November 23, 2010 posts

Business / Economic / Financial

[ This link to a somewhat more cumulative blog posts page will precede current days news since most all topics remain current in terms of impact and longer-term effect and can be searched by topical index term more easily. The same is provided since the blog site http://alpeiablog.blogspot.com has just been censored as to size by google which is typical for google as nsa / cia / gov’t shill as more are becoming aware of. The same is true for microsoft, another co. that’s seen their best days and relies on the government to maintain their monopoly. Up to now the better page http://www.scribd.com/alpeia is provided for ease of formatting and clarity thereby while the Washington Post page is the real deal but without formatting http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/community/mypost/index.html?plckPersonaPage=PersonaComments&plckUserId=alpeia&newspaperUserId=alpeia ]

The 17 Things Worrying Investors This Week Lloyd's Wall of Worry

Week of November 22-26
Worry Count: 17


CHINA: 1,330,044,605 people can’t be wrong.

The PIIGS: Fasten your seatbelts. It’s gonna be a long, bumpy, expensive, weird, (insert your own adjective here) freak show of a ride.

CALIFORNIA AND THE OTHER 49 STATES: Not yet as dire as “The PIIGS”. Might I suggest the classier moniker of “The Prosciuttos” for the American basket-case states?

QE II: Gobble?

U.S. ECONOMY: The “Punky Brewster” of the global economic landscape.

UNEMPLOYMENT: Only thing worse than losing your job, losing your unemployment check. At least there’s the holiday season to cheer everyone up (read: heavy sarcasm).

TAXES: Praying to the Financial Market Gods that we don’t have another TARP-like vote fiasco.

OBAMA ADMINISTRATION PART II: Still two years before the Pres. election and the peanut gallery is already pleading for a Hail Mary Pass to get them back in the game.

HFT: Instead of beating up these liquidity supplying traders, let’s honor them with their very own stock exchange. But wait -- with no retail saps to pick-off they will never get that Day 1 opening bell tick. Perfect.

XMAS 2010: As my professor friend Nick says, “Nowadays Americans are dining off of two menus – The Million Dollar and the $0.99 Cent.” And both are pissed about it.

CURRENCIES: Poor Mr. Greenback. Does someone need a hug?

HOUSING CRISIS: Price Stabilization – Are we there yet? Just a little bit more. Are we there yet? Just a little bit more. Are we there yet? Just a little bit more….

INFLATION/DEFLATION: Fed Chief Ben B. comes out swinging from his heels in defense of inflation promotion. Don’t punch yourself out as this one is likely to go the distance.

COMMODITIES: Corrected but still sky high; fortunately these prices are only affecting core, basic, life-sustaining necessities and sparing our electronic gadgets and plus-sized SUVs. Whew!

INSIDER TRADING: Another black eye for Hedge Funds. I estimate that makes black eye number 6,597.

INTEREST RATES: South Korea and China slowly turning up the dial to “11”. On the other hand the U.S. has removed the dial altogether. This never ends well….

NORTH KOREA: Here we go again.

Mom: “Honey I thought you were going to raise their allowance?”
Dad: “I did. But they’re a year older and they want more now.”
Mom: “Kids nowadays!”

Stocks Sharply Lower Today as Fed Minutes Aggravate Negative Global Factors Midnight Trader 4:14 PM, Nov 23, 2010 -- '

* NYSE down 139.58 (-1.83%) to 7,470.72

* DJIA down 142.21 (-1.27%) to 11,036

* S&P 500 down 17.11 (-1.43%) to 1,181

* Nasdaq down 37.07 (-1.46%) to 2,495

GLOBAL SENTIMENT

* Hang Seng down 2.67%

* Nikkei up 0.93%

* FTSE down 1.8%

UPSIDE MOVERS

(+) JCG sold to private equity firms.

(+) HPQ beat with results and raised guidance last night.

(+) BWS beat with Q3 results.

DOWNSIDE MOVERS

(-) CBRL beat with earnings, backs outlook.

(-) BRCD turned lower in evening action, falling this morning despite earnings beat.

(-) LTXC misses with sales, guides below Street view.

(-) PSUN continues evening decline that followed Q3 beat but a mixed outlook.

(-) DYN among early actives as company begins strategic alternatives process.

(-) ZLC loss widens.

(-) CPB misses with earnings.

(-) ADI reverses modest evening gain that followed earnings beat, in-line guidance.

(-) RBS upgraded on valuation.

MARKET DIRECTION

Stock averages end sharply lower, suffering in the wake of an intensifying North and South Korea conflict and continued worries over euro-zone debt. Those developments greatly overshadowed some upbeat U.S. economic data issued earlier Tuesday.

South Korea warned North Korea of "enormous retaliation" if it took more aggressive steps after Pyongyang fired scores of artillery shells at a South Korean island, in one of the heaviest attacks on its neighbor since the Korean War ended in 1953, Reuters reported.

The European Union urged Ireland to adopt an austerity budget on time to unlock promised EU/IMF funding, while Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen rebuffed calls for a snap election and insisted the budget would go ahead as planned on December 7.

Gold gained amid the South Korean tensions. The euro hit a two-month low against the dollar. U.S. oil futures prices fell 0.6% to settle at $81.27 a barrel. Energy shares were among the leading decliners.

U.S. stocks extended losses in afternoon trading upon release of Federal Reserve meeting minutes. Central bank officials downgraded their assessment of the U.S. economy at their last meeting three weeks ago. The Fed expects the economy to grow at a moderate pace next year, with unemployment staying high and inflation uncomfortably low.

Members revealed their preference for a go-slow approach to bond buying.

"Participants generally agreed that large adjustments had been appropriate when economic activity was declining sharply in response to the financial crisis. In current circumstances, however, most saw advantages to a more incremental approach that would involve smaller changes in the Committee's holdings of securities calibrated to incoming data," the minutes said, largely adopting arguments advanced by St. Louis Fed President James Bullard.

The Fed also released the minutes of its regularly scheduled meeting on Nov. 2-3, showing a committee at odds over the Fed's $600 billion bond-buying plan despite a convincing 10-to-1 pro-vote. Several members of the FOMC saw a risk of higher inflation from the bond-buying plan. Some were concerned about the impact of the plan on the dollar's value in foreign exchange markets.

Earlier in the day, government data showed gross domestic product rose 2.5% in July through September, up from its initial estimate of 2.0% growth in the third quarter. Economists were expecting GDP would be revised up to show a 2.4% growth rate.

Existing home sales slipped 2.2% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.43 million in October, worse than economists were expecting. The decline comes after two months of increases.

The broader market gained little traction from deal news. J. Crew (JCG) jumped 16% as private-equity firms TPG Capital and Leonard Green & Partners agreed to acquire the clothing retailer for $43.50 a share in cash, or about $3 billion.

Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) was up 1.6% late in the day, a rare gainer, after it beat with earnings and raised guidance in a report issued late Monday.’

[video] Teddy Weisberg: No Positives for Market NEW YORK (TheStreet) - - Teddy Weisberg of Seaport Securities is bearish on the direction of the market.

Unintended Consequences of Bernanke's QE2 Simon Maierhofer, On Tuesday November 23, 2010, 12:34 pm EST

In the mid-2000s, Alan Greenspan was the hero of the financial world. With his blunt philosophy of inflation, Greenspan was credited for turning the tech-bust into a real estate and financial boom.Following the 2008/2009 meltdown, Greenspan morphed from hero to scapegoat (or for Thanksgiving aficionados; turkey to feather duster). Another Turkey to Feather Duster Roundtrip?Bernanke carried on the torch of fearless Keynesian Fed Presidents and made it on the cover of Time magazine within his first term. Much ink has been spilled about the effects and side effects of quantitative easing in general and QE2 in particular (click here if you care to read my two cents worth). Actions speak louder than words, and the initial reaction by stocks and commodities has been net-positive (at least when going back to the initial announcement), which is exactly what the financial alchemists in Washington wanted to see; but, what about the economy or the unemployed? Obviously, that's only a secondary concern.According to Bernanke (quoted in the Washington Post), inflating stock prices is the golden grail of today's monetary policy: 'Higher stock prices will boost consumer wealth and help increase confidence, which can also spur spending. Increased spending will lead to higher incomes and profits that, in a virtuous circle, will further support economic expansion.'

QE2 - UNFAIR FOR MANY REASONS

Perhaps it's been lost to Mr. Bernanke that the Fed actively inflating asset prices has a number of unfair side effects.

1) Wall Street banksters' get to profit from their mistakes that led to the sub-prime debacle.

2) Retail investors have been withdrawing money from mutual funds for two years. The effect of higher stock prices is lost to many.

3) Artificially depressing interest rates takes away wealth from savers and distributes it to borrowers. Who are today's savers? Retirees and near-retirees. In fact, this group accounts for more individuals (and lost spending power) than ever before.

WHAT EFFECT HAS THE FEDERAL RESERVE'S MONETARY POLICY HAD ON JOBLESS AMERICANS? LET'S EXAMINE THE FACTS:

August 2007: Fed lowered discount rate, unemployment rate at 4.7%

December 2008: Fed reduced rates to just north of zero, unemployment rate at 7.4%.

March 2009: Fed launches QE1, unemployment rate at 8.6%.

November 2010: Fed launches QE2, unemployment rate at 9.6%.

MAKING THE RICH RICHER AND THE POOR POORER

While large cap (NYSEArca: IVV - News), mid cap (NYSEArca: MDY - News), small cap (NYSEArca: IWM - News), international (NYSEArca: EFA - News), emerging market stocks (NYSEArca: EEM - News) and commodities are brewing their own Fed sponsored bubble, the jobless are left in the dust. Would there have been anyway to help them?

Our infrastructure (streets and bridges) is literally rotting away beneath our tires. $600 billion (as in $600 billion QE2) would have been enough money to employ 4 million construction workers at $75,000/year for two years.

Going this route would provide jobs for the hardest hit sector, increase morale and social status and distribute money to the consumer so he can do what he does best - consume. The labor cost of such an infrastructure repair program would be far less than $600 billion because the government wouldn't have to pay unemployment benefits to Americans who could be employed.

GOING THE JAPAN ROUTE

The United States' current predicament is not unique, it happened before. Not in the U.S., but in Japan (NYSEArca: EWJ - News). Following a late 1980s real estate bust, Japan's Nikkei has gone nowhere but down (aside from counter trend rallies, some massive, but nonetheless trumped by the bear market).

The chart below illustrates Japan's pain. The April 2010 ETF Profit Strategy Newsletter, includes an in-depth analysis of the similarities between the two scenarios.

One of the few differences is that Japan's breakdown occurred amidst a roaring global bull market. The U.S. bear market isn't that lucky, as it parallels an escalating European debt crisis and, therefore, should be swifter and ultimately more pronounced.

DON'T COUNT YOUR CHICKENS BEFORE THEY HATCH

If there's only one sentence you take away from this article, let it be this: Things change fast. If you wish, you may add a second: Bear markets work much faster than bull markets.

Momentum is a strong force. Upside momentum breeds optimism which eventually culminates at optimistic extremes. A few days before the April decline, the ETF Profit Strategy Newsletter noted that the: 'message conveyed by the composite bullishness is unmistakably bearish.'

A more recent example of bear market forces taking hold can be found in the municipal bond market. For over two years, muni bonds have been quenching the thirst of yield hungry investors.

On July 8, the ETF Profit Strategy Newsletter observed: 'Predicting the location of the next credit crisis isn't easy by virtue of the fact that there are so many darn cracks everywhere. Nevertheless, the $2.8 trillion municipal bond market looks especially ripe for disaster.'

On August 26 - the very day muni bonds and 30-year Treasury Bonds (NYSEArca: TLT - News) peaked - the ETF Profit Strategy Newsletter followed up the initial red flag with this word of advice: 'Our technical analysis along with fundamentals suggest that T-Bonds are getting ready to roll over. A look at the overall picture suggests that this is more than just a minor correction. The rally in municipal, corporate and high yield bonds is showing signs of weakness too. Investors should start exiting from those markets.'

The chart of the iShares S&P National Muni Bond ETF (NYSEArca: MUB - News) below shows that MUB lost nearly two years worth of gains within a matter of weeks.

DON'T DISCOUNT THE RIPPLE EFFECT

Thus far, the major indexes a la Dow Jones (DJI: ^DJI), S&P (SNP: ^GSPC) and Nasdaq (Nasdaq: ^IXIC) have largely resisted that drag. But a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.

