Style Outperformer:
Sector Outperformers:
- 1) Coal +2.23% 2) Oil Tankers +1.85% 3) HMOs +1.30%
Stocks Rising on Unusual Volume:
- SZYM, CFNL, MET, LNC, INVN, AMBA, NAV, P, TPX, FSYS, GPRE, HRB, SFD, CLDX, PKT, COO, ANN, UAL, SDT, DWRE, SF and BSFT
Stocks With Unusual Call Option Activity:
- 1) BMC 2) STI 3) FL 4) AMTD 5) ANN
Stocks With Most Positive News Mentions:
- 1) ZMH 2) TXN 3) DF 4) T 5) MCD
Charts:
Evening Headlines
Bloomberg:
- Italian Banks’ Bad Loans Seen Rising as Gridlock Hampers Growth. UniCredit
SpA (UCG) and Intesa Sanpaolo SpA (ISP), Italy’s biggest banks, may
struggle to boost profit as political gridlock threatens to increase
borrowing costs, worsen an economic contraction and drive up bad loans.
The Italian benchmark 10-year bond yield climbed as much as 0.44
percentage point and an index of the country’s financial shares dropped
as much as 11 percent after last week’s general election left Italy’s
largest political parties groping to form a government amid a four-way
parliamentary split. The disarray may impede economic growth as the
longest recession in 20 years and tougher rules from regulators,
including the Bank of Italy, are already forcing banks to set aside more
money against doubtful loans, said Jacopo Ceccatelli,
a partner at JC & Associati SIM, a Milan-based financial
advisory firm. “Given the worsening of the economic environment and the
pressure from the Bank of Italy to raise bad-loan coverage, I
expect Italian banks’ profitability and capital generation to
continue to deteriorate,” Ceccatelli said. “The political
uncertainty may add further pressure on banks as the increasing
spreads affect the lenders’ funding costs and the value of their
sovereign-debt holdings.”
- Austrian Banks Rated Negative by Moody’s on Bad-Debt Charges. Austrian banks’ creditworthiness is
still deteriorating because the cost of rising bad debt in
eastern Europe is slowing their efforts to raise capital buffers, Moody’s Investors Service said. “Underpinning our negative outlook for the banking system
are the limited capital buffers to absorb potential losses in a
stressed economic environment,” Moody’s analysts Swen Metzler
and Carola Schuler wrote. “Our stress test shows that most
Austrian banks have limited resources to cope with substantial
potential losses on their high exposures to central and eastern
European regions as well as to domestic corporate borrowers.”
- China’s Exports Top Estimates While Imports Miss Forecasts. Overseas shipments increased 21.8 percent from a year earlier,
the
customs administration said on its website today, in a month that had
four fewer working days than last year. The number compares with the 8.1
percent median estimate in a Bloomberg News survey. Imports fell a more-than-estimated 15.2 percent, leaving a trade surplus of $15.25 billion. There are also “some discrepancies” between China’s reporting of exports
to Hong Kong and Hong Kong’s reporting of imports from China, Chang
Jian, an economist at Barclays Plc in Hong Kong, said in a Bloomberg
Television interview.
- Maersk Sees Tanker Slump Persisting Amid Biggest Glut Since 1996. The biggest glut since 1996 in the
supply of the largest oil tankers means owners will have to wait
three more years for rates to recover, according to A.P.
Moeller-Maersk A/S. The global fleet of very large crude carriers expanded 28
percent over the last four years, Hanne Sorensen, chief
executive officer of Maersk Tankers, said in response to e-
mailed questions yesterday. The fleet is currently oversupplied
by about 70 ships and as many as 50 more VLCCs will be delivered
this year, Sorensen said. The expansion followed a surge in shipbuilding that began
in 2007 and 2008, when daily returns rose as high as $229,000,
according to data from Clarkson Plc, the world’s biggest
shipbroker. Daily earnings for supertankers plunged 71 percent
to $8,705 in the past 12 months, Clarkson data show, amid the
longest series of OPEC production cuts in four years. Frontline
Ltd., the VLCC operator led by billionaire John Fredriksen, said
Feb. 22 it needs daily returns of $24,200 to break even.
“We have to go back to 1996 to find a situation as
challenged as the one we have today,” Sorensen said. “A
recovery must be supply-driven, and that is not likely in the
coming three years.
- China Copper Imports Slump to
20-Month Low. Copper imports by China tumbled to the lowest level in 20
months as a week-long holiday slowed customs procedures amid high local
inventories. Stockpiles tallied by the Shanghai Futures Exchange climbed
to 226,201 tons last week, the highest since March of last year.
