Monday, April 12, 2010

Monday Watch

Posted by Gary .....at 12:41 AM

Weekend Headlines
Bloomberg:
  • Greece Wins EU45 Billion Aid Pledge to Blunt Crisis. European governments offered debt- burdened Greece a rescue package worth as much as 45 billion euros ($61 billion) at below-market interest rates as they try to end its fiscal crisis and restore confidence in the euro. Forced into action by a surge in Greek borrowing costs to an 11-year high, euro-region finance ministers said they would offer as much as 30 billion euros in three-year loans in 2010 at around 5 percent. That’s less than the current three-year Greek bond yield of 6.98 percent. Another 15 billion euros would come from the International Monetary Fund. “This is a step of clarification that markets are waiting for -- it shows there is money behind this,” Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker told reporters in Brussels today after chairing the ministers’ conference call. “The initiative for activating the mechanism rests with the Greek government.”
  • Default Swaps Drop to Three-Month Low on Greece: Credit Markets. The cost to protect Asian bonds against default fell to the lowest in at least three months after European governments offered a rescue package to stem Greece’s budget crisis. The Markit iTraxx Asia index of credit-default swaps on 50 investment-grade borrowers declined 7 basis points to 89 basis points as of 8:16 a.m. in Singapore, Citigroup Inc. prices show. That’s the lowest since Jan. 12, according to CMA DataVision. A benchmark for Australia also fell to the lowest since Jan. 12 while a Japan index dropped to its lowest since June 2008. “The package provided some much-needed detail that the market was looking for, which has improved risk appetite,” Ken Hanton, senior credit analyst at National Australia Bank Ltd., said in a phone interview from Sydney. “Now attention will turn to whether Greece actually has to call on the support before its next bond deal.”
  • Mortgage Bonds Weather End of Fed's Purchases: Credit Markets. Yields on mortgage bonds with government-backed guarantees fell relative to U.S. government debt in the first full week of trading after the Federal Reserve ended its unprecedented purchase program, bolstering credit for housing as the economy begins to create jobs. Yields on Fannie Mae’s current-coupon 30-year mortgage bonds declined to within 0.66 percentage point of 10-year Treasuries last week, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Spreads shrank after widening from a record low 0.59 percentage point on March 29 to 0.69 percentage point April 1, a day after the Fed completed its $1.25 trillion program. Investors are betting that plans by Washington-based Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in McLean, Virginia, to buy delinquent loans from securities they guarantee will return cash to holders who will invest the money back in the $5.4 trillion market, said Paul Norris of Dwight Asset Management Co.
  • Thai Clashes to Spur 'Rush' of Stock Sales, UOB Asset Says. Foreign investors may extend their biggest sale of Thai stocks in two months after a clash between soldiers and protesters left as many as 21 people dead. “Some overseas investors will be so jittery that they may rush to reduce their investments,” Vana Bulbon, chief executive officer of UOB Asset Management (Thailand) Co., which oversees the equivalent of $1.6 billion in investments, said in an interview in Bangkok yesterday. “No one expected that many deaths and this situation further worsens the political crisis.” Another 858 people were injured in the deadliest political clash in the country in 18 years, according to the government Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said he will stay in power even as protesters asked him to resign to take responsibility.
  • Chinese Oil-Well Pipe Makers Face U.S. Tariffs of 30% to 99%. The U.S. Commerce Department approved duties of about 30 percent and 99 percent on imports of Chinese steel pipes used in oil and gas wells, acting on a complaint by American producers including U.S. Steel Corp(X). The final ruling affects $1.1 billion of annual imports, the U.S. said in a statement yesterday. Thirty-eight companies including Tianjin Pipe International Economic and Trading Corp. must pay a 29.94 percent rate, while Jiangsu Changbao Steel Tube Co. and remaining producers are charged 99.14 percent.
  • China Bank Regulator Says Crisis Showed Leverage Must Be Reduced. The market can never regulate and supervise itself, Liu, chairman of the China Banking Regulatory Commission, said today at the Boao Forum for Asia. Financial regulation in China will go “back to the basics,” Liu said. Ratios and limits can’t be neglected by the “colorful” innovations of the finance industry, Liu said. Prevention is always better than the cure, he said.
