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Tansy_Gold

(17,817 posts)
Mon Apr 15, 2013, 08:18 PM Apr 2013

STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Tuesday, 16 April 2013

[font size=3]STOCK MARKET WATCH, Tuesday, 16 April 2013[font color=black][/font]


SMW for 15 April 2013

AT THE CLOSING BELL ON 15 April 2013
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Dow Jones 14,599.20 -265.86 (-1.79%)
S&P 500 1,552.36 -36.49 (-2.30%)
Nasdaq 3,216.49 -78.46 (-2.38%)


[font color=green]10 Year 1.68% -0.03 (-1.75%)
30 Year 2.88% -0.04 (-1.37%)[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 - Essential Reading:[/font][/font]
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Matt Taibi: Secret and Lies of the Bailout


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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=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
10/26/12 UPDATE: Former Goldman Sachs director Rajat Gupta sentenced to two years in federal prison. He will, of course, appeal. . .
11/20/12 Hedge fund manager Matthew Martoma charged with insider trading at SAC Capital Advisors, and prosecutors are looking at Martoma's boss, Steven Cohen, for possible involvement.
02/14/13 Gilbert Lopez, former chief accounting officer of Stanford Financial Group, and former controller Mark Kuhrt sentenced to 20 yrs in prison for their roles in Allen Sanford's $7.2 billion Ponzi scheme.
03/29/13 Michael Sternberg, portfolio mgr at SAC Capital, arrested in NYC, charged with conspiracy and securities fraud. Pled not guilty and freed on $3m bail.
04/04/13 Matthew Marshall Taylor,fmr Goldman Sachs trader arrested, charged by CFTC w/defrauding his employer on $8BN futures bet "by intentionally concealing the true huge size, as well as the risk and potential profits or losses associated."
04/04/13 Matthew Taylor admits guilt, makes plea bargain. Sentencing set for 26 June; faces up to 20 years in prison but will likely only see 3-4 years. Says, "I am truly sorry."
04/11/13 Ex-KPMG LLP partner Scott London charged by federal prosecutors w/passing inside tips to a friend in exchange for cash, jewelry, and concert tickets; expected to plead guilty in May.










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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]


35 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Tuesday, 16 April 2013 (Original Post) Tansy_Gold Apr 2013 OP
I survived Monday (barely) Demeter Apr 2013 #1
Dogwoods blooming in central IN Roland99 Apr 2013 #10
Welcome home, Roland! Demeter Apr 2013 #13
Wish I was home! I've been mostly a weekender the last couple of months Roland99 Apr 2013 #26
Peak Oil as seen through the eyes of Arab oil producers by Fabius Maximus Demeter Apr 2013 #2
4 Lessons for Building a Solar Economy Demeter Apr 2013 #3
Fallacy of Cleaning the Gyres of Plastic with a Floating ‘Ocean Cleanup Array’ By Stiv Wilson Demeter Apr 2013 #15
Now It’s Official: Obama Sells Catfood Futures, Um, Social Security and Medicare Cuts Demeter Apr 2013 #4
How to Save American Finance from Itself Has financialization gone too far? BY ROBERT M. SOLOW Demeter Apr 2013 #5
S Korea in $15.3bn stimulus bid to spur economic growth muriel_volestrangler Apr 2013 #6
TURBO-FRAUD Demeter Apr 2013 #7
Obama's income fell in election year, paid 18.4 percent tax rate Demeter Apr 2013 #8
US Futures gaining ground Roland99 Apr 2013 #9
So, that loud flushing sound Demeter Apr 2013 #12
Actually, that late dropoff would have helped the shorts, no? Roland99 Apr 2013 #25
and doubling down Roland99 Apr 2013 #28
Occupy Affiliate Aims at Abolishing Consumer Debt By Matthew Cardinale Demeter Apr 2013 #11
WikiLeaks’ New Release: The Kissinger Cables and Bradley Manning By Amy Goodman Demeter Apr 2013 #19
may be answered in the article, but . . . . Tansy_Gold Apr 2013 #24
DRONING ON: Obama administration lied about drone targets Demeter Apr 2013 #14
Americans Are Quitting Their Jobs At The Highest Rate In 5 Years Demeter Apr 2013 #16
Time to Bell the Obama Cat By Norman Solomon Demeter Apr 2013 #17
Progressive Caucus members who haven't stood up by Norman Solomon Demeter Apr 2013 #18
The thing is...Obama is the Cat's Paw, not the cat Demeter Apr 2013 #30
Pin the tail on the donkey. westerebus Apr 2013 #32
S Korea in $15.3bn stimulus bid to spur economic growth xchrom Apr 2013 #20
Asian markets fall after deadly Boston Marathon blasts xchrom Apr 2013 #21
UK inflation rate held steady at 2.8% in March xchrom Apr 2013 #22
DEFLATION: Consumer Prices Unexpectedly Fall 0.2% xchrom Apr 2013 #23
Capital Study: Chinese Investment in Europe Hits Record High xchrom Apr 2013 #27
EU Comissioner: Time to Move 'Quicker and Harder' Against Tax Evasion xchrom Apr 2013 #29
Did you folks see this over in Jonestown????? Hotler Apr 2013 #31
Crossed that bridge ages ago... westerebus Apr 2013 #33
Yeah, I saw it Demeter Apr 2013 #34
And why,with futures hitting bottom, did gas price go up 25 cents yesterday? Demeter Apr 2013 #35
 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
1. I survived Monday (barely)
Mon Apr 15, 2013, 08:57 PM
Apr 2013

and Tuesday is Board Meeting night. Oh, joy!

