Bloomberg:
- The cost of insuring against losses on corporate bonds fell on the first trading day of 2010 as investors bet a rebound in Chinese and US manufacturing will help spur recovery in the global economy. The Markiet CDX North America Investment Grand Index fell 2.5 basis points to 82.75, according to broker Phoenix Partners Group prices at 11 am in NY. The Markit iTraxx Crossover Index of credit-default swaps on 50 European companies with mostly high-yield credit ratings dropped 15.5 basis points to 416.5, the lowest since May 2008.
- Barton Biggs, who piled into stocks at the bottom of the global bear market in March, is loading up on the biggest U.S. companies and speculating commodities will drop in 2010. The 77-year-old manager of Traxis Partners LP is buying household-product manufacturers, drugmakers and computer companies on speculation they will prove bargains as earnings surge. The hedge fund, which gained three times the industry average in 2009, is shorting raw materials and says banks will trail the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index for five years. “Big capitalization, high-quality U.S. stocks are very, very cheap compared to everything else,” said Biggs, who cited Procter & Gamble Co. and Johnson & Johnson in a Dec. 29 interview. He called commodities “an investment vehicle for maniacs” that will probably fall in 2010. “I don’t know what’s going to happen in the second half of next year. I’m just saying that in the next three to six months, the economy is going to keep recovering and stocks are going to go up again.”
- Novartis AG offered to buy the rest of Alcon Inc.(ACL), the world’s largest eye-care company, from Nestle SA and minority shareholders for about $39.3 billion, as Chief Executive Officer Daniel Vasella expands into eye surgery. Nestle will sell a 52 percent stake to the Basel, Switzerland-based drugmaker for an average of $180 a share, or a total of $28.1 billion, Novartis said today.
- Cold, windy weather enveloping the U.S. from the northern Plains to the East Coast may continue to break temperature records today. In south Florida, orange growers may escape most crop damage. The National Weather Service issued hard-freeze warnings for last night and this morning for southern Alabama and Georgia and the northern part of Florida, including the panhandle. Such warnings alert growers of temperatures that may fall below 32 degrees Fahrenheit (zero Celsius) for more than three consecutive hours. A low of 20 degrees was forecast for Jacksonville, Florida, overnight, which would break the existing record of 22 degrees, said Dave Samuhel, a meteorologist for AccuWeather.com Inc. in State College, Pennsylvania. Typical temperatures for Jacksonville this time of year are 42 degrees, he said. A cold blast expected next weekend “is supposed to be stronger” than the current weather pattern, Jack Scoville, a Price Group Inc. vice president in Chicago, said in an e-mail yesterday.
- Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America(BAC) along with Citigroup(C), Morgan Stanley(MS) and Goldman Sachs Group Inc.(GS), all based in New York, added a combined $2.74 billion of the debt, for which there were few buyers as recently as March, to their short-term trading assets during the third quarter, up 13 percent from the second quarter, the most-recent data show. Prices of these securities may slump again, leaving the banks exposed to potential losses that the Treasury Department’s rescue plan was designed to mitigate, said Joshua Rosner, a managing director at New York-based Graham Fisher & Co., which advises regulators and institutional investors. “It’s a trade that will likely work out, but it’s still a speculative trade, which is not what a taxpayer should want from firms that have only recently come out of critical care,” Rosner said.
- Heating oil surged more than 3 percent amid a forecast that weather in the northeast U.S. will remain frigid through the middle of the month, increasing demand for home-heating fuel. The U.S. Climate Prediction Center forecast below-normal temperatures from Texas to Maine from Jan. 9 to Jan. 17. Distillate stockpiles were at the lowest level since July in the week ended Dec. 25, according to the Energy Department. “It’s all about the cold weather up and down the East Coast, which translates into greater demand for heating oil, so I’m expecting distillate inventories to have substantial draws over the next couple of weeks,” said Andy Lipow, president of Lipow Oil Associates LLC in Houston.
- Total SA, Europe’s third-largest oil company, accelerated its expansion in unconventional energy by agreeing to buy a stake in Chesapeake Energy Corp.’s(CHK) assets in the biggest U.S. natural-gas field for as much as $2.25 billion. Total will pay $800 million for the 25 percent stake and as much as $1.45 billion over as long as six years by funding 60 percent of Chesapeake’s costs in the Barnett Shale formation of North Texas, the companies said today in separate statements. The Barnett field produces about half of all shale gas in the U.S., according to Oklahoma City-based Chesapeake. Shale-gas successes prompted the Potential Gas Committee, a group of industry, academic and government volunteers, to boost its estimate of U.S. gas reserves by 39 percent last year.
- The Internal Revenue Service said it will regulate the tax-preparation industry for the first time, requiring companies including H&R Block Inc.(HRB) and Jackson Hewitt Tax Service Inc.(JTX) to register and pay a fee. The plan, which won’t take effect until at least next year, will require paid tax preparers to pass a competency test and supply an identification number when they file clients’ returns.
- U.S. manufacturing expanded in December at the fastest pace in more than three years, capping a late-2009 global factory rebound that helped pull the world out of the worst slump since the 1930s. The Institute for Supply Management’s factory index rose to 55.9, the highest level since April 2006, according to the Tempe, Arizona-based group. Readings greater than 50 signal expansion. Construction spending dropped for a seventh month, the Commerce Department said in a separate release. “There is a broad-based global manufacturing recovery occurring right now,” said Dean Maki, chief U.S. economist at Barclays Capital Inc. in New York. Maki was the No. 1 forecaster of economic growth from January through September in a Bloomberg News survey. “Manufacturing was picking up speed as we moved into the end of 2009, and we expect growth will be picking up further.” The production index climbed, while the new orders gauge rose to the highest level in five years. The employment index increased to 52 from 50.8, the third straight month of expansion.
