Wednesday, June 15, 2011

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Top News

US: NY Empire State Manufacturing Index drops considerabl...

NASDAQ - a minute ago

FXstreet.com (Barcelona) - US NY Empire State Manufacturing Index fell by -7.79 points in June, following a 11.88 points rise in May, according to the NY Fed official publication. The reading was ...

What Investors Need to Know about Junior Gold Stock, Runn...

InvestorIdeas.com - 7 minutes ago

POINT ROBERTS, Washington, June15, 2011 - www.InvestorIdeas.com, a leader in sector research for investors including gold and mining stocks, issues an investor update for Running Fox Resources ...

Bernanke Don't tie debt limit to spending cuts

Politico - an hour ago

By JENNIFER EPSTEIN | 6/15/11 7:10 AM EDT Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Tuesday again urged congressional Republicans to support an increase in the debt ceiling ahead of the early August deadline set by Treasury

Greeks Walk Off the Job in Austerity Protest

New York Times - 51 minutes ago

By RACHEL DONADIO and NIKI KITSANTONIS ATHENS - Weary of austerity and worried about their futures, thousands of Greeks marched on Wednesday in a nationwide general strike, the third and largest of the year.

FOREX-Euro slides on market jitters over Greece, banks

Reuters - an hour ago

By Jessica Mortimer LONDON, June 15 (Reuters) - The euro fell nearly 1 percent against the dollar on Wednesday after euro zone ministers failed to reach agreement on how to tackle the Greek debt crisis and Moody's threatened large

Schumer Helps Banks With a Patent Problem

By EDWARD WYATT (NYT)

Senator Charles E. Schumer inserted into a bill a provision that appears aimed at helping banks address a costly problem with a patented system for processing digital copies of checks.

Changes in Chase’s Top Ranks

By ERIC DASH (NYT)

Decisions by Jamie Dimon put even more attention on the contest to succeed him at the bank’s chief executive.

Crowd-Source Your Night In The City With The AreaNow iPhone App (TCTV) ( by TechCrunch.com , TechCrunch.com)
Oil falls below $99 in Asia as traders eye mixed signs on US economy
SIGNAPORE — Oil prices fell below $99 a barrel Wednesday in Asia as traders eyed mixed signs about the strength of the U.S. economy and crude demand.

( Associated Press Associated Press , AP)

World stock markets down as investors anticipate rate hikes in India, China
BANGKOK — World stock markets mostly slipped Wednesday as investors anticipated growth-denting rate hikes by central banks in India and China to contain stubbornly high inflation.

( Associated Press Associated Press , AP)

UK unemployment rate holds steady at 7.7 percent as wage growth remains moderate

LONDON — Official data show Britain’s unemployment rate held steady at 7.7 percent in the three months ending April, matching the rate reported a month ago.
( Associated Press Associated Press , AP)
UK government to back proposals to separate banks
LONDON — The British government intends to force banks to insulate their retail operations from their more volatile investment banking, a Treasury source confirmed Wednesday. ( Associated Press Associated Press , AP)

Analysts Defend Nine Dragons After S&P Move
Analysts are speaking out in support of paper company Nine Dragons Paper (Holdings) Ltd. after its shares plunged in Hong Kong on Tuesday following a withdrawal of its credit rating by Standard & Poor's.
http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/?p=13921?mod=djemChinaRTR_t

Pawlenty Defense: If China Can Do It, So Can U.S.
Republican presidential hopeful Tim Pawlenty defended his much-criticized economic plan, which calls for setting a target of 5% gross domestic product growth over the next 10 years, by pointing to Chinese growth numbers.
http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/?p=13919?mod=djemChinaRTR_t

Chinese Builder Loses Showpiece Polish Highway Deal
Poland canceled a contract for a stretch of highway with the first Chinese firm to win a major public works deal in the European Union, the country's highway authority said late Monday.
http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/?p=13917?mod=djemChinaRTR_t

China Raises Reserve Requirements
China's central bank raised the percentage of deposits that banks must hold in reserve for the sixth time this year, moving quickly to further damp lending after the latest inflation reading showed prices rising at the fastest pace since July 2008. - China Real Time: Economists React - Asia Today: Chinese Inflation Figure Rises - Heard on the Street: Test of Nerve on Inflation - Central Bank Watch
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303714704576384890805560986.html?mod=djemChinaRTR_t

Media & Marketing
In China, Women Begin Splurging
A growing number of luxury brands in China have revamped their marketing tactics to also appeal to self-made female entrepreneurs. - Scene: Chinese Men Get Their Lux Due, Too
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703864204576315291406475666.html?mod=djemChinaRTR_t

Apple's Retail Secrets

Apple's successful retail formula includes intensive control of how employees interact with customers, scripted training for tech support and consideration of every store detail, confidential training manuals and interviews with former employees reveal.

