How Algos Orchestrate "Momentum Ignition" Chaos | ZeroHedge:
'via Blog this'
Friday, December 28, 2012
Wednesday, December 26, 2012
Monday, November 12, 2012
On America's Generous "Patriotic Millionaires" Who Just Can't Wait To Pay Down The US Debt | ZeroHedge
On America's Generous "Patriotic Millionaires" Who Just Can't Wait To Pay Down The US Debt | ZeroHedge: "There were 165 signatories to the original "Patriotic Millionaires" list, among which Nouriel Roubini, Leo Hindery, Rick Schottenfield, and mysteriously, Whitney Tilson. One should of course add Warren Buffett: the progenitor of the grassroots movement. Thus a total of 166. In other words, assuming only these 166 people donated cash to the US Treasury in 2012 to pay down the debt (while a potential tax deal awaits), the average patriotic millionaire has donated a whopping of $46,684.45 toward paying down the US debt."
'via Blog this'
'via Blog this'
Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Saturday, September 29, 2012
Friday, September 28, 2012
Social media trading is gaining ground
Social media trading is gaining ground: "This 'event-detection', as it is often called, requires a powerful analytics engine which detects abnormal signals and then analyses them combined with contextual data, both historical and concurrent, to decide whether the chatter is meaningful or simply noise.
Its biggest – and not insignificant – claim to fame, for example, was breaking the news of Osama bin Laden's death to its client-base 20 minutes before the major media outlets , thereby offering any clients trading at the time a potentially huge information advantage"
'via Blog this'
Its biggest – and not insignificant – claim to fame, for example, was breaking the news of Osama bin Laden's death to its client-base 20 minutes before the major media outlets , thereby offering any clients trading at the time a potentially huge information advantage"
'via Blog this'
Monday, September 10, 2012
Super Mario’s Big Bluff- The ECB 'Bull" Out !!
Super Mario’s Big Bluff: "So the ECB is not actually announcing a massive new bond-buying program. Instead it’s just announced that it’s willing to provide more money as long as EU nations hand over their fiscal sovereignty and implement austerity measures.
This is nothing new. In fact, this has been the exact same program that the ECB’s had in place ever since the EU Crisis began in 2010. "
'via Blog this'
This is nothing new. In fact, this has been the exact same program that the ECB’s had in place ever since the EU Crisis began in 2010. "
'via Blog this'
Thursday, September 6, 2012
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Sunday, August 26, 2012
Saturday, August 25, 2012
Thursday, August 23, 2012
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Monday, August 13, 2012
Saturday, August 11, 2012
Friday, August 10, 2012
Thursday, August 2, 2012
ECB Drawing Up Plans for Bond Purchases: Draghi - Business News - CNBC
ECB Drawing Up Plans for Bond Purchases: Draghi - Business News - CNBC: ""The Governing Council will consider further non-standard monetary policy measures according to what is required to repair monetary policy transmission. In the coming weeks we will design the appropriate modalities for such policy measures.""
Here comes Euro QE !!
'via Blog this'
Here comes Euro QE !!
'via Blog this'
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Friday, July 20, 2012
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Monday, July 9, 2012
Monday, July 2, 2012
Monday, June 25, 2012
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Monday, June 18, 2012
India Stuns Markets By Holding, Not Cutting, Rates - Asia Business News - CNBC
India Stuns Markets By Holding, Not Cutting, Rates - Asia Business News - CNBC: ""Further reduction in the policy interest rate at this juncture, rather than supporting growth, could exacerbate inflationary pressures," the RBI wrote in its mid-quarter policy review."
Glad they kept their heads this time !
'via Blog this'
Glad they kept their heads this time !
'via Blog this'
Friday, June 15, 2012
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
Private Equity Has Too Much Money To Spend On Homes: Mortgages
By John Gittelsohn - Jun 13, 2012 12:00 AM ET
Funds planning to invest more than $6 billion to buy and rent foreclosed homes are finding it easy to raise money. The difficulty is spending it.
The number of low-cost foreclosed homes coming to market has dropped, bulk sales have been slow to materialize and prices are recovering in markets such as Phoenix, making it hard for private-equity firms, hedge funds and pension systems to buy as many homes as they need.
The flow of discounted foreclosures has slowed since late 2010, when some of the largest mortgage servicers, including Bank of America, imposed a temporary moratorium on home seizures amid allegations they used faulty or forged paperwork to seize properties from delinquent borrowers. Photographer: Ronda Churchill/Bloomberg
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“The folks that raised capital are worried about under- accumulating properties and how to get capital out in an efficient way,” Richard Ford, a managing director in the real estate investment banking group at Jefferies Group Inc., said in a telephone interview. “A lot’s being raised. Less than $2 billion of institutional capital has been spent.”
