be fairly unimpressed with two institutions in particular:

European regulators are convinced that two of the continent’s banks will fail to produce credible plans to plug capital deficits by Friday’s deadline, exposing both to the risk of full or partial nationalisation.

Officials said that it looked “almost inevitable” that a fresh injection of state funds would be needed at Italy’s Monte dei Paschi di Siena and Germany’s Commerzbank. “These are the big cases,” said one.

Since that report was released Commerzbank have announced that they believe they will reach the required capital limited without additional state funds:

The company anticipates boosting its Core Tier 1 capital or, trimming equivalently its risk-weighted assets, by approximately 6.3 billion euros by June 30, 2012. Commerzbank also said it will continue to guarantee the supply of credit, in particular for Germany’s Mittelstand, or SME business, as well as for its large corporate customers and institutional clients.

Commerzbank said that an estimated 57 percent of the requirement was met by year-end 2011 as a result of Core Tier 1 relief amounting to 1.6 billion euros and also retained fourth-quarter earnings of about 1.2 billion euros.

Martin Blessing, chairman of the board of Managing Directors of the bank stated, “Within just a few weeks, through to the initiated measures we have already reduced our Core Tier 1 capital requirement by around EUR 3.0 billion by year-end 2011, and thus already fulfilled almost 60% of the EBA capital requirement. In the coming five and a half months we intend to decrease the need for Core Tier 1 capital by up to a further EUR 3.3 billion by means of the implementation of a number of measures.”

Those measures include shrinking risk-weighted assets, halting all new loans aside from clients doing business in Germany and Poland, suspending all new business in certain operational areas, retaining earnings and tightening up the cost structure including sacking staff.

What isn’t mentioned in the article, but I suspect is happening, is that Commerzbank, like other European banks, is using the liquidity provided by the LTRO to continue to re-purchased its own financial instruments, as it was doing in December:

Commerzbank AG bought back more hybrid capital from investors than the company had initially planned as Germany’s second-largest lender fights to bolster capital and avoid a second taxpayer-funded rescue.

Commerzbank will spend about 643 million euros ($835.2 million) to repurchase a nominal 1.27 billion euros of securities, the Frankfurt-based company said today. That’s more than the 600 million euros the bank said on Dec. 5 that it intended to spend. The transaction will boost core Tier 1 capital, a measure of financial strength, by more than 700 million euros, according to the company’s statement.

As I mentioned yesterday, this process is all well and good for the banks (and their share price ) in the short term, but it is seriously impeding the recovery of the real economy as these banks become “zombified” and close down their loan books.

This exact message was noted by Moody’s today in a report titled “Euro Area Debt Crisis Weakens Bank Credit Profiles” (sorry requires login):

To lower actual and perceived risks, many banks have begun to reduce sovereign and interbank exposures, in particular non-domestically, as discussed in more detail below. Bank deleveraging raises the prospect of a destabilising feedback process: bank asset sales can cause the market for certain bank assets, including sovereign debt, to become stressed if these sales create excess supply, which can force further selling, resulting in deepening market stress. Furthermore, if banks extend less credit to governments, businesses and households, this can curb economic activity, with adverse implications for borrowers’ payment ability and ultimately for bank asset quality and solvency.

Making the threat of bank deleveraging particularly relevant, banks play a larger role as financial intermediaries in the euro area than, for example, in the US. The assets of all euro area banks amounted to the equivalent of $27.8 trillion at year-end 2010, about twice the size of all US banks ($14.3 trillion). At the same time, bond and equity markets are much larger in the US than in the euro area.

Although, as noted by Moody’s, these actions will ultimately lead to a deterioration in asset quality and stability because they will add to the already deflationary pressure of government austerity, that certainly hasn’t stopped banks taking these actions.

GOOD COMMENT SECTION AT LINK

[Ghost Dog]

44. In that case, the Squid's fix is in.

In the United Kingdom, stamp duty is a form of tax charged on instruments (that is, written documents), and requires a physical stamp to be attached to or impressed upon the instrument in question.[1][2][3] The more modern versions of the tax no longer require a physical stamp.

The scope of stamp duty has been reduced dramatically in recent years. Apart from transfers of shares and securities, the issue of bearer instruments and certain transactions involving partnerships, stamp duty was largely abolished in the UK from 1 December 2003. "Stamp duty land tax" (SDLT), a new transfer tax derived from stamp duty, was introduced for land transactions from 1 December 2003. "Stamp duty reserve tax" (SDRT) was introduced on agreements to transfer uncertificated shares and other securities in 1986, and with the growth of paperless transactions SDRT rather than stamp duty now applies to most transfers of shares and securities...