It was up around 70F today, with a 20 mph wind. A wind like that feels good at 70F, and like the knife of Death at 40F.

Everything is bursting into bloom...scylla, wild hyacinths, daffs, primroses, even a crazy tulip. No forsythia yet, but the willows are definitely leafing out.

 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
13. Welcome home, Roland!
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 06:50 AM
Apr 2013

Tuesday is featuring April Showers and 50F--it's actually seasonal!

We need the rain, so I'm happy (also, I threw the papers yesterday).

Roland99

(53,342 posts)
26. Wish I was home! I've been mostly a weekender the last couple of months
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 09:04 AM
Apr 2013

here in central IN all week and again next week. Nothing schedule after that, though, but that will likely change!

need the rain in FL badly...several inches under normal.

 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
2. Peak Oil as seen through the eyes of Arab oil producers by Fabius Maximus
Mon Apr 15, 2013, 09:03 PM
Apr 2013
http://fabiusmaximus.com/2013/04/11/hirsch-peak-oil-49874/

Summary: One of the world’s great energy experts reports on the view from a energy conference in Qatar. Oil is the fountain of their prosperity, and they well understand how brief the Age of Oil will be...Reflections by Robert Hirsch on the Conference “Peak Oil: Challenges and Opportunities for the GCC Countries”.

Held at Doha, Qatar on 2-4 April 2013.
Posted with his generous permission.


....

I was fortunate to be among the few westerners invited to attend and speak at this first-of-its kind “peak oil” (PO) conference in a Middle East. The fact that a major Middle East oil exporter would hold such a conference on what has long been a verboten subject was quite remarkable and a dramatic change from decades of PO denial. The two and a half day meeting was well attended by people from the GCC as well as other regional countries.

The going-in assumption was that “peak oil” will occur in the near future. The timing of the impending onset of world oil decline was not an issue at the conference, rather the main focus was what the GCC countries should do soon to ensure a prosperous, long-term future. To many of us who have long suffered the vociferous denial of PO by Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and OPEC countries, this conference represented a major change. In the words of Kjell Aleklett (Professor of Physics at Uppsala University, Sweden), who summarized highlights of the conference, the meeting was “an historic event.”

While many PO aficionados have been focused on the impacts and the mitigation of “peak oil” in the importing countries, most attendees at this conference were concerned with the impact that finite oil and gas reserves will have on the long-term future of their own exporting countries. They see the depletion of their large-but-limited reserves as affording their countries a period of time in which they either develop their countries into sustainable entities able to continue into the long term future or they lapse back into the poor, nomadic circumstances that existed prior to the discovery of oil/gas. Accordingly, much of the conference focus was on how the GCC countries might use their current and near-term largesse to build sustainable economic and government futures.

A flavor of the conference can be gotten from the following loosely translated, random quotations:

About the Conference:

This is a groundbreaking conference.
The organizers were brave to organize this conference.

Peak Oil:

Peak oil provides an incentive to consider important national and regional issues. The GCC is currently working new problems with old solutions.
Oil revenue represents about 93% of the Saudi budget. Everything is now imported — foreign expertise and most labor. Saudi can’t continue on the current track, because it would lead to a “bad future.” We need radical change.
After peak oil, will there be great cities, or will Middle East cities end up like the gold mining ghost towns of the old U.S. west?
So far we have wasted our opportunity.
Shale oil in the U.S. is so much foolishness and does not invalidate peak oil. We definitely must worry about peak oil.

The Gulf States:

Political reforms have failed to properly address our lack of democracy and accountability.
When people are excluded from politics, they get unruly.
Citizens in the Middle East prefer public sector jobs because they pay better than private sector jobs.
Foreigners are the majority of our populations, typically 80%.
Schools are teaching children “old stuff.” Schools are a disaster.
The current culture is one of waste.
There are job vacancies in Saudi but local people are not prepared to fill them. Saudi’s go abroad to get advanced degrees but don’t qualify for Saudi jobs, so Saudi must import foreign labor. Aramco did a good job of training Saudi nationals.
The GCC must educate women and give them greater rights and equality.
In many countries absolute rulers get the incomes and revenues and not much is left for the people. A selfish dictator does not develop his country.
The Arab legal system is in bad shape and needs attention.
People read religious literature when they should be reading technical literature.
The region has wealthy, wealthy persons and poor, poor people.
Rulers must understand that the people must be part of the future.
Future generations must have rights.

About the world and peak oil:

Globalization is being broadly viewed more negatively now. When peak oil comes, it will be extremely difficult to maintain.
High oil prices will impact the world even before the onset of peak oil.
Peak oil is the most important question in this part of the world.



.

About the author

Robert Hirsch ran the US Fusion Program during the 1970?s, and went from there to become one of America’s top energy experts. Here is a brief biography.

He was the lead author of one of the major papers about 21st century energy: “Peaking of World Production: Impacts, Mitigation, and Risk Management“ (aka “Mitigations”), commissioned by the Dept of Energy, published February 2005. Co-authors are the economists Roger Bezdek and Robert Wendling. They also wrote The Impending World Energy Mess: What It Is and What It Means to You (2010).

