Is it really worth taking this risk for 20 basis points or 30 basis points or whatever it is when in fact already corporate credit and the interest rate on U.S. Treasuries is the lowest in history?” he asked.

He said corporations have been borrowing at very low rates to improve their balance sheets, buy back shares and pay dividends, but said that when he asks CEOs why they are not hiring and investing, the universal answer is that they are not doing so because of “extreme uncertainty.”

We’ve filled the gas tank,” he said. “If businesses large and small….were properly incented…if Congress can do something convincing and give them clarity and certainty I do think we could go gangbusters, because our corporations’ balanced sheets are cleaner, people have learned to curb costs to a degree unimaginable previously, they’re ready to roll.”

Ready to roll. The battle between the monetary and fiscal forces – central bankers vs. politicians lingers on. Are monetary policies from central bankers just enabling politicians to conduct business as usual without taking any responsibility? Spend, spend, spend and let the inflation ignited by central bankers bail you out. So far not much inflation but central bankers have provided lots of kindling. Does Congress hold the match?

Don’t let the boredom get to you. There is a tendency to want to make something happen. Sometimes patience is the key. VIX is below 15 for the 5^th time in the last two years. The guys from Market Tech Reports point out that all 4 of those previous instances preceded a greater than 6% that lasted 2 months on average. That timing would place us just in front of the election. Is the election and fiscal cliff about to bring more uncertainty? We would love to see a sell off before the stronger seasonal period of November 1- May 1. 1406 level on the S&P is still resistance. Let’s see if the option players start to roll off or will they try to close above 1400 on Friday. Either way we think that next week could see a bumpier ride as options roll off. Support could wane in the aftermath of trader’s closing out option positions on Friday’s expiration. Keep an eye on the calendar.

http://markettechreports.blogspot.com/2012/08/market-top-indicators-vix.html

To learn more about us and Blackthorn Asset Management LLC visit our website at www.BlackthornAsset.com .

Answer: The opening act at the Woodstock Festival on August 15, 1969 was Richie Havens. Who closed the show? Jimi Hendrix.

Today’s Question: Only 23 MLB players have thrown a “Perfect Game”. Of those 23 only two went on to win 300+ games in the Major Leagues. One was Cy Young. Who is the only other 300 game winner?

A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty. – Winston Churchill

Disclosure: This blog is informational and is not a recommendation to buy or sell anything. If you are thinking about investing consider the risk. Everyone’s financial situation is different. Consult your financial advisor.

What is interesting is that the production index, a key measure of state manufacturing conditions, rose from 5.5 to 15.5 and that is its strongest reading in 15 months. Labor market indicators reflected stronger labor demand growth and steady work weeks, rising from 8.5 to 13.7 this month.

The new orders index rose to 7.9 after three months of virtually flat and that suggests that demand finally grew after staying flat since February. Similarly, the shipments index rebounded to 9.6 after two months of near-zero readings; and the report’s capacity utilization index rose from 5 to 13.3 to its highest level since early 2011.

The Dallas Fed district is said to be very diverse but it is also one which has a larger oil, gas, and energy exposure than other Fed districts.  Why that matters is that the growth has kicked back up despite a large drop in the price of oil. Some 24% of the firms surveyed noted improvement in the level of business activity in June, up from 15% last month, and the company outlook index edged up from 4.7 to 5.5.

Things will have to get better soon or this may be a one-off if the Expectations component is correct.  The report noted, “Expectations regarding future business conditions slipped in June. The index of future general business activity edged down from 4.3 to 1.3. The index of future company outlook also fell three points from its May level, coming in at 8.4. Indexes for future manufacturing activity moved up slightly in June, pushing further into positive territory.”

The Dallas Fed is not generally a major market-moving figure. Still, this is one of the few reports which rose rather than one which turned in slower growth or some tendency toward negative growth or contraction.

JON C. OGG

This from their Web Site is CLASSIC!

Richard Fisher, president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas is the Top Banker in the Country to SPEAK UP for what should have been done years ago. That means he is held in very high regard with US.