At its most recent earnings disappointment, Cisco CEO Chambers disclosed that weak sales to the government and state sector contributed to weak earnings. The government sector accounts for 13% of spending on goods and services.

It's probably just a matter of time until this weakness affects the tech (NYSEArca: XLK - News), and by extension the consumer discretionary (NYSEArca: XLY - News) sectors; especially since earnings for 2011 are expected to clock in at an all-time high (no, that's not a typo, check Standard and Poor's earnings estimates).

For right now, the straws (fundamental problems) are piling up on the camel's back (stock market), until the last straw breaks his back. My personal guess is that the insanity will go on a bit longer, but as we've seen in 2000, 2007, 2010 and the above MUB chart, the power of the last straw can bring the camel to its knees in a hurry.

Unlike Wall Street and the financial media, the ETF Profit Strategy Newsletter doesn't simply ignore red flags, but tries to identify Trojan-Horse-like asset classes before they enter and destroy your portfolio. Semi-weekly updates continually monitor major asset classes and provide invaluable support and resistance levels.

Fred Carstensen: We're in for a Lost Decade Levy ‘Economist Fred Carstensen is a professor of economics at the University of Connecticut and executive director of the university's Center for Economic Analysis.

H.L.: What do you predict is the real effect of the Federal Reserve’s plan to buy $600 billion worth of Treasurys – and what do you think of Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke’s defense of the move against other countries’ negative reactions?

F.C.: It’s exactly what the late economist Milton Friedman, the great guru of conservative economic thought, would want him to do. There’s no question that it’s the right strategy, and there’s no question that it’s actually working. The American stock market is up 14 percent since Bernanke announced in August that he would do this. And it’s gotten investors to switch from government debt to equities. Household wealth has increased $1.3 trillion as a consequence, and households feeling somewhat wealthier will consume somewhat more.

The hope is that the shift in investments will also help convince companies to expand. So insofar as the Fed police can actually influence financial markets, it’s worked.

But there are two issues: First, it may not be large enough to really have a sufficient impact on economic performance. Second, monetary policy is like pushing on a string, because ultimately businesses respond to demand not supply. So, Bernanke has successfully improved the supply of credit, but American demand is still very weak. In fact, some significant share of the benefits from the policy flow out of the country and flow abroad. And because so much of what we consume is imported, it increases capital exports to China, Viet Nam, South Korea, and Germany and increases imports of merchandise, and those two processes tend to drive the value of the dollar down. It diminishes the demand for dollars and increases the demand for foreign currencies, because when you invest in China you have to convert your dollars into Chinese currency. The consequence is the demand for dollar falls. That’s why foreign countries are complaining about this, because it’s working. Meanwhile, the foreign countries that I mentioned are pursuing dynamic economic development strategies, improving their workforce, investing in education, investing in infrastructure. The U.S. is pursuing none of these strategies in any coherent way.

But let’s get this into perspective. The depreciation of the dollar is much, much less than the depreciation that occurred during the Bush administration. There is no historical basis on which to complain about the change in the value of the American dollar or about the Fed’s policies by other countries or by the Republicans who are criticizing it and asking that it be stopped. The only reason they would want it stopped is because they want to thwart economic recovery. I do mean that the only motivation that I can understand is they want to thwart recovery. But the data demonstrate that the policy has been successful, but in a large sense, the policy has not and will not improve American economic performance.

H.L.: Where is the U.S. economy headed?

F.C: In general, the economy is going to grow at an anemic pace, and as a consequence it will generate relatively few new jobs. We will therefore continue to have relatively high unemployment rates for several years. I don’t see how we’re going to get unemployment rates below 8 to 10 percent in the foreseeable future. I don’t see where the job creation is going to come from.

Most forecasters have downgraded their projections for U.S. economic growth for the next two or three years from a range of 2.5 to 3 percent growth down to 2 to 2.3 percent annually. That is such a slow growth rate it will create very few jobs. We will not get a job recovery in the near future, and we are not making the kinds of strategic investments that are likely to strengthen our economic performance further out. Frankly, I think we’re in for a lost decade. I can easily see us limping along through the entire decade.

H.L.: What’s going to change it?

F.C.: It’s just a matter of effective political leadership and getting the people to understand the kind of perverse policies that we’re currently pursuing. There’s a huge mythology that’s been out there over the last 30 years that government doesn’t do anything useful, Yet it’s public-sector investment in human capital and infrastructure that is at the heart of America’s historic economic success and it is precisely the strategy that these competitive economies are now pursuing. India and China are in fact making massive investments in education, rfeserach and development, and infrastructure. It is making them progressively more competitive, even as America becomes less competitive.

H.L.: Is the economy threatened by deflation -- the downward cycle of prices, leading to lower profits, then lower wages, then fewer new jobs, and more layoffs -- that feeds on itself, drains the economy, and keeps it flaccid?

F.C.: No. There is some small threat of deflation, but the Federal Reserve is going to do everything imaginable to prevent that from happening. If we got into a deflationary cycle it would be extraordinarily destructive.

H.L.: Will the resurgent Republicans solve our economic problems with the plans they’ve announced, or will their goal of blocking all Democratic initiatives paralyze the economy and the nation even more than they already are?

F.C.: Yes. I have seen nothing in the Republican proposals that suggest anything, any strategies or initiatives that would help to drive economic recovery. They talk about budget cuts. Well, budget cuts are going to reduce the number of people who are employed, reduce the demand for goods and services, so inherently what the core set of proposals that Republicans seem to be committed to enacting would clearly be a drag on the national economy.

H.L.: So you seem to think that the deficit hawks are wrong in their approach to healing the economy?

F.C.: Reducing the deficit in the short term in the face of a weakening economy inevitably weakens the economy further. That’s simply basic economic analysis that has nothing to do with ideology.

H.L.: Should all the Bush tax cuts be extended or just those for people earning less than $250,000 a year?

F.C.: Keep them, kill them, it won’t make much difference either way. The reason is that the Bush tax cuts themselves delivered very little benefit to the American economy. Following the Bush tax cuts we had the lowest level of business investment in 50 years. We had a very weak job recovery. The benefits of the Bush tax cuts both in consumption and in investment largely flowed out of the country. They benefited the global economy. They did not benefit the American economy. We import our consumption goods and the attractive investments are in emerging markets, so the money did not stay here.’

Tumbling Tuesday - China Korea and Europe, Oh My! Davis ‘Man was yesterday silly! We ran with some upside plays out of the box but they died by 10:10. I called the top at 10:12 when I pointed out to Members that 2,530 was Friday’s top-out on the Nas and 2,532 was resistance going back to the Friday before. By 10:54, the Nasdaq was back down to 2,515 and I said to Members:

Wow, that turned fast! What a joke that the Nas can pop from 2,500 to 2,530 in 30 mins and then all the way back down 30 mins later – as I said this morning – an untradable market unless you are a real cowboy day-trader.

Of course we are cowboy day traders, and mega kudos to JRW, who called a move into TZA at $20.06 and a move out at $20.84 (4%) at 1pm. My own 1:31 note to Members was: "Volume died at 77M on the Dow at 1:27, only 50M since 10am so very slow at the moment, which means we could start heading up again." And, of course, we did! At 1:57, I added: "Meanwhile, Nas looks like it’s going to make another run back to 2,532 – just to make sure it’s totally obvious what a farce this market is…"

Of course, at PSW, we don’t care IF the market is fixed as long as know HOW it’s fixed so we can play along at home. As the Nas headed back to our 2,532 target (where they closed exactly for the day), we added the weekly QQQQ $53 puts at .45, which was a play I called at 3:01 in Member Chat, while the puts were still selling for .55 – that's how fixed the market is – we know option prices an hour in advance!

Speaking of fixed markets, the image above right is from Bess Levin’s well-titled "Insider Trading Festivus 2010" in which she suggests sending FBI strip-o-grams to the evil hedge fund of your choice "just to f*ck with them!" Bess cautions fund managers not to assume that all FBI agents bursting through their doors are strippers as that can lead to some very awkward moments…

Meanwhile, it’s a Festivus for the rest of us (who are short) as the markets roll back over. Of course, yesterday’s insane market moves served to reinforce our "take the money and run" sentiment as we got a drop on the Dow all the way to 11,060 at 12:48 yet the Dow recovered 120 points into the close on weak volume that gave us the cue to move in short – despite our bullish expectations for HP (HPQ) earnings (we sold puts earlier in the session).

The Nikkei was up 1% this morning but the rest of Asia had a rotten day with the Hang Seng falling 627 points (2.67%) and the Shanghai off 56 points (2%) and the BSE down 265 points (1.33%). This knocked the FXI below support and down to the 22 DMA at 42.67 (see David Fry’s chart) and breaking that would be – bad. China is experiencing runaway inflation and Wen Jiabao’s price controls are doing nothing to rein in the 54% increase in the money supply over the past two years – an amount our own Fed calls "a good start."

Bloomberg has an article today with this little anecdote:

Standing near his 12-table noodle shop on Beijing’s Yonghegong Avenue, owner Liu Heliang says meat and vegetable prices have climbed 10 percent in a year and staff wages are up 40 percent.

“I’m struggling to make ends meet with costs going up like this,” said Liu, a native of Sichuan province who pays his workers as much as 1,800 yuan ($271) a month, or 88 percent more than the Beijing minimum wage, to serve up a staple Chinese meal. “Raising prices is the only way out,” he said, predicting he won’t be able to hold out beyond two months.

I mean, really people, how is a man supposed to run a successful business when he is forced to pay his workers close to $10 a day?!? This is why we must protect the business owners in this country before our own workers start getting funny ideas about being able to afford to eat the food they serve or buy the things they make ... This is a great example of why China’s growth is unsustainable. Just the way Egypt’s growth was unsustainable 3,000 years ago because it was based on slavery, China’s growth also reaches a breaking point if the workers are no longer willing to accept their lot in life.

Paying a worker $271 a month (and that dollar matters when it’s only $271!) for 160 hours of work (and you know it’s more than that) is $1.70 per hour or about what I made as a busboy in 1976, when my plan was to buy a brand new VW Beetle for $1,999. That’s why Tata motors has cars for $2,499 – that’s what the market will bear over there! Of course, in 1976 gas was $1 per gallon and we’d put 6 kids in that VW and $1 each would get us to the shore and back and another Dollar would pay for lunch so I was happy to work one hour to pay for a day off and save the rest. Modern workers are not so lucky as they work all 40 hours of the week just to buy necessities and spend their free time praying nothing happens that will force them to borrow money.

“They are just not addressing the fundamental problem at all,” said Patrick Chovanec, an associate professor at Beijing’s Tsinghua University. With the expansion of credit and cash in the economy stemming from China’s response to the global crisis, “you’re sitting on a volcano,” he said. China’s plans to rein in prices include selling state food reserves, stabilizing the cost of natural gas and cracking down on speculation in and hoarding of agricultural products, the State Council said. The aim is to damp food inflation that reached 10 percent in October, more than twice the 4.4 percent headline rate.

If you think you don’t have to worry about whether or not Chinese workers can afford a Big Mac, think again. The myth of infinite Chinese demand is what’s spurring the speculative rally in America. Since the people PHYSICALLY cannot afford price increases, margins are being squeezed and sales are dropping fast. Bloomberg points to another example of an apple seller whose prices went up 60% which led directly to a 60% drop in sales – all this is right on the money with my call on the 2010 outlook I made last year – it’s "A Tale of Two Economies" and the wealthy investing class simply does not see (or does not want to see) the abject suffering of the working class – whether it’s Chinese or US workers, as the situation reaches a breaking point.

Even the mighty US consumers are nearing the breaking point with just 15.7% of holiday shopping completed by the week ending Nov. 14th compared to 20.5% at this time last year and 28.3% in 2008 – the last year we had a "healthy" economy and when 10M more people had jobs and 4M more families had homes to put a Christmas tree up in.

Food companies are still reeling from lower sales volumes that began in 2008 with what some dub "pantry deloading." Over the past two years, the number of items kept in American pantries has fallen about 20%, according to a recent SymphonyIRI survey. Consumers are also cutting back on the range of goods they stock. The average household had 369 unique items in its medicine cabinets, pantries and cosmetics bags this year, compared with 404 in 2006, the survey found.

