Indices
- Russell 2000 952.48 +1.06%
- Value Line Geometric(broad market) 407.93 +1.04%
- Russell 1000 Growth 710.49 +.27%
- Russell 1000 Value 798.75 +.94%
- Morgan Stanley Consumer 951.01 +.84%
- Morgan Stanley Cyclical 1,178.99 +1.39%
- Morgan Stanley Technology 741.11 +.25%
- Transports 6,272.67 +2.10%
- Bloomberg European Bank/Financial Services 96.52 -.62%
- MSCI Emerging Markets 43.04 -2.14%
- Lyxor L/S Equity Long Bias 1,138.39 +.26%
- Lyxor L/S Equity Variable Bias 847.02 -.10%
Sentiment/Internals
- NYSE Cumulative A/D Line 179,291 +.4%
- Bloomberg New Highs-Lows Index 911 +289
- Bloomberg Crude Oil % Bulls 34.48 -1.88%
- CFTC Oil Net Speculative Position 228,195 -3.20%
- CFTC Oil Total Open Interest 1,720,024 +.56%
- Total Put/Call .85 -5.56%
- ISE Sentiment 129.0 +14.16%
- Volatility(VIX) 11.30 -10.25%
- S&P 500 Implied Correlation 55.49 +.09%
- G7 Currency Volatility (VXY) 9.03 -2.90%
- Smart Money Flow Index 11,488.19 +1.19%
- Money Mkt Mutual Fund Assets $2.652 Trillion +.20%
Futures Spot Prices
- Reformulated Gasoline 316.38 -1.44%
- Heating Oil 293.90 -1.08%
- Bloomberg Base Metals Index 207.68 +.90%
- US No. 1 Heavy Melt Scrap Steel 352.67 USD/Ton unch.
- China Iron Ore Spot 134.60 USD/Ton -8.0%
- UBS-Bloomberg Agriculture 1,545.72 +.52%
Economy
- ECRI Weekly Leading Economic Index Growth Rate 6.3% -10 basis points
- Philly Fed ADS Real-Time Business Conditions Index -.1831 +8.99%
- S&P 500 Blended Forward 12 Months Mean EPS Estimate 114.24 +.21%
- Citi US Economic Surprise Index 27.0 +6.9 points
- Fed Fund Futures imply 56.0% chance of no change, 44.0% chance of 25 basis point cut on 3/20
- US Dollar Index 82.26 -.55%
- Yield Curve 174.0 -5 basis points
- 10-Year US Treasury Yield 1.99% -5 basis points
- Federal Reserve's Balance Sheet $3.147 Trillion +1.84%
- U.S. Sovereign Debt Credit Default Swap 38.04 -2.49%
- Illinois Municipal Debt Credit Default Swap 134.0 -2.19%
- Western Europe Sovereign Debt Credit Default Swap Index 97.45 +1.1%
- Emerging Markets Sovereign Debt CDS Index 171.34 +1.02%
- Israel Sovereign Debt Credit Default Swap 129.91 +6.63%
- Iraq Sovereign Debt Credit Default Swap 449.06 +5.10%
- China Blended Corporate Spread Index 393.0 +1 basis point
- 10-Year TIPS Spread 2.57% unch.
- TED Spread 19.75 +.25 basis point
- 2-Year Swap Spread 13.5 -1.0 basis point
- 3-Month EUR/USD Cross-Currency Basis Swap -16.50 unch.
- N. America Investment Grade Credit Default Swap Index 78.48 -3.72%
- European Financial Sector Credit Default Swap Index 142.88 +2.96%
- Emerging Markets Credit Default Swap Index 239.70 +.30%
- CMBS AAA Super Senior 10-Year Treasury Spread to Swaps 119.0 -11.0 basis points
- M1 Money Supply $2.473 Trillion +.49%
- Commercial Paper Outstanding 1,018.0 -.3%
- 4-Week Moving Average of Jobless Claims 346,800 -2,000
- Continuing Claims Unemployment Rate 2.4% unch.
- Average 30-Year Mortgage Rate 3.63% +11 basis points
- Weekly Mortgage Applications 823.70 -4.7%
- Bloomberg Consumer Comfort -31.6 +.8 point
- Weekly Retail Sales +2.7% +10 basis points
- Nationwide Gas $3.70/gallon -.01/gallon
- Baltic Dry Index 880.0 +5.51%
- China (Export) Containerized Freight Index 1,110.77 unch.