  • Dubai's $330 Billion of Deferred Building Imposes Investor Fees. Silvia Turrin paid two-thirds of the $520,000 purchase price of her Dubai apartment, only to learn that it won’t be finished until 2012, two years late. When she stopped payments to Emaar Properties PJSC, the developer hit her with late fees. “We feel hopeless and we’re running out of options,” said Turrin, one of about 400 buyers in two nonexistent towers called 29 Boulevard. “It’s almost like we don’t have any rights.” Developers in Dubai are demanding that buyers like Turrin keep paying for homes that in some cases haven’t even been started. Builders in the emirate have delayed or canceled projects worth about $331 billion, Dubai-based market researcher Proleads estimates. The best performing real estate market in the world collapsed in 2008 after credit dried up, sparking defaults and forcing writedowns of land and property values.
  • Pimco Says Investors to Hold Down Mortgage Rates as Fed Exits. Investor demand for mortgage-backed securities will help keep U.S. home-loan costs down after the end of the Federal Reserve’s $1.25 trillion purchase program for the debt, said Pacific Investment Management Co., manager of the world’s biggest bond fund. Home prices are unlikely to rise “dramatically” after lower-cost housing hit bottom last year, Scott Simon, Pimco’s head of mortgage-backed securities, wrote in a commentary on the company’s Web site. “If and when we see mortgages cheapen, we expect to see private institutions stepping in to buy,” Simon said.
  • How Hassan Nemazee Duped the World's Biggest Banks. The star political fundraiser used his Harvard links to scam Bank of America(BAC), Citibank(C) and HSBC out of $292 million. On the evening of March 13, 2007, limousines lined up outside the Cipriani restaurant in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood. Inside, Hassan Nemazee, surrounded by New York’s deep- pocketed donors, was orchestrating one of the year’s major fundraisers for Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid. As guests dined on steak and beet salad, Nemazee introduced the senator and her husband, former President Bill Clinton. Harvard-educated Nemazee, a scion of one of Iran’s wealthiest families, helped raise more than $500,000 that night. Three years later, on March 18, Nemazee stood in a federal courthouse 2 miles (3 kilometers) away and confessed to a 12- year scheme to defraud banks of $292 million, Bloomberg Markets reports in its May issue.
  • China's Real Estate Is Overheated, Nomura Asset Says. China’s real-estate market is overheating and investors should stay cautious on developers after the shares fell the most in the main equities index this year, according to Nomura Asset Management Hong Kong Ltd. “In the first-tier cities, property markets are obviously overheating,” Shen Xiaomin, portfolio manager at Nomura Asset, said in a Bloomberg Television in Hong Kong today. “There is too much money in the economy.” Property prices in China rose at the fastest pace in almost two years in February, spurring warnings of asset bubbles. Hedge fund manager James Chanos said last week that China is “on a treadmill to hell” and that the land market is a bubble that may burst as early as this year.
  • Goldman(GS) Courts Endowment Chiefs in Bid for School Fund Business. Goldman Sachs Group Inc., the most profitable securities firm in Wall Street history, is courting endowment heads to join its asset-management group, according to three people with knowledge of the search.The company started approaching chief investment officers at endowments, as well as money managers that oversee such assets, late last year, said the people, who declined to be identified because the search isn’t public. The bank is looking to expand its portfolio-solutions team of 50 employees, which invests on behalf of clients and works on asset allocation, portfolio construction and manager selection, said Andrea Raphael, a spokeswoman for the New York-based company.
Wall Street Journal:
  • Warsaw Mourns Its Fallen Leaders. Taxis flew flags, radio stations played somber music and Poles in the thousands filled the streets here to honor the country's president, killed in a plane crash in Russia with nearly a hundred senior officials in a tragedy that has left the nation in a state of grief. The tragedy delivered a major blow to Poland's political firmament. But the response both within the ex-Soviet-bloc nation and around the world showed how significantly Poland's place on the world stage has changed since the country emerged from communism in 1989.