See Wikipedia for a list of his positions and publications. He has over 50 publications, plus 14 patents — including Farnsworth–Hirsch fusor (see Wikipedia).


MORE LINKS IN SUPPORT AT OP
 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
3. 4 Lessons for Building a Solar Economy
Mon Apr 15, 2013, 09:10 PM
Apr 2013
http://www.alternet.org/environment/4-lessons-building-solar-economy?akid=10322.227380.dt2l_S&rd=1&src=newsletter824098&t=22&paging=off

...electric companies and solar developers throughout the nation are watching Hawaii, which derives a larger fraction of its electricity from the sun than any other state. Homeowners and businesses have led the charge here, something that distinguishes Hawaii from other states at the forefront of solar, like Nevada and Arizona, which depend more heavily on large-scale installations. The reasons for Hawaii’s solar boom are many. The Polynesians who inhabited the Hawaiian islands before the arrival of Europeans were entirely self-sufficient. But in 2010 it was a different picture: the state generated 86.1 percent of its electricity from imported petroleum. The high price tag on that energy, along with a heightened awareness of the islands’ isolation, has led the state to set an ambitious goal: to derive 40 percent of its power from renewable sources by 2030. It reached 13 percent in 2012...Hawaii has roughly doubled its solar power capacity every year since 2007, and in 2012 installed more solar than in the last six years combined. It’s not hard to see what’s behind the solar frenzy: With the average electric bill stacking up to roughly $230 per month, Hawaii has the highest electricity rates in the nation by far—nearly twice as high as the second-most expensive state.

Solar has the potential to decrease a homeowner’s electric bill to zero, except for a monthly $18 service charge. Those kinds of savings, combined with federal and local tax credits, mean a Hawaiian homeowner can recoup the cost of a solar investment in just 3.1 years. Even if all the tax credits were removed, it would still take only 8.9 years for a Hawaii solar installation to pay for itself.... But so much solar has also created problems. Each island’s electric grid is isolated from the others, and therefore less stable than a typical mainland grid, particularly when unpredictable solar energy enters the picture. But solutions are beginning to emerge. Better energy storage systems and weather-prediction technology are being developed to stabilize those grids. Meanwhile, the Hawaii legislature is poised to reduce solar tax credits, which some say are too expensive. In short, Hawaii is solving problems today that other states may encounter tomorrow...

MORE
 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
15. Fallacy of Cleaning the Gyres of Plastic with a Floating ‘Ocean Cleanup Array’ By Stiv Wilson
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 07:00 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.nationofchange.org/fallacy-cleaning-gyres-plastic-floating-ocean-cleanup-array-1365949670

...The ocean surface is 315 million square kilometers—70 percent of the earth’s surface. Plastic isn’t just contained within the borders of the gyres, it’s everywhere in the ocean. Half of it, like Coke bottles and PVC pipe, sinks. What does a garbage patch look like? Imagine the night sky on a cloudless, moonless night. Now replace the ocean surface with space, and the stars with plastic; it’s dispersed and it goes on infinitely. Yes, humans have managed to create a problem on a degree of scale that’s nearly incomprehensible and so overwhelming we’re predisposed to like ideas like Slat’s because it has the appearance of near divine simplicity. Every time a gyre cleanup proponent has shown me a design for addressing the problem, the first thing I ask is, “do you have the money to make 20 million of those doo-hickies?” They look at me with a puzzled look, and I just mutter, ‘The ocean is really, really, really, big.”...

...The two most common types of plastic in the ocean are polyethylene (PE- plastic bags, dispensing bottles) and polypropylene (PP- bottle caps, fishing gear). So, it stands to reason that these types of plastic would be what Slat’s machine would ‘harvest’ to sell to recyclers. Well, if the economic viability of Slat’s ocean cleaning device rests on his assumption that it will produce a product that will be sold in the market, he needs to better understand the market landscape for his product.

Plastics, chemically speaking, are polymer chains of monomer hydrocarbon molecules. Ultraviolet light weakens the polymer chains until they break, which is why you have the confetti-like micro-plastics found in the ocean. The number one barrier to a closed loop, cradle-to-cradle scenario for plastic is that recycling weakens the polymer chains and thus, the structural integrity of what you can recycle them into. Ocean-borne plastics are so brittle you can break them apart with your fingers, and they’re also saturated with toxic chemicals present in seawater. Another issue is bio-fouling. Life adheres to plastic, and for the most part, plastic can only be recycled if it’s clean or cleaned. Another issue is that plastics have to be separated by type, i.e. PP, PE, etc. In an ocean plastic scenario where all these bits are crazy small, this requires spectroscopic analysis that identifies plastic by the frequency of light it reflects. This is very expensive, even in an automated scenario.

Another issue is transportation—plastic bags are hardly ever recycled because in most places, it’s more expensive to transport them to a recycler then the recycler will pay for them. So, from the market analysis standpoint in a gyre cleanup business plan, ocean plastics are about the worst possible feedstock for recycling imaginable, putting the product at a severe competitive disadvantage. Put it this way: Hiring people to climb trees in New York City to gather all the plastic bags in their branches would be more efficient and cheaper than ocean harvesting. Wait, do I sound crazy? Or visionary?