- Oil Tanker Rate(Arabian Gulf to U.S. Gulf Coast) 17.50 unch.
- Rail Freight Carloads 235,174 -5.64%
Best Performing Style
Worst Performing Style
Leading Sectors
Lagging Sectors
Weekly High-Volume Stock Gainers (22)
- EGL, IMMR, CSII, MW, P, BIOS, AMBA, GNMK, PCRX, FSYS, BONT, ADNC, NFP, DYN, WAGE, WAIR, ADVS, PRIM, SQI, HPTX, HTWR and ICON
Weekly High-Volume Stock Losers (8)
- GOV, STAN, DKS, ESC, SHOS, ANGO, SLCA and VHC
Weekly Charts
ETFs
Stocks
*5-Day Change
Broad Market Tone:
- Advance/Decline Line: Lower
- Sector Performance: Most Sectors Declining
- Market Leading Stocks: Underperforming
Equity Investor Angst:
- ISE Sentiment Index 129.0 +37.33%
- Total Put/Call .85 +19.72%
Credit Investor Angst:
- North American Investment Grade CDS Index 78.92 +.75%
- European Financial Sector CDS Index 142.87 +1.38%
- Western Europe Sovereign Debt CDS Index 98.95 -.28%
- Emerging Market CDS Index 239.62 +.59%
- 2-Year Swap Spread 13.5 -.25 bp
- 3-Month EUR/USD Cross-Currency Basis Swap -16.5 unch.
Economic Gauges:
- 3-Month T-Bill Yield .08% -1 bp
- China Import Iron Ore Spot $134.60/Metric Tonne +1.28%
- Citi US Economic Surprise Index 27.0 -2.3 points
- 10-Year TIPS Spread 2.57 -2 bps
Overseas Futures:
- Nikkei Futures: Indicating -103 open in Japan
- DAX Futures: Indicating -5 open in Germany
Portfolio:
- Slightly Lower: On losses in my retail/tech/medical sector longs
- Disclosed Trades: Covered some of my (IWM)/(QQQ) hedges, then added them back
- Market Exposure: 50% Net Long
Bloomberg:
- Merkel Demands Cyprus Action Amid Clashes on Haircuts. German
Chancellor Angela Merkel said Europe must act to support Cyprus as
euro-area officials scrambled to overcome differences on losses for
investors and the role of the International Monetary Fund in a bid to
end nine months of bailout talks. Making way for the bloc’s 17 finance ministers in Brussels,
Merkel said that while euro countries won’t provide assistance
“under any conditions,” the currency union needed to prevent
Cyprus from lurching toward insolvency.
- Prodi Says Europe Hurt by Too Much Austerity Amid Very High Euro. Former
Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi said fiscal austerity measures in
Europe have been excessive and called the euro too high. “The
euro has a very high rate of exchange,” Prodi, a former European
Commission president, said in an interview with Sara Eisen airing on
Bloomberg Television today. “I do think that it’s stronger than needed.”
- Singapore’s February Home Sales Decline to 14-Month Low on Curbs. Singapore’s
home sales plunged 65 percent to a 14-month low in February after the
government introduced its seventh round of cooling measures to cool
record home prices. Home sales dropped to 708 units in February from
a revised 2,016 units in January, according to data released by the
Urban Redevelopment Authority today. That’s the smallest number of
residences sold since December 2011, when sales declined to a two-year
low of 632 units.
- El-Erian Say Fed ‘Forced’ Central Banks to Ease Policy. The
Federal Reserve’s record
monetary stimulus has compelled central banks from Mexico to
Japan to follow suit, said Mohamed El-Erian, chief executive officer of
Pacific Investment Management Co. The Fed’s “artificially low” benchmark
interest rate has put upward pressure on several currencies,
threatening to erode the competitiveness of those nations’ economies,
El-Erian said
in a speech today in Stanford, California. “Ultimately, they
are forced -- Mexico has been forced, Brazil has been forced,
Korea has been forced, Japan has been forced -- into doing
exactly the same thing” as the Fed.