... Aside from an exemption for 'qualifying intermediaries' such as market makers at large banks,[5] Stamp Duty Reserve Tax (SDRT) was introduced under the Finance Act 1986 to ensure that a form of tax equivalent to stamp duty would continue to be payable on the transfer of uncertificated shares. At that time, it was expected that the TAURUS share trading system would come into operation. In the event, SDRT was adapted for the change to trading in uncertificated shares in CREST, and is charged on agreements to transfer shares and other securities. SDRT is not a stamp tax, but a self-assessed transfer tax which is usually collected automatically by stock market participants (such as brokers) when a transaction takes place...

/... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stamp_duty_in_the_United_Kingdom#Stamp_duty_reserve_tax

... Because the UK tax code provides exemptions from the Stamp Duty Reserve Tax for all financial intermediaries, including market makers, investment banks and other members of the LSE,[81] and due to the strong growth of the contracts for difference (CFD) industry, which provides UK investors with untaxed substitutes for LSE stocks, according to the Oxera (2007) report,[77] more than 70% percent of the total UK stock market volume, including the entire institutional volume remained (in 2005) exempt from the Stamp Duty, in contrast to the common perception of this tax as a "tax on bank transactions" or a "tax on speculation". On the other hand, as much as 40% of the Stamp Duty revenues come from taxing foreign residents,[82] because the tax is "chargeable whether the transaction takes place in the UK or overseas, and whether either party is resident in the UK or not."[80]

/... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobin_tax#United_Kingdom_experience_with_stock_transaction_tax_.28Stamp_Duty.29

[Demeter]

25. U.S. losing high-tech manufacturing jobs to Asia

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/us-losing-high-tech-manufacturing-jobs-to-asia/2012/01/17/gIQA9P1S6P_story.html

The United States lost more than a quarter of its high-tech manufacturing jobs during the past decade as U.S.-based multinational companies placed a growing percentage of their research-and-development operations overseas, the National Science Board reported Tuesday.

NEED I POST MORE?

[DemReadingDU]

32. video: Dismantling Detroit

1/19/12 Dismantling Detroit By HEIDI EWING and RACHEL GRADY

A three-part series of videos produced by independent filmmakers, who are supported in part by the non-profit Sundance Institute.

Part 1
We chose to focus our cameras on Detroit out of a gut feeling that this city — often heralded as the birthplace of the middle class — may well be a harbinger of things to come for the rest of the country.
One of the men, who had come up from Kentucky to scrap after losing a job in a coal mine, stands out in our minds. Taking a short break from the action, he looked up and said with disgust, “All that’s left here are the remnants of what was.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/19/opinion/dismantling-detroit.html


Part 2 & 3 are coming next week

[Demeter]

34. I was born and raised in Detroit

and although I was young when we left, I mourn the loss every time I go downtown.

[DemReadingDU]

36. It isn't just Detroit, it is what is going on everywhere in America

The once great factory cities and towns, are mostly gone.

Just about everything that we use on a daily basis, that used to be Made in U.S.A., are made elsewhere.

[Ghost Dog]

45. In a parallel universe you could be rebuilding all that starting now, but using a much cleaner

mindset and methods.

[DemReadingDU]

50. Yes we could, we should rebuild

I'm sure lessons have been learned, we could do it again, even better. But I don't see anyone rebuilding that off-shored those factories that made our clothing, shoes, appliances, towels, toys, etc. etc.

[xchrom]

28. Hey Washington! We're Still 10 Million Jobs Short

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/01/19-12

The U.S. recession officially ended in June 2009, but most Americans don't feel like we are in a recovery. That's because it's been a weak recovery, with the size of the economy barely bigger today than it was four years ago, when the recession started.

Since America is a rich country, it is not growth itself that matters most but employment and, of course, the distribution of income. And the employment numbers are just terrible.

The simplest measure is the percentage of the working-age population that is employed. That peaked at 63.4 percent in December 2006. It plummeted to a low of 58.2 percent last July and is hardly different now - 58.5 percent in the latest figures.

What this means is that we need about 10 million jobs to get back to full employment.

[DemReadingDU]

39. Audio: Who makes all my crap?

1/6/12 This American Life: Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory

Mike Daisey was a self-described "worshipper in the cult of Mac." Then he saw some photos from a new iPhone, taken by workers at the factory where it was made. Mike wondered: Who makes all my crap? He traveled to China to find out.

Mike Daisey performs an excerpt that was adapted for radio from his one-man show "The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs." A lifelong Apple superfan, Daisey sees some photos online from the inside of a factory that makes iPhones, starts to wonder about the people working there, and flies to China to meet them.

click for the link to the audio...
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/454/mr-daisey-and-the-apple-factory



After listening to this hour program, you will never again look at that techie gadget with such affection.

