3/16/08 Derivative and Counter-party Exposures
Bloomberg noted the median price in Southern California dropped a record 18% from a year earlier to $408,000. The median price paid for a Bay Area home was $548,000, down from $620,000 in February of last year. More than a third of the existing homes that sold in February in Southern California had been foreclosed upon at some point since the beginning of last year… In some parts of Southern California, ‘there’s virtually no activity going on,’ DataQuick analyst John Karevoll said… ‘Right now the only activity we can really monitor is this noisy, distressed stuff.’”
According to AMG Data Services, for the week ended Mar 12, - Equity Fund Outflows -$1.4 Bil; Taxable Bond Fund Inflows $1.3 Bil
xETFs - Equity Fund Outflows -$2.7 Bil; Taxable Bond Fund Inflows $484 Mil
Mar 5 - Equity Fund Outflows -$1.8 Bil; Taxable Bond Fund Inflows $2.9 Bil
xETFs - Equity Fund Outflows -$1.1 Bil; Taxable Bond Fund Inflows $2.5 Bil.
Doug Noland: "I found the opening question from this afternoon’s Bear Stearns conference call quite telling: “What is your current gross notional non-exchange traded derivative exposure?” The executive’s response - “To be honest with you, I don’t know this number off the top of my head…” - was not comforting. But to be fair, the company’s derivative obligations are not today the most pressing issue facing management. It is, however, a deep concern for an increasingly panicked marketplace. The Bear Stearns funding crisis certainly brings somewhat to a head the market’s festering worries with regard to the daisy-chain of derivative and counter-party exposures, liquidity risk, and a complete lack of transparency. Bear Stearns’ management was quick to blame “false rumors and innuendo” for the funding crisis. Yet, how sound are the underpinnings for Bear Stearns, the U.S. Credit system, or the markets overall when market chatter can have such destabilizing effects?...The Fed is in a real quagmire here. Because of the “daisy-chain” nature of contemporary risk intermediation (specifically in the derivatives and securities financing marketplaces), a failure these days in one of any number of institutions would quickly reverberate throughout the entire (frail) system. As such, today virtually any player of significant presence in the derivatives and/or “repo” markets is likely to be perceived by the Fed as “too big to fail...At this point, it should be apparent that rate cuts are destabilizing the system. They not only damage Federal Reserve credibility, they are battering confidence in the dollar and U.S. financial assets more generally. With the financial crisis having reached the “core” of the U.S. Credit system and the currency markets having turned “disorderly,” we’re now on Dollar Crisis Watch. One of my greatest fears has always been an unwieldy dislocation in the currency derivatives market."
Peter Schiff: " The real estate bubble allowed borrowers to leverage themselves to the hilt using inflated home values as collateral. However, now that the bubble has burst, mortgage balances far exceed current property values. It is a trillion dollar time bomb that no one can possibly defuse."
Come Monday morning, we should see a deal for Bear Stearns. In my view, it is probable that 2 buyers will split the pie. My guess might be JP Morgan and Barclays.
You have to love the government. They send out letters saying you can expect your tax refund shortly. That tops the check is in the mail.
George Ure: "A simple reality check on gold's upper limit comes from a visit to the Minneapolis Fed site where you can plug in the momentary $850 high of gold in 1980 and see what the equivalent price today would be, thanks to the Fed's printing money faster than actual GDP growth: $2,224..
By the same token, there's a historical 16:1 relationship between silver and gold. With gold's close over $1000 this week, a quick punch of the calculator says that today silver prices at its historical 16:1 relationship would price silver at $62.50 - and if applied to gold at $2,224.03, then a case could be made for $140 silver."
In February, real earnings were down 0.8 percent from a year earlier.
The White House said on Saturday Bush would meet members of the President's Working Group on Financial Markets on Monday. The working group is led by U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and also includes Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke as well as the heads of the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc and J.C. Flowers & Co. are interested in buying Bear Stearns Cos., the New York Times reported, citing unnamed people briefed on the talks.
CNN has confirmed that Barack Obama won the Texas caucuses with 38 convention delegates, compared to 29 for Clinton. The Texas primary is a complicated, two-step process. Clinton won more delegates than Obama in the popular-vote portion, 65 to 61. With his likely caucus-delegate haul, looks like Obama won the overall statewide delegate lead, 99 to 94 -- or once superdelegate endorsements are factored in, 109 to 106.
Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama built on his win in January’s Iowa caucuses with a strong showing Saturday at the state’s 99 county conventions, where thousands of Democrats gathered to take the next step in picking delegates to the party’s national convention in August.
With 2,132 of the 2,500 delegates to district and state conventions chosen, the state party said Obama had won 52.1 percent. He was followed by Hillary Clinton at 31.5 percent and John Edwards at 16 percent.
Obama’s campaign said Saturday the strong showing would be enough for him to claim an additional seven pledged delegates, boosting his estimated total in Iowa to 23, up from 16 the night of the caucuses.
According to the NY Times DealBook, the private equity firm Providence Equity Partners reached a settlement Friday with Wachovia, one of the banks financing its purchase of Clear Channel Communication’s television unit, helping clear the way for the radio broadcaster’s larger sale to two other buyout firms. Providence will now pay $1.1 billion for the 56-station unit, down from the original $1.225 billion price tag, Clear Channel said in a statement. But Clear Channel will add $80 million in working capital to the deal, effectively lowering the price to $1.02 billion, according to people briefed on the matter. In return, Wachovia will drop a lawsuit it had filed in a North Carolina state court against its client, Providence.
Saturday, March 15, 2008
Friday, March 14, 2008
Gold and the Dollar
3/15/08 Gold And The Dollar
Gold futures soared to a record high of $1,007.30 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange Friday, as the dollar hit new all-time lows against the euro and the Swiss franc.
The dollar index was at 71.658, down from 72.047 in London earlier Friday. The euro was trading at $1.5672, up from $1.5566 and the pound was at $2.0375, up from $2.0292 in London earlier. The dollar bought 99.63 yen, down from 100.54 yen in London.
Citigroup Inc. plans to shed hundreds of billions of dollars worth of assets to reorganize the firm, The Wall Street Journal reported on its Web site Friday, citing an analyst meeting with Citi Chief Executive Vikram Pandit.
Bear Stearns said it is working with J.P. Morgan on permanent financing or "other alternatives."
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. said Friday that it has saved U.S. consumers more than $1 billion with its $4 prescription plan. Dr. John Agwunobi, senior vice president and president of health and wellness at the retailing giant, noted that the plan had further-reaching implications because many of Wal-Mart's competitors cut their prescription prices as well.
Consumer price inflation across the 15 nations that make up the European single currency rose at an annual pace of 3.3% in February, Eurostat reported Friday, revising the figure up from a preliminary February reading of 3.2% to an all-time high.
The United States is in a recession that could be "substantially more severe" than recent ones, National Bureau of Economic Research President Martin Feldstein said on Friday. "The situation is very bad, the situation is getting worse, and the risks are that it could get very bad," Feldstein said in a speech at the Futures Industry Association meeting in Boca Raton, Florida. "There's no doubt that this year and next year are going to be very difficult years."
Moody's Investors Service Friday downgraded Washington Mutual Inc.'s senior unsecured rating to Baa3 from Baa2 and its long-term deposit rating to Baa2 from Baa1. WaMu's bank financial strength rating of C- and short term rating of Prime-2 were affirmed. Moody's has a negative outlook on all Washington Mutual entities.
The March series of calls and puts expire March 21 or in 4 trading days after today. The market is closed for trading on Good Friday. For those willing to accept some risk, please note I sold some Lehman March 25 puts, and the stock was trading at the time at $41, and I sold some Bear Stearns March 25 puts with the stock trading at $33 at the time. This strategy is certainly not for everyone. I believe Bear Stearns will be purchased by
JP Morgan Chase and I believe the selling in Lehman is overblown.
The February CPI level of 211.693 (1982-84=100) was 4.0 percent higher than in February 2007.
Two-year note yields dropped 14 basis points, or 0.14 percentage point, to 1.48 percent at 10:38 a.m. in New York, according to bond broker Cantor Fitzgerald LP.
Futures markets are now pricing in a 38 percent chance that the Fed cuts benchmark interest rates next week by a full percentage point to 2 percent. Coming into the session, expectations were for a smaller cut to 2.25 percent.
Microsoft Corp. plans to buy Rapt Inc., plugging a hole in its suite of tools for Web publishers and advertisers, the software giant said Friday. Rapt's software and consulting services help Web site publishers tweak how they package and price display-ad space.
The Securities and Exchange Commission said Friday it will allow municipal bond issuers to submit bids in auctions of their own securities without incurring charges of market manipulation. The guidelines are designed to help municipal bond issuers get out of the auction-rate market, where several auctions have failed because of a lack of buyers, and rates have shot up.
Citigroup's U.S. economists said Friday they anticipate Federal Reserve policy makers will lower the fed funds rate by 100 basis points to 2% next week, from the current 3%, "and more cannot be ruled out."
The benchmark for U.S. stock option prices closed at the highest level since March 2003 after Bear Stearns Cos. got an emergency bailout from the Federal Reserve and JPMorgan Chase & Co. The Chicago Board Options Exchange Volatility Index rose 14 percent to 31.16 for the biggest advance since Jan. 17. The so- called VIX, which tends to increase when stocks fall, has gained 80 percent in the past year.
