STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Friday, 7 September 2012

[Tansy_Gold]

[font size=3]STOCK MARKET WATCH, Friday, 7 September 2012[font color=black][/font]

SMW for 6 September 2012

AT THE CLOSING BELL ON 6 September 2012
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Dow Jones 13,292.00 +244.52 (1.87%)
S&P 500 1,432.12 +28.68 (2.04%)
Nasdaq 3,135.81 +66.54 (2.17%)



[font color=red]10 Year 1.68% +0.04 (2.44%)
30 Year 2.80% +0.05 (1.82%) [font color=black]


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[font size=2]Market Conditions During Trading Hours[/font]
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[font size=2]Euro, Yen, Loonie, Silver and Gold[center]

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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Market Data and News:[/font][/font]
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Economic Calendar
Marketwatch Data
Bloomberg Economic News
Yahoo Finance
Google Finance
Bank Tracker
Credit Union Tracker
Daily Job Cuts
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Economic Blogs:[/font][/font]
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The Big Picture
Financial Sense
Calculated Risk
Naked Capitalism
Credit Writedowns
Brad DeLong
Bonddad
Atrios
goldmansachs666
The Stand-Up Economist
The Automatic Earth
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Government Issues:[/font][/font]
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LegitGov
Open Government
Earmark Database
USA spending.gov
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Videos:[/font][/font]
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Charlie Rose talks with Roubini
Charlie Rose talks with Krugman
William Black: This Economic Disaster
Bill Moyers with Kevin Drum and David Corn
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[font color=red]Partial List of Financial Sector Officials Convicted since 1/20/09 [/font][font color=red]
2/2/12 David Higgs and Salmaan Siddiqui, Credit Suisse, plead guilty to conspiracy involving valuation of MBS
3/6/12 Allen Stanford, former Caribbean billionaire and general schmuck, convicted on 13 of 14 counts in $2.2B Ponzi scheme, faces 20+ years in prison
6/4/12 Matthew Kluger, lawyer, sentenced to 12 years in prison, along with co-conspirator stock trader Garrett Bauer (9 years) and co-conspirator Kenneth Robinson (not yet sentenced) for 17 year insider trading scheme.
6/14/12 Allen Stanford sentenced to 110 years without parole.
6/15/12 Rajat Gupta, former Goldman Sachs director, found guilty of insider trading. Could face a decade in prison when sentenced later this year.
6/22/12 Timothy S. Durham, 49, former CEO of Fair Financial Company, convicted of one count conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, 10 counts of wire fraud, and one count of securities fraud.
6/22/12 James F. Cochran, 56, former chairman of the board of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and six counts of wire fraud.
6/22/12 Rick D. Snow, 48, former CFO of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and three counts of wire fraud.
7/13/12 Russell Wassendorf Sr., CEO of collapsed brokerage firm Peregrine Financial Group Inc. arrested and charged with lying to regulators after admitting to authorities he embezzled "millions of dollars" and forged bank statements for "nearly twenty years."
8/22/12 Doug Whitman, Whitman Capital LLC hedge fund founder, convicted of insider trading following a trial in which he spent more than two days on the stand telling jurors he was innocent




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[font size=3][font color=red]This thread contains opinions and observations. Individuals may post their experiences, inferences and opinions on this thread. However, it should not be construed as advice. It is unethical (and probably illegal) for financial recommendations to be given here.[/font][/font][/font color=red][font color=black]

[Demeter]

1. The Hopium Europium Makes Everything Look Fine

if you squinch your eyes real tight and look cross-eyed.

I'm glad I wasn't around Thursday...I was being slave-driven by Sis. I am exhausted, and so is she.

But, we are making progress.

Speaking of Progress, It's Friday, again. I NEED A THEME.

Please, help this brain-dead, battered blogger put together something fit for human consumption. Catch our imaginations.

[Fuddnik]

5. Hopium?

I'm just getting by on oxycodone. Been a rough week around here too.

On Tuesday, I went to the oral surgeon (not to be confused with a sturgeon) and had a pedicure performed on my jaw bone. (Yes, could be confused with the jaw-bone of an ass). Had obsolete implants removed and prepped (bone graft)for new ones in a few months.

My wife got sick after her trip to the wing-nut fest next door on Sunday, and she's slept and otherwise been out of it since then. I got her to the doctor this morning, some new meds, and she feels better after she woke up again this evening.

It should all be better again by Tuesday when I see my doctor, surgeon, and last but most important, my bartender!

[Demeter]

11. Hope your wife recovers

Exposure to GOP can be fatal for women....

