STOCK MARKET WATCH, Tuesday July 8

[ozymandius]

Source: du

STOCK MARKET WATCH, Tuesday July 8, 2008

COUNTING THE DAYS
DAYS REMAINING IN THE * REGIME 197
DAYS SINCE DEMOCRACY DIED (12/12/00) 2725 DAYS
WHERE'S OSAMA BIN-LADEN? 2450 DAYS
DAYS SINCE ENRON COLLAPSE = 2741
Number of Enron Execs in handcuffs = 19
ENRON EXECS CONVICTED = 10
Enron execs conveniently deceased = 3
Other Arrests of Execs = 54

---

U.S. FUTURES &
MARKETS INDICATORS>
NASDAQ FUTURES-----------------------------S&P FUTURES

---

AT THE CLOSING BELL WHEN BUSH TOOK OFFICE on January 22, 2001
Dow - 10,578.24
Nasdaq - 2,757.91
S&P 500 - 1,342.90
Oil - $27.69/bbl
Gold - $266.70/oz.
$1 USD = EUR 1.06678
$1 USD = JPY 116.6200

AT THE CLOSING BELL ON July 7, 2008

Dow... 11,231.96 -56.58 (-0.50%)
Nasdaq... 2,243.32 -2.06 (-0.09%)
S&P 500... 1,252.31 -10.59 (-0.84%)
Gold future... 928.80 -4.80 (-0.52%)
30-Year Bond 4.50% -0.03 (-0.60%)
10-Yr Bond... 3.93% -0.04 (-1.08%)






GOLD,EURO, YEN, Loonie and Silver

---

PIEHOLE ALERT

Heads Up!
Preliminary info on appearances by Bush & Co. throughout the country. Details & links are added as they become available so check back. And if you know more, are organizing something, or would like to, contact [e-mail]

For information on protests and other actions Citizens For Legitimate Government

---

Read more: du

[Dr.Phool]

1. Good 'toon to start us off with a grin.

I showed my wife that article on Saturday, and she came back from shopping with a watermelon!

[ozymandius]

3. Oh My!

That's food for thought. And other things.

[ozymandius]

2. Market WrapUp: The Politics of Deception

Historian Kevin Phillips on decades of bi-partisan deceit
BY TONY ALLISON

Kevin Phillips, author of Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism, has expertly detailed the history of false economic achievement in a recent Harper’s Magazine article. The culmination of 40+ years of gradual but consistent distortion of economic statistics have come home to roost and explain much of our current morass. Inflation statistics help determine interest rates, cost-of-living increases for wages and Social Security benefits as well as interest payments on the national debt. Inflation statistics also affect the planning, spending, saving and investing habits of every American. And lastly, decades of understated inflation means that GDP growth has been overstated.

It is Phillips contention that the under-measurement of inflation has put the country at great risk. To acknowledge the reality would send interest rates sharply higher. This would directly affect the continued viability of the massive build-up of debt, both public and private, that has fueled the economy over the last two decades. In addition, if the true state of inflation were acknowledged, the government would face huge increases in pension, retirement benefits and borrowing costs, overwhelming an already debt-burdened federal budget. Ultimately of course, the market will acknowledge the truth about inflation and interest rates will climb anyway. If government statistics remain distorted, institutional trust and credibility will be just two more victims of inflation.

....

Rotten to the “core”

Not to be outdone by prior administrations, President Nixon requested that Fed Chairman Arthur Burns develop the concept of “core inflation” statistics. Headline inflation was rising in the early 1970’s and Nixon wanted a method to make the inflation number more politically palatable. Core inflation would be used to exclude those “volatile” categories such as food and energy.

....

The end of M3

The second President Bush kicked the ball along a little further by introducing an “experimental” CPI calculation in 2002, which shaved 0.3% off the official CPI. And in 2006, the Bush Administration stopped publishing M3 statistics, which would effectively highlight both rising money supply growth and rising inflation concerns. The laughable excuse from the Federal Reserve for deleting M3 was the expense of compiling the information. For an organization that prints money, the cost wouldn’t even amount to a rounding error.

http://www.financialsense.com/Market/wrapup.htm

[DemReadingDU]

20. Harpers - Kevin Phillips: The economy is worse than you know

Here is the article that was printed in Harpers

4/27/08 Hard numbers: The economy is worse than you know by Kevin Phillips

http://www.tampabay.com/news/article473596.ece

[ozymandius]

4. Today's Reports

10:00 Pending Home Sales May
Briefing NA
Consensus -2.8%
Prior 6.3%

10:00 Wholesale Inventories May
Briefing 0.7%
Consensus 0.6%
Prior 1.3%

15:00 Consumer Credit May
Briefing $5.0B
Consensus $7.0B
Prior $8.9B

http://www.briefing.com/Investor/Public/Calendars/EconomicCalendar.htm

[Pale Blue Dot]

43. Holy crap: Pending home sales down 4.7%

Much worse than expected.

[Pale Blue Dot]

44. Home Sales to Vary in Narrow Range, Then Rise in Second Half (realtor.com pulling good news out of

their ass)

Modest near-term movement is expected in existing-home sales, with a recovery in sales seen during the second half of the year, according to the latest forecast by the National Association of Realtors®.

The Pending Home Sales Index,* a forward-looking indicator based on contracts signed in May, fell 4.7 percent to 84.7 from an upwardly revised reading of 88.9 in April, and remains 14.0 percent below May 2007 when it stood at 98.5.

Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, said some pullback after a sharp increase in the previous month was expected. “The overall decline in contract signings suggests we are not out of the woods by any means. The housing stimulus bill that is still being considered in the Senate is critical to assure a healthy recovery in the housing market, jobs and the economy,” he said.

The PHSI in the West slipped 1.3 percent to 97.5 in May but is 2.0 percent higher than May 2007. In the Northeast, the index declined 2.9 percent to 77.0 in May and is 16.4 percent below a year ago. The index in the Midwest fell 6.0 percent to 78.6 and is 13.8 percent below May 2007. In the South, the index dropped 7.1 percent in May to 84.5 and is 22.1 percent below a year ago.

