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SocGen: QE3 Is Coming Soon, But First The S&P Is Going To Tank Joe WeisenthalFebuary 13, 2013 SocGen has put out a big special report titled: QE3 delayed, but still likely. Their high level overview of where things stand right now looks like this: * QE3 has been delayed by the recent bout of good news from the US economy: SG is now in line with the consensus, expecting the launch in Q2 (24-25 April FOMC meeting). * As the $400bn Operation Twist program is still boosting demand for long-dated US Treasuries, we believe the Fed will be concentrating its...

Here's The Chart That Has Stock Market Bears Ripping Their Hair Out Sam Ro Febuary 12, 2012Stocks have had an incredible run so far since the beginning of the year. The S&P 500 is up a whopping 6.7% during the period, closing at 1342 on Friday. In December, we surveyed 16 of Wall street's top strategists who told us that the S&P 500 would close at just 1363 by the end of 2012. At the time, five of those strategists had targets below 1342. Why were they so conservative? Well, some of the key risks cited included deterioration in the...

A Quick Look At How Much The Stock Market Has Died Simone Foxman Febuarary 9, 2012Despite a spectacular rally year to date, it's been observed that there's basically no market volume. So we took a look at historical volumes, as well as trends that have been going on in the last few years. Turns out volume of trade hasn't been this light on average in over 10 years, and that—in general—it has been trending down pretty clearly since the onset fo the financial crisis. Another thing that's interesting is the daily trading range. The difference between daily market highs and...

Participants in a recent shale gas energy conference held in Hobbs, New Mexico, referred to a whirlwind trip to Lea County, NM, as “exhausting” but “enlightening.” Bradford County Commissioners Doug McLinko, Mark Smith, and Daryl Miller, Susquehanna County Commissioner Mary Ann Warren and Pennsylvania state Rep. Tina Pickett were among local elected officials to partake in discussions and serve as guests on informative panels.

Art Cashin On A Scary Parallel Between Now And Last Summer Joe Weisenthal Febuary 9,2011 In his morning note, UBS floor guy draws a scary parallel between the market today and last summer. ------------- Let’s Hope It’s Not An Omen - In his column this morning, Mark Hulbert notes that corporate insiders are “now selling their companies’ stock at a rate not seen since late last July. That’s a scary parallel indeed, since that late-July spike in selling came just days before one of the more painful two-week periods in the stock market in years.” Hulbert then examines how aggressive...

Godzilla Will Come Out Of Tokyo Bay Before Japan Economy And Stock Market Rebounds Economics / Japan Economy Feb 02, 2012 - 10:55 AM By: Money Morning Keith Fitz-Gerald writes: Let's talk Japan. Every year some analyst comes out with a variation of the story that Japan is about to rebound. Usually the argument goes something like this: Japanese markets are impossibly cheap and the central bank will be there to prevent a catastrophe. Or sometimes there is another variation of the Cinderella story. Either way, don't hold your breath. Japan posted its first trade deficit since 1980 last year...

An Extremely Bullish Sign Courtesy Of Wall Street Analysts Joe WeisenthalFeburary 2, 2012 If you're looking for a nice, fresh batch of charts, head on over to Stone Street Advisors, where @dutch_book has posted a whole bunch of good ones on the economy, markets, and so on. This one is pretty great. It's from BofA, and it's an index showing levels of bearishness and bullishness among sell side analysts. Not surprisingly, periods of extreme sell-side bullishness are near market tops, and the opposite is true as well. At the moment, sellsides are as bearish as all get out, and so......

India is the first buyer of Iranian oil to agree to pay for its purchases in gold instead of the US dollar, debkafile's intelligence and Iranian sources report exclusively. Those sources expect China to follow suit. India and China take about one million barrels per day, or 40 percent of Iran's total exports of 2.5 million bpd. Both are superpowers in terms of gold assets. By trading in gold, New Delhi and Beijing enable Tehran to bypass the upcoming freeze on its central bank's assets and the oil embargo which the European Union's foreign ministers agreed to impose Monday, Jan....

Canada needs to look beyond its southern neighbour for markets because the United States economy is unlikely to ever fully recover, Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney said Sunday. In an interview with CTV's Question Period, Carney said that it is vital for Canada to look for new trading partners in the Asia-Pacific region and elsewhere to prevent the economy from being dragged down by the U.S. "It's going to take a number of years before they get back to the U.S. that we used to know - in fact, they are not, in our opinion, ultimately going to get...

