Tuesday Watch

Evening Headlines
Bloomberg:

• Heating Oil and Diesel Supplies Rising to 27-Year High in Survey: Energy Markets. U.S. heating oil and diesel inventories probably climbed to a 27-year high as the slowing economic recovery curbed demand, a Bloomberg News survey showed. “We really have some risk that the normal, seasonal uptrend in heating oil prices will be disrupted because of high inventories and weak ongoing demand,” said Tim Evans, an analyst at Citi Futures Perspective in New York. “Refiners overestimated demand this summer so we are going into the fall turnaround season with fuel supplies at the highest level in a generation, especially for distillate,” said Stephen Schork, president of consultant Schork Group Inc. in Villanova, Pennsylvania. “You have to go back to the Reagan years to see anything like this.” U.S. stockpiles of oil and fuel climbed 5.3 million barrels to 1.13 billion in the week ended Aug. 13, the highest level since at least 1990, when the Energy Department began to collect weekly data. On a monthly basis supplies are at the highest level since November 1983. “Demand for crude oil will dry up even more than usual this fall as refiners shut units,” Schork said.
  
• Fed Loses Bid for Review of Bailout Disclosure. An appeals court refused to reconsider a decision compelling the Federal Reserve Board to release documents identifying banks that might have failed without the U.S. government bailout. The full U.S. Court of Appeals in New York, in a docket entry dated Aug. 20, denied a May 4 request by the Fed to review a three-judge panel’s unanimous March 19 decision requiring the agency to release records of the unprecedented $2 trillion U.S. loan program begun primarily after the 2008 collapse of Bear Stearns Cos.
• Hedge Funds Bet Most on Higher Commodities Prices Since 2008, Led by Food. Speculators including hedge funds are more bullish on commodity prices than at any time since April 2008 after adding to wagers that wheat and corn will keep climbing, Commodity Futures Trading Commission data show. An index of speculative holdings in futures for 20 commodities rose 2.6 percent to almost 1.18 million contracts in the week ended Aug. 17, according to data released by the CFTC on Aug. 20. Commodity assets under management gained about $8 billion in July to more than $300 billion, driven mostly by new investments, according to Barclays Capital.
• Oil Falls a Fifth Day on Concern Over U.S. Supply Gains, Slowing Recovery. Oil declined for a fifth day after analysts estimated that U.S. inventories of crude rose last week and as the dollar rose against the euro because of concern the global economy is slowing. Oil dropped to the lowest in almost seven weeks yesterday as investors sought the relative safety of the U.S. currency before economic reports that may show the recovery is faltering. Crude oil for October delivery dropped as much as 56 cents, or 0.8 percent, to $72.54 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Deliveries of gasoline, a measure of demand, were little changed at an average 9.257 million barrels a day in July, compared with 9.26 million in July 2009, the industry-funded American Petroleum Institute reported Aug. 20. It was the second-lowest July demand number since 2003.
• Florida Man to Plead Guilty to $880 Million Grocery-Business Ponzi Scheme. Nevin Shapiro, the former owner of Capitol Investments USA Inc. accused of leading an $880 million Ponzi scheme, is to plead guilty, court papers showed. Shapiro, 41, of Miami Beach, Florida, is charged with defrauding more than 60 investors in his bogus wholesale grocery distribution business. He is accused of using new investors’ money to pay earlier ones, as well as to fund his lavish lifestyle. Prosecutors said Shapiro stole $35 million to pay illegal gambling debts and make payments on a $5.3 million house, a $1.5 million yacht, a Mercedes-Benz and seats to Miami Heat basketball games. He also bought a pair of diamond-studded handcuffs to give to a prominent professional athlete and donated $150,000 to the University of Miami for an athletic lounge, prosecutors said.
• Greek Banks Pressured to Merge as Economic Slump Hurts Profits. Greek banks are under growing political pressure to merge as second-quarter earnings probably slumped on rising loan losses and worsening asset quality in the debt-burdened country.
• U.S. Funding of Embryonic Stem Cell Research Halted. U.S. funding of embryonic stem cell research approved by President Barack Obama was halted by a federal judge who ruled that the work violates a law passed to bar the destruction of human embryos. U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth in Washington today issued an order temporarily stopping the U.S. Health & Human Services Department and the National Institutes for Health from conducting the studies. The judge cited the still-in-force 1996 Dickey-Wicker Amendment. “The language of the statute reflects the unambiguous intent of Congress to enact a broad prohibition of funding research in which a human embryo is destroyed,” Lamberth said in a 15-page decision.
• Mining Mergers Will End in Tears for Investors: Matthew Lynn. Almost every day brings news of another mega-deal in the mining and resources industry. BHP Billiton Ltd. makes a $40 billion bid for Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan Inc. Vedanta Resources Plc pays $8.4 billion for a controlling stake in the oil driller Cairn India Ltd., while Korea National Oil Corp. offers 1.87 billion pounds ($2.9 billion) for U.K. exploration company Dana Petroleum Plc. Mergers-and-acquisitions bankers who know anything about oil, iron ore or potash are no doubt looking forward to generous bonuses this Christmas. The City of London, where many of the resources companies are listed, is enjoying a frenzy of wheeler- dealing. Speculators and hedge funds can make a fortune taking positions in the shares. And yet, shareholder value is more likely to be destroyed in this flurry of bids.
• Obama Misreads Message of 'Live Free or Die': Amity Shlaes. Stick with me, families, on this experiment of government expansion. That is the implicit message from President Barack Obama this summer.
• Dell(DELL) Said to Prepare Sweetened 3Par Bid After HP's(HPQ) Counteroffer. Dell Inc. is readying a sweetened offer for data-storage provider 3Par Inc. after its earlier bid got scuttled by a $1.6 billion proposal by Hewlett-Packard Co., according to a person familiar with the matter. The offer may be sent in the coming days, said the person, who declined to be identified because the plans aren’t public.
• Carter to Go to North Korea to Release Prisoner, Reports Say. Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter will soon travel to North Korea to negotiate the release of an American citizen who has been detained for seven months, Foreign Policy Journal and Yonhap News reported.