Yun said location has never mattered more than in the current market. “Some markets have seen a doubling in home sales from a year ago, while others are seeing contract signings cut in half. Price conditions vary tremendously, even within a locality, depending upon a neighborhood’s exposure to subprime loans.”

http://www.realtor.org/press_room/news_releases/2008/home_sales_vary_then_rise

[UpInArms]

45. U.S. May pending home sales index down 4.7%: NAR

07. U.S. May pending home sales index down 4.7%: NAR
10:01 AM ET, Jul 08, 2008

[UpInArms]

46. from the blather: Whole inventories rose 0.8% more than consensus

wholesale inventories rose 0.8%, which is slightly more than the consensus estimate that called for growth of 0.6%

[UpInArms]

51. U.S. May consumer credit up $7.8 bln or at 3.6% rate - charging away for gas today?

04. U.S. May consumer credit up $7.8 bln or at 3.6% rate
3:00 PM ET, Jul 08, 2008

[UpInArms]

57. Ka-ching! Consumers borrow mostly on credit cards

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080708/ap_on_bi_ge/consumer_credit

WASHINGTON - Consumers boosted their borrowing in May, mostly reflecting heavy credit card use to finance their purchases.

The Federal Reserve reported Tuesday that consumer credit increased at an annual rate of 3.6 percent in May, roughly the same pace as logged in the prior month.

Use of revolving credit, which is primarily credit cards, rose at a 7.1 percent pace in May. That compared with a cutback in such credit of 0.5 percent in April.

...more...

[ozymandius]

5. Oil swings down $6 over 2 days

VIENNA, Austria - Oil prices swung below $140 a barrel Tuesday after a plunge of nearly $4 in the previous session, as the dollar strenthened and fears of a supply disruption faded.

But analysts warned the pullback was likely to be fleeting.

....

Trader and analyst Stephen Schork said the expectation just a few days ago that crude prices would touch $150 this week now "does not look like the proverbial done deal."

Be that as it may, we have seen this movie before, i.e. crude oil weakens a little and the bubble-bears jump in," he added in his Schork report, suggesting the price respite might be temporary.

Sweet crude for August delivery fell $2.32 to $139.05 a barrel in electronic trade on the New York Mercantile Exchange by noon in Europe. The contract fell $3.92, or about 2.7 percent, to settle at $141.37 in New York on Monday.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/oil_prices

[Pale Blue Dot]

49. Update: Crude oil down more than $8 in 2 days

NEW YORK - Oil prices fell as much as $6 a barrel Tuesday, bringing crude down $10 this week and hurling prices back to levels not seen since June 26. Traders, keeping a wary eye on the global economy, cashed in gains from oil’s recent rally.

A barrel of light, sweet crude for August delivery fell $6.23 in morning trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange, following a $3.92 slide on Monday, and later traded down $5.79 at $135.58. The market’s bearish turn this week erases, at least for the time being, the effect of a rally that pushed prices past $145 in a string of record-setting sessions before the Fourth of July.

Analysts attributed much of the recent sell-off to profit-taking, saying traders were cashing in on the previous week’s gains. At the same time, concerns about supply disruptions subsided and fears that the economic slowdown is spreading moved to the forefront.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12400801/

[fedsron2us]

61. No truth in the rumours that Lehman has been squeezed

out its long positions by Arabs shorting the price of oil (sounds so crazy that it might actually be true)

[Pale Blue Dot]

6. Office Depot Issues Second Quarter Preliminary Outlook (HINT: It's not good.)

DELRAY BEACH, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Office Depot, Inc. (NYSE:ODP - News), a leading global provider of office products and services, announced today that it continued to be negatively impacted by the challenging economic environment in the second quarter of 2008.

As a result of additional pressure from weakening business conditions in the second quarter, North American Retail same store sales decreased nearly 10 percent versus the prior year and total Company sales were down slightly. The Company anticipates its EBIT margin to have declined for the second quarter by 200 basis points more than the 200 to 250 basis point decline previously indicated on a year-over-year basis as sales trends worsened late in the quarter.

Office Depot said it is disappointed with these preliminary results driven by a very difficult business environment, but it continues to press ahead with the implementation of its strategic plans and margin expansion initiatives. While the Company anticipates the economic environment to be difficult over the balance of the year, it expects its profit margins to improve sequentially in the third and fourth quarters.

http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/080708/20080707006135.html?.v=1

[ozymandius]

7. Stocks move toward lower open ahead of Bernanke speech

NEW YORK - Stocks headed for a lower open Tuesday as investors, anxious about the nation's stumbling mortgage lenders, awaited a speech by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke.

Bernanke's speech at a mortgage lending forum hosted by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. comes as Wall Street's worries about the industry are resurging.

The idea that goverment-sponsored lenders Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae might need to raise more capital sent their stocks plummeting on Monday. And later that afternoon, cash-strapped IndyMac Bancorp Inc. said it is no longer accepting new mortgage loan submissions and cutting 3,800 jobs — more than half its work force.

Bernanke is scheduled to speak at 8:30 a.m. Eastern time.

....

Investors are also awaiting a 10 a.m. Eastern time report from the National Association of Realtors on pending home sales in May, and Alcoa Inc.'s second-quarter results after the market closes. Both pending home sales and Alcoa's quarterly profit are expected to decline.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080708/ap_on_bi_st_ma_re/wall_street

[radfringe]

12. lower open ahead of Bernanke speech

heh... bernake been infected with bush piehole syndrome?

[ozymandius]

14. But he strides to the podium with such gusto.

[radfringe]

22. :snicker:

must be the watermelon

[UpInArms]

25. Futures cut losses after Bernanke comments (will continue to give $$$$ to investment banks)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080708/bs_nm/markets_stocks_dc

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock futures trimmed losses on Tuesday but still pointed to a lower market open after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the central bank may extend emergency lending for big Wall Street investment banks.

S&P 500 futures were 6.30 points lower and were below fair value, a mathematical formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract.

Dow Jones industrial average futures fell 35 points, and Nasdaq 100 futures declined 8 points.

[UpInArms]

27. Chopper Ben wants the power to destroy the citizenry

05. Bernanke: Fed needs powers to oversee money markets
8:00 AM ET, Jul 08, 2008

06. Bernanke: New powers needed if Fed given job to stop turmoil
8:00 AM ET, Jul 08, 2008

07. Bernanke: Fed should oversee payment, settlement system
8:00 AM ET, Jul 08, 2008

08. Bernanke cautiously pushes for new powers for Fed
8:00 AM ET, Jul 08, 2008

09. Bernanke: Fed mulling extending loans to brokers beyond 2008
8:00 AM ET, Jul 08, 2008

[ozymandius]

32. Maybe this is why Paulson evidences high blood pressure.

He is irrelevant. The administration wants the super secret Fed to run the economic dog-n-pony show. Paulson used to be somebody at Goldman Sachs. Now he is charged with doing stand-up like his predecessor John Snow.