Can not leave out, Harvey Rosenblum.

Wall Street is buzzing about the annual report just put out by the Dallas Federal Reserve. In the paper, Harvey Rosenblum, the head of the Dallas Fed’s research department, bluntly calls for the breakup of Too-Big-To-Fail banks like Bank of America, Chase, and Citigroup.

The government’s bottomless sponsorship of these TBTF institutions, Rosenblum writes, has created a “residue of distrust for government, the banking system, the Fed and capitalism itself.”

I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.

First, this managerialism is nothing new for the Fed. The (ahem) ”libertarian” Alan Greenspan once said: “If they’re too big to fail, they’re too big.”

Second, the Fed already had a number of fantastic opportunities to “break up” so-called TBTF institutions: right at the time when it was signing off on the $29 trillion of bailouts it has administered since 2008. If the political will existed at the Fed to forcibly end the phenomenon of TBTF, it could (and should) have done it when it had the banks over a barrel.

Third, capitalism (i.e. the market) seems to deal pretty well with the problem of TBTF: it destroys unmanageably large and badly run companies. Decisions have consequences; buying a truckload of derivatives from a soon-to-be-bust counter-party will destroy your balance sheet and render you illiquid. Who seems to blame? The Fed; for bailing out a load of shitty companies and a shitty system . Without the Fed’s misguided actions the problem of TBTF would be long gone. After a painful systemic breakdown, we could have created a new system without any of these residual overhanging problems. We wouldn’t be “taxing savers to pay for the recapitalization of banks whose dire problems led to the calamity.” There wouldn’t be “a two-tiered regulatory environment where the misdeeds of TBTF banks are routinely ignored and unpunished and a lower tier where small regional banks are increasingly forced to swim upstream against the law’s sheer length, breadth and complexity, leading to a “massive increase in compliance burdens.”

So the Fed is guilty of crystallising and perpetuating most of these problems with misguided interventionism. And what’s the Fed’s purported answer to these problems?

More interventionism: forcibly breaking up banks into chunks that are deemed not to be TBTF.

And what’s the problem with that?

Well for a start the entire concept of “too big to fail” is completely wrong. The bailout of AIG had nothing to do with AIG’s “size”. It was a result of systemic exposure to AIG’s failure. The problem is to do with interconnectivity. The truth is that AIG — and by extension, the entire system — was deemed too interconnected to fail. Many, many companies had AIG products on their balance sheets. If AIG had failed (and taken with it all of that paper, very generously known as “assets”) then all those companies would have had a hole blown in their balance sheets, and would have sustained losses which in turn may well have caused them to fail, bleeding out the entire system.

The value that seems to matter in determining systemic robustness is the amount of systemic interconnectivity, in other words the amount of assets on balance sheets that are subject to counter-party risk (i.e. which become worthless should their guarantor fail).

Derivatives are not the only such asset, but they make up by far the majority:

Global nominal exposure is growing again. And those derivatives sit on global balance sheets waiting for the next black swan to blow up a hyper-connected counter-party like AIG. And such a cascade of defaults will likely lead to another 2008-style systemic meltdown, probably ending in another goliath-sized bailout, and another few rounds of the QE slop-bucket.

The question the Fed must answer is this: what difference would it make in terms of systemic fragility if exposures are transferred from larger to companies to smaller ones?

Breaking up banks will make absolutely zero difference, because the problem is not the size but systemic interconnectivity. Losses sustained against a small counter-party can hurt just as much as losses sustained against a larger counter-party. In a hyper-connected system, it is possible for failed small players to quickly snowball into systemic catastrophe.

The Fed (as well as the ECB) would do well to remember that it is not size that matters, but how you use it.

Campaign Spending Shows Political Ties, Self-Dealing

Kim Barker, Al Shaw, ProPublica:

“Our analysis found that more than $306 million has been spent so far by major super PACs and the five leading presidential candidates. In some cases, payees serve both candidates and the super PACs aligned with them, raising the specter that groups may be working together in ways that violate the rules, campaign finance experts said. We also found instances in which overseers of some political action committees directed hefty fees to their own companies, a legal form of self-dealing.”