Asia Mixed; Tepco Gains

Asian markets were mixed Wednesday in choppy trade, with Tokyo shares up 0.1% supported by gains in Tokyo Electric Power.

Hitachi to Start Talks to Buy Stake in India's Hi-Rel

Hitachi has agreed to start talks to form a capital and business alliance with India's Hi-Rel Electronics as part of efforts to ramp up its electronics business for power systems in India.

India Inflation Picks Up

India's inflation accelerated in May, topping market estimates and adding to pressure on the central bank to tighten monetary policy later this week.

RBI Governor Subbarao Grapples With ‘Horror Show’

Will headline inflation of 9.06% for May force Reserve Bank of India Governor Duvvuri Subbaro to spring for a larger interest rate increase on Thursday?

A cloudy outlook for gold at the moment

There are a lot of reasons why people should look to invest in gold at the moment, says Tiberius Asset Management's head of trading, but, there are also reasons why, in the short term, it might be best to stay away

Gold, silver, base metals. All feature in new Yukon drilling results

A banner year for exploration in the Yukon means one thing: lots of drilling results. The first trickle shows promise and investors can expect much more to come. Tuesday , 14 Jun 2011

Glencore shares dip on results, bid denial

Shares in the recently- listed commodities trader slipped on the back of weaker-than-expected results for the first quarter, the group dismissed reports of a possible takeover bid for ENRC Tuesday , 14 Jun 2011

Chinese gold production to rise more than 10% this year

According to a senior official from the China Gold Association, China's gold production is expected to grow by more than 10% in 2011 and world gold prices will continue to climb Wednesday , 15 Jun 2011

China's asset managers rushing to launch resource investment funds

Chinese asset managers are rushing to launch funds that invest in natural resources and precious metals overseas to respond to demand for tools to hedge against stubbornly rising inflation Tuesday , 14 Jun 2011

Elections, taxes and the return of the diamond sector

David Hargreaves, mining consultant to XCAP Securities talks about the longer term implications of Humala's election win in Peru, the mining tax in Australia and how much higher diamond prices can go.

Greeks rage against austerity while EU argues ATHENS/BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Striking Greeks raged against a new wave of austerity on Wednesday after euro zone finance ministers failed to agree how to make private creditors contribute to a second bailout for their indebted country. | Full Article

Stock futures signal lower open for equities June 15, 2011 04:37 AM ET LONDON (Reuters) - Stock index futures pointed to a weaker open on Wall Street on Wednesday, with futures for the S&P 500, the Dow Jones and the Nasdaq 100 all down 0.4 percent. | Full Article

Consumer morale sees near-record jump in May - survey 15 JUN 2011 06:56 BST LONDON (Reuters) - Consumer confidence enjoyed one of its biggest jumps on record last month, a survey showed on Wednesday, providing a glimmer of hope that the recovery may get back on track. | Full Article

FTSE down as financials blunted by regulatory worries 15 JUN 2011 09:45 BST LONDON (Reuters) - The top share index inched lower on Wednesday, with financials under pressure from the prospect of tougher regulation and the euro zone debt crisis. | Full Article

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Benjamin Graham Was A Crappy Hedge Fund Manager

Jack Bogle, the outspoken godfather of index funds and passive investing strategies, didn't approve of a recent Wall Street Journal article defending hedge funds.

In particular, he took issue with the author's reference to Benjamin Graham, the legendary Columbia finance professor who literally wrote the book on Security Analysis and mentored Warren Buffett.