Investors are trying to spend at least $6.4 billion on single-family rentals, including from funds such as Colony Capital LLC, GTIS Partners, KKR & Co., Oaktree Capital Group LLC (OAK), Och-Ziff Capital Management Group LLC (OZM) and the Alaska Permanent Fund Corp. They want to take advantage of U.S. home prices that are 35 percent below the 2006 peak and growing demand for rentals as the homeownership rate sits at the lowest level since 1997.
The largest pending bulk sale is a portfolio of 2,490 properties by Fannie Mae, the Washington-based mortgage-finance company controlled by the U.S. government. Final bids, announced in February, are still being reviewed.
Bulk Sales
The Federal Housing Administration, which manages about 35,000 repossessed homes whose mortgages it insured, plans to sell loans on about 5,000 properties with delinquent loans beginning in September for possible conversion to rentals, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Shaun Donovan said June 8.
Future bulk sales by Fannie Mae (FNMA) and McLean, Virginia-based Freddie Mac (FMCC), also government-controlled, may be delayed by political pressure to monitor the properties in the pilot project, making it harder for investors to accumulate real estate owned -- or REO -- homes that were repossessed, according to a June 7 note by Jaret Seiberg, a policy analyst with Guggenheim Securities LLC in Washington.
“This could be a disappointment to many investors who expected Fannie and Freddie to unload thousands of properties through the REO-to-rental program,” Seiberg wrote.
Auctioning Properties
Bank of America Corp. (BAC), which had more than $40 billion of losses related to mortgages and foreclosures, has conducted only two bulk auctions of a “few hundred” properties, according to Rick Simon, a spokesman for the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank.
“That isn’t a large part of our strategy,” Simon said in a telephone interview from his office in Calabasas, California. Rather than selling in bulk, the bank is agreeing to short sales, in which homeowners sell their properties for less than they owe; selling foreclosures through real estate brokers; and auctioning off properties one at a time, Simon said.
PropertyAccess, a unit of FirstService Corp. (FSV) that manages about 10,000 single-family rentals a year for banks and institutional investors, is starting an “acquisition platform” to help large funds find properties, said Jim Warren, senior vice president of the Austin, Texas-based division. By the fourth quarter, PropertyAccess will be able to procure 500 to 1,000 homes a month for investors, he said in a telephone interview.
Colony Builds
“You’ve got Warren Buffett saying he’d buy 200,000 homes if he could find the operational ability to do so,” Warren said. “The reverse of the conversation is, Where the hell do you think you’re getting 200,000 properties? The operations exist.”
Colony Capital, the private-equity firm founded by Tom Barrack, is building an in-house staff to realize its plans to acquire $1.5 billion of rental homes by April of next year, said Justin Chang, acting president of the firm’s Colony American Homes unit. Colony, based in Scottsdale, Arizona, has acquired 1,200 homes and hired 125 people to buy and maintain properties in Arizona, California and Nevada, with plans to add at least three other states this year, Chang said.
“Our view is there’s tons to buy, and tons to buy attractively,” he said in a telephone interview. “Once you own the homes, it’s fixing them up, leasing them up and managing them on a go-forward basis which is challenging.”
An exception is Nevada, the U.S. leader for delinquent mortgages for more than five years, according to RealtyTrac Inc. Foreclosures in the state slowed after a law that took effect in October raised the burden of proof on lenders seeking to repossess property, making it “a less attractive part of our business,” Chang said.
‘Sharpshooter’ Buying
Tom Shapiro, chairman of New York-based GTIS Partners, expects to invest $1 billion by 2016, in what he estimates is a $1 trillion market for single-family rentals. He said he’s buying properties one at a time, like “a sharpshooter,” rather than purchasing them in bulk because houses aren’t a commodity like oil or gold.
“If you buy by the pound, I think you’ll underperform,” Shapiro said in a telephone interview from New York. “If a firm that wants to put in $500 million today at $100,000 a house, that’s 5,000 houses, and they’re not doing the level of work they need to. They’re not going to every house and looking at the Google street map.”
The homes in the Fannie Mae bulk sale will be sold in regional pools in Atlanta, Chicago, three regions of Florida, Las Vegas, Southern California and Phoenix, according to a summary prepared by Credit Suisse (CSGN) Group AG, the financial adviser for the sale.
Andrew Wilson, a Fannie Mae spokesman, and Steven Vames, a spokesman for Credit Suisse, both declined to comment because the transaction is a private placement.
Outright Sales
The pools will be either sold outright to investors or used for joint ventures with Fannie Mae, according to six people who reviewed the offering and asked not to be identified because of a nondisclosure agreement. Buyers of the homes, 85 percent of which come with rental tenants, will face sales restrictions to prevent flipping or flooding the market with distressed properties, the people said.
About 8 percent of the 114,157 homes in Fannie Mae’s inventory of foreclosed properties had tenants as of March 31, according to a regulatory filing.