Read Full article Here

US House of Representatives Approves Plan to Destroy
Medicare, Medicaid and Food Stamps

By Patrick Martin

The US House of Representatives has adopted a budget resolution that calls for privatization of Medicare and the elimination of Medicaid, food stamps and many other federal entitlement benefits. The resolution is part of a bipartisan campaign to slash spending on social programs.

Read Full Article Here

US Anti-terrorism Law Curbs Free Speech and Activist Work, Court Told

By Paul Harris in New York

A group political activists and journalists has launched a legal challenge to stop an American law they say allows the US military to arrest civilians anywhere in the world and detain them without trial as accused supporters of terrorism.

Read Full Article Here

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Economy

Break Up the Big Banks, Says the Dallas Fed

Robert Reich, Op-Ed:

Wall Street’s increasing power remains “difficult to control because they have the lawyers and the money to resist the pressures of federal regulation.” The Dodd-Frank act that was supposed to control Wall Street “leaves TBTF [too big to fail] entrenched.” The Dallas Fed goes on to argue that the Fed’s easy money policy can’t be much help to the U.S. economy as long as Wall Street is “still clogged with toxic assets accumulated in the boom years.

Read Full Article Here

Department of Energy Knew of Solyndra Risks, Former FBI Agent Finds

Ronnie Greene, News Analysis:

“The Department of Energy was fully aware of the risks in backing Solyndra Inc., a start-up company that pocketed a half-billion dollar DOE loan but never turned a penny in profit before shutting its doors, concludes a former FBI agent hired to examine the company’s books. The expert’s report, filed this week in Solyndra’s voluminous bankruptcy case in California  , could embolden critics who say the government ignored financial red flags in supporting the solar panel maker with President Obama’s maiden green energy loan in 2009.”

Read Full Article Here

While White House Emphasizes Easing Student Debt Burden, Fed Contractors Play Hardball

Marian Wang, News Analysis:

“Under Education Department contracts, collection companies “rehabilitate” a defaulted loan by getting a borrower to make nine payments in 10 months. If they succeed, they reap a jackpot: a commission equal to as much as 16 percent of the entire loan amount, or $3,200 on a $20,000 loan. These companies receive that fee only if borrowers make a minimum payment of 0.75 percent to 1.25 percent of the loan each month, depending on its size.”

Read Full Article Here

Bank Of America CEO Gets $7.5 Million Pay Package After The Bank Lost More Than Half Its Stock Value

Pat Garofalo, News Report:

“The Wall Street Journal noted this week that that CEO pay lagged behind profits and productivity last year, mirroring a trend that has been occurring with workers’ wages for decades. But even that slight modicum of moderation regarding executive compensation evidently didn’t extend to Bank of America, which gave CEO Brian Moynihan a $7.5 million pay package — six times as much as he made in 2010 — following a year in which the company’s stock plummeted.”

Read Full Article Here

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Wars and Rumors of War

Assad remarks give little hope of peace

By AGENCIES

BAGHDAD: Bashar Assad’s remarks on a UN-Arab plan yesterday gave little hope of peace as the Syrian tyrant called for an end to “terrorist acts” by foreign powers.

“It’s not surprising, but it’s discouraging and disappointing,” US State Department spokesman Mark Toner said.

Arab leaders, meanwhile, urged a peaceful end to the bloodshed through “serious national dialogue,” at a landmark summit in the Iraqi capital yesterday.

They approved a resolution calling on the “Syrian government and all opposition factions to deal positively with the envoy (Kofi Annan) by starting serious national dialogue.”

Arab leaders said the plan should be implemented “immediately and completely.”

It said “the massacre committed by the Syrian forces against civilians in Baba Amro … can be considered crimes (against) humanity.”

Read Full Article Here

Israel Shields Public From Risks of War With Iran

Gareth Porter, Inter Press Service:

“The message that Iran is too weak to threaten an effective counterattack is contradicted by one of Israel’s leading experts on Iranian missiles and the head of its missile defense program for nearly a decade, who says Iranian missiles are capable of doing significant damage to Israeli targets.”