The decline in U.S. stocks is ``way overdone'' and the Dow Jones Industrial Average may rally 1,000 points, investor Barton Biggs said.``We're in a financial panic,'' Biggs said during a telephone interview with Bloomberg Television from New York. ``We're setting up for a really big rally. I don't mean three or four hundred points on the Dow, I mean 1,000 points on the Dow. I don't know if we're going to get it next week or the week after. But this thing has gotten crazy and is overdone.''
According to the WSJ, two massive housing developments in Las Vegas, involving several of the nation's largest home builders, have received default notices on about $765 million in debt, according to one of the partners in the projects. John Ritter, chief executive of Las Vegas-based Focus Property Group, says that two joint ventures -- involving Focus as well as builders Toll Brothers Inc., KB Home and Lennar Corp. among others -- have each missed an interest payment in recent weeks and are in negotiations with lenders.
According to Bloomberg, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. obtained a $2 billion credit line as the investment bank tried to blunt the stock's worst drop in almost eight years and assure investors the firm isn't short on cash. The unsecured, three-year facility from 40 banks replaces an existing credit line, New York-based Lehman said today in a statement. JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc., also based in New York, led the effort, the firm said.
Gold futures soared to a record high of $1,007.30 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange Friday, as the dollar hit new all-time lows against the euro and the Swiss franc.
The dollar index was at 71.658, down from 72.047 in London earlier Friday. The euro was trading at $1.5672, up from $1.5566 and the pound was at $2.0375, up from $2.0292 in London earlier. The dollar bought 99.63 yen, down from 100.54 yen in London.
Citigroup Inc. plans to shed hundreds of billions of dollars worth of assets to reorganize the firm, The Wall Street Journal reported on its Web site Friday, citing an analyst meeting with Citi Chief Executive Vikram Pandit.
Bear Stearns said it is working with J.P. Morgan on permanent financing or "other alternatives."
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. said Friday that it has saved U.S. consumers more than $1 billion with its $4 prescription plan. Dr. John Agwunobi, senior vice president and president of health and wellness at the retailing giant, noted that the plan had further-reaching implications because many of Wal-Mart's competitors cut their prescription prices as well.
Consumer price inflation across the 15 nations that make up the European single currency rose at an annual pace of 3.3% in February, Eurostat reported Friday, revising the figure up from a preliminary February reading of 3.2% to an all-time high.
The United States is in a recession that could be "substantially more severe" than recent ones, National Bureau of Economic Research President Martin Feldstein said on Friday. "The situation is very bad, the situation is getting worse, and the risks are that it could get very bad," Feldstein said in a speech at the Futures Industry Association meeting in Boca Raton, Florida. "There's no doubt that this year and next year are going to be very difficult years."
Moody's Investors Service Friday downgraded Washington Mutual Inc.'s senior unsecured rating to Baa3 from Baa2 and its long-term deposit rating to Baa2 from Baa1. WaMu's bank financial strength rating of C- and short term rating of Prime-2 were affirmed. Moody's has a negative outlook on all Washington Mutual entities.
The March series of calls and puts expire March 21 or in 4 trading days after today. The market is closed for trading on Good Friday. For those willing to accept some risk, please note I sold some Lehman March 25 puts, and the stock was trading at the time at $41, and I sold some Bear Stearns March 25 puts with the stock trading at $33 at the time. This strategy is certainly not for everyone. I believe Bear Stearns will be purchased by
JP Morgan Chase and I believe the selling in Lehman is overblown.
The February CPI level of 211.693 (1982-84=100) was 4.0 percent higher than in February 2007.
Two-year note yields dropped 14 basis points, or 0.14 percentage point, to 1.48 percent at 10:38 a.m. in New York, according to bond broker Cantor Fitzgerald LP.
Futures markets are now pricing in a 38 percent chance that the Fed cuts benchmark interest rates next week by a full percentage point to 2 percent. Coming into the session, expectations were for a smaller cut to 2.25 percent.
Microsoft Corp. plans to buy Rapt Inc., plugging a hole in its suite of tools for Web publishers and advertisers, the software giant said Friday. Rapt's software and consulting services help Web site publishers tweak how they package and price display-ad space.
The Securities and Exchange Commission said Friday it will allow municipal bond issuers to submit bids in auctions of their own securities without incurring charges of market manipulation. The guidelines are designed to help municipal bond issuers get out of the auction-rate market, where several auctions have failed because of a lack of buyers, and rates have shot up.
Citigroup's U.S. economists said Friday they anticipate Federal Reserve policy makers will lower the fed funds rate by 100 basis points to 2% next week, from the current 3%, "and more cannot be ruled out."
The benchmark for U.S. stock option prices closed at the highest level since March 2003 after Bear Stearns Cos. got an emergency bailout from the Federal Reserve and JPMorgan Chase & Co. The Chicago Board Options Exchange Volatility Index rose 14 percent to 31.16 for the biggest advance since Jan. 17. The so- called VIX, which tends to increase when stocks fall, has gained 80 percent in the past year.
The decline in U.S. stocks is ``way overdone'' and the Dow Jones Industrial Average may rally 1,000 points, investor Barton Biggs said.``We're in a financial panic,'' Biggs said during a telephone interview with Bloomberg Television from New York. ``We're setting up for a really big rally. I don't mean three or four hundred points on the Dow, I mean 1,000 points on the Dow. I don't know if we're going to get it next week or the week after. But this thing has gotten crazy and is overdone.''
According to the WSJ, two massive housing developments in Las Vegas, involving several of the nation's largest home builders, have received default notices on about $765 million in debt, according to one of the partners in the projects. John Ritter, chief executive of Las Vegas-based Focus Property Group, says that two joint ventures -- involving Focus as well as builders Toll Brothers Inc., KB Home and Lennar Corp. among others -- have each missed an interest payment in recent weeks and are in negotiations with lenders.
According to Bloomberg, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. obtained a $2 billion credit line as the investment bank tried to blunt the stock's worst drop in almost eight years and assure investors the firm isn't short on cash. The unsecured, three-year facility from 40 banks replaces an existing credit line, New York-based Lehman said today in a statement. JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc., also based in New York, led the effort, the firm said.
Municipal Debt and Another Rescue
3/14/08 Municipal Debt and Another Rescue
Acccording to Bloomberg, the risk of guaranteeing municipal debt is increasing because the economy is slowing and some insurers may cut prices to regain lost business, said Ajit Jain, head of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.'s new bond insurer. Fiscal stress in Vallejo, California, and Jefferson County, Alabama, may be the ``tip of the iceberg'' for municipal defaults, said Jain, who runs Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Assurance Corp. He said downgrades of some insurers hurt the industry's integrity and those firms may spark ``pricing wars'' if they regain their financial footing and seek to recoup lost business. ``While we are writing business at pricing levels that are economically attractive to us, I remain very concerned about the long-term viability of this product,'' Jain said in testimony submitted today to the House Financial Services Committee in Washington D.C.
``We are looking at the worst set of macroeconomic conditions since the Great Depression,'' Mort Zuckerman said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. ``I don't know where the bottom is. The federal government's going to have to do a lot more to contain what I think is the potential of a perfect storm.''
The latest in a spate of deals for virtualization start-ups is Microsoft’s acquisition of Kidaro, an Israeli developer of desktop virtualization software for enterprises. According to The Deal.com, Microsoft ponied up $100 million for the venture-capitalk-backed start-up.
UnitedHealth Group Inc. said its first-quarter and full-year results may be squeezed, but believes it is too early for negative conclusions.
Cigna still anticipates full-year adjusted income from operations between $4.05 and $4.25 per share.
CEO Immelt noted that GE has no exposure to losses to CDO's and SIV's.
Gold futures soared to the psychologically key level of $1,000 an ounce early Thursday, propelled by ongoing dollar weakness. Gold for April delivery was last up $17.30 at $997.80 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Pilgrim's Pride, the nation's largest chicken producer, is closing a chicken processing complex in North Carolina and six of its 13 distribution centers in the U.S., furloughing 1,100 workers, as a result of soaring feed costs. The moves were part of a plan to "curtail losses amid record-high costs for ... seed ingredients and an oversupply of chicken."
With the caucuses victory Obama ends up carrying more delegates from Texas than Clinton.The Illinois Senator leads in the overall race with 1597 delegates vs. 1470 for Clinton. So why is it that the media states Clinton won Texas and has momentum from March 4? It's one more instance of purposeful misinformation.
U.K. hedge fund Toscafund Asset Management has approached Washington Mutual, offering to participate in any consortium looking to recapitalize the bank, The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.
In February, the prices of U.S. agricultural exports climbed 4.4% and are up 30.8% over the past year.
Retail sales down 0.6% in February.
Foreclosure rates continued to rise. Countrywide's foreclosure rate rose to 1.64 percent in February, compared with 1.48 percent in January and 0.80 percent in February 2007.
Are you better off now than you were four years ago? This has become a fundamental question in presidential elections. And for the first time since 1992, a plurality of voters heading into November’s election answer that question with a resounding no, according to the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.Forty-three percent say that they and their families are worse off, compared with 34 percent who say they’re better off; 21 percent respond that their status is the same.
The ranks of workers remaining on jobless aid is at a level not seen in nearly 2 1/2 years, according to the Labor Department.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson urged banks to consider cutting dividends.
AOL is buying social-networking site Bebo for $850 million.
AIG fell 4.7 percent to $41.60, the lowest in more than 10 years. Morgan Stanley predicted losses linked to credit-default swaps may total $3 billion for world's largest insurer by assets.