Wall Street Journal:

• Fed Split on Move to Bolster Sluggish Economy. The Aug. 10 meeting of top Federal Reserve officials was among the most contentious in Ben Bernanke's four-and-a-half year tenure as central bank chairman. With the economic outlook unexpectedly darkening, the issue was a seemingly technical one: whether to alter the way the Fed manages its huge portfolio of securities. But it had big implications: Doing so would plunge the Fed back into the markets and might be a prelude to a future easing of monetary policy, moves that divided the men and women atop the central bank. At least seven of the 17 Fed officials gathered around the massive oval boardroom table, made of Honduran mahogany and granite, spoke against the proposal or expressed reservations. At the end of an extended debate, Mr. Bernanke settled the issue by pushing successfully to proceed with the move. The debate over the decision to keep the Fed's $2.05 trillion stock of mortgage debt and U.S. Treasury holdings from shrinking, described in interviews with several participants, set the stage for a more consequential discussion inside the Fed that remains very much alive: what to do next, if anything, about America's stubbornly weak recovery and troublingly low inflation.
• Biden: U.S. May Keep GM Stake Beyond This Year. Vice President Joe Biden reiterated Monday that the U.S. government may maintain an ownership stake in General Motors Co. beyond this year, as the auto maker prepares to return to the stock markets as early as this fall.
• Red-Ink Fears Prompt Mortgage Backer to Raise Fees. The country's most popular federal mortgage-insurance program is set to raise fees to borrowers in a bid to avoid burning through its dwindling reserves as home prices come under renewed pressure. The move reflects new threats facing the Federal Housing Administration, a New Deal-era agency that has taken a central role in the housing market since mortgage markets seized up three years ago. The FHA, which doesn't make loans but rather insures lenders against losses, guaranteed $857 billion in loans at the end of June, up 24% from a year ago.
• New Fees Weighed for Mortgage Industry. The Obama administration may propose that any federal backing of mortgages be paid for through fees on the lending industry, according to people familiar with the internal discussions. While the administration hasn't settled on a plan to revamp failed mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which are now under federal supervision, a consensus appears to be emerging that some type of government guarantee will be needed to keep the ailing mortgage market functioning. Some conservatives don't believe the government should offer any type of guarantee, while others advocate limited, but explicit, backing. About nine in 10 new loans are currently backed by Fannie, Freddie or government agencies.
• Suit Says Countrywide CEO Allowed Lax Loans. The Securities and Exchange Commission alleges that Countrywide Financial Corp.'s ex-chief executive Angelo Mozilo approved loans for favored borrowers that contradicted the company's lending policies. The SEC's statements came in federal-court filings filed last week in its pending civil fraud case against Mr. Mozilo and two other former top Countrywide officials. It appears to be the first time in the year-old case that the SEC has addressed Mr. Mozilo's role in the controversial VIP lending program, where borrowers sometimes received better loan terms and service than were generally available. Some of the borrowers included public officials.
• Businesses Add iPads to Their Briefcases. Some Companies, Which Barred the iPhone, Build Apps for Tablet Computer and Give Apple Gadget to Employees.

CNBC:

• Quant Funds Falling Out of Favor. (video)
• Hurricane Danielle Forms in Atlantic, Seen Strengthening.
• 7 Changes to Bring Small Investors Back.
  

IBD:

• Epix(EPIX) Deal Means Movie Rental Outfit Will Get Newer Releases. Those familiar red Netflix (NFLX) envelopes aren't going away soon.

Business Insider:

• Julian Robertson On Why The Hedge Fund Business Is The Opposite Of Major League Baseball.

Zero Hedge:

• IOU Part Two: California To Issue IOUs For Second Year In A Row. The insolvent state of California which, just like the country of the USA, is operating without a budget (and who needs a budget when the Fed-PD complex will buy the bulk of anything and everything needed to fund ongoing daily operations), has once again ended up on the verge of bankruptcy. As a result, it has just passed a measure which for the second time in as many years (going all the way back to the Great Depression), will allow it to use IOUs in lieu of payment on everything from supplies to contracted services and health-care costs, so it can actually preserve cash to make payments to its generous debtors.

Huffington Post:

• Two Top Investigators Leave Financial Crisis Commission. Two senior staffers have quietly left the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, a panel working under a tight deadline that has been dogged by rumors of discord among key personnel.