Read Full Article Here

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Environmental

EPA Climate Proposal Could Limit Coal’s future, at Least in U.S.

Renee Schoof, News Report:

The rules require future power plants to keep their emissions of heat-trapping gases under a limit. Most natural gas plants would meet the standard easily, but coal-fired plants would have to reduce emissions by about half. The equipment to capture and store those emissions underground isn’t commercially viable. “This is not a sudden death for the coal industry by any means,” said David Pumphrey of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a center-right research center.

Read Full Article

**************************************************************************************************

Activism

Fault Lines: History of an occupation Part 1

Uploaded by AlJazeeraEnglish on Mar 21, 2012

Fault Lines tells the definitive history of Occupy Wall Street from its early days through the movement’s rapid spread up to the brutal crackdown by state authorities.

Fault Lines: Occupy Wall Street: Surviving the Winter Part 2

Uploaded by AlJazeeraEnglish on Mar 27, 2012

Fault Lines follows key Occupy organisers through the winter as they continue to build a movement even after violent evictions across the country.

On the News With Thom Hartmann: Anti-Austerity Strikes Halted Business in Spain Yesterday, and More

In today’s On the News segment: Supreme Court now deciding the fate of Obamacare, the recall vote of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is set, new oil subsidies sail through Congress, natural gas platform disaster continues to unfold in the North Sea, Egyptian courts censor Internet pornography, and more.

Read Transcripts Here

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Articles of Interest

Russian Proton-M Puts Military Satellite into Orbit

Russia’s Space Forces launched a Proton-M carrier rocket with a Cosmos class military satellite on board on Friday, spokesman Lt. Col. Alexey Zolotukhin said.

Read Full Article Here

Japan orders SDF to intercept DPRK rocket if necessary

China.org.cn

Japanese Defense Minister Naoki Tanaka officially ordered the Self-Defense Forces (SDF) to intercept a Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s (DPRK) rocket launch if necessary on Friday.

Tanaka issued the order after he told SDF on Tuesday to take preparatory measures against the DPRK rocket launch.

Japan and other countries see the rocket launch as a cover for a long-range ballistic missile test, Xinhua reported.

Read Full Article Here

All Parties Ignore the One Way to Reduce Health Care Costs: Single-Payer

David U. Himmelstein MD and Steffie Woolhandler MD, MPH, Truthout:

“Both parties studiously avoid the one health-reform solution that – unlike computers – would actually save money while sparing patients: single-payer, nonprofit national health insurance. Research shows that single-payer reform could save about $380 billion annually that’s currently wasted on insurers’ overhead and the unnecessary paperwork (and screen-work) they inflict on hospitals, doctors and patients.”

Read Full Article Here

CWA Union Teams Up With Free Press, Consumer Groups to Oppose Telecom Deregulation

Mike Elk, In These Times:

“The Communications Workers of America union has been criticized by progressive consumers groups like Free Press for its positions on net neutrality and the proposed AT&T-T-Mobile merger. Now, though, CWA is teaming up with groups like Free Press to fight two big bills that they say would deregulate the telecommunications industry, help build telecom monopolies and lead to telecom job losses.”

Read Full Article Here

Exclusive: Soros’ son strikes out on his own

(Hmmmm, Can anyone say Restructuring and SEC?)

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

By Jennifer Ablan and Matthew Goldstein

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The upheaval within billionaire investor George Soros’ firm continues as one of his sons is separating some of his personal fortune to manage it himself.

Jonathan Soros, who stepped down in September from day-to-day management of Soros Fund Management LLC, plans to hire at least one of his father’s key employees, say two people familiar with the situation.

The two sources said Soros’ son intends to set up his own family office – something the Soros Fund converted to last year – with the help of David Kulsar, currently chief risk officer for the Soros Fund.

“Jonathan wants to manage some of his own money so the (Soros Fund) family office has made that accommodation for him,” said a source familiar with the situation but who was not authorized to discuss the matter.

