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STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Thursday, 11 October 2012
[font size=3]STOCK MARKET WATCH, Thursday, 11 October 2012[font color=black][/font]
SMW for 10 October 2012
AT THE CLOSING BELL ON 10 October 2012
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Dow Jones 13,344.97 -128.56 (-0.95%)
S&P 500 1,432.56 -8.92 (-0.62%)
Nasdaq 3,051.78 -13.24 (-0.43%)
[font color=green]10 Year 1.67% -0.06 (-3.47%)
30 Year 2.88% -0.07 (-2.37%) [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
[/center][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]
58 replies
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?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1326185544357Day two in the new school program for the Kid....
http://www.businessinsider.com/lagarde-jobless-rates-are-terrifying-2012-10
Christine Lagarde has called for decisive action from world leaders to end uncertainties in the global economy that are prolonging “terrifying and unacceptable” levels of unemployment.
Rounding on Europe and the US in particular, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund said this week’s annual meetings in Tokyo needed to be marked by “courageous action on behalf of our members”.
Speaking just days after the IMF slashed its global growth forecasts for both this year and next, Ms Lagarde said the economic weakness was not just a result of “tail risks” such as a eurozone break-up but “the degree of uncertainty in many corners of the world – whether it is Europe or America”.
“It is deterring investors from investing and creating jobs,” she said. “We need action to lift the veil of uncertainty.”
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/lagarde-jobless-rates-are-terrifying-2012-10#ixzz28zZbUTrb
Christine Lagarde has called for decisive action from world leaders to end uncertainties in the global economy that are prolonging “terrifying and unacceptable” levels of unemployment.
Rounding on Europe and the US in particular, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund said this week’s annual meetings in Tokyo needed to be marked by “courageous action on behalf of our members”.
Speaking just days after the IMF slashed its global growth forecasts for both this year and next, Ms Lagarde said the economic weakness was not just a result of “tail risks” such as a eurozone break-up but “the degree of uncertainty in many corners of the world – whether it is Europe or America”.
“It is deterring investors from investing and creating jobs,” she said. “We need action to lift the veil of uncertainty.”
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/lagarde-jobless-rates-are-terrifying-2012-10#ixzz28zZbUTrb
and here the people in charge are supposed to be smarter than us.
http://www.businessinsider.com/iranian-minister-woos-india-2012-10
NEW DELHI (AP) — As Western sanctions squeeze Iran and its currency tumbles, the country's energy minister wooed Indian businesses for more investment and trade.
Majid Namjoo told a meeting of Indian business leaders Wednesday that huge business opportunities exist with Iran's private sector, which remains largely unaffected by sanctions imposed by the United States and the European Union.
Namjoo is on a four-day visit to India to explore the possibilities of trade and joint ventures in renewable energy, power, pharmaceuticals, agriculture and food processing.
The United States and the European Union have imposed sanctions on Iran to deter it from pursuing a nuclear weapons program. Iran insists its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/iranian-minister-woos-india-2012-10#ixzz28zaqZjKV
***i think trade between india and iran is a geographic natural.
NEW DELHI (AP) — As Western sanctions squeeze Iran and its currency tumbles, the country's energy minister wooed Indian businesses for more investment and trade.
Majid Namjoo told a meeting of Indian business leaders Wednesday that huge business opportunities exist with Iran's private sector, which remains largely unaffected by sanctions imposed by the United States and the European Union.
Namjoo is on a four-day visit to India to explore the possibilities of trade and joint ventures in renewable energy, power, pharmaceuticals, agriculture and food processing.
The United States and the European Union have imposed sanctions on Iran to deter it from pursuing a nuclear weapons program. Iran insists its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/iranian-minister-woos-india-2012-10#ixzz28zaqZjKV
***i think trade between india and iran is a geographic natural.
http://www.businessinsider.com/brian-enos-new-app-redefines-the-concept-of-an-album-2012-10
Brian Eno has created a new iPad app, Scape, that aims to revolutionise the concept of the 'album'.
"I've got nothing against records - I've spent my life making them - but they are a kind of historical blip," says Brian Eno. We're in his Notting Hill studio talking about Scape, the iPad application that Eno has made with musician and software designer Peter Chilvers. Scape challenges the concept of what an 'album' of music can be.