- Eagle Ford Shale Boom Fuels ‘Madhouse’ in South Texas Counties. The shale boom has changed all that here and throughout an oil-rich
swath of counties extending to the Canadian border. Figures released
yesterday by the U.S. Census Bureau show counties in south and west Texas are now among the fastest-
growing places in the U.S. as oilfield workers rush to the Eagle Ford
Shale. The underground formation holds an estimated 3 billion barrels of
oil and 150 trillion cubic feet of natural gas reserves.
- No-Bid U.S. Government Contracts Jump 9% Defying Obama Direction. President Barack
Obama in 2009 told federal agencies that no-bid contracts were
“wasteful” and “inefficient.” Four years later, his administration spent
more money on non-competitive contracts than ever before. Federal agencies
awarded $115.2 billion in no-bid contracts in fiscal year 2012, an 8.9
increase from $105.8 billion from 2009, according to data compiled by
Bloomberg. The jump unfolded even as total contract spending decreased
by about 5 percent. Lockheed Martin Corp., Boeing Co. and Raytheon Co.
were top recipients of sole-source contracts.
- Obama Will Use Nixon-Era Law to Fight Climate Change. President
Barack Obama is preparing to tell all federal agencies for the first
time that they should consider the impact on global warming before
approving major projects, from pipelines to highways. The result could
be significant delays for natural gas- export facilities, ports for coal
sales to Asia, and even new forest roads, industry lobbyists warn.
“It’s got us very freaked out,” said Ross Eisenberg, vice president of
the National Association of Manufacturers, a Washington-based group that
represents 11,000 companies such as Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) and
Southern Co. (SO) The standards, which constitute guidance for agencies
and not new regulations, are set to be issued in the coming weeks,
according to lawyers briefed by administration officials. In taking the
step, Obama would be fulfilling a vow to act alone in the face of a
Republican-run House of Representatives unwilling to pass measures
limiting greenhouse gases. He’d expand the scope of a Nixon-era law that
was first intended to force agencies to assess the effect of projects
on air, water and soil
pollution.
- Obama to Press Congress for $2 Billion Clean-Energy Fund. President Barack Obama is pressing
Congress to create a $2 billion clean-energy research fund with
fees paid by oil and gas producers to help lower U.S. dependence
on oil.
Obama will announce the congressional challenge today at
the Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont, Illinois, one of the
Energy Department’s largest labs for scientific and engineering
research.
- Goldman’s O’Neill Says S&P 500 Beyond 1,600 Needs Growth. U.S.
economic growth will have to accelerate to “ridiculously strong levels”
to justify any advance for the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index
(SPX) above 1,600, said Jim O’Neill, chairman of Goldman Sachs Asset
Management. After gaining 9.6 percent this year, the S&P 500 is
trading at 1,563.23, less than 2 points from a record and within 3
percent of 1,600. O’Neill, who coined the term BRIC in describing the
rise of Brazil, Russia, India and China, has an estimate of 1,575 for
the U.S. equity benchmark this year. The world’s biggest economy is forecast to grow 1.9 percent in 2013 and 2.7 percent next year. “In
order to justify the S&P above 1,600, we’d have to see growth
expectations go to something like 4 percent and beyond,” O’Neill said in a Bloomberg Television interview in Singapore. “I don’tsee persistent upside from those kind of levels without some
more evidence that the economy would be growing by ridiculously strong
levels.”
- BYD Said to Be Planning Sale of New Stock; Shares Tumble.
BYD Co., the struggling Chinese carmaker partially owned by Warren
Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK/A), fell on concern existing
investors will be diluted after two people familiar with the matter said
the company plans to issue new stock. BYD, China’s biggest maker of
electric vehicles, fell 9.8 percent to $3.03 at 2:34 p.m. in New York,
erasing the year-to- date gains.
Wall Street Journal:
- IMF Says EU Banks Face Further Losses. With anemic economic growth likely to lead to more losses on loans,
risks to the financial stability of the European Union remain
"elevated," and urgent action is needed to adequately capitalize the
bloc's banks and establish a shared system for closing down or
restructuring failing institutions, the International Monetary Fund said
Friday. In its first-ever review of the health of the financial system across
all 27 EU members, the IMF said the bloc has made some progress in
addressing the weaknesses that have exacerbated its fiscal crisis and
stalled its economic recovery. But it said much work remains to be done, with banks likely to face
higher losses on loans to households and businesses to add to the losses
they have suffered on their holdings of government bonds. The Fund
added that low economic growth and low interest rates may also weaken
insurance companies and pension funds.