[Demeter]

54. And Yet He's Too Much a Company Man to Come Out and Say So

There's something pathological about the Omerta that surrounds the Worst Failure Ever and his puppet.

[UpInArms]

31. Bernanke cautiously pushes for new powers for Fed

http://www.marketwatch.com/News/Story/bernanke-cautiously-pushes-new-powers/story.aspx?guid=%7BF957AF5A%2DD21E%2D446C%2D8024%2D4B4096BC35F9%7D

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke stuck his toe into the shark-infested waters of Washington regulatory battles and cautiously suggested that the Fed be given new powers to oversee financial markets. In a speech at a FDIC conference, Bernanke said Congress would have to give the Fed new powers if it wanted to give the central bank the job to limit the impact of financial market turmoil on the economy. Bernanke bent over backwards to suggest rather than demand any new powers from Congress. In a major development on another topic, Bernanke said the Fed was considering extending its emergency loans to broker-dealers beyond 2008 to help stabilize the market. The Fed's emergency primary dealer credit facility is now set to expire in mid-September.

[Pale Blue Dot]

8. Retail Property, Vacancies Q2 Worst in 30 Years

NEW YORK -- U.S. store closings and cutbacks turned the second quarter into the worst for strip mall owners in 30 years, as budget-conscious consumers flocked to low-cost warehouse-style grocery centers, according to a report by real estate research firm Reis.

Strip malls, which are usually anchored by grocery or drug stores, saw average vacancies spike 0.5 percentage points to 8.2 percent, a level unseen since 1995, according to the report released on Monday.

Vacancies at regional malls rose 0.4 percentage points to 6.3 percent, the highest level since the first quarter of 2002, according to the preliminary results.

"They definitely came up weaker than our expectations and we've been pretty bearish on our outlook for retail for some time," Reis Chief Economist Sam Chandan said. "In the market in general there have been a lot of store closings."

http://moneynews.newsmax.com/headlines/commercial_vacancies/2008/07/07/110465.html

I've noticed at least one vacancy per strip mall in my mall hell town.

[ozymandius]

13. My neighborhood has a bruising display of empty storefronts.

Little Five Points is typically a bustling center for artists and ethnic mom-n-pop shops. The artists are still there as sidewalk vendors, relying on foot traffic generated by the retail outlets for their business. The shops however do not draw customers as they have in past years. The 100 year-old building now looks so much its age with darkened windows concealing empty spaces resembling missing teeth.

Businesses in this area come and go after the new year holidays. This year, however, businesses left in January and have not been replaced.

[Warpy]

48. I see empty strip mall spaces in the "better" parts of this town

because they all got built to service new neighborhoods of trophy houses that were being sold to speculators. The speculators have long since dumped the houses on the market and walked away, leaving whole neighborhoods blighted by abandoned and unmaintained properties. The people who bought the trophy houses to occupy are feeling the combined pinches of falling property values and long commutes and are shopping at the dollar stores in my neighborhood instead of the chichi shops in their own.

Everything seems to be contracting inward as people lower their expectations and strive for convenience and the ability to live within means that have been shrinking since the 70s. That means all those strip malls in the outlying areas will soon become moonscapes of empty stores and deserted, weedy parking lots.

Welcome to the Chicago School of Economics endgame.

[Dr.Phool]

9. Red everywhere in Asian and European markets.

Nikkei down almost 2 1/2%
Hang Seng down over 3%
FTSE down over 1 1/2%

Markets are doing a Buster Douglas routine.

[ozymandius]

17. more details

Stocks Decline in Europe, Asia, Led by UBS; U.S. Futures Fall

July 8 (Bloomberg) -- Stocks fell in Europe and Asia and U.S. index futures dropped as concern deepened financial firms will need more capital and automakers forecast slumping sales. The U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index entered a bear market.

UBS AG, Deutsche Bank AG and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc. retreated after analysts said the two largest U.S. mortgage finance companies may have to raise a combined $75 billion. Merrill Lynch & Co. fell in Germany after Wachovia Corp. slashed its earnings forecast for the third-biggest U.S. securities firm. Carmakers sank as PSA Peugeot Citroen SA warned of a ``greater slowdown'' in demand in Europe and Fiat SpA said it will close four auto plants.

The MSCI World Index lost 0.7 percent to 1,355.74 at 12:31 p.m. in London, extending its decline from an October record to 19.4 percent. Futures on the Standard & Poor's 500 Index fell 0.3 percent, indicating the benchmark for American equities may slip into a bear market today. The S&P 500 was down 19.99 percent from its all-time high as of yesterday's close.

....

Europe's Dow Jones Stoxx 600 Index today sank 1.4 percent, led by Bank of Ireland Plc and Bradford & Bingley Plc. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index lost 2 percent. The U.K.'s FTSE 100 dropped as much as 2.8 percent, extending its decline from last year's high to 20 percent, the common definition of a bear market.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&refer=home&sid=aSEBXUrwAi3w

[UpInArms]

24. World stocks at 21-month low as banks plunge

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/markets_global_dc

LONDON (Reuters) - Fresh credit fears swept global financial markets on Tuesday, pushing world stocks to their lowest levels since October 2006 as concerns intensified that the financial sector would have to raise more capital.

Banks tumbled across the board after a Lehman Brothers report said a pending accounting change could force Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to raise an $46 billion and $29 billion respectively at a difficult time, knocking their shares to near 16-year lows on Monday.

In Britain, shares in troubled mortgage bank Bradford & Bingley fell 20 percent to record lows, below the price of its planned rights issue, due to concerns over its future.

Fresh worries over the financial sector dealt a blow to risky assets, which have been already reeling from fears about rising inflation due to high energy costs and slowing growth.

"The crisis in the financial system, given banks are the lubricant for the economy, points to continued tight credit," said Jonathan Lawlor, head of European research at Fox-Pitt, Kelton.

"So we have a loop where tight credit leads to slower economic growth, which leads to higher losses for the financial system, which leads to capital constraints for the banks."

...more...

[ozymandius]

10. Siemens cutting 16,750 jobs worldwide

FRANKFURT, Germany - Industrial conglomerate Siemens AG says it is cutting 16,750 jobs worldwide because of the slowing economy. The cuts amount to 4.2 percent of its global work force.

...the cuts will include 12,600 mostly administrative jobs, along with another 4,150 positions...

-very short-

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080708/ap_on_bi_ge/germany_siemens

[ozymandius]

11. U.S. Pending Home Sales Probably Fell for Third Month in Four

July 8 (Bloomberg) -- Americans signed fewer contracts to buy previously owned homes in May for the third month in four, a sign home prices have yet to touch bottom, economists said before a private report today.