Bear Stearns is a creditor of Carlyle, which is near collapse and having its assets, primarily AAA rated mortgages from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, seized by creditors.
Thornburg Mortgage received a default notice from Morgan Stanley after failing to meet a $9 million margin call. Morgan Stanley had lent Thornburg $49 million and now says it "has exercised or will exercise its rights under the agreement."
Morgan Keegan & Co. downgraded shares of Lowe's from Market Perform to Underperform. They feel that Mooresville, N.C.-based Lowe's could be susceptible to deteriorating macroeconomic trends during fiscal 2008, which they believe are showing no signs of improvement.
U.S. natural gas inventories fell by 86 billion cubic feet in the week ending March 7 to 1,398 billion cubic feet, Energy Information Administration reported on Thursday. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, April natural gas gained 14.4 cents to $10.155 per million British thermal units. Natural gas inventories have been falling for 16 consecutive weeks.
Crude oil for April delivery rose more than $1 to $111 a barrel in mid-morning trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
GM shares fell as much as 9% to $19, their lowest level since January 2006. Ford fell as low as $5.12, a level not seen since 1991.
JPMorgan Chase & Co and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York agreed to provide financing to Bear Stearns, the fifth-largest U.S. investment bank for up to 28 days. Bear Stearns said the move would allow it to continue normal operations. "Another piece of mistrust. The CFO yesterday said fears of liquidity concerns are overblown," said Tom Sowanick, chief investment officer at Clearbrook Financial LLC in Princeton, New Jersey. "But what happened in 24 hours that they didn't know 24 hours ago? But overnight, the company needed a government bail out," he added.
Acccording to Bloomberg, the risk of guaranteeing municipal debt is increasing because the economy is slowing and some insurers may cut prices to regain lost business, said Ajit Jain, head of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.'s new bond insurer. Fiscal stress in Vallejo, California, and Jefferson County, Alabama, may be the ``tip of the iceberg'' for municipal defaults, said Jain, who runs Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Assurance Corp. He said downgrades of some insurers hurt the industry's integrity and those firms may spark ``pricing wars'' if they regain their financial footing and seek to recoup lost business. ``While we are writing business at pricing levels that are economically attractive to us, I remain very concerned about the long-term viability of this product,'' Jain said in testimony submitted today to the House Financial Services Committee in Washington D.C.
``We are looking at the worst set of macroeconomic conditions since the Great Depression,'' Mort Zuckerman said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. ``I don't know where the bottom is. The federal government's going to have to do a lot more to contain what I think is the potential of a perfect storm.''
The latest in a spate of deals for virtualization start-ups is Microsoft’s acquisition of Kidaro, an Israeli developer of desktop virtualization software for enterprises. According to The Deal.com, Microsoft ponied up $100 million for the venture-capitalk-backed start-up.
UnitedHealth Group Inc. said its first-quarter and full-year results may be squeezed, but believes it is too early for negative conclusions.
Cigna still anticipates full-year adjusted income from operations between $4.05 and $4.25 per share.
CEO Immelt noted that GE has no exposure to losses to CDO's and SIV's.
Gold futures soared to the psychologically key level of $1,000 an ounce early Thursday, propelled by ongoing dollar weakness. Gold for April delivery was last up $17.30 at $997.80 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Pilgrim's Pride, the nation's largest chicken producer, is closing a chicken processing complex in North Carolina and six of its 13 distribution centers in the U.S., furloughing 1,100 workers, as a result of soaring feed costs. The moves were part of a plan to "curtail losses amid record-high costs for ... seed ingredients and an oversupply of chicken."
With the caucuses victory Obama ends up carrying more delegates from Texas than Clinton.The Illinois Senator leads in the overall race with 1597 delegates vs. 1470 for Clinton. So why is it that the media states Clinton won Texas and has momentum from March 4? It's one more instance of purposeful misinformation.
U.K. hedge fund Toscafund Asset Management has approached Washington Mutual, offering to participate in any consortium looking to recapitalize the bank, The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.
In February, the prices of U.S. agricultural exports climbed 4.4% and are up 30.8% over the past year.
Retail sales down 0.6% in February.
Foreclosure rates continued to rise. Countrywide's foreclosure rate rose to 1.64 percent in February, compared with 1.48 percent in January and 0.80 percent in February 2007.
Are you better off now than you were four years ago? This has become a fundamental question in presidential elections. And for the first time since 1992, a plurality of voters heading into November’s election answer that question with a resounding no, according to the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.Forty-three percent say that they and their families are worse off, compared with 34 percent who say they’re better off; 21 percent respond that their status is the same.
The ranks of workers remaining on jobless aid is at a level not seen in nearly 2 1/2 years, according to the Labor Department.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson urged banks to consider cutting dividends.
AOL is buying social-networking site Bebo for $850 million.
AIG fell 4.7 percent to $41.60, the lowest in more than 10 years. Morgan Stanley predicted losses linked to credit-default swaps may total $3 billion for world's largest insurer by assets.
Bear Stearns is a creditor of Carlyle, which is near collapse and having its assets, primarily AAA rated mortgages from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, seized by creditors.
Thornburg Mortgage received a default notice from Morgan Stanley after failing to meet a $9 million margin call. Morgan Stanley had lent Thornburg $49 million and now says it "has exercised or will exercise its rights under the agreement."
Morgan Keegan & Co. downgraded shares of Lowe's from Market Perform to Underperform. They feel that Mooresville, N.C.-based Lowe's could be susceptible to deteriorating macroeconomic trends during fiscal 2008, which they believe are showing no signs of improvement.
U.S. natural gas inventories fell by 86 billion cubic feet in the week ending March 7 to 1,398 billion cubic feet, Energy Information Administration reported on Thursday. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, April natural gas gained 14.4 cents to $10.155 per million British thermal units. Natural gas inventories have been falling for 16 consecutive weeks.
Crude oil for April delivery rose more than $1 to $111 a barrel in mid-morning trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
GM shares fell as much as 9% to $19, their lowest level since January 2006. Ford fell as low as $5.12, a level not seen since 1991.
JPMorgan Chase & Co and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York agreed to provide financing to Bear Stearns, the fifth-largest U.S. investment bank for up to 28 days. Bear Stearns said the move would allow it to continue normal operations. "Another piece of mistrust. The CFO yesterday said fears of liquidity concerns are overblown," said Tom Sowanick, chief investment officer at Clearbrook Financial LLC in Princeton, New Jersey. "But what happened in 24 hours that they didn't know 24 hours ago? But overnight, the company needed a government bail out," he added.
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Confidence?
3/13/08 Confidence?
``Congress needs to determine immediately whether Admiral Fallon's resignation is another example of truth tellers being forced to the sidelines in the Bush administration,'' said Senator John Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat who lost to Bush in the 2004 election. ``His departure must not clear the way for a rush to war with Iran.'' Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced that Fallon, 63, was resigning over perceived differences on Iran policy with the Bush administration as Fallon was starting an Iraq visit yesterday. Fallon will retire from the Navy at the end of March. Fallon's resignation came after publication of an article in Esquire magazine, written by Thomas P.M. Barnett, a former professor at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island, that portrayed the admiral as the bulwark against a U.S. offensive against Iran ``If, in the dying light of the Bush administration, we go to war with Iran, it'll come down to one man,'' Barnett wrote. ``If we do not go to war with Iran, it'll come down to the same man. He is that rarest of creatures in the Bush universe: the good cop on Iran, and a man of strategic brilliance.'' Barnett's article said Fallon might be ousted. Gates described as ``just ridiculous'' the idea raised in the article that if Fallon leaves, it may mean the U.S. is going to war with Iran.
The outlook for the global economy deteriorated for a fourth month in March amid declining faith in Asia's ability to dodge the U.S. slump, a survey of Bloomberg users on five continents showed. The Bloomberg Professional Global Confidence Index fell to 13.1 from 14.3 in February. Respondents in Asia were the most pessimistic about worldwide growth and a gauge of confidence in their own economy fell to 38.1 from 43.5. A reading below 50 indicates negative sentiment. The Bloomberg Professional Confidence Survey collated the responses of 5,430 Bloomberg users from Auckland to New York on economic conditions in their region and the world. The survey was conducted from March 3 to March 7. The investors, traders and analysts were also asked about the outlook for their currencies, bonds, stocks and interest rates in the next six months. Participants are in cities including Hong Kong, Zurich and London.
On Tuesday, Jeffrey L. Bewkes, the chief executive of Time Warner, AOL’s parent company, acknowledged weakness in the business and said he was open to combining AOL with another company — “whatever configuration makes it the strongest and the most valuable.”
Reuters reports that Valero is considering selling many of its US refineries because of poor profits.
Humana said earnings will range from $4 to $4.25 a share, rather than the $5.35 to $5.55 given on Feb. 4, according to a statement distributed today by Business Wire. Earnings for the first quarter will be 44 cents to 46 cents a share, down from a previous forecast of 80 cents to 85 cents, Humana said. The revised forecasts stem from ``stand-alone PDP financial performance,'' while Medicare Advantage, Commercial and Military services businesses aren't affected, according to the statement.
After a plan by the Federal Reserve and other central banks to swap mortgage-backed securities for Treasurys, inter-bank loan rates for three months in the euro-zone edged up to 4.61% from 4.6%, according to data from the European Banking Federation.
Global spot market trading of liquefied natural gas rose 31 percent last year as cold winter temperatures prompted increased purchases, according to London- based LNG Shipping Solutions.