- Two SAC Affiliates Agree to Settle Insider Suits. Two affiliates of Steven A. Cohen's embattled SAC Capital Advisors
agreed to pay more than $614 million to settle separate civil
insider-trading probes, the Securities and Exchange Commission said
Friday. One of those affiliates, CR Intrinsic Investors, agreed itself to pay
more than $600 million to settle a civil lawsuit filed by the SEC in
November, representing the largest settlement ever for allegations of
insider trading, the regulator said.
MarketWatch:
- Inflation highest in more than three years. U.S. consumer prices rose 0.7% in February for the largest gain since
June 2009. Gasoline prices rose 9.1%, also making the largest jump since
June 2009, and accounted for almost three-fourths of February’s gain in
the consumer price index. The broader price category for energy
increased 5.4%.
CNBC:
- Inside Dell: Merger Proxy Will Show Business in Free Fall. (video)
The leveraged buyout of Dell requires that only 42 percent of existing
shareholders vote against the deal for it to be abandoned. Given the present opposition it faces from large shareholders—such as
Southeastern Asset Management and Carl Icahn, who favor a leveraged
recapitalization, or the many event driven investors who may simply be betting
on a raised offer and have bought stock above the deal price—it is fair to say
the LBO is in doubt.
Zero Hedge:
Business Insider:
NBCNews.com:
Real Clear Politics:
- In Reality, Debt Matters. It Matters a Lot. Right now, public debt is more than 75 percent of gross domestic
product. So when do we get to worry? At 100 percent? Demographics? Right
now, most baby boomers are on the verge of retirement. But don't worry. It would be nice if some reporter asked the president what happened.
Why did debt matter in 2006 but not now? Why in 2009 did the president
promise to cut the deficit in half if it's nothing to fret over? He was right then, not now. And surely, even he can't argue that our
situation has improved. Actually, reality rarely holds him back.
Reuters:
Handelsblatt:
- A
one-time levy of 15% on financial assets might suffice to push Italy's
debt to below 100% of gdp, citing Commerzbank chief economist Joerg
Kraemer.
Style Underperformer:
Sector Underperformers:
- 1) Disk Drives -1.60% 2) Semis -1.60% 3) Medical Equipment -1.33%
Stocks Falling on Unusual Volume:
- AMX, BBT, TLK, EGY, MXWL, GEL, PKX, SXL, WOR, RGP, CG, ULTA, DK, TISI, VHC, PKO, CCL, ISRG, CUK, PCN, ARO, BTH, PTY, AMX, WAC, JPM, RAX, KLAC, DTSI, CGI, CLVS, BWS, EBIX and TSLA
Stocks With Unusual Put Option Activity:
- 1) ULTA 2) BBT 3) USG 4) HOV 5) STT
Stocks With Most Negative News Mentions:
- 1) DAL 2) CCL 3) TISI 4) VZ 5) F
Charts:
Style Outperformer:
Sector Outperformers:
- 1) Oil Service +.62% 2) Gold & Silver +.43% 3) Utilities +.39%
Stocks Rising on Unusual Volume:
- CRK, DTV, OGE, CNP, ROSE, SNE and PANL
Stocks With Unusual Call Option Activity:
- 1) FSL 2) RAD 3) ULTA 4) HSP 5) DTV
Stocks With Most Positive News Mentions:
- 1) PNC 2) FWLT 3) ARO 4) HIBB 5) BWS
Charts:
Evening Headlines
Bloomberg:
- Euro-Crisis Redux Seen as Greatest Threat to German Powerhouse.
A resurgence of the debt crisis
that scarred the euro-area over the past 3 1/2 years is the
biggest threat facing Germany in an election year, policy makers and
leading economists said. With sovereign bond yields declining in
countries such as Italy and Ireland, governments across Europe cannot be
lulled into thinking they can let up on their budget-cutting efforts,
economists including Deutsche Bank AG senior adviser Thomas Mayer and
Holger Schmieding of Berenberg Bank said during Bloomberg’s first
Germany Day conference in Berlin yesterday. “No nonsense,” Schmieding
said during a panel discussion at the event, urging governments not to
“backtrack in any way on the achievements” made so far. “If any country
tried now to undo austerity, it would likely shatter confidence, it
would probably spark another row in Europe, another wave of the euro
crisis, and that wave of crisis would leave us all with less
business investment, less jobs across the euro area.”
