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STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Friday, 2 October 2015
[font size=3]STOCK MARKET WATCH, Friday, 2 October 2015[font color=black][/font]
SMW for 1 October 2015
AT THE CLOSING BELL ON 1 October 2015
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Dow Jones 16,272.01 -12.69 (-0.08%)
[font color=green]S&P 500 1,923.82 +3.79 (0.20%)
Nasdaq 4,627.08 +6.92 (0.15%)
[font color=red]10 Year 2.04% +0.01 (0.49%)
30 Year 2.85% +0.02 (0.71%) [font color=black]
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[font size=2]Market Conditions During Trading Hours[/font]
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(click on link for latest updates)
Market Updates
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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
Wall Street on Parade
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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
[/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
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.
08/01/13 Fabrice Tourré convicted on six counts of security fraud, including "aiding and abetting" his former employer, Goldman Sachs
08/14/13 Javier Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout charged with wire fraud, falsifying records, and conspiracy in connection with JP Morgan's "London Whale" trade.
08/19/13 Phillip A. Falcone, manager of hedge fund Harbinger Capital Partners, agrees to admit to "wrongdoing" in market manipulation. Will banned from securities industry for 5 years and pay $18MM in disgorgement and fines.
09/16/13 Javier Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout officially indicted on charges associated with "London Whale" trade.
02/06/14 Matthew Martoma convicted of insider trading while at hedge fund SAC (Stephen A. Cohen) Capital Advisors. Expected sentence 7-10 years.
03/24/14 Annette Bongiorno, Bernard Madoff's secretary; Daniel Bonventre, director of operations for investments; JoAnn Crupi, an account manager; and Jerome O'Hara and George Perez, both computer programmers convicted of conspiracy to defraud clients, securities fraud, and falsifying the books and records.
05/19/14 Credit Suisse, which has an investment bank branch in NYC, agrees to plead guilty and pay appx. $2.6 billion penalties for helping wealthy Americans hide wealth and avoid taxes.
09/08/14 Matthew Martoma, convicted SAC trader, sentenced to 9 years in prison plus forfeiture of $9.3 million, including home and bank accounts
08/03/15 Former City (London) trader Tom Hayes found guilty of rigging global Libor interest rates. Each fo eight counts carries up to 10 yr. sentence.
08/21/15 Charles Antonucci Sr, former pres. Park Ave. Bank sentenced to 2.5 years in prison for bribery, fraud, embezzlement, and attempt to steal $11MM in TARP bailout funds, as well as $37.5MM fraud on OK insurance company. To pay $54MM in restitution and give up additional $11MM.
09/21/15 Volkswagen CEO Martin Winterkorn apologizes for VW cheating on air quality standards with emission testing avoidance device. Stock drops 20%, fines may total $18B.
09/22/15 Stewart Parnell, CEO Peanut Corp. of America, sentenced to 28 years in prison for selling salmonella-tainted peanut butter that killed nine.
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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]
24 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
http://downwithtyranny.blogspot.com/2015/09/whats-called-capitalism-is-far-from-any.html
Predators and prey. The homeless and left-behind are at the bottom (“decomposers”). Most of everyone else is in the next layer up (“producers”). The rest, from the well-off to the wealthy, are “consumers.” Interesting how that language works, isn’t it?
http://www.education.com/worksheet/article/food-chain-pyramid/
A recent piece I did on the British Labour politician Tony Benn featured a speech that offered a “history of neoliberalism” (click here to read and listen). Near the beginning of the speech, Benn said, “This country and the world have been run by rich and powerful men from the beginning of time.” Consider that for a moment, what that means about the arc of human history...Near the end of his short talk, referencing the Thatcher (and Reagan) counterrevolution against the great populist gains of the 19th and 20th centuries, he said that this is “what the whole modern crisis is about, the restoration of power to those who’ve always controlled the world, the people who own the land and the resources and all the rest of it.”