Deploying Funds
Carrington Capital Management LLC, based in Santa Ana, California, announced a $450 million commitment in January from Los Angeles-based opportunity investment fund Oaktree to buy single-family rentals.
“We’re finding the hardest thing is deploying funds,” Carrington Executive Vice President Rick Sharga said in a telephone interview. “It’s hard to find investments in any volume.”
Real estate brokers oppose bulk sales to large funds, arguing there’s enough demand by small investors and individual buyers planning to live in the homes to absorb the inventory coming to market.
Large-scale foreclosure sales “would put further downward pressure on home prices, take away local investment opportunities and enrich Wall Street investment funds,” Richard Smith, chairman of Realogy Corp., said in a telephone interview. “It’s a solution in search of a problem.”
Realogy, based in Parsippany, New Jersey, handled about a quarter of all U.S. listed home sales last year through such brands as Coldwell Banker and Sotheby’s International Realty. Its parent, Domus Holdings Corp., on June 8 filed papers for an initial public offering that would raise as much as $1 billion. Brokers wouldn’t receive commissions from bulk sales.
Potential Investors
Opposition to bulk sales isn’t deterring potential investors. Oliver Chang, who estimated last year that 7.5 million homes with a market value of $1 trillion would be lost to foreclosure by 2016, left his job as an analyst with Morgan Stanley in May to start a fund investing in rental homes.
“We are seeing tremendous interest in our fund from investors, and expect to close on a significant allocation shortly,” Chang said in a departure note to his colleagues. He declined to comment for this story.
Treehouse Group LLC, a Tempe, Arizona-based real estate company, and London-based property investor Regis Group Plc formed a partnership to buy and manage $1.5 billion of single- family homes, Treehouse Chief Executive Officer Dallas Tanner said at a Jefferies conference last month in Falls Church, Virginia, according to three people at the gathering, who asked not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak for the company and the conference was closed to the media.
“Treehouse Group and Regis Plc have formed a strategic partnership and are creating a national platform,” Tanner said in an e-mail, declining to comment further.
Discounted Foreclosures
The flow of discounted foreclosures has slowed since late 2010, when some of the largest mortgage servicers, including Bank of America, imposed a temporary moratorium on home seizures amid allegations they used faulty or forged paperwork to seize properties from delinquent borrowers. Even after a $25 billion settlement in February between the five largest loan servicers and attorneys general from 49 states, foreclosure processing hasn’t recovered.
Banks repossessed 185,451 homes in the first quarter, a 14 percent decline from a year earlier, RealtyTrac data show. The number of REOs bought by third parties in the first quarter was 123,778, down 15 percent from a year earlier, according to the Irvine, California-based company.
Delinquent Borrowers
Rather than seize properties from delinquent borrowers, banks have stepped up the number of short sales, which rose to their highest level in three years during the first quarter and are expected to surpass the number of REO sales this quarter, according to a May 31 RealtyTrac report.
About 1.6 million homes were in the so-called shadow inventory -- meaning they’re more than 90 days delinquent or already held by banks and not listed for sale -- according to a March 21 report by CoreLogic Inc. (CLGX) The total balance of loans on homes in the first quarter’s shadow inventory was $1.13 trillion, Standard & Poor’s said in a May 8 report.
About 6 million borrowers will lose their homes in the next five years because of inability to pay their mortgages, creating demand for as many as 4 million new rental households, according to Scott Simon, head of mortgage bonds at Pacific Investment Management Co. in Newport Beach, California. If funds spend $6 billion on foreclosures, that buys only about 40,000 homes at $150,000 apiece, leaving plenty more for investors of all size to buy rental housing, he said.
Foreclosure Surplus
“There will be millions of new foreclosures,” Simon said in an e-mail. “Renting is now more expensive than owning in most areas. However, if you can’t get a loan, housing is in practice infinitely expensive.”
While there’s a foreclosure supply surplus nationwide, Phoenix, one of areas hardest-hit by the housing crisis, is running dry, according to Simon. Investors are competing to buy a shrinking pool of distressed homes, helping home values find a floor, he said. Prices there jumped more than 11 percent from a year earlier in April, the biggest increase among the 10 largest U.S. metropolitan areas, according to CoreLogic.
That’s prompting some single-family investors to look elsewhere. Landsmith LP, a San Francisco-based firm with about $100 million to invest in single-family rentals, sold 75 of its 250 homes in Phoenix, said Chief Executive Officer James Breitenstein. The deal, announced yesterday, was for $7.5 million, about $2.2 million more than Landsmith paid for the properties.
Phoenix Rising
“We’ve attained key investment objectives in Phoenix, and are now entering other U.S. markets exhibiting the traits we first identified in Arizona,” Breitenstein said in a statement. “There are a select number of other cities and sub-markets that offer the right combination of currently distressed housing prices, a stable if not rising employment rate, and investment fundamentals that fit our model.”
