What a week. It looked good in the beginning of the week. It looks really gloomy at the moment. I think correction were required. I just hope that it will be on the upside from next week. I bought some C and FNM shares. I hope these stocks will gain over the next few weeks. YGE, I just don’t know what this will do given the fact that Chinese government tighten up loaning procedures. The market seems to be correcting as the DOW is on a 3 day slide. I am hoping that it will soar back on Monday. I loaded some FNM, C and YGE shares which will pay off end of next week.
I ordered a steam bath from Steam Showers Inc. located in California. I am hoping that it will be at my house within 5 days. I am excited about it. I hope that it will be in a good temperature and insert enough steam.
It was a great weekend. I needed a good weekend to cheer up for the year. Malahat is feeling great and I hope that everything goes well with the pregnancy.
NEW YORK (AP) -- The stock market slumped Wednesday on concerns that tighter lending standards in China could endanger an economic recovery. Disappointing earnings results from IBM Corp. and Morgan Stanley added to the market's angst. At the same time, a spike in the dollar pushed commodity prices sharply lower, hurting stocks of energy companies and materials producers. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 190 points from a 15-month high, its biggest drop since Oct. 30. Demand for safe havens like government debt jumped, pushing yields lower in the Treasury market. Concerns grew that China's efforts to keep its economy under control could hurt a global recovery. A top banking regulator said Wednesday that China will tighten its monitoring of banks as it tries to prevent speculative bubbles in areas like real estate. It would be the latest effort by China to restrict runaway lending and cool that country's overheated growth. Stocks fell sharply last week after China tightened its monetary policy and boosted the amount banks must hold in reserve. Investors are worried about how badly a slowdown in China's huge economy would affect other countries. "The China news is a disappointment and a continuation of the trend," said Steven Goldman, chief market strategist at Weeden & Co. in Greenwich, Conn., referring to last week's moves. Meanwhile, IBM Corp. led the Dow industrials lower after the company's results, which many analysts praised, nonetheless disappointed investors who had hoped profits would be stronger. Banks posted mixed results. Bank of America Corp. reported better results and said credit conditions were improving, but also said the economic environment "remain fragile." Wells Fargo & Co. sounded an optimistic note on consumer resilience, but Morgan Stanley fell short of expectations.
- PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti – A powerful aftershock sent Haitians screaming into the streets on Wednesday, collapsing buildings, cracking roads and adding to the trauma of a nation stunned by an apocalyptic quake eight days ago. The magnitude-5.9 jolt matched the strongest of the aftershocks that have followed the huge quake of Jan. 12 that devastated Haiti's capital. The new temblor collapsed seven buildings in Petit-Goave, the seaside town closest to the epicenter, according to Mike Morton of the U.N. Disaster Assessment and Coordination agency, but there were no reports of people crushed or trapped, perhaps because the earlier quake frightened most people into sleeping outside. Wails of terror erupted in Port-au-Prince, where the aftershock briefly interrupted rescue efforts amid the broken concrete of collapsed buildings, and prompted doctors and patients to flee the University Hospital. Hundreds of thousands of Haitians remain homeless, hungry and in mourning — most still waiting for the benefits of a nearly $1 billion global aid campaign. At least one woman died of a heart attack in Port-au-Prince, according to Eddy Thomas, a private undertaker.
- WASHINGTON (AP) -- The housing market remains a significant risk to the economy, data Wednesday showed, as bad weather across much of the country hit the construction industry. The Commerce Department said construction of new homes and apartments fell 4 percent in December to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 557,000 from an upwardly revised 580,000 in November. Applications for future projects, however, increased strongly as the industry ramps up for the spring selling season. The results for new home construction were lower than the 580,000 forecast by economists surveyed by Thomson Reuters and were led by declines of 19 percent in the Northeast and Midwest. Construction fell 1 percent in the West, but rose more than 3 percent in the South. "Builders continue to be nervous about the employment situation and the number of foreclosures out there competing with them," said David Crowe, chief economist at the National Association of Home Builders. Another problem, Crowe noted, is that builders have seen their financing for new projects dry up steadily over the past 18 months. Applications for new building permits, a gauge of future activity, rose 11 percent to an annual rate of 653,000, a far stronger showing than economists had predicted and the highest level of activity since October 2008.