Next Wednesday, between 12:30 and 2PM, we will get a ton of new information to digest and analyze. The Federal Reserve will make a series of statements while unveiling its new communication effort. A portion of the new information will be contained in the revised Summary of Economic Projections (SEP). The Fed has worked long and hard on its new communication policy. The question is, “What will people think and how will the markets react?” I believe that there is a very good possibility that the Fed’s plan will add to uncertainties regarding monetary policy. Contrary to its objectives, the...

Israeli officials told visiting USS Chief Joint of Staffs Martin Dempsey that it would give President Barack Obama no more than 12 hours notice if and when it attacks Iran, The London Times reported Sunday. The Netanyahu government also will not coordinate with the United States an attack on the Islamic Republic, according to the report, the latest in a number of suposed scenarios concerning cooperation or lack of it between Jerusalem and Washington.

China's Manufacturing Index Signals Contraction, But Markets Miraculously Maintain Gains Sam Ro Jan. 19, 2012, 11:18 PM China's HSBC Flash Purchasing Manager's Index climbed to 48.8 in January, up from 48.7 in December. This is a preliminary reading on Chinese manufacturing activity, ahead of the official PMI number. A reading below 50 signals contraction. Signs that China might be slowing have been met with mixed emotions from traders. On one hand, weak data may encourage easier monetary policy, which in a sense is bullish. Then again, bad data is still bad data. Tonight, markets are showing a mixed response to...

Crammed into tiny cages, unable to stand and deprived of food and water, these dogs endured terrible suffering on a truck bound for a chain of restaurants. The harrowing pictures show the cruel conditions in which 1,500 of the animals were found when the truck was stopped at a toll gate by highway police and animal rescue volunteers in Chongqing, south-west China. ... The animals were moved to a nearby farm by volunteers from the Chongqing Animal Protection Association who gave them food, water and emergency treatment. ...

It’s like a political blindside to the American voter. Somehow, with virtually no coverage in the press, the White House has managed to close in on the unthinkable… bending online piracy laws to give the Department of Justice abusive power over the Internet. Sound farfetched? Constitutionalist attorney Gary Kreep, President of the United States Justice Foundation (USJF), not only has a firm grasp on the legislation that would grant this authority, but he also has inside sources informing him that the Senate is scheduled to make this potential nightmare a reality when they pass S. 968 into law on January...

Great news. Some have seen my FB note about the Indiana committeeman verifying that the RNC passed a resolution exposing UN Agenda 21, unanimously. This is true. (See attached). Now Oklahoma also verifies it. See below correspondence from Robert Semands, Govern Edmond Locally spokeperson, and please repost. Let's hold our GOP elected officials at all levels accountable to adhere to this RNC resolution. Are they Republican or not? Time to hold them accountable. By the way - who is OUR NJ RNC Committee person? Let's thank him/her! In other news, the National Federation of Republican Assemblies adopted the following resolutions...

Iran said on Sunday it had received a letter from the U.S. government about the Strait of Hormuz, Foreign Ministry spokesman ...was quoted ... as saying Tehran had not yet decided if it would reply to the letter, the contents of which he did not detail. "America's message over the Strait of Hormuz reached us through three channels. It was given to our U.N. representative, the Swiss ambassador conveyed it to the Foreign Ministry and also Iraqi President Jalal Talabani gave the message to Iran,"

In a post last month, I noted that Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s patience with Obama’s dithering over the Keystone Pipeline in order to pander to the rainbow and unicorn crowd that forms his political base wouldn’t last forever. Harper, I wrote, fully understands what motivates Obama, and it’s not sound energy policy:

Enraged Iranian officials are vowing retaliation against Israel, the US and the UK over the latest assassination of a nuclear scientist, 32-year-old Mustafa Ahmadi Roshan, in Tehran. A former Iranian ambassador who served in Mexico and Italy recommended that an American being held in Tehran be executed in retaliation for the assassination. “The terrorist attack on the scientist must not be left unanswered and therefore it is advisable to immediately execute [the suspected CIA spy [Amir Mirzai Hekmati] at the site of the explosion,” recommended former Ambassador Mohamed Hassan Qadiri in a post on his blog. He added that had...