Inventories at bonded warehouses were as high as 900,000 tons, said
Zhong Min, vice general manager of Jinrui Futures Co., a unit of Jiangxi
Copper Co., on March 6.
- Rebar Trades Near Lowest Level in Two Months as Output Increases.
Steel reinforcement-bar futures in Shanghai traded near the lowest
level in more than two months as steel mills increased output and spot
market price dropped. Rebar for delivery in October on the Shanghai Futures Exchange fell as much as 1.1 percent to 3,890 yuan ($625) a metric ton,
before trading at 3,927 yuan at 11 a.m. local time. The most-active
contract on March 4 closed at 3,905 yuan, the lowest level since Dec.
27. China’s daily crude steel output in late-February was estimated to
have risen by 1.4 percent from the middle of the month to 2.03 million
tons, according to industry consultancy Custeel.com. The average spot
price for rebar fell for the fourth session yesterday to 3,764 yuan a
ton, according to data
from Beijing Antaike Information Development Co.
- Molybdenum
to Drop as China Curbs Weaken Steel: Chart of the Day. Molybdenum, the
steel-hardening ingredient that's plunged by two-thirds since September
2008 even as most non-ferrous metals gained, is poised to fall further
after China cracked down on some property sales. "China's restrictions
on speculative investment has had an immediate impact to reduce
transactions in steel and therefore molybdenum," said Wang Min, an
analyst at Beijing Antaike Information Development Co.
- Roach Says BOJ, Fed Currency Weakening Won’t End in ‘Pretty Way’. (video) “Whether
it’s the Bank of Japan (8301), the Federal Reserve or even the ECB, the
idea that they can engineer economic recovery by quantitative easing
that may lead to weaker currencies ultimately is not a story that will
end in a pretty way.
Currency devaluation as a recipe for economic growth always
comes at a cost of taking market share from someone else.” “China is understandably concerned about that, as has been
Brazil, as has been most major developing economies that rely on
exports as a source of economic growth.” “The developed economies say, well we’re not trying to
depreciate our currencies, but they know this is going to
happen.” “This is one of the unintended and potentially dangerous
consequences of the financial engineering of quantitative
easing.”
- Raped Egypt Women Wish Death Over Life as Crimes Ignored.
The back seat of Joanna Joseph’s
Hyundai is still stained with the young woman’s blood. Joseph, a
volunteer with Operation Anti-Sexual Harassment,
helped rescue the 19-year-old from Cairo’s Tahrir Square on Jan. 25 as
Egyptians marked the second anniversary of the uprising that toppled
Hosni Mubarak. Walking through the square on her way home from work, the
victim was accosted by a gang that raped her with a knife, according to
the doctor who operated on her and witnesses of the attack. It was one
of 29 assaults
documented that day in Tahrir, which has been plagued by sexual
violence since it became the center of political protests.
- China Investor Said in Talks for Stake in NYC GM(GM) Building. A
Chinese investor is in talks to
buy a 40 percent stake in Manhattan’s General Motors Building, a
50-story tower near the southeast corner of Central Park. The
prospective buyer is the family of Zhang Xin, chief executive officer of
office landlord Soho China Ltd. (410), according to a person with
knowledge of the negotiations who asked not to be named because the
talks are private. The sellers are a Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) fund
that invests on behalf of the sovereign wealth funds of Kuwait and
Qatar, and Meraas Capital LLC, a Dubai-based private-equity
firm, the person said. If completed, the deal would value the
tower at about $3.4 billion, according to the Wall Street
Journal, which reported the talks earlier today.
- Citigroup(C) Seeks $1.2B of Buybacks After 2012 Rejection. Citigroup
Inc. (C), the third-biggest U.S. bank, asked the Federal Reserve for
permission to repurchase $1.2 billion of shares without seeking a
dividend (C) increase a year after its previous request was rejected.
- UN Votes for Sanctions on North Korea Despite Threats.
The UN Security Council unanimously approved tougher sanctions on North
Korea for a forbidden nuclear test, hours after the totalitarian state
threatened a preemptive atomic strike on the U.S. and other
“aggressors.” The United Nations body yesterday voted 15-0, with no
debate, to adopt a resolution drafted by the U.S. and China in the
aftermath of the Feb. 12 underground blast. North Korea responded by
nullifying the 1953 armistice that ended the Korean War and canceling a
hotline with the U.S. and South Korea.