The index of pending home resales fell 3 percent after a 6.3 percent gain in April, according to the median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey of 36 economists before a report from the National Association of Realtors.

....

The National Association of Realtors is scheduled to release the figures at 10 a.m. in Washington. Estimates in the Bloomberg survey ranged from a drop of 6 percent to a gain of 0.2 percent.

Another report from the Commerce Department at the same time today may show that wholesale inventories rose 0.7 percent in May, according to a Bloomberg survey of economists. That compares with a 1.3 percent gain in April.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&sid=aGHwxiZ9KceM&refer=economy

[ozymandius]

15. Fed's Loans to Wall Street May Prevent Raising Rates This Year

July 8 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve may hold off on its first interest-rate increase since 2006 until policy makers judge that financial markets are stable enough to allow the central bank to withdraw its lending backstop for Wall Street.

Raising rates while at the same time removing securities dealers' access to direct loans from the central bank would be a double hit to markets that officials probably want to avoid, Fed watchers said. The Fed also may have a hard time justifying higher borrowing costs before it has a plan for ending emergency lending to nonbanks.

The timing difficulty, along with continued strains in credit markets, means traders may be mistaken in estimating the odds of a rate boost by year-end at 74 percent.

....

The Fed is only supposed to lend to nonbanks under emergency circumstances when no other ``adequate'' credit is available. The PDCF and the Fed loans to secure Bear Stearns's takeover by JPMorgan Chase & Co. were the first extension of funds to nonbanks since the 1930s.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&refer=economy&sid=asifV2BrHcf0

[ozymandius]

19. Fed, SEC Team Up On Bank Oversight

Two top regulators reached a formal agreement to coordinate their oversight of Wall Street yesterday, as the government attempts to build a new system to guard against a meltdown of the financial system.

Leaders of the Federal Reserve and the Securities and Exchange Commission signed a memorandum of understanding that explicitly allows for the two agencies to share information about the inner workings of investment banks. The move formalizes what has been a reality since the rescue of Bear Stearns in March and marks an end to an era in which the two agencies held information close to their vests.

....

The agreement is a baby step in a broader path toward changing the way the nation's financial system is regulated. The Bush administration proposes streamlining the oversight of banks and investment firms while giving the Fed new powers to guard against financial crises. Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke will address the topic in a speech today and in congressional testimony Thursday.

Bernanke is considering whether to extend a special lending program for investment banks, implemented during the Bear Stearns episode, that is scheduled to end in September. He is considering extending that program beyond the end of the year if the strains in financial markets continue.

....

Bernanke also favors exploring new procedures by which the government can ensure that if investment firms fail, they could do so in a way that inflicts less damage on the overall economy. Such a formal procedure, which is in place for regular banks, might have made the dissolution of Bear Stearns more orderly.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2008/07/08/ST2008070800083.html

[ozymandius]

16. Fannie, Freddie Capital Concerns Send Bond Risk to 14-Week High

July 8 (Bloomberg) -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac triggered a surge in the cost of protecting company debt from default to the highest in 14 weeks on concern the two largest U.S. mortgage finance companies may need to raise $75 billion.

Credit-default swaps on the Markit iTraxx Crossover index of 50 companies with mostly high-risk, high-yield debt ratings increased 23 basis points to 560, the highest since March 31, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co. at 12:05 a.m. in London. In Tokyo the Markit iTraxx Japan index climbed 2 to 150, Morgan Stanley prices show.

Record delinquencies on home loans already helped cause financial companies worldwide to write down more than $400 billion on debt holdings and prompted Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to raise almost $20 billion in new capital. They may need as much as $75 billion more as new accounting rules require them to bring off-balance sheet mortgages on to their books, according to Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. analysts led by Bruce Harting.

...

Banks repossessed twice as many homes in May as they did a year ago and foreclosure filings rose 48 percent, according to Realty Trac Inc., a real estate database in Irvine, California. Home prices in 20 U.S. metropolitan areas fell 15.3 percent in April by the most on record, the S&P/Case-Shiller home-price index shows.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a9RNCDYW_Q0U&refer=home

[ozymandius]

18. IndyMac to exit most home lending, slash 3,800 jobs

IndyMac Bancorp, once a leader in the nontraditional home loans that helped drive the housing boom, all but quit the mortgage business Monday and said it would lay off 3,800 people, more than half its staff, in the wake of growing defaults by borrowers.

The Pasadena-based savings and loan became the latest in a series of major Southern California-based lenders that have been absorbed by other companies or have simply been forced to stop making home loans, often shutting down altogether.

....

The company, which before Monday had 7,200 employees, will have 3,400 after the cutbacks, down from more than 10,000 at its peak in 2006. It declined to specify the number of jobs to be lost in California.

Employees leaving the headquarters late Monday declined to comment, saying they had been asked by the company not to discuss the cuts. An IndyMac manager, speaking on condition of anonymity at a nearby Ralphs store, said simply, "There's not enough food to feed the mouths."

....

The problem with IndyMac's product line was that borrowers often used such loans to turn their homes into ATMs, refinancing from time to time as long as housing prices were rising. When prices stalled and then plunged, defaults surged.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-indymac8-2008jul08,1,3576874.story

[ozymandius]

23. Indymac Death Watch: Comment from Reader Steve on Regulatory Intervention

We haven't been covering the spectacle of Indymac twisting in the wind, since highly-regarded blogs like Calculated Risk and Housing Wire follow the mortgage lenders closely.

However, the panic yesterday about Fannie and Freddie perhaps having to come up as much aswith $75 billion in equity ($75 billion?) diverted attention from what on any other day would likely have been the top story: the grim announcements by Indymac, briefly in possession of the dubious status of being America's biggest independent mortgage lender.

The Wall Street Journal has a decent story, but its press release was bleak. While the bank is stopping virtually all new mortgage lending and 'fesses up that it does not expect to be able to raise new capital unless the environment improves, the most serious admission is:

In light of the current environment and related deterioration of our financial position since last quarter, we have been working closely with our federal banking regulators with respect to the actions that they and we must take to meet our mutual goal of keeping Indymac safe and sound through this crisis period. In that respect, based on information we have provided to our regulators, they have advised us that we are no longer “well capitalized”, which we stated on May 12 was a possible scenario. Our regulators have also asked us to submit to them a new business plan for their review and approval, something on which we have been working with them for some time. We have agreed on the basic elements of the plan, and the regulators have directed us to begin executing on it. An important element of our plan is to improve our capital ratios. Without an external capital raise, the traditional way to improve safety and soundness is to sell assets and shrink the balance sheet, which in normal times generally has the effect of improving capital ratios and bolstering liquidity. Yet in this environment, where either there are no bids for most of IMB’s mortgage loans and securities or the bid/ask spreads are abnormally wide, “fire-selling” assets would actually deplete capital further. As a result, the most realistic and cost-effective way to shrink both our balance sheet and our servicing rights asset (which, as discussed in previous communications, is up against the regulatory cap limit), is to curtail most new loan production.