"Until about 120 years ago," Eno says, "all music was ephemeral in the sense that you would never actually hear the same thing twice. Recording changed that. You could listen to an identical thing over and over and over again and that's what all of us grew up doing. Most of our experience is of perfectly repeatable music."
He adds: "Scape is positioned exactly halfway between the traditional experience of music as constantly changing and the last hundred years experience, as a totally fixed thing."
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/brian-enos-new-app-redefines-the-concept-of-an-album-2012-10#ixzz28zcxrga9
Brian Eno has created a new iPad app, Scape, that aims to revolutionise the concept of the 'album'.
"I've got nothing against records - I've spent my life making them - but they are a kind of historical blip," says Brian Eno. We're in his Notting Hill studio talking about Scape, the iPad application that Eno has made with musician and software designer Peter Chilvers. Scape challenges the concept of what an 'album' of music can be.
"Until about 120 years ago," Eno says, "all music was ephemeral in the sense that you would never actually hear the same thing twice. Recording changed that. You could listen to an identical thing over and over and over again and that's what all of us grew up doing. Most of our experience is of perfectly repeatable music."
He adds: "Scape is positioned exactly halfway between the traditional experience of music as constantly changing and the last hundred years experience, as a totally fixed thing."
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/brian-enos-new-app-redefines-the-concept-of-an-album-2012-10#ixzz28zcxrga9
http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/11/oct-10-is-romney-leading-right-now/
...Although Mr. Romney’s standing declined by two points in the Gallup national tracking poll, he improved slightly in four other tracking surveys, from Rasmussen Reports, Ipsos, Investors’ Business Daily and the RAND Corporation. And the state polling data that came in on Wednesday was generally consistent with about a three-and-a-half-point bounce for Mr. Romney, similar to previous days. There is some spotty evidence that Mr. Romney’s bounce may have been as large as five or six points in polls conducted in the 48 hours after the debate, so perhaps the most recent data does reflect something of a comedown for him. But if his bounce started out at five or six points and has now settled in at three or four, that would still reflect an extremely profound swing in the race — consistent with the largest shifts produced by past presidential debates. We’ll see what happens once the news cycle turns over, such as after Thursday’s vice-presidential debate. For the time being, however, Mr. Romney continues to rocket forward in our projections. The forecast model now gives him about a one-in-three chance of winning the Electoral College (more specifically, a 32.1 percent chance), his highest figure since Aug. 22 and more than double his chances from before the debate. Mr. Romney may have increased his chances of becoming president by 15 or 20 percent based on one night in Denver.
The more troubling sign for Mr. Romney, however, is that although he’s made gains, he does not seem to have taken the lead in very many state polls. That trend, if anything, has become more entrenched. Of the half-dozen or so polls of battleground states published on Wednesday, none showed Mr. Romney ahead; the best result he managed was a 48-48 tie in a Rasmussen Reports poll of New Hampshire. (We ran the model on Wednesday before the latest polls from Marist College, The Philadelphia Inquirer, or The New York Times, Quinnipiac University and CBS News were published overnight, which were also suggestive of a narrow advantage for Mr. Obama in the majority of swing states.)
How to reconcile this against the fact that Mr. Romney is about tied — or perhaps even has a small lead — in the average of national polls right now? From a forecasting standpoint, this is the question that the whole election may turn upon. There are basically four ways to explain the difference.
1) This is a statistical quirk that will work its way out of the system.
2) Mr. Obama has some pronounced advantage in the Electoral College relative to his position in the popular vote.
3) The state polls systematically overestimate Mr. Obama and underestimate Mr. Romney.
4) The national polls systematically overestimate Mr. Romney and underestimate Mr. Obama.