That radical re-transformation of the world back to control by its original and longtime owners, “rich and powerful men,” was begun in England by Margaret Thatcher and several deliberate policies. Benn (my emphasis): “So privatization is a deliberate policy, along with the destruction of local democracy and the destruction of the trade unions to restore power back to to where it was.” Benn also mentions the role of crushing personal debt in the Thatcher de-democratization of her society:
Notice that this re-transformation back to what was, this re-transfer of power to society’s original owners, isn’t about any ideology, any set of theories, any academic anything about “invisible hands” or mathematically correct economic models. This is about one group — “rich and powerful men” — reasserting control of the world, a control they’ve enjoyed since the virtual “beginning of time,” since the first day “property” meant more than just personal property (what I carry and wear) and included ownership of fields, buildings and land itself. That period, which started the day the first city-state, the first temple-state arose, lasted more than 5,000 years. For almost all of the time since humanity left the Stone Age, the mass of humans have been ruled by the rich and powerful, until the opening of a very brief window initiated, as Benn tells it, by the trade union movement of the mid-1800s. That small window is now closing. We’re watching the end, if we allow it, of this one-time-only freshwater teardrop in time, as it falls to become lost in the deep well of our salt-water civilized past. (And don’t be confused. If that small window, the 250-year period of relative freedom, closes — if “rich and powerful men” regain full control as they have almost already done — they will also end the 5,000-year window of human civilization. Because, climate.)
Please don’t take a short view of the times we inhabit together. This is what’s at stake, now, this year, this election cycle, this decade — at most, this quarter-century, which is more than half over...
What’s Called “Capitalism” Is Far from Any Model of “Capitalism” or “Market”
Simply put, we’re not living in a “capitalist” economy, and present economic activity is not properly described by the word “market.” To see and say that completely misses the facts. The economic “theory” we’re guided by, if it can be called a theory at all, is what Benn described at the start of his speech: “This country and the world have been run by rich and powerful men from the beginning of time.” The closest I can come to describing this “theory” is “predators and prey.” For more than 5,000 years the predators — “rich and powerful men” — enjoyed complete control. “Capitalism” is what they’re calling today’s reassertion of that control. But it’s not by any stretch “capitalism,” not even close. Noam Chomsky, in a recent interview with Jacobin magazine, says it quite well. First, from the introduction to the interview:
The interview ranges widely (feel free to read it all). I want to point to just one section, in which Chomsky characterizes what we insist on calling and defending as “capitalism” (my emphasis in italics):
If you click that last link and scroll down, you’ll get his sense of where we’re headed as a species, in particular with respect to habitability and climate.
But your takeaway should be this. Economic predation by the powerful is not an economic system in any sophisticated sense, any more than organized bullies stealing every child’s lunch money the minute she enters the building is a “system” in any complex sense. It’s not even a “racket” if that term implies misdirection and a multi-step process. It’s just boots on the neck and hands in the pocket.
Nor is such theft a “market” by any definition. It’s simply theft, backed by the power of the bullies themselves, their fists, their clubs, and the power of the state that enables them for a cut of the prize.
Feel free to defend (or not) what this “system” is becoming. Just don’t misdescribe it. It’s not capitalism by any definition. Nor is it a market, unless a factory farm with a slaughterhouse at one end is a market. Don’t confuse others; don’t confuse yourself.
Predators and prey. The homeless and left-behind are at the bottom (“decomposers”). Most of everyone else is in the next layer up (“producers”). The rest, from the well-off to the wealthy, are “consumers.” Interesting how that language works, isn’t it?
http://www.education.com/worksheet/article/food-chain-pyramid/
A recent piece I did on the British Labour politician Tony Benn featured a speech that offered a “history of neoliberalism” (click here to read and listen). Near the beginning of the speech, Benn said, “This country and the world have been run by rich and powerful men from the beginning of time.” Consider that for a moment, what that means about the arc of human history...Near the end of his short talk, referencing the Thatcher (and Reagan) counterrevolution against the great populist gains of the 19th and 20th centuries, he said that this is “what the whole modern crisis is about, the restoration of power to those who’ve always controlled the world, the people who own the land and the resources and all the rest of it.”
That radical re-transformation of the world back to control by its original and longtime owners, “rich and powerful men,” was begun in England by Margaret Thatcher and several deliberate policies. Benn (my emphasis): “So privatization is a deliberate policy, along with the destruction of local democracy and the destruction of the trade unions to restore power back to to where it was.” Benn also mentions the role of crushing personal debt in the Thatcher de-democratization of her society:
What she said, and this is very clever, “You can buy your council house so you’ll be a property owner. You may not be able to get a wage increase, but you can borrow.” And the borrowing was deliberately encouraged because people in debt are slaves to their employers.”