Sis has only been here 2 days and I am in physical agony. It doesn't help that one of my clients wants to move everything around in her apartment. I can do it in one place, for a couple of hours, but not two, all day long....getting up from sleep to take aspirin does not help...I'm short sleep, now, too.

[Roland99]

15. NFP Hope fueling US Futures

S&P 500 +0.5%
DOW +0.3%
NASDAQ +0.3%


imho, judging from Obama's words last night, the NFP won't match yesterday's ADP report in its positive tone.

[Roland99]

16. And hopium is dashed. Non-Farm Payrolls disappoint

* U.S. August nonfarm payrolls up 96,000
* June, July payrolls revised down by 41,000
* August hourly earnings flat, up 1.7% yr-on-yr
* August factory jobs down 15,000
* August private payrolls up 103,000

[Roland99]

18. US 10-year yields crash from 1.73% to 1.62%

[Roland99]

19. Labor Force Participation Rate hits 63.5. Lowest since 1981!

data back to 2002:
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000/

Change the start year in the dropdown at the top to see the chart from 1981.

[Po_d Mainiac]

21. But, but the ADP was....n/t

[Ghost Dog]

22. (Over here in EU) 24 hours and counting...

European Stocks Higher At Mid-day

9/7/2012 7:19 AM ET
(RTTNews) - European stocks rose sharply on Friday, extending the previous session's rally, after data showed German exports increased unexpectedly in July, while France's budget deficit narrowed in the first seven months of the year.

Another report released by the U.K. Office for National Statistical Office showed that U.K. industrial output rose 2.9 percent month-over-month in July, reversing all of the 2.4 percent drop in June. Economists expected a more modest 1.5 percent increase.

With the ECB's bond-buying plan keeping the underlying mood upbeat, investors are looking forward to U.S. employment data later in the global day for fresh cues from Federal Reserve on possible policy action.

Asian stocks rose sharply today, with Chinese and Hong Kong shares climbing 3-4 percent after Beijing unveiled massive infrastructure investment plans to support the economy. U.S. stock futures are also rising, signaling the Standard & Poor's 500 index will extend yesterday's biggest rally since 2008.

/... http://www.rttnews.com/1961385/european-stocks-higher-at-mid-day.aspx?type=emn&Node=B3

Analysis: ECB sets stage for euro rescue but will Spain jump?
PARIS | Thu Sep 6, 2012 7:37pm BST

(Reuters) - European Central Bank President Mario Draghi has delivered a roadmap for rescuing the euro zone from potential meltdown but the onus is now on Spain to swallow its pride and apply for help to bring down crippling borrowing costs.

Draghi met or exceeded market expectations by announcing on Thursday that the ECB was ready to buy unlimited amounts of bonds of up to three-year maturity of countries that request a European bailout and fulfill strict policy conditions.

The Italian ECB chief asserted his authority by isolating dissent from Germany's Bundesbank, which publicly criticized the decision, while maintaining pressure on euro zone governments to pursue budget discipline and economic reforms.

However, his escape route from the euro zone's sovereign debt crisis, which has raged since early 2010, hinges on Madrid requesting assistance, which Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy still seems to be wriggling to avoid or delay.

Other political landmines litter the road out of danger, ranging from Germany's constitutional court to Greece's failure to meet its fiscal targets, and the growing reluctance of Dutch, German and Finnish lawmakers to support any further bailouts.

/... http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/09/06/us-eurozone-rescue-idUSBRE8850ZK20120906

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/... http://economia.elpais.com/ [/center]

[Roland99]

24. Spain's IBEX is up over 25% in recent weeks. Amazing, eh?

[Ghost Dog]

25. Yeah.

I took profit Wednesday (didn't need extra risk of waiting for Thursday), after doing same last early April. --> ~ 10% on the year, including dividends.

Then, making some adjustments, jumped back in again...

Pray for me

Edit: pssst: This is now a little below where I sold Wednesday - http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/ITX:SM

Hmmm... Sexy Empowered Young Chinese Women Wearing >International-Spanish Clothes<



(Disclaimer: Right now, nope, but likely soon will be again, an Inditex shareholder.)

[Ghost Dog]

26. German media, lawmakers decry ECB 'blank cheque'

Fri Sep 7, 2012 5:07pm IST
BERLIN, Sept 7 (Reuters) - Germany's conservative press accused the European Central Bank on Friday of writing a "blank cheque" to indebted euro zone states by agreeing to buy their bonds, and some pro-government lawmakers threatened legal action to stop the purchases.