[chart]

We’re going to run our annual PSW Holiday Shopping Survey this weekend so our Members can give us their observations of Black Fridays from around the nation. Our holiday surveys have been excellent predictors in the past so I look forward to this year’s results! The Government revised GDP UP this morning, to 2.5% in Q3 from 2% originally estimated. That’s a nice 50% improvement over Q2′s 1.7%, although we still have 9.6% official unemployment but I guess those bums weren’t shopping anyway. A big contributor to GDP was a 28.2% boost in year over year profits in the Financial Sector, which is about 20% of the S&P these days. Thank goodness for that as we were sure worried about our Bankster buddies in this rough economy!

openingimageFed Minutes are out at 2 pm and we can expect the Fed to lower their forecasts, despite the GDP. They have to do this to justify QE2, of course, as "The Bernank" does whatever it takes to distract you from what’s really happening.

Ireland is NOT "fixed." As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, they are two weeks away from a budget vote and, if they can’t agree on the loan terms that are being shoved down their throats – we could be right back to chaos over there. Now that Ireland does appear to have a lifeline, the sharks have moved on to surround Portugal, Italy and Spain, with Antonio Garcia Pascual, chief southern European economist at Barclays Capital in London, saying “Spain is bit too big to be bailed out, the size of a rescue required would use up all the funds available and then you have Italy with contagion as well,” prompting “a situation where the euro itself is put into question.”

So happy Tuesday to you and GOOD LUCK – we’re going to need it to get through this mess! We’ll be watching our 10% lines and taking the money and running on our short plays because we don’t really have the volume for a proper breakdown just yet but the trend is no longer the friend of the bulls who need to do more than last minute stick-saves to turn things around at this point.

Things should be interesting this afternoon with the Fed Minutes and, for the morning, we’ll be looking to hold the floor we established last Thursday and Friday at Dow 11,120 (already lost), S&P 1,185 (already lost), Nasdaq 2,500 (holding), NYSE 7,550 (oops again), and Russell 715 (holding). If those break down, we’ve got a clean shot for another 2.5% drop below those lines and that’s going to make for a very worried Thanksgiving for those who ignored my cash calls of the past month.’

Why Ben Bernanke Is Wrong Rein This column originally appeared in Forbes [ ‘… In other words, he wants simply to reinflate the bubble that caused our problems in the first place. Soaring equity prices won't increase confidence until more jobs are created. It will only postpone the day of reckoning…’ ]

‘I have a childhood friend named Johnny. Our families used to vacation together. By high school we had grown apart, as Johnny got into drinking and pot. He dropped out of school and graduated to hard drugs and who knows what else. By the time he reached his 20s, he was a total mess. Out of love, his parents vainly doled out money and vacations to him. No matter how well-intentioned they were, his parents basically enabled him. Johnny got worse and worse. Nothing worked until one day they kicked him to the curb and said "we love you but we won't give you any more money.' The next few years were torture for both Johnny and his parents. He would disappear for months at a time, occasionally showing up gaunt and ragged. Fortunately, he is now getting rid of his internal demons, off drugs, back in school and living at home. Like Johnny's parents, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is misguided with his $600 billion "QE2" quantitative easing. He is continuing to enable America's addiction to debt without addressing America's internal structural problems. As I said on Bloomberg TV in an appearance last week, America is addicted to debt the way a drug addict is addicted to heroin. Bernanke needs to cut off the money supply, as Johnny's parents did, and have the U.S. go through very painful restructuring for three to five years. Otherwise America will never get better. With QE2, Bernanke is copying the mistakes Japan made over the past two decades trying to move beyond its stagnation. Like the U.S. now, Japan lowered interest rates nearly to zero and invested in infrastructure. Those policies led to drawn-out stagnation with entire industries and towns dependent on handouts. The same will happen to America if Bernanke continues to pump liquidity into the system. Why? Low interest rates and an increased money supply are worthless tools if companies don't think there are ways to make money. More than a trillion dollars sits on the books of America's largest companies in reserves for a rainy day, because they are scared about the future. It is true that when credit markets don't work a short-term money infusion is needed (as was done with the Trouble Asset Relief Program in 2008), but continuing to throw money at those problems nearly three years after the recession started in the hope that something will finally stick is foolish. Aside from relying on the wrong measures to remedy the current situation, here are two more reasons why Bernanke's policy is wrong.First, Bernanke says he wants a looser monetary policy to boost the stock market and increase confidence, even though the Dow has rebounded from 6,000 to 11,000 in the last two years. Huh? What a ridiculous, dimwitted view for a central b anker to have. In other words, he wants simply to reinflate the bubble that caused our problems in the first place. Soaring equity prices won't increase confidence until more jobs are created. It will only postpone the day of reckoning. Instead, the U.S. should look to Singapore for guidance. The government there subsidized new hires of private companies as soon as the crisis hit. The result? Companies competed to hire at a fraction of their normal costs. Even though Singapore's export-oriented economy got hit hard, its gross domestic product grew 10.6% in the third quarter of 2010, year over year. America should subsidize new hires for small and medium enterprises in key sectors like clean technology, high technology and media and focus on job creation in small and medium-size businesses, not on temporary census takers. That will boost confidence and create jobs. Second, global investors are rightly worried that with the U.S. money supply growing the value of the dollar will continue to drop. So what are they doing? Companies likeApple, General Electric and Pepsi are investing in emerging markets like Brazil, India and China that are rebounding better from the crisis. The result is massive asset bubbles in those places that could create great volatility if they popped. In other words, Bernanke is unleashing America's economic woes and bubbles on the rest of the world. America's closest allies like Germany and Brazil are protesting, sensibly, as are the Chinese. They don't want Bernanke to fob off America's problems onto them. Lowering the value of dollar also won't help America export its way to success, as Bernanke and President Obama mistakenly believe. Countries like Thailand and Japan will keep up by devaluing their own currencies. Currency wars don't help anyone. Instead of debasing the greenback, America should bolster its manufacturing prowess. It doesn't have the workers and infrastructure needed to make Nike and Ralph Laurenproducts, but it can and should be manufacturing more products higher up the value chain, where China and Vietnam can't compete. Instead of trying to blame China's currency policies for America's problems (I am still not sure how Bernanke seems to forget that the global crisis started because of irresponsible regulatory oversight and easy credit in the U.S., since he became a member of the Fed's Board of Governors in 2002), the Federal Reserve chairman needs to look at quelling America's economic demons. There are no easy answers. Fixing those problems will be painful and politically difficult and may cause unemployment to spike and the equity markets to drop. But it has to be done. Unless Bernanke learns as Johnny's parents did that tough love works better than throwing money at problems, I am very concerned that America's addiction to debt will continue to damage the global economy.’

Fed lowers economic expectations for 2011 Washington Post - Neil Irwin - During the housing boom, millions of homeowners got easy access to mortgages. Now, some mortgage lenders and government officials have taken action after discovering that many mortgage documents were mishandled. Bernanke Has FOMC Dissent But Still Runs The Show Forbes Fed Downgrades US Economic Outlook - Minutes Wall Street Journal

Asian Stocks Decline on Korea Attack Jonathan Burgos | Asian stocks fell, dragging the benchmark index to an almost four-week low.

Yuan begins trading against the rouble China started allowing the yuan to trade against the Russian rouble in the interbank market from Monday as policymakers promote the currency’s use in global trade and finance.

Velma Hart, Who Questioned Obama’s Policies, Loses Job Velma Hart, who told President Obama she was “exhausted” of defending him and became the face of disappointed Americans this fall, has lost her job.

The Beginning Of The Ponzi End: As Of Today, The Biggest Holder Of US Debt Is Ben Bernanke Well, folks, it’s official – mark November 22, 2010 in your calendars – today is the day the Ponzi starts in earnest.

Irish Clash with Cops as IMF Readies Austerity Plan In Dublin, Ireland, people are not taking the IMF invasion sitting down. On Monday, November 22, around 50 Irish demonstrators attempted to stage a sit-down at a government building and protest the sell-out of the country to the international bankers.

Who Will Any Form of Intermediate Term Wealth Effect Really Help? [ The so-called ‘wealth effect touted by no-recession helicopter ben‘ is just a continuation of the fraudulent wall street bailout / subsidization churn-and-earn scam / fraud. Bill Fleckenstein Has Some Thoughts On QE2: “These Idiots Think We Can Print Our Way To Prosperity” ( I disagree! I believe they are well aware of the folly of their fraudulent and ultimately disastrous approach but are, as in the last debacle, creating a fraudulent bubble for the wall street frauds and insiders to sell into, which they are indeed doing as we speak. (INSIDER SELLING IS AT RECORD HIGHS) (Another Nobel Economist Says We Have to Prosecute Fraud Or Else the Economy Won’t Recover As economists such as William Black and James Galbraith have repeatedly said, we cannot solve the economic crisis unless we throw the criminals who committed fraud in jail. ) ] Fed to pump $600B into the economy (Washington Post) [ Listen to this total, absolute b*** s*** … from no-recession-helicopter ben shalom or b.s. for short, bernanke, with green shoots wilting on the vine … to his recent ‘better to try and fail than to do nothing at all’ … Balderdash! … I hearken back to a distinction made by the brilliant Peter Drucker who in emphasizing the distinction between efficiency and effectiveness states that being effective means doing the right things, clearly not the case here … other than frothing that fraudulent wall street market with high-frequency programmed trades and debased dollars he can’t seem to print enough of, and for all but wall frauds churn and earn profits as they retain their fraudulent gains from the last debacle and this one, his policies are nothing short of disaster for this nation and the world. That money going into wall street pockets has to come from somewhere … guess. Remember, america’s defacto bankrupt and the consequences for those continuing frauds on wall street don’t justify the irretrievable costs! ] In addition to a question for Bloomberg TV anchor Betty Lui, who asked Bill to “admit” that “the markets were in a better mood yesterday after QE2,” which is simply this: “Betty? Betty? Betty? How about in summer 2008, 2007, were the markets in a good mood? Were the markets in a good mood then?” Quite right! The same pattern that preceded the last crash. Falling dollar, high volume programmed high frequency trades to the upside creating an even larger, gravity-defying bubble for the wall street frauds and insiders to sell into. They’re not too big or important to fail and jail! Prospective economic health depends on that reality! ]

John Hussman: Bubble, Crash, Bubble, Crash, Bubble... [ This really is the story and far worse than the bad scenario presented herefter by Hussman in light of the debased dollar and the inflated earnings and lower P / E ratios thereby, etc. ] Excerpt from the Hussman Funds' Weekly Market Comment (11/8/10):

‘We will continue this cycle until we catch on. The problem isn't only that the Fed is treating the symptoms instead of the disease. Rather, by irresponsibly promoting reckless speculation, misallocation of capital, moral hazard (careless lending without repercussions), and illusory "wealth effects," the Fed has become the disease ... It is difficult to interpret Bernanke's defense of QE2 as anything else but an attempt to replace the recent bubble with yet another - to drive already overvalued risky assets to further overvaluation in hopes that consumers will view the "wealth" as permanent. The problem here is that unlike housing, which consumers had viewed as immune from major price declines, investors have observed two separate stock market plunges of over 50% each, within the past decade alone. While investors have obviously demonstrated an aptitude for ignoring risk over short periods of time, it is a simple fact that raising the price of a risky asset comes at the sacrifice of lower long-term returns, except when there is a proportional increase in the long-term stream cash flows that can be expected from the security. As a result of Bernanke's actions, investors now own higher priced securities that can be expected to deliver commensurately lower long-term returns, leaving their lifetime "wealth" unaffected, but exposing them to enormous risk of price declines over the intermediate (2-5 year) horizon. This is not a basis on which consumers are likely to shift their spending patterns. What Bernanke doesn't seem to absorb is that stocks are nothing but a claim on a long-term stream of cash flows that investors expect to be delivered over time. Propping up the price of stocks changes the distribution of long-term investment returns, but it doesn't materially affect the cash flows. This reckless policy has done nothing but to promote further overvaluation of already overvalued assets. The current Shiller P/E above 22 has historically been associated with subsequent total returns in the S&P 500 of less than 5% annually, on average, over every investment horizon shorter than a decade ... We are betting on the wrong horse. When the Fed acts outside of the role of liquidity provision, it does more harm than good. Worse, we have somehow accepted a situation where the Fed's actions are increasingly independent of our democratically elected government. Bernanke's unsound leadership has placed the nation's economic stability on two pillars: inflated asset prices, and actions that - in Bernanke's own words - should be "correctly viewed as an end run around the authority of the legislature" (see below). The right horse is ourselves, and the ability of our elected representatives to create an economic environment that encourages productive investment, research, development, infrastructure, and education, while avoiding policies that promote speculation, discourage work, or defend reckless lenders from experiencing losses on bad investments.’