Rasmussen Reports:

• 48% Say Obama's Views Are Extreme; 51% Say Hillary Is Mainstream.

Politico:

• Eric Cantor: Mosque Builders 'Not Interested in Healing'. Rep. Eric Cantor, one of the highest-ranking Jewish lawmakers, says Muslims building a community center in Lower Manhattan are “insensitive” and “not interested in healing or bringing people together.” Cantor told POLITICO in an interview here in his central Virginia district that he does not understand why organizers are pushing so hard to build a Islamic community center blocks from where radicals killed thousands of Americans.

Yomiuri:

• Toshiba Corp. will this year put on the market a 3D television that doesn't require special glasses, citing the company.

South China Morning Post:

• Some real estate developers in Shanghai have misreported property prices to the government, distorting national housing-market data.

Evening Recommendations
Citigroup:

• Reiterated Buy on (WINN), target $16.

Janney Montgomery:

• Rated (BKE) Sell, target $21.
• Rated (TLB) Buy, target $14.
• Rated (ANN) Buy, target $19.
• Rated (ZUMZ) Buy, target $19.
• Rated (URBN) Buy, target $40.
• Rated (JCG) Buy, target $41.
• Rated (ANF) Buy, target $42.
  

Night Trading

• Asian equity indices are -1.25% to +.25% on average.
• Asia Ex-Japan Investment Grade CDS Index 126.0 +3.0 basis points.
  
• Asia Pacific Sovereign CDS Index 115.75 -1.0 basis point.
  
• S&P 500 futures -.31%.
  
• NASDAQ 100 futures -.35%.

Morning Preview Links

Earnings of Note
Company/Estimate

• (BIG)/.47
• (BKS)/-.80
• (BKC)/.34
• (MDT)/.81
• (PAY)/.30

Economic Releases
10:00 am EST

• Existing Home Sales for July are estimated to fall to 4.65M versus 5.37M in June.

Upcoming Splits

• None of note
  

Other Potential Market Movers

• The Fed's Evans speaking, $37 Billion 2-year Treasury Notes Auction, weekly retail sales reports, Richmond Fed Manufacturing Index, weekly ABC consumer confidence reading and the EnerCom Oil & Gas Conference could also impact trading today.
  

BOTTOM LINE: Asian indices are mostly lower, weighed down by technology and commodity shares in the region. I expect US stocks to open modestly lower and to rally into the afternoon, finishing mixed. The Portfolio is 75% net long heading into the day.

Stocks Slightly Higher into Afternoon on Buyout Speculation, Short-Covering, Bargain-Hunting

Broad Market Tone:

• Advance/Decline Line: Lower
  
• Sector Performance: Mixed
  
• Volume: Below Average
  
• Market Leading Stocks: Performing In Line
  

Equity Investor Angst:

• VIX 25.60 -3.18%
  
• ISE Sentiment Index 119.0 +46.91%
  
• Total Put/Call .91 -11.65%
  
• NYSE Arms 1.05 -40.12%
  

Credit Investor Angst:

• North American Investment Grade CDS Index 109.21 bps -.68%
  
• European Financial Sector CDS Index 120.75 bps -.22%
  
• Western Europe Sovereign Debt CDS Index 141.33 bps -2.47%
  
• Emerging Market CDS Index 232.27 bps -.84%
  
• 2-Year Swap Spread 17.0 -1bp
  
• TED Spread 17.0 unch.
  

Economic Gauges:

• 3-Month T-Bill Yield .15% unch.
  
• Yield Curve 212.0 unch.
  
• China Import Iron Ore Spot $147.50/Metric Tonne unch.
  
• Citi US Economic Surprise Index -59.5 -.5 point
  
• 10-Year TIPS Spread 1.57% -3 bps
  

Overseas Futures:

• Nikkei Futures: Indicating -31 open in Japan
• DAX Futures: Indicating +2 open in Germany

Portfolio:

• Slightly Higher: On gains in my Medical and Ag long positions
  
• Disclosed Trades: None
  
• Market Exposure: 75% Net Long

Bear Radar

Style Underperformer:

• Mid-Cap Growth (-.36%)

Sector Underperformers:

• 1) Oil Tankers -1.61% 2) Road & Rail -1.41% 3) Semis -1.31%

Stocks Falling on Unusual Volume:

• KIRK, INTU, HTHT, EBIX, UHAL, PLXS and KRO
  

Stocks With Unusual Put Option Activity:

• 1) DTG 2) SWN 3) DISH 4) MO 5) DLTR
  

Stocks With Most Negative News Mentions:

• 1) SAFM 2) RIG 3) DIS 4) MA 5) MF
  

Bull Radar

Style Outperformer:

• Large-Cap Value (+.30%)

Sector Outperformers:

• 1) Utilities +.85% 2) Drugs +.56% 3) Telecom +.55%

Stocks Rising on Unusual Volume:

• AEE, PEG, WMT, NANO, SCOK, ISLN, CALM, WCRX, POWL, INFA, CVLT, KNSY, FMCN, APKT, CISG, FSLR, USTR, TPL and POT
  

Stocks With Unusual Call Option Activity:

• 1) WHR 2) TEX 3) AMD 4) MDT 5) RVBD
  

Stocks With Most Positive News Mentions:

• 1) HPQ 2) KBH 3) GOOG 4) TUES 5) AAPL

Monday Watch

Weekend Headlines
Bloomberg:

• Bond Funds Attracting Cash Like Stocks During Dot-Com Boom: Credit Markets. The amount of money flowing into bond funds is poised to exceed the cash that went into stock funds during the internet bubble, stoking concern that fixed- income markets are headed for a fall. Investors poured $480.2 billion into mutual funds that focus on debt in the two years ending June, compared with the $496.9 billion received by equity funds from 1999 to 2000, according to data compiled by Bloomberg and the Washington-based Investment Company Institute. Concern that the global economic recovery is faltering, with the U.S. growing at a slower-than-forecast 2.4 percent pace in the second quarter, is prompting investors to pile into fixed-income securities of all types even with some yields at record lows. The new cash has helped fuel a rally and drove yields on investment-grade U.S. corporate debt down to a record 3.79 percent last week, while two-year U.S. Treasury yields fell to an all-time low of less than 0.5 percent. The money flowing into bonds is “probably not repeatable on a consistent basis,” said Joel Levington, managing director of corporate credit in New York at Brookfield Investment Management Inc., which oversees $24 billion. “Eventually it won’t be sustainable. Whether that means five years from now or five weeks is a little difficult to tell,” he said.
• Fed Said to Plan Reining in AIG's Credit Line by $3.6 Billion. The Federal Reserve plans to cut American International Group Inc.’s credit line by about $3.6 billion in a sign of confidence the insurer can reduce reliance on taxpayer funds, said a person with knowledge of the proposal. Under terms of AIG’s 2008 rescue, paying down the line was supposed to lower the amount of credit available. The Fed gave an exemption in 2009 on $3.6 billion in proceeds from asset sales and has decided this year that the relief may no longer be necessary, said the person, who declined to be identified because the plan isn’t public. AIG had $13.3 billion in credit remaining on the line as of June 30. “This means there’s little anticipation AIG will need the credit,” said Clark Troy, a senior analyst based in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, for Aite Group, a research firm. “It’s a step in the right direction in terms of making AIG less dependent on federal aid.”
• Australia May Ax Mining Tax After Labor Fails to Win Majority in Election. Australia’s proposed mining tax may be scrapped after the incumbent Labor Party failed to win a clear majority in yesterday’s federal election. “If the Liberals were to form a government, there’s no mining tax,” Peter Chilton, a fund manager at Constellation Capital Management Ltd. who holds both shares in BHP Billiton Ltd. and Rio Tinto Group, said by phone from Sydney. “That’s potentially positive for the mining sector. If Labor forms an arrangement with the Greens, there’s more uncertainty.” Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard, 48, and opposition leader Tony Abbott, 52, will need to broker deals with other lawmakers to pass legislation after neither party secured enough votes to form a government in the House of Representatives.
• ShoreBank of Chicago Shuttered by Regulators to Open as Urban Partnership. ShoreBank Corp., the Chicago lender operating under a Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. cease-and- desist order for 13 months, was shut by regulators and most of its assets were sold to Urban Partnership Bank. Urban Partnership, created to make the acquisition, will keep ShoreBank’s 15 branches, including those in Cleveland and Detroit, according to the FDIC. Its chief executive officer will be William Farrow, a former executive at the Chicago Board of Trade and Bank One Corp., said two people familiar with the matter, who declined to be identified because talks were private. The closure will cost the FDIC’s deposit-insurance fund $367.7 million. “The good news is that the bank, under this new management, will still be there and serving the South Side community,” said Dory Rand, president of the Chicago-based Woodstock Institute, a non-profit group that studies community lending. Investors include Goldman Sachs Group Inc.(GS), General Electric Co.(GE), JPMorgan Chase & Co.(JPM), Citigroup Inc.(C) and philanthropic groups, the people said. ShoreBank raised more than $145 million from the firms in May and the funds were placed in escrow pending a decision by the U.S. Treasury to offer another $75 million in bailout funds. ShoreBank posted a $119 million loss in 2009 and a $39.6 million loss in the first half of this year, according to FDIC figures. It had a net loss of $9.3 million in 2008. Representative Spencer Bachus, the ranking Republican on the House Financial Services Committee, said in May that firms that had banded together in an attempt to save ShoreBank were making the investments to gain favor with President Barack Obama’s administration.
• Euro Falls for Second Week as Slow Economic Growth Reduces Risk Demand. The euro dropped for a second week against the dollar to a five-week low as weaker economic data and calls by a European Central Bank official for more economic aid damped investor appetite for higher-yielding currencies. The 16-nation currency reached a seven-week low against the Swiss franc after ECB council member Axel Weber Aug. 19 told Bloomberg Television the central bank should assist financial institutions to prevent year-end liquidity tensions. The dollar and yen rose against most of their major counterparts as data indicated the global economic recovery may be faltering. The Japanese finance minister is set to meet the prime minister this week to discuss the nation’s currency. “The exceptionally weak numbers in the last couple of days in the U.S., that has weighed on risk appetite,” said Richard Franulovich, a senior currency strategist at Westpac Banking Corp. in New York. “In the euro, Canadian dollar and Australian dollar, the price action is very disappointing, the initial bias would be to sell these currencies and for more dollar strength.”
• Pakistan Flood Aid Helps Terrorism Fight as Peace 'Fragile,' Qureshi Says. More than 70 countries made pledges of about $320 million in aid to Pakistan’s flood victims at a two-day meeting of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. The UN counted about $120 million in pledges toward its appeal for $460 million in emergency aid, and another $200 million was promised, according to Nicholas Reader, spokesman for the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. The UN is confident its appeal, now 70 percent funded, will be fully met, he said yesterday. “The message from here to the people of Pakistan is, do not give up hope,” Abdullah Hussain Haroon, Pakistan’s ambassador to the UN, said at the end of the meeting yesterday. “It is difficult. It will take time. But we have standing with us the community of the world.” Pakistan’s worst-ever floods have killed 1,600 people and displaced as many as 20 million. As many as 17 million acres (6.8 million hectares) of farm land have been submerged and billions of dollars of crops destroyed, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said Aug. 19 in New York.
• Bury Keynesian Voodoo Before It Can Bury Us: Kevin Hassett. Initial claims for unemployment benefits surged to 500,000 in mid-August, a level more typical of a recession than a recovery. The bad news confirmed what conservative economists have been saying for some time: The biggest Keynesian stimulus in U.S. history was a bust. Incredibly, some Keynesians who supported Barack Obama’s $862 billion stimulus now claim it fell short of their goals not because the idea was flawed, but because the spending package was too small.