- NEW YORK (AP) -- Wells Fargo & Co. on Wednesday took a more optimistic view than other banks about the outlook for the loan business and the economy as it reported a surprise $394 million profit for the fourth quarter. The bank did say problems remain in lending portfolios and that another downturn in the economy would hurt profitability. But unlike the extremely cautious tone banks such as JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc. have taken in recent days, Wells Fargo provided a brighter picture for 2010. Mike Loughlin, Wells Fargo's chief credit and risk officer, said, "while losses remained elevated during the quarter as expected, a more favorable economic outlook and improved credit statistics in several portfolios further increase our confidence that our credit cycle is turning." Analysts weren't as sure about Wells Fargo's statements on a potential recovery. "I think it's still too early to make that prediction," said Adam Barkstrom, a managing director at Sterne Agee. Barkstrom said the bank is still highly exposed to risky mortgage markets like Florida and California. Economists and investors also have doubts about consumers' ability to pay their bills because many banks are still reporting a high number of loan defaults. But Wells Fargo said it was seeing improvement.
- NEW YORK (AP) -- Stocks traded mixed early Thursday as good news from several strong earnings reports was tempered by an unexpected jump in initial jobless claims. The Labor Department said workers filing for unemployment benefits for the first time rose by 36,000 to 482,000 last week. Economists polled by Thomson Reuters were expecting a small drop. The four-week average rose for the first time since August. The report provided a grim reminder that while the economy might have improved modestly, a robust recovery is unlikely until companies start adding jobs. The unemployment rate remained at 10 percent last month. The disappointing jobs report was offset partly by a batch of strong earnings reports. Xerox, UnitedHealth and Goldman Sachs were among big companies that posted better-than-expected fourth-quarter results. In the first hour of trading, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 31.36, or 0.3 percent, to 10,571.79. The broader Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 0.48, or less than 0.1 percent, to 1,137.56, and the Nasdaq composite index rose 7.33, or 0.3 percent, to 2,298.58. Stocks tumbled Wednesday as concern grew that China would move to curb rapid economic growth and the latest round of earnings failed to impress investors.
- NEW YORK (AP) -- Stocks traded mixed early Thursday as good news from several strong earnings reports was tempered by an unexpected jump in initial jobless claims. The Labor Department said workers filing for unemployment benefits for the first time rose by 36,000 to 482,000 last week. Economists polled by Thomson Reuters were expecting a small drop. The four-week average rose for the first time since August. The report provided a grim reminder that while the economy might have improved modestly, a robust recovery is unlikely until companies start adding jobs. The unemployment rate remained at 10 percent last month. The disappointing jobs report was offset partly by a batch of strong earnings reports. Xerox, UnitedHealth and Goldman Sachs were among big companies that posted better-than-expected fourth-quarter results. In the first hour of trading, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 31.36, or 0.3 percent, to 10,571.79. The broader Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 0.48, or less than 0.1 percent, to 1,137.56, and the Nasdaq composite index rose 7.33, or 0.3 percent, to 2,298.58. Stocks tumbled Wednesday as concern grew that China would move to curb rapid economic growth and the latest round of earnings failed to impress investors.
- PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti – Workers are carving out mass graves on a hillside north of Haiti's capital, using earth-movers to bury 10,000 earthquake victims in a single day while relief workers warn that people are still dying of their injuries. Medical clinics have 12-day patient backlogs, untreated injuries are festering and makeshift camps housing thousands of survivors could foster disease, experts said. "The next health risk could include outbreaks of diarrhea, respiratory tract infections and other diseases among hundreds of thousands of Haitians living in overcrowded camps with poor or nonexistent sanitation," said Dr. Greg Elder, deputy operations manager for Doctors Without Borders in Haiti. The death toll is estimated at 200,000, according to Haitian government figures relayed by the European Commission, with 80,000 buried in mass graves. The commission now estimates 2 million homeless, up from 1.5 million, and says 250,000 are in need of urgent aid. In the sparsely populated wasteland of Titanyen, north of Port-au-Prince, burial workers said the macabre task of handling the never-ending flow of bodies was traumatizing. "I have seen so many children, so many children. I cannot sleep at night and, if I do, it is a constant nightmare," said Foultone Fequiert, 38, his face covered with a T-shirt against the overwhelming stench. The dead stick out at all angles from the mass graves — tall mounds of chalky dirt, the limbs of men, women and children frozen together in death. "I received 10,000 bodies yesterday alone," said Fequiert. Workers say they have no time to give the dead proper religious burials or follow pleas from the international community that bodies be buried in shallow graves from which loved ones might eventually retrieve them.