Insiders selling (into the bubble as preceded last crash), this is an especially great opportunity to sell / take profits! Suckers’ rally to keep suckers suckered (easy for the wall street frauds to do with just a mouse click / push of the button – and, they know all those technical trade lines that are easy to program in this current phase of the scam/fraud with the debased dollar). Keep in mind, the totally mindless blather from the ‘cottage industries’ of and fraudulent wall street itself in talking up lower P/E multiples when the same is a direct result of the debasement of the dollar and the consequent manipulation / translation (not real, see Davis, infra) which preceded the financial crisis / last crash. Unemployment, trade, deficit, etc., numbers continue decidedly worse than expected along with other negative data (and in the ‘wrong direction’, that spin accorded ‘down but not as bad as before’ b*** s*** ) yet the market has rallied like no tomorrow with used home foreclosure / distressed sales, though abated owing to ‘foreclosuregate’, the other ‘heralded’ good news. Moreover, the dumbo lemmings of Europe have jumped on the fraudulent defacto bankrupt american crazy train propelled to the precipice also as if no tomorrow. This is about keeping the suckers sucked in with the help of a market-frothing pre-election debased dollar for favorable currency translation and paper (but not real when measured in, ie., gold, etc.) profits which preceded the last crisis, inflating a bubble as in the last crisis to facilitate the churn-and-earn, particularly with computerized (and high frequency) trades and which commissions they’ll get again on the way down. There is nothing to support these overbought stock prices, fundamentally or otherwise. These are desperate criminals ‘at work’. Even wall street shill, the senile Buffett is saying we’re still in a recession (depression) [ Davis: ‘… all profits are inflated by 10% (from falling, debased dollar) and that 10% is the E that gets divided from the P and gives us a much better price/multiple to hang our hats on and that gets investors to BUYBUYBUY …’ The bull market that never was / were beyond wall street b.s. when measured in gold ] This is a great opportunity to sell / take profits (these lower dollar, hyperinflationary currency manipulations / translations to froth paper stocks will end quite badly as in last crash)! This is a global depression. This is a secular bear market in a global depression. The past up moves were manipulated bull (s***) cycles (at best) in a secular bear market. This has been a typically manipulated bubble as has preceded the prior crashes with great regularity that the wall street frauds and insiders commission and sell into. This is a typical wall street ‘programmed computerized high-frequency churn and earn pass the hot potato scam / fraud as in prior crashes ( widely reported, high-frequency trading routinely accounts for more than 50% of daily U.S. equity trading volume and regularly approaches 70%. )’. This national decline, economic and otherwise, will not end until justice is served and the wall street frauds et als are criminally prosecuted, jailed, fined, and disgorgement imposed.The Stock Market's Long Decline Has Begun Smith ]

(11-23-10) Dow 11,036 -142 Nasdaq 2,495 -37 S&P 500 1,180 -17 [CLOSE- OIL $81.25 (-54% for year 2008) (RECORD TRADING HIGH $147.27) GAS $3.00 (reg. gas in LAND OF FRUITS AND NUTS $3.15 REG./ $3.29 MID-GRADE/ $3.39 PREM./ $3.79 DIESEL) / GOLD $1,377 (+24% for year 2009) / SILVER $27.57 (+47% for year 2009) PLATINUM $1,659 (+56% for year 2009) / DOLLAR= .74 EURO, 83 YEN, .63 POUND STERLING, ETC. (How low can you go - LOWER) / http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/h15/update 10 YR NOTE YIELD 2.80% …..… AP Business Highlights ...Yahoo Market Update... T. Rowe Price Weekly Recap – Stocks / Bonds / Currencies - Domestic / International This Is a Secular Bear Market and The End of Buy and Hold … and Hope MARKET MANIPULATION AND HOW THE LATEST BUBBLE-FRAUD PRE-COMING CRASH IS BEING ACCOMPLISHED 3-11-10 6 Theories On Why the Stock Market Has Rallied 3-9-10 [archived website file] Risks Lurk for ETF Investors The bull market that never was/were beyond wall street b.s. when measured in gold Property Values Projected to Fall 12% in 2010 Jan 31, 2010 The Week Ahead: Risk Is Off the Cliff; Unwind Has Begun Jan 31, 2010 01-13-10 Forecast for 2010 from Seeking Alpha Contributor THE COMING MARKET CRASH / CORRECTION 1-28-10 Maierhofer (01-15-10) 11 Clear Signs Economy Sinking Economic Black Hole 1-22-10: 20 Reasons Why The U.S. Economy Is Dying And Is Simply Not Going To Recover Current Economic / Fiscal Charts Trendsresearch.com forecast for 2009 1-7-10 Crash is coming! ‘WORST ECONOMIC COLLAPSE EVER’ Must Read Economic / Financial Data This Depression is just beginning The coming depression… thecomingdepression.net MUST READ: JEREMY GRANTHAM’S QUARTERLY UPDATE 25 January 2010 (850 on the S&P) by TPC The Next Wave of Collapse is Coming Sooner than you think Sliding Back Into the Great Depression ABSOLUTELY, ABSURDLY, RIDICULOUS! SELL / TAKE PROFITS WHILE YOU CAN SINCE MUCH, MUCH WORSE TO COME!

National / World

Lowest ever: Obama job approval sinks to 39%, as even Democrats’ support melts away President Obama has passed the Big 4-0 — going the wrong way.

Korean War Crisis: Brought To You By Uncle Sam Despite the fact that South Korea admits it fired the first shots that prompted the North to retaliate, the vast majority of the establishment press are feverishly blaming North Korea for a new escalation in the crisis, while failing completely to acknowledge the fact that the whole fiasco was generated as a direct result of Uncle Sam’s policy through two separate administrations to ensure hereditary dictator Kim Jong-Il and his successors acquired the atom bomb.

North Korea Attack Part Of RAND Plan For Total War? The exchange of artillery fire between North and South Korea, which the North says was started by South Korea firing shells during a military drill, could act as the catalyst for a huge new conflict that the RAND Corporation has been lobbying for over the past two years.

Polls Indicate Americans Waking Up To TSA Tyranny A new national poll indicates that the majority of Americans are against the enhanced TSA pat-downs that some have likened to sexual molestation, while more travelers are turning against the full body scanners as they learn more about the risks associated with the technology.

NKorea’s military command vows ‘merciless’ military strike against SKorea North Korea threatened to continue “merciless” strikes on South Korea on Tuesday after the communist state launched a deadly artillery attack across their western sea border.

Ron Paul: Crotch Groped by TSA, Calls for Boycott of Airlines Kurt Nimmo | “I think it’s a healthy wake-up call to a lot of Americans,” Paul told Jones.

Ron Paul: Korea Conflict May Be Orchestrated Crisis To Boost Dollar Paul Joseph Watson | RAND Corporation lobbied Pentagon for major war to reverse US economy

RT Crew Arrested for Reporting Pentagon’s Dirty Laundry Kurt Nimmo | It is Job One of the corporate media to make sure the American people remain oblivious to the ramifications of U.S. foreign policy.

Korean War Crisis: Brought To You By Uncle Sam Paul Joseph Watson | US military-industrial complex armed North Korea with nuclear weapons.

Breaking: South Korea Threatens Retaliation Against North Korea Infowars.com | Kim Jong-un, the anointed successor of Kim Jong-il, is said to be responsible.

Drudgereport: US-SKorea Joint Military Exercises Possible in Coming Days...
NKorea's military command vows 'merciless' military strike against South...
Fires artillery onto island...
South denies seeking redeployment of U.S. tactical nuclear weapons...
Returns Fire...
'Intentional, planned attack'...
CHINA WATCHES... WHITE HOUSE CONDEMNS...
Russia Sees 'Colossal Danger'...
IT BEGINS

POLL: Obama job approval sinks to 39%...
Woman who told Obama her financial fears -- has lost her job...
Even MoveOn.org sours...
Afghan violence soars, insurgency expanding..

A united goal: Saving the tiger (Washington Post) [ Clearly the wisdom of an historically great leader for the ages, Vladimir V. Putin should be given great deference in all matters of global concern. Having evolved from his youthful indiscretion as a novice KGB agent, a hand dealt to him (by a soviet communist system) more than chosen, he has reminded the world of the greatness that was, is, and forever will be Russia’s and His! ] The tale of the magnificent Siberian tiger, and its unfinished fight for survival, should be a compelling one for the 500 conservationists and world leaders arriving for Russian Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin's tiger summit this weekend. Protecting where the wild things are Washington Post - Kathy Lally - ‎IN MOSCOW The tale of the magnificent Siberian tiger, and its unfinished fight for survival, should be a compelling one for the 500 conservationists and world leaders arriving for Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's tiger summit this weekend ... 13 nations meet to try to save wild tigers CNN International Putin, Wen, other leaders in bid to save the tiger Reuters

The Economy Will Not Recover Until the Economic Criminals are Prosecuted, and There Are Real Investigations Into 9/11 and Other Government Failures Trust is essential for a stable economy; Trust is currently at an all-time low; Launching criminal prosecutions and real investigations is one of the main prerequisites for an economic recovery.

Multitudes of lobbyists weigh in on Dodd-Frank Act (Washington Post) [ Who cares what they have to say. What can you expect them to say? After all, for the amounts they’re getting paid, what do you expect them to say. As it stands, the dodd-frank bill’s already a soft touch for the perennial frauds on wall street. Partner rates, ie., Washington-based Patton Boggs, at $990 per hour (in 2008, higher no doubt today), do you really think you’re paying for knowledge / expertise or just influence / slush? These amounts are staggering. Such is unheard of in more productive societies. ] The financial overhaul has generated more work for lawyers and lobbyists now than during the frenzied days leading up to its passage.

Helmand's refugees disheartened by troops (Washington Post) [ ‘Gauge of success?’ Come on! What success can be had? Greater defacto bankruptcies for the nato coalition members? More death and destruction? Even if it were not true (that they are to blame) though I believe it is, the u.s. / brits / nato will be blamed for even unimprovable scenarios beyond their scope and control where even pyhric victories are not in the cards (though that’s all they could possibly have hoped for). Indeed, a geopolitical misstep of monumental proportion for the u.s., Britain, et als. Then there’s the u.s. initiated resurgence of the poppy / heroin production / trade … their raison d’etre. ] The arid province will be an important gauge of success in the U.S.-led strategy against the Taliban. But refugees offer a bleak assessment, blaming insecurity in Afghanistan on the presence of U.S. and British troops.

With bailout near, Irish PM's coalition cracks (Washington Post) [ Cracks? If it were only the Irish coalition that suffers from cracks, things might be just a smidgen better than the bleak reality, current and prospective. Cracked, on crack, all cracked up, etc., are expressions that describe any number of political / business interest groups that should have got crackin’ when the same would have really meant something! ]

The Wall Street snitch pitch (Washington Post) [ Oh yeah! Laws are great on paper, but in a pervasively corrupt, defacto bankrupt nation as america, just try to get them to apply them as opposed to the more lucrative perpetration and cover-up (but the incentives are a positive). ] An unlikely ad has been getting screen time in Manhattan theaters that cater to a Wall Street crowd. [

October 15, 2010 (*see infra)

Steven M. Martinez, Assistant Director In Charge
Federal Bureau of Investigation, USDOJ
11000 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 1700

Los Angeles, CA 90024

Dear Sir:

I enclose herewith 3 copies of the within DVD rom autorun disk (which will open in your computer’s browser) as per your office’s request as made this day (the disk and contents have been scanned by Avast, McAfee, and Norton which I’ve installed on my computer to prevent viral attacks / infection and are without threat). I also include 1 copy of the DVD as filed with the subject court as referenced therein (which files are also included on the aforesaid 3 disks in a separate folder named ‘112208opocoan’). The (civil) RICO action (as you’re aware, the RICO Act is a criminal statute which provides a civil remedy, including treble damages and attorney fees, as an incentive for private prosecution of said claims probably owing to the fact that the USDOJ seems somewhat overwhelmed and in need of such assistance given the seriousness and prevalence of said violations of law which have a corrupting influence on the process, and which corruption is pervasive). A grievance complaint against Coan was also filed concurrently with the subject action and held in abeyance pending resolution of the action which was illegally dismissed without any supporting law and in contravention of the Order of The Honorable Robert N. Chatigny, Chief Judge, USDC, District Connecticut. The files below the horizontal rule are the referenced documents as filed. (Owing to the damage to the financial interests of both the U.S. and the District of Congresswoman Roybal-Allard, viz., Los Angeles, the Qui Tam provisions of the Federal False Claims Act probably would apply and I would absent resolution seek to refer the within to a firm with expertise in that area of the law with which I am not familiar).