MORE INTERESTING RUMINATION AT LINK
 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
4. Now It’s Official: Obama Sells Catfood Futures, Um, Social Security and Medicare Cuts
Mon Apr 15, 2013, 09:18 PM
Apr 2013
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2013/04/now-its-official-obama-sells-catfood-futures-um-social-security-and-medicare-cuts.html

There is no more pretense possible. As we’ve warned for some time, Obama is eager to put a notch on his belt by being the President that rolled back the New Deal programs that helped create broad-based middle-class prosperity and dignity. He’s cast himself as an adult inflicting discipline on profligate Americans. But in reality, the profligacy was most concentrated among elite financiers who used leverage on leverage vehicles to stoke liquidity that led to worldwide underpricing of risk. They paid themselves record bonuses in the years immediately preceding the crisis, and then in a grotesque display of ingratitude, did so again in 2009, able to do so only thanks to massive taxpayer support, alphabet-soup special borrowing programs, and the tax on savers known as ZIRP. And the direct result of their looting exercise that produced the crisis was the explosion in government deficits, due to a collapse in tax revenues and a rise in payments under countercyclical programs such as unemployment insurance and food stamps.

But are the real perps the object of Obama’s disciplinary impulses? No. He seems spectacularly unwilling to take on anyone even remotely approaching his size (as if a President should be cowed by senior banker bullies like Jamie Dimon). The President’s failure to reprimand the financial CEOs who dissed him by refusing to attend his address on the first year anniversary of Lehman was a tacit acknowledgement that they were really in the driver’s seat.

Keep in mind what is happening here. We are not in the realm of Obama kayfabe, where he pretends that those big bad Republicans forced him to do what he wanted to do all along. This is Obama’s budget offer, not the result of pretend hard fought battles over positions that are at most 10 degrees apart....To be honest, I’ve never bought the 11 dimensional chess palaver. My wee theory is that Obama has a picture in his closet. In Oscar Wilde’s story, Dorian Gray sells his soul so that his portrait will age while he remains the beauty of the original image. Gray becomes increasingly debauched and his picture becomes more grotesque. Even an effort to reform makes the picture more frightful since Gray took up the idea only to see if it might reverse the uglification of his painting. Grey stabs the painting. His corpse is so withered and aged that it barely identifiable, but his picture has reverted to its former beauty.

My pet construct is that Obama has a picture too, but it’s a lucky painting, not a beauty painting. It makes Obama look like a winner, so Obama wins. His bad luck goes into that portrait in his closet. But I’m not sure he sold his soul (maybe it was just in indentured servitude) since it does not seem to be working so well of late. Obama had a reversal of his characteristic good fortune when the Supreme Court declared recess appointments to be invalid, which is a serious complication for him...

 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
5. How to Save American Finance from Itself Has financialization gone too far? BY ROBERT M. SOLOW
Mon Apr 15, 2013, 09:24 PM
Apr 2013
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/112679/how-save-american-finance-itself#

...Running a central bank is in one way a little bit like flying a plane or sailing a boat: much of the time standard responses and small adjustments will do just fine, but every so often a situation arises in which fundamental understanding, knowledge of history, and good judgment can make the difference between riding out the storm and crashing. There was no such person in charge in 1929, and the result was disaster. There was one in 2008.

In his earlier scholarly life, Ben Bernanke, the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, had been a careful student of the general interaction between the financial system and the real economy and especially of its working out in the Great Depression of the 1930s. So he had done his homework. His decisive and innovative actions at the Fed saved our economy from free fall with a possibly catastrophic end. I once non-joked that Bernanke was the Captain Kirk of central banking: he had loaned where no man had loaned before. In a life before turning to government service, first as a member of the Federal Reserve Board, then briefly as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, and then returning to the Fed as chairman in 2006, Bernanke was a well-known and highly respected academic economist. (The reader should know that I was one of his teachers in graduate school at MIT, and have remained a friend.) My opinion is that, after a briefly hesitant start as Fed chairman, probably still under the considerable aura of Alan Greenspan, Bernanke rose admirably to a difficult occasion and has been generally right in his judgments and his decisions, and in his willingness and his ability to explain both.

In March 2012, George Washington University invited Bernanke to give four lectures as part of a course devoted to the role of the Federal Reserve in the economy. The lectures are now reproduced in book form, apparently from lightly edited transcripts. Each lecture ends with half a dozen questions from anonymous “students” and Bernanke’s answers. Some of the questions are smart, some less so, in which case Bernanke exhibits the professorial skill of seamlessly answering a slightly different question. We are not told anything about the audience. I imagine a lot of people wanted to hear about the Federal Reserve and the financial crisis from the chairman himself. It’s rather like hearing Admiral Nelson reminisce about the battle of Trafalgar....

NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART, NOR THOSE WITH HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE...

ST. BEN OF BERNANKE...I DON'T THINK SO!

muriel_volestrangler

(101,154 posts)
6. S Korea in $15.3bn stimulus bid to spur economic growth
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 06:20 AM
Apr 2013
South Korea is the latest Asian country to try and boost economic growth by spending hard, unveiling a 17.3tn won ($15.3bn; £9.2bn) stimulus plan.

The funds will be used to help small and medium-sized exporters, create jobs, boost a stagnant property market and cover a shortfall in tax revenue.

South Korea has been hurt by weak exports and subdued domestic demand.