Wall Street Journal:

• Gunmen Fighting Rio Police Invade Luxury Hotel. Heavily armed drug-gang members engaged in an intense firefight with police, then fled into a luxury hotel popular with foreign tourists and held about 30 people hostage for three hours Saturday before surrendering. The upscale, beachside neighborhood of Sao Conrado where the Intercontinental Hotel sits was transformed into a war zone as upward of 50 gunmen with high-caliber rifles, pistols and even hand grenades faced off with police.
• Hiring Spree Gets Long in the Tooth. Wall Street employees about to return from the summer doldrums have something new to worry about: their jobs. The weak economy, volatile markets, regulatory upheaval and changes in how traders and investment bankers are paid are starting to trigger job cuts that could reverse a recent rebound in overall employment levels at banks and securities firms.
• Firms Weigh Options for Those Piles of Cash. A recent flurry of merger activity captured investors' imaginations last week and returned their focus to the wads of cash lying around on corporate balance sheets. Non-financial companies in the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index are sitting on a record $2 trillion, according to FactSet. While no one is calling for a new mergers boom, many are looking for companies to increasingly spread some of that money in other ways—namely through dividends and buybacks.
• Credit-Card Rates Climb. Levels Hit Nine-Year High as New Rules Limiting Penalty Fees Help Fuel Rise. Interest rates continue to tumble for the U.S. Treasury, companies and home buyers alike. But for a large portion of 381 million U.S. credit-card accounts, borrowing rates have been moving only one way: up. And average rates are likely to climb further in the near future. New credit-card rules that took effect Sunday limit banks' ability to charge penalty fees. They come on top of rule changes earlier this year restricting issuers' ability to adjust rates on the fly. Issuers responded by pushing card rates to their highest level in nine years.

Bloomberg Businessweek:

• ECB Turns Vandal With Its Balance-Sheet Binges: Brendan Brown. The growing failure of European monetary union can’t be measured by superficial yardsticks such as the number of tiny euro-area economies at risk of meltdown or of monthly turbulence in currency markets. The main development has been the dashing of hopes for monetary stability. The euro crisis isn’t over and confidence in the European Central Bank has faded. The ECB now presides over a bloated balance sheet that has expanded to about 2 trillion euros ($2.54 trillion) from 1.084 trillion in June 2006 and camouflages the massive creation of monetary reserves. When the economic recovery accelerates, the ECB -- crippled by a near-insolvent balance sheet -- will fuel asset bubbles by keeping interest rates too low for too long. The next business cycle will be both violent and short. Belief in European monetary stability is now dead.

CNBC:

• Buffett-Backed BYD Misses Earnings as Auto Sales Slip. BYD, a Chinese carmaker backed by U.S. billionaire Warren Buffett, posted lower-than-expected second quarter earnings, which fell substantially from the previous quarter as China's booming car sales lost steam in a slowing economy.
• Warren Buffett's Semi-Secret Stock Picker Lou Simpson Set to Retire. The low-profile 73-year-old man whose stellar stock picks are often attributed to Warren Buffett is calling it quits.