Bogle wrote a letter to the editor. Here's an excerpt: Citing Benjamin Graham as the first "hedged fund" operator is an especially unfortunate example. "The trick," Mr. Rice writes, was Graham's "clever way to make money . . . whether it [the market] continued to rise, or started to fall." ...

Proposal for New Hedge Fund Fee Structure: 1% + 33% of Alpha

By The Big Picture

One of my pet peeves is the way that insiders -- whether corporate CEOs, hedge fund managers, or elected politicos -- capture compensation (or credit) for normal cyclical gains they had little or nothing to do with.

This is the approach favored by the Crony Capitalists — those people pretending to be free market participants, and who merely pretend to be creating value. They are taking credit for structural successes that would have occurred with or without them. What they are actually doing is capturing value, not creating it — and then transferring it from its true owners (shareholders/investors) to themselves.

This is wrong; it is legalized theft.

If you want to see a good example of how CEOs transfer shareholder wealth to themselves, a good place to start is Roger Lowenstein’s 2004 book, Origins of the Crash: The Great Bubble and Its Undoing. The section on CEO compensation is astounding; these guys were essentially getting wildly overcompensated for being CEOs during a bull market. The prime example was the CEO of Heinz, who gave himself (with the tacit approval of his Board of~~Crony~~ Directors) a $90 million bonus. And this was back in the early 1990s, when $90 million was real money.

Why Do You Want To Be A Hedge Fund Investor?

www.ritholtz.com

Earlier this year, Goldman Sachs Asset Management announced that it would launch a new mutual fund that — apparently — will bring the joy of hedge fund investing to the masses. For as little as $1,000, the Multi-Manager Alternatives Fund (GMAMX) allows mom-and-pop investors to put their life savings into some of Wall Street’s riskiest and most expensive products. This “fund of funds” will, according to its prospectus, let investors gain exposure to the trading strategies of hedge funds...

Public pensions fare well with hedge funds

Big public pension funds reaped strong returns from their hedge fund portfolios in 2012, with most of them handily surpassing their own benchmarks and well-used industry indexes. The hedge fund portfolios, for the most part, achieved close to what chief investment officers wanted, despite a 1,500-basis-point difference between the best and worst performers, according toPensions & Investments' analysis of the returns of 19 hedge fund portfolios from 17 U.S. public retirement plans with aggregate hedge fund assets of $60.7 billion.

Daniel Loeb surfing to the top of the hedge fund charts again

Something must be in the water over at 399 Park Avenue, where Daniel Loeb's hedge fund Third Point is headquartered. His Third Point Ultra fund has already gained 12.42 percent this year through the 13th of March, according to data from HSBC’s Private Bank.

The portfolio added 3.3 percent alone between March 1 and March 13. By comparison, hedge funds have returned about 4 percent year-to-date, according to HSBC.

The roughly $1.7 billion Ultra portfolio is a levered version of the firm’s flagship Offshore fund, which manages about $5.7 billion and has gained 8.5 percent over the same period. ...

CHART: Hedge Fund Gold Allocation Falls

After taking a cursory look at the recent 13-Fs filed by hedge funds, it became apparent that hedge funds were scaling back their exposures to gold. George Soros was among the big names that unloaded his position. According to Goldman Sachs' new Hedge Fund Trend Monitor report, hedge funds in aggregate scaled back big time.

Despite low turnover, hedge funds notably reduced holdings of underperforming long-time favorites Apple and gold while raising allocations to rallying Financials. For the first time in three years AAPL was not the top stock in our VIP list, instead ranking as the third most frequent top-10 holding... Continue to read.

10 Publicly Traded Hedge Funds That Pay a Dividend
Investing in publicly traded hedge funds is a great way for an investor to see returns through capital appreciation and dividend payments in the financial sector. When it comes to investing, many think of the process as a choice between growth and value stocks; you’re either taking on risk in search of capital appreciation, or you’re seeking out stable sources of current income through dividend payments. Luckily, Wall Street has many investment options and investors don’t have to make a clear-cut choice between capital gains and dividends. There are a lot of misunderstandings about dividend stocks out there; make sure you’re investing for the right reasons, check out 5 Common Misconceptions About Dividend Investing. ... Continue.