Wall Street Journal:
- Firms Send Record Cash Back to Investors. U.S. companies are showering investors with a record windfall in the
form of dividends and share buybacks, helping to propel the stock
market's rally. Companies in the S&P 500 index are expected to pay at least $300
billion in dividends in 2013, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices,
which would top last year's $282 billion.
- Republicans Point to Falling Oil Production on Federal Lands. The nomination of REI Chief Executive Sally Jewell to lead the Interior
Department is drawing attention to declining rates of oil and natural
gas production on federal lands - a trend Republicans say undermines
President Barack Obama's pledge to support all forms of energy
production and use. Statistics from the Congressional Research Service released this week
show oil production on federal lands and waters dropped 18% between
fiscal year 2010 and fiscal year 2012, which ended Sept. 30, 2012. The
report shows natural gas production dropped 28% over the same period.
- Strassel: Jumping the Sequester. When the president canceled White House tours, he revealed his claims as ludicrous.
Fox News:
- Cost of Entitlements: To cover $35T promise, future generations face steep tax hikes. Babies who can't even count yet have a nasty surprise coming once they start working and paying taxes. If no changes are made in entitlements such as Medicare, younger
taxpayers will have to cover unfunded promises of $35 trillion. That means future generations, unless lawmakers can break the
gridlock and agree to entitlement reform soon, will see massive tax
hikes, massive benefit cuts -- or both. Sacrifice will be required
either way, but analysts say the pain is greater the longer lawmakers
wait.
- US postpones award for Egyptian woman after anti-Semitic tweets surface. The Obama administration pulled back on plans to give an award to an
Egyptian activist after anti-American and anti-Semitic messages were
discovered on her Twitter account. Samira Ibrahim, an Egyptian activist who rallied worldwide attention
against forced "virginity tests" on female protesters, was supposed to
be honored Friday along with nine others by first lady Michelle Obama
and Secretary of State John Kerry. The State Department, though,
announced that it would postpone the International Women of Courage
award while officials investigate the tweets. Ibrahim is now headed back
home. "We, as a department, became aware very late in the process about
Samira Ibrahim's alleged public comments," State Department spokeswoman
Victoria Nuland told reporters.
MarketWatch.com:
CNBC:
Zero Hedge:
Business Insider:
CNN:
- Ford(F) CEO Mulally's $317 million haul.
Mulally now has about 7.3 million shares worth more than $93.5 million,
at the recent share price. He has 17.1 million in-the-money stock
options.
That translates to stock worth another $220.2 million, though he'll
have to pay $107.3 million to exercise those options.
And Mulally has a separate retirement account with $3 million in company contributions. That brings his Ford holdings to $317 million.
Reuters:
- States probing top U.S. banks over debt collection. The
largest U.S. banks face a multi-state investigation into whether they
helped debt collectors pursue faulty judgments against credit card
customers, according to people familiar with the matter. At issue is whether weak
record-keeping by banks or a failure to pass accurate information to
collection agencies harmed consumers. The
allegations against the banks echo those central to last year's $25
billion federal-state mortgage settlement to resolve charges that the
banks "robo-signed" documents and pursued foreclosures with faulty
information. This latest probe targets the same banks, including Bank of
America (BAC.N), JPMorgan Chase (JPM.N), Citigroup (C.N) and Wells
Fargo (WFC.N), said the sources who spoke on condition of anonymity
because the investigations are continuing.
- US-based stock funds take in $5.7 bln latest week-Lipper.
- Texas Instruments(TXN) raises its earnings, revenue target. Texas Instruments raised its targets for first-quarter
earnings and revenue to the upper end of its previous forecast ranges,
due to improving demand for its chips in an industry that has been hit
for several quarters by a weak global economy.
- Fed's Fisher: tapering Fed's bond buys could help housing. Slowing the Federal Reserve's current pace of monthly asset purchases could paradoxically help the U.S. housing market, a top Fed official said on Thursday.
Telegraph:
Nikkei:
- Japan to End
Uptick Rule on Short-Selling. The change will increase market liquidity,
according to the report. The current rule allows short sales only on an
uptick.
China Securities Journal:
- People's Bank of China will allow branches to raise the down
payment and interest rate on second homes according to local
government's property control targets and policy requirements, citing a
document from the central bank. Some cities with property prices rising
"overly fast" may have second home down payment raised to 70% and
interest rate increased to 1.3 times, the report said.
- PBOC's
Pan Says 3.5% CPI Target Has Challenges. China's consumer prices
currently face pressures from imported inflation and carry over effects,
citing People's Bank of China Deputy Governor Pan Gongsheng. Price
adjustments of resource products will also put upward pressure on CPI,
Pan said.