NY Times:

• In Striking Shift, Small Investors Flee Stock Market. Renewed economic uncertainty is testing Americans’ generation-long love affair with the stock market. Investors withdrew a staggering $33.12 billion from domestic stock market mutual funds in the first seven months of this year, according to the Investment Company Institute, the mutual fund industry trade group. Now many are choosing investments they deem safer, like bonds. If that pace continues, more money will be pulled out of these mutual funds in 2010 than in any year since the 1980s, with the exception of 2008, when the global financial crisis peaked. Small investors are “losing their appetite for risk,” a Credit Suisse analyst, Doug Cliggott, said in a report to investors on Friday. One of the phenomena of the last several decades has been the rise of the individual investor. As Americans have become more responsible for their own retirement, they have poured money into stocks with such faith that half of the country’s households now own shares directly or through mutual funds, which are by far the most popular way Americans invest in stocks. So the turnabout is striking.
• Scrutiny for Chinese Telecom Bid. Warning about a potential threat to national security, eight Republican lawmakers have asked the Obama administration to scrutinize a bid by one of the biggest corporations in China to supply telecommunications equipment to Sprint Nextel in the United States. In a letter sent last week to top administration officials, including Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner and the director of national intelligence, Lt. Gen. James R. Clapper Jr., the senators expressed concern over claims that the company had sold equipment to the regime of Saddam Hussein and had a close business relationship with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard in Iran. The senators also said the company, Huawei Inc., had close ties to the People’s Liberation Army in China. “Sprint Nextel supplies important equipment to the U.S. military and law enforcement agencies, and it offers a broad array of devices, systems, software and services to the private sector,” wrote the group of senators, including Jon Kyl of Arizona, Christopher S. Bond of Missouri and Susan Collins of Maine. “We are concerned that Huawei’s position as a supplier of Sprint Nextel could create substantial risk for U.S. companies and possibly undermine U.S. national security.”
• Stock Swing Still Baffles, Ominously. Months later, analysts are still seeking the cause of a quick and mysterious plunge of the stock markets; some suspect a conspiracy.

NY Post:

• Schooling Shoppers. Consumers Are Waiting for Sales as Retailers Cut Stock. This back-to-school season may teach consumers and retailers a cruel lesson. Wallet-conscious parents are holding out for the steep Labor Day weekend markdowns on everything from three-ring binders to ring-spun denim. Meanwhile, retailers have kept inventories so lean that experts say eye-popping deals and consumer choices will be in shorter supply. The likely result: many kids will be showing up for class in last year's duds.

Business Insider:

• Is This March 2009 All Over Again for Stocks? How attractive are equities following last week's sharp selloff? Mike O'Rourke of BTIG argues that the answer is very, citing his modified 'Fed model' for valuing stocks vs. bonds.
  
• Top Mining Executive: Commodities Could Hit New Lows if Chinese Growth Slows to a Mere 7%. How dependent is the commodity world on rapid growth in China? Sydney Morning Herald (via PragCap):

Zero Hedge:

• Clampdown On Market Abuse by High Frequency Churners, Er, Traders Begins. It couldn't happen to a nicer group of pirates. After a year-long campaign by Zero Hedge warning about the ongoing threat to market structure by the HFT plague, culminating in a the May 6 crash, whose incipient conditions exist to this day, the FT reports that the even more worthless regulator, FINRA, is beginning a clampdown on broker dealers who allowed high-frequency traders to have access to the markets without undertaking proper checks. As this means all of them, there is about to be a huge change in market structure as arguably more than half of the market "participants" are suddenly excluded from constant daily churning activity. What the outcome of this will be is anyone's guess, but definitely expect strange things if this is truly a first step towards reverting to some form of normalcy.
• As Iran is Loading Fuel in its First Nuclear Power Plan, Israel Warns Reactor Use "Totally Unacceptable".
• Why The Fed's Upcoming Jackson Hole Economic Symposium Could Have Wide-Ranging Implications.
  

LA Times:

• Iran Unveils Unmanned Aerial Bomber. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says the drone bomber will serve as a deterrent against attacks. Analysts say the plane, with a range of 180 miles, could be used for surveillance or attacks in the Persian Gulf region. Iran unveiled an unmanned bomber jet Sunday that will probably fail to tip the region's strategic balance but suggests Tehran continues to invest in shoring up its conventional weapons capabilities. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, speaking during annual Defense Industry Day ceremonies, described the Karrar drone as "a messenger of honor and human generosity" before also terming it a "messenger of death for the enemies of humanity." FOR THE RECORD An earlier version of this report said the drone has a range of 180 miles. Official accounts state its range is 620 miles. The audience applauded and praised the prophet Muhammad and his descendants as a sheet covering the olive-green aircraft was removed. A short video showed what was said to be the drone launching into the sky and firing a missile as martial music played.

SteelGuru:

• Freight Costs to Drop for Two Years on Fleet Size. According to Tufton Oceanic Limited, manager of the world's largest shipping hedge fund, the biggest and fastest growing commodity shipping fleet in history will cause at least a two year drop in freight costs. According to data from the research unit of Clarkson Plc, the chart of the day shows how the carrying capacity of the commodity shipping fleet, in green, rose by 14% to 500 million deadweight tons since August 2009. According to the Baltic Exchange in London, returns from capsize ships, in white, dropped 19% in 2010. Mr Andreas Vergottis, Hong Kong based research director at Tufton Oceanic, which manages the USD 1.7 billion Oceanic Hedge Fund, said that "Next year will be worse than 2010 and 2012 will be worse than 2011. Dry bulk demand will grow 6%, 7% and 8% but it seems the fleet is growing twice as fast." Mr Vergottis said that the commodity shipping fleet will expand at a 15% annual pace for at least the next two years, while an increase in orders for new vessels in 2010 may extend the length of the slump. Meanwhile, Clarkson estimates that global seaborne trade in dry bulk commodities will expand 7% to 3.2 billion tonnes in 2010.