The move is expected to help boost annual growth by 0.3 percentage point this year and create 40,000 jobs.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22162383
 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
7. TURBO-FRAUD
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 06:25 AM
Apr 2013


...for millions of Americans, filing electronically has become the method of choice. Eighty percent of individual filers filed online in 2012, fulfilling a goal set by Congress in 1998. That percentage is expected to rise further this year. But the convenience of e-filing and the satisfaction of having your refund deposited directly into your bank account may come at a price: Identity theft is easier to pull off via an e-filed return. In 2011, 1.1 million cases of tax-identity theft—which includes stealing tax rebates—were reported, up from a mere 58,000 in 2008. Last summer, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) also discovered 1.5 million falsified returns, totaling $5.2 billion. Given that the IRS doesn't match the information submitted via electronically filed forms against its own historical data, the lure for fraud is clear. Crooks fill out multiple returns with ease—using stolen credentials often gathered from hacked computers and breached security systems—and deposit those returns directly into anonymous, pre-paid debit accounts.

from newsletter...no link available
 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
8. Obama's income fell in election year, paid 18.4 percent tax rate
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 06:40 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/04/12/us-obama-taxes-idUSBRE93B0Y420130412?feedType=RSS&feedName=politicsNews

President Barack Obama paid an effective federal tax rate of 18.4 percent in 2012 and saw income from his best-selling books drop as he ran for re-election, according to his tax returns released by the White House on Friday.

Obama and his wife Michelle had adjusted gross income of $608,611 last year, down from $789,674 in 2011, and paid $112,214 in total taxes, compared to $162,074 in 2011. Their total income came in at $662,076 - down almost 22 percent from $844,585 the previous year.

As president, Obama is entitled to a $400,000 annual salary. He reported salary income in 2011 and 2012 of $394,800, however, after deducting pre-tax amounts he paid for his health insurance premium, according to a White House official.

The Obamas' outside business income fell sharply as the president's book sales declined. In 2012, the couple had business income of $258,772, down from $441,369 in 2011. Book sales have declined dramatically since the early days of his presidency. In 2009, his business income from book sales came in around $5.2 million....

MUCH MORE DETAIL AT LINK

Roland99

(53,342 posts)
9. US Futures gaining ground
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 06:43 AM
Apr 2013
S&P 500 +0.5%
DOW +0.5%
NASDAQ +0.6%


Gold up 2.2% to $1,391/oz

Oil down a bit more to $88.46/bbl

 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
12. So, that loud flushing sound
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 06:48 AM
Apr 2013

was a short squeeze?

But, but, but, there's NO speculation in the commodities markets!

Roland99

(53,342 posts)
25. Actually, that late dropoff would have helped the shorts, no?
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 09:03 AM
Apr 2013

a late min rally would have put the shorts in a bad spot.

 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
11. Occupy Affiliate Aims at Abolishing Consumer Debt By Matthew Cardinale
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 06:45 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.nationofchange.org/occupy-affiliate-aims-abolishing-consumer-debt-1365952321



.....“The point of Rolling Jubilee was to tunnel under Wall Street to help the 99 percent,” Aleks Perisic, a member of Rolling Jubilee, told IPS.

Illegitimate debt

Most, if not all, of the money in the United States lent by banks is money that the banks never originally had in the first place, as previously reported by IPS. In other words, most of the money that U.S. banks lend out is conjured into existence through a stroke on a keyboard, by way of a practise called fractional reserve lending, where banks are allowed to create and lend a certain multiple of funds that they have on deposit with the Federal Reserve. That method is just one of the reasons Strike Debt believes that so much bank debt is illegitimate. (NOT A LEGITIMATE ARGUMENT, IMHO)

“Money is really created out of thin air,” Perisic said, who said the group had done extensive research on the matter. “This debt is really illegitimate, and it never should have existed in the first all place,” he added.

“The first thing is they (the families) should never had gone into debt for basic necessities in the first place. Beyond that, the fact that banks get a write-off when they discharge the debt, yet people are pursued to pay the full amount,” Perisic said.


Economist Ellen Brown said she thought the idea was interesting and noted that bankruptcy is the “original debt jubilee”. However, U.S. Congress and former President George W. Bush in 2005 made it more difficult for families who are not in poverty to discharge their debts through bankruptcy. Brown suggested there is an easier way to forgive debts in the United States.

“The Federal Reserve could just step in and buy the debt. Let’s say they bought a trillion dollars in debt. When they rip it up, they add money into the money supply anyway,” Brown told IPS. “When you forgive the debt, it’s the same as giving them money, which creates demand, and the stores put in more orders to make the stuff – that’s how you stimulate the economy.”


The Federal Reserve has actually engaged in three rounds of quantitative easing, known as QE1, QE2 and QE3, purchasing bad debts from banks with the intent of freeing those banks to lend to consumers. However, the strategy has largely not succeeded, Brown said, because the banks have not used those funds to make new loans to small businesses or consumers.

“What they [the Federal Reserve] are buying now is mortgage-backed securities and government debt. Instead of mortgage-backed securities, they could buy student debt and rip it up, but they’re not there to serve the people,” Brown wrote.


Brown said she believed U.S. Congress and the President could authorise the Federal Reserve to buy and forgive student loan debt. The purchases would not be inflationary because the U.S. monetary supply lost four trillion dollars since 2008, so it would take at least four trillion dollars in debt forgiveness to get the money supply back to where it was in 2008.....