Hedge Funds Love These 3 Outperforming Semiconductor Stocks ...
Do you like to follow the buying trends of smart money investors? We ran a screen to find semiconductor stocks currently in favor by hedge fund managers. We began by screening the semiconductor industry for stocks that are rallying above their 20-day, 50-day, and 200-day moving averages, indicating that these stocks have strong upward momentum.
We then screened for those with bullish sentiment from institutional investors, with significant net institutional purchases over the last quarter representing at least 5% of share float. ... Continue.

10 REITs Absolutely Adored By Hedge Funds
After identifying the most popular stocks among hedge funds (see our full Top 10 here) according to their third-quarter 13F filings, we have decided to break down the top 10 REIT stocks that hedge funds love. The REIT industry, notably specialized REITs in hospitality and healthcare, should see positive growth from a rise in job growth and expansion due to freeing up of the credit markets. Our list includes 400 hedge funds and prominent investors that are required by the SEC to disclose their public equity holdings quarterly. In descending order, we have outlined the most-loved REIT stocks based on the aggregate number of funds owning each. ...Continue.

Apple Stock Hit by Panic Selling: 'Someone Yelled Fire'(Yahoo) Forget the "fiscal cliff." The real panic on Wall Street is over Apple's stock. Nearly every mutual and hedge fund has piled into Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) during its spectacular rise over the past few years. Now, these same funds are scrambling for the exits as the stock goes through an equally spectacular decline. Apple plunged to a six-month low Thursday as funds rushed to take profits on the stock before it's too late. Shares are now off 25 percent since late September-shortly after the iPhone 5 launch and a month before the iPad Mini introduction. The stock, once up 74 percent on the year, is still up 30 percent for 2012. That's why Wall Street is getting out while it can. ...

Billionaire George Soros’s Latest Stock Picks (InsiderMonkey) George Soros is best known for the fortune he made shorting the British pound in 1992, but he currently invests a considerable amount of money in equities and so is required to report many of his long positions in 13F filings. We’ve gone through the 13F for the third quarter of the year and compared Soros’s holdings at the end of September to three months earlier. Read on for our impression of his moves and compare them to what he's bought and sold before. AIG. American International Group, Inc. (NYSE::AIG) became Soros’s largest 13F equity holding during the third quarter with a position of over 15 million shares being reported in the filing. A number of value investors have been getting into the insurer over the course of the year, and at a P/B ratio of 0.5 it certainly looks cheap compared to the book value of its equity. We also like its earnings multiples- it trades at 9 times forward earnings estimates- and revenue was up strongly in the third quarter compared to the same period in 2011. Fellow billionaire Dan Loeb had initiated a position during the second quarter of 2012 and we think that it still looks like a good buy for investors. ...

Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers still facing issues as tough year nears an end (BizJournals) In late 2011, Jim Rogers seemed almost golden. He was about to close his last big merger deal. He was poised to take a corporate chairmanship tailored to his penchants for energy policy and reshaping the utility-business model. He was ready to bask in the spotlight of a national convention he’d helped bring to Charlotte. But by late 2012, it’s evident things have not gone so well. “It has been a year of challenges,” the Duke Energy Corp. chief executive concedes. “Nothing in life is perfect.” Dan Fogel, associate director of the Wake Forest University Business School’s Center for Energy, ...

Argo unveils emerging markets hedge fund (InvestmentWeek) Argo Group has launched an emerging markets hedge fund investing in bonds and currencies from a universe of over 40 emerging market countries. The Argo Local Markets fund aims to hold between 20 and 30 positions and has been launched with an initial $7m of seed capital. It will offer investors weekly liquidity and has a mandate to take on moderate leverage. Argo chief executive Kyriakos Rialas said: "The case for investing in emerging markets is compelling. ...

Argentina's President Is Making Great Political Theater Out Of Paul Singer Seizing The Country's Naval Ship(BusinessInsider) Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner is turning her feud with hedge fund manager Paul Singer into a political rallying cry in Argentina. The President has refused to pay Singer's firm Elliott Management the $1.3 billion it owes the fund after it defaulted in 2010. de Kirchner says it's because Singer was given multiple chances (in 2005 and 2010) to restructure, like other hedge funds did, and take a haircut to recoup at least a portion of their losses. Singer, needless to say, did not. Instead, he decided to capture one of Argentina's naval vessels as collateral, and got Ghana to give him an order to detain the ARA Libertad last month. ...