In addition to needing to shrink our assets to improve our capital ratios, we also need to do so to ensure that we maintain prudent operating liquidity. A consequence of falling below well-capitalized is that we are no longer permitted to accept new brokered deposits or renew or roll over existing ones, unless we get a waiver from the FDIC. While we have submitted a waiver application, it is uncertain as to whether such a waiver will be granted.

Reader Steve e-mailed some insightful comments:

For anyone who's remained in denial, this press release paints a clear picture of the severity of the credit crisis: Indymac can't raise needed capital, and can only sell off assets at a loss. Part of this story is specific to Indymac, but the problem of capital starvation and deflating assets is a general condition. Evidently the regulators can't find a buyer for Indymac, and are shrinking it as a prelude to nationalization.

What's interesting is how they are shrinking it. The prohibition on opening or rolling brokered deposits is an obvious thing to do, but forcing Indymac out of the non-GSE mortgage business is not. The problem for FDIC is that non-GSE mortgages wind up getting pledged to FHLB, and as a secured creditor with an over-collateralized position, FHLB borrowings must be paid off by FDIC if the bank becomes insolvent. This is a large cash flow hit to the insurance fund (over $10B or 1/5 of the Fund in the case of Indymac), but the obligation of FDIC as Receiver to marshall the assets of the estate leaves no discretion for over-collateralized borrowings. The Board of the FDIC made some public comments about this problem a few months ago. FDIC has no access to the Fed to liquify and park a FHLB portfolio. In a bridge bank scenario, the FHLB borrowings remain in place, but FDIC is still obligated to provide a combination of capital and guarantees against loss sufficient to launch a new, well-capitalized institution (perhaps in partnership with private capital)--also a large figure, and the main driver behind Fed/FDIC's push to modify the bank holding company regulations to allow in more unregulated capital.

My view is that the regulators have adopted a go-slow program in order to kick these problems over to the next administration.

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2008/07/indymac-death-watch-comment-from-reader.html

[UpInArms]

33. IndyMac forbidden to make new loans

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/indymac-halts-new-loans-under/story.aspx?guid=%7B7FA3323C%2D60AC%2D4D72%2D9B4C%2D3E9538694C21%7D

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- IndyMac Bancorp said late Monday that regulators have told the lender it isn't "well capitalized" after failing to raise new capital.

The company said it has agreed to a new business plan with regulators which includes halting new mortgages to shrink its balance sheet and improve capital ratios. It will also cut 3,800 jobs, bringing staff levels to roughly 3,400.

IndyMac is also barred from accepting new brokered deposits unless it gets a waiver from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., a bank regulator that insures deposits. But the company said it's not certain a waiver will be granted. Second-quarter losses may be larger than the first-quarter, the company also warned.

IndyMac shares slumped 30% to 50 cents during after-hours trading on Monday.
"Insured financial institutions don't fail in the U.S., they go through an orderly unwinding process under the guidance of regulators, and I think that's what we're seeing with IndyMac," Fred Cannon, an analyst at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, said in an interview on Monday. "We do not expect IndyMac will be the last financial institution to go through this."

<snip>

Between 150 and 300 banks may fail over the next few years as the real estate slump takes a heavy toll on the industry, experts told MarketWatch in May.

...more...

[UpInArms]

52. Struggling IndyMac says depositors pulling cash

http://www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/idUSN0826480020080708?sp=true

NEW YORK, July 8 (Reuters) - IndyMac Bancorp Inc (IMB.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) on Tuesday said depositors were withdrawing cash at an "elevated" pace after a prominent U.S. senator recently questioned the big mortgage lender's ability to survive the U.S. housing crisis.

Shares of the largest independent, publicly traded U.S. mortgage lender fell as much as 52 percent.

Paul Miller, a Friedman, Billings, Ramsey & Co analyst, said shareholders could be wiped out, and cut his price target for the parent of the IndyMac Bank thrift to zero per share from $1.00.

"It's hard to gauge how this situation will resolve itself," said Christopher Wolfe, managing director at Fitch Ratings, which downgraded IndyMac on Tuesday. "We see a high likelihood of some kind of regulatory intervention occurring, which could result in asset dispositions, or the thrift going into receivership."

In a regulatory filing, IndyMac said it still faces "elevated levels of deposit withdrawals" after Sen. Charles Schumer, a New York Democrat, late last month raised questions to regulators about a potential collapse.

Mortgage rivals that have already met their demises include New Century Financial Corp NEWCQ.PK and American Home Mortgage Investment Corp AHMIQ.PK, which filed for bankruptcy protection last year. Countrywide Financial Corp avoided possible collapse when it was acquired last week by Bank of America Corp (BAC.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz).

...more...

[UpInArms]

21. dollar watch

http://quotes.ino.com/chart/?s=NYBOT_DX&v=i

Last trade 72.755 Change +0.053 (+0.07%)

http://www.dailyfx.com/story/topheadline/Majors_Divided_on_the_Dollar_s_1215503549186.html

http://www.dailyfx.com/story/topheadline/Majors_Divided_on_the_Dollar_s_1215503549186.html

The majors have lost consensus on the fate of the US dollar. The Australian and New Zealand dollars remain weak, with the latter booking 125 pips in profits on last week’s short trade. The Canadian dollar too appears ready to give in to greenback strength. Meanwhile, trading in the Euro, Sterling and Swiss pairings has been choppy around key technical levels. The Yen looks to blaze its own path altogether as it prepares a rally against the dollar.



...more...