  • AIG(AIG), Goldman(GS) Unwind Soured Trades. The derivatives unit of Inc. has unwound most of its soured mortgage trades with American International GroupGoldman Sachs Group Inc. still left after the insurer was bailed out by the U.S. government in 2008, according to people familiar with the matter. The move by AIG Financial Products to terminate credit-default swaps insuring about $3 billion of mortgage-asset pools arranged by Goldman caused AIG to realize a $1.5 billion to $2 billion loss last year, the people said. But the insurer is no longer exposed to declines in the value of these asset pools, called "Abacus," which could have forced AIG to make payouts upon defaults or triggered a costly collateral call. Reducing the risk of AIGFP's derivatives portfolio is a crucial part of efforts to stabilize AIG following its near-collapse and enormous government bailout, which came after AIG had to hand over tens of billions of dollars in cash collateral to banks that entered into credit-default swaps with the insurer. AIGFP currently has roughly 14,400 outstanding derivative trades on interest rates, currencies, bonds and other instruments, down from as many as 44,000 at the unit before September 2008. The notional value of the remaining derivatives is about $770 billion, down from more than $2 trillion, said a person familiar with the matter. Company officials hope to end this year with just $300 billion to $500 billion in outstanding trades, leaving a low-risk portfolio of positions that would run off over time. The credit-default swaps on U.S. subprime-mortgage assets comprised a small fraction of the unit's trades but were chiefly responsible for AIG's near-collapse. According to people familiar with the matter, AIG and Goldman last year agreed to tear up $3 billion in swap contracts at market prices. Goldman got to keep between $1.5 billion and $2 billion of cash collateral, and AIG realized that amount as a loss, they added. The canceled credit-default swaps were on about 70% of the "Abacus" asset pools, or CDOs, that AIG insured. Created by Goldman mostly between 2004 and 2006, the Abacus CDOs essentially were bundles of derivatives linked to mortgage-backed securities. The Abacus-related swaps weren't part of the controversial November 2008 effort by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to help AIG tear up the bulk of its credit-default swaps on mortgage CDOs by acquiring the troubled securities from banks. That rescue enabled Goldman, France's Société Générale SA and other banks to get 100 cents on the dollar for $62 billion in mortgage securities insured with AIG.
  • United(UAUA), US Aiways(LCC) Talks at Key Juncture. Discussions between United Airlines and US Airways have become “very serious,” said one person close to the matter, but they remain at a very sensitive stage. This person noted that it was just as likely that they fall apart as result in a consummated transaction. Any deal would be an all-stock transaction, this person noted, with United being the surviving entity. The premium paid to USAirways shareholders have not been settled yet, this person said.
  • At the Mine, Search for Answers Begins. Federal and state mine safety officials began searching the Massey Energy Co. mine for causes of the explosion that killed 29 miners last week and were expected to look closely at ventilation systems and safety procedures. The discovery of the bodies of the last four missing miners over the weekend shattered the hopes of families in the Coal River Valley, where American flags were lowered to half mast and handmade signs offering prayers and condolences were taped to windows.
  • China Says Trade Data Justify Its Yuan Policy.
  • Did FDR End the Depression?
Marketwatch.com:
  • SEC Inspects Derivatives-Based Funds. ETFs Could be Affected as Regulators Examine Derivatives, Position Limits. Concern about the risks of leveraged investments has prompted securities regulators to take a closer look at these specialized products, and the result could blunt their appeal to investors and traders. Exchange-traded funds are part of a review of derivatives-based funds that the Securities and Exchange Commission announced in late March. Meanwhile, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission has indicated it may put stricter position limits in futures markets that could impact some large commodity ETFs. IndexUniverse.com editor Matt Hougan said the SEC check-up appears primarily focused on leveraged and inverse ETFs, and some actively managed ETFs. Leveraged exchange-traded notes, or ETNs, are a "winner" since the debt instruments aren't regulated by the SEC and so aren't included in the review, Hougan added. Even so, ETNs have their own unique counterparty risks, he said.
BusinessWeek:
  • Gasoline Traders Boost Price-Rise Bets to Record, CFTC Says. Hedge-fund managers and other large speculators boosted their net long positions for gasoline, bets that the motor fuel’s price will rise, to a record last week, according to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Wagers that prices will rise outnumbered bets they will fall by 78,541 in the week ended April 6, according to the commission’s Commitments of Traders report April 9. That’s the largest number since the CFTC began to compile data for the contract in 2006 and a 7.1 percent gain from the week before. Speculators also added to their long positions for crude oil and heating oil. Overall open interest for gasoline gained 8,863 contracts to 321,990 during the period, according to the CFTC report. Speculative long positions have outnumbered short positions, or wagers that prices will fall, since the launch of the RBOB contract in 2006. Gasoline for May delivery rose 7.36 cents, or 3.2 percent, to $2.3483 a gallon on the New York Mercantile Exchange in the week ended April 6. Futures settled at an 18-month high of $2.3502 a gallon on April 5. Bets that oil prices would rise increased for a second week and outnumbered short positions by 128,138, an increase of about 11,000, or 9.4 percent, from the week ended March 30. The number of net-long positions has more than tripled in the past eight weeks. Speculative long positions have outnumbered short positions since May. Oil for May delivery rose $4.47, or 5.4 percent, to $86.84 a barrel on the Nymex in the week ended April 6. It was the highest daily settlement price since Oct. 8, 2008. Open interest rose for the first week in three, gaining 4.6 percent to 1.34 million contracts.