... some of our competitors are issuing forecasts suggestive of a very large difference between the Electoral College and the popular vote — to a degree that is frankly not credible, in my view. (We’ll compare the FiveThirtyEight forecasts against some alternatives in a moment.)...In the chart below, I’ve compared the results from the FiveThirtyEight “now-cast” as of Wednesday night to those issued by three other polling sites: Real Clear Politics, HuffPost Pollster and Talking Points Memo’s PollTracker. The results cover the 11 battleground states that the campaigns have made a material amount of advertising expenditures in, along with each site’s estimate of the national popular vote. On average among the 11 battleground states, we show Mr. Obama with a 2.3 percentage point lead, or 1.9 percentage points as weighted by each state’s turnout in 2008. Among the four methods, we have the worst figure for Mr. Obama in Iowa, New Hampshire, New Mexico and Wisconsin, and the highest in none. Our average result for Mr. Obama among the 11 states is also the lowest of the four systems, although tied with RealClearPolitics if weighted by turnout...The flip-side is that our estimate of Mr. Obama’s national popular vote is the highest of the four systems: the “now-cast” shows him one and a half percentage points ahead nationally, while HuffPost Pollster shows a tie, and the other two methods have Mr. Romney slightly ahead.
Thus, we perceive only about a half-point difference between Mr. Obama’s performance in the battlegrounds and his national figures. This is similar to the actual results from 2008, when Mr. Obama won the 11 battleground states by an average of 7.7 percentage points (weighted by turnout) and the national popular vote by 7.3 points. By contrast, Talking Points Memo has Mr. Obama three points ahead on average in the battlegrounds, but three points behind in the national popular vote — a six-point spread. Real Clear Politics shows about a three -and-a-half-point gap, while HuffPost Pollster, whose methodology is the most similar to FiveThirtyEight, has a two-point difference. A two-point difference is within the realm of possibility, although our model would require a bit more evidence to support a difference that large (specifically, poor polling for Mr. Obama in non-battleground states relative to his polling in swing states). But there’s just no way that Mr. Obama would be even-money in the Electoral College if he were trailing in the national popular vote by four to six points.
All of this is a very long-winded way of answering the question in the headline: is Mr. Romney ahead right now? None of the systems that rely on state-level polling say that he’s ahead in the Electoral College right now, although the FiveThirtyEight models perceive a slightly smaller Electoral College gap between Mr. Romney and Mr. Obama than some of the other systems.
MORE THAN YOU WILL EVER WANT TO KNOW ABOUT POLLING AT LINK
IMO, IT'S THE SLACKER-IN-CHIEF'S TO LOSE....
...Although Mr. Romney’s standing declined by two points in the Gallup national tracking poll, he improved slightly in four other tracking surveys, from Rasmussen Reports, Ipsos, Investors’ Business Daily and the RAND Corporation. And the state polling data that came in on Wednesday was generally consistent with about a three-and-a-half-point bounce for Mr. Romney, similar to previous days. There is some spotty evidence that Mr. Romney’s bounce may have been as large as five or six points in polls conducted in the 48 hours after the debate, so perhaps the most recent data does reflect something of a comedown for him. But if his bounce started out at five or six points and has now settled in at three or four, that would still reflect an extremely profound swing in the race — consistent with the largest shifts produced by past presidential debates. We’ll see what happens once the news cycle turns over, such as after Thursday’s vice-presidential debate. For the time being, however, Mr. Romney continues to rocket forward in our projections. The forecast model now gives him about a one-in-three chance of winning the Electoral College (more specifically, a 32.1 percent chance), his highest figure since Aug. 22 and more than double his chances from before the debate. Mr. Romney may have increased his chances of becoming president by 15 or 20 percent based on one night in Denver.
The more troubling sign for Mr. Romney, however, is that although he’s made gains, he does not seem to have taken the lead in very many state polls. That trend, if anything, has become more entrenched. Of the half-dozen or so polls of battleground states published on Wednesday, none showed Mr. Romney ahead; the best result he managed was a 48-48 tie in a Rasmussen Reports poll of New Hampshire. (We ran the model on Wednesday before the latest polls from Marist College, The Philadelphia Inquirer, or The New York Times, Quinnipiac University and CBS News were published overnight, which were also suggestive of a narrow advantage for Mr. Obama in the majority of swing states.)
How to reconcile this against the fact that Mr. Romney is about tied — or perhaps even has a small lead — in the average of national polls right now? From a forecasting standpoint, this is the question that the whole election may turn upon. There are basically four ways to explain the difference.