Evening Recommendations
Piper Jaffray:
- Rated (TIVO) Overweight, target $16.
BMO Capital:
- Rated (ZTS) Underperform, target $28.
Night Trading
- Asian equity indices are -.25% to +1.25% on average.
- Asia Ex-Japan Investment Grade CDS Index 103.0 -.5 basis point.
- Asia Pacific Sovereign CDS Index 80.50 -1.0 basis point.
- NASDAQ 100 futures +.04%.
Morning Preview Links
Earnings of Note
Company/Estimate
- (ANN)/.01
- (FL)/.72
- (GCO)/2.12
Economic Releases
8:30 am EST
- The Change in Non-Farm Payrolls for February is estimated to rise to 165K versus 157K in January.
- The Unemployment Rate for February is estimated at 7.9% versus 7.9% in January.
- Average Hourly Earnings for for February are estimated to rise +.2% versus a +.2% gain in January.
10:00 am EST
- Wholesale Inventories for January are estimated to rise +.3% versus a -.1% decline in December.
Upcoming Splits
Other Potential Market Movers
- The USDA crop report could also impact trading today.
BOTTOM LINE: Asian indices are mostly higher, boosted by technology and industrial shares in the region. I expect US stocks to open modestly higher and to weaken into the afternoon, finishing mixed. The Portfolio is 75% net long heading into the day.
Today's Market Take:
Broad Market Tone:
- Advance/Decline Line: Higher
- Sector Performance: Most Sectors Rising
- Market Leading Stocks: Performing In Line
Equity Investor Angst:
- ISE Sentiment Index 138.0 -12.66%
- Total Put/Call .81 +15.71%
Credit Investor Angst:
- North American Investment Grade CDS Index 82.51 -1.43%
- European Financial Sector CDS Index 142.80 -4.15%
- Western Europe Sovereign Debt CDS Index 99.83 +.85%
- Emerging Market CDS Index 239.53 -.30%
- 2-Year Swap Spread 14.25 +.75 bp
- 3-Month EUR/USD Cross-Currency Basis Swap -16.25 +2.5 bps
Economic Gauges:
- 3-Month T-Bill Yield .10% unch.
- China Import Iron Ore Spot $146.30/Metric Tonne +.34%
- Citi US Economic Surprise Index 5.1 -1.9 points
- 10-Year TIPS Spread 2.58 +1 bp
Overseas Futures:
- Nikkei Futures: Indicating +182 open in Japan
- DAX Futures: Indicating +5 open in Germany
Portfolio:
- Slightly Higher: On gains in my retail/tech sector longs
- Disclosed Trades: Covered some of my (IWM)/(QQQ) hedges
- Market Exposure: Moved to 75% Net Long
Bloomberg:
- Draghi Keeps Gradual Recovery Faith as ECB Cuts Forecasts. European Central Bank President
Mario Draghi stuck to his view that the euro region will
gradually recover later this year even as officials trimmed
their economic forecasts and considered cutting interest rates. “Later in 2013 economic activity should gradually recover,
supported by a strengthening global backdrop and our
accommodative monetary policy stance,” Draghi told a press conference
in Frankfurt after the ECB left its benchmark interest rate at 0.75
percent, a record low. While officials discussed cutting borrowing costs
today, the “prevailing consensus was to leave the rates unchanged,”
Draghi said.
- Bersani Clings to Premiership Goal as Allies Predict Failure.
Pier Luigi Bersani will probably
fail to win the consensus needed to form a government in Italy, some
allies said yesterday after giving the Democratic Party head a mandate
to negotiate parliamentary backing with rivals. Bersani revamped his
program to entice Beppe Grillo’s Five Star Movement into an alliance
with the Democratic Party, or PD. He repudiated his previous commitment
to budget rigor and added policy proposals reminiscent of Five Star’s.
Still, success depends on smoothing over differences with Grillo, who
called Bersani a “dead man talking” after the PD failed to win a
parliamentary majority in Feb. 24-25 elections.
- Berlusconi Is Convicted in Wiretapping Trial. Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was convicted in a wiretapping case related to the
2006 battle for control of Banca Nazionale del Lavoro SpA, the
first of three corruption rulings he faces this month.
- German Factory Orders Fall as Euro Crisis Curbs Demand. German factory orders unexpectedly
fell in January as the sovereign debt crisis curbed demand in
the euro area. Orders, adjusted for seasonal swings and inflation,
declined 1.9 percent from December, when they rose a revised 1.1
percent, the Economy Ministry in Berlin said today. Economists
forecast a 0.6 percent gain, according to the median of 41
estimates in a Bloomberg News survey. In the year, workday-
adjusted orders dropped 2.5 percent.