US Dollar: A Puppet of the Stock Market?

http://www.dailyfx.com/story/bio1/US_Dollar__A_Puppet_of_1215466531343.html

The rollercoaster ride in the stock market also hit the currency market today. At one point, the rally in the US dollar evaporated as the stock market collapsed on fears that the financial sector could be in for more trouble. After having been up more than 100 points at the beginning of the US trading session, the Dow Jones Industrial Average choked back all of those gains to end the day down 56 points. This was not before falling more than 160 points, then reversing back to flat and then dropping once again. The meltdown in stocks was triggered by Lehman Brother’s warning that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could be forced to raise as much as $75 billion in capital to offset write downs and meet new accounting rules. Fresh trouble in the financial sector is the type of uncertainty that the market cannot handle right now. The new earnings season is about to begin and Fannie and Freddie’s problems resurrect concerns about the resiliency of US companies in the face of soaring prices and falling demand. The US dollar has merely been a puppet of the stock market today as liquidation out of US stocks lead to liquidation out of the US dollar. Normally, hawkish comments like those from San Francisco Fed President Yellen would help the dollar, but today, traders were more worried about the problems in the financial sector and how Yellen’s comments suggest that there will be no relief from the Federal Reserve. Pending home sales, wholesale inventories and consumer credit are due for release tomorrow. These are Tier 2 economic data which means that they will not be particularly market moving. We still believe that the US dollar has bottomed and as such, we look for more gains against the Japanese Yen and Euro. The US economic calendar is very light, but the disappointments in German industrial production could lead to even more disappointments for other Eurozone reports this week, which would weigh on the EUR/USD.

...more...

[UpInArms]

26. Crisis wipes $1 trillion from financial stocks

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/financial_losses

NEW YORK — U.S. financial companies have lost more than $1 trillion in value this year, and yet another decline on Monday shows concerns aren't going away soon.

Banks and brokerages began the week lower on the same fears that have been proven toxic since last summer in the ongoing credit crisis. The financial sector was hit with a confluence of troubles on Monday: cautious remarks from a Federal Reserve official and new capital concerns at Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.

The drop in names like Lehman Brothers, Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch caused the financial section of the Standard & Poor's 500 index to lose almost $150 billion in value on Monday, according to the rating agency. That means S&P 500's 85 financial components have lost some $1.3 trillion since the sector reached a high last October.

Even more startling is that shares of 35 of the companies, which include insurers, have lost more than half their value so far this year. The financial sector used to be the index's main driver, and many economists believe that the broader market will rise or fall on their health.

"Some would argue that perhaps the sell-off in financials is overdone, but at the same time there is just much uncertainty out there about write-offs, loan losses, and how bad the housing market is," said Jim Herrick, a director of equity trading at Baird & Co. "For a period of time the pain was in the big money center banks, but now it's spreading."

...more...

[UpInArms]

35. Goldman Sachs lost at least $100 million on nine trading days

Goldman Sachs Group Inc., the world's biggest investment bank, disclosed in a regulatory filing that it lost at least $100 million on nine trading days during the second quarter. Goldman reported that total trading revenue in the second quarter fell 17 percent to $4.87 billion, according to the filing.

The firm, known for aggressive trading tactics that can cause big swings from week to week, still far surpassed many of its rivals on the Street. That has put more focus on Merrill Lynch, which will report its quarterly results next Thursday.

[Pale Blue Dot]

28. Pricing in a Bush Presidency

From The Big Picture blog:

I continue to see a steady drumbeat of partisan political market commentary from the usual quarters. Their stunningly ignorant claim is that the current market selloff has nothing to do with the Housing debacle or the credit collapse, $145 Oil, six consecutive months of negative employment data, nearly $5 per gallon gasoline, a 40% devaluing of the US Dollar, an exhausted US consumer, and massive financial sector write offs.

No, those are irrelevant to the market. Instead, we get an explanation that the market weakness is due to . . . Obama's lead in the polls.

I have previously criticized this poor form of analysis as one that confuses Cause & Effect. It is a classic error of misunderstanding causation versus correlation.

Whenever a challenger is winning in a national election, it is most often because the current economy is so weak that it gets reflected in market conditions. That negative backdrop is also why the party that is not in possession of the White House outpolls the incumbent party. The SAME FACTORS -- a punk economy, high inflation and weak employment -- are causative of both the market selloff and the challenger's lead.

http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2008/07/pricing-in-a-bu.html

[Demeter]

55. Notice They Don't Blame Bush, Big Business, or the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy Either

They were allin this together, and they are all going down together , and and they are all going to jail together.

Just like Millikin and his junk bond buddies did.

[Pale Blue Dot]

29. Psst! Hear the Rumor of the Day?

“I will hurt the shorts, and that is my goal,” Richard S. Fuld Jr. fumed.

Richard S. Fuld Jr., the chairman of Lehman Brothers, has vented about short sellers.

It was April, and Mr. Fuld was blaming short sellers, one of the most maligned tribes on Wall Street, for spreading rumors about Lehman Brothers, the troubled investment bank he runs. Shorts bet against stocks, and Lehman, they were whispering, looked like the next Bear Stearns.

Mr. Fuld must have been irate again last week, when Lehman’s stock price plunged 11 percent in the space of three hours for no apparent reason. The shares opened that June 30 morning at $22.25, drifted higher — and then took an abrupt turn around 1:30 p.m. Lehman closed that day at $19.81, its lowest level since 2000.

This time, the rumor du jour wasn’t that Lehman was going to be forced into bankruptcy. No, this time the talk was that Lehman was about to be sold to Barclays, the big British bank. It was eerily reminiscent of Bear Stearns’s fire sale to JPMorgan Chase in March. And when it comes to Lehman, the shorts have bet right lately: the stock has lost almost 70 percent of its value this year.

The rumor turned out to be wrong, as rumors often do. But this one even had an exact price: Lehman would be sold for $15 a share, traders buzzed all afternoon, in what would amount to a “take under” — Wall Street parlance for when a company sells itself for less than its market value.

Maybe a few people were whispering, but many more seemed to be listening. Talk that Barclays was buying even reached Lehman’s trading desks, where the rumor whipped around the office and then reverberated across Wall Street again. Panicky Lehman employees started calling friends outside the firm to find out what was going on inside the firm. One Lehman executive said, “Even my mother-in-law called me.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/08/business/08sorkin.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

[ozymandius]

30. Home Prices Fall in 23 of 25 U.S. Metropolitan Areas (Update1)

July 7 (Bloomberg) -- Home values fell in 23 of 25 U.S. metropolitan areas in April, according to Radar Logic Inc., as sales of a record number of foreclosed homes pushed prices down.

The Sacramento, California, region saw the biggest drop, with prices falling 31.7 percent from April 2007. Sacramento was followed by the Las Vegas area (29.9 percent), San Diego (28.1 percent), Phoenix (25.5 percent) and Los Angeles (23.4 percent), Radar Logic said.

....