Jonathan Soros, who was a law clerk for a federal judge before joining with his brother Robert in 2002 to oversee the management of Soros Fund, did not return calls or emails seeking comment. He currently is a senior fellow with the Roosevelt Institute, a liberal think tank group in New York.

Kulsar, who also did not return a phone call seeking comment, worked in risk management for John Meriweather’s JWM Partners before joining the Soros Fund. Meriweather founded Long-Term Capital Management, the hedge fund whose collapse in 1999 sparked fears of a financial crisis.

Read Full Article Here

Robert Reich

As the Supreme Court shows every sign of throwing out “Obamacare” and leaving 30 million Americans without health insurance, another drama is being played out in the quiet corridors of the Federal Reserve system that may affect even more of us.

Taxpayers will be on the hook for another giant Wall Street bailout, and the economy won’t be mended, unless the nation’s biggest banks are broken up.

That’s not just me talking, or the Occupier movement, or that wayward executive who resigned from Goldman Sachs a few weeks ago. It’s the conclusion of the Dallas Federal Reserve, one of the most conservative of the Fed’s regional banks.

The lead essay in its just released annual report says a cartel of giant banks continues to hobble the recovery and poses an ongoing danger to the economy.

Wall Street’s increasing power remains “difficult to control because they have the lawyers and the money to resist the pressures of federal regulation.” The Dodd-Frank act that was supposed to control Wall Street “leaves TBTF [too big to fail] entrenched.”

The Dallas Fed goes on to argue that the Fed’s easy money policy can’t be much help to the U.S. economy as long as Wall Street is “still clogged with toxic assets accumulated in the boom years.”

So what’s the answer, according to the Dallas Fed? It’s “breaking up the nation’s biggest banks into smaller units.”

Thud. That’s the sound the report hitting the desks of Wall Street executives. They and their Washington lobbyists are doing what they can to make sure this report is discredited and buried.

When I spoke with one of the Street’s major defenders in the Capitol this morning he snorted, “Dallas represents small regional banks that are jealous of Wall Street.” When I reminded him the Dallas Fed was about the most conservative of the regional banks and knew firsthand about the dangers of under-regulated banks — the Savings and Loan crisis ripped through Texas like nowhere else — he said, “Dallas doesn’t know its [backside] from a prairie gopher hole.”

So as Republicans make the repeal of “Obamacare” their primary objective (and Alito, Scalia, Thomas, Roberts and perhaps Kennedy sharpen their knives) another drama is taking place at the Fed. The question is whether Bernanke and company in Washington will heed the warnings coming from its Dallas branch, and amplify the message.

Robert Reich is the author of Aftershock: The Next Economy and America’s Future, now in bookstores. This post originally appeared at RobertReich.org.

(read more)

43% of ALL jobs created in the United States since June of 2009 have come from a conservative state that represents 8% of the national economy.  And Barack Obama has taken credit for every single one of them even as he demonizes the policies that actually produced all of those jobs.

Now, notice how this liberal tries to give credit to the most successful job-engine in America, and then steal that credit away from the conservatives and the conservative policies that brought that job-engine about.

Texas, the jobs engine
Conservatives hail it and liberals dispute the story, but one thing is certain about the Lone Star State’s employment success: The number is real.

By Rick Wartzman
July 3, 2011

For the last few weeks, I’ve been unable to get a startling statistic out of my head: Since the recession officially ended, Texas has created more than 4 of every 10 new jobs in America.

That’s right, Texas: the reddest of red states, home to gun lovers and school textbooks that openly question whether the Founding Fathers intended for the separation of church and state. I am no ideologue. Still, whenever I get political, I tend to tilt reflexively to the left, making the jobs figure a bit disconcerting at first.

Counterproductiveness and foolishness are two of the three hallmarks that define the left.  Hypocrisy is the third.