Forbes:

• U.S. Spends, China Benefits. The former chief Asia-Pacific economist for Morgan Stanley (MS) argues that American stimulus just ends up helping the Chinese economy--and hurting our own. "Just as water flows down," he writes, "stimulus affects low-cost economies more, wherever it is initiated." His argument starts off with a simple proposition: producers will take stimulus funds and source products in developing nations, where costs are cheaper. Xie says America's General Electric (GE) and Germany's Siemens (SI) get to make the decisions as to where stimulus money is ultimately spent, not Washington or Berlin.

Citizen-Times:

• Foreclosure Crisis Won't Be Fixed Until Jobs Return.

The Beast:

• Why Obama's Failing by Douglas Schoen - Democratic Consultant. The net result of Obama's failed policies is that consumers are reluctant to spend, entrepreneurs are reluctant to invest, and employers are reluctant to hire to the degree necessary to spur economic growth.

Rasmussen Reports:

• Daily Presidential Tracking Poll. The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Sunday shows that 25% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as president. Forty-two percent (42%) Strongly Disapprove, giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -17 (see trends).

Politico:

• Barack Obama's Mosque Moment Frustrates Dems. Obama’s support of the Park51 community center, less than three months before a bitterly contested midterm election, would have sparked a huge Republican backlash in any event. But the impact of the decision on Democrats, with many frantically distancing themselves from Obama, has given the story real resonance and the longest of news-cycle legs. Tellingly, aides to New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg knew about Obama’s decision before staffers for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), and New York’s two senators, Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, learned about it. One senior Democratic congressional staffer on the Hill learned that Obama was “injecting the mosque story into the national bloodstream” when someone e-mailed him a transcript of Obama’s remarks as he was settling into his seat at a Washington Nationals game.
• Islamic Center Leader Says Site is Not Moving. Daisy Khan, one of the leading organizers behind the mosque and Islamic community center near ground zero in New York City, said Sunday that moving the project to another location is not currently on the table. Khan said she believed the project would be built. "Of course, it has to go ahead," she said. "There's so much at stake." Asked if America was "Islamophobic," Khan responded that it's like "metastasized anti-Semitism." "It's not even Islamophobia, it's beyond Islamophobia — it's hate of Muslims," she said.
  

USA Today:

• 'Cash for Clunkers' Car Dealers Investigated. The government is investigating at least 20 car dealerships it claims violated the rules of last year's cash-for-clunkers program. Government auditors say up to $94 million in rebates may be ineligible because they lack the proper documentation. One year after the $3 billion car-buying frenzy, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has reached an enforcement phase.

Reuters:

• US Government Officials Saw Drilling Ban Costing Many Jobs. Senior U.S. officials expected the deepwater drilling ban to cost about 23,000 jobs and hold up $10.2 billion in investments, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing federal documents. The Obama administration issued the initial moratorium in late May after the huge BP Plc (BP) (BP) oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The ban spurred opposition from oil companies and local lawmakers who said it would exact a heavy toll in jobs and hurt crude production in coming years. After a federal judge threw out the original ban partly on grounds it was economically unjustified, the Interior Department issued a new moratorium on July 12, barring new oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico through Nov. 30. The Journal said new documents shed light on the Obama administration's deliberations on the economic impact of its drilling moratorium. According to the documents, the top offshore drilling regulator, Michael Bromwich, told Interior Secretary Ken Salazar the halt on new drilling "will have a significant economic impact on direct and indirect employment in the oil and gas industry, as well as other secondary economic consequences," the newspaper said. A federal regulatory agency memo predicted the moratorium would affect about 9,450 workers in "lost direct employment" and 13,797 more in jobs lost through indirect effects, according to the newspaper. U.S. officials signaled previously they expected serious economic ramifications from the moratorium. In July, federal forecasters predicted a cut in oil production in 2011 by 82,000 barrels per day, or almost 30 million barrels, due to delayed or canceled drilling caused by the moratorium.
• U.S. Ends Probe of Hedge Fund "Idea Dinner". Hedge fund managers can go back to eating, drinking and sharing trading ideas now that sources say federal investigators have dropped an inquiry into whether a group of money-managers conspired at a so-called "idea dinner" to drive down the value of the euro. Soros Fund Management, Greenlight Capital, and SAC Capital Management were among the better-known hedge funds that had analysts or traders at the dinner sponsored by brokerage firm Monness Crespi Hardt & Co. These firms and others, including Paulson & Co, were then contacted by the government to save their email and trading records.

Financial Times:

• BHP(BHP) in Canadian Charm Offensive. BHP Billiton will launch its charm offensive in Canada this week, as the mining group seeks to convince Canadian regulators and PotashCorp shareholders of the value in its $39bn (£25.1bn) bid to take over the fertiliser producer. The clock has now started ticking on BHP’s hostile bid for PotashCorp. In the 60-day first round of the offer, PotashCorp shareholders can choose to tender their shares to BHP for $130 each in cash before October 20.