Nevada and California were the states with the most homeowners entering some stage of foreclosure in May, according to RealtyTrac Inc. of Irvine, California, a seller of real estate data. Foreclosures, which reached a record high of 2.47 percent of U.S. homes in March, sell for less than occupied homes and lower the average selling price of all homes by 6 percent, according to Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. economists Michelle Meyer and Ethan Harris.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601110&sid=aUKNXKCNLhGA

[mnhtnbb]

38. Property values up dramatically for Wake County (NC)

The revaluation (done every 8 years) has raised property values, on average, 42%.

http://www.newsobserver.com/1181/story/1129367.html

Let the squawking begin--even though property tax rates have declined sufficiently that
most property owners will be paying less in taxes.

[ozymandius]

34. fresh acidic futures for you

08:27 ET
S&P futures vs fair value: -4.2. Nasdaq futures vs fair value: -12.5. Futures point to a negative start, but are well off their worst levels. Fed Chairman Bernanke said the Fed may extend its lending to Wall Street firms through 2009. Merrill Lynch (MER) had its second quarter earnings estimates cut at Wachovia, noting Merrill's CDO and bond insurer exposure.

08:00 ET
S&P futures vs fair value: -9.0. Nasdaq futures vs fair value: -14.5. Stock futures indicate a lower start to the trading day. Fed Chairman Bernanke will speak about mortgage lending at 8:00 ET. In corporate news, yesterday after the close IndyMac (IMB) announced that it has been unable to raise additional capital and was informed by regulators that it is no longer well capitalized. Crude prices are trading 1.1% lower to $139.79 per barrel. Financial stocks fell in overseas trading, with Japan's Nikkei ending its session with a loss of 2.5%, and as European markets trade more than 1% lower.

[UpInArms]

36. Wealth funds meet in Singapore to allay Western fears

http://www.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idUSSIN1823920080708?feedType=RSS&feedName=businessNews?sp=true

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Sovereign wealth funds that control an estimated $3 trillion in assets will meet in Singapore this week to discuss a code of ethics aimed at allaying Western fears that their investments are politically motivated.

The International Monetary Fund's international working group of sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) will gather on July 9-10 to thrash out voluntary guidelines that the IMF hopes will be finalized by October this year.

Highly-secretive wealth funds, investment funds owned by national governments, have become increasingly active in buying Western assets in the past year, often armed with cash piles from soaring oil prices and trade.

Several have participated in multi-billion-dollar capital infusions into banks such as Citigroup (C.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and UBS (UBSN.VX: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), which were reeling from losses from the collapse of the U.S. subprime mortgage market.

Goldman Sachs estimates U.S. and European banks may need a further capital infusion of more than $200 billion. Analysts say banks have already written off $400 billion in bad investments.

But the funds' growing clout has fuelled political concerns about foreign influence over domestic assets. That could spur protectionism, chilling the climate for foreign investment in the West even as the global economy slows, analysts say.

...more...

[UpInArms]

37. It's a recession: 75% of Americans say

http://money.cnn.com/2008/07/07/news/economy/recession_poll/index.htm

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Most Americans still think the economy is in a recession, but the number who feel that way has declined, according to a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll released Monday.

In a telephone poll of over 1,000 adult Americans, 75% said they believe the nation is now in a recession. That figure fell from 79% in April. In March 74% believed the U.S was in a recession.

This decline is the first time the number - which had been steadily rising since October - has fallen. Then, the poll showed only 46% thought the economy was in a recession.

"From a consumers's perspective, the economy is bad, and the environment is going to be tough for a while," said Wachovia economist Mark Vitner. "That's pretty accurate."

The traditional definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth. Though growth was sluggish in the last quarter of 2007 and the first quarter of 2008, the U.S. economy has not yet shown retraction in the current slowdown. The advance GDP numbers for the second quarter of 2008 are due to be released on July 31.

"Whether the economy technically meets the definition of a recession matters more for economists and policy makers than it does for consumers," said Vitner. "Consumers' frame of mind is pretty simple: it's a bad economy."

...more...

[TalkingDog]

50. It's only a Recession when that last 25% starts pissing and moaning.

Then, it's a Depression for the rest of us.

If I'm not mistaken, that 4% falls slightly outside the margin of error for the number polled. But only slightly

[Demeter]

59. That 25% Is Too Busy Phoning and Squeezing and Panicking to Piss and Moan

And in a complete state of shock, they don't react promptly to stimuli.

[DemReadingDU]

39. Fleckenstein: Global economy won't bail out the US

7/7/08 This nation is the world's biggest consumer, so a slowdown here means a slowdown everywhere. And there is no safe harbor -- not in tech nor in the media's market misconceptions. Bill Fleckenstein

some snippets...

There is no credence to the notion that "down 20% equals a bear market." (This is an urban legend, which I believe began somewhere on Bubblevision.) A 20% decline does not imply that we had a bear market and now it's over. This is just an expression of the bulls' desire to find a magic number, prompting cries of goodbye to all that.

Bear markets are periods when most stocks decline -- whether 18% or 40% -- and folks lose money. The size of the decline is not the arbiter of whether a bear market is under way. Before this bear market is over, the decline will be far worse than most think possible.

Finally, a word on the world of hurt known as the financial arena. "It's about to blow" is how a friend I've dubbed the "Lord of the Dark Matter" began a call to me last week. Behind the scenes, many parts of the credit/mortgage market were "offered only," with no buyers in sight for troubled loans. My friend said the problem had nothing to do with the end of the month or the end of the quarter. Instead, he believed it had to do with the enormous amount of inventory that would be looking for a home in the next quarter.

He said the equity market was "miles behind what was occurring in the mortgage-backed/credit markets." Though he noted that he'd said it before, he repeated: "It's never been this bad."

more...
http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Investing/ContrarianChronicles/GlobalEconomyWontBailOutTheUS.aspx

[Dr.Phool]

40. Looks like it's gonna be another one of them days.

15 minutes in, and it's been up 5, down 25, up 25.

Gotta run out for most of the day. Don't get seasick.

[antigop]

41. An indication of how "great" the economy is....

http://www.bizjournals.com/dallas/stories/2008/07/07/daily5.html

Pawn shop operator and short-term lender Cash America International Inc. said it believes its second-quarter earnings will come in well above its previous forecasts due to an increase in pawn loans and online cash advances.

The Fort Worth-based company said it now expects earnings for the quarter ended June 30 to reach 62 cents to 64 cents per share, up 44 percent from earnings of 43 cents per share in the year-ago period. In April, the company said it was expecting second-quarter earnings of 51 cents to 54 cents per share.