CNBC:
NY Times:
Business Insider:
zerohedge:
  • Edolphus Towns Says Fed Officials Were Unhappy About Friedman Waiver To Buy (GS) Stock, Were Overruled. One of the most botched cases of conflict of interest abuse by a Federal Reserve official will forever remain the purchase of Goldman Sachs shares by Goldman Board Member, and FRBNY Board Member (the squid likes to keep its Federal Reserve puppets closely supervised) Stephen Friedman: an act strictly forbidden by the Fed itself. The action was so indefensible it led to Friedman's quitting shortly after disclosure of his transgression leaked. Yet the reasons why Friedman managed to effect this purchase of 37,000 shares of GS on December 17, 2008 is because he was granted a "waiver" by the Fed. A month ago, Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Edolphus Towns sent a rather angry letter demanding an explanation from Ben Bernanke why he had allowed this blatant case of semi-insider trading to occur at the highest echelons of shadow government. Today, we find out that Towns is unhappy with the production provided by the Fed, and concludes "that senior officials had misgivings about granting the waiver but were ultimately overruled" and that "we believe a closer examination of this issue is necessary, especially when Congress is considering increasing the Fed’s powers.
  • Goldman's(GS) Take On The Greek Bailout: The Lawsuits A-Coming.
  • Projecting Social Security; Medicare; The Budget; Mandatory, Discretionary and Interest Outlays. (graphs) Presented without commentary, cause it's really all pretty self-explanatory. Compliments of Ned David Research.
Risk.net:
  • "Drastic Measures" Needed to Curb Public Debt, Says BIS. Economists at the Bank for International Settlements have warned the fiscal problems facing industrial economies are more serious than official figures suggest, and that proposed measures for tackling public debt could prove insufficient. In a report called The future of public debt: prospects and implications, the authors say important factors, such as the costs associated with ageing populations in industrialised countries, have been overlooked. During the financial crisis, governments implemented stimulus programmes and took on large amounts of debt from failing institutions, which led to a dramatic increase in public debt ratios. OECD figures show that total public sector debt in industrialised countries is expected to exceed 100% of GDP in 2011, levels unprecedented in peacetime. But according to the report, co-authored by Stephen Cecchetti, MS Mohanty and Fabrizio Zampolli, even these figures may conceal the true size of the problem.
LA Times:
  • FedEx(FDX) is Geared Up for Electric Delivery Trucks. "We would like to significantly expand the number of vehicles we have in this category," Smith said. "But the capital costs are 50% higher than regular vehicles. Production hasn't ramped up enough to bring down the expense. The regulatory requirements are arduous, and there aren't enough tax credits or incentives."
The Tennessean:
  • Health Law May Worsen Family Doctor Shortage. With health reform set to bring 32 million people onto the insurance rolls over the next decade, there aren't enough primary care doctors to serve the masses, and fewer medical students are choosing primary care as a career path. Bogged down with debt, worried about lower pay for longer hours and enticed by the innovations of newer fields, more medical students are opting for lucrative specialties that can earn triple the salary of primary care. The nation is short 16,663 primary care doctors, and by 2025 that number will reach nearly 140,000, according to the American Academy of Family Physicians. Resolving the shortage could take at least a decade because of the time required to train aspiring doctors, but experts say a start would be to change the pay structure, open up more residency posts and encourage medical colleges to produce more general practice doctors."The number of primary care doctors has stayed flat, but the American population has not," said Holmes, founder of Family Practice Associates at Southern Hills Medical Center. "The patient suffers if we don't have enough people to give them care."