Confidence among Australian consumers weakened sharply in March to its lowest level since 1993, according to data released Wednesday, sparking economists' predictions that the central bank is unlikely to continue a run of interest rate hikes. The index of consumer sentiment fell a seasonally adjusted 9.1 percent in March to 88.6 points, from 97.4 points in February, compilers Westpac Banking Corp. and the Melbourne Institute said. The index was down 23 percent from a year earlier. Westpac said the fall in the index over the last three months is the sharpest three-month decline since the index was first measured in January 1975.
Rob Hanna: "I looked at all instances where the S&P closed at a 100-day low and then exploded up 3.5% or more the next day. Looking back to 1962 I found 9 other instances...The stats are quite impressive with the average trade gaining 2% over the next week and 3% over the next two weeks. The average winning trade posted 3.4% over the next week and 5.4% over the next two weeks. There is a positive expectation going forward for the next month...there’s still some juice left in this rally. It also appears likely the market will look to digest these gains over the next 1-3 days and traders looking for short-term gains may be able to get a better entry point."
The euro rose to $1.5502 according to FactSet data, its highest level since the European unit began trading in January 1999.
U.S. crude inventories rose more than expected, up 6.2 million barrels to 311.6 million barrels in the week ending March 7, U.S. Energy Information Administration reported on Wednesday. Gasoline supplies rose by 1.7 million barrels in the latest week, while distillate stocks fell by 1.2 million barrels, EIA reported.
U.S. crude inventories fell by 500,000 barrels to 305.2 million barrels in the week ending March 7, the American Petroleum Institute reported on Wednesday, according to Moody's Economy.com. Distillate stocks fell by 2.7 million barrels to 114.3 million barrels in the same period, while gasoline stocks dropped by 3.7 million barrels to 219.3 million barrels, the API said.
UPS Inc. may not meet its first-quarter earnings guidance and plans to focus more on growth opportunities overseas because of the uncertain U.S. economy, executives of the world's largest shipping carrier said Wednesday.
Fifty-four percent of the CFOs said the United States is in recession, and another 24 percent said there is a high likelihood of one starting later this year, according to a Duke University/CFO Magazine survey completed on March 7.
Robert McHugh: "There is no real lending associated with this $200 billion of fresh fiat cash. And that is the problem. This Fed injection does nothing for households. And it is households that will determine if we avert depression or not. Consumer spending is 70 percent of GDP. Households need the money, and they can't get it. Credit card companies are cutting lines. Banks are raising lending standards. House values are dropping below outstanding mortgage and home equity debts. Incomes can't keep up. Jobs are shrinking. Trickle down won't work. We need trickle up this time. The Fed's announced plan today is to monetize bad debt from Wall Street banks, to accept their securities backed by bad loans in exchange for cash. This is in lieu of a drastic further drop in interest rates. Once again, save Wall Street and to blazes with households. Because they are not doing a thing here for households, this plan will fail. Households get more inflation and that is it. Wall Street gets a free ride. Somebody ought to be arrested. What a heist. Of course Spitzer can't do anything. He's preoccupied."
With the wins in Mississippi and Texas, Obama now leads Clinton 1,608 to 1,478 in the total delegate count, CNN estimates.
The New York Board of Trade's U.S. dollar index fell to 72.457 before recovering slightly to trade at 72.509. This is a new record low.
Crude-oil futures on Wednesday closed at a new high of $109.92 a barrel after earlier surpassing $110 a barrel for the first time. Gold for April delivery ended up $4.50 at $980.50 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
The federal government budget deficit widened to a record $175.6 billion in February, in part because of the economic slowdown and in part because of the extra day in February this year that allowed the government to send out more tax refunds and more benefit checks, the Treasury Department reported Wednesday.
The Amex Securities Broker/Dealer index fell 3%, while the KBW Bank index shed 2.5% and the S&P Insurance index fell 2%.
The former VP candidate leaves the Clinton campaign after controversial remarks about Obama.
A U.S. military spokesman said three American soldiers were killed in a rocket attack on their combat outpost south of Baghdad on Wednesday. The deaths bring to 12 the number of U.S. troops killed in three days.
Target Corp. said it's in talks with an investment partner to sell about half of its credit-card loans for $4 billion.
Obama: “We were told that Michigan and Florida wouldn’t count, and so we said we wouldn’t campaign there,” Mr. Obama said. “Senator Clinton said the same thing, that they wouldn’t count. Now her campaign is suggesting that they should.”Mrs. Clinton said last October that the Michigan primary was meaningless, but she left her name on the ballot. Mr. Obama and the other major Democratic candidates removed their names from the ballot in a gesture of good faith to early-voting states whose primaries were officially allowed by the Democratic Party. Neither candidate campaigned in Michigan. Any plan to redo the Michigan and Florida primaries requires the state parties to submit a plan to the Democratic National Committee’s panel on rules and bylaws (which excommunicated the two states in the first place for jumping the primary queue by holding contests in January). Senator Bill Nelson, Democrat of Florida, has proposed a mail-in contest, but the entire Florida Democratic Congressional delegation rejected it, saying it was impractical to rerun the January primary.
Electronic Arts announced it's taking its fight for Take-Two Interactive directly to shareholders, commencing a tender offer for the maker of the Grand Theft Auto series of video games worth $26 a share in cash, or $2 billion.
U.S. foreclosure filings fell 4% in February compared to January, but rose nearly 60% from last year, according to RealtyTrac. "We have still not reached the peak of foreclosure activity in this cycle," said James J. Saccacio, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac.
The U.S. dollar on Thursday plunged below 100 Japanese yen for the first time since autumn 1995, pressured by ongoing worries about the U.S. economy and financial turmoil.
Carlyle Capital has been unable to agree a refinancing package with lenders and it expects lenders to take possession of substantially all its remaining assets.
``Congress needs to determine immediately whether Admiral Fallon's resignation is another example of truth tellers being forced to the sidelines in the Bush administration,'' said Senator John Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat who lost to Bush in the 2004 election. ``His departure must not clear the way for a rush to war with Iran.'' Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced that Fallon, 63, was resigning over perceived differences on Iran policy with the Bush administration as Fallon was starting an Iraq visit yesterday. Fallon will retire from the Navy at the end of March. Fallon's resignation came after publication of an article in Esquire magazine, written by Thomas P.M. Barnett, a former professor at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island, that portrayed the admiral as the bulwark against a U.S. offensive against Iran ``If, in the dying light of the Bush administration, we go to war with Iran, it'll come down to one man,'' Barnett wrote. ``If we do not go to war with Iran, it'll come down to the same man. He is that rarest of creatures in the Bush universe: the good cop on Iran, and a man of strategic brilliance.'' Barnett's article said Fallon might be ousted. Gates described as ``just ridiculous'' the idea raised in the article that if Fallon leaves, it may mean the U.S. is going to war with Iran.
The outlook for the global economy deteriorated for a fourth month in March amid declining faith in Asia's ability to dodge the U.S. slump, a survey of Bloomberg users on five continents showed. The Bloomberg Professional Global Confidence Index fell to 13.1 from 14.3 in February. Respondents in Asia were the most pessimistic about worldwide growth and a gauge of confidence in their own economy fell to 38.1 from 43.5. A reading below 50 indicates negative sentiment. The Bloomberg Professional Confidence Survey collated the responses of 5,430 Bloomberg users from Auckland to New York on economic conditions in their region and the world. The survey was conducted from March 3 to March 7. The investors, traders and analysts were also asked about the outlook for their currencies, bonds, stocks and interest rates in the next six months. Participants are in cities including Hong Kong, Zurich and London.
On Tuesday, Jeffrey L. Bewkes, the chief executive of Time Warner, AOL’s parent company, acknowledged weakness in the business and said he was open to combining AOL with another company — “whatever configuration makes it the strongest and the most valuable.”
Reuters reports that Valero is considering selling many of its US refineries because of poor profits.
Humana said earnings will range from $4 to $4.25 a share, rather than the $5.35 to $5.55 given on Feb. 4, according to a statement distributed today by Business Wire. Earnings for the first quarter will be 44 cents to 46 cents a share, down from a previous forecast of 80 cents to 85 cents, Humana said. The revised forecasts stem from ``stand-alone PDP financial performance,'' while Medicare Advantage, Commercial and Military services businesses aren't affected, according to the statement.
After a plan by the Federal Reserve and other central banks to swap mortgage-backed securities for Treasurys, inter-bank loan rates for three months in the euro-zone edged up to 4.61% from 4.6%, according to data from the European Banking Federation.
Global spot market trading of liquefied natural gas rose 31 percent last year as cold winter temperatures prompted increased purchases, according to London- based LNG Shipping Solutions.
Confidence among Australian consumers weakened sharply in March to its lowest level since 1993, according to data released Wednesday, sparking economists' predictions that the central bank is unlikely to continue a run of interest rate hikes. The index of consumer sentiment fell a seasonally adjusted 9.1 percent in March to 88.6 points, from 97.4 points in February, compilers Westpac Banking Corp. and the Melbourne Institute said. The index was down 23 percent from a year earlier. Westpac said the fall in the index over the last three months is the sharpest three-month decline since the index was first measured in January 1975.
Rob Hanna: "I looked at all instances where the S&P closed at a 100-day low and then exploded up 3.5% or more the next day. Looking back to 1962 I found 9 other instances...The stats are quite impressive with the average trade gaining 2% over the next week and 3% over the next two weeks. The average winning trade posted 3.4% over the next week and 5.4% over the next two weeks. There is a positive expectation going forward for the next month...there’s still some juice left in this rally. It also appears likely the market will look to digest these gains over the next 1-3 days and traders looking for short-term gains may be able to get a better entry point."