- BRUSSELS – General Motor Co.'s Opel unit will cut 8,300 jobs across Europe, including 4,000 in Germany, and close a plant in Antwerp, Belgium — casualties of the "tough reality" of a shrinking European auto market. Opel head Nick Reilly said Thursday that the Antwerp plant had to go, with the loss of more than 2,300 jobs, because the company needs to shed 20 percent of its manufacturing capacity. That's because far fewer cars are being sold as a result of the recession. "We have to take a plant out and unfortunately it's Antwerp," Reilly said at a press conference in Brussels. "It is the tough reality of the current business environment." Reilly said the economic crisis means European car markers will likely sell 1.5 million fewer cars this year than in 2009 and 4 million fewer than in 2007. The GM cutbacks were a hard blow for the 2,600 Opel workers in Antwerp and the automotive supply companies that employ 10,000 workers. Werner Dillen, a trade union official, said the future "is not bright (but) we had been expecting that news for 12 months." When General Motors Co. planned to sell its European car making unit to Canada's Magna and Russia's Sberbank last year, the bidders said they would close Antwerp down. GM later decided not to sell its European business. German daily Welt reported Thursday that most of Antwerp's Astra production is to be transferred to the plant in Bochum, citing anonymous sources from the workers' council.
- BEIJING – China declared it is over the global crisis and signaled a shift in focus to controlling inflation, sparking concern it could hamper growth and the country's contribution to a worldwide rebound. Economic growth accelerated to 10.7 percent in the final quarter of 2009, the government said Thursday, beating most forecasts and driving the full-year expansion to 8.7 percent. But inflation also picked up, driven by a jump in food costs amid a torrent of stimulus spending and bank lending. The strong numbers keep China on a course to replace Japan sometime later this year as the world's second-largest economy after the U.S. Chinese leaders say the fiscal largesse will continue this year but have ordered banks to curb credit after a surge in 2009 to a record 9.5 trillion yuan ($1.39 trillion) in new loans. They worry that reckless lending has fueled overinvestment in some industries such as steel and cement and a possible bubble in stock and real estate prices, which are up sharply. Most Asian stock markets dropped as investors worried whether Beijing can prevent overheating without hurting recovery in what is now the world's third-largest economy. Hong Kong's main index lost 2 percent. "The Chinese authorities seem to be juggling knives at this juncture. Let's hope they don't cut themselves or drop the knives on the audience," said Thomas Lam, chief economist at financial services firm OSK-DMG in Singapore. A solid Chinese recovery could help to drive a global rebound by boosting demand for imported oil, industrial raw materials and consumer goods. But inflation could disrupt that by eroding consumer spending power and pushing up the price of China's exports, hurting sales and demand for imports used to produce them — factory machinery from the United States, Germany and Japan or iron ore from Australia. "We need to prevent overly fast price increases and closely watch the trend in consumer inflation," said Ma Jiantong, commissioner of the National Bureau of Statistics, at a news conference. Inflation is politically sensitive in China, where it can erode the rising living standards that underpin the ruling Communist Party's claim to power. Analysts said they expect Beijing to take new steps to control credit through tighter restrictions on lending and ordering banks to set aside still more reserves following an increase last week.