ECB President Mario Draghi unveiled plans on Thursday for potentially unlimited purchases of bonds of up to three years maturity of countries that request a European bailout and fulfil strict policy conditions. The German central bank chief was the sole dissenting voice in the decision.

Chancellor Angela Merkel has given her tacit support for the plans, saying they buy time for vulnerable states such as Spain and Italy to implement tough reforms.

But the outcry from a small but vocal eurosceptic minority of her own centre-right MPs and from influential conservative media underlined the political risks for her as the euro crisis builds ahead of a general election one year from now.

"Blank cheque for the indebted states," was the headline of the top-selling Bild tabloid, a harsh critic of the bailouts for Greece and other struggling euro zone nations, adding that the ECB move could make the euro "kaputt".

"Draghi sets off Germany's alarm bell," was the headline in the conservative daily Die Welt...

/... http://in.reuters.com/article/2012/09/07/eurozone-ecb-germany-idINL6E8K79PZ20120907

[Ghost Dog]

27. Europe close: Off the boil after US jobs data

LONDON (SHARECAST) - European stocks came off the top in the afternoon session after disappointing jobless data from the US. US non-farm payrolls rose by 96,000 in August, versus the consensus estimate for a rise of 125,000.

The unemployment rate, meantime, which is calculated from the so-called Household Survey data, fell to 8.1% from 8.3% in July. Economists had thought it would remain unchanged.

However, much of that decrease has to do with a 368,000 person decrease in the size of the active civilian labour force. In fact, employment dropped by 119,000.

Despite US data acting as a wet blanket, markets still closed the day with decent rises, topping up yesterday's gains.

Banks happy to see ECB wave its cheque book

Banks, sitting on tons of sovereign debt they would like to get shot of, were understandably in demand after the European Central Bank's announcement yesterday that it is prepared to buy up sovereign debt of Eurozone countries if asked to do so.

Societe Generale and Credit Agricole topped the tree in Paris, with fellow lender BNP Paribas while in Frankfurt, Commerzbank and Deutsche Bank formed two of the three best performing blue-chips. In Spain, Santander moved up, though not as briskly as its French and German counterparts while Italy's Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena and Portugal's Banco Espirito Santo caught the eye with chunky gains...

/... http://www.sharecast.com/cgi-bin/sharecast/story.cgi?story_id=20349156


Why Did the Labor Force Shrink So Much in August?

—By Kevin Drum
| Fri Sep. 7, 2012 10:01 AM PDT

Post

From the LA Times today:

The Labor Department said the jobless rate dropped over the month, to 8.1% from 8.3% in July, but that came as many people dropped out of the labor market. In a nation where the population is growing, a shrinking labor force suggests that many workers are giving up job searches because they are striking out in the employment market or don't see good prospects.

That's what you'd think, all right. And yet, although the number of people not in the labor force shot up by about half a million in August, the number of "discouraged workers" didn't budge. So what caused the labor force shrinkage?

Beats me. But BLS data does suggest one thing: the shrinkage came almost entirely among those with a high school diploma or less. Among that group, the labor force shrank by 637,000. Among those with bachelor's degrees, the labor force grew by 707,000. This is for workers 25 and older, so it has nothing to do with an influx of college students graduating this summer (and I'm using seasonally adjusted figures anyway).

I'm not sure what this means. Maybe I'm not reading the data carefully enough — an occupational hazard among us amateurs. Still, something seems a little off here. Why did so many high school grads (and dropouts) leave the labor force?

/... http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/09/why-did-labor-force-shrink-so-much-august

[Fuddnik]

2. It appears Australia has it's very own little Matilda Koch-Romney.

World's richest woman lauds $2-a-day wages

Paul Kane / Getty Images

Easy for her to say. Gina Rinehart, chairman of Hancock Prospecting and listed as the world's richest woman, has put her silver foot in her mouth again, lauding African miners' willingness to work for $2 a day.
By Martha C. White, NBC News contributor

An Australian mining heiress who courted controversy last month for suggesting her countrymen were just too lazy to be rich is at it again.

Gina Rinehart, thought to be the world's richest woman, chastised miners for being “too expensive,” saying, “Africans want to work. Its workers are willing to work for less than $2 per day.”

In a 10-minute recording posted on YouTube to the Sydney Mining Club, Rinehart lambasted the domestic mining industry, saying it couldn’t compete in a global marketplace. “Not with Australian prices,” she said. She also railed against the country’s carbon tax and regulatory “red tape.”

But Rinehart’s most inflammatory statement by far was the comparison between Australian miners and those who work in developing African nations. “Such statistics make me worry for this country’s future,” she said.