Tom Steyer New Investments
FARALLON CAPITAL Hedge fund billionaire into politics (DailyDemocrat) Hedge-fund billionaire Tom Steyer staked millions of his own money to take on big oil and then to close a corporate-tax loophole costing California $1 billion a year -- and won both times. Ever heard of him? Don't worry, you will. With his latest behind-the-scenes win at the polls as the man who stared down big business by standing up for Proposition 39, this Stanford MBA and top Obama fundraiser has become an out-of-nowhere big-time political player in California. So what does Tom Steyer want now? "I am an enormous lover of California and to the extent that I see something wrong, I will be involved in trying to fix it," Steyer, 55, said Monday. "What form that takes, I don't have a fixed idea." ...

This Hedge Fund Returned Nearly 25% Last Quarter
Artis Capital Management was a top performing hedge fund during the third quarter. Coming in with the fourth best Q3 performance, the fund’s picks had a weighted average return of 25.5% during the first half of the year, and returned 24.6% for the third quarter, boosting the fund’s year to date performance to 56.4%. Artis Capital was founded in 2001 and is a San Francisco-based hedge fund with a focus on public technology companies. ... Read more.

More ETFs Play Hedge Fund Copycat
What if you could emulate the actions of the most successful hedge fund managers for a fraction of what they cost? Two ETFs that debuted this summer are trying to do that by using public filings to replicate their portfolios. And a third, which launched early this month, promises to add another hedge fund dimension to ETF copycats by adopting what its sponsor calls the only true market-neutral strategy in the lot. Researchers have been trying to emulate hedge fund strategies since the 1990s ... Read more

BMW Pininfarina Gran Lusso Coupé.

BMW and Pininfarina are two of the most tradition-swathed names in the motoring world. Each is a byword for cutting-edge technology, style, dynamics and aesthetics. With the BMW Pininfarina Gran Lusso Coupé, the two

time-honoured companies are unveiling the outcome of their first collaboration at the Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este 2013. The BMW Pininfarina Gran Lusso Coupé is a one-off and represents the exclusive interpretation of a luxurious BMW Coupé as seen through the eyes of Pininfarina.

...

All Time Record Gold Transactions Reported By LBMA

The precious metals have been weak again in May with gold falling 4.4% despite this weeks’ recovery. Silver is down 7% and platinum by 2.6%. Palladium has recovered from recent weakness and those who accumulated on weakness are set for the best month since November after it surged 6.6% in May.

Weakness in gold and silver is leading to robust demand internationally as store of value buyers accumulate gold and silver on this dip. This is particularly the case in Asia where premiums remain robust and supply demand imbalances remain. ...

6 Tips to Work From Home Successfully

The future of work is the work itself, not where and when the work takes place. Workplace flexibility programs are already catching on and will soon become standardized as more millennials enter the workplace. All workers, not just millennials,want freedom and flexibility and some are even quitting their jobs to becoming freelancers in order to gain that freedom. oDesk.com has 3.3 million registered freelancers, and Intuit predicts that by 2020, 40% of Americans will be freelancers. When it comes to working from home, 13.4 million people (9.4% of all American workers) work from home at least one day per week compared to just 9.2 million in 1997 according to one Census Bureau.

Today's top Green Energy Good News

Russia is funding research into powering its airplanes with solar energy. The airline industry is being hurt by high fuel prices, and solar-powered planes would not only be cheaper but also would remove a major source of carbon pollution that contributes to global warming.

Texas is set to double its wind energy generation from 60 gigawatts to 120 gigawatts in 2013.

Britain has made substantial investments in wind energy and its technology. British PM David Cameron is touting his country’s green expertise on his trip to India to promote trade with that country. ... Continue.

High-Dividend ETFs with Reasonable Valuations

Investors have picked over the ETF universe in search of any kind of yield in an extremely low-rate market for bonds. As a result, ETFs tracking many traditional high-yield sectors have been bid up to expensive levels, but there are still places investors can go for income without paying nosebleed valuations. “Unfortunately, valuations [for dividends, high-yield junk bonds, MLPs, and REITs] are approaching sky high levels in many instances as more investors fall in love with these products ... Continue.