- NEW YORK (AP) -- Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said Thursday it earned $4.79 billion in the fourth quarter as the bank cut back on compensation and its trading business again outdistanced the rest of the financial industry. The company rewarded its employees with $16.2 billion in salaries and bonuses for 2009, up 47 percent from the previous year but still lower than many had expected. Compensation accounted for 36 percent of Goldman's $45.17 billion in 2009 revenue, the lowest annual ratio ever for the company. In 2008, Goldman set aside 48 percent of its revenue to pay employees. The pullback in pay helped the bank easily top analysts' earnings estimates. Goldman earned $8.20 a share in the last three months of the year, well above the $5.20 a share expected by analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters. Trading of fixed income, commodities and currencies buoyed Goldman's profits for the third straight quarter. The bank also reported higher fees from underwriting stock and debt offerings. Its shares initially rose but pulled back in midmorning trading, falling $2.99, or 1.78 percent, to $164.80. Goldman, which has outperformed other financial companies for years, has been the strongest bank throughout the financial crisis. It had less exposure to toxic mortgage-backed securities than other companies and also has been more aggressive in its trading. For the full year, Goldman earned $13.4 billion, almost as much as the $15 billion earned by the five other big national banks combined. 2009 was a difficult year for the banking industry, as companies with big lending operations lost money in those businesses. JPMorgan Chase & Co., earned $11.73 billion for the year on the strength of its investment banking business, and Wells Fargo & Co. turned a $7.99 billion profit. But Citigroup Inc. and Bank of America Corp. lost a combined $3.81 billion. And Morgan Stanley, whose problems have been attributed in part to a lack of aggressiveness in its trading business, lost $907 million.
- NEW YORK – Toyota said Thursday it is recalling 2.3 million vehicles in the U.S. to fix accelerator pedals that can become stuck, the latest in a string of quality problems that have bedeviled the Japanese automaker. The recall affects the 2009-2010 RAV4, the 2009-2010 Corolla, the 2009-2010 Matrix, the 2005-2010 Avalon, the 2007-2010 Camry, the 2010 Highlander, the 2007-2010 Tundra and the 2008-2010 Sequoia. The latest move comes just months after Toyota Motor Corp. recalled 4.2 million vehicles over concerns that accelerator pedals could become lodged under floor mats, causing sudden acceleration. That problem was blamed for several crashes, including an accident involving a Lexus that accelerated to more than 120 mph before crashing in San Diego, killing four people. But Toyota said Thursday's recall is due to potential problems with the actual gas pedal mechanism, causing the accelerator to become stuck regardless of whether the vehicle contains a floor mat. Toyota said in certain rare cases, the gas pedal mechanism wears down, causing the accelerator to become harder to press, slower to return or, in some cases, stuck.
- BEIJING – Beijing issued a stinging response Friday to Hillary Rodham Clinton's criticism that it is jamming the free flow of words and ideas on the Internet, accusing the United States of damaging relations between the two countries by imposing its "information imperialism" on China. Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu defended China's policies regarding the Web, saying the nation's Internet regulations were in line with Chinese law and did not hamper the cyber activities of the world's largest online population. His remarks follow those made by the U.S. ecretary of state, who in a speech Thursday criticized countries engaging in cyberspace censorship, and urged China to investigate computer attacks against Google. "Regarding comments that contradict facts and harm China-U.S. relations, we are firmly opposed," Ma said in a statement posted Friday on the ministry's Web site. "We urge the U.S. side to respect facts and stop using the so-called freedom of the Internet to make unjustified accusations against China." In her speech in Washington, Clinton cited China as among a number of countries where there has been "a spike in threats to the free flow of information" over the past year. She also named Tunisia, Uzbekistan, Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam.
- BAGHDAD – Suicide bombers struck near three hotels popular with Western journalists and businessmen Monday just as Iraq announced the execution of Saddam Hussein's notorious cousin known as "Chemical Ali." At least 37 people were killed and more than 104 injured, security officials said. The blasts — coming in a span of about 15 minutes in downtown Baghdad — came shortly before state television announced that Ali Hassan al-Majid had been hanged. There was no claim of responsibility for the latest major attacks in Baghdad — about six weeks after a series of blasts killed 127 and brought outcry against Iraq's government for repeated security lapses as U.S. troops withdraw. Government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said the latest bombings "represent an extension" of the activities of insurgents linked to Saddam's regime. But he stopped short of declaring the blast as possible revenge for the execution. The first explosion struck at about 3:40 p.m. local time in the parking lot of the Sheraton Hotel, toppling high concrete blast walls protecting the site and damaging a number of buildings along the Abu Nawas esplanade across the Tigris River from the Green Zone.
No comments:
Post a Comment