[xchrom]

42. +1

[Demeter]

31. Supreme Court holds the fate of Medicaid

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0112/71570.html

Two cases before the Supreme Court have the potential to effectively do what Republican lawmakers have tried and failed: transform Medicaid into a block grant program for states with few enforceable federal rules about how they provide health coverage for the poor. That outcome may not be the most likely scenario. But legal experts say no one can predict what the high court will do — particularly because many were surprised that the Supreme Court agreed to consider the Medicaid portion of the big multistate challenge to President Barack Obama’s health reform law in the first place.

Should the courts rule against the Obama administration and back the states’ contention that Medicaid expansion under the health reform law is unconstitutional, it would severely limit Washington’s ability to tell the states: If you want the federal Medicaid funds, you have to follow the federal Medicaid rules. And that outcome — federal money but few federal strings attached — would be much like the block grant approach that Republicans have periodically attempted, most recently in last year’s House budget...last week, the 26 states challenging the law filed a brief arguing that Congress exceeded constitutional limits by telling states how to run their Medicaid programs. The health law requires expansion of Medicaid to populations not previously covered starting in 2014, although the feds are picking up the tab in the first years and most of the cost for several years thereafter...

The second Supreme Court case, arising from a dispute over California Medicaid payment rates to health care providers, could give states even more latitude to run their programs by limiting individuals’ right to argue in court that a state Medicaid policy violates federal law...Douglas v. Independent Living Center of Southern California, was argued in October. The court will decide whether individual Medicaid beneficiaries and providers can sue California for cutting payment rates to the point that they say violates federal rules.

Should the court make sweeping rulings in both cases, legal experts say federal law will no longer have much power to bind state decisions on Medicaid, including who’s eligible, what benefits are covered and how much to pay providers. In short, it would become a lot like a block grant. Under that scenario, “the program is fried,” said Washington and Lee law professor Tim Jost, who argued for upholding the health reform law’s Medicaid provision in a recent New England Journal of Medicine essay. “It ceases to be Medicaid as we know it.”...“Medicaid could go the way of the dodo,” agreed Harvard Law School’s I. Glenn Cohen, author of another NEJM piece that argued the opposite — that the court should block Medicaid expansion...Jost, Cohen and other experts pointed out that the Supreme Court has ample reason to avoid such an outcome. The court has never before struck down anything like the Medicaid expansion and doing so could cause a legal earthquake that could extend well beyond health care, upending the legal foundation of laws like the Clean Air Act and No Child Left Behind. Yet most court observers were surprised that the justices agreed to hear the states’ Medicaid claim. No lower court had agreed with the states’ argument, and the relevant legal questions seemed settled. So another surprise next June can’t be ruled out.

MORE

[xchrom]

37. Draghi: Europe's master of illusion

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/NA21Dj02.html

We may only be a couple of trading weeks into the calendar year, but the competition for the Man of the Year for 2012 may already be over. With a breathtaking display of chutzpah and impossible acts of bravado befitting an alumnus of Goldman Sachs, the new president of the European Central Bank (ECB), Mario Draghi, may already have saved the eurozone and with it, the global economy.

For that is what both the bond and equity markets are telling us, now that a series of bond issues in Europe have gone very well, with even bankrupt Spain raising new money for less than 5% this week.

The proximate cause of this would be the ECB three-year loans to European banks (which attracted over 489 billion euros, or over
US$600 billion, of demand in December) and a second tranche next month is expected to dole out another 400 billion euros in long-term liquidity to European banks who are unable to borrow in the markets.

The flood of liquidity engineered by the ECB has more than offset any investor concerns arising from a set of dreaded set of credit rating cuts engineered by S&P (including the much-prized triple-A rating of France).

[xchrom]

48. Has Portugal's debt default clock begun to tick?

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/01/20/eurozone-portugal-idUKL6E8CJ48D20120120

Jan 20 (Reuters) - Portugal clinched a deal on ambitious labour market reforms this week and carried out its biggest debt sale since seeking a 78-billion-euro bailout, but the challenges for the second-most risky country in the euro zone may be shifting up a gear.

Undermining the glow of Lisbon's achievements is the rapidly rising market concern that Portugal is the next potential candidate to default in the euro zone after Greece -- a point that is fast becoming clear as Athens approaches the end of its debt restructuring talks.

"Portugal is obviously the next in the line of fire," said Michael Cirami, a portfolio manager at U.S. investment managers Eaton Vance. "Portugal is unlikely to go unnoticed whether they strike a deal or not (on Greek debt restructuring)."