We love our iPhones and iPads. We love the prices of our iPhones and iPads. We love the super-high profit margins of Apple, Inc., the maker of our iPhones and iPads. And that's why it's disconcerting to remember that the low prices of our iPhones and iPads--and the super-high profit margins of Apple--are only possible because our iPhones and iPads are made with labor practices that would be illegal in the United States. And it's also disconcerting to realize that the folks who make our iPhones and iPads not only don't have iPhones and iPads (because they can't afford them),...

Following his recent wins in Iowa and New Hampshire, it isn't a stretch to say that Mitt Romney is being widely hailed as the presumptive Republican nominee for the presidency. While almost every GOP presidential candidate has experienced at least a temporary surge in the polls, Romney, who has been endorsed by high-profile members of the Republican establishment, has bounced back every time, putting down firestorms by Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry and Herman Cain. As the primary race shifts to South Carolina, Romney continues to lead the pack. Although both Rick Santorum and Rep. Ron Paul experienced significant surges following...

Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, is scheduled to arrive in Israel on Thursday for talks with Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz, and other senior defense and intelligence officials. The visit comes as the United States attempts to coordinate with Israel on the issue of Iran's nuclear capabilities, and to determine Israel's intentions with regard to a possible attack on Iranian nuclear facilities.

Under the National Operations Center (NOC)’s Media Monitoring Initiative that emerged from the Department of Homeland Security in November, Washington has written permission to collect and retain personal information from journalists, news anchors, reporters or anyone who uses “traditional and/or social media in real time to keep their audience situationally aware and informed.” According to DHS, the definition of personal identifiable information can consist of any intellect “that permits the identity of an individual to be directly or indirectly inferred, including any information which is linked or linkable to that individual.” RT adds: "Previously established guidelines within the administration say...

Key US oil supplier may cut off spigot SundayCHRIS KAHN, AP Energy Writer Saturday, January 14, 2012 NEW YORK (AP) — One of the biggest suppliers of oil to the United States may shut off the spigot this weekend, pushing crude and gasoline prices higher for Americans. Nigeria, which supplies 8 percent of U.S. oil imports, could see production halted if striking workers walk off the job Sunday. Workers are demanding the return of a vital government fuel subsidy that has kept gasoline prices low in that impoverished and restive nation of 160 million people. It’s unclear how much of...

The bombing attack in Tehran which killed Iranian nuclear scientist Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan last Wednesday, Jan. 11, generated an angry phone call from US President Barack Obama to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the next day, DEBKAfile's Washington and intelligence sources report. Washington is increasingly concerned, the Wall Street Journal reported Saturday, that Israel is preparing to strike Iran's nuclear sites over US objections and has bolstered the defenses of US facilities in the region in case of a conflict. Obama, Defense and Secretary Leon Panetta and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have been sending private messages to their Israel contacts...

WASHINGTON – The desperation of homebuilders was a running joke among top Federal Reserve officials during the waning phase of the housing bubble in 2006, according to transcripts released Thursday. They laughed about the cars that builders were giving to buyers. They laughed about efforts to make empty homes look occupied. They laughed at a report that one builder said inventory was rising “through the roof.”

U.S. military moves carriers, denies Iran link 5:28pm EST By Phil Stewart WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. military said on Wednesday that a new aircraft carrier strike group had arrived in the Arabian Sea and that another was on its way to the region, but denied any link to recent tensions with Iran and portrayed the movements as routine. The shift in the powerful U.S. naval assets comes at a moment of heightened tensions with Iran, which has threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz - the world's most important oil shipping lane - if U.S. and EU sanctions over...

Conflict: As Iran's despot clowned with Latin dictators, someone was playing hardball back home, taking out another nuclear scientist. At the same time, the U.S. Navy won Iranian hearts and minds with two sea rescues. A war is on. We would've loved to see the look on Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's face when, fresh from cracking nuclear bomb jokes with Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, he was informed that another nuclear scientist, Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, a chemist who ran the Natanz nuclear enrichment center in central Iran, had met his end the same way as three other bomb-making Iranian nuclear scientists —...

The State Department on Wednesday issued a new travel warning to Syria, and announced a further reduction in staff at the country’s U.S. embassy. U.S. citizens are recommended to avoid all travel to Syria, and a number of State Department employees present in Damascus have been asked to depart Syria as soon as possible. Tensions in the country have increased since demonstrations began in March 2011, resulting in thousands of deaths. U.S. ambassador Robert Ford headed back to Syria in early December, after being called home due to concerns for his safety. As the State Department warns the situation is...

