We’ve been following recent announcements of pullbacks in capital spending in the oil and gas patch. Every day it seems, one or two more companies announce that capital spending will be cut by up…
So much for deflation worries, and so much for an early end to the recession. OPEC shocked the market by saying it will cut production by 4.2 million a day. Most comments from the…
Two weeks ago we announced that we were going to start using Twitter to communicate with our readers. As of today, we are happy to say that our efforts have been warmly received by…
According to Bloomberg, "Losses and writedowns from the credit crisis surpassed $1 trillion today, and show little sign of ending, as Morgan Stanley marked down the value of mortgages and leveraged loans." "The losses…
There are many stocks which are supposed to be at least somewhat immune to the recession. This notion has become less and less true, even if some of the former recession-proof stocks have not…
Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT) may be one of the restructuring nightmares of the decade. This morning the company is taking further steps in its restructuring by announcing "cost cutting measures"…. Another sign that business…
The SIPC came out with a statement last night indicating that they will be involved in the Madoff situation. The SIPC maintains a special reserve fund authorized by Congress to help investors at failed…
Yesterday was a rather odd day in more than one way. The reaction to Goldman Sachs Group (NYSE: GS) was given a warm reception, despite the much wider losses than expected, the negative revenues…
It is getting rather thin in analyst coverage, but these are the top ten analyst upgrades and downgrades we have seen this Wednesday morning: ActivIdentity (NASDAQ: ACTI) Started as Buy at Stanford Group. BCE…
"One riot, one Ranger"–inscription on statue dedicated to Texas Rangers, 1960. During the last century, Texas was long on land and short on lawmen. That means that each dispute got one constable. The Chinese…
Citigroup (C) will probably merge its commercial bank and investment bank. That makes sense. They both serve corporate customers. Investment banking fees are down and so is corporate lending. Efficiency is the battle cry…
No one knows where Madoff’s money went. It would be hard for him to spend $50 billion on himself. He could have secretly sent it to charities round the world. That would make him…
F. Scott Fitzgerald was right. One chance and one chance only. The Fed took its last step by cutting rates to zero and saying it will buy up all of the debt it can…
OPEC is serious now. The nut-ball dictators who run Iran and Venezuela need more money to balance their budgets and keep the flow of capital to terrorists going. In Saudi Arabia, the government has…
SEC chief Christopher Cox admits that the agency bungled the Madoff matter. He says that the agency received warnings as early as 1999. For some reason those warnings did not make it from the…
As Freud said, "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar". It is not always a symbol for a part of the male anatomy. It is a smoke, a pleasure, something to do outside to…
According to Reuters, the Fed may need to use a trillion dollars to halt the economy from moving into a period of deflation. Reuters reports that OPEC will make the largest production cut in…
Markets in Asia were slightly higher. The Nikkei rose ,5% to 8,613. The Hang Seng rose 1.5% to 15,261. The Shanghai Composite was up .1% to 1,977. At the open, the FTSE was up…
Satyam Computer (SAY) Plans to buy another company send stock diving. Drops to $5.05 from 52-week high of $29.84. KKR Financial (KFN) Plans to replace CEO on top of poor performance. Drops to $.60…
General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE) has reconfirmed its December 2 earnings outlook of $0.50 to $0.52 EPS excluding charges and $0.36 to $0.42 including charges); it still sees full-year 2008 earnings of $1.78 to…