The Germans Knuckle Under
Whether the Germans wanted to flaunt it or not, they have always been the economic linchpin of the Eurozone. They were, until last year when China pulled ahead, the world’s largest exporter. Their GDP,…
All Work
Douglas A. McIntyre
The Oil Spill: Where Are The Remedies When They Are Needed
It is one thing to make a mistake and another to be unprepared to fix it. That is particularly true with the means of correction are at hand. BP plc (NYSE: BP), Transocean (NYSE: RIG), and…
Apple Starts To Run Out Of iPads
Someone blundered. After Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) ran low on iPads for its overseas launch and then had to delay shipments of the tablet sold on its website, its U.S. stores are running out of…
NASDAQ Cancels Trades On 296 Companies
Acknowledging that there may have been human error in the very sharp but temporary drop in stock prices yesterday, the NASDAQ has canceled trades on dozens of stocks that were made between 2:40 pm and…
Media Digest 5/7/2010
Reuters: Stocks fell in Asia and Europe as the pound and euro fell. Reuters: The GOP’s attempt to kill a consumer watchdog program was not successful. Reuters: The Goldman Sachs Group (NYSE: GS) is…
Nasdaq Will Cancel Trades, NYSE Arca May As Well.
Nasdaq Operations said it will cancel all trades executed between 2:40 p.m. to 3 p.m. showing a rise or fall of more than 60 percent from the last trade in that security at 2:40…
Why The DJIA Will Renew Its Assault On 12,000
The DJIA will once again begin its move toward 12,000 after the market collapse of the last several days. The quick drop of almost 1,000 points on May 6 seems to have been due to a trading or…
The Month’s Biggest Index Losers: Chinese Agriculture, Chinese Solar, and Semiconductor Fabricators
There were strong losses in three Tickerspy indexes over the most recent 30-day period. This month’s biggest fallers are in Chinese Agriculture, Chinese Solar, and Semiconductor Fabricators. Chinese agriculture stocks continue to decline, and are down 43.2% in the past…
Did a Software Glitch Cause The Market Crash?
Part of the drop that took the DJIA down almost 1,00o points to under 10,000 is being blamed on software glitches at the exchange. Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG) dropped 21% in a few minutes and…
Oil Spill Causes NOAA To Close Regions In The Gulf
NOAA is restricting fishing for a minimum of 10 days in federal waters most affected by the BP oil spill, largely between Louisiana state waters at the mouth of the Mississippi River and waters…
Carbon Emissions Take Record Drop In The US
The US Energy Information Administration has just released its review of CO2 emissions in the US for 2009. That year’s report shows the largest ever absolute drop and percentage drop in CO2 emissions since…
Contagion Brush Fire
“Each of the six banking systems Portugal, Spain, Italy, Ireland, Greece, the UK… faces different challenges, but the contagion risk could dilute these differences and impose very real, common threats on all of them,”…
A Note On Inflation From The Fed
A note from the desk of President Jeffrey M. Lacker, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond: “The median inflation expectation from the University of Michigan’s monthly survey of consumer sentiment is 2.9 percent, and other surveys…
Is US Bailing Out Greece?
From the desk of Senator Jim DeMint: “Right now, 17 percent of the IMF funding pool that the $40 billion bailout is being drawn from comes from U.S. taxpayers. If that ratio holds true, that…
Productivity Still Too Hot
Although productivity is not rising at the rate it did in the first quarter, the increase is still too “hot” to help employment. According to the BLS: “Nonfarm business sector labor productivity increased at…
Nintendo Unit Sales Drop 21% From Last Year
The news is bad for Nintendo. It reported its fiscal year numbers. The video game company posted its first full-year drop in revenue in six years. Wii sales were down 21% year-over-year to 20.53…
Freddie Mac: Another $10.6 Billion From Taxpayers
Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) lost another $8 billion in the first calendar quarter of the year. That includes $1.3 billion in dividends paid to the Treasury. Freddie might have simply kept the money. It…
Senate Financial Reform Plans Can’t Address Short Term Trouble
The Senate has voted 96 to 1 in favor of a program that prevents the use of government funds to bailout large financial firms the way that the TARP fund did. At the same…
The World’s Most Important Bond Investor Calls Ratings Agencies As Flawed
Bill Gross, the head investment officer of bond giant PIMCO and the most famous fixed-income investor in the world, dismissed Moody’s (NYSE: MCO) and S&P as deeply flawed arbiters of investment risk. In his monthly…
Media Digest 5/6/2010 Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg
MarketWatch: Asia shares were off by 2%. Reuters: Riots against austerity measures continued n Greece. Reuters: US regulators want to increase supervision of broadband. Reuters: The Fed’s Rosengren says rates must stay low.