The concerns were clearly borne out this week as Portugal's bond yields rose virtually without interruption, to all-time highs, despite the issuance of 2.5 billion euros of short-term treasury bills on Wednesday at slightly lower yields.

[xchrom]

49. GE revenue lower than expected, Europe a worry

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/01/20/uk-ge-idUKTRE80J0RY20120120

(Reuters) - General Electric Co's (GE.N) fourth-quarter revenue fell short of Wall Street expectations, with Europe's weakening economy and weak sales of appliances as the main culprits.

The largest U.S. conglomerate expects a volatile year but it plans to expand in emerging markets and cut back in Europe. Its shares fell 2.2 percent in premarket trading.

Its profit came in 1 cent per share above Wall Street's forecasts.

"We're concerned about the revenue miss," said Oliver Pursche, president of Gary Goldberg Financial Services in Suffern, New York. "That's really what we're focused on this earnings season. We're not so concerned about being a penny above or below expectations, because that can be handled with accounting."

[xchrom]

51. PRECIOUS-Gold eases as euro rally fades

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/01/20/markets-precious-idUKL3E8CK2BD20120120

LONDON, Jan 20 (Reuters) - Gold eased on Friday, tracking a dip in the euro as some investors cashed in gains in the single currency after a short-covering rally, and as markets awaited the outcome of talks between Greece and its creditors.

Stocks and other commodities also weakened as appetite for assets seen as higher risk faded.

Spot gold was down 0.3 percent at $1,652.16 an ounce at 1506 GMT, while U.S. gold futures for February delivery were down $1.5 at $1,653 an ounce. Gold has had a strong start to the year, rising more than 5 percent so far after a sharp price drop in December.

Low interest rates, strong physical demand from key Asian markets and concerns over the both the inflation outlook and sovereign debt are all lending support, but analysts say the precious metal could face some tough headwinds this year.

[Demeter]

59. Lagarde Warns on Fiscal Cuts Before Davos

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-20/lagarde-joins-warning-on-fiscal-cuts-as-financial-leaders-head-to-davos.html

International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde joined world financial and trade organization chiefs in warning policy makers gathering in Davos, Switzerland next week against fiscal cuts that jeopardize growth. “The world faces significant and urgent challenges that weigh heavily on prospects for future growth,” Lagarde and members of the Global Issues Group of the World Economic Forum said in a statement. “We worry about decelerating global growth and rising uncertainty, high unemployment” and a potential shift to protectionist policies, they said....While governments need to stem contagion in Europe and restore confidence in financial institutions to end the sovereign-debt crisis and spur expansion, they should manage fiscal consolidation to promote rather than reduce growth prospects, the group said. Its members also include World Bank President Robert Zoellick, World Trade Organization Director- General Pascal Lamy and the heads of eight other multilateral and regional institutions.

Policy makers and business leaders will meet at the World Economic Forum starting on Jan. 25 after the World Bank cut its global growth forecast this month by the most in three years, saying that a recession in the euro region threatens to exacerbate a slowdown in emerging markets. The IMF proposed this week to raise its lending capacity by as much as $500 billion to insulate the world against any worsening of Europe’s debt crisis. Lagarde and the heads of the institutions highlighted an expanded role of the European Central Bank as one option for helping resolve the region’s crisis. “Different options are being considered for stemming contagion in the euro area,” the Global Issues Group said. “They have involved greater recourse to the European Central Bank’s balance sheet and require a strengthening of the European Financial Stability Fund. Governance reforms are needed to offset the risk of moral hazard involved in short-term support packages and to ensure longer-term fiscal discipline.”

The ECB’s decision to offer banks unlimited three-year loans and the central bank’s purchase of sovereign bonds helped balloon its balance sheet to a record 2.73 trillion euros ($3.5 trillion) in December. In the short term, confidence in financial institutions can be restored by recapitalizing banks quickly where necessary and ensuring that deleveraging by lenders doesn’t impair trade and project finance, the Global Issues Group said...Banks are hoarding the European Central Bank’s record 489 billion-euro injection into the banking system, thwarting attempts by policy makers to avert a credit crunch in the region. Almost all of the money loaned to 523 euro-area lenders last month wound up back on deposit at the Frankfurt-based central bank instead of pouring into the financial system, according to estimates by Barclays Capital based on ECB data.

Governments are urging European banks to keep lending to companies and individuals while requiring them to raise an additional 114.7 billion euros of core capital by June to weather a deepening sovereign-debt crisis. Instead of raising equity, most lenders across Europe have vowed to meet capital rules by trimming at least 950 billion euros from their balance sheets over the next two years, either by selling assets or not renewing credit lines, according to data compiled by Bloomberg...