Notice that this re-transformation back to what was, this re-transfer of power to society’s original owners, isn’t about any ideology, any set of theories, any academic anything about “invisible hands” or mathematically correct economic models. This is about one group — “rich and powerful men” — reasserting control of the world, a control they’ve enjoyed since the virtual “beginning of time,” since the first day “property” meant more than just personal property (what I carry and wear) and included ownership of fields, buildings and land itself. That period, which started the day the first city-state, the first temple-state arose, lasted more than 5,000 years. For almost all of the time since humanity left the Stone Age, the mass of humans have been ruled by the rich and powerful, until the opening of a very brief window initiated, as Benn tells it, by the trade union movement of the mid-1800s. That small window is now closing. We’re watching the end, if we allow it, of this one-time-only freshwater teardrop in time, as it falls to become lost in the deep well of our salt-water civilized past. (And don’t be confused. If that small window, the 250-year period of relative freedom, closes — if “rich and powerful men” regain full control as they have almost already done — they will also end the 5,000-year window of human civilization. Because, climate.)
Please don’t take a short view of the times we inhabit together. This is what’s at stake, now, this year, this election cycle, this decade — at most, this quarter-century, which is more than half over...
What’s Called “Capitalism” Is Far from Any Model of “Capitalism” or “Market”
Simply put, we’re not living in a “capitalist” economy, and present economic activity is not properly described by the word “market.” To see and say that completely misses the facts. The economic “theory” we’re guided by, if it can be called a theory at all, is what Benn described at the start of his speech: “This country and the world have been run by rich and powerful men from the beginning of time.” The closest I can come to describing this “theory” is “predators and prey.” For more than 5,000 years the predators — “rich and powerful men” — enjoyed complete control. “Capitalism” is what they’re calling today’s reassertion of that control. But it’s not by any stretch “capitalism,” not even close. Noam Chomsky, in a recent interview with Jacobin magazine, says it quite well. First, from the introduction to the interview:
Throughout his illustrious career, one of Noam Chomsky’s chief preoccupations has been questioning — and urging us to question — the assumptions and norms that govern our society.
Following a talk on power, ideology, and US foreign policy last weekend at the New School in New York City, freelance Italian journalist Tommaso Segantini sat down with the eighty-six-year-old to discuss some of the same themes, including how they relate to processes of social change.
For radicals, progress requires puncturing the bubble of inevitability: austerity, for instance, “is a policy decision undertaken by the designers for their own purposes.” It is not implemented, Chomsky says, “because of any economic laws.” American capitalism also benefits from ideological obfuscation: despite its association with free markets, capitalism is shot through with subsidies for some of the most powerful private actors. This bubble needs popping too.
Following a talk on power, ideology, and US foreign policy last weekend at the New School in New York City, freelance Italian journalist Tommaso Segantini sat down with the eighty-six-year-old to discuss some of the same themes, including how they relate to processes of social change.
For radicals, progress requires puncturing the bubble of inevitability: austerity, for instance, “is a policy decision undertaken by the designers for their own purposes.” It is not implemented, Chomsky says, “because of any economic laws.” American capitalism also benefits from ideological obfuscation: despite its association with free markets, capitalism is shot through with subsidies for some of the most powerful private actors. This bubble needs popping too.
The interview ranges widely (feel free to read it all). I want to point to just one section, in which Chomsky characterizes what we insist on calling and defending as “capitalism” (my emphasis in italics):
Q: How do you think that the capitalist system will survive, considering its dependence on fossil fuels and its impact on the environment?
Chomsky: What’s called the capitalist system is very far from any model of capitalism or market. Take the fossil fuels industries: there was a recent study by the IMF which tried to estimate the subsidy that energy corporations get from governments. The total was colossal. I think it was around $5 trillion annually. That’s got nothing to do with markets and capitalism.