- China Inflation Over 3.5% May Prompt Rate Rise: NDRC Chen. China
may need to raise interest rates should gains in the consumer-price
index stay at more than 3.5 percent for three months, a senior
researcher affiliated with the country’s top planning agency said.
“In theory, if CPI remains above 3.5 percent for three months, there
should be an interest-rate movement,” Chen Dongqi, the deputy head of
the National Development and Reform Commission’s macroeconomic research
institute, said in an interview yesterday after a speech at Tsinghua
University in Beijing.
- Academic Use of CFTC’s Private Derivatives Data Investigated. The top U.S. derivatives regulator
has suspended a program of visiting academic researchers over
concerns about the handling of confidential trading data. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission said in a
statement yesterday that it began an internal management review
and asked the agency’s inspector general to investigate its
oversight of data used to research issues including high-
frequency trading. The commission’s concerns were initially triggered by an
outside person who raised questions about academic research that
referenced CFTC data, according to the statement. “The management review, which is ongoing, has
preliminarily discovered issues regarding the manner in which
academic consultants and contractors were brought into the
agency, their status with respect to the agency, their access to
CFTC systems and information, and the adequacy of related
documentation,” the CFTC said. “To date, we have not confirmed
any specific incidents of improper or unauthorized data
disclosure.”
- Fed's Balance Sheet Has Nothing on These Banks.(video)
- U.S. Will Be 99% Energy Independent by 2030: BP CEO. (video)
Wall Street Journal:
- U.S. Household Wealth at Highest Level Since Late '07. The net worth of U.S. families rose by $1.17 trillion at the end of
2012 to the highest level since late 2007, as rising home values and
gains in stock holdings boosted household balance sheets. U.S.
households' net worth—the value of homes, stocks and other investments
minus debts and other liabilities—rose 1.8% to $66.07 trillion from
October through December, the highest level since the fourth quarter of
2007, according to a Federal Reserve report released Thursday.
- Bad-News Bears Crash the Party. The Dow Jones Industrial Average has hit an all-time high. The Standard &
Poor's 500-stock index is close behind. Stock prices remain reasonably priced
based on many measures, individual investors are shifting back to stocks and
corporate profits have been strong. So what are a group of hedge funds and other investors doing? Selling.
CNBC:
Zero Hedge:
Business Insider:
NYPost:
- Pink slips are high fashion at JCPenney(JCP).
The flailing retailer — whose CEO, Ron Johnson, is now fighting for his
own job — has fired 1,500 store-level department managers and
merchandising positions across its chain, The Post has learned.
Reuters:
Telegraph:
- Accounting change could cost banks billions. Banks could be hit with billions of pounds in new losses under changes to the
way they are required to account for assets, in a move intended to make the
financial system less prone to a crisis.
People's Daily:
- New policies announced by the government may cause "panic
selling" and lead to a subsequent drop in existing home sales, citing
Qin Hong, director of policy research at the Ministry of Housing and
Urban-Rural Development.
Style Underperformer:
Sector Underperformers:
- 1) Road & Rail -1.55% 2) Gold & Silver -.96% 3) Computer Hardware -.77%
Stocks Falling on Unusual Volume:
- BKU, HFC, VLO, ENOC, NSANY, FMX, KAR, KYN, NX, PETM, SCTY, YY, MDP, MYRG, AVAV, SHG, ROST, FLT, MEOH, DWRE, DLLR, PIR, SN, FIS, WDAY, SRPT, NSM, MCY, FRED, CPRT, ZUMZ, ROST and BLT
Stocks With Unusual Put Option Activity:
- 1) PETM 2) CIEN 3) NAV 4) HON 5) DOW
Stocks With Most Negative News Mentions:
- 1) F 2) TSCO 3) PETM 4) PSA 5) DVA
Charts:
Style Outperformer:
Sector Outperformers:
- 1) Networking +2.20% 2) Steel +1.03% 3) Banks +.94%
Stocks Rising on Unusual Volume:
- UPL, PBR, IRE, NAV, CPL, CIG, HOTT, DISCK, CIEN, SFD, ANGI, LVLT, SMTC, CPL, ROVI, GPS, JDSU, SDT, FNSR, UPL, PRIM and MDVN
Stocks With Unusual Call Option Activity:
- 1) ASTX 2) CIEN 3) KEY 4) NAV 5) SYMC
Stocks With Most Positive News Mentions:
- 1) CL 2) COST 3) LTD 4) T 5) KR
Charts: