For the week 4/19-4/23

[Posted 2:00 AM ET…Beirut, Lebanon]

 

 

Of all the world’s hot spots, I have long argued this is as important as any of them, including Iran, because a region wide Middle East conflict could just as easily start in Lebanon.

 

And so after coming here five years ago, on the heels of the assassination of former prime minister Rafik Hariri in a horrific truck bombing that claimed 22 lives, I ignored the following U.S. State Department warning on travel here.

 

“The Department of State continues to warn U.S. citizens to avoid all travel to Lebanon due to current safety and security concerns. U.S. citizens living and working in Lebanon should understand that they accept risks in remaining and should carefully consider those risks….

 

“While Lebanon enjoys periods of relative calm, the potential for spontaneous upsurge in violence is real. Lebanese government authorities are not able to guarantee protection for citizens or visitors to the country should violence erupt suddenly. Access to borders and ports can be interrupted with little or no warning. Public demonstrations occur frequently. Under such circumstances, the ability of U.S. government personnel to reach travelers or provide emergency services may at times be severely limited.”

 

While some of the above is standard boilerplate for a fair number of countries these days, I did register with the Department of State before coming here, just in case. I also have to note that, slightly tongue in cheek, I am a trained professional…a professional traveler who is duly aware of the political situation in countries I visit. I thus saw this period as indeed one of “relative calm” and I’ve had zero issues, though I have not been to Hizbullah territory as I was in 2005.

 

Things are nonetheless happening in Lebanon on an almost daily basis. I didn’t realize until I read in the paper one morning that the day before, “A mob of angry soccer fans attacked the Kuwait Embassy in Beirut Wednesday after the Lebanese soccer team Nejmeh lost its match against the Kuwaiti team of Al-Qadsia. A group of 50 people left the Cit Sportive Stadium in Beirut after the match…then headed to the (Kuwaiti Embassy) where they attacked the embassy guards and destroyed the guard room. The Lebanese Army intervened to stop the fighting and fired gunshots into the air to disperse the crowd.”

 

That would have been exciting to stumble across. The other day I hired a driver to take me into the Bekaa Valley, but whereas in ’05 I went into the Hizbullah stronghold of Baalbek, this time I stayed 30-45 minutes away (at a lovely winery). In this instance I had read the following in the Daily Star newspaper upon my arrival last Sunday.

 

“The security situation in Baalbek calmed down during the weekend after a clash broke out between the Lebanese Army and a powerful clan in the city….

 

“The Jaafar clan fired on an army patrol conducting a raid in the Hay al-Sharawna neighborhood of Baalbek to locate fugitives from justice….

 

“Security sources told the Daily Star the clashes were serious and 10 people were wounded: five soldiers and five clan members, but that no one was killed.

 

“They added that the clash lasted for 90 minutes and that 20 RPG rockets were fired, while some 3,000 rounds of ammunition were used.”

 

Good time to drink wine instead, I mused.

 

Actually, a development occurred this week that had I known about it earlier, before my trip arrangements were made, may have given me pause; the accusation on the part of Israel and the United States that Syria has been supplying Scud missiles to Hizbullah. If true, this is a game-changer, for while the balky Scud isn’t the kind of weapon usually associated with the nimble terrorists, it places all of Israel at risk for the first time. It’s already a game-changer in terms of the rhetoric and where this comes into play for anyone traveling here is that if Israel were to attack a suspected arms convoy, either in Bekaa or Syria itself, there would be a decent chance Hizbullah would respond in kind. This is remote, I was told on Thursday in a meeting with one of the true experts here in Lebanon (more on this later), but one never knows for sure in this place. What if Israel mistook a civilian vehicle(s) for an arms shipment? It’s certainly happened before.

 

Where it really comes into play for a little old tourist like yours truly is that Hizbullah, in controlling South Beirut, can in an instant blockade the airport road, as it has done numerous times in the past, and then you’re stuck.

 

But just a quick history lesson to provide a little context.

 

1975-1990…Lebanese civil war, centered here in Beirut, that by some accounts claimed up to 150,000 lives (a figure I saw again just this week in a related article). The civil war erupted when Christians attacked a bus of Palestinians in Beirut.

 

1978…Israel invades Lebanon to suppress Palestinian attacks from the south and then occupies parts of the country for 22 years.

 

1978…as up to 40 militias battle it out, Hizbullah, “Party of God,” is founded with the express mission of destroying Israel.

 

1983…Hizbullah takes out the U.S. Marine barracks near Beirut’s international airport, killing 241, and simultaneously attacks the French barracks, killing 58.

 

1990s…following Syria’s military role in ending the fighting, supported by both the U.S. and the French (who once governed here before Lebanon’s independence in 1943), Lebanese businessman, Rafik Hariri, with the support of both Syria and his sponsor, Saudi Arabia, begins to rebuild Beirut. Some call him a hero and visionary. Others say that in grabbing huge tracts of land for himself, he is running roughshod over the place. Bottom line, Hariri becomes prime minister and without his $billions, Beirut’s transformation probably doesn’t take place.

 

2000…Israel leaves, but keeps some lands bordering the Golan Heights, taken from Syria in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, including a 15-square mile territory called Shebaa Farms.

 

2004…UN Security Council Resolution 1559 calls for free and fair elections in Lebanon as well as for the disarming of Hizbullah. All foreign troops, read Syria, are to withdraw.

 

2005…Rafik Hariri, now leading a political coalition and still the go-to guy on everything having to do with Beirut’s development, has a falling out with Syria. He is assassinated in February. Syria has its hands all over the slaughter and a UN tribunal would eventually begin to make progress on reaching indictments. [But then the courageous prosecutor, Detlev Mehlis, resigns, and the tribunal has essentially bogged down ever since, though under a new Canadian prosecutor there is a chance indictments will be handed down in the next 12 months. This is a highly explosive issue, to say the least, should charges ever be formally filed. Hizbullah, for one, while always denying involvement, would go ballistic were it to be implicated in any way.]

 

2005, part II…two coalitions emerge in the aftermath of the bombing, the March 8 coalition (so named for the day of a massive demonstration) which contains pro-Syrian supporters, including Hizbullah, and the March 14 coalition, comprised of moderates and pro-democracy forces that are pro-West. March 14 is led by Rafik Hariri’s $billionaire son, Saad, who has zero experience in politics and was just working in the family construction and development business. Syria is then forced to withdraw all its troops after 29 years of occupation (I specifically arrived back then the last day they did so, as the troops exited through Baalbek).

 

Since then the political process has been a mess…plus…

 

2006…Israel and Hizbullah stage a 34-day war that claims 1,200 Lebanese lives (mostly civilians) and 160 Israelis (mostly soldiers). Israel does tremendous damage to Lebanon’s infrastructure. UN Security Council Resolution 1701 ended the war with UN forces, UNIFIL, moving in to police the southern part of Lebanon, and Hizbullah, once again, was to disarm. Instead, a rocket force once thought to be 15,000 missiles before the ’06 conflict, is today anywhere from 40,000 to as many as 60,000 strong.

 

Separately, elections were first held in spring 2005, with Hariri emerging as leader of the majority March 14 coalition, but he’s had major trouble establishing a true government, as, among others, Hizbullah demands a seat at the table, and a veto. Under Lebanon’s crazy constitution, for example, the president must be a Christian, the prime minister a Sunni, and the Speaker a Shia, with cabinet positions evenly allotted.

 

[Lebanon is roughly 39% Christian, 28% Sunni, and 28% Shia, with the rest a myriad group of sects, including the Druze. Lebanon hasn’t held an official census since 1932 and this is an issue again because there was a call to lower the voting age from 21 to 18; but while this would add an estimated 50,000 Christians to the voting rolls, it would also add 175,000 Muslims, which would greatly aid Hizbullah, thus no change as yet.]

 

2008…Hizbullah, during the latest impasse on formation of a cabinet, decides to show who is boss and takes over vast areas of Beirut it had never entered in force before. In the fighting that ensues, 65 are killed. It’s a truly frightening moment. Hizbullah withdraws.

 

And that’s pretty much where things stand today. Hizbullah has veto power in the cabinet but little governing is taking place with Saad Hariri prime minister. Hariri and other March 14 coalition members, though, once virulently anti-Syria, have been undergoing one “road to Damascus” conversion after another, prostrating themselves at the feet of Syrian President Assad even though it is highly likely he, at best, knew of the assassination plot against Rafik Hariri. This part of the process is rather sickening, and pitiful, to an outside observer such as yours truly.

 

But let me tell you about where I am located. From my hotel room window, on the 18th floor of the Phoenicia, where I also stayed in 2005, I can see the site of the Hariri assassination (replaced by a memorial and small square), the bombed out famous St. George Yacht Club, which they are leaving as a reminder, though the club is in use with a lovely pool and yacht basin, where I can see at least five major league yachts moored at the present time. Also, I look down on a bombed out HSBC building which is being repaired (finally), a huge apartment tower that was severely damaged, which it appears they are slowly doing something with, and then off in the distance a major project that is going to consist of spectacular office and apartment towers with beautiful views of the Mediterranean, which is one block away from where I sit, and I can see a steady flow of tanker traffic, as well as Lebanese navy patrol boats. I’ve read that way up in the sky, beyond what I can see, Israel conducts almost constant operations and one assumes is mapping out its next targets during a future war.

 

So right in front of me is Lebanon…Beirut…good and bad, past and future.

 

But I was floored in my first walk on Monday to one of my favorite spots from before, near Martyrs Square, where all the sidewalk cafes are, as to the level of development taking place; apartments, offices, a spectacular shopping mall. None of this was going on in the same part of town in 2005. I won’t get into whether this is another bubble as I don’t know enough yet, and in the grand scheme of things it really doesn’t matter (especially as opposed to past pronouncements of mine on the global real estate front), but it is almost solely Saudi and Kuwaiti money from what I can gather.

 

My hotel is 99% Arab occupied and on Tuesday, when I hired a driver to take me into Bekaa, and the winery (Chateau Kefraya), “Charbel” gave me a terrific tour of areas and neighborhoods I hadn’t seen before both in Beirut and in the surrounding mountains where Saudi, Kuwaiti and, in some cases, South Americans, are building their own villages, in essence; all of them preferring to be with others of their kind, of course. The villas are spectacular. Parts of Beirut are spectacular.   And you just wonder why all of it is taking place when some of us believe the dream will be shattered anew at some point.

 

If you were totally naïve to the politics, and history, you’d think parts of Lebanon were almost like Club Med.  There’s a reason why long ago Beirut was known as the “Paris of the Mediterranean.” It’s why I think there is no more fascinating place in the world, even if I have trouble entering certain areas my contact told me yesterday I should nonetheless feel totally safe in. [We aren’t talking the Hizbullah stronghold in south Beirut…that’s a different animal, especially for an American.]

 

So what of my contact? He is Michael Young, opinion editor of the Daily Star. I have long been a fan of his, and his paper, and just happened to write him a note before I came, requesting a few minutes. Young was born in America but shortly thereafter came to Beirut and has been here ever since. It also just so happens that he literally came out with a book the other week, “The Ghosts of Martyrs Square: An Eyewitness Account of Lebanon’s Life Struggle.” It was kind of funny. We met at the entrance to a large, beautiful shopping mall I hadn’t been to before, and in looking for a place to have a drink passed through a bookstore so, of course, I eagerly purchased a copy and got his signature.

 

I obviously haven’t had a chance to read it yet, but I strongly encourage you to pick up a copy. Let’s move the needle on sales. As an endorsement on the book jacket reads, from another favorite of mine, Jim Hoagland of the Washington Post, “Michael Young plunges deep beneath the headlines to provide this inside account of Lebanon’s national genius for self-destruction and phoenix-like recovery.”

 

Michael and I had a terrific discussion – he shot down some of my concerns and theories, but didn’t disagree with many others – and there is no truer description of what I’ve observed in my trips here…self-destruction and recovery.

 

Michael has experienced firsthand the impacts of the bombs of war (though his immediate neighborhood has remained largely intact), while I consider Lebanon just a massive powderkeg, for one primary reason alone, the presence of Hizbullah. It’s a situation totally unique to the world…where an armed militia, not the political leaders, and not the official military, really calls the shots. Until they are disarmed (which isn’t likely to happen in my lifetime unless Israel were to somehow totally wipe it out) it’s why we all need to pay attention to what happens here.

 

—

 

Back to the issue of Scuds, Syria denies it has delivered them to Hizbullah, but White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said:

 

“We are obviously increasingly concerned about the sophisticated weaponry that is allegedly being transferred.”

 

But Lebanese Prime Minister Hariri said:

 

“Israel is trying to reproduce the same scenario [in Iraq] for Lebanon. The rumors about Scuds are only a pretext for threatening my country…These accusations are reminiscent of the weapons of mass destruction allegations against Saddam Hussein; they were never found, they did not exist.”

 

Obama administration Near East point man, former ambassador to Lebanon, Jeffrey Feltman, told a congressional panel that giving Scuds to Hizbullah would be “an incendiary, provocative action,” which “could affect war and peace in the region.”

 

Senator Dianne Feinstein, Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said:

 

“I believe there is a likelihood that there are Scuds that Hizbullah has in Lebanon. A high likelihood….

 

“The rockets and missiles in Lebanon are substantially increased and better technologically than they were and this is a real point of danger for Israel.”

 

Of course all the above, including the introduction, in the long run has everything to do with Iran, who, together with Syria, employs Hizbullah as its proxy army. 

 

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said in an interview that there is no reason for war to break out in the region, or over Iran, in responding to the latest warning from Jordan’s King Abdullah II. But Barak added:

 

“We also shouldn’t delude ourselves. The growing alienation between us and the United States is not good for the state of Israel.”

 

On Iran, specifically, Barak told an Israeli paper that Iran does not yet “pose an existential threat to Israel.”

 

Vice President Joe Biden said on Thursday that Israel would not attack Iran without first conferring with the White House and that the U.S. and Israel want to give sanctions a last shot.

 

[As an aside, on the key issue of settlements in East Jerusalem, which is impeding the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, there were conflicting statements this week. On one hand, Prime Minister Netanyahu said any freeze in Jerusalem was “totally, totally a non-starter,” but then some in his coalition have said they would allow for a temporary halt in construction if it will advance the peace process.]

 

Meanwhile, the New York Times ran a story that Defense Secretary Robert Gates, in a January memo to the president, said there is a line the U.S. will not permit Iran to cross, but that the administration needs to have a battle plan in place, and to prepare for the worst. We haven’t as yet done so, the secretary warned.

 

Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Michael Mullen issued this important statement in reading the tea leaves.

 

“We in the Pentagon, we plan for contingencies all the time and certainly there are options which exist,” adding that while it’s a last resort, military action would go “a long way” in setting back Iran’s nuclear activities. 

 

This is the first time I can recall an administration official conceding what I’ve been arguing all along…better to set the program back a few years (as long as we’re prepared for the consequences) than to have a nuclear-armed Iran.

 

On Iran’s home front, the government is looking to hike gasoline prices to cut consumption and reduce its dependence on imported fuel should gasoline be part of any new sanctions regime (though to me this is doubtful). And remember the reform movement? You remember, don’t you? The movement that President Obama totally ignored? Iran’s watchdog banned all activities by two leading reformist parties that had backed opposition leader Mousavi.

 

Lastly, Iran has been conducting extensive war games in the Persian Gulf and Strait of Hormuz.

 

The news that the SEC filed suit against Goldman Sachs hit as I was wrapping things up last week, and you read my emotional response to it all…thrilled beyond words…but what have we learned in the succeeding week? That Goldman’s apologists are still out in force, that it undoubtedly will put together the largest amount of legal brainpower in the history of mankind should it opt not to settle and fight it out instead, and that as CEO Lloyd Blankfein and “Fab” Tourre prepare to testify on Tuesday before a select Senate panel out looking for its own blood, perhaps the SEC doesn’t have that strong a case.

 

To review the facts, the following is from an editorial in the Financial Times.

 

“The case the U.S. regulator has brought against Goldman is damning. It alleges that just before the subprime bubble burst in 2007, the bank (hooked up) with a hedge fund manager, John Paulson, to market certain subprime mortgage-related securities. Goldman did not tell the purchasers that they were buying an interest in loans hand-picked by Mr. Paulson, who took a very bearish view of the subprime market. Or that he had chosen them for their high likelihood of default.

 

“The buyers were also not informed that Mr. Paulson’s purpose in structuring the deal was to take a short position against the investments they were making. This trade ultimately netted him roughly $1 billion in profits, while the buyers lost their investment….

 

“To entice investors, the bank persuaded an independent credit adviser, ACA Management, to lend its name to the transaction. ACA did so on an understanding it obtained from Goldman that Mr. Paulson was to take a long position in the securities. This was not the case. Had ACA not been involved in the trade, investors might not have purchased the securities. What is worse, ACA, now a subsidiary of Royal Bank of Scotland, then insured most of the issued securities. That ACA took an $841 million loss when the deal went bad can hardly make for good relations between Goldman and the UK government, which owns most of RBS.”

 

Forget Goldman’s reputation, should the SEC’s case hold up….

 

“This will confirm many investors’ view that Wall Street operates a rigged game. It is suggested that other banks did similar trades. Mr. Paulson has until now been seen as one of the heroes….He has been the subject of admiring profiles in the media. But while it is one thing to profit from others’ misjudgments if they are making them anyway, any suggestion that he profited in an underhanded way will tarnish him.”

 

The above was in last Saturday’s edition of the FT, but since then the same themes keep coming up. The SEC suit proves our worst suspicions that the game is rigged. And as Sen. Carl Levin and his colleagues added this week, they are also out to get the ratings agencies, such as Moody’s, who allowed the banks to pay them off as the latter built portfolios of garbage to then market. The investors saw AAA, trusted the Goldman, or JPMorgan Chase, or Deutsche Bank salesperson when they told them the portfolio was secure (or the slice of it, as was often the case), and now the banks turn around and say in defense, ‘Hey, these were sophisticated investors who should have known this AAA portfolio was really crap. It’s not our fault,’ this as the bank itself was taking all sides of the trade imaginable and profiting six ways to Sunday.

 

Through it all, though, Goldman itself maintains that it never bets against its clients and that it has a code of ethics! Goldman issued a letter that said in part, “(it) would never condone one of its employees misleading anyone, certainly not investors, counterparties or clients.” And, besides, sophisticated investors are to assume someone equally sophisticated is on the other side of the trade, so don’t blame us.

 

It’s this last bit that really irks the hell out of me. Yes, some investors, I imagine, deserved to get burned, but look at the municipalities who relied on their Goldman or JPMorgan or UBS salesperson…from some little municipality in Alabama, to a city in Italy, to the Greek government. Ethics? Code of ethics? Who the hell is kidding whom?

 

Maybe the SEC picked the wrong case. I don’t know, especially sitting here in Beirut where for various technical reasons it hasn’t been that easy to keep up this week, let alone the fact I didn’t come all the way out to Albania and Lebanon to spend my days giving a rat’s ass about Goldman’s reputation. Maybe we’ll see on Tuesday as Blankfein and Tourre testify that the latter in particular has balls of steel and that in this instance, the SEC’s case is riddled with holes; such as did ACA really not know what Paulson was up to? Certainly the presentation booklet, despite its boilerplate disclaimers, didn’t mention it.

 

The real issue is for the industry as a whole. It in no way was a level playing field. There are tons of cases yet to be filed where there were overt material omissions of fact; not just in the example of securitization run wild, but perhaps more importantly in hiding the true financial condition of Wall Street’s own brethren, such as in the case of AIG, which I note below. Or the Greek government’s.