MUCH MORE, BUT THIS WAS A NEW IDEA WE HAVEN'T SEEN POSTED
 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
19. WikiLeaks’ New Release: The Kissinger Cables and Bradley Manning By Amy Goodman
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 07:18 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.nationofchange.org/wikileaks-new-release-kissinger-cables-and-bradley-manning-1365686618


WikiLeaks has released a new trove of documents, more than 1.7 million U.S. State Department cables dating from 1973-1976, which they have dubbed “The Kissinger Cables,” after Henry Kissinger, who in those years served as secretary of state and assistant to the president for national security affairs.

One cable includes a transcribed conversation where Kissinger displays remarkable candor: “Before the Freedom of Information Act, I used to say at meetings, ‘The illegal we do immediately; the unconstitutional takes a little longer.’ (laughter) But since the Freedom of Information Act, I’m afraid to say things like that.”....


WikiLeaks’ latest release, which includes documents already declassified but very difficult to search and obtain, is a testament to the ongoing need for WikiLeaks and similar groups. The revealed documents have sparked controversies around the world, even though they relate to the 1970s. If we had a uniform standard of justice, Nobel laureate Henry Kissinger would be the one on trial, and Bradley Manning would win the Nobel Peace Prize.

Tansy_Gold

(17,817 posts)
24. may be answered in the article, but . . . .
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 09:02 AM
Apr 2013

I think part of the discussion should be how much of the student loan debt total consists of interest and charges, and how much is actually principal?

Break that down and it may be a different discussion.

 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
14. DRONING ON: Obama administration lied about drone targets
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 06:54 AM
Apr 2013

SURPRISE, SURPRISE!

http://www.salon.com/2013/04/10/obama_administration_lied_about_drone_targets/

Investigative reports and on-the-ground testimonies have made it public knowledge that far more people than al-Qaida leaders are killed by drone strikes. The U.K.’s Bureau of Investigative Journalism (BIJ) estimates that in Yemen, Pakistan and Somalia over 1,000 civilians may have been killed by U.S. drone strikes. The Obama administration has long maintained, however, that strikes are only ever authorized to target “specific senior operational leaders of al-Qaida and associated forces.” Documents obtained by McClatchy newspapers suggest that these claims are false.

The top-secret intelligence reports reveal, as one expert with the Council on Foreign Relations told McClatchy, that the administration is “misleading the public about the scope of who can legitimately be targeted.” It is not clear who leaked the documents to McClatchy for review...

I'M THINKING THE MORE CORRUPT A GOVT. IS, THE MORE IT LEAKS...AND THE LESS IT LEAKS (I'M THINKING CHENEY), THE MORE TOTALITARIAN IT IS.

THIS IS A NO-WIN SCENARIO!

 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
16. Americans Are Quitting Their Jobs At The Highest Rate In 5 Years
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 07:06 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.businessinsider.com/american-quitting-jobs-at-high-rate-2013-4

People are voluntarily quitting their jobs at the highest rate since the pre-recession era, according to the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey — known as JOLTS — published by The Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The report says that 2.16 million people quit their jobs in the latest data, which represents 53 percent of all job separations — this includes quits, layoffs and discharges — when accounting for retirees.

The graph below, published by Gluskin Sheff Research, illustrates the trend in the quitting rate and the number of people who have quit as a percentage compared to the total number of people employed in the past decade:



So what does this mean about our labor market? In short, it's an indication that people are confident that they can find other opportunities elsewhere and is "a sign of any sustained improvement in the labor markets," Fed vice chair Janet Yellen said in a speech last month.

Peter Cappelli, a management professor at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business, tells Christopher Rugaber at The Associated Press that this confidence happens when "the economy grows fast enough." Ultimately, people have faith in their own skills to make a living some other way rather than stay in a job they're not satisfied with.

So who are these workers? There's a good possibility that people are leaving their jobs to pursue freelancing, consulting or the entrepreneur route. This need to work for yourself is predicted to reach 40 percent of the American workforce by 2020, and is most common in sectors of the economy that are growing. Economist Robert Reich tells us that "at least [for now, a few employees feel they can do better as consultants or freelancers," because "they've been required to take on so much extra work they need more control over their time. Although the labor participation rate is extremely low — the lowest it's been since 1979 — employers are demanding longer work hours from those who are employed. "This has put a particularly heavy burden on working mothers and others who have primary responsibility for child care or elder care." Aside from those with an entrepreneurial mindset, another group of people who are quitting tend to be "young, black, Hispanic, female [and] working class," says Pat Buchanan at Free Republic. In this group, workers may be leaving to go back to school for a chance of finding better jobs.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/american-quitting-jobs-at-high-rate-2013-4#ixzz2QchqIBeO


According to the BLS, job openings have risen by 11.3 percent in the past year, yet hiring has declined by 1.6 percent, meaning that jobs are available but there aren't enough people with the needed skills to fill them.

WE ALL KNOW HOW THAT WORKS...AT THE PRICE EMPLOYERS ARE WILLING TO PAY...


 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
17. Time to Bell the Obama Cat By Norman Solomon
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 07:09 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.nationofchange.org/time-bell-obama-cat-1365607173

The story goes that some mice became very upset about the cat in the house and convened an emergency meeting. They finally came up with the idea of tying a bell around the cat’s neck, so the dangerous feline could no longer catch victims unawares. The plan gained a lot of enthusiastic praise, until one mouse piped up with a question that preceded a long silence: “Who’s going to bell the cat?”