The euro rose to $1.5502 according to FactSet data, its highest level since the European unit began trading in January 1999.
U.S. crude inventories rose more than expected, up 6.2 million barrels to 311.6 million barrels in the week ending March 7, U.S. Energy Information Administration reported on Wednesday. Gasoline supplies rose by 1.7 million barrels in the latest week, while distillate stocks fell by 1.2 million barrels, EIA reported.
U.S. crude inventories fell by 500,000 barrels to 305.2 million barrels in the week ending March 7, the American Petroleum Institute reported on Wednesday, according to Moody's Economy.com. Distillate stocks fell by 2.7 million barrels to 114.3 million barrels in the same period, while gasoline stocks dropped by 3.7 million barrels to 219.3 million barrels, the API said.
UPS Inc. may not meet its first-quarter earnings guidance and plans to focus more on growth opportunities overseas because of the uncertain U.S. economy, executives of the world's largest shipping carrier said Wednesday.
Fifty-four percent of the CFOs said the United States is in recession, and another 24 percent said there is a high likelihood of one starting later this year, according to a Duke University/CFO Magazine survey completed on March 7.
Robert McHugh: "There is no real lending associated with this $200 billion of fresh fiat cash. And that is the problem. This Fed injection does nothing for households. And it is households that will determine if we avert depression or not. Consumer spending is 70 percent of GDP. Households need the money, and they can't get it. Credit card companies are cutting lines. Banks are raising lending standards. House values are dropping below outstanding mortgage and home equity debts. Incomes can't keep up. Jobs are shrinking. Trickle down won't work. We need trickle up this time. The Fed's announced plan today is to monetize bad debt from Wall Street banks, to accept their securities backed by bad loans in exchange for cash. This is in lieu of a drastic further drop in interest rates. Once again, save Wall Street and to blazes with households. Because they are not doing a thing here for households, this plan will fail. Households get more inflation and that is it. Wall Street gets a free ride. Somebody ought to be arrested. What a heist. Of course Spitzer can't do anything. He's preoccupied."
With the wins in Mississippi and Texas, Obama now leads Clinton 1,608 to 1,478 in the total delegate count, CNN estimates.
The New York Board of Trade's U.S. dollar index fell to 72.457 before recovering slightly to trade at 72.509. This is a new record low.
Crude-oil futures on Wednesday closed at a new high of $109.92 a barrel after earlier surpassing $110 a barrel for the first time. Gold for April delivery ended up $4.50 at $980.50 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
The federal government budget deficit widened to a record $175.6 billion in February, in part because of the economic slowdown and in part because of the extra day in February this year that allowed the government to send out more tax refunds and more benefit checks, the Treasury Department reported Wednesday.
The Amex Securities Broker/Dealer index fell 3%, while the KBW Bank index shed 2.5% and the S&P Insurance index fell 2%.
The former VP candidate leaves the Clinton campaign after controversial remarks about Obama.
A U.S. military spokesman said three American soldiers were killed in a rocket attack on their combat outpost south of Baghdad on Wednesday. The deaths bring to 12 the number of U.S. troops killed in three days.
Target Corp. said it's in talks with an investment partner to sell about half of its credit-card loans for $4 billion.
Obama: “We were told that Michigan and Florida wouldn’t count, and so we said we wouldn’t campaign there,” Mr. Obama said. “Senator Clinton said the same thing, that they wouldn’t count. Now her campaign is suggesting that they should.”Mrs. Clinton said last October that the Michigan primary was meaningless, but she left her name on the ballot. Mr. Obama and the other major Democratic candidates removed their names from the ballot in a gesture of good faith to early-voting states whose primaries were officially allowed by the Democratic Party. Neither candidate campaigned in Michigan. Any plan to redo the Michigan and Florida primaries requires the state parties to submit a plan to the Democratic National Committee’s panel on rules and bylaws (which excommunicated the two states in the first place for jumping the primary queue by holding contests in January). Senator Bill Nelson, Democrat of Florida, has proposed a mail-in contest, but the entire Florida Democratic Congressional delegation rejected it, saying it was impractical to rerun the January primary.
Electronic Arts announced it's taking its fight for Take-Two Interactive directly to shareholders, commencing a tender offer for the maker of the Grand Theft Auto series of video games worth $26 a share in cash, or $2 billion.
U.S. foreclosure filings fell 4% in February compared to January, but rose nearly 60% from last year, according to RealtyTrac. "We have still not reached the peak of foreclosure activity in this cycle," said James J. Saccacio, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac.
The U.S. dollar on Thursday plunged below 100 Japanese yen for the first time since autumn 1995, pressured by ongoing worries about the U.S. economy and financial turmoil.
Carlyle Capital has been unable to agree a refinancing package with lenders and it expects lenders to take possession of substantially all its remaining assets.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Hiring?
3/12/08 Hiring?
Across the country, some 26 percent of companies expect to increase the size of their work force between April and June, according to the survey to be released Tuesday by Manpower Inc. Nine percent plan a decrease, while 60 percent predict no change and 5 percent are unsure, the Milwaukee-based global staffing company found.The numbers are slightly worse than those for the same quarter last year, when 28 percent of employers expected to hire and 7 percent planned to cut jobs. But they're better than the predictions for the current quarter, when hiring was expected to outpace job cuts by a margin of just 10 percentage points.
The International Energy Agency warned Tuesday that there is unlikely to be much relief from current high oil prices because of brisk demand in China and other emerging markets.
Home builder Toll Brothers Inc. warned that it could suffer "significant" losses if its joint-venture partners don't honor their obligations to certain development projects amid the housing downturn. "We have had a number of partners who have had visible financial stress," said Toll's chief financial officer, Joel Rassman. "But that's all I can disclose."
Municipal bonds now are yielding more than Treasuries of comparable maturities. One might consider going long munis and short Treasuries with comparable maturities.
FT's Laura Cohn: "Take the Hamptons on Long Island. Traditionally a bastion of strength powered by Wall Street bonuses, the market appears to be eroding. According to John Brady, sales associate at Coldwell Banker Prestigious Properties in the East Hampton area, nearly 70 homes at the lower end of the spectrum in East Hampton and Southampton are in pre-foreclosure. Two years ago, there were only 10. Perhaps even more telling, there has been a big jump in the number of homes on the market. In 2007, there was an eight-month supply for sale, Mr Brady says. This year, three year's worth is sitting around. "If we have three years of inventory, it's a bad sign," he says. "For people's homes to appreciate, there have to be more sales." For that to happen, he notes, prices will have to come down. A decline in prices would be quite a switch. Since 2003, the median price of a single-family home in the Hamptons has risen steadily year after year. Last year prices increased 12 per cent, to $740,000, according to Suffolk Research Service in Hampton Bays, New York. At the same time, however, the number of homes sold fell for the third year in a row, to 2,867 from 3,148 the previous year - a 9 per cent drop. So far this year, the market has deteriorated further. In the three months through January, for instance, the median price of a home in the area fell 9 per cent from the prior period to $680,000, Suffolk reports. At the same time, the number of sales fell 3 per cent to 620."
KB Home, one of the largest production home builders in New Mexico, is closing its Albuquerque office and will no longer build in the state, the company announced Friday.The company also plans to cease operations in Chicago and the mid-Atlantic.
According to Bloomberg, the cost of shipping Middle East crude to Asia may be steady, after falling the most in three months yesterday, because a backlog of cargoes is building up. Refineries still need to arrange for the shipment of about 30 more cargoes on board very large crude carriers, or VLCCs, this month, according to a report from Paris-based shipbroker Barry Rogliano Salles. That compares with about 60 vessels sailing toward the region for arrival in March.
According to statesman.com, unofficial and incomplete tallies posted online by Texas democrats suggest that Obama won the caucuses by enough of a margin, 56 percent to 44 percent, that he could reap up to 38 delegates from the caucuses compared with Clinton's 29. If that happens, he stands to take more pledged delegates from Texas than Clinton (though that arithmetic leaves out how 35 Texas superdelegates, consisting of U.S. House members and party dignitaries, eventually shake out).
Rob Hanna: "The Capitulative Breadth Indicator (CBI) spiked to 15 today. This is the highest reading it’s posted since I began tracking it live in 2005. Backtests to 1995 show only 3 other instances when the market was closing at new lows and the CBI was as high as 15. They occurred in August of 1998, September of 2001, and July of 2002. All three instances eventually shot up to mid-30’s or higher. The highest CBI reading was July 2002 at 52. Needles to say, we’re hitting some pretty elite levels here and those other selloffs were about as scary as they come...Time-wise I still believe we’re only days away from a multi-week bottom. I'm currently on the lookout for a washout day or a reversal day that could mark the low."
The Fed will lend up to $200 billion of Treasury securities to primary dealers secured for a term of 28 days, rather than overnight, as in the existing program. The Federal Reserve's new lending plan entails lending Treasury securities in exchange for debt including private mortgage-backed securities that have slumped in value as homeowners defaulted on their payments. The Federal Open Market Committee has also authorized increases in its temporary reciprocal currency arrangements with the European Central Bank and the Swiss National Bank.
In early Tuesday trading, crude for April delivery was last up $1.46 at $109.36 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange and gold for April delivery was last up $9.20 at $981 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
The latest snapshot of trade activity, reported by the Commerce Department on Tuesday, showed that the country's trade gap increased to $58.2 billion. That was up from a trade shortfall of $57.9 billion in December and was the highest since November.