The document in 5 pages under penalty of perjury I was asked to forward to the FBI office in New Haven is probably the best and most concise summary of the case RICO Summary to FBI Under Penalty of Perjury at Their Request (5 pages) [ ricosummarytoFBIunderpenaltyofperjury.pdf http://albertpeia.com/ricosummarytoFBIunderpenaltyofperjury.pdf ].

The correspondence I received from the Congresswoman by way of email attachment (apparent but typical problem with my mail) along with my response thereto is included on the 3 disks as fbicorrespondencereyes.htm . With regard to the calls to the FBI’s LA and New Haven, CT offices: There was one call to the LA office and I was referred to the Long Beach, CA office where I personally met with FBI Agent Jeff Hayes to whom I gave probative evidentiary documents of the money laundering which he confirmed as indicative of same (he was transferred from said office within approximately a month of said meeting and his location was not disclosed to me upon inquiry). The matter was assigned to FBI Agent Ron Barndollar and we remained in touch for in excess of a decade until he abruptly retired (our last conversation prior to his retirement related to the case and parenthetically, Rudy Giuliani whose father I stated had been an enforcer for the mob to which he registered disbelief and requested I prove it, which I did – he served 12 years in prison, aggravated assault/manslaughter? – and no, there is no Chinese wall of separation – Andrew Maloney’s the one that prosecuted gotti).

In contradistinction to the statement in said correspondence, there is a plethora of information including evidence supporting the claims set forth in the RICO VERIFIED COMPLAINT (see infra). Such includes and as set forth in the case, inter alia,

1. A judgment had been entered in my favor in the case, United States District Court Case #3:93cv02065(AWT)(USDCJ Alvin Thompson), worth approximately now in excess of $300,000 remains unaccounted for and which could be used for payment to creditors, Los Angeles, etc..
2. Counsel Robert Sullivan on my behalf documented by way of certification upon investigation that Alan Shiff, USBCJ, had falsely stated a dismissal upon which false statement he predicated a retaliatory and spurious contempt proceeding against me causing substantial damage, and for which he sought Judicial Notice of those and related proceedings as did I in some of my filings.
3. The Order of Dismissal With Prejudice by Alan Shiff, USBCJ, owing to Defendant Coan’s failure to file anything whatsoever by the court’s deadline causing creditors and me substantial damages: [ Shiff Order of Dismissal With Prejudice on Coan’s Failure to File Page 1 Page 2 ]
4. Defendant Coan had filed an action against me to prevent me from suing him which necessitated me to fly to Connecticut for a hearing before The Honorable Robert N. Chatigny, Chief Judge, USDC, District of Connecticut, who denied Coan’s requested relief as to Coan but precluded my action against Shiff (although there is no immunity, judicial or otherwise, for criminal acts, ie., fraud connected with a case under Title 11, USC, etc.) . [ transcript in pertinent part - crossexamofcoanbypeia.pdf ]
5. Newly appointed judge, Maryanne Trump Barry, Donald Trump’s sister, was assigned the RICO case despite the conflict of interest in light of hundreds of thousands of dollars of illegal (drug) money being laundered through the Trump casinos by the RICO defendants, and despite my motion to recuse her which motion she heard herself and denied, and U.S. Trustee Hugh Leonard with whom I met personally refused to join or file a separate motion to recuse and not long thereafter left said office for private practice at Cole, Shotz, et als on retainer with the RICO defendants as his primary client.
6. Probative and evidentiary documents, affidavits, exhibits, including those turned over to FBI Agent Jeff Hayes in Long Beach, CA, had been given to Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Lacey with whom I met personally at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Newark, N.J., at which time Samuel Alito was U.S. Attorney, and went over said documents and their probative value with him. Within approximately a month thereafter upon inquiry I was told that Jonathon Lacey was no longer with the office, that the file/documents could not be located, and that there was no further information available concerning contacting him or his location. I thereupon delivered by hand, copies of said documents to the office of then U.S. Attorney Alito, addressed to him, with assurance they would go directly to him. In addition to being inept [ I looked in on the one mob case he had brought, bungled, lost (accidently on purpose?) since I was suing some mob-connected under RICO and the court (I had known / previously met outside of court the judge Ackerman through a client) was absolute bedlam and a total joke since incompetent corrupt Alito brought in all 20 mob defendants (rather than prosecute one or a few to flip them first) who feigning illness had beds/cots in the courtroom along with their moans during testimony and had the jury in stitches. As much as I hate the mob, it truly was funny, if not so tragic.], Alito is also corrupt (and maybe corrupt because he is inept). After a reasonable (but still rather short) time I called to determine the status and was told that Alito was no longer with the Office of the U.S. Attorney, that he was (appointed) a federal judge, and that neither the documents nor any file or record of same could be located. Alito did parley the same / cover-up into quid pro quo direct lifetime appointment to the Court of Appeals, 3^rd circuit, despite the absence of judicial experience or successful tenure as U.S. Attorney (Maryanne Trump Barry as well). This is the same Sam Alito that now sits on the purported highest court in the land. The real application of the illegal rule ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’.

There is applicable insurance / surety coverage and neither LA, nor creditors, nor I should continue to have been damaged by this brazened corrupt and illegal scenario, which should be resolved in accordance with the meaningful rules of law apposite thereto.

Sincerely,

Albert L. Peia

611 E. 5^th Street, #404

Los Angeles, CA 90013

(213) 219-**** (cell phone)

(213) 622-3745 (listed land line but there are unresolved problems with the line, computer connection may be the reason but I hesitate to chance greater non-performance / worsening by their ‘fix’ so cell phone best for contact).

----------

*The foregoing and as indicated therein was previously send 9-14-10 but delivery confirmation was flawed as set forth below and my inquiries to the u.s. postal service rebuffed (I believe tampered with inasmuch as your office could not locate same). This cover letter (9-13-10) is on the 3 disks with navigable hyperlinks to the subject files for ease of reference, including the files in the RICO action as indicated. (10-15-10) I spoke with Rose, FBI, ADIC Secretary, who indicates once again that your office has not received the aforesaid and which can reasonably be presumed to have been tampered with, and hence, a violation of the federal statute concerning same. ]

-----

Food banks swamped by demand (Washington Post) [ Oooooh! Sounds bullish (unlike those other bank runs) … to the lunatic frauds on wall street this full-moon luneday (Monday) … you know … ‘demand is up’ … riiiiight! … but the real question is: Are Stocks Over Loved and Over Valued? [ Is the Pope Catholic? Do bears s*** in the woods? … Reality’s short answer: YES! YES! YES! ]
Simon Maierhofer, On Monday November 22, 2010, 12:32 pm EST ‘Momentum and perception are the big intangibles of the investing universe. Nobody knows exactly when the investing masses' mojo will turn on or off, overheat or over correct.Valuations, similar to gravity, are the big equalizer. In a world of uncertainty, valuations are the one thing you can rely on. Getting valuations right is one thing, figuring out when valuations will exercise their gravitational pull on stocks (NYSEArca: VTI - News) is another.
Using Valuations as a Guide
When planning a trip from point A to B, you need to know where A and B are. If you don't know your destination, you will most likely end up some place you don't want to be. Failing to prepare is preparing to fail.Fair valuations are the final investment destination. If you invest in an undervalued market or stock and have the patience to let the market do its magic, your investment will be profitable 9 out of 10 times.If you invest in an overvalued market and don't get out in time, odds are that your journey will end in tears.
Asking the 'Valuation Guru'
Charles Dow, the founder of the Wall Street Journal and inventor of the Dow Jones Averages was an astute student of valuations. According to Mr. Dow, a correct understanding of valuations is the single most important ingredient to investment success. If Mr. Dow was still alive, what would he say about today's market? Would he tell you to buy or sell?Let's examine the most basic and probably purest measure of value: Dividend yields.Unlike P/E ratios, dividend yields can't be fudged and massaged. Companies with a healthy cash flow use their financial prowess to attract and retain buy-and hold type investors with juicy dividend checks.The dividend yield is expressed as a percentage of the stock price and can rise for two reasons: 1) stock price drops or 2) dividend payment increases. As a rule of thumb, the higher dividend yields, the healthier valuations.
Dividend Yield - Buy High, Sell Low
It's human nature to want what you can't get. Current yields are low, but everybody wants income, so investors are willing to risk the return of their money for return on their money. Current yields are close to an all-time low, so it's fair to assume that stocks are overvalued.The opposite was true in the first quarter of 2009. A variety of ETFs yielded close to or even more than 10%. The Financial Select Sector SPDRs (NYSEArca: XLF - News) and Vanguard Financial ETF (NYSEArca: VFH - News) paid more than 7%.Dividend ETFs like the iShares DJ Select Dividend (NYSEArca: DVY - News) and SPDR S&P Dividend ETF (NYSEArca: SDY - News) had yields north of 6%, and even plain value ETFs like Vanguard Value (NYSEArca: VTV - News) and iShares Russell 1000 Value (NYSEArca: IWD - News) paid more than 4%.The problem at that time was that nobody was interested in yield. Investors shunned stocks and yields like cats shun water. Within a week of prices bottoming and stocks beginning to rally, the ETF Profit Strategy Newsletter recommended to load up on dividend-rich ETFs.Here's the newsletter's March 2, 2009 recommendation: 'This counter trend rally will have to be broad and powerful in order to relieve investor's pent-up urge to buy. Dividend ETFs with a higher allocation to financials are likely to rise higher than the broad market. Some of the dividend yields are quite juicy and can help to offset timing mistakes.'

Beware of the Yields Trap

Since then, the S&P (SNP: ^GSPC) has risen as much as 84%, the performance for the Dow Jones (DJI: ^DJI) and Nasdaq (Nasdaq: ^IXIC) has been similar. What about dividend yields?If the March 2009 lows marked a true market bottom, dividend payments should have increased somewhat proportionally to stock prices. They didn't. In fact, yields today are lower than they were at the March 2009 bottom.In March 2009 the dividend yield for S&P 500 constituents was 3.6%. By multiplying 3.6% with the March 2009 low of 666 we arrive at a dividend yield of 23.98 points. In October 2010, the S&P yielded 1.97%. Based on an S&P at 1,200 points, this represented 23.64 points, 0.34 points less than at the March 2009 bottom.Hunting after yield without considering the risk at current prices is similar to maxing out your credit cards just to rack up frequent flier miles. The return comes at a (long-term) cost.Beware of the Earnings TrapIn my humble opinion, earnings are more than just a trap, they are a minefield. According to the numbers we are fed, earnings have already surpassed the threshold reached at the peak of the dot-com bubble and are projected to eclipse even the 2007 all-time record high in 2011.If this doesn't strike you as odd, take a moment to examine the chart below. Leading up to the 2007 stock market and earnings high, we had consistent GDP growth (not historically great but steady). The real unemployment rate (U-6, published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics) was 8.4%.[chart]Today, GDP is sputtering (and inflated by government subsidies) and U-6 unemployment has more than doubled to 17%. For those who prefer to go by the media's more palatable U-3 jobless number, it has soared from below 4.7% to 9.6%. Does that look like the kind of environment that would produce record high earnings?I don't think it would be presumptuous to wonder if financial engineering and massaging the books has something to do with high earnings. Remember the 157 rule change which allows banks (NYSEArca: KBE - News) to hide real estate losses (see June 2010 ETF Profit Strategy Newsletter for a detailed analysis).Even when assuming that current earnings are for real, the P/E ratio (high earnings translate into a lower P/E ratio) is still historically elevated. Admittedly not as much out of line as a year ago, but still high.

Don't Bet Against Valuations

Buying into an overvalued market and expecting a long-term gain, is like sowing seed in the winter and expecting to reap in the summer - it doesn't work that way.Of course, over the short-term, markets can defy valuations and make disciplined investors look like temporary fools. But, as the 2000 and 2008 declines have shown, there are no shortcuts to long-term success.The most intriguing facet of dividend yields and P/E ratios is that they tend to pinpoint major market bottoms. All historic market bottoms had one thing in common: super high dividend yields and ridiculously low P/E ratios.Based on this historic clue, the March 2009 bottom looks more like a fake than a major bottom. Just as ice doesn't thaw unless the temperature rises above 32 degrees, the market doesn't bottom until P/E ratios and dividend yields signal that a valuation reset has occurred.The December issue of the ETF Profit Strategy Newsletter includes a detailed analysis of P/E ratios, dividend yields, and two other benchmarks of value-based forecasting plotted against historic charts of the S&P 500 and Dow Jones.A picture paints more than a thousand words, and the featured chart shows how overvalued stocks are and how far they have to drop before a sustainable new bull market can begin.’