When things get bad – and they will – the most essential items necessary for survival will disappear first. As currencies collapse, financial market destabilize and economies come to a standstill, critical supplies like food and medicine will become difficult to acquire at any price. This is exactly what is now taking place in Greece, where access to life-saving drugs and even common over-the-counter medicines like aspirin is becoming a tragedy where the losses will be measured not in Dollars or Euros, but lives.

Following the mourning period for former leader Kim Jong Il, North Korean authorities have begun to punish citizens who did not display enough sadness at his death, The Daily NK reported Wednesday.The Daily NK, an online newspaper based in South Korea and run by opponents of the North Korean government, said it had learned from a source in North Hamkyung Province that, "The authorities are handing down at least six months in a labor-training camp to anybody who didn't participate in the organized gatherings during the mourning period, or who did participate but didn't cry and didn't seem genuine." 

-excerpt - Russian state news agency RIA Novosti quoted a Westberg spokesman as saying that the Chariot was ferrying cargo owned by Russia's state arms trader Rosoboronexport.

The number two diplomat in the U.S. State Department met Wednesday with leaders of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, the highest-level contact between Washington and the once-banned group poised to dominate the country's first parliament chosen after the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak. Deputy Secretary of State William Burns met with the head of the Brotherhood's political party, which has won more than 40 percent of the seats in elections that ended Wednesday. The parliament is scheduled to convene on Jan. 23. Its main task is to appoint a 100-member panel to write a new constitution. With its election victory, the Islamist...

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrived Wednesday in Cuba for talks with his counterpart Raul Castro as the Islamic Republic blamed Israel and the United States for the killing of a nuclear scientist in a Tehran car bombing. The scientist's killing heightened already high tensions with the West over Iran's suspect nuclear program but a defiant Ahmadinejad flashed the victory sign several times after landing in Havana. The Iranian leader was greeted by nine girls in traditional Iranian attire as he stepped off the plane that flew him in from Nicaragua on the third leg of his Latin American tour. Ahmadinejad,...

Investors Haven't Been This Worried About A Stock Market Crash In Years Sam Ro Jan. 10, 2012, 7:21 PM The Yale School of Management regularly surveys individual and institutional investors on their stock market crash confidence. Specifically, they ask the survey taker how confident he/she is that the there won't be a stock market crash within the next six months. According to the latest read (h/t Bespoke), crash confidence is at its lowest level since early 2009. In other words, investors are increasingly worried about an imminent market crash. However, this could also be a bullish contrarian indicator. Back in...

The goal of U.S. and other sanctions against Iran is regime collapse, a senior U.S. intelligence official said, offering the clearest indication yet that the Obama administration is at least as intent on unseating Iran’s government as it is on engaging with it. The official, speaking this week on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters, said the administration hopes that sanctions “create enough hate and discontent at the street level” that Iranians will turn against their government.

SEATTLE, Wash.– Some 300 Chinese Foxconn employees who manufacture X-box 360 machines said they would throw themselves from their Wuhan, China, plant if demands for lost wages were not met. China Jasmine Revolution, an activist revolutionary organization with a name borrowed from the Tunisian revolt that set off the Middle East unrest, reported that employees made their demands for a wage increase for 100 employees on Jan. 2. Management at Foxconn — the world’s largest contract electronics manufacturer and a crucial link in the supply chains of Apple, Dell, Nintendo and Song — responded with an ultimatum.

ROME—Organized crime has tightened its grip on the Italian economy during the economic crisis, making the Mafia the country's biggest "bank" and squeezing the life out of thousands of small firms, according to a report on Tuesday. Extortionate lending by criminal groups had become a "national emergency," said the report by anti-crime group SOS Impresa. Organized crime now generated annual turnover of about €140 billion ($178.89 billion) and profits of more than €100 billion, it added. "With €65 billion in liquidity, the Mafia is Italy's number one bank," said a statement from the group, which was set up in Palermo...