Kroger sees full-year 2008 EPS of $1.83 to $1.90.
In the Persian Gulf, news agency Zawya Dow Jones reported yesterday that the United Arab Emirates is re-examining its currency's peg.
theStar.com Editorial: "The Bush administration has reinterpreted the Geneva Conventions to deny legal protection to detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp and CIA-run holding tanks. It hauled Canadian Omar Khadr and others before military tribunals where normal standards of justice do not apply. It despatched Canadian Maher Arar and others via "extraordinary rendition" to torture in Syria and elsewhere. Bush's veto of the no-torture law is consistent with his efforts to affirm and expand presidential power, and to rationalize bad decisions. He ignored bipartisan advice to ban torture from scores of former members of Congress, generals and diplomatic and security officials. As a troubled presidency draws to a bleak close, American voters will get the chance to weigh this and other issues of character."
"We wish that the president had taken his opportunity to send the clear message to the people of the United States and of the world that we are serious about upholding our ban on torture," the Jewish Council for Public Affairs said in a statement Monday. "We continue to support legislative efforts to ensure the humane treatment of all detainees in U.S. custody."
Cadbury Schweppes PLC will complete the spinoff of its U.S. drinks business on May 7 and said Tuesday it had secured credit agreements for both new companies.
Investor's Business Daily and TechnoMetrica Market Intelligence said their IBD/TIPP economic optimism index fell to 42.5 from February's 44.5. A reading below 50 indicates pessimism. March's result was the lowest since a reading of 42.0 in October 2005 in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and was the 12th straight month the index has been in pessimistic territory.
Moody's Corp. Chief Executive Officer Raymond McDaniel said per-share profit will be $1.90 to $2, compared with a February forecast of $2.17 to $2.25. Revenue will decline in the mid-to-high teens, compared with a previous estimate of ``low double digits,'' McDaniel said.
Amgen's Aranesp and Epogen and J&J's Procrit showed greater risks for patients with cancers of the breast, head and neck, lung, and cervix in eight clinical trials, said staff of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in briefing documents posted today on the agency's Web site. An FDA advisory panel will consider benefits and risks of the products March 13 in Gaithersburg, Maryland.
Caterpillar Inc.is estimating its earnings per share in 2008 to grow 5% to 15% with sales also forecast to rise at a similar pace, the company said late Tuesday, citing a presentation given by Chief Executive Jim Owens.
The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite rose the most in more than five years. The Dow Jones Industrial gained 416.66 points to 12,156.81. The S&P 500 climbed 47.28 points to 1,320.65, while the Nasdaq Composite climbed 86.42 points to 2,255.76.
Crude for April delivery rose 85 cents, or 0.8%, to close at $108.75 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Gold for April delivery rose $4.20 to end at $976 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
China's foreign exchange reserves climbed at a monthly record in January, lifting total reserves to $1.6 trillion, according to statements by Commerce Ministry officials Wednesday. The pace of reserve accumulation amounted to $61.6 billion, the highest seen in a single month, according to calculations by Standard Chartered.
U.S. mortgage applications dipped last week, reflecting lower demand for home loan refinancing as interest rates surged to their highest since October, an industry group said on Wednesday. The Mortgage Bankers Association said its seasonally adjusted index of mortgage applications, which includes both purchase and refinance loans, for the week ended March 7 fell 1.9 percent to 671.7.
China's retail sales climbed 20.2 percent, matching the fastest pace in at least nine years, a sign that consumer spending may sustain the world's fastest- growing major economy as export demand weakens.
OPEC may earn $927 billion from oil exports this year, the U.S. government's Energy Information Administration said, raising its estimate 9 percent.
Data on the five-fold growth of derivatives to $516 trillion in five years comes from the most recent survey by the Bank of International Settlements, the world's clearinghouse for central banks in Basel, Switzerland...Also, keep in mind that while the $516 trillion "notional" value (maximum in case of a meltdown) of the deals is a good measure of the market's size, the 2007 BIS study notes that the $11 trillion "gross market values provides a more accurate measure of the scale of financial risk transfer taking place in derivatives markets."
Across the country, some 26 percent of companies expect to increase the size of their work force between April and June, according to the survey to be released Tuesday by Manpower Inc. Nine percent plan a decrease, while 60 percent predict no change and 5 percent are unsure, the Milwaukee-based global staffing company found.The numbers are slightly worse than those for the same quarter last year, when 28 percent of employers expected to hire and 7 percent planned to cut jobs. But they're better than the predictions for the current quarter, when hiring was expected to outpace job cuts by a margin of just 10 percentage points.
The International Energy Agency warned Tuesday that there is unlikely to be much relief from current high oil prices because of brisk demand in China and other emerging markets.
Home builder Toll Brothers Inc. warned that it could suffer "significant" losses if its joint-venture partners don't honor their obligations to certain development projects amid the housing downturn. "We have had a number of partners who have had visible financial stress," said Toll's chief financial officer, Joel Rassman. "But that's all I can disclose."
Municipal bonds now are yielding more than Treasuries of comparable maturities. One might consider going long munis and short Treasuries with comparable maturities.
FT's Laura Cohn: "Take the Hamptons on Long Island. Traditionally a bastion of strength powered by Wall Street bonuses, the market appears to be eroding. According to John Brady, sales associate at Coldwell Banker Prestigious Properties in the East Hampton area, nearly 70 homes at the lower end of the spectrum in East Hampton and Southampton are in pre-foreclosure. Two years ago, there were only 10. Perhaps even more telling, there has been a big jump in the number of homes on the market. In 2007, there was an eight-month supply for sale, Mr Brady says. This year, three year's worth is sitting around. "If we have three years of inventory, it's a bad sign," he says. "For people's homes to appreciate, there have to be more sales." For that to happen, he notes, prices will have to come down. A decline in prices would be quite a switch. Since 2003, the median price of a single-family home in the Hamptons has risen steadily year after year. Last year prices increased 12 per cent, to $740,000, according to Suffolk Research Service in Hampton Bays, New York. At the same time, however, the number of homes sold fell for the third year in a row, to 2,867 from 3,148 the previous year - a 9 per cent drop. So far this year, the market has deteriorated further. In the three months through January, for instance, the median price of a home in the area fell 9 per cent from the prior period to $680,000, Suffolk reports. At the same time, the number of sales fell 3 per cent to 620."
KB Home, one of the largest production home builders in New Mexico, is closing its Albuquerque office and will no longer build in the state, the company announced Friday.The company also plans to cease operations in Chicago and the mid-Atlantic.
According to Bloomberg, the cost of shipping Middle East crude to Asia may be steady, after falling the most in three months yesterday, because a backlog of cargoes is building up. Refineries still need to arrange for the shipment of about 30 more cargoes on board very large crude carriers, or VLCCs, this month, according to a report from Paris-based shipbroker Barry Rogliano Salles. That compares with about 60 vessels sailing toward the region for arrival in March.
According to statesman.com, unofficial and incomplete tallies posted online by Texas democrats suggest that Obama won the caucuses by enough of a margin, 56 percent to 44 percent, that he could reap up to 38 delegates from the caucuses compared with Clinton's 29. If that happens, he stands to take more pledged delegates from Texas than Clinton (though that arithmetic leaves out how 35 Texas superdelegates, consisting of U.S. House members and party dignitaries, eventually shake out).
Rob Hanna: "The Capitulative Breadth Indicator (CBI) spiked to 15 today. This is the highest reading it’s posted since I began tracking it live in 2005. Backtests to 1995 show only 3 other instances when the market was closing at new lows and the CBI was as high as 15. They occurred in August of 1998, September of 2001, and July of 2002. All three instances eventually shot up to mid-30’s or higher. The highest CBI reading was July 2002 at 52. Needles to say, we’re hitting some pretty elite levels here and those other selloffs were about as scary as they come...Time-wise I still believe we’re only days away from a multi-week bottom. I'm currently on the lookout for a washout day or a reversal day that could mark the low."
The Fed will lend up to $200 billion of Treasury securities to primary dealers secured for a term of 28 days, rather than overnight, as in the existing program. The Federal Reserve's new lending plan entails lending Treasury securities in exchange for debt including private mortgage-backed securities that have slumped in value as homeowners defaulted on their payments. The Federal Open Market Committee has also authorized increases in its temporary reciprocal currency arrangements with the European Central Bank and the Swiss National Bank.
In early Tuesday trading, crude for April delivery was last up $1.46 at $109.36 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange and gold for April delivery was last up $9.20 at $981 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
The latest snapshot of trade activity, reported by the Commerce Department on Tuesday, showed that the country's trade gap increased to $58.2 billion. That was up from a trade shortfall of $57.9 billion in December and was the highest since November.
Kroger sees full-year 2008 EPS of $1.83 to $1.90.
In the Persian Gulf, news agency Zawya Dow Jones reported yesterday that the United Arab Emirates is re-examining its currency's peg.
theStar.com Editorial: "The Bush administration has reinterpreted the Geneva Conventions to deny legal protection to detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp and CIA-run holding tanks. It hauled Canadian Omar Khadr and others before military tribunals where normal standards of justice do not apply. It despatched Canadian Maher Arar and others via "extraordinary rendition" to torture in Syria and elsewhere. Bush's veto of the no-torture law is consistent with his efforts to affirm and expand presidential power, and to rationalize bad decisions. He ignored bipartisan advice to ban torture from scores of former members of Congress, generals and diplomatic and security officials. As a troubled presidency draws to a bleak close, American voters will get the chance to weigh this and other issues of character."