American Residential Properties Inc. raised $225 million in a private real estate investment trust offering that was completed on May 11, President Laurie Hawkes said. She expects the REIT, now limited to institutional investors, to go public next year. The Scottsdale, Arizona-based investment firm previously committed about $85 million for more than 650 single- family rental homes in Arizona and Nevada through a separate fund.
“There’s no question the Phoenix market has become more competitive,” Hawkes said in a telephone interview. “But we’re still finding a lot of opportunity in Phoenix as well as our other target markets.”
Prices have also begun to recover in Miami as the supply of foreclosed homes dwindles. Home values were up 2.8 percent through March from a post-peak low in April 2011, according to an S&P/Case-Shiller price index for the area.
Going Public
A $25 million fund raised by Delavaco Properties Inc., a Fort Lauderdale, Florida-based owner of about 450 single-family properties, was “more than two times over-subscribed” with investors drawn to the 7.5 percent interest on the debt plus options to buy shares of the company, said Chief Executive Officer Andy DeFrancesco. The firm plans to go public, with a listing on the Toronto Stock Exchange, late this year, he said.
Delavaco, which buys homes costing an average of $70,000 that rent for $1,500 a month, will grow by accumulating properties with steady returns, not by purchasing in bulk, DeFrancesco said in a telephone interview.
“I don’t know how you can put $1 billion to work and maximize your profit,” he said. “To spend $1 billion in short order, you’d need to buy 10 homes a day or more. You’d have to take a lot of junk.”
The Alaska Permanent Fund tentatively agreed on May 27 to invest as much as $400 million in single-family rentals through American Homes 4 Rent, a property-management company owned by Wayne Hughes, the retired chairman of Public Storage. (PSA) Hughes didn’t respond to telephone messages seeking comment.
Expected Returns
“Nobody’s ever done this on a scale before,” Michael Burns, chief executive officer of the Alaska Permanent Fund, which had $41.5 billion under management at the end of the first quarter, said in a telephone interview from Juneau, Alaska. “These people’s background is in public storage, which is about as close as we could find.”
The Alaska fund expects unlevered returns on its investment of 6 percent to 7 percent a year, Burns said. The expected yield, while better than Treasury bonds, is an indication that the single-family rental market’s risk is lower -- and so are potential rewards -- than the usual draw for opportunistic investors, said Steve Duffy, managing director of real estate investment banking at accounting firm Moss Adams Capital LLC.
“It’s logical that early capital had the view to get a higher return from their investments,” Duffy said in a telephone interview from his office in Irvine, California. “That’s no longer the case. The risk is down because the economy is recovering and there’s stabilization in housing.”
While the market for single-family rentals is experiencing growing pains, there’s still a lot of opportunity as investors gain a better view of cash-flow potential and financing becomes easier to get, said Ford of Jefferies.
“You’re still talking millions of homes,” he said. “Real companies are being built.”
To contact the reporter on this story: John Gittelsohn in Los Angeles at johngitt@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Kara Wetzel at kwetzel@bloomberg.net; Rob Urban at robprag@bloomberg.net
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Germany Is Open to Pooling Debt, With Conditions - European Business News - CNBC
Germany Is Open to Pooling Debt, With Conditions - European Business News - CNBC: "Under the plan, largely ignored when it was introduced late last year, the debt overhang in the 17 members of the euro currency union — defined as any debt exceeding 60 percent of gross domestic product, or nearly $3 trillion by some estimates — would be transferred into a fund that would be paid off over roughly 25 years. The proposal differs from euro bonds in part because it is limited in scope rather than open-ended, which could help win approval by the German Constitutional Court."
'via Blog this'
'via Blog this'
Monday, June 4, 2012
Thursday, May 31, 2012
Monday, May 28, 2012
CNBC Stock Market News — DuckDuckGo Cooks Google’s Goose: Analyst — CNBC.com Stock Blog - CNBC
CNBC Stock Market News — DuckDuckGo Cooks Google’s Goose: Analyst — CNBC.com Stock Blog - CNBC: "Is Weinberg making money? Oh yeah. Remember, there are no salespeople. No tricky local search options. No crazy investments in driverless cars, a la Google. Weinberg simply resells paid search links through established online relationships.
“It’s a standard kind of affiliate deal,” he said. “AOL uses Google search, Yahoo uses the Microsoft ad platform. We’re equivalent to Yahoo in that respect.”"
'via Blog this'
“It’s a standard kind of affiliate deal,” he said. “AOL uses Google search, Yahoo uses the Microsoft ad platform. We’re equivalent to Yahoo in that respect.”"
'via Blog this'
Greece to Leave Euro Zone on June 18: Wealth Manager - Business News - CNBC
Greece to Leave Euro Zone on June 18: Wealth Manager - Business News - CNBC: "He added that Greek society was built on cheating and scheming, saying “everyone does it” but that voters elsewhere in the euro zone were now calling Greece to account.