The soaring national debt has reached a symbolic tipping point: It’s now as big as the entire U.S. economy. The amount of money the federal government owes to its creditors, combined with IOUs to government retirement and other programs, now tops $15.23 trillion. That’s roughly equal to the value of all goods and services the U.S. economy produces in one year: $15.17 trillion as of September, the latest estimate. Private projections show the economy likely grew to about $15.3 trillion by December — a level the debt is likely to surpass this month.(U.S. Debt)

Since 2007, Mike and Chantell Sackett have been fighting to build their dream home on the Idaho lot they bought years ago. The Sacketts say they had gotten local permits and spent thousands prepping the land for construction - then the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) showed up. The EPA told the Sacketts their property contained wetlands and issued a compliance order mandating that they return it to its original state or risk facing fines starting at $37,500 per day. The Sacketts say they were stunned, and asked the EPA for a hearing on the matter. The agency denied their request,...

The United States is rapidly becoming the very first "post-industrial" nation on the globe. All great economic empires eventually become fat and lazy and squander the great wealth that their forefathers have left them, but the pace at which America is accomplishing this is absolutely amazing. It was America that was at the forefront of the industrial revolution. The United States has become a nation that consumes everything in sight and yet produces increasingly little.

Ann Coulter's criticism of Rick Santorum for being "more of a Catholic than a Conservative" makes me want to do even more to help people come to understand his positions. ...Coulter's comments help explain why Catholics like me consider ourselves to be 'reluctant Republicans." She was derisive of Rick Santorum's concern for the poor. She mocked his insistence upon the connection between moral, social and economic issues. She was condescending and dismissive of his integrated campaign message. ...Santorum understands that freedom is a good of the human person. Further that he sees that the market economy, as promising as it...

An Iranian court has convicted an American man of working for the CIA and sentenced him to death, state radio reported Monday, in a case adding to the accelerating tension between the United States and Iran. Iran charges that as a former U.S. Marine, Amir Mirzaei Hekmati, received special training and served at U.S. military bases in Iraq and Afghanistan before heading to Iran for his alleged intelligence mission. The radio report did not say when the verdict was issued. The 28-year-old former military translator was born in Arizona and graduated from high school in Michigan. His family is of...

This seems like a really bad idea to me. Talk about crony capitalism. Individual buyers will be shut out from buting these properties.

Todd Palin, the husband of 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, is throwing his support behind 2012 GOP presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich. Sources close to the campaign say Gingrich spoke to Todd Palin this morning, but he hasn’t spoken to Sarah Palin recently.

Todd Palin, husband of former Alaska governor and GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, has endorsed Newt Gingrich in the Republican presidential primary, giving the former House Speaker a much-needed boost among Tea Party conservatives. Palin told ABC News that he had not spoken to Gingrich or anyone from his campaign, but appreciated that the former speaker had fought through scrutiny similar to that placed on his wife during her unsuccessful vice presidential bid in 2008. Palin also applauded Gingrich for fighting through the en masse resignation of his senior staff last summer, saying his campaign has “burst out of...

Todd Palin, husband of Sarah Palin, has endorsed Newt Gingrich for president, he told ABC News Monday, prompting some political watchers to, well, snicker. Business Insider's Joe Weisenthal wisely tweets, "Who is Todd Palin's constituency?"

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- U.S. consumers increased their debt in November by a seasonally adjusted $20.4 billion, the largest increase since November 2001, the Federal Reserve reported Monday. Monthly debt rose at a 10% annual rate in November, a much faster pace than had been expected by Wall Street economists.

Solar failuresThe Orange County Register December 29, 2011 10:03 AM Sooner or later, the laws of economics prevail, even in heavily subsidized industries like solar power. The latest evidence that government manipulation cannot overcome economic reality is the decision by BP PLC, the giant British energy company, to leave the solar power business. BP has developed solar energy for 40 years and for more than a decade touted its “Beyond Petroleum” campaign. The Wall Street Journal suggested, however, that BP’s solar experiment was more gimmick than serious investment. BP spent millions trying to go green, but simultaneously spent billions on...

Iran has the ability to temporarily block the Strait of Hormuz but the U.S. “would take action and reopen” it, Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman General Martin Dempsey said Sunday, making clear to Iran that in threatening to close the straits, it is literally playing with fire. . “They’ve invested in capabilities that could, in fact, for a period of time block the Strait of Hormuz,” Dempsey said in an interview for CBS's “Face the Nation." “We’ve invested in capabilities to ensure that if that happens, we can defeat that.” Blocking the strategic shipping lane linking the Gulf of Oman...