"We wish that the president had taken his opportunity to send the clear message to the people of the United States and of the world that we are serious about upholding our ban on torture," the Jewish Council for Public Affairs said in a statement Monday. "We continue to support legislative efforts to ensure the humane treatment of all detainees in U.S. custody."
Cadbury Schweppes PLC will complete the spinoff of its U.S. drinks business on May 7 and said Tuesday it had secured credit agreements for both new companies.
Investor's Business Daily and TechnoMetrica Market Intelligence said their IBD/TIPP economic optimism index fell to 42.5 from February's 44.5. A reading below 50 indicates pessimism. March's result was the lowest since a reading of 42.0 in October 2005 in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and was the 12th straight month the index has been in pessimistic territory.
Moody's Corp. Chief Executive Officer Raymond McDaniel said per-share profit will be $1.90 to $2, compared with a February forecast of $2.17 to $2.25. Revenue will decline in the mid-to-high teens, compared with a previous estimate of ``low double digits,'' McDaniel said.
Amgen's Aranesp and Epogen and J&J's Procrit showed greater risks for patients with cancers of the breast, head and neck, lung, and cervix in eight clinical trials, said staff of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in briefing documents posted today on the agency's Web site. An FDA advisory panel will consider benefits and risks of the products March 13 in Gaithersburg, Maryland.
Caterpillar Inc.is estimating its earnings per share in 2008 to grow 5% to 15% with sales also forecast to rise at a similar pace, the company said late Tuesday, citing a presentation given by Chief Executive Jim Owens.
The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite rose the most in more than five years. The Dow Jones Industrial gained 416.66 points to 12,156.81. The S&P 500 climbed 47.28 points to 1,320.65, while the Nasdaq Composite climbed 86.42 points to 2,255.76.
Crude for April delivery rose 85 cents, or 0.8%, to close at $108.75 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Gold for April delivery rose $4.20 to end at $976 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
China's foreign exchange reserves climbed at a monthly record in January, lifting total reserves to $1.6 trillion, according to statements by Commerce Ministry officials Wednesday. The pace of reserve accumulation amounted to $61.6 billion, the highest seen in a single month, according to calculations by Standard Chartered.
U.S. mortgage applications dipped last week, reflecting lower demand for home loan refinancing as interest rates surged to their highest since October, an industry group said on Wednesday. The Mortgage Bankers Association said its seasonally adjusted index of mortgage applications, which includes both purchase and refinance loans, for the week ended March 7 fell 1.9 percent to 671.7.
China's retail sales climbed 20.2 percent, matching the fastest pace in at least nine years, a sign that consumer spending may sustain the world's fastest- growing major economy as export demand weakens.
OPEC may earn $927 billion from oil exports this year, the U.S. government's Energy Information Administration said, raising its estimate 9 percent.
Data on the five-fold growth of derivatives to $516 trillion in five years comes from the most recent survey by the Bank of International Settlements, the world's clearinghouse for central banks in Basel, Switzerland...Also, keep in mind that while the $516 trillion "notional" value (maximum in case of a meltdown) of the deals is a good measure of the market's size, the 2007 BIS study notes that the $11 trillion "gross market values provides a more accurate measure of the scale of financial risk transfer taking place in derivatives markets."
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
A Short Term Bounce?
3/11/08 A Short Term Bounce?
Robert McHugh: "There was a lot of technical damage done to stock averages Friday. We got confirmation of 18 month, very Bearish Head & Shoulders tops patterns in several indices, as prices completed their right shoulders and fell decisively below necklines. These patterns are huge, and the downside targets are 20 percent below where we stand now in several averages. In other words, these patterns are calling for a stock market crash. These patterns are saying that the Bear Market is nowhere near over. We also got half of a Dow Theory re-confirmation of the Bear Market, as the Dow Industrials closed below their January lows. We now await the same action from the Trannies for downside confirmation. If we do not get the confirmation, that means there is hope for Bulls, but no Bull market signal. Further, prices fell decisively below the bottom boundary of a 26 year rising trend-channel from 1982, which could be suggesting that the current Bear market is the big one, one of major Supercycle degree, the fulfillment of the Kondratieff winter cycle technical folks have been watching for, for a decade. It suggests we may be headed for a depression, not just a recession."
Brett Steenbarger: "Rises in the relative equity put/call ratio (which I operationalize as the 10-day equity put/call volume ratio divided by the 200-day ratio) have been reliably associated with market bottoms since 2004. On Friday, we saw the 10-day ratio exceed the 200-day ratio by over 20%.
Since 2004 (N = 1033 trading days), we've had 129 occasions in which the relative put/call ratio has met or exceeded the 20% threshold. Twenty days later, the S&P 500 Index (SPY) has been up by an average of 2.22% (103 up, 26 down), much stronger than the average 20-day gain of .11% (537 up, 367 down) for the remainder of the sample.
More broadly, when the relative equity put/call ratio has been above 1.0 (meaning that we're seeing more puts traded relative to calls over the past 10 days compared to the past 200 days), the next 20 trading days in SPY have averaged a gain of .84%. When the relative ratio has been below 1.0, the next 20 days in SPY have averaged a loss of -.31%.
While it is certainly possible for the market to get weaker in the short run even when the ratio has exceeded 1.20 (50 of the 129 occasions were down after five trading days), it's generally paid to fade extremes in the relative equity put/call ratio."
A survey says the national average price for gasoline rose 9 cents over the last two weeks. The average price of self-serve regular gasoline on Friday was $3.19 a gallon, mid-grade was $3.31 and premium was $3.42, according to the Lundberg Survey of 7,000 stations nationwide released Sunday.
According to Bloomberg, the hedge-fund industry is reeling from its worst crisis in a decade as banks are now demanding more money pledged to support outstanding loans even when the investment is backed by the full faith and credit of the United States.
According to the Houston Chronicle, Russia is forcing Exxon Mobil to abandon plans to export natural gas to China. Nigeria is requiring explorers to share output with its citizens. Indonesia will cut sales to Japan. Countries holding almost half the world's gas are curbing shipments to meet growing domestic use, hurting importers from the U.S. to Japan. Prices for the heating fuel may rise 50 percent within five years on the New York Mercantile Exchange as a result, said Chris Jarvis, president of Caprock Risk Management in Hampton Falls, N.H. He anticipated the rally in gas prices during the past month. While raising energy costs, the policies will limit opportunities for Exxon Mobil and Royal Dutch Shell Plc, who are struggling to reverse a five-year production decline of 23 percent in the U.K. North Sea and 42 percent in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico. Natural-gas use is rising 2.5 percent a year, three times the rate for oil, according to BP Plc statistics.
Declassified documents and interviews on the ground in Bolivia prove that the Bush Administration is using U.S. taxpayers' money to undermine the Morales government and coopt the country's dynamic social movements--just as it has tried to do recently in Venezuela and traditionally throughout Latin America.
Rob Hanna: "My Capitulative Breadth Indicator (CBI) moved up to 11 on Friday. In the past, readings above 10 have signified broad capitulative action in individual large-cap components. It has been a reliable indicator of exhaustive movement and has frequently been followed by a substantial short-term bounce in the S&P 500. Readings above 10 have been a fairly rare occurrence with only 16 instances in 13 years between 1995 and 2007. They’ve become more frequent recently, though. This is the third time the indicator has moved to 10 or higher in the last 5 months. As I’ve written in the past, buying the S&P 500 on a close in the CBI of 10 or higher and then selling when the indicator closes back at 3 or lower would have been profitable 100% of the time. The indicator is currently 17 for 17. This does not mean it will work this time. It also does not mean there won’t be significant downside before the expected bounce ensues."
Palatin Technologies, Inc. announced today the completion of a Phase I clinical trial of PL-3994, a novel, long-acting natriuretic peptide receptor A (NPRA) agonist under development for treatment of acute decompensated congestive heart failure (CHF). The Phase I trial was a randomized, double-blind, placebo- controlled, single ascending dose study in 26 healthy volunteers who received the medication or placebo subcutaneously. The evaluations included safety, tolerability, pharmacokinetics and several pharmacodynamic endpoints, including levels of cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP), a natural messenger nucleotide. Dosing concluded with the successful achievement of the primary endpoint of the study, a prespecified reduction in systemic blood pressure. No volunteer experienced a serious or severe adverse event. Elevations in plasma cGMP levels, increased diuresis (urine excretion) and increased natriuresis (sodium excretion) were all observed for several hours after single sub- cutaneous doses. Data analysis is ongoing and will be submitted for presentation when the analysis is complete.
MBIA expects $200 million in mark-to-market losses from its credit derivative business, and said that Fitch Ratings' insurer financial strength ratings can cause serious volatility in how the company is viewed in the equity markets.
McDonald's Corp said on Monday sales at restaurants open at least 13 months rose 11.7 percent globally in February, well above Wall Street expectations, helped by U.S. coffee sales and strength overseas. Same-store sales, a key gauge of retail health, rose 8.3 percent in the United States and 15.4 percent in Europe. The Asia/Pacific, Middle East and Africa division posted comparable sales growth of 10.9 percent.
Blackstone: "Economic Net Income for the quarter ended December 31, 2007 totaled $128.2 million as compared to Pro Forma Adjusted Economic Net Income of $894.9 million for the quarter ended December 31, 2006."