Rinehart’s remarks drew a sharp rebuke from Australia’s Prime Minister, and it is doubtful that even those African mineworkers would agree with Rinehart’s endorsement of a sub-two-dollar daily wage. Violence flared at a South African platinum mine three weeks ago after workers demanded what media outlet AFP characterized as a near-tripling of their monthly wages to roughly $1,500 (12,500 South African rand).

This isn’t Rinehart’s first jab at Australia’s working class. In a recent article, she wrote, “If you're jealous of those with more money... spend less time drinking, or smoking and socialising and more time working.” That remark touched off its own media firestorm, with politicians and pundits alike pointing out that Rinehart acquired the source of her wealth simply by being born into the right family.

(snip)
http://bottomline.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/09/06/13706124-worlds-richest-woman-lauds-2-a-day-wages?lite

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

People like her are the reason they invented rope. And guillotines.

Another born rich, inherited....(long train of deleted expletives.)

[Po_d Mainiac]

4. She even looks like she crawled out from under a rock n/t

[Fuddnik]

6. I had some much less flattering comments about that picture.

That's also why the hangman invented hoods.

She's a two-hooder. Give the hangman one in case hers falls off.

[Po_d Mainiac]

7. ASSett bubble? n/t

[AnneD]

8. Fear not...

Max Keiser gave her a royal skewer, complete with colorful adjectives that are never bleeped.

[Hotler]

28. There are a bunch of rich folks and bankers in this world that.....

need a serious fucking beat-down. and it needs to done in the public square. didn't Dick Fuld get his ass kicked one day after Lemans went down???

[Po_d Mainiac]

3. The Turd is real

My primary concern here is the continued deterioration in the Comex open interest numbers. You'll recall that the last two weeks of CoTs have been lousy as specs are buying and The Cartels are rapidly creating paper gold and dumping silver longs in order to satisfy the spec demand. I believe that this trend has continued this week and we'll likely see confirmation on Friday.

http://www.tfmetalsreport.com/blog/4160/storm-flags-flying

[Hugin]

17. Gold & Silver both went vertical overnight.

Au up $24 (and counting)
Ag up $0.56 (and counting)

There goes a strong Dollar for awhile. (Will crude follow?)

[Po_d Mainiac]

20. The pits were busy between 8:30 and 8:40

Perhaps a couple heavy hitters daring the banksters and the CFTC.

[just1voice]

9. Elizabeth Warren "The system is rigged"

Sure is. Here's someone who dared speak the truth at the political propaganda theater:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/09/06/1128591/-Elizabeth-Warren-The-system-is-nbsp-rigged

[Ghost Dog]

10. Thanks. Worth quoting here:

People feel like the system is rigged against them. And here's the painful part: they're right. The system is rigged. Look around. Oil companies guzzle down billions in subsidies. Billionaires pay lower tax rates than their secretaries. Wall Street CEOs—the same ones who wrecked our economy and destroyed millions of jobs—still strut around Congress, no shame, demanding favors, and acting like we should thank them. (...)

The Republican vision is clear: "I've got mine, the rest of you are on your own." Republicans say they don't believe in government. Sure they do. They believe in government to help themselves and their powerful friends. After all, Mitt Romney's the guy who said corporations are people.

No, Governor Romney, corporations are not people. People have hearts, they have kids, they get jobs, they get sick, they cry, they dance. They live, they love, and they die. And that matters. That matters because we don't run this country for corporations, we run it for people. And that's why we need Barack Obama.

[Demeter]

12. The Debtwatch Manifesto by Steve Keen

http://www.debtdeflation.com/blogs/2012/01/03/the-debtwatch-manifesto/

Preamble

The fundamental cause of the economic and financial crisis that began in late 2007 was lending by the finance sector that primarily financed speculation rather than investment. The private debt bubble this caused is unprecedented, probably in human history and certainly in the last century (see Figure 1). Its unwinding now is the primary cause of the sustained slump in economic growth. The recent growth in sovereign debt is a symptom of this underlying crisis, not the cause, and the current political obsession with reducing sovereign debt will exacerbate the root problem of private sector deleveraging.



US private debt clearly rose faster than GDP from the end of World War II (when the debt to GDP ratio was 43%) until 2009 (when it peaked at 303%), but there is no intrinsic reason why it (or the public sector debt to GDP ratio) has to rise over time. I give a theoretical explanation elsewhere (Keen 2010), but an empirical comparison will suffice here: 1945 till 1965 were the best years of the Australian economy—with unemployment averaging 2 percent—and during that time the private debt ratio remained relatively constant at 25% of GDP (see Figure 2).