Wall Street Journal:
- A veteran value manager is taking another step back from investment decision-making at his firm. Third Avenue Management LLC plans to announce Monday that Martin J. Whitman is relinquishing his role as the firm's co-chief investment officer, leaving protégé Curtis Jensen as the sole investment chief. Mr. Whitman, the firm's 85-year-old founder, will remain co-manager of the flagship Third Avenue Value Fund.
MarketWatch.com:
- Wal-Mart(WMT) new favorite among top-performing advisers.
CNBC:
Barron’s:
- Google (GOOG)has gotten the year off to an impressive start, in part thanks to a bullish note this morning from FBR Capital analyst Heath Terry. Terry repeated his Outperform rating, and lifted his price target to $810, from $680. He also moved up his 2010 EPS estimate to $26.16, from $25.59. “We continue to believe that Google is the best-positioned of the large-cap Internet companies, particularly as the advertising environment continues to improve, online gains share of both advertising and commerce dollars, and overall online/mobile consumer activity increases,” he writes in a research note. “Our checks suggest that search advertising is strengthening - gaining share as advertisers return dollars to the highest ROI forms of advertising.” Terry thinks that the company should see “noticeable incremental revenue growth” from the mobile segment by year end.
NY Times:
The Business Insider:
- 10 Blasphemous Trade Ideas That Spit In The Face Of Conventional Wisdom.
LATimes:
ABCNews:
- President Obama recently named Amanda Simpson to be a Senior Technical Advisor to the Commerce Department. In a statement, Simpson, a member of the National Center for Transgender Equality's board of directors, said that "as one of the first transgender presidential appointees to the federal government, I hope that I will soon be one of hundreds, and that this appointment opens future opportunities for many others." A 2004 YWCA "Woman on the Move," Simpson recently served as Deputy Director in Advanced Technology Development at Raytheon Missile Systems in Tucson, Arizona. At Raytheon, Simpson -- a former test pilot who had worked for the company for more than a generation -- transitioned from male to female and was instrumental in convincing the military contractor to add gender identity and expression to its equal employment opportunity policy. She later ran unsuccessfully for Congress and was a delegate for then-Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, to the Democratic National Convention in 2008.
MacRumors.com:
- In a brief report [Google translation], French site Mac4Ever claims that Apple's special media event now reportedly scheduled for January 27th will see both the introduction of the company's much-rumored tablet device and the launch of beta versions of iPhone OS 4.0 and the associated Software Development Kit for developers. According to the report, the SDK will include a "simulator" to assist developers in adapting their existing App Store applications to support the tablet's screen resolution. The deployment of tools for supporting multiple screen resolutions could also pave the way for a higher-resolution
paidContent.org:
San Francisco Chronicle:
- California's political leaders, who are facing the daunting challenge of closing an estimated $20.7 billion budget deficit this year, are looking to Washington for help. Just don't call it a bailout. Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, said he plans to head to the nation's capital "early and often" seeking federal assistance. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger already has put the federal government on notice that he wants billions he says the state is owed. And outgoing Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, D-Baldwin Vista (Los Angeles County), said she would head east as soon as this month. It is not just cash that California wants. Schwarzenegger is calling for permanent changes to the formula that determines the amount of money the federal government contributes to Medi-Cal, California's Medicaid program, noting that the state is among the lowest in the country in reimbursement rates. He also wants money for the costs of providing special education in schools and incarcerating illegal immigrants, both unfunded federal mandates.
Rassmussen:
Politico:
- After four relatively low-profile years pushing the official party line as chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Dean is once again the tribune of frustrated liberals. And after he called out President Barack Obama and his congressional allies over their concessions on health care, those close to him predict he’s just getting warmed up. Dean’s health care stand has infuriated party leaders, who have alternately tried to marginalize him and to bring him on board. Yet at the same time, his provocative approach has re-energized the political group he founded and thrilled legions of progressive activists, many of whom were drawn to politics by Dean's insurgent 2004 presidential campaign, then deflated when he didn’t land an Obama Cabinet post. They have grown increasingly disenchanted with Obama’s presidency.
- In governor’s races across the country, top GOP candidates are concentrating their attacks on the White House, the surest sign yet that Republicans see opportunity in nationalizing the 2010 election and a departure from the strategy that elected two Republicans to governorships in November. While Chris Christie in New Jersey and Bob McDonnell in Virginia both refrained from overt criticism of President Barack Obama in their successful 2009 races, the current crop of GOP gubernatorial contenders seems intent on making the 2010 election a referendum on Obama’s policies.
zerohedge:
- Is The US Government Buying Stocks?
HedgeCo.Net:
- Trends in Hedge Fund Capital Raising for 2010.
Reuters:
National Post:
- A new study by the Alzheimer Society of Canada says the country urgently needs a strategy to minimize the impact of the Baby Boomers' march toward dementia. The study, Rising Tide: The Impact of Dementia on Canadian Society, suggests that 1.1 million Canadians will have Alzheimer's disease, or a related dementia, by 2038. If not mitigated, dementia's prevalence will create a tenfold increase in the demand for long-term care beds and cost the Canadian economy a staggering $97-billion annually, the study found. It also suggests the amount of time Canadians spend caring for parents and spouses with dementia will triple in the next three decades, to 756 million hours a year. "If we do nothing, dementia will have a crippling effect on Canadian families, our health-care system and economy," said Richard Nakoneczny, president of the Alzheimer Society of Canada.
Nikkei English News:
- Panasonic Corp., in partnership with Skype Technologies SA, plans to introduce plasma televisions equipped with videoconferencing functions.
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