In recent days, the big cat in the White House has provoked denunciations from groups that have rarely crossed him. They’re upset about his decision to push for cuts in Social Security benefits. “Progressive outrage has reached a boiling point,” the online juggernaut MoveOn declared a few days ago. Obama’s move to cut Social Security is certainly outrageous, and it’s encouraging that a wide range of progressive groups are steamed at Obama as never before. But this kind of outrage should have reached a “boiling point” a long time ago. The administration’s undermining of civil liberties, scant action on climate change, huge escalation of war in Afghanistan, expansion of drone warfare, austerity policies serving Wall Street and shafting Main Street, vast deference to corporate power. . . The list is long and chilling. So is the evasive record of many groups that are now denouncing Obama’s plan to cut Social Security. Mostly, their leaders griped in private and made nice with the Obama White House in public.

Yet imagine if those groups had polarized with President Obama in 2009 on even a couple of key issues. Such progressive independence would have shown the public that there is indeed a left in this country -- that the left has principles and stands up for them -- and that Obama, far from being on the left, is in the center. Such principled clarity would have undermined the right-wing attacks on Obama as a radical, socialist, etc. -- and from the beginning could have gotten some victories out of Obama, instead of waiting more than four years to take him on. Whether or not Obama’s vicious assault on Social Security is successful, it has already jolted an unprecedented number of longtime supporters. It should be the last straw, suffused with illumination. That past is prologue. We need to ask: Do such groups now have it in them to stop pretending that each of the Obama administration’s various awful policies is some kind of anomaly?

From this spring onward, a wide range of progressive groups should be prepared to work together to effectively renounce Obama’s leadership. We need to invigorate political options other than accepting the likes of President Obama -- or embracing self-marginalization. For progressives, there’s not a lot to be gained by venting against Obama without working to implement a plausible strategy for ousting corporate war Democrats from state power. Nor is there a useful path for third parties like the Green Party in races for Congress and other partisan contests; those campaigns rarely end up with more than a tiny percentage of the vote, and the impacts are very small. This spring, there’s a lot of work beckoning for progressives who mean business about gaining electoral power for social movements; who have no intention of eliding the grim realities of the Obama presidency; who are more than fed up with false pretenses that Obama is some kind of ally of progressives; who recognize that Obama has served his last major useful purpose for progressives by blocking a Romney-Ryan regime from entering the White House; who are willing to be here now, in this historical moment, to organize against and polarize with the Obama administration in basic terms; and who, looking ahead, grasp the tragic folly of leaving the electoral field to battles between right-wing Republicans and Democrats willing to go along with the kind of destructive mess that President Obama has been serving up. A vital next step is staring us in the face: get to work now to develop and launch grassroots progressive campaigns for next year’s primaries that can defeat members of Congress who talk the talk but fail to walk the walk of challenging Obama’s austerity agenda.

Who are those congressional incumbents who call themselves “progressive” but refuse to take a clear stand against slashing Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits? I have a little list. Well, actually it’s not so little. SEE ATTACHED POST As of today, after many weeks of progressive lobbying and pleading and petitioning nationwide, 47 members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus have refused to sign the letter, initiated by Congressmen Alan Grayson and Mark Takano, pledging to “vote against any and every cut to Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security benefits -- including raising the retirement age or cutting the cost of living adjustments that our constituents earned and need.” After all this time, refusal to sign the Grayson-Takano letter is a big tipoff that those 47 House members are keeping their options open. They want wiggle room for budget votes on Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security benefits. Most of them represent a left-leaning district, and some could be toppled by grassroots progressive campaigns. By itself, lobbying accomplishes little. Right now, it’s time to threaten members of Congress with defeat unless they vote against all efforts to cut Social Security and Medicare benefits...The best way to sway members of Congress is to endanger their seats if they aren’t willing to do the right thing. In the real world, politics isn’t about playing cat and mouse. It’s about power.

SEE LINK TO CONTACT REPS. AT OP
 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
18. Progressive Caucus members who haven't stood up by Norman Solomon
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 07:12 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.rootsaction.org/news-a-views/601-progressive-caucus-members-who-havent-stood-up


As of now, the following House members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus have NOT signed the letter initiated by Congressmen Alan Grayson and Mark Takano pledging: “We will vote against any and every cut to Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security benefits -- including raising the retirement age or cutting the cost of living adjustments that our constituents earned and need.”

Karen Bass
Xavier Becerra
Earl Blumenauer
Suzanne Bonamici
Michael Capuano
Andre Carson
Donna Christensen
Judy Chu
Yvette Clarke
William “Lacy” Clay NOW SIGNED
Emanuel Cleaver NOW SIGNED
David Cicilline NOW SIGNED
Steve Cohen
Elijah Cummings
Danny Davis NOW SIGNED
Rosa DeLauro
Donna Edwards
Sam Farr
Chaka Fattah
Lois Frankel
Marcia Fudge
Janice Hahn
Jared Huffman
Rush Holt
Michael Honda NOW SIGNED
Sheila Jackson-Lee
Hakeem Jeffries
Eddie Bernice Johnson
Joe Kennedy III
Ann McLane Kuster
John Lewis
David Loebsack
Ben Ray Lujan
Carolyn Maloney NOW SIGNED
Ed Markey NOW SIGNED
Jim McDermott
George Miller
Gwen Moore
Jim Moran
Eleanor Holmes Norton
Frank Pallone
Ed Pastor
Chellie Pingree
Mark Pocan
Jared Polis
Charles Rangel
Lucille Roybal-Allard
Linda Sanchez
Jan Schakowsky
Louise Slaughter
Bennie Thompson
John Tierney
Mel Watt
Peter Welch
 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
30. The thing is...Obama is the Cat's Paw, not the cat
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 09:20 AM
Apr 2013

A useful tool, an obliging fool, who wants to look cool to the 1% school.