And the same is true of other components of the so-called capitalist system. By now, in the US and other Western countries, there’s been, during the neoliberal period, a sharp increase in the financialization of the economy. Financial institutions in the US had about 40 percent of corporate profits on the eve of the 2008 collapse, for which they had a large share of responsibility.
There’s another IMF study that investigated the profits of American banks, and it found that they were almost entirely dependent on implicit public subsidies. There’s a kind of a guarantee — it’s not on paper, but it’s an implicit guarantee — that if they get into trouble they will be bailed out. That’s called too-big-to-fail.
And the credit rating agencies of course know that, they take that into account, and with high credit ratings financial institutions get privileged access to cheaper credit, they get subsidies if things go wrong and many other incentives, which effectively amounts to perhaps their total profit. The business press tried to make an estimate of this number and guessed about $80 billion a year. That’s got nothing to do with capitalism.
It’s the same in many other sectors of the economy. So the real question is, will this system of state capitalism, which is what it is, survive the continued use of fossil fuels? And the answer to that is, of course, no.
By now, there’s a pretty strong consensus among scientists who say that a large majority of the remaining fossil fuels, maybe 80 percent, have to be left in the ground if we hope to avoid a temperature rise which would be pretty lethal. And it is not happening. Humans may be destroying their chances for decent survival. It won’t kill everybody, but it would change the world dramatically.
Chomsky: What’s called the capitalist system is very far from any model of capitalism or market. Take the fossil fuels industries: there was a recent study by the IMF which tried to estimate the subsidy that energy corporations get from governments. The total was colossal. I think it was around $5 trillion annually. That’s got nothing to do with markets and capitalism.
And the same is true of other components of the so-called capitalist system. By now, in the US and other Western countries, there’s been, during the neoliberal period, a sharp increase in the financialization of the economy. Financial institutions in the US had about 40 percent of corporate profits on the eve of the 2008 collapse, for which they had a large share of responsibility.
There’s another IMF study that investigated the profits of American banks, and it found that they were almost entirely dependent on implicit public subsidies. There’s a kind of a guarantee — it’s not on paper, but it’s an implicit guarantee — that if they get into trouble they will be bailed out. That’s called too-big-to-fail.
And the credit rating agencies of course know that, they take that into account, and with high credit ratings financial institutions get privileged access to cheaper credit, they get subsidies if things go wrong and many other incentives, which effectively amounts to perhaps their total profit. The business press tried to make an estimate of this number and guessed about $80 billion a year. That’s got nothing to do with capitalism.
It’s the same in many other sectors of the economy. So the real question is, will this system of state capitalism, which is what it is, survive the continued use of fossil fuels? And the answer to that is, of course, no.
By now, there’s a pretty strong consensus among scientists who say that a large majority of the remaining fossil fuels, maybe 80 percent, have to be left in the ground if we hope to avoid a temperature rise which would be pretty lethal. And it is not happening. Humans may be destroying their chances for decent survival. It won’t kill everybody, but it would change the world dramatically.
If you click that last link and scroll down, you’ll get his sense of where we’re headed as a species, in particular with respect to habitability and climate.
But your takeaway should be this. Economic predation by the powerful is not an economic system in any sophisticated sense, any more than organized bullies stealing every child’s lunch money the minute she enters the building is a “system” in any complex sense. It’s not even a “racket” if that term implies misdirection and a multi-step process. It’s just boots on the neck and hands in the pocket.
Nor is such theft a “market” by any definition. It’s simply theft, backed by the power of the bullies themselves, their fists, their clubs, and the power of the state that enables them for a cut of the prize.
Feel free to defend (or not) what this “system” is becoming. Just don’t misdescribe it. It’s not capitalism by any definition. Nor is it a market, unless a factory farm with a slaughterhouse at one end is a market. Don’t confuse others; don’t confuse yourself.
Big fan of the SMW page and the posters here.
The execs at the bank hated Credit Unions. Seemed to think it was unfair that they didn't need to make a profit. 
They were always trying get laws passed to hamstring them. (To be clear I was a peon there, but you see and hear things)
This was a conservatively run bank at the time, but they were also trying to get the laws changed so they could expand into other areas like insurance. Seems to me they succeeded to our detriment. Early 90's and derivatives were just getting popular.
