10 Monday AM Reads
My reads to start your week:
• China’s First Trade Contraction in Two Years Adds Growth Concern (Bloomberg)
• Is the $25 Billion Foreclosure Settlement a Stealth Bank Bailout? (Time)
• Ex-Apple and AIG earnings, Q4 S&P 500 earnings growth falls from 5.5% to a meager 0.8% (Factset)
• ECB Cash Doesn’t Wean Investors Off German Debt (Bloomberg)
• Analysis: Criminal probe trail going cold at MF Global (Reuters) see also MF Global Trustee Sees $1.6 Billion Customer Shortfall (Deal Book)
• Why the Wealthy Really Are Moving Cash to the Caymans (Smart Money)
• Elizabeth Warren profile: A girl who soared, but longed to belong (Boston Globe)
• Copper Traders Turn Bullish as Inventories Drop to 2009 Low: (Bloomberg) see also Rich to Invest More in Commodities, Reduce Cash (Bloomberg)
• BREAKING THE CODE: WHY YUOR BARIN CAN RAED TIHS (Discovery News)
• Jeremy Lin Drives Knicks’ Sales, MSG Shares (Bloomberg)
• NASA’s science missions bring the universe into sharper focus even as agency struggles with manned flight (Washington Post)
What are you reading?
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Too Late to Jump Aboard?
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Source: WSJ
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February 13th, 2012 at 9:58 am
File under “humour”
http://nymag.com/print/?/news/features/wall-street-2012-2/
February 13th, 2012 at 10:19 am
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/merkel-leading-europe-in-wrong-direction-soros-2012-02-12?Link=obinsite
February 13th, 2012 at 10:43 am
On MF Global, three fundamental questions:
1. Are they probing why MF Global is in Chapter 11 instead of Chapter 7 bankruptcy? My understanding is that borkers are virtually always in Chapter 7 and it may be illegal to be otherwise. However, it is to the TBTF banks advantage and the customers’ disadvantage to have them in Ch 11.
2. The last time I checked, most institutions would view misplacing $1.6B as more than a rounding error. A shortfall of this magnitude would indicate poor financial controls and accounting systems and inapproriate authroity matrices. At the very laeast, this should be a clear SarbOx prosecution for the Chairman, CEO, CFO, COO, and Treasurer who are responsible for having appropriate systems in place and certify that they do have them.
3. Have the FBI been able to penetrate Louis Freeh’s cone of silence on the e-mails and other documentation during the last couple of weeks. His successful stonewalling on this issue has been bizarre to date and indicates that the FBI and others have not really been trying.
February 13th, 2012 at 10:56 am
What has ‘vaporized’ is not the MF Global customers’ funds, but the desire to get to the bottom of who took them
http://www.forbes.com/sites/francinemckenna/2012/02/12/mf-global-its-not-over-until-its-over/
Next big date for Greece possibly March 25 as bond rollover will need more aid
http://www.ifre.com/derivatives-investors-dump-march-greek-cds-contract/20048490.article
February 13th, 2012 at 11:13 am
Streeteye:
The Forbes article is a classic reason why Ron Paul is not going away. The US has the worst of both world’s: it is effectively de-regulated as the financial laws appear to be unenforceable; while the laws themselves are hundreds or thousands of pages in length with even more pages of regulations that cause law-abiding citizens and companies to sink in a morass of red-tape.
If MF Global cannot or will not be prosecuted under SarbOx, then it is time that Congress simply repeal the act and inform everybody in the country that they are on their own and it is buyer beware.
February 13th, 2012 at 11:29 am
More on peak oil:
http://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Shedding-Some-Light-on-Peak-Oil.html
Again?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/13/debt-ceiling-congress-_n_1253655.html
February 13th, 2012 at 11:54 am
Banking sanctions are causing Iran to default on consumer staples payments:
http://www.firstpost.com/world/iran-turns-to-barter-for-food-as-sanctions-cripple-imports-208894.html
Meanwhile, the bombing job on the Israeli embassy personnel’s vehicle in New Delhi seems to have been a two-man motorcycle team, planting a magnetic bomb on the back of her vehicle. The incident was a mere football field’s distance from the Indian Prime Minister’s residence–rather ballsy.
With this, and the thwarted Tbilisi job, it would seem *somebody* is thinking of rolling out a war.
Partial disclosure: long COS.TO
February 13th, 2012 at 12:28 pm
rd I’ll help you feed the masses on the MFG issue (and more) .. seems the buyer-be-aware attitude is playing out .. a trade is a trade .. a sale is a sale .. next sell ie: hire a lawyer … now picture that southpark episode “and its gone”
February 13th, 2012 at 12:58 pm
STATE SENATOR CONSTANCE JOHNSON INTRODUCES “EVERY SPERM IS SACRED” AMENDMENT TO ANTI-CHOICE LEGISLATION
http://www.themarysue.com/constance-johnson-masturbation-amendment/
She would make a great VP for Santorum.
February 13th, 2012 at 1:47 pm
Maybe it’s all a joke, maybe “MFG” stands for “Mutha Fu#%^& Gone” (as in your money is:)
Corzines next firm’s acronym will no doubt be “STFU”.
February 13th, 2012 at 1:50 pm
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/17343120-5639-11e1-8dfa-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1mHPAtjKD
a woody allen “you know nothing of my work moment” from Paul Volcker on “his ” rule
February 13th, 2012 at 2:22 pm
Venn ya got me with that WTF .. fyi – its on the Comedy tab and just our USA way to work it alittle
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/10/oklahoma-senator-constance-johnson-satirical-amendment-ejaculation_n_1268768.html
February 13th, 2012 at 2:33 pm
Why the Wealthy Really Are Moving Cash to the Caymans
Don’t tell me he got paid for writing that nonsense.
>>Do you want to spend the rest of your life living next to Roman Polanski in France?<<
Count me in. You stay in your apartment in New York, Brett.
February 13th, 2012 at 3:11 pm
I tracked this down ..
for me this was the words spoken of the day (so far) Jay Fielden (T&C magazine editor) @ 6m55s on Greece issue (and tbp in general) “… what is fair here ? is it fair for bus driver to get that 20% of his salary cut – his retirement age go up to 65 – his pension cut @ FOR someone who sits on billions of dollars to do nothing …. on side of some of the ship owners as that – I’ve been paying my fair share to a completely corrupt inept government they’ve squandered it all – by* ah you know …”
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036789/ns/msnbc_tv-morning_joe/#46366414
* another BUY that could work here .. government doesn’t make much but Law .. but hopefully some WORK by means other than MIC .. does it take 4 Houses to get that done – POTUS SCOTUS Senate HoR in lock step ? guess it wouldn’t hurt .. but Really ? can we coin the twentyfirst10′s Stockholm Syndrome yet .. bye
February 13th, 2012 at 4:10 pm
Retail Stocks Rally to All-Time High
http://www.wwd.com/business-news/financial/retail-stocks-rally-to-all-time-high-3608359
How can this be? …it ….it must be another Liberal lie.
Haven’t Obama’s huge tax increases wrecked the economy? Hasn’t he Socialized most of American business? Haven’t people left the nation, moved their money to the Cayman Islands and other former Mormon Mission Sanctuaries? I mean… Billions of American have lost their jobs. Family farms have been scorched to pay Death Taxes. Whole Communities of American Christians have been killed in wars!!!
How can this be?