Institutional Investor:
The Hill:
  • Energy, Ag Industries Seek Derivatives Exemption. Energy and agriculture interests are lobbying the Senate for a broad exemption from new regulations of the multitrillion-dollar derivatives market. In a draft letter, the Natural Gas Supply Association (NGSA) and National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) say $900 billion of capital could be drained from the economy if legislation forces clearing and margin requirements in the derivatives market. "Without exempting commodity end-users and derivatives for hedging, this legislation would significantly impact the U.S. agricultural industry, natural gas jobs, government revenues and local economic value," the associations write in the letter.
Forbes:
San Francisco Chronicle:
  • Office Vacancy Rate Rises in San Francisco. An amount of office space equivalent to 13 Bank of America buildings sits vacant in San Francisco today as companies continue to shed more square footage than they rent - a trend that won't change until employers start putting more people behind desks. The 13 million square feet of available space in the first quarter of 2010 translates to a 17.7 percent office vacancy rate, up from 14.7 percent a year ago and nearly one percentage point from the previous quarter ending in December, according to data released Friday by the real estate firm Jones Lang LaSalle.
Rasmussen Report:
  • 39% Say Supreme Court Too Liberal, 25% Too Conservative. As President Obama prepares to nominate a replacement for retiring Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, 39% of voters nationwide believe the Supreme Court is too liberal. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 25% think the high court is too conservative, and 27% feel the court’s ideological balance is about right.
  • 66% Say America Is Overtaxed. When thinking about all the services provided by federal, state and local governments, 75% of voters nationwide say the average American should pay no more than 20% of their income in taxes. However, the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that most voters (55%) believe the average American actually pays 30% or more of their income in taxes. Sixty-six percent (66%) believe that America is overtaxed. Only 25% disagree.
Politico:
  • High Stakes for Obama at Nuclear Terror Meet. President Barack Obama embarks this week on the most elaborate diplomatic undertaking of his presidency, playing host to nearly 40 heads-of-state at a high-wattage summit intended to avert the catastrophic possibility of nuclear terrorism. Setting the stage for the “sense of urgency” he’s called for at the summit, Obama spent four hours Sunday meeting with heads of state from Pakistan, India, South Africa, and Kazakhstan, as well as “courtesy call” with the acting president of Nigeria. In remarks Sunday before his bilateral meeting with South African President Jacob Zuma, Obama set the stage for the two-day summit beginning Monday, calling terrorists with nuclear weapons “the single biggest threat to U.S. security... something that could change the security landscape of this country and around the world for years to come," and warning that "we know that organizations like al Qaeda are in the process of trying to secure a nuclear weapon."
Reuters:
  • Mirant to Take Over RRI to Create GenOn Energy. Mirant Corp (MIR) agreed to take over rival RRI Energy (RRI), creating one of the largest U.S. independent power producers and cutting costs as they deal with weak electricity prices that have challenged the entire industry.
  • Zapatero Says Ready for Tough Austerity Measures. With Greece battling a debt crisis that investors fret could spread to Spain, Zapatero is tasked with convincing investors it can tame a budget deficit that reached 11.4 percent of gross domestic product in 2009 while avoiding social conflict. "We have a plan, a credible quantified plan which we have already begun to implement, a plan to reduce the public deficit," Zapatero told the FT. "What we have to be judged on in the future is whether we gradually do implement all the different items included in that plan. We will certainly do so whatever the cost." "If we have to make more cuts or demand more austerity than we will do it," Zapatero said.
  • Google(GOOG) CEO: Tech Silence in China Spat No Shock.
Financial Times:
  • Fund of Hedge Funds Hit on Liquidity Solution. Funds of hedge funds ran into some very sticky ground in 2008 when many of them found the underlying funds were unprepared or unable to match the liquidity they had promised investors. While most of the gates and sidepockets imposed during the financial crisis have now been lifted, investors are still wary and fund of funds managers are trying to design vehicles that are less prone to such liquidity traps. “A lot of people are traumatised by what happened to the market in 2008 with liquidity,” says Guido Bolliger, Olympia’s chief investment officer. “People are more comfortable with products that are using managed accounts.”
  • Industrials Get Nod Over OTC Derivatives. Industrial companies have won recognition from European regulators that they should be granted exemptions from sweeping regulation of the over-the-counter derivatives markets. It marks a partial victory amid fears that a crackdown on off-exchange derivatives markets, blamed by some for exacerbating the financial crisis, could unfairly penalise corporate users of such instruments. Companies on both sides of the Atlantic say being forced to use derivatives that are traded on exchanges and cleared through clearing houses, as regulators insist to make the system safer, would drain cash and prevent legitimate hedging of business risk. They include the airline Lufthansa, heavy plant maker Caterpillar and aerospace group Rolls-Royce.