1) This is a statistical quirk that will work its way out of the system.
2) Mr. Obama has some pronounced advantage in the Electoral College relative to his position in the popular vote.
3) The state polls systematically overestimate Mr. Obama and underestimate Mr. Romney.
4) The national polls systematically overestimate Mr. Romney and underestimate Mr. Obama.
... some of our competitors are issuing forecasts suggestive of a very large difference between the Electoral College and the popular vote — to a degree that is frankly not credible, in my view. (We’ll compare the FiveThirtyEight forecasts against some alternatives in a moment.)...In the chart below, I’ve compared the results from the FiveThirtyEight “now-cast” as of Wednesday night to those issued by three other polling sites: Real Clear Politics, HuffPost Pollster and Talking Points Memo’s PollTracker. The results cover the 11 battleground states that the campaigns have made a material amount of advertising expenditures in, along with each site’s estimate of the national popular vote. On average among the 11 battleground states, we show Mr. Obama with a 2.3 percentage point lead, or 1.9 percentage points as weighted by each state’s turnout in 2008. Among the four methods, we have the worst figure for Mr. Obama in Iowa, New Hampshire, New Mexico and Wisconsin, and the highest in none. Our average result for Mr. Obama among the 11 states is also the lowest of the four systems, although tied with RealClearPolitics if weighted by turnout...The flip-side is that our estimate of Mr. Obama’s national popular vote is the highest of the four systems: the “now-cast” shows him one and a half percentage points ahead nationally, while HuffPost Pollster shows a tie, and the other two methods have Mr. Romney slightly ahead.
Thus, we perceive only about a half-point difference between Mr. Obama’s performance in the battlegrounds and his national figures. This is similar to the actual results from 2008, when Mr. Obama won the 11 battleground states by an average of 7.7 percentage points (weighted by turnout) and the national popular vote by 7.3 points. By contrast, Talking Points Memo has Mr. Obama three points ahead on average in the battlegrounds, but three points behind in the national popular vote — a six-point spread. Real Clear Politics shows about a three -and-a-half-point gap, while HuffPost Pollster, whose methodology is the most similar to FiveThirtyEight, has a two-point difference. A two-point difference is within the realm of possibility, although our model would require a bit more evidence to support a difference that large (specifically, poor polling for Mr. Obama in non-battleground states relative to his polling in swing states). But there’s just no way that Mr. Obama would be even-money in the Electoral College if he were trailing in the national popular vote by four to six points.
All of this is a very long-winded way of answering the question in the headline: is Mr. Romney ahead right now? None of the systems that rely on state-level polling say that he’s ahead in the Electoral College right now, although the FiveThirtyEight models perceive a slightly smaller Electoral College gap between Mr. Romney and Mr. Obama than some of the other systems.
MORE THAN YOU WILL EVER WANT TO KNOW ABOUT POLLING AT LINK
IMO, IT'S THE SLACKER-IN-CHIEF'S TO LOSE....
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-11/manhattan-apartment-rents-near-peak-with-september-surge.html
The "New York by Gehry" residential building, stands in New York.
Manhattan apartment rents surged in September, coming within 2.1 percent of the peak, as improving employment boosted competition among tenants.
The median monthly rent jumped to $3,195, up 10 percent from a year earlier and 3.2 percent from August, according to a report today by appraiser Miller Samuel Inc. and broker Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate. The number of new leases signed last month jumped 55 percent from a year earlier to 2,535, as renters facing sharp renewal increases moved out in search of better deals, said Jonathan Miller, president of New York-based Miller Samuel.
“This is not a fluke,” he said. “This is where the die has been cast for the next year or two years.”
Improving employment in the city has increased demand for leasing, putting monthly rents on course to surpass the 2006 peak of $3,265 in the first quarter of 2013, according to Miller. Newly hired potential tenants are competing for housing in a market already crowded with would-be homebuyers who are lingering in their apartments because they can’t get a mortgage, he said. New York City added 77,400 jobs in the 12 months through August, according to the state Labor Department.