- Italian Lawmakers Face Backlash as Grillo’s Force Arrive. Italy’s incumbent lawmakers, who
united last year to impose austerity on taxpayers, are bracing
for a fight over their own privileges as the upstart movement
led by Beppe Grillo enters parliament and vies for key roles. Up for grabs as the legislature convenes today are the
speakerships of the Senate and Chamber of Deputies, followed by
appointments to budget committees and commission chairmanships.
The posts could give Grillo’s Five Star Movement, which took a
quarter of the votes in elections last month, enough leverage
over the bodies’ more than 2 billion euros ($2.6 billion) in
annual operating expenses. “The costs could be cut in half,” said Elio Lannutti, a
consumer advocate, ex-senator and a friend of Grillo’s. “If
they keep these people out, the revolution is just going to get
bigger.”
- China Seen Overstating Exports to Hong Kong:
Chart of the Day. Widening differences in bilateral trade data reported
by China and Hong Kong suggest export-import activity is being
overstated by the mainland as companies report inflated figures,
according to Mizuho Securities Asia Ltd. China's numbers were 47% higher
than Hong Kong's in January, compared with a 13% difference two years
earlier.
- Wen’s Failure to Tame China Home Prices Leaves Li With Challenge. China’s
new leaders are inheriting a challenge that stymied the outgoing
government: deflating a bubble in big-city home prices without damping
economic growth. In one of its final acts before the leadership change,
China’s State
Council on March 1 imposed tough new measures intended to cool the
market, a step that sent property stocks tumbling. While curbs initiated
last year had some success, prices resumed climbing in the second half
as the central bank cut interest rates to reverse an economic slowdown.
- BRICs Abandoned by Locals With Fund Outflows Highest Since 1996. The 2.5 million rupees ($45,984)
Nirav Vora had in the Indian stock market six years ago have
plunged by 72 percent. Now the 39-year-old father of two in
Mumbai, who depends on investment income for his livelihood, is
plowing money into government bonds. “The confidence of small investors is rock bottom,” Vora
said by phone on Feb. 26. “They have no faith in the markets.” Vora’s exit from equities is being repeated across the
biggest emerging markets as disappointing profits and growing
state intervention cause stocks to trail global shares for a
fourth year. Trading by Brazilian individuals has dropped to the
lowest level since 1999, exchange data show. Russian mutual
funds posted 16 straight months of outflows, the most since at
least 1996, and withdrawals in India are the biggest in more
than two years. Chinese investors emptied more than 2 million
stock accounts in the past 12 months.
- Rebar Pares Fourth Weekly Drop as Sharp Decline Spurs Purchases.
Steel reinforcement-bar futures
climbed for the first time in eight days, paring a fourth weekly
drop, as the lowest prices in three months spurred purchases. Rebar for
delivery in October on the Shanghai Futures Exchange advanced as much as
0.7 percent to 3,791 yuan ($610) a metric ton and was at 3,773 yuan at
9:55 a.m. local time. The price has dropped 4 percent this week, the most since the week
ended Feb. 22. “The slump in the rebar futures was too far and too
swift,” Dang Man, analyst at Maike Futures Co., said by phone
from Xi’an today. “We think rebar futures will remain weak for
a while as bearish fundamentals have to run their course.”
- Goldman(GS), JPMorgan(JPM) Ordered to Fix Capital Planning by Fed. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co., the
world’s biggest trading firms, must submit new capital plans to
regulators to address weaknesses the Federal Reserve found in their
planning processes. The central bank didn’t object to the capital
plans of the two New York-based companies, and approved proposals from
14 other banks, the Fed said yesterday in a report. Capital plans
submitted by Ally Financial Inc. and BB&T Corp. were rejected, while
American Express Co., the biggest U.S. credit-card issuer by customer
spending, revised its submission to win approval. The deficiencies found
at Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan related to projections of losses and
revenue, according to a Fed official.
- JPMorgan(JPM) Hid Trades Banned by Volcker Rule, Senate Probe Finds. JPMorgan
Chase & Co. (JPM) engaged in high-risk proprietary trading under
the guise of ordinary hedging, said Senate investigators, who urged U.S.
regulators to strengthen the proposed ban on such trades known as the
Volcker rule. Regulators should require banks that hold federally
insured deposits to explicitly link positions in derivatives to the
underlying risk they are hedging, the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on
Investigations recommended in a 300-page report released yesterday.