Telegraph:
  • Hedge Funds Buying Equities at Fastest Pace Since 2007. UBS, which has one of the biggest prime brokerage units in the word that deals with hedge fund services, found that banks have been the biggest target of hedge fund share buying over the past month, signalling a recovery in the sector. Although hedge funds remain net sellers of financial sector stocks with shorts outweighing long positions, this will soon be reversed based on current trends, according to the analysts. At the same time, traditional long-only funds have been sellers of bank stocks, indicating dramatically differing views on the outlook for the financial sector over the coming months. Karen Olney, a market strategist at UBS, said: "Hedge funds appear to be taking a view that fears over regulation for the sector are overblown and that the positive performance by many banks will be sustainable." She added: "Long-only managers appear to be doing some profit-taking, while hedge funds are buying into the recovery at the fastest pace since 2007." Banks are not the only stocks hedge funds and long-only managers appear to disagree on. Traditional fund managers have piled into insurance sector stocks in the past month, while hedge funds are shorting the sector, and utilities appear to be disliked by long-only money while hedge funds have bought in to their shares. The largest position among hedge funds, though, has been built in industrial stocks. The funds are overweight in the sector by about 8pc relative to the market, while oil gas shares are the most disliked by hedge funds.
MailOnline:
  • Ten-Point Lead in Mail Poll Puts Tories on Course for a Majority in Election. The Tories have a ten-point lead over Labour - enough to secure a working majority on May 6 - according to a poll carried out for the Daily Mail. And the gap between the personal ratings of David Cameron and Gordon Brown is wider still. Asked if they would rather see a Conservative government under Cameron or a Labour government under Brown after the election, 42 per cent went for the former and only 29 per cent the latter. This 13 per cent gap compared with the overall poll figures, putting the Tories on 37 per cent, Labour on 27 and the Liberal Democrats on 22. The findings of the survey by Harris are an emphatic. They also provide proof that immigration has become a major issue with voters even though it has been widely ignored as a national campaign issue. An overwhelming majority of voters want tough controls on immigration and almost half say they would be more likely to vote for any party which offered a crackdown.
Der Tagesspiegel:
  • Germany won't see any new employment created until 2012 or 2013 at the earliest, citing Frank-Juergen Weise, the head of the country's labor agency. An average of 3.5 million people will be unemployed in Germany this year, or 120,000 more than in 2009, Weise said.
Profil:
  • International Monetary Fund Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said "painful" deflation is the only effective solution for Greece, citing an interview. "Greece has to retreat on the exact same path it took the past few years," Strauss-Kahn said. This included lower wages and lower prices, he said.
Xinhua:
  • China's trade deficit in March "proves" the yuan's exchange rate isn't the "decisive" factor that caused trade imbalances, citing Ministry of Commerce spokesman Yao Jian.
China Daily:
  • Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping emphasized the importance of maintaining a stable yuan during a meeting yesterday with former U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson. Xi said he hoped Paulson would continue to "exert his influence" on closer financial dialogue and cooperation between the U.S. and China.
Weekend Recommendations
Barron's:
  • Made positive comments on (TROW), (VCI), (CA), (KEY), (BRKR) and (LAZ).
  • Made negative comments on (CLNE).
Citigroup:
  • Reiterated Buy on (ADM), target $37.
Night Trading
  • Asian indices are -.50% to +1.0% on average.
  • Asia Ex-Japan Investment Grade CDS Index 89.0 -7.0 basis points.
  • S&P 500 futures +.33%.
  • NASDAQ 100 futures +.34%.
Morning Preview Links

Earnings of Note
Company/Estimate
  • (AA)/.09
Economic Releases
2:00 pm EST
  • The Monthly Budget Deficit for March is estimated at -$62.0 Billion versus -$191.6 Billion in February.
Upcoming Splits
  • (AAN) 3-for-2
Other Potential Market Movers
  • The (MSFT) event, BOC Senior Loan Officer Survey and China's President Hu visiting DC for the nuclear summit could also impact trading today.
BOTTOM LINE: Asian indices are mostly higher, boosted by technology and commodity stocks in the region. I expect US stocks to open modestly higher and to maintain gains into the afternoon. The Portfolio is 100% net long heading into the week.

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