The "New York by Gehry" residential building, stands in New York.
Manhattan apartment rents surged in September, coming within 2.1 percent of the peak, as improving employment boosted competition among tenants.
The median monthly rent jumped to $3,195, up 10 percent from a year earlier and 3.2 percent from August, according to a report today by appraiser Miller Samuel Inc. and broker Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate. The number of new leases signed last month jumped 55 percent from a year earlier to 2,535, as renters facing sharp renewal increases moved out in search of better deals, said Jonathan Miller, president of New York-based Miller Samuel.
“This is not a fluke,” he said. “This is where the die has been cast for the next year or two years.”
Improving employment in the city has increased demand for leasing, putting monthly rents on course to surpass the 2006 peak of $3,265 in the first quarter of 2013, according to Miller. Newly hired potential tenants are competing for housing in a market already crowded with would-be homebuyers who are lingering in their apartments because they can’t get a mortgage, he said. New York City added 77,400 jobs in the 12 months through August, according to the state Labor Department.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-10/investors-claim-kkr-told-equity-firms-not-to-bid-for-hca.html
According to the complaint, Blackstone President Tony James, seen here wrote in an e-mail to KKR co-founder George Roberts in reference to the Freescale Semiconductor Ltd. buyout,“We would much rather work with you guys than against you.”
Top executives at buyout firms including Blackstone Group LP (BX), KKR & Co. (KKR), Bain Capital Partners LLC and Carlyle Group (CG) LP assured each other in e-mails that they wouldn’t compete on deals to avoid driving up prices and angering competitors, according to a now public court complaint.
“We would much rather work with you guys than against you,” Blackstone President Tony James wrote in an e-mail to KKR co-founder George Roberts in reference to the Freescale Semiconductor Ltd. (FSL) buyout, according to the complaint. “Together we can be unstoppable but in opposition we can cost each other a lot of money.” According to the complaint, Roberts replied, “Agreed.”
The disclosures are a setback for the industry’s efforts to clean up its image, which has come under scrutiny as Bain Capital co-founder Mitt Romney seeks to become the next U.S. president. Individuals and pension funds that held shares in companies including Freescale, HCA Holdings Inc. (HCA), Neiman Marcus Group Inc., Clear Channel Communications Inc. and Aramark Holdings Corp. sued the private-equity firms and large investment banks including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) and JP Morgan Chase & Co (JPM) in 2007 and 2008.
The correspondence was cited as evidence that the firms rigged bids in 19 leveraged buyouts and eight other transactions, including the biggest deals of the leveraged buyout boom, according to the amended complaint unsealed yesterday by a federal judge in Boston.
According to the complaint, Blackstone President Tony James, seen here wrote in an e-mail to KKR co-founder George Roberts in reference to the Freescale Semiconductor Ltd. buyout,“We would much rather work with you guys than against you.”
Top executives at buyout firms including Blackstone Group LP (BX), KKR & Co. (KKR), Bain Capital Partners LLC and Carlyle Group (CG) LP assured each other in e-mails that they wouldn’t compete on deals to avoid driving up prices and angering competitors, according to a now public court complaint.
“We would much rather work with you guys than against you,” Blackstone President Tony James wrote in an e-mail to KKR co-founder George Roberts in reference to the Freescale Semiconductor Ltd. (FSL) buyout, according to the complaint. “Together we can be unstoppable but in opposition we can cost each other a lot of money.” According to the complaint, Roberts replied, “Agreed.”
The disclosures are a setback for the industry’s efforts to clean up its image, which has come under scrutiny as Bain Capital co-founder Mitt Romney seeks to become the next U.S. president. Individuals and pension funds that held shares in companies including Freescale, HCA Holdings Inc. (HCA), Neiman Marcus Group Inc., Clear Channel Communications Inc. and Aramark Holdings Corp. sued the private-equity firms and large investment banks including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) and JP Morgan Chase & Co (JPM) in 2007 and 2008.
The correspondence was cited as evidence that the firms rigged bids in 19 leveraged buyouts and eight other transactions, including the biggest deals of the leveraged buyout boom, according to the amended complaint unsealed yesterday by a federal judge in Boston.