[Demeter]

61. Pretty Soon, I'm going to start fabricating news reports of good news

I'll call it satire, and make a fortune. The 1% will read it for laughs, the 99% for secret plans for destroying the 1%....

[Demeter]

62. Speaking of which, I need a Theme for the Weekend

I was thinking of influenza, but if you have a better one, stop me before it's too late.

[Ghost Dog]

63. How about Stoicism, by way of an antidote?

Stoicism (Greek ????????ό? ) is a school of Hellenistic philosophy founded in Athens by Zeno of Citium in the early 3rd century BC. The Stoics taught that destructive emotions resulted from errors in judgment, and that a sage, or person of "moral and intellectual perfection," would not suffer such emotions.[1]

Stoics were concerned with the active relationship between cosmic determinism and human freedom, and the belief that it is virtuous to maintain a will (called prohairesis) that is in accord with nature. Because of this, the Stoics presented their philosophy as a way of life, and they thought that the best indication of an individual's philosophy was not what a person said but how he behaved.[2]

Later Stoics, such as Seneca and Epictetus, emphasized that because "virtue is sufficient for happiness," a sage was immune to misfortune. This belief is similar to the meaning of the phrase 'stoic calm', though the phrase does not include the "radical ethical" Stoic views that only a sage can be considered truly free, and that all moral corruptions are equally vicious.[1]

From its founding, Stoic doctrine was a popular and durable philosophy,[citation needed] with a following throughout Greece and the Roman Empire, including the Emperor Marcus Aurelius, until the closing of all philosophy schools in 529 AD by order of the Emperor Justinian I, who perceived their pagan character as at odds with the Christian faith.[3][4]..

/... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoicism

For the Stoics nothing passes unexplained. There's a reason for everything in Nature. They believed there is an active "force" which is everywhere coextensive with matter. The Stoics believed that there was something acting within them — as they put it — "a spirit deeply infused, germinating and developing as from a seed in the heart of each separate thing that exists." ...

... Out of their cosmology the Stoics developed their ethics — which focused on Virtue. They believed Virtue to be the law that governed the Universe. For them, that which Reason (God/Logos) ordained must be accepted as binding upon the "particle of reason which is in each one of us." In turn, human law comes into existence when persons recognize this obligation — hence justice, responsibility, and freedom revolved around this obligation to (Reason).

The Stoics expressed these ethics further into the ideas of community. The individual must recognize the "society of rational beings of which he is a member, and subordinate his own ends to the ends and needs of this society" — the city of Zeus.

This city of Zeus was the ideal cosmopolis. In this city, the Stoics believed all is ordained by reason — working intelligently. The citizens exist for the sake of one another, working towards contributing towards one another's good. Such intercourse would find expression in justice, in friendship, in family and political life.

More specifically — in their own times — the Stoics boldly and bravely declared there was no difference "between Greek and barbarian, between male and female, and bond and free." All persons were members of "one body as partaking in reason."

/... http://www.novaroma.org/via_romana/stoicism.html

Or, did you already cover this?

[AnneD]

65. Meh...

as a Nurse I gotta go with pandemics. The reading and study of them have been an interest of mine for a long time. Infact, the essay I wrote for my Micro was so good, the proff let me cost for the year. Said it was PhD thesis material. Too bad I lost it in one of my moves but I compared the Bubonic Plague, the Potatoe Famine, and the Spanish Flu and the changes that they caused to the social and political structures (or The little bug that could-and did!).

The last one I followed was the Avian Flu. I picked up on it when it was a few cases in China. I followed it to Toronto. Had a Nurse e-mail bud that got stuck in one of the hospitals. We corresponded through out. It was amazing the difference from her experiences and what they were telling us. We dodged the bullet on that one. I am convienced it was because Canada had a better health care system. If it had hit here, if would have been worse. But instead of learning a valuable lesson. We just got smug. Next time we won't be so lucky.

Did you know the H1N1 was diagnosed and first called in by a School Nurse in NY. Her quick action in calling the Health Dept saved untold numbers of folks. It was caught early.

[DemReadingDU]

66. Sometimes it's difficult to know what to believe

While I believe there could be a real risk of pandemics, sometimes the government, with pharma, hype unnecessary panic to get people to spend money to buy excess prescriptions and flu shots.

[Ghost Dog]

67. That's interesting.

'Just' epidemics too.

[Fuddnik]

69. How about inventions?

Assholes like Mitt Romney, who were born with a silver spoon in their eye, is what inspired someone to invent this contraption.

on edit: I said his eye, because he's too clueless to find his mouth.