Reality check for Fed forecasts (Reuters) - Reuters - The U.S. economy, to mix two Federal Reserve catch phrases, may be disappointingly slow for an extended period.

Largest-ever insider trading probe targets Goldman Sachs Insider-trading charges are being prepared against a vast network of consultants and traders across the US financial industry in a years-long probe that a report suggests will reveal a pervasive culture of backroom dealing.

Ireland fears civil unrest as bank crisis deepens One of Ireland’s biggest trade unions warned today that the nation was on the brink of civil unrest as government officials negotiated a multibillion euro bailout for the country’s ailing banks.

Geithner warns GOP: politicizing the Federal Reserve could ‘hurt credibility’ [ Riiiiight! This coming from an administration without an credibility whatsoever! ‘No recession as per b.s. ben shalom bernanke? The natiion’s living it! ]Bloomberg | Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said the Obama administration would oppose any effort to strip the Federal Reserve of its mandate and warned Republicans against politicizing the central bank.

US STOCKS-Futures rise after news of Irish bailout [ Oh come on! This long discounted many times previously / over is a non-event vis-à-vis the u.s. economy other than pointing to the weakness of the global economy and the dire fiscal predicament of the nations therein, particularly pervasively corrupt, defacto bankrupt america. ]

Weekly Market Forecast: Risk Back On Edition Summers ‘Last week’s rally occurred for one reason and one reason only: options expiration week. I’ve detailed this phenomenon countless times, but the primary point is that EVERY month, Wall Street shreds options traders by pushing the market this way and that to insure the maximum number of options contracts expire worthless. As the below chart shows, last week was no exception with both the puts and calls taking it on the chin in succession. In particular, Wall Street gunned for 1,200 on the S&P 500. [Chart] Again, none of this action was related to anything fundamental or economic in the world: it was option contract shredding by Wall Street and that’s that. Of course, the ramp job occurring on the 18th coincided with the US Dollar dropping when it hit up against the upper trend-line of its recent downward trading channel: [Chart] This rejection was in turn precipitated by the Euro bouncing at the lower trend-line (135) of its own upward trading channel (the Euro accounts for over 50% of the US Dollar index and consequently the two currencies trade in near perfect inverse correlation). [Chart] In many ways, this move was to be expected. The Euro had fallen pretty far pretty fast. The main issue now is whether the currency can rally to break above resistance at 137.5. This line acted as strong former support multiple times in the last few months, so it should now act as strong resistance. In this context, we could see a tad more upside in stocks as the Euro rallies to challenge 137.5 (which would coincide with the US Dollar falling to test 78). However, at that point the risk-off trade should return with a vengeance with the US Dollar rallying strongly and the Euro falling (along with equities and commodities). If this DOESN’T happen, then the US Dollar has serious trouble as a violation of 76 would break its multi-year trend-line. [Chart] This would trigger a serious potential “flight from the Dollar” pattern in the form of a massive Head and Shoulders that has been forming in the US Dollar over the last 20 years. [Chart] In closing, keep your eyes glued to the Euro. The markets seem to view the Irish bailout as a “positive” for the currency. If this view results in the European currency breaking above 37.5, then the inflation trade is back on with a vengeance and the US Dollar could potentially be in SERIOUS trouble.’

Bernanke Admits QE2 May Fail, Requests Fiscal Stimulus Now Lenzner ‘Kudos to Dr. Sherry Cooper, Executive Vice President and Chief Economist, BMO Financial Group. She read Ben Bernanke’s ECB address in Germany on Friday– and discovered that the inventor of Quantitative Easing I and II admitted that his monetary policy may not assure economic recovery– what his critics have been carping about or weeks now.Unnoticed by most was Bernanke’s carefully phrased suggestion that a further fiscal stimulus is necessary. And since no-one has a finer view of the unfolding economic scenario, we ought to take the Fed Chairman’s warning as deadly serious.“The Federal Reserve is nonpartisan and does not make recommendations regarding specific tax and spending programs,” Bernanke stated. ” However, in general terms, a fiscal program that combines near-term measures to enhance growth with strong, confidence-inducing steps to reduce longer-term structural deficits would be an important complement to the policies of the Federal Reserve.”Clearly, Bernanke has doubts that the $600 billion program to purchase securities may not properly affect the yields on acquired securities and “via substitution effects in investors’ portfolios, on a wider range of assets.” Stunning, that admission.He also chose last Friday at the ECB to retreat on the notion that “quantitative easing” is the accurate term to use in describing Fed policy. Stunning that he was backing off the phrasing used to describe his policy. Wow!Clearly, Bernanke is worried about longer-term unemployment becoming “intractable long-term structural unemployment.” He reckons it “could threaten the strength and sustainability of the recovery.”Shocking that there has been no appropriate clamor at the White House, at Treasury, on Wall Street, in Congress, on cable TV– to motivate public opinion for another fiscal stimulus. NO matter what the Republican nabobs say. This is one of the most overlooked issues of our time.Household net worth is over $12 trillion less– yes, that’s $12 trillion– less than it was 3 years ago– a shocking, rocking, sickening loss of 18.5% of household net worth. Wake up everyone. The Fed Chairman has come clean about prospects.For more insight into Bernanke’s controversial policy, you would be wise to read Stephen Robert’s column examining the fallacy of QE2 and fingering other troubling ramifications of it. Robert is the former Chairman and CEO of the Oppenheimer group of mutual funds.’

Crisis of Fiat Currencies: US Dollar Surpluses Converted into Gold Something is going on that your government does not want you to know about. Very few journalists have written about it and little or nothing has appeared in the mainstream media. The story could be one of major stories of our time.

‘Credibility of the Fed’ Under Historic Attack: Mishkin The Federal Reserve is undergoing what former central bank governor Frederic Mishkin is calling an unprecedented level of attacks caused by its inability to articulate a clear message regarding its multitrillion-dollar monetary policies.

Economist: TSA screenings will kill Americans on highways The TSA’s intrusive new screenings will result in more deaths on highways, says an economist with St. Lawrence University in New York state.

International Soccer Star: Reclaim Your Power By Pulling Your Money Out of Your Bank on December 7th Most Americans haven’t heard of him, but Eric Cantona is a huge international soccer star known throughout Europe and much of the world.

The 17 Things Worrying Investors Right Now
LLOYD'S WALL OF WORRY
WEEK OF NOVEMBER 15-19
WORRY COUNT: 17

CHINA: Kickin’ it purely “my way or the highway.” Especially treacherous on the rest of us as they are still building their highways.

THE PIIGS: Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece and Spain. FYI: News of their demise has been greatly…delayed.

CALIFORNIA AND THE OTHER 49 STATES: Automakers – done. Banks – done. Next on line at the bailout window: Muni Bonds

. “Please step up to the white line.”

QE II: In the popularity ratings still more dear than a root canal but not by much.

U.S. ECONOMY: This aging heavyweight looks to be making a comeback but don’t expect any championship belts.

UNEMPLOYMENT: The good news is we added 151,000 new jobs. The bad news is that's about 100,000 less than needed to keep us from sinking deeper into the jobless quicksand pit.

TAXES: Extend and Pretend-- it ain't just for loans anymore.

HEALTHCARE REFORM: “If I were a cheese what kind of cheese would I be? Umm…that would be Swiss.” Give it a year or so.

OBAMA ADMINISTRATION PART II: “Heavy lies the crown.”

XMAS 2010: Praying the Repo Man doesn’t tow away Santa’s sleigh until after he brings some good cheer. Stack of $20s for me, KK!

CURRENCIES: No longer a race to the bottom. More like a slow bumpy roll down into death valley.

HOUSING CRISIS: The reset button doesn’t seem to be working here. Might I suggest bulldozers and bonfires?

INFLATION/DEFLATION: The Fed’s inflation wish will come true. And then, like old luggage and my gut, it will be with us for a long time.

G20 MEETING: Granted I wasn’t expecting any Gold Medals for the U.S., I wasn’t expecting a disqualification smack down either.

TERRORISM: I knew there was a reason I always hated changing the toner cartridge.

COMMODITIES: Trying to wrestle them down with higher margin requirements. You mean some people actually pay for these things?

HFT: High Frequency Trading -- a festering boil on our stock market but nothing a penny transaction tax wouldn’t clear up. Dr. SEC, we’re waiting…?

Who Will Any Form of Intermediate Term Wealth Effect Really Help? [ The so-called ‘wealth effect touted by no-recession helicopter ben‘ is just a continuation of the fraudulent wall street bailout / subsidization churn-and-earn scam / fraud. Bill Fleckenstein Has Some Thoughts On QE2: “These Idiots Think We Can Print Our Way To Prosperity” ( I disagree! I believe they are well aware of the folly of their fraudulent and ultimately disastrous approach but are, as in the last debacle, creating a fraudulent bubble for the wall street frauds and insiders to sell into, which they are indeed doing as we speak. (INSIDER SELLING IS AT RECORD HIGHS) (Another Nobel Economist Says We Have to Prosecute Fraud Or Else the Economy Won’t Recover As economists such as William Black and James Galbraith have repeatedly said, we cannot solve the economic crisis unless we throw the criminals who committed fraud in jail. ) ] Fed to pump $600B into the economy (Washington Post) [ Listen to this total, absolute b*** s*** … from no-recession-helicopter ben shalom or b.s. for short, bernanke, with green shoots wilting on the vine … to his recent ‘better to try and fail than to do nothing at all’ … Balderdash! … I hearken back to a distinction made by the brilliant Peter Drucker who in emphasizing the distinction between efficiency and effectiveness states that being effective means doing the right things, clearly not the case here … other than frothing that fraudulent wall street market with high-frequency programmed trades and debased dollars he can’t seem to print enough of, and for all but wall frauds churn and earn profits as they retain their fraudulent gains from the last debacle and this one, his policies are nothing short of disaster for this nation and the world. That money going into wall street pockets has to come from somewhere … guess. Remember, america’s defacto bankrupt and the consequences for those continuing frauds on wall street don’t justify the irretrievable costs! ] In addition to a question for Bloomberg TV anchor Betty Lui, who asked Bill to “admit” that “the markets were in a better mood yesterday after QE2,” which is simply this: “Betty? Betty? Betty? How about in summer 2008, 2007, were the markets in a good mood? Were the markets in a good mood then?” Quite right! The same pattern that preceded the last crash. Falling dollar, high volume programmed high frequency trades to the upside creating an even larger, gravity-defying bubble for the wall street frauds and insiders to sell into. They’re not too big or important to fail and jail! Prospective economic health depends on that reality! ]

John Hussman: Bubble, Crash, Bubble, Crash, Bubble... [ This really is the story and far worse than the bad scenario presented herefter by Hussman in light of the debased dollar and the inflated earnings and lower P / E ratios thereby, etc. ] Excerpt from the Hussman Funds' Weekly Market Comment (11/8/10):

‘We will continue this cycle until we catch on. The problem isn't only that the Fed is treating the symptoms instead of the disease. Rather, by irresponsibly promoting reckless speculation, misallocation of capital, moral hazard (careless lending without repercussions), and illusory "wealth effects," the Fed has become the disease ... It is difficult to interpret Bernanke's defense of QE2 as anything else but an attempt to replace the recent bubble with yet another - to drive already overvalued risky assets to further overvaluation in hopes that consumers will view the "wealth" as permanent. The problem here is that unlike housing, which consumers had viewed as immune from major price declines, investors have observed two separate stock market plunges of over 50% each, within the past decade alone. While investors have obviously demonstrated an aptitude for ignoring risk over short periods of time, it is a simple fact that raising the price of a risky asset comes at the sacrifice of lower long-term returns, except when there is a proportional increase in the long-term stream cash flows that can be expected from the security. As a result of Bernanke's actions, investors now own higher priced securities that can be expected to deliver commensurately lower long-term returns, leaving their lifetime "wealth" unaffected, but exposing them to enormous risk of price declines over the intermediate (2-5 year) horizon. This is not a basis on which consumers are likely to shift their spending patterns. What Bernanke doesn't seem to absorb is that stocks are nothing but a claim on a long-term stream of cash flows that investors expect to be delivered over time. Propping up the price of stocks changes the distribution of long-term investment returns, but it doesn't materially affect the cash flows. This reckless policy has done nothing but to promote further overvaluation of already overvalued assets. The current Shiller P/E above 22 has historically been associated with subsequent total returns in the S&P 500 of less than 5% annually, on average, over every investment horizon shorter than a decade ... We are betting on the wrong horse. When the Fed acts outside of the role of liquidity provision, it does more harm than good. Worse, we have somehow accepted a situation where the Fed's actions are increasingly independent of our democratically elected government. Bernanke's unsound leadership has placed the nation's economic stability on two pillars: inflated asset prices, and actions that - in Bernanke's own words - should be "correctly viewed as an end run around the authority of the legislature" (see below). The right horse is ourselves, and the ability of our elected representatives to create an economic environment that encourages productive investment, research, development, infrastructure, and education, while avoiding policies that promote speculation, discourage work, or defend reckless lenders from experiencing losses on bad investments.’