- U.S. Drone Over Persian Gulf Pursued by Iranian Jet. A U.S. military drone operating
over international waters in the Persian Gulf was pursued by an
Iranian military aircraft on March 12, according to the
Pentagon. The MQ-1 Predator drone, which was accompanied by two
manned U.S. military airplanes, was conducting a classified
surveillance flight in international airspace when it was
approached by an Iranian F-4 jet that came within 16 miles (26
kilometers) of the unmanned plane, Pentagon spokesman George Little said yesterday in an e-mailed statement. After a “verbal
warning” from the U.S., the Iranian plane broke off, according
to the statement.
- Ulta Salon(ULTA) Plunges After Forecast Trails Analysts’ Estimates.
Ulta Salon, Cosmetics & Fragrance, Inc. (ULTA), the beauty-product
retailer that has full-service salons in all its stores, plunged in late
trading after its first- quarter profit forecast was less than
analysts’ estimates.
Ulta slid 12 percent to $78 at 4:30 p.m. in New York.
Wall Street Journal:
- Employers Blast Fees From New Health Law. Employers are bracing for a little-noticed fee in the federal
health-care law that will charge them $63 for each person they insure
next year, one of the clearest cost increases companies face when the
law takes full effect.
Companies and other plan providers will
together pay $25 billion over three years to create a fund for
insurance companies to offset the cost of covering people with high
medical bills.
The fees will hit most large U.S.
employers, and several have been lobbying to change the program,
contending the levy is unfair because it subsidizes individually
purchased plans that won't cover their workers.
- New Push to Securitize Renewable-Power Pacts. The Obama administration and some on Wall Street are laying the
groundwork for bundling renewable-power contracts into securities, part
of an effort to make it cheaper to finance alternative energy. The initiative aims to extend to renewable energy a financial tool
already used in the mortgage and credit-card industries. The securities
could be sold to pension funds or other investors, who would receive a
return funded by payments from users of electricity where solar panels
or other equipment is installed. An early focus is the military, which is preparing to spend billions
of dollars on electricity from solar, wind and other renewable sources
during the next decade. The military services can enter into
electricity-purchase agreements without new appropriations from
Congress.
- Obama Sets Timeline on Iran Nuclear Bomb. Ahead of Israeli Visit, U.S. Leader Says Tehran Is a Year or More Away from Atomic Weapon; Netanyahu Has Different View. Barack Obama said it would take Iran a year or more to build a
nuclear weapon, an assessment that sets up a potential area of discord
with Israel's leader days before the U.S. president visits the Middle
East. Mr. Obama, who will travel to Israel and Palestinian territories next
week in his first presidential visit, told Israel's Channel 2
television that an Iranian atomic weapon was a "red line" that
threatened Israel and the U.S. But in setting a timeline for development of an Iranian nuclear weapon
that is longer than the more urgent one usually cited by Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu, Mr. Obama appeared to be tamping down any
expectations for pre-emptive action against Iran while aiming to assure
its closest Mideast ally of U.S. support. It was the first time Mr.
Obama had himself publicly stated a timeline.
- Wells(WFC) CEO Pay Is Tops Among Peers. Wells
Fargo & Co. awarded Chief Executive John Stumpf $22.9 million in
compensation for 2012, making him the highest-paid chief of a major U.S.
commercial bank.
- The Doctor Won't See You Now. He's Clocked Out. ObamaCare is pushing physicians into becoming hospital employees. The results aren't encouraging. Big government likes big providers. That's why ObamaCare is gradually
making the local doctor-owned medical practice a relic. In the not too
distant future, most physicians will be hourly wage earners, likely
employed by a hospital chain.
Why? Because when doctors practice in
small offices, it is hard for Washington to regulate what they do. There
are too many of them, and the government is too remote. It is far
easier for federal agencies to regulate physicians if they work for big
hospitals. So ObamaCare shifts money to favor the delivery of outpatient
care through hospital-owned networks.
The irony is that in the name of
lowering costs, ObamaCare will almost certainly make the practice of
medicine more expensive. It turns out that when doctors become salaried
hospital employees, their overall productivity falls.