Telegraph:

• UK Government Urged to Reveal 'True' National Debt of £4.8 trillion. The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) has calculated that the national debt is £4.8 trillion once state and public sector pension liabilities are included, or £78,000 for every person in the UK. The IEA raised its concerns after the latest public finances data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) this week, which showed that the total debt, excluding bank bail-outs, is £816bn – itself a record high. However, the figures strip out the state's pension liabilities in a contravention of standard accounting practices. Mark Littlewood, the IEA's director-general, said: "The latest official national debt figure is seriously misleading. Looming in the background are pension liabilities. These should be moved to the forefront. "The ONS should include these liabilities in their calculations. It is shocking enough to see official figures revealing a jump in national debt over the last year from the equivalent of 48pc of GDP to 56pc, but the grave reality is that our real national debt stands at 333pc of GDP." Nick Silver, an IEA research fellow, said the full figure, including the £1.2 trillion public sector pension liability and £2.7 trillion state pension liability, should be published either monthly or annually alongside the net debt data for reasons of transparency.
• Wikileaks Rape Claim Woman 'Experienced' Unwelcome Advances'. A woman at the centre of the alleged smear campaign against the founder of the Wikileaks said she had supported a rape claim because she had experienced unwelcome sexual advances from him. A spokesman for the Swedish prosecutor said the rape charge was dropped by a prosecutor when new information became available. The molestation charge is still under investigation and it was not clear last night if Mr Assange had been in touch with the Swedish authorities. WikiLeaks is preparing to release of a fresh batch of classified documents from the Afghan war, despite warnings from the Pentagon that they could endanger American soldiers. The Australian remains under suspicion of a lesser crime of molestation, which would not lead to an arrest warrant. Molestation covers a wide of range of offences under Swedish law, including inappropriate physical contact with another adult, and can result in fines or up to one year in prison.
• Euro Crisis Has Not Gone Away, It Is Merely Masked by Other Troubles. Medium-term fundamentals are so unfavourable, with rapidly ageing and then falling populations in several countries, that both consumers and businesses take a gloomy attitude to prospects. And business is so tied up with restrictions that, even when things do go well, firms are cautious about the future. In the background there is a looming fiscal crisis as not only peripheral countries but also France and Belgium, supposedly part of the northern core, face high ratios of government debt to GDP. If the world economy is heading for a slowdown, and I think that it is, then on past form the eurozone will join in. Indeed, despite super-strong German GDP figures in Q2, more recent forward-looking indicators have looked rather soft, mirroring what has been happening in the US and UK. A marked slowdown will bring to the fore all the problems which caused such anxiety earlier in the year. It is the weakest members who have most to fear. As the eurozone economy softens, worries about the future of the euro will soon resurface.
  

TimesOnline:

• Potash Corp.(POT) is encouraging China to mount a rival offer to the hostile bid for the Canadian fertilizer company launched by BHP Billiton Ltd.(BHP). Goldman Sachs, RBC Capital Markets and Bank of America Merrill Lynch, advising Potash, have "reached out" to Sinochem International Corp., China's largest chemical trader, in recent days.

The People's Daily:

• Property bubbles exist in some of China's large cities, citing Ba Shusong, deputy head of the financial institute of the State Council's Development Research Center.

New Express Daily:

• China Vanke Co. Chairman Wang Shi said home prices in the nation's largest cities may fall 10% to 15%.

Radio Mozambique:

• The U.S. government will donate $1 billion to finance HIV/AIDS projects in Mozambique until 2014, citing a communique from the U.S. embassy in Maputo. The money will be used to buy medication for HIV/AIDS patients in the southern African country.

Weekend Recommendations
Barron's:

• Made positive comments on (APD) and (HP).

Citigroup:

• Reiterated Buy on (GLW), target $25.
• Reiterated Buy on (STZ), target $21.

Night Trading

• Asian indices are -.50% to +.25% on average.
• Asia Ex-Japan Investment Grade CDS Index 123.0 +1.0 basis point.
• Asia Pacific Sovereign CDS Index 116.75 -2.75 basis points.
• S&P 500 futures +.18%.
• NASDAQ 100 futures +.26%.

Morning Preview Links

Earnings of Note
Company/Estimate

• (SAFM)/1.87

Economic Releases
8:30 am EST

• The Chicago Fed National Activity Index for July is estimated at -.10 versus a reading of -.63 in June.
  

Upcoming Splits

• (ODFL) 3-for-2
  

Other Potential Market Movers

• The Fed's Hoenig speaking and the EnerCom Oil & Gas Conference could also impact trading today.
  

BOTTOM LINE: Asian indices are mostly lower, weighed down by technology and automaker shares in the region. I expect US stocks to open mixed and to rally into the afternoon, finishing modestly higher. The Portfolio is 75% net long heading into the week.

Weekly Outlook

U.S. Week Ahead by MarketWatch (video).
Wall St. Week Ahead by Reuters.
Stocks to Watch Monday by MarketWatch.
Weekly Economic Calendar by Briefing.com.

BOTTOM LINE: I expect US stocks to finish the week mixed as increasing economic fear, greater sovereign debt angst and china concerns offset buyout speculation, bargain-hunting and lower energy prices. My intermediate-term trading indicators are giving mixed signals and the Portfolio is 75% net long heading into the week.