A lot of Californians are whining about the fact that many “Texas jobs” came at California’s expense.  And the whiny liberals are right; many of those employers DID escape from the liberal hellhole known as the People’s Soviet State of California.  But here’s the question: do you want America to be more like California – which among other things features a $500 billion black hole of economic death known as unfunded liabilities from state union pensions - or do you want a job?  Do you want a demagogic excuse for why all the jobs are going elsewhere, or do you want a job?  Do you want to sit on your fat pimply sweaty ass living on welfare until the system crashes and you starve to death, or do you want a system that actually produces something?

If you want the former vote for Obama, vote for Democrats, and then go to hell when you die.  If you want the latter, for God’s sakes, please vote for the Republicans who  are actually creating jobs in America.

Democrats look back at 2008 and blame “failed Republican policies.”  Basically, all they have to point at is the fact that George Bush was president when it happened.  They ignore the fact that Democrats had total control of the House and near total control of the Senate for nearly two years prior to the disaster happening.  They claim that Republicans refusing to regulate was what created the mess.  They ignore the fact that Democrats REPEATEDLY refused ANY regulation whatsover of Fannie and Freddie which had overwhelming control of the housing market that actually caused the meltdown.  Look at the actual facts:

http://startthinkingright.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/aei-article-how-fannie-and-freddie-blew-up-the-economy/

http://startthinkingright.wordpress.com/2010/08/10/barney-frank-and-democrat-party-most-responsible-for-2008-economic-collapse/

http://startthinkingright.wordpress.com/2010/05/11/barney-frank-video-proves-democrats-at-core-of-2008-economic-collapse/

http://hennessysview.com/business/franklin-raines-criminal-enterprise-and-barack-obama-his-accomplice/

http://politicsorpoppycock.com/2008/09/28/franks-fingerprints-are-all-over-the-financial-fiasco/

The last link above refers to a Boston Herald story which has since been scrubbed.  It’s amazing how articles that taint Democrats have a way of “vanishing.”  It’s one of the reasons I blog.  I want to preserve the record of what actually happened to this country.

All this to say that Democrats had a false demagogic narrative based on lies.

But the American people bought those lies in 2008.  And Democrats had dictatorial control of the White House, the House of Representatives and a filibuster-proof Senate for nearly two full years.  And they took their same failed policies which led to the economic collapse of 2008 and expanded them.  And they promised Americans that their godawful stimulus would work.  It not only failed; it completely failed even by the Obama White House’s own constantly-shifting standards.  And it cost us $3.27 TRILLION we didn’t have.

Now, amazingly, the fact that the president happens to be a Democrat – and the fact that that Democrat took bad news and made it far worse – no longer matters.  Now Democrats want to say that it’s the Republicans – who only control the House of Representatives – are blocking economic progress.  Even though it DIDN’T matter that Nancy Pelosi was running the House of Representatives into the ground in 2007 and 2008.  To go along with Harry Reid doing the same thing during the same time period in the US Senate.

Democrats don’t run on facts; they run on demagoguery.  Remember that the man who led Texas into the job-creating machine that it is not only has nothing to do with George Bush, he actually didn’t like Bush as a big spending and compromising “compassionate conservative.”  Because Democrats and their mainstream media propagandists are already starting to tell the demagogic lie that Rick Perry is somehow identical to George Bush simply because the two men were governors of the same state.

Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher said he would have voted against the easing effort had he been a voter when the program was launched in November 2010.

“I cannot foresee any circumstance at present that would lead me to support any further expansion of our initiative on that front,” said Fisher, who is a voter on the Fed’s policy-setting panel this year.

Fisher said recent data point to signs of incipient upward pressure on prices.

“As far as price stability … we do have some pressures that are building,” he said.

U.S. core consumer prices rose at the quickest pace in 15 months while underlying producer prices rose at the fastest rate in more than two years in January, reports have shown over the last two days.

The U.S. central bank at its January meeting said that despite an accelerating pace, the recovery was still too weak to forcefully lower a high jobless rate.

Against that backdrop, it elected stay on track with the bond buying, which is due to be done by mid-year. Fisher voted in favor of the move.

Illustrating differing views of the outlook at the Fed, another Fed voter, Chicago’s Charles Evans, said in a speech in Rockford, Illinois that the pace of recovery remains disappointing, with unemployment is too high and inflation too low for the Fed to rest from its stimulus efforts.

© Thomson Reuters 2011

“.. en mis momentos más bajos he llegado a preguntarme si la política monetaria que hemos ingeniado podría estar funcionando en los lugares equivocados”

Esto implica que una vez escarbado en la superficie de la FED, podemos observar que, la FED duda de la FED. Fisher estaría a punto de abandonar la FED proximamente, preocupado por la gente que ha jugado con las reglas que puso la FED y que esperaban vivir “de rentas” a través de bonos u otros instrumentos los últimos años de su vida y que ahora reciben cada vez menos rendimiento por sus ahorros. Ja! lo que no se preocupa es que la pol. monetaria de la FED no ha creado ni empleo, ni moderada inflación … sólo burbujas.

Ayer tuvimos un “amago” de wano, y nuevamente nos pararon, y lo llevan haciendo desde hace tiempo, ya saben que si participamos en este negocio somos conscientes de los riesgos … por lo que debemos estar preparad@s y no olvidar que la gestión prudente de nuestras posiciones es nuestro mejor salvavidas. Akí no hay nada seguro, y el mercado es el que imparte justicia, aunque a veces parezca tuerto …

Bien, debemos distinguir entre la intervención de la FED y los movimiento intradiarios del mercado, que aunque puedan estar provocados son muy diferentes. Esto es muy dificil en días como ayer, dado que ante un movimiento al alza de tipos en China, demandas a entidades fras. y agitación en los mercados …. no sabemos como ha quedado el marcador.

Espero una sesión similar a la de ayer, habrá que vigilar la volatilidad el VIX y atentos a los resultados de Boeing en pre-mercado. Apenas tenemos noticias por lo que los inventarios de crudo semanales serán de interés, además la ofensiva de la FED sigue y hoy tenemos al presi de la FED de Richmond de escaramuza por los mercados …

Estamos en un rango bastante extrecho en el S&P, siendo 1162 barrera clave para los oseznos. Viendo como fué lo de ayer es dificil asegurar algo, me inclino por una sesión legeramente alcista, aunque ya digo que habrá que mirar la retaguardia a menudo.

Que tengan una feliz sesión

Federal Officials warn: Taking a simple walk in the park is no longer a Walk in the Park…

• Government

327 CIA mind-control victims win Cash claims

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article495413.ece

Justice is … Severed? It is not news that the CIA has been experimenting on US citizens. I think it is news that most Americans are not aware of this fact

• Economy

Dallas Fed chief: All we are creating is Bubble after Bubble

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/dalls-feds-fisher-stunner-admits-worries-fed-has-created-nothing-bubbles

In his just- released speech we read this stunner: “In my darkest moments, I have begun to wonder if the monetary accommodation we have already engineered might even be working in the wrong places…”and “A great many baby boomers or older cohorts who played by the rules, saved their money and migrated over time, as prudent investment counselors advise, to short- to intermediate-dated, fixed-income instruments are earning extremely low nominal and real returns on their savings. Further reductions in rates earned on savings will hardly endear the Fed to this portion of the population.”

• Health

Canada Declares BPA Toxic

http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2010/10/13/bpa-toxic.html

What is Bisphenol A? This stuff lines cans, juice boxes, plastic straws, and the ink from most credit card receipts… and Causes genetic mutations and cancer, AND IS ABSORBED THROUGH THE SKIN!  Canada has said “No More!”