Fox News:
CNBC:
- Rusal CEO: 'Last Act of Drama' in Commodity Market. Oleg
Deripaska, the CEO of the world's largest aluminum company Rusal said
global commodity producers need to cut output by up to 10 percent to
bring the market back to balance. "At the moment in many industries not
just aluminum, [but] steel, cement, nickel we have a very urgent call to
reduce output because the financial crisis created huge distortions in
terms of demand," Deripaska told CNBC Europe's "Closing Bell" in
London. "We are seeing maybe the last act of the drama when a lot of
CEOs with a very good career were punished last year because of
shareholders
suffering on the return on their investments and I think this has
created a very important shift of paradigm," Deripaska added. "We produce so much product which currently occupies warehouse [space]
around the world and at the moment we should take a significant
reduction, up to 10 percent. Of course, it's different for different
industries," Deripaska said of the commodity market.
- How Your 2012 Tax Return Affects Health Care in 2014. For many Americans, the health reform law passed in 2010 will forevermore tie their health to their taxes. And even though the big changes required by the Patient Protection and
Affordable Care don't start until 2014, the tax impact starts now.
- 'Abenomics’ Is Going to Fail: Mr Yen. "Abenomics" will not be able to achieve the two percent inflation target
in Japan, Eisuke Sakakibara, former vice finance minister of Japan told
CNBC on Friday, referring to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's combination of
ultra-loose monetary policy and fiscal stimulus. He noted that if dollar-yen breaks 100, the next stop for the
currency pair could be 130, adding that this would be "risky" for the
Japanese economy. "I remember in 1998, 1999 – it [dollar-yen] did go to 150 – I was at that time in the government, I was terrified," he said.
Zero Hedge:
Business Insider:
Reuters:
- EU finance experts burn midnight oil over Cyprus deal. EU and IMF officials
planned to work on a rescue package for Cyprus through the night in Brussels with the aim of presenting the outline of a bailout programme to euro zone finance experts on Friday morning, sources said.
-
Molycorp(MCP) posts loss on writedown, to cut jobs. Molycorp Inc said on Thursday it planned to cut an unspecified number of jobs as it reported a fourth-quarter loss and booked an impairment charge related to
its 2012 takeover of rare earth processer Neo Material
Technologies.
Financial Times:
- EU needs austerity and reform, not spending By Guido Westerwelle. In
the wake of the elections in Italy, some people are trotting out an old
theory: that it was not homegrown problems that produced this election
result, but a unilateral austerity
policy imposed from outside. This “austerity course”, they say, has now
been rejected. Growth, according to that thinking, can be created easily
through spending programmes financed by borrowing.
But this is wrong on two counts.
Telegraph:
- Germany’s prudence is Europe’s poison. The spending cuts planned in Berlin by finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble to
balance the budget a year early will make it impossible for others to grow.
Evening Recommendations
Keefe Bruyette:
- Downgraded (PGR) to Underperform, target $23.
Night Trading
- Asian equity indices are -.25% to +1.25% on average.
- Asia Ex-Japan Investment Grade CDS Index 101.50 -1.0 basis point.
- Asia Pacific Sovereign CDS Index 80.25 -.75 basis point.
- NASDAQ 100 futures +.11%.
Morning Preview Links
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Economic Releases
8:30 am EST
- Empire Manufacturing for March is estimated to fall to 10.0 versus 10.04 in February.
- The Consumer Price Index for February is estimated to rise +.5% versus unch. in January.
- The CPI Ex Food & Energy for February is estimated to rise +.2% versus a +.3% gain in January.
9:00 am EST
- Net Long-term TIC Flows for January are estimated to fall to $40.0B versus $64.2B in December.
9:15 am EST
- Industrial Production for February is estimated to rise +.4% versus a -.1% decline in January.
- Capacity Utilization for February is estimated to rise to 79.4% versus 79.1% in January.
- Manufacturing Production for February is estimated to rise +.5% versus a -.4% decline in January.
9:55 am EST
- Preliminary Univ. of Mich. Consumer Confidence for March is estimated to rise to 78.0 versus 77.6 in February.
Upcoming Splits
Other Potential Market Movers
- The Eurozone CPI data, JPMorgan(JPM) Senate Hearing and the Japanese upper house vote on Kuroda could also impact trading today.
BOTTOM LINE: Asian indices are mostly higher, boosted by real estate 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 50% net long heading into the day.