“The basic question is that a German has to increase working from 65 to 67 and that is to pay for Greeks retiring at 50. The 17th of June is the perfect opportunity to say either 'we’ll behave' or 'we’ll carry on cheating,'" he said."
'via Blog this'
“The basic question is that a German has to increase working from 65 to 67 and that is to pay for Greeks retiring at 50. The 17th of June is the perfect opportunity to say either 'we’ll behave' or 'we’ll carry on cheating,'" he said."
'via Blog this'
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
JPM is a Buy; Rumors of Trouble are a 'Farce': Bove — US Business News - CNBC
JPM is a Buy; Rumors of Trouble are a 'Farce': Bove — US Business News - CNBC: "JPM is a Buy; Rumors of Trouble are a 'Farce': Bove"
'via Blog this'
'via Blog this'
Did The Fed Just Give Us A Very Big Clue Just How Big JPM's CIO Loss May Be? | ZeroHedge
Did The Fed Just Give Us A Very Big Clue Just How Big JPM's CIO Loss May Be? | ZeroHedge: "the cumulative "realized losses/gains securities (AFS/HTM) and Trading and Counterparty Losses" amount to $31.5 billion for the pendency of the stress test.
In other words $31.5 billion is how much pain JPM is allowed, in the NY Fed's view, to suffer before losses and dividends/buyback would jeopardize the capital structure, and the buyback process should be halted
Once again, as a reminder, the buyback process was halted today."
'via Blog this'
In other words $31.5 billion is how much pain JPM is allowed, in the NY Fed's view, to suffer before losses and dividends/buyback would jeopardize the capital structure, and the buyback process should be halted
Once again, as a reminder, the buyback process was halted today."
'via Blog this'
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
As One JPMorgan Trader Sold Risky Contracts, Another One Bought Them - US Business News - CNBC
As One JPMorgan Trader Sold Risky Contracts, Another One Bought Them - US Business News - CNBC: "While JPMorgan has been reluctant to share the details of the transactions, it is believed that the London trader, Bruno Iksil, sold default protection on a specific index: the CDX IG 9. That index tracks the default risk of 125 major North American companies, including Aetna, Walt Disney and Lockheed Martin. If the default risk increases, JPMorgan effectively loses money. By January and February of this year, brokers were relentlessly calling hedge funds and trying to sell the contracts to them, according to investors. Given the size of the position in the relatively quiet market, the seller was quickly revealed as JPMorgan. Hedge funds and others began to chatter about the merits of the trade.
The rationale for the hedge funds was simple: with JPMorgan selling so much of this insurance, the price was artificially cheap. In buying it, the funds were betting that the cost would increase when the bank eventually stopped selling. Such a move would notch them a tidy profit while causing steep losses on paper for JPMorgan."
'via Blog this'
The rationale for the hedge funds was simple: with JPMorgan selling so much of this insurance, the price was artificially cheap. In buying it, the funds were betting that the cost would increase when the bank eventually stopped selling. Such a move would notch them a tidy profit while causing steep losses on paper for JPMorgan."
'via Blog this'
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
David Tepper and Appaloosa heavy buying...now upside down!
Sometime around March 31 the market was soaring, and there were still those naive, clueless ones, who thought that 2012 would not be a carbon copy of 2011. Rumors of more QE were becoming quieter and quieter as the S&P was on a rampage, the economy was humming along (courtesy of the reacord warm winter as ZH predicted in January, but this would not be widely accepted for at least 2-3 more weeks), Europe was "fixed" and the world was a lovely place. It is right there that everyone's favorite "baller to the waller" David Tepper went all in and bought anything that moves, or doesn't, in financials and tech. As the chart below shows, after having a mere $764 million in equity AUM at the end of December 31, Appaloosa went on an epic liftathon, and increased its AUM to a whopping $4.1 billion in the span of 3 months.
Having cut just his two positions in Boston Scientific and Hartford, Tepper then nearly doubled his holdings to a total of 53 different CUSIPs, with a focus almost exclusive on banks and tech.
Here are the key additions:
QQQ: new $1.3 billion position;
Apple: $410 MM from $73 MM;
Citi: new $223 MM position;
United Continental: up to $171 MM from $22 MM;
Google: new $104 MM position;
QCOM: new $102 MM position;
Goodyear: up to $97 MM from $86 MM;
Broadcom: new $95 MM;
Ford Motor: new $82 MM position;
Bank of America: new $71 MM position.
And so on.
Which means that unless he sold everything in the past 2 weeks, which he didn't, Tepper is now stuck holding a flaming bag of, well, stocks which are about 15-20% cheaper than they were at March 31 - something he and his LPs will hardly be happy with.
So what happens next? Expect another book talking TV interview on the Comcast/GE Joint Venture fin-comedy station, by the man who appeared on CNBC once back in September 2010 and sent the DJIA soaring (or rather helped QE2 off on its brief but Bon Voyage, which launched at the same time). We can only hope that the script will be somewhat updated since his last appearance.
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
Bank Of Japan Goes Full Tilt, Buys Record Amount Of ETFs And REITs To Prevent Market Crash | ZeroHedge
Bank Of Japan Goes Full Tilt, Buys Record Amount Of ETFs And REITs To Prevent Market Crash | ZeroHedge: "The Japanese central bank said it spent 39.7 billion yen (about $500 million) buying up stock ETFs as part of its ongoing asset-purchase program, breaking a previous record of ¥28.5 billion, set on April 16. In addition to the ETF buys, the Bank of Japan also acquired ¥2.3 billion in real-estate investment trusts Monday." "
'via Blog this'
'via Blog this'
Saturday, May 5, 2012
April's Jobs Report and the Youth Problem - This and The"Occupy" movements will hobble this country with their grassroots effect.
By SUSANNA KIM and BILL McGUIRE
Yesterday, 4:49 PM
U.S. employers added 115,000 jobs in April, fewer than economists expected, and the unemployment rate fell slightly to 8.1 percent as more people exited the workforce, the Labor Department reported Friday.
Economists had expected about 165,000 jobs to be added, according to a consensus figure from Bloomberg. April's jobs gain was the smallest in six momths.
"The unemployment rate is not materially changing, which is disappointing since privately held companies have continued to grow their sales and are generally the engine of job growth," said Brian Hamilton, CEO of Sageworks and a leading expert on privately held companies. "This probably reflects continued anxiety about the economy and where it will be 12 months from now. We are 34 months into an expansion and an 8.1 percent unemployment rate is too high at this point."
Employers added 120,000 jobs in March in that month's disappointing jobs report, which showed the jobless rate at 8.2 percent. But the Labor Department revised the March figure upward today to 155,000.
Employment increased in professional and business services, retail trade, and health care, but declined in transportation and warehousing, the government said.
"Looking through the revisions and weather effects, this report indicates a labor market that continues to show a modest pace of improvement, about in line with expectations and an economy that is making some headway in recovery," said Peter Hooper, a Deutsche Bank economist.
On Thursday, the Labor Department reported people filing for unemployment benefits fell last week. After inching higher during the last few weeks, the jobless claims fell to 365,000 for the week ending April 28, down from 392,000 in the prior week.
Hiring among U.S. private employers dropped in April to the lowest level in seven months, payroll company ADP reported on Wednesday.
Among the major worker groups, teenagers have the highest unemployment rate, but the imminent summer hiring season may make a dent in that figure.
In April, teenagers had a 24.9 percent unemployment rate, compared with a 7.5 percent rate for adult men and 7.4 percent among adult women.
Companies like Jamba Juice, based in Emeryville, Calif., have already started ramping up seasonal hiring in anticipation of stronger business during the warmer months.
The food retailer is planning to add 2,500 seasonal hires this summer for most of their 750 locations nationwide. The company employed about 4,900 people, 190 of whom are part of its corporate offices or operation services as of January 3, according to the company's latest annual report.
Its peak selling season is during the spring and summer, and seasonal hiring at Jamba Juice and other companies across the country is likely to boost employment figures -- at least temporarily.
Kathy Wright, vice president of human resources at Jamba Juice, said the company's preliminary numbers showed it has hired 500 seasonal employees so far.
Youth are generally the company's customer base, so the company says it is serving both its customers and the communities they live in by hiring young people.
"They are usually very excited to work for us," she said. "We have a team environment, and they love the product. If you love the product, you love the brand already, so coming to work is not like coming to work. It's having fun. We look for people with passion to deliver a great experience to our customers."
Wright says seasonal hires are usually between the ages of 16 and 19 and in high school or college and looking for summer employment
"They're out of school and have free availability when we have an open door," she said.
The company has also partnered with the Labor Department's Job Corps, the no-cost education and vocational training program to help underserved youth ages 16 through 24.
"We're committed to helping out as long as we continue to open more stores," Wright said, adding that the company's growth trajectory may lead to the opening of 40 more stores this year. Stores can employ 8 to 20 people, she said.
The company partners with Job Corps to place six to eight participants in the public agency's culinary schools, like its location in San Francisco, to intern at Jamba Juice's corporate office in Northern California.
Jamba Juice is also one of the companies participating in the White House's summer jobs initiative for workers ages 16 to 24, announced by President Obama in January. On Wednesday, Labor Secretary Hilda Solis announced the launch of an online "Summer Jobs+ Bank" with nearly 300,000 summer jobs targeted toward low-income youth.
Those openings include credited internships, job shadowing, mentorship and 90,000 paid jobs. The program's jobs bank compiles jobs targeted toward youth from both job boards and companies.
"America's young people face record unemployment, and we need to do everything we can to make sure they've got the opportunity to earn the skills and a work ethic that come with a job," President Obama said in January when announcing the program.
Friday, May 4, 2012
Real U-3 Unemployment Rate: 11.6%
Real U-3 Unemployment Rate: 11.6% | ZeroHedge: "Propaganda unemployment rate: 8.1%; Real unemployment rate: 11.6%. Reason for difference: organic growth of labor force"
'via Blog this'
'via Blog this'
The 12-Million-Worker Hole: This Is the Scariest Employment Graph, and Now You Can Play With It - Derek Thompson - Business - The Atlantic
The 12-Million-Worker Hole: This Is the Scariest Employment Graph, and Now You Can Play With It - Derek Thompson - Business - The Atlantic: "The 12-Million-Worker Hole: This Is the Scariest Employment Graph, and Now You Can Play With It"
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Jobs Gap » The Hamilton Project. Jobs Gap Calculator
Jobs Gap » The Hamilton Project: "If the economy adds about 208,000 jobs per month, which was the average monthly rate for the best year of job creation in the 2000s, then it will take until March 2020—or eight years—to close the jobs gap. "
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Wednesday, May 2, 2012
IRS Presence at OffshoreAlert Conference Criticized - US Business News - CNBC
IRS Presence at OffshoreAlert Conference Criticized - US Business News - CNBC: "“There is certainly no reason for 19 IRS employees to attend the conference,” Grassley wrote in a letter to IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner Monday. “In a challenging fiscal time, this is not the best use of IRS resources.”"
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The good ole US of A .....101.5% Debt/GDP And... 1.7% Effective Interest Expense....Yeeeeha !
Name The Country: 101.5% Debt/GDP And... 1.7% Effective Interest Expense | ZeroHedge: "101.5% Debt/GDP And... 1.7% Effective Interest Expense"
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Bolivia Nationalizes Unit of Spanish Power Company - Business News - CNBC
Bolivia Nationalizes Unit of Spanish Power Company - Business News - CNBC: "Bolivia's leftist President Evo Morales marked May Day on Tuesday by nationalizing the local unit of Spain's Red Electrica, ratcheting up tension between the former colonial power and South American governments eager to assert control over energy resources."
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Bulls Bet on Indian Stocks, Despite Economic Gloom - Asia Business News - CNBC - CNBC
Bulls Bet on Indian Stocks, Despite Economic Gloom - Asia Business News - CNBC - CNBC: "In a recent report, HSBC forecasts the Sensex will rise to 19,300 by the year-end, an upside of more than 10 percent from current levels. Morgan Stanley expects a 20 percent rise in the benchmark index over the next 12 months."
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Tuesday, May 1, 2012
The words of Tecumseh .....
So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart.
Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and
Demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life,
Beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and
Its purpose in the service of your people.
Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide.
Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend,
Even a stranger, when in a lonely place. Show respect to all people and
Bow to none. When you arise in the morning, give thanks for the food and
For the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks,
The fault lies only in yourself. Abuse no one and nothing,
For abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision.
When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts
Are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes
They weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again
In a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home."
Monday, April 30, 2012
Gold Shakes Off $1.24 Billion 'Fat Finger' - MarketBeat - WSJ
Gold Shakes Off $1.24 Billion 'Fat Finger' - MarketBeat - WSJ: "One indicator that the transaction was a mistake was its size. At 750,000 troy ounces, such large trades are rarely conducted amid very thin trading volumes. Monday trading was expected to be quiet as market participants in China and Japan are out on holiday and many European traders are preparing for a holidays there."
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Friday, April 27, 2012
The End of Pax Americana: How Western Decline Became Inevitable - Christopher Layne - International - The Atlantic
The End of Pax Americana: How Western Decline Became Inevitable - Christopher Layne - International - The Atlantic: "Indeed, looking forward a decade, the two biggest domestic threats to U.S. power are the country's bleak fiscal outlook and deepening doubts about the dollar's future role as the international economy's reserve currency. Economists regard a 100 percent debt-to-GDP ratio as a flashing warning light that a country is at risk of defaulting on its financial obligations. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has warned that the U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio could exceed that level by 2020--and swell to 190 percent by 2035."
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Thursday, April 26, 2012
Bill Gross on Euro Zone and US problems
Gross on whether he's betting on another round of quantitative easing:
"I don't at the moment. I am willing to listen and I did listen intently at the press conference and to prior speeches from Janet Yellin and Mr. Dudley in New York. The big three at the Fed I think have moved closer to the middle in terms of the need for additional QE. They in the market are going to wait for the next eight weeks for two key employment Friday reports between now and then, as well as tomorrow's GDP number, which I think should be judged in my opinion by nominal growth as opposed to real growth. The Fed does not target nominal GDP. They target inflation though. They want lower unemployment, which requires 3% real growth. So the 2 plus the 3 equals a 5% nominal GDP growth target, which the Fed really wants to shoot for. So watch tomorrow's numbers and don't be dissuaded by the 2.5% number or the 3% real growth number. It's the nominal growth number that is key."
On whether the Federal Reserve will resist an additional round of quantitative easing:
"I think so. The Fed does want unemployment to come down. It has been coming down. As a matter of fact, it's lower than their prior projections were. There's little doubt in my mind that a target for unemployment of at least 7% and perhaps lower is what they're shooting for and that is going to require, 6, 12, 18 months, in my view. It might and probably will require, maybe not on June 30, additional quantitative easing. Quantitative easing is basically writing checks. The Fed's been writing checks, the ECB has been writing checks, the Bank of England has been writing checks, even the Bank of Japan has been writing checks. This is $2-3-4 trillion worth of check writing that has supported financial markets, but in turn has allowed for employment growth and lower unemployment. I really think that it's required. I don't welcome it from the standpoint of the negative consequences, but I think it is required."
On whether he would rule out QE3 down the road:
"I don't think so. The Chairman has not ruled it out. Again, to reaffirm, if we see some weak employment reports over the next two months, then QE3 is back on."
On whether there's a risk of a double-dip recession:
"I think so, if liquidity disappears. That was the recessionary implications of 2008 and 2009. Investors fled to cash and it was up to the central banks to re-liquefy the markets and to lever the markets, which they have done. If you have problems in euro land where money basically flees to the center, to Germany, to banks, to cash, as opposed to outward, then euro land continues with their recessionary environment. Ultimately that effects the United States. We at PIMCO are not believers that the United States can simply go it alone on this 2-3% growth path without other countries and other continents participating at the same time."
On when inflation will hit:
"It has already started to hit. Let's look at it this way. In a very slow-growth, in euro land, a very recessionary environment, we still have inflation at over 2%. It is really remarkable. The amount of easing we have seen over the past three years in terms of quantitative easing and extremely low policy rates everywhere has really been an inflationary thrust. I think even the Chairman would be willing to acknowledge that. None of them are willing to acknowledge that it will not come back down. They still think it will be 2% or lower. We suspect not. We suspect, like the Bank of England, Mervyn King always writes letters of apology, saying that the 3% inflation will really become 2%, all we have to do is wait. I think that will be the standard, you know, we will hear from the Chairman and other Fed officials that inevitable inflation will come back down to 2% or maybe lower, but I suspect it will not."
On whether a breakup of the euro zone will happen in the next several years:
"We certainly do not want that. A break up produces disastrous short-term consequences. I think markets know that and policymakers know that, too. Euro land is a dysfunctional family, more dysfunctional than Democrats and Republicans in Washington, DC. The Germans versus the Spanish and the Germans versus the Greeks in terms of ethics so to speak and fiscal discipline is quite a disparity. It's really that requirement for Germany to begin to write checks not only through the ECB, but to basically subsidize through their own fiscal maneuverings, that produces the problems. The Germans, for a long time, have supported East Germany in terms of the amalgamation of the two countries. They are not quite willing to go that far in terms of the big family in euro land and so those are the problems we see on a day to day basis."
On the employment reports coming out:
"They are beginning to move lower, it appears. Ben Bernanke spoke to that and answered some questions in terms of seasonality. We may have seen some strong seasonality in terms of prior reports, not last month's, but the two before that. We have seen initial claims on unemployment move up today. They have indicated for the past three weeks that we are really moving into a weaker employment framework, which would probably produce 150,000 jobs, but not the 200,000 that really got the market excited."
On where he sees the 10-year at the end of 2012:
"I see it around 2%. It is dependent on the Fed continuing to buy 10-year Treasuries. It will be interesting in June to see what happens if the Fed stops writing checks. Basically the Fed says that this is a stock type of argument. It is really like a wine cellar. They have taken half of the wine out of the seller and now they basically said that at the end of June, it will be up to the private market to restock the wine cellar because it is empty. I basically take the flow view that says, hey, at 1.95%, not much of a value there. So let's see, if the Fed doesn't buy them, let's see who else will. It will be an interesting experiment at the end of June if the Fed does not do a quantitative easing, but for the moment, I think the 10-year stays at where it is."
On mortgage-backed securities:
"Mortgages benefit from inactivity and low volatility. A mortgage can prepay or a mortgage can not prepay. So that shifts the average life of a mortgage back and forth. For that negativity and for that optionality that that mortgage holders holds, you get a higher yield. If you expect yields to stay the same for the next one, two or three years, then the 100 or 150 basis points from a mortgage is much better than 2% from a 10-year Treasury."
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