Insiders selling (into the bubble as preceded last crash), this is an especially great opportunity to sell / take profits! Suckers’ rally (off lows on full moon influence into the close) to keep suckers suckered (easy for the wall street frauds to do with just a mouse click / push of the button – and, they know all those technical trade lines that are easy to program in this current phase of the scam/fraud with the debased dollar). Keep in mind, the totally mindless blather from the ‘cottage industries’ of and fraudulent wall street itself in talking up lower P/E multiples when the same is a direct result of the debasement of the dollar and the consequent manipulation / translation (not real, see Davis, infra) which preceded the financial crisis / last crash. Unemployment, trade, deficit, etc., numbers continue decidedly worse than expected along with other negative data (and in the ‘wrong direction’, that spin accorded ‘down but not as bad as before’ b*** s*** ) yet the market has rallied like no tomorrow with used home foreclosure / distressed sales, though abated owing to ‘foreclosuregate’, the other ‘heralded’ good news. Moreover, the dumbo lemmings of Europe have jumped on the fraudulent defacto bankrupt american crazy train propelled to the precipice also as if no tomorrow. This is about keeping the suckers sucked in with the help of a market-frothing pre-election debased dollar for favorable currency translation and paper (but not real when measured in, ie., gold, etc.) profits which preceded the last crisis, inflating a bubble as in the last crisis to facilitate the churn-and-earn, particularly with computerized (and high frequency) trades and which commissions they’ll get again on the way down. There is nothing to support these overbought stock prices, fundamentally or otherwise. These are desperate criminals ‘at work’. Even wall street shill, the senile Buffett is saying we’re still in a recession (depression) [ Davis: ‘… all profits are inflated by 10% (from falling, debased dollar) and that 10% is the E that gets divided from the P and gives us a much better price/multiple to hang our hats on and that gets investors to BUYBUYBUY …’ The bull market that never was / were beyond wall street b.s. when measured in gold ] This is a great opportunity to sell / take profits (these lower dollar, hyperinflationary currency manipulations / translations to froth paper stocks will end quite badly as in last crash)! This is a global depression. This is a secular bear market in a global depression. The past up moves were manipulated bull (s***) cycles (at best) in a secular bear market. This has been a typically manipulated bubble as has preceded the prior crashes with great regularity that the wall street frauds and insiders commission and sell into. This is a typical wall street ‘programmed computerized high-frequency churn and earn pass the hot potato scam / fraud as in prior crashes ( widely reported, high-frequency trading routinely accounts for more than 50% of daily U.S. equity trading volume and regularly approaches 70%. )’. This national decline, economic and otherwise, will not end until justice is served and the wall street frauds et als are criminally prosecuted, jailed, fined, and disgorgement imposed.The Stock Market's Long Decline Has Begun Smith ]

(11-22-10) Dow 11,178 -25 Nasdaq 2,532 +13 S&P 500 1,197 -2 [CLOSE- OIL $81.74 (-54% for year 2008) (RECORD TRADING HIGH $147.27) GAS $3.00 (reg. gas in LAND OF FRUITS AND NUTS $3.15 REG./ $3.29 MID-GRADE/ $3.39 PREM./ $3.79 DIESEL) / GOLD $1,365 (+24% for year 2009) / SILVER $27.76 (+47% for year 2009) PLATINUM $1,660 (+56% for year 2009) / DOLLAR= .73 EURO, 83 YEN, .62 POUND STERLING, ETC. (How low can you go - LOWER)/ 10 YR NOTE YIELD 2.81% …..… AP Business Highlights ...Yahoo Market Update... T. Rowe Price Weekly Recap – Stocks / Bonds / Currencies - Domestic / International This Is a Secular Bear Market and The End of Buy and Hold … and Hope MARKET MANIPULATION AND HOW THE LATEST BUBBLE-FRAUD PRE-COMING CRASH IS BEING ACCOMPLISHED 3-11-10 6 Theories On Why the Stock Market Has Rallied 3-9-10 [archived website file] Risks Lurk for ETF Investors The bull market that never was/were beyond wall street b.s. when measured in gold Property Values Projected to Fall 12% in 2010 Jan 31, 2010 The Week Ahead: Risk Is Off the Cliff; Unwind Has Begun Jan 31, 2010 01-13-10 Forecast for 2010 from Seeking Alpha Contributor THE COMING MARKET CRASH / CORRECTION 1-28-10 Maierhofer (01-15-10) 11 Clear Signs Economy Sinking Economic Black Hole 1-22-10: 20 Reasons Why The U.S. Economy Is Dying And Is Simply Not Going To Recover Current Economic / Fiscal Charts Trendsresearch.com forecast for 2009 1-7-10 Crash is coming! ‘WORST ECONOMIC COLLAPSE EVER’ Must Read Economic / Financial Data This Depression is just beginning The coming depression… thecomingdepression.net MUST READ: JEREMY GRANTHAM’S QUARTERLY UPDATE 25 January 2010 (850 on the S&P) by TPC The Next Wave of Collapse is Coming Sooner than you think Sliding Back Into the Great Depression ABSOLUTELY, ABSURDLY, RIDICULOUS! SELL / TAKE PROFITS WHILE YOU CAN SINCE MUCH, MUCH WORSE TO COME!

WSJ: U.S. in Vast Insider Trading Probe... By SUSAN PULLIAM, MICHAEL ROTHFELD,JENNY STRASBURG and GREGORY ZUCKERMAN ‘Federal authorities, capping a three-year investigation, are preparing insider-trading charges that could ensnare consultants, investment bankers, hedge-fund and mutual-fund traders and analysts across the nation, according to people familiar with the matter.The criminal and civil probes, which authorities say could eclipse the impact on the financial industry of any previous such investigation, are examining whether multiple insider-trading rings reaped illegal profits totaling tens of millions of dollars, the people say. Some charges could be brought before year-end, they say. The investigations, if they bear fruit, have the potential to expose a culture of pervasive insider trading in U.S. financial markets, including new ways non-public information is passed to traders through experts tied to specific industries or companies, federal authorities say.One focus of the criminal investigation is examining whether nonpublic information was passed along by independent analysts and consultants who work for companies that provide "expert network" services to hedge funds and mutual funds. These companies set up meetings and calls with current and former managers from hundreds of companies for traders seeking an investing edge.On the InsideThe New Age of Insider Information on Wall Street. Among the expert networks whose consultants are being examined, the people say, is Primary Global Research LLC, a Mountain View, Calif., firm that connects experts with investors seeking information in the technology, health-care and other industries. "I have no comment on that," said Phani Kumar Saripella, Primary Global's chief operating officer. Primary's chief executive and chief operating officers previously worked at Intel Corp., according to its website.In another aspect of the probes, prosecutors and regulators are examining whether Goldman Sachs Group Inc. bankers leaked information about transactions, including health-care mergers, in ways that benefited certain investors, the people say. Goldman declined to comment.Independent analysts and research boutiques also are being examined. John Kinnucan, a principal at Broadband Research LLC in Portland, Ore., sent an email on Oct. 26 to roughly 20 hedge-fund and mutual-fund clients telling of a visit by the Federal Bureau of Investigation."Today two fresh faced eager beavers from the FBI showed up unannounced (obviously) on my doorstep thoroughly convinced that my clients have been trading on copious inside information," the email said. "(They obviously have been recording my cell phone conversations for quite some time, with what motivation I have no idea.) We obviously beg to differ, so have therefore declined the young gentleman's gracious offer to wear a wire and therefore ensnare you in their devious web." The email, which Mr. Kinnucan confirms writing, was addressed to traders at, among others: hedge-fund firms SAC Capital Advisors LP and Citadel Asset Management, and mutual-fund firms Janus Capital Group, Wellington Management Co. and MFS Investment Management. SAC, Wellington and MFS declined to comment; Janus and Citadel didn't immediately comment. It isn't known whether clients are under investigation for their business with Mr. Kinnucan.The investigations have been conducted by federal prosecutors in New York, the FBI and the Securities and Exchange Commission. Representatives of the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's office, the FBI and the SEC declined to comment.Another aspect of the probe is an examination of whether traders at a number of hedge funds and trading firms, including First New York Securities LLC, improperly gained nonpublic information about pending health-care, technology and other merger deals, according to the people familiar with the matter.Some traders at First New York, a 250-person trading firm, profited by anticipating health-care and other mergers unveiled in 2009, people familiar with the firm say. A First New York spokesman said: "We are one of more than three dozen firms that have been asked by regulators to provide general information in a widespread inquiry; we have cooperated fully." He added: "We stand behind our traders and our systems and policies in place that ensure full regulatory compliance."Key parts of the probes are at a late stage. A federal grand jury in New York has heard evidence, say people familiar with the matter. But as with all investigations that aren't completed, it's unclear what specific charges, if any, might be brought.[chart]The action is an outgrowth of a focus on insider trading by Preet Bharara, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney. In an October speech, Mr. Bharara said the area is a "top criminal priority" for his office, adding: "Illegal insider trading is rampant and may even be on the rise." Mr. Bharara declined to comment.Expert-network firms hire current or former company employees, as well as doctors and other specialists, to be consultants to funds making investment decisions. More than a third of institutional investment-management firms use expert networks, according to a late-2009 survey by Integrity Research Associates LLC in New York.The consultants typically earn several hundred dollars an hour for their services, which can include meetings or phone calls with traders to discuss developments in their company or industry. The expert-network companies say internal policies bar their consultants from disclosing confidential information.Generally, inside traders profit by buying stocks of acquisition targets before deals are announced and selling after the targets' shares rise in value.The SEC has been investigating potential leaks on takeover deals going back to at least 2007 amid an explosion of deals leading up to the financial crisis. The SEC sent subpoenas last fall to more than 30 hedge funds and other investors.“Today two fresh faced eager beavers from the FBI showed up unannounced (obviously) on my doorstep thoroughly convinced that my clients have been trading on copious inside information.... We obviously beg to differ, so have therefore declined the young gentleman's gracious offer to wear a wire and therefore ensnare you in their devious web.” John Kinnucan, of Broadband Research, in an Oct. 26 email to clients Some subpoenas were related to trading in Schering-Plough Corp. stock before its takeover by Merck & Co. in 2009, say people familiar with the matter. Schering-Plough stock rose 8% the trading day before the deal plan was announced and 14% the day of the announcement. Merck said it "has a long-standing practice of fully cooperating with any regulatory inquiries and has explicit policies prohibiting the sharing of confidential information about the company and its potential partners."Transactions being focused on include MedImmune Inc.'s takeover by AstraZeneca Plc in 2007, the people say. MedImmune shares jumped 18% on Apr. 23, 2007, the day the deal was announced. A spokesman for AstraZeneca and its MedImmune unit declined to comment. Investigators are also examining the role of Goldman bankers in trading in shares of Advanced Medical Optics Inc., which was taken over by Abbott Laboratories in 2009, according to the people familiar with the matter. Advanced Medical Optics's shares jumped 143% on Jan. 12, 2009, the day the deal was announced. Goldman advised MedImmune and Advanced Medical Optics on the deals.A spokesman for AstraZeneca and its MedImmune unit declined to comment. In subpoenas, the SEC has sought information about communications—related to Schering-Plough and other deals—with Ziff Brothers, Jana Partners LLC, TPG-Axon Capital Management, Prudential Financial Inc.'s Jennison Associates asset-management unit, UBS AG's UBS Financial Services Inc. unit, and Deutsche Bank AG, according to subpoenas and the people familiar with the matter. Representatives of Ziff Brothers, Jana, TPG-Axon, Jennison, UBS and Deutsche Bank declined to comment.Among hedge-fund managers whose trading in takeovers is a focus of the criminal probe is Todd Deutsch, a top Wall Street trader who left Galleon Group in 2008 to go out on his own, the people close to the situation say. A spokesman for Mr. Deutsch, who has specialized in health-care and technology stocks, declined to comment. Prosecutors also are investigating whether some hedge-fund traders received inside information about Advanced Micro Devices Inc., which figured prominently in the government's insider-trading case last year against Galleon Group hedge fund founder Raj Rajaratnam and 22 other defendants.Fourteen defendants have pleaded guilty in the Galleon case; Mr. Rajaratnam has pleaded not guilty and is expected to go to trial in early 2011. Among those whose AMD transactions have been scrutinized is hedge-fund manager Richard Grodin. Mr. Grodin, who received a subpoena last fall, didn't return calls. An AMD spokesman declined to comment.’