• Strange

Enormous Ring developing in the Sun

http://beforeitsnews.com/story/218/366/Enormous_Ring_is_Developing_on_the_Sun.html

…Should have used a coaster…

Great Quotes

“Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety deserve neither Liberty nor Safety” –Attributed to Dr. Benjamin Franklin

Interesting story on the Bank of International Settlements (BIS). The BIS is the Central Bank’s banker. The BIS facilitates the flow of capital around the world and helps to implement and enforce accounting principles. One of the largest gold swaps ever performed was executed early this year.  Central Banks or Bank agreed to give BIS 340 TONS of gold in return for cash. That implies a liquidity squeeze or a perceived possibility of a liquidity squeeze on a sovereign nations Central Bank or banks around the world. The guess is, of course, one or several of the PIIGS. This has put pressure on the price of gold as now there is a potential seller of gold on the open market in the form of BIS should this liquidity squeeze tighten. The important takeaway here is that a European country or countries have been busy preparing for trouble.

Spain’s push into the finals of the World Cup is extending the denial of problems in that nations banks and we can expect a further lack of news out of Spain until after Sunday. A win by Spain and it will put off any news until the end of July as the celebration continues. Never underestimate the power of the “beautiful game”. In early June we gave a range for the market to bounce into the 10,250-10,500 area. The closing high for the Dow was 10,450 on that run before resuming its bear market.  This market was very oversold and due for a bounce. We now expect the Dow to bounce into the 10,200-10,400 area. If the market finds resistance there than we may get the move towards 8,400 that we have been eyeing for in the Sept/Oct timeframe. Looking to swap our gold miners for the metal itself. High quality dividend stocks are starting to look cheap by historical standards.

Answer: Damascus, Syria is considered to be the oldest continually inhabited city in the world.

Today’s Question: What is the smallest state (in terms of area) in the United States?

Of Note: Houston’s Economic Activity Hit Bottom in Dec 2009, Six Months After Overall US Economy

From Best to Worst:

1. Oil Demand Has Steadily Increased as Prices Decline in Recent Weeks
2. Autos Still Strong, Up Each Month
3. Grocery Stores Report Strong Sales, Although of Private Labels
4. After Plastic Price Spike in Winter, Market Fundamentals Returning
5. Rig Counts Off-Set (Oil/Gas)
6. National Retailers Unimpressed with Houston Consumers
7. Houston Commercial Real Estate Investors On Sidelines
8. Housing and Builder Permits are Paring Back Sharply After Tax Credit Expiration
9. Natural Gas Fundamentals Continue Deterioration
10. Uncertainties Abound (NASA, Offshore Drilling, Mergers)

See Report Here.

The deadline for entries for this year’s Essay Contest, “Economics in Motion Pictures,” is almost here. To ensure that your students’ entries arrive in time to be eligible for the contest, the essays must be postmarked by March 7.

Please remind students to review the rules of entry carefully. For details, visit http://dallasfed.org/educate/essay/index.html

If you have any questions, please contact Heather McDonald at heather.mcdonald@dal.frb.orgblockquote>

Evening at the Fed
Dinner and Discussion for High School Teachers
Dallas, November 29, 2007
Houston, December 4, 2007
San Antonio, December 11, 2007
El Paso, December 13, 2007

Financial Markets: Innovations and Challenges

The 2007 Evening at the Fed series will feature Jeffery Gunther, assistant vice president and senior economist in the Dallas Fed’s Financial Industry Studies Department. Gunther will speak on factors leading up to the recent financial market turmoil, in particular the role of nontraditional financial instruments. He will address such questions as:

• Are financial innovations, such as hedge funds, forever changing the financial landscape?
• What happened in the U.S. sub prime real estate market?
• What does the consumer need to understand about nontraditional financial instruments?
• What impact do these new financial instruments have on the US economy?

Join us at a location convenient for you. The fee to attend is $15, which includes dinner and materials. Space is limited and the registration fee must be received by the cut-off date.

This would probably be a good session for government and U.S. history teachers, too.

Registration details after the fold.

Registration

Register and pay using the online form. Mail and fax options are also included on the registration form. Dallas registration Deadline: November 22 Houston registration Deadline: November 27 San Antonio registration Deadline: December 4 El Paso registration Deadline: December 6 There is a $15 charge to attend. Space is limited and the fee must be paid by the registration deadline.

Credit

Certificates for professional development credit hours will be available.

More information

• • Elizabeth Waddle
    Phone (800) 333-4460, ext. 25276
    E-mail