Cash America (NYSE: CSH) said its pawn lending business contributed to the higher-than-expected results as revenue from pawn loans and increased gross profit dollars on the sale of merchandise exceeded expectations. In addition, the company's online cash advance product experienced strong revenue growth and lower-than-expected loan losses.

[Pale Blue Dot]

42. Ameriprise buys Seligman

Ameriprise Financial will acquire J.&W. Seligman & Co. for $440 million, with the deal expected to close during the fourth quarter, reports Crain's Pensions & Investments.

Seligman has $18 billion in client money, of which $11 billion is retail, $4 billion institutional and $3 billion from alternatives, said Ameriprise spokesman Ryan S. Lund. At the end of March, RiverSource Investments, Ameriprise’s U.S. money management unit, was managing $146 billion in client assets, Mr. Lund said.

While the acquired firm will become a part of RiverSource Investments, its strategies will continue to use the Seligman brand name.

The purchase is a sign of Ameriprise’s commitment to the asset management business, Christopher P. Keating, director and head of institutional sales, client service and consultant relations for RiverSource, said in a telephone interview. The acquisition brings a number of strong teams and high-margin strategies to Ameriprise, Mr. Keating said, including the technology investment team led by Paul Wick, which manages $2 billion in hedge funds and more than $3 billion in retail strategies.

http://www.investmentnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080708/REG/585357424/-1/RSS02&rssfeed=RSS02

[Roland99]

47. 11:35am - Yay! Happy Day!

Dow 11,267.13 +35.17
Nasdaq 2,253.74 +10.42
S&P 500 1,253.93 +1.62
10 YR 3.90% -0.03
Oil $136.20 $-5.17
Gold $914.00 $-14.80

[UpInArms]

53. JPMorgan's Dimon says credit crisis could worsen

http://www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/idUSN0848258520080708?sp=true

ARLINGTON, Va, July 8 (Reuters) - JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) Chief Executive Jamie Dimon on Tuesday said simply because some problems in the credit markets have been resolved does not mean market conditions won't get worse.

"I do think we have some very serious issues to face," he said. "Things could actually get worse."

Dimon, speaking at a mortgage lending forum sponsored by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp, also said that investment banks should not be considered too big to fail and said the U.S. regulatory response to the credit crisis has been appropriate.

Dimon, whose bank is widely expected to acquire a U.S. regional bank, said an accounting rule requiring banks to mark assets to their current market value is a deterrent to merger activity.

FAS 157, as the rule is known, would force an acquirer to write down the value of assets from a target bank, even if those loans and securities were sound, to reflect current depressed market values. In some cases, Dimon said, a target bank could emerge with negative value under mark-to-market accounting, thereby forcing an acquirer to raise more capital.

...goes on to say that investments may fail and the government has to step in...

more of that privatizing the profits and socializing the risks shit

[TalkingDog]

56. FINNFAAAAAAAN !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What did you do?

Did you predict another wretched day for the Market?

Somebody is going to hire you on to make dire predictions every day.

Hope everyone is doing OK on the SMW.

Have fun.



TD

[Demeter]

58. I Expect Those 150+ Points Cost a Bundle of PPT Funds

The fundamentals certainly aren't there. Unless there was excitement over the dip in oil.

[skoalyman]

60. well oil fell seem like every time it sells off they pump it up even higher

the ole pump stretch and dump routine:puffpiece:

[UpInArms]

62. you're a

quick study, skoalyman!

:hi:

[skoalyman]

65. It was mostly an observation

I noticed it seem to go a little higher each time they dump it realistically there s got to be a cut off point somewhere at least I hope so.:hi: but I'm no economist so who knows lol:shrug:

[Pale Blue Dot]

64. I swear it wasn't me this time.

The economy just got completely fixed today - that's all.

:D

[UpInArms]

63. here's the end of the day party news: ponies for everybody and no bears allowed!

Dow 11,384.21 152.25 (1.36%)
Nasdaq 2,294.44 51.12 (2.28%)
S&P 500 1,273.70 21.39 (1.71%)
10-Yr Bond 3.88% 0.05

NYSE Volume 6,091,674,500
Nasdaq Volume 2,532,076,250

4:15 pm : The stock market rebounded Tuesday following a late session rally as financial stocks soared and crude prices plummeted. The S&P 500 rose 1.7%, with eight of the ten economic sectors advancing.

The financial sector spiked 5.7% in a rebound bid after falling 17% over the previous few weeks. Beaten-down names Freddie Mac (FRE 13.81, +1.90) and Fannie Mae (FNM 17.94, +2.20) showed significant strength. Fed Chairman Bernanke said the Fed is committed to financial stability, and may continue its emergency lending to investment banks through 2009.

Crude fell 3.8% to $135.99 per barrel, marking a two-day decline of 6.4%. Traders took profits on reports that Iran's president wants to avoid war with Israel and the United States. Commodities as a whole fell 2.4% as the dollar rose 0.5%.

The drop in crude prices lifted energy sensitive names, with transportation stocks climbing 5.0% and airlines gaining 11.2%. The consumer discretionary sector climbed 2.2%.

Conversely, the energy sector slipped 1.5% due to the decline in crude prices.

In corporate news, savings and loan company IndyMac Bancorp (IMB 0.44, -0.27) fell 38% after announcing that it could not successfully raise new capital, and that regulators said the firm is no longer well capitalized. IndyMac will no longer accept new loan submissions.

VMware (VMW 40.24, -12.95) plunged 24% to its lowest level since its August 2007 IPO after the company said it expects fiscal year 2008 revenue growth to be below prior guidance that called for more than 50% growth. The tech company also announced the departure of its president and CEO. EMC Corp (EMC 13.39, -1.75), which has a majority holding in VMware, fell on the news.

Office Depot (ODP 7.12, -3.29) announced that it expects second quarter North American retail same-store sales slipped 10% from last year, citing the sluggish economic environment. The company expects its earnings before interest and taxes margin to shrink by 2% more than previously forecast. Shares of Office Depot fell 32% on the announcement.

In economic news, the latest pending home sales data indicate that the home sales market is still weak, but is not deteriorating at the same rate we saw throughout 2007. According to the National Association of Realtors, May pending home sales fell 4.7%, which is slightly more than the expected decline of 2.8%. However, April was revised higher to a gain of 7.1% from a rise of 6.3%.DJ30 +152.25 NASDAQ +51.10 NQ100 +2.4% R2K +3.7% SP400 +2.2% SP500 +21.39 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 2025/2.48 bln/844 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 2149/1.72 bln/1031