Think I have a future as a rapper?

xchrom

(108,903 posts)
20. S Korea in $15.3bn stimulus bid to spur economic growth
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 08:07 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22162383

South Korea is the latest Asian country to try and boost economic growth by spending hard, unveiling a 17.3tn won ($15.3bn; £9.2bn) stimulus plan.

The funds will be used to help small and medium-sized exporters, create jobs, boost a stagnant property market and cover a shortfall in tax revenue.

South Korea has been hurt by weak exports and subdued domestic demand.

The move is expected to help boost annual growth by 0.3 percentage point this year and create 40,000 jobs.

xchrom

(108,903 posts)
21. Asian markets fall after deadly Boston Marathon blasts
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 08:08 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22162380

Key Asian markets declined in Tuesday trading after two explosions at the Boston Marathon in the US killed three people and injured dozens more.

Japan's Nikkei index closed 0.4% lower, having registered earlier falls of up to 2%. Oil and gold prices also fell.

Earlier on Monday, US markets closed lower after the blasts accelerated a sell-off started by weak economic data.

Analysts said that investors would be more risk averse in coming sessions and would focus on Asia's problem areas.

xchrom

(108,903 posts)
22. UK inflation rate held steady at 2.8% in March
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 08:10 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22165218

UK consumer price inflation held steady at 2.8% in March, at its highest level since May last year, the Office for National Statistics said.

Rises in the cost of books, digital cameras and car insurance were offset by lower inflation for petrol and diesel.

The Bank of England has said it expects inflation to exceed 3% later this year.

Many economists believe pressure from food prices, and gas and electricity bills will push up the rate.

xchrom

(108,903 posts)
23. DEFLATION: Consumer Prices Unexpectedly Fall 0.2%
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 08:47 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.businessinsider.com/consumer-price-index-march-2013-4

The CPI release is out.
Consumer prices unexpectedly fell 0.2% in March from the previous month.
Economists were predicting a flat reading.
Excluding food and energy, prices were up 0.1% (economists were looking for a 0.2% advance).


***sure doesn't seem like it to my handbag.

xchrom

(108,903 posts)
27. Capital Study: Chinese Investment in Europe Hits Record High
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 09:06 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.spiegel.de/international/business/study-finds-massive-investment-in-europe-by-chinese-state-companies-a-894570.html


Chinese state-owned companies are expanding their influence in Europe, investing more than $12.6 billion (€9.6 billion) in the Continent last year, according to a study by the Hong Kong-based private equity firm A Capital.

The amount represented an increase of about one-fifth in comparison to 2011, and was all together larger than investments in North America and Asia combined. About 86 percent of the investments were in the service and industrial sectors.

The study by A Capital is the most comprehensive investigation yet into Chinese investment in Europe. The private equity firm itself counts the Chinese government among its investors, in the form of the China Investment Corporation (CIC).

Chinese firms have caused a furor in the past for their partial or complete takeovers of German flagship companies like concrete pump manufacturer Putzmeister, warehouse equipment maker Kion and consumer electronics manufacturer Medion.

xchrom

(108,903 posts)
29. EU Comissioner: Time to Move 'Quicker and Harder' Against Tax Evasion
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 09:09 AM
Apr 2013
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/eu-tax-comissioner-discusses-efforts-to-combat-havens-and-evaders-a-894418.html

SPIEGEL: The finance ministers of France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom want to step up the fight against tax evaders. In a letter, they announced a computerized exchange of information between their tax authorities. Would this help?

Semeta: If the five countries push for more ambitious information exchange, allowing all European Union member states to collect the taxes they are due, it would certainly be a positive thing. Automatic exchange of information has been our standard in the EU for years now, and the European Commission has been pushing to expand its scope to make the fight against tax evasion much stronger. With five of the largest member states also looking to achieve this same goal, we could expect good results. And I think the best way to achieve this now is to quickly adopt the large package of anti-evasion measures which the European Commission has put on the table.

SPIEGEL: Does that explain the shift by Luxembourg, and likely Austria, which, because of secrecy within their banking sectors, declined in the past to exchange information with other tax authorities?

Semeta: I can only welcome the readiness of Luxembourg to adopt the EU standard for greater transparency through automatic exchange of information. And Austria will certainly not want to remain isolated.
 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
34. Yeah, I saw it
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 11:34 AM
Apr 2013

It triggered my regular fantasy that we had a responsible press of investigative reporters dogging the heels of politicians so that we the People knew what the hell they were up to, every minute they were awake....

 

Demeter

(85,373 posts)
35. And why,with futures hitting bottom, did gas price go up 25 cents yesterday?
Tue Apr 16, 2013, 11:48 AM
Apr 2013

Fear of crazy bombers? A tax protest? Just for the hell of it?

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