America’s minimum private debt ratio in 1945 may have been artificially low in the aftermath of both the Great Depression and World War II (and there are good reasons why the US economy should have a higher sustainable debt ratio than does Australia), but at some time between 1945 and America’s first post-WWII financial crisis in 1966 (Minsky 1982, p. xiii), it passed this level.

The explosion in speculative debt drove asset prices to all-time highs—relative to consumer prices—from which they are now inexorably collapsing (see Figure 3 and Figure 4).





CLEAR THINKING AND GREAT EXPLANATIONS--A RESOURCE TO BOOKMARK!

[Demeter]

13. Democracy's Gold Standard

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7417

Last March, the country's highest court found that secret, computerized vote counting was unconstitutional. Unfortunately, the country was Germany, and the Constitution violated by e-voting systems was the one that the U.S. wrote and insisted Germans ratify as part of their terms of surrender following WWII.

Paul Lehto, a U.S. election attorney and Constitutional rights expert, summarized the German court's unambiguous, landmark finding:

"No 'specialized technical knowledge' can be required of citizens to vote or to monitor vote counts."

There is a "constitutional requirement of a publicly observed count."

"[T]he government substitution of its own check or what we’d probably call an 'audit' is no substitute at all for public observation."

"A paper trail simply does not suffice to meet the above standards.

"As a result of these principles,...'all independent observers' conclude that 'electronic voting machines are totally banned in Germany' because no conceivable computerized voting system can cast and count votes that meet the twin requirements of...being both 'observable' and also not requiring specialized technical knowledge.

After the verdict in the case --- filed by a computer expert and his political scientist son --- Lehto wondered how it could be that open, observable democracy is seemingly an inviolable right for "conquered Nazis," but not, apparently, for citizens of the United States...

..."Hand-counting paper ballots is recognized as the gold standard in state laws across the country," Ellen Theisen of the non-partisan election watchdog organization VotersUnite.org told me. "Why settle for anything less?"

Theisen's thoughts echoed Lehto's interpretation of the findings of the High Court in Germany. "By letting software count our votes," she said, "we give software control over our government."...The time to demand confidence in the accuracy of our elections is now. Not in the weeks just prior to an election, when the corporate media suddenly find "a story" in problems at the polls – and there are more and more each and every year, as more and more voters experience just how terrible our system of e-democracy has become...

MAYBE IF WE HAD CONFIDENCE IN THE POLLING, MORE QUALIFIED PEOPLE WOULD RUN FOR PUBLIC OFFICE....

[Ghost Dog]

23. ... Extremely serious people, generally, our German cousins.

Why we love them and need them so much,

even down here in chill-out land. (<-- that's a joke).

See eg. also: http://www.history.upenn.edu/faculty/goldberg.shtml

[Demeter]

14. Rise & Demise of Neo-Liberal U: Collapsing Business Plan of American Higher Ed by David Schultz

http://logosjournal.com/2012/spring-summer_schultz/

The dominant business model for American higher education has collapsed, taking with it the financial integrity, academic quality, access, and independence that college and universities once enjoyed.

Since the end of World War II two business models have defined the operations of American higher education. The first was the Dewey model that lasted until the 1970s. The second, a corporate model, flourished until the economic crash in 2008. What the new business model for higher education will be is uncertain, but from the ashes of the status quo we see emerging one that returns to an era before World War II when only the affluent could afford college and access was limited to the privileged few.

Model I: The Dewey University

The first post-World War II business model began with the return of military veterans after 1945 and it lasted though the matriculation of the Baby Boomers from college in the 1970s. This was a model that produced an ever expanding number of colleges for a growing population seeking to secure a college degree. It was a model that coincided with the height of the Cold War where public funding for state schools was regarded as part of an important effort to achieve technological and political supremacy over communism. It also represented the expansion of more and more middle and working class students entering college. This was higher education’s greatest moment. It was the democraticization of college, made possible by expansion of inexpensive public universities, generous grants and scholarships, and low interest loans.

Public institutions were key to this model. They were public in the sense that they received most if not all of their money either from tax dollars to subsidize tuition and costs or federal money in terms of research grants for faculty. The business model then was simply-public tax dollars, federal aid, and an expanding population of often first generation students attending public institutions at low tuition in state institutions. Let us call this the Dewey business model, named after John Dewey, whose theories on education emphasized the democratic functions of education, seeking to inculcate citizenship values though schools.

Model II: The Corporate University

CONTINUES AT LINK