"You can almost draw (the credit unwind) out in a diagram," said a managing director at the Economic Outlook Group in Princeton, N.J. "With home prices going down, consumers cut back on spending. If consumers cut back on spending, the economy weakens further. If the economy weakens further, fewer people are able to afford mortgages, so home foreclosures increase."
In 2008, its sixth year, the war will cost approximately $12 billion a month, triple the "burn" rate of its earliest years, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and co-author Linda J. Bilmes report in a new book.
Crude surges to surpass $108 a barrel for first time. Natural gas traded up to $10.04. Gold for April delivery fell $2.40 to end at $971.80 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Lehman Bros. will cut 5% of its staff worldwide as turmoil in the financial markets tamps down business prospects, CNBC television reported Monday morning.
WellPoint Inc. cut its full-year earnings forecast to the range of $5.76 to $6.01 a share, including investment gains of 6 cents, from its previous forecast of $6.41 a share, citing higher-than-expected medical costs, lower-than-expected fully insured enrollment and the overall economic environment. Shares of WellPoint fell 17% to $54.70 in recent after-hours trading after closing down $1.20, or 1.8%, at $67.12.
German Bundesbank President Axel Weber said a high CPI leaves no leeway for rate cuts at the European Central Bank.
The White House said Vice President Dick Cheney will discuss concerns about record oil prices when he visits Saudi Arabia next week during a trip to the Middle East.
China's consumer prices rose at their fastest pace in almost 12 years in February as prices for meat, vegetables and energy surged, raising the likelihood the central bank will lift interest rates. China's consumer prices climbed 8.7% in February, accelerating from a 7.1% rise in January, the Statistics Bureau said.
Texas Instruments Inc. announced a lower mid-point for its first-quarter revenue estimate.
Robert McHugh: "There was a lot of technical damage done to stock averages Friday. We got confirmation of 18 month, very Bearish Head & Shoulders tops patterns in several indices, as prices completed their right shoulders and fell decisively below necklines. These patterns are huge, and the downside targets are 20 percent below where we stand now in several averages. In other words, these patterns are calling for a stock market crash. These patterns are saying that the Bear Market is nowhere near over. We also got half of a Dow Theory re-confirmation of the Bear Market, as the Dow Industrials closed below their January lows. We now await the same action from the Trannies for downside confirmation. If we do not get the confirmation, that means there is hope for Bulls, but no Bull market signal. Further, prices fell decisively below the bottom boundary of a 26 year rising trend-channel from 1982, which could be suggesting that the current Bear market is the big one, one of major Supercycle degree, the fulfillment of the Kondratieff winter cycle technical folks have been watching for, for a decade. It suggests we may be headed for a depression, not just a recession."
Brett Steenbarger: "Rises in the relative equity put/call ratio (which I operationalize as the 10-day equity put/call volume ratio divided by the 200-day ratio) have been reliably associated with market bottoms since 2004. On Friday, we saw the 10-day ratio exceed the 200-day ratio by over 20%.
Since 2004 (N = 1033 trading days), we've had 129 occasions in which the relative put/call ratio has met or exceeded the 20% threshold. Twenty days later, the S&P 500 Index (SPY) has been up by an average of 2.22% (103 up, 26 down), much stronger than the average 20-day gain of .11% (537 up, 367 down) for the remainder of the sample.
More broadly, when the relative equity put/call ratio has been above 1.0 (meaning that we're seeing more puts traded relative to calls over the past 10 days compared to the past 200 days), the next 20 trading days in SPY have averaged a gain of .84%. When the relative ratio has been below 1.0, the next 20 days in SPY have averaged a loss of -.31%.
While it is certainly possible for the market to get weaker in the short run even when the ratio has exceeded 1.20 (50 of the 129 occasions were down after five trading days), it's generally paid to fade extremes in the relative equity put/call ratio."
A survey says the national average price for gasoline rose 9 cents over the last two weeks. The average price of self-serve regular gasoline on Friday was $3.19 a gallon, mid-grade was $3.31 and premium was $3.42, according to the Lundberg Survey of 7,000 stations nationwide released Sunday.
According to Bloomberg, the hedge-fund industry is reeling from its worst crisis in a decade as banks are now demanding more money pledged to support outstanding loans even when the investment is backed by the full faith and credit of the United States.
According to the Houston Chronicle, Russia is forcing Exxon Mobil to abandon plans to export natural gas to China. Nigeria is requiring explorers to share output with its citizens. Indonesia will cut sales to Japan. Countries holding almost half the world's gas are curbing shipments to meet growing domestic use, hurting importers from the U.S. to Japan. Prices for the heating fuel may rise 50 percent within five years on the New York Mercantile Exchange as a result, said Chris Jarvis, president of Caprock Risk Management in Hampton Falls, N.H. He anticipated the rally in gas prices during the past month. While raising energy costs, the policies will limit opportunities for Exxon Mobil and Royal Dutch Shell Plc, who are struggling to reverse a five-year production decline of 23 percent in the U.K. North Sea and 42 percent in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico. Natural-gas use is rising 2.5 percent a year, three times the rate for oil, according to BP Plc statistics.
Declassified documents and interviews on the ground in Bolivia prove that the Bush Administration is using U.S. taxpayers' money to undermine the Morales government and coopt the country's dynamic social movements--just as it has tried to do recently in Venezuela and traditionally throughout Latin America.
Rob Hanna: "My Capitulative Breadth Indicator (CBI) moved up to 11 on Friday. In the past, readings above 10 have signified broad capitulative action in individual large-cap components. It has been a reliable indicator of exhaustive movement and has frequently been followed by a substantial short-term bounce in the S&P 500. Readings above 10 have been a fairly rare occurrence with only 16 instances in 13 years between 1995 and 2007. They’ve become more frequent recently, though. This is the third time the indicator has moved to 10 or higher in the last 5 months. As I’ve written in the past, buying the S&P 500 on a close in the CBI of 10 or higher and then selling when the indicator closes back at 3 or lower would have been profitable 100% of the time. The indicator is currently 17 for 17. This does not mean it will work this time. It also does not mean there won’t be significant downside before the expected bounce ensues."
Palatin Technologies, Inc. announced today the completion of a Phase I clinical trial of PL-3994, a novel, long-acting natriuretic peptide receptor A (NPRA) agonist under development for treatment of acute decompensated congestive heart failure (CHF). The Phase I trial was a randomized, double-blind, placebo- controlled, single ascending dose study in 26 healthy volunteers who received the medication or placebo subcutaneously. The evaluations included safety, tolerability, pharmacokinetics and several pharmacodynamic endpoints, including levels of cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP), a natural messenger nucleotide. Dosing concluded with the successful achievement of the primary endpoint of the study, a prespecified reduction in systemic blood pressure. No volunteer experienced a serious or severe adverse event. Elevations in plasma cGMP levels, increased diuresis (urine excretion) and increased natriuresis (sodium excretion) were all observed for several hours after single sub- cutaneous doses. Data analysis is ongoing and will be submitted for presentation when the analysis is complete.
MBIA expects $200 million in mark-to-market losses from its credit derivative business, and said that Fitch Ratings' insurer financial strength ratings can cause serious volatility in how the company is viewed in the equity markets.
McDonald's Corp said on Monday sales at restaurants open at least 13 months rose 11.7 percent globally in February, well above Wall Street expectations, helped by U.S. coffee sales and strength overseas. Same-store sales, a key gauge of retail health, rose 8.3 percent in the United States and 15.4 percent in Europe. The Asia/Pacific, Middle East and Africa division posted comparable sales growth of 10.9 percent.
Blackstone: "Economic Net Income for the quarter ended December 31, 2007 totaled $128.2 million as compared to Pro Forma Adjusted Economic Net Income of $894.9 million for the quarter ended December 31, 2006."
"You can almost draw (the credit unwind) out in a diagram," said a managing director at the Economic Outlook Group in Princeton, N.J. "With home prices going down, consumers cut back on spending. If consumers cut back on spending, the economy weakens further. If the economy weakens further, fewer people are able to afford mortgages, so home foreclosures increase."
In 2008, its sixth year, the war will cost approximately $12 billion a month, triple the "burn" rate of its earliest years, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and co-author Linda J. Bilmes report in a new book.
Crude surges to surpass $108 a barrel for first time. Natural gas traded up to $10.04. Gold for April delivery fell $2.40 to end at $971.80 an ounce on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Lehman Bros. will cut 5% of its staff worldwide as turmoil in the financial markets tamps down business prospects, CNBC television reported Monday morning.
WellPoint Inc. cut its full-year earnings forecast to the range of $5.76 to $6.01 a share, including investment gains of 6 cents, from its previous forecast of $6.41 a share, citing higher-than-expected medical costs, lower-than-expected fully insured enrollment and the overall economic environment. Shares of WellPoint fell 17% to $54.70 in recent after-hours trading after closing down $1.20, or 1.8%, at $67.12.
German Bundesbank President Axel Weber said a high CPI leaves no leeway for rate cuts at the European Central Bank.
The White House said Vice President Dick Cheney will discuss concerns about record oil prices when he visits Saudi Arabia next week during a trip to the Middle East.
China's consumer prices rose at their fastest pace in almost 12 years in February as prices for meat, vegetables and energy surged, raising the likelihood the central bank will lift interest rates. China's consumer prices climbed 8.7% in February, accelerating from a 7.1% rise in January, the Statistics Bureau said.
Texas Instruments Inc. announced a lower mid-point for its first-quarter revenue estimate.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)