National / World

Patience with Palin? Michael S. Rozeff | I see her as a phony and an extremely dangerous person, just as dangerous as Bush and Obama [ I quite agree! He is absolutely correct. ]

TSA Searches: Are Trains and Subways Next? John Pistole, the TSA boss, has implored activists to rethink their “opt-out” protest this week. Pistole warns that the national protest against naked body scanners and intrusive pat downs at airports would be a mistake and will only serve to “tie up people who want to go home and see their loved ones,” according to the Associated Press.

ABC producer says TSA agent felt inside her underwear As the busiest travel days of the year approach, more and more passengers are accusing the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) of going too far with their screenings.

Blinding Hypocrisy: Insouciant Americans In a recent column, “The Stench of American Hypocrisy,” I noted that US public officials and media are on their high horse about the rule of law in Burma while the rule of law collapses unremarked in the US. Americans enjoy beating up other peoples for American sins. Indeed, hypocrisy has become the defining characteristic of the United States.

Beck: Obama Will Blame Terror Attack On TSA Resistance In little noticed comments made during an appearance on Judge Andrew Napolitano’s show on Fox News, Glenn Beck warned that the Obama administration wouldn’t hesitate to exploit a terror attack targeting airliners to blame the event on people protesting naked body scanners and TSA groping in airports.

St. Louis tops list of most dangerous US cities (AP) TRENTON, N.J. – St. Louis overtook Camden, N.J., as the nation's most dangerous city in 2009, according to a national study released Sunday.The study by CQ Press found St. Louis had 2,070.1 violent crimes per 100,000 residents, compared with a national average of 429.4. That helped St. Louis beat out Camden, which topped last year's list and was the most dangerous city for 2003 and 2004.Detroit, Flint, Mich., and Oakland, Calif., rounded out the top five. For the second straight year, the safest city with more than 75,000 residents was Colonie, N.Y.The annual rankings are based on population figures and crime data compiled by the FBI. Some criminologists question the findings, saying the methodology is unfair.Greg Scarbro, unit chief of the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting Program, said the FBI also discourages using the data for these types of rankings.Kara Bowlin, spokeswoman for St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay, said the city actually has been getting safer over the last few years. She said crime in St. Louis has gone down each year since 2007, and so far in 2010, St. Louis crime is down 7 percent.Erica Van Ross, spokeswoman for the St. Louis Police Department, called the rankings irresponsible."Crime is based on a variety of factors. It's based on geography, it's based on poverty, it's based on the economy," Van Ross said."That is not to say that urban cities don't have challenges, because we do," Van Ross said. "But it's that it's irresponsible to use the data in this way." [ See the lists here http://albertpeia.com/listssafestdangerouscities.htm ]

TSA Searches: Are Trains and Subways Next? Kurt Nimmo | Pistole would like to see TSA workers operate as a “national-security, counterterrorism organization, fully integrated into U.S. government efforts.”

Beck: Obama Will Blame Terror Attack On TSA Resistance Paul Joseph Watson | Fox News host warns that administration is preparing to exploit event to squelch resistance to airport security.

TSA needs false flag security incident to convince Americans to accept obscene pat-downs Mike Adams | The formula works like a charm for everything from pushing flu vaccines to justifying a war.

Crisis of Fiat Currencies: US Dollar Surpluses Converted into Gold Bob Chapman | Western powers have tried to destroy gold as a backing for currencies for many years.

TSA Tactics Find Ominous Parallel in Nazi Germany Kurt Nimmo | Left unchallenged, government invariably evolves into a tyrannical force at odds with the interest of the people.

Young Boy Strip Searched by TSA You Tube | The father tried several times to just hold the boys arms out for the TSA agent but I guess it didn’t end up being enough for the guy.

Jesse Ventura’s Conspiracy Theory: JFK Assassination Federal Jack | Jesse adds new explosive information to the assassination conspiracy theory.

TSA Warns Travelers May Be Arrested, Detained, and Fined for Refusing Search Kurt Nimmo | TSA announces it will enlist local police to detain people who refuse dangerous naked body scans and molestation of their private parts.

‘JFK Deathbed Confession’ reaches #1 on Google Ahead of Ventura TV program Aaron Dykes | Former Gov. Jesse Ventura appeared on the Alex Jones Show today to inform the world about the earth-shattering info that will air tonight on TruTV, prompting a #1 search term.

Drudgereport: Pessimistic Fed to slash growth forecasts...
Ireland Second Euro Nation to Request International Aid as Banks Wobble...
Protesters break through front gate of PM's office...
Rescue Would Dwarf Greek Bailout...
Portugal on the brink...
Spain Will Be 'the Biggie...
HANDS ON BOY
TSA WORKERS FEAR BACKLASH
GLORIA ALLRED: I LIKED BEING FELT-UP AND FINGERED!
Ireland to Seek EU-Led Bailout; Works to Avert Bank 'Collapse'...
WSJ: U.S. in Vast Insider Trading Probe...

Lame duck Dem governor in Iowa OKs $100 million in raises for state workers...

BUFFETT: 'Rich' Americans Should Be Paying 'a Lot' More in Taxes...

Monday, November 22, 2010

November 19, 2010 posts

I truly believe that though uploaded on 11-19-10, this day did not appear on either scribed or my blog page (how pathetic their felt need to censor) which I truly believe to have been a consequence of the following:

Rockefeller Wants Government to Shut Down Fox and MSNBC [ This is really quite shocking (and believe me, I’m no fan of either) , and totally unforgivable and people must ask the question would it have been better if rockefeller’s family hadn’t placed him in the senate. Given the state of the nation’s pervasive corruption, defacto bankruptcy, and decline, it’s difficult to justify the tenure of such long-standing ‘leaders’ / pols as rockefeller who have rode the nations down. ] “It really almost makes you ask the question would it have been better if we had never invented the internet,” Rockefeller mused during the confirmation hearing of Gary Locke, Barry Obama’s choice for Commerce Secretary…The former Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell and Obama’s current director Admiral Dennis C. Blair, agreed with Rockefeller about the internet and national security … Rockefeller’s comments once again demonstrate the arrogance of “elected officials” who believe they have the power to control … and dictate what sort of news and even entertainment Americans should consume…’ Sen. Rockefeller: FCC Should Take FOX News, MSNBC Off Airwaves SEN. JAY ROCKEFELLER (D-WV): [ Clearly, just a hillbilly in heart and mind! ]

Congress's latest awful tech-policy idea (Washington Post) [ I agree! Drudgereport: Web Censorship Bill Sails Through Senate Committee... [ I believe this to be a backdoor censorship ploy by the government. This is particularly so in light of jay rockefeller’s outrageous statements! ]‘ … In short, COICA would allow the federal government to censor the internet without due process… Scholars, lawyers, technologists, human rights groups and public interest groups have denounced the bill. Forty-nine prominent law professors called it “dangerous.” (pdf.) The American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch warned the bill could have “grave repercussions for global human rights.” (pdf.) Several dozen of the most prominent internet engineers in the country — many of whom were instrumental in the creation of the internet — said the bill will “create an environment of tremendous fear and uncertainty for technological innovation.” (pdf.) Several prominent conservative bloggers, including representatives from RedState.com, HotAir.com, The Next Right and Publius Forum, issued a call to help stop this “serious threat to the Internet.”And Tim Berners-Lee, who invented the world wide web, said, “Neither governments nor corporations should be allowed to use disconnection from the internet as a way of arbitrarily furthering their own aims.” He added: “In the spirit going back to Magna Carta, we require a principle that no person or organization shall be deprived of their ability to connect to others at will without due process of law, with the presumption of innocence until found guilty.”Critics of the bill object to it on a number of grounds, starting with this one: “The Act is an unconstitutional abridgment of the freedom of speech protected by the First Amendment,” the 49 law professors wrote. “The Act permits the issuance of speech suppressing injunctions without any meaningful opportunity for any party to contest the Attorney General’s allegations of unlawful content.” (original emphasis.)Because it is so ill-conceived and poorly written, the law professors wrote, “the Act, if enacted into law, will not survive judicial scrutiny, and will, therefore, never be used to address the problem (online copyright and trademark infringement) that it is designed to address. Its significance, therefore, is entirely symbolic — and the symbolism it presents is ugly and insidious. For the first time, the United States would be requiring Internet Service Providers to block speech because of its content.”The law professors noted that the bill would actually undermine United States policy, enunciated forcefully by Secretary of State Clinton, which calls for global internet freedom and opposes web censorship. “Censorship should not be in any way accepted by any company anywhere,” Clinton said in her landmark speech on global internet freedom earlier this year. She was referring to China. Apparently some of Mrs. Clinton’s former colleagues in the U.S. Senate approve of internet censorship in the United States…’ FCC TO MOVE ON WEB REGULATION... ] Meet the "Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act".

don t_rump: I'll Decide on Presidential Run by June CBS News [ The complete take-over of government by confirmed mobster and fraudulent wall street criminals to pillage and plunder the nation even further in new york metro sinkhole style to support their lavish, plush fraudulent lifestyles. How totally pathetic is pervasively corrupt, defacto bankrupt america. trump should be in jail! Look for the pay-offs / bribes. How pathetic and tragic at once is fallen america! ] Real estate fraudster / mobster and unreality television star don t_rump said on ABC's "Good Morning America" today that he'll make a decision about running for president in 2012 by June. don juan trump eyes US presidency BBC News NEWS FLASH: Direct from Lost Angeles Learning Annex – Presenting mobster t_rump of new yoke, new joyzey, and now caleefornia mob fame with his continuing message for the past several years: buy real estate (and watch the values go down…..riiiiight!).
Bank sues Trump over Chicago tower loan...
Trump casino to miss interest payment...
trump’s fired
Blagojevich calls feds 'cowards and liars'…[Yes. This is a rare moment for one to say that a sleazy hypocrite like blago, who is on corrupt federale-connected mobster trump’s celebrity apprentice, happens to be correct based upon facts / reality and my own direct observation and experience and the law – Don’t forget to include corrupt federal judges as maryanne trump barry, sam alito, shiff, matz, hall, underhill, dorsey, etc.. Defacto bankrupt america’s so-called system is pervasively corrupt and broken] (AP) [Abolish the corrupt, costly, economically wasteful lifetime extravagantly appointed federal courts - see RICO case [ http://www.albertpeia.com/112208opocoan/ricosummarytoFBIunderpenaltyofperjury.pdf http://www.albertpeia.com/112208opocoan/PeiavCoanetals.htm ]

Gingrich makes 2012 plans, inches up in early polls (The Ticket) [ Pathetic! Still part of the current problem, including for all the reasons he previously stepped down! ] Palin admits she’s considering 2012 run (The Ticket) [ Preposterous! A total joke! More needs not be said! ]

‘JFK Deathbed Confession’ reaches #1 on Google Ahead of Ventura TV program Aaron Dykes | Former Gov. Jesse Ventura appeared on the Alex Jones Show today to inform the world about the earth-shattering info that will air tonight on TruTV, prompting a #1 search term.

Go to following pages for above links:
http://www.albertpeia.com/currentopics2ndqtr10108.htm
http://www.albertpeia.com
http://www.scribd.com/alpeia
http://alpeiablog.blogspot.com
http://www.albertpeia.com/alresume.htm

http://www.albertpeia.com/wallstreetlunacy2ndqtr10108.htm

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