 

This week, the European agency responsible for determining debt levels revised Greece’s budget deficit to GDP ratio up to 13.6% from 12.9%, the latter the figure that has been used since the crisis began. This is a huge difference in this game, yet Eurostats had to concede it could be even worse for Greece because of the complex swaps securities on its books. You can say the same thing about a ton of governments, financial institutions (such as one Irish bank I discuss below), and municipalities. In my state of New Jersey, for example, over the past year we learned of all kinds of swaps arrangements that make our deficits even worse, and it’s the same situation all over. We’ll be learning about this crap for years to come, yet it all started with some bankers at Goldman, Morgan Stanley, you name it, who basically created sham product with little real backing behind it, just to earn gobs in fees.

 

And imagine these institutional salespeople peddling this toxic waste. They’ve got to close the deal, regardless of the ultimate impact on their client, because they can pick up a huge bonus come yearend! After all, their wife has been bitching she can’t keep up with another Goldman spouse, the car isn’t nice enough, the house is too small to entertain 600 of their closest friends, the salesman’s mistress has demands of her own….I’m dead serious.   This is the part of the game people don’t want to write about, but it’s there in spades. 

 

So many of these folks in this game have zero ethics, but no doubt Lloyd Blankfein will tell the senators this week what an honorable shop he runs, and all the funds they give to charity, and how Goldman makes its communities better, and, by god, we’ve actually got a microfinance program going on that has created thousands of jobs. Big f’n deal. Any good your firm has done doesn’t absolve it from out and out fraud. That’s supposed to be the true bottom line, but we’ll learn over the coming years whether or not it sticks.

 

Oh, a few more items concerning Goldman Sachs this week. Wouldn’t you know but on Friday, the Wall Street Journal reported that director Rajat Gupta tipped off disgraced hedge fund king Raj Rajaratnam as to Warren Buffett’s key Sept. 2008 investment in Goldman that led to a huge rally in its shares off the crisis lows. Nice ethics there (though I imagine some at Goldman will say, well, he wasn’t exactly an “employee,” Gupta was just a “director”).

 

And the Financial Times reported on the many conflicts of interest as a result of Goldman’s involvement in a huge refinancing at Lloyd’s, with Goldman serving as both underwriter and investor, which in this instance hardly put the client’s interests first because Goldman helped make the terms of the offering more expensive. Seeing as the UK government had a large stake in Lloyd’s, once again, imagine how pissed off the Brits are. If I’m a British taxpayer, I sure am.

 

Ah, but the code…the code…we are so honorable. We are… Goldman Sachs. Kneel before thee, peons! 

 

—

At least financial reform legislation appears to have taken a big leap forward, helped by the Goldman suit. Republicans now understand this is a big-time losing issue come November if they do not back a decent bill and for all the usual bitching and moaning, the Senate version is pretty good, with the exception of the proposal to spin off derivatives trading desks, which could force financial institutions to forego their regulatory charters, allowing them to keep the units, which were responsible for more than $20 billion in profits at the five largest banks alone last year. Even the White House doesn’t want them spun off. What we need, first and foremost, is transparency…and the senate’s version addresses this satisfactorily.

 

Another item concerning the banks, though, is an IMF proposal to be presented to the G20 finance ministers that would (1) levy a flat tax, and (2) a VAT-like tax on profits and compensation to pay for the costs of future financial crises. The banks are willing to accept financial reform legislation, but they are very upset at the IMF plan. Insurers, hedge funds and others would have to pay as well.

 

The problem is if it is not approved by the G20 (and as I write it is unlikely it will be), then each country could have its own rules and the banks would just pick and choose where they want to be domiciled for the best tax treatment.

 

On another key issue these days, China, it’s almost as if the government is talking the economy down, while the facts seem to speak otherwise. The economy, as the central bank had to finally admit, is doing just fine even as China slaps all kinds of restrictions on housing in an attempt to tamp down speculation. Strategist Marc Faber said China’s real estate issues mean that 11.9% growth (actually upgraded Friday to 12.2%) is unsustainable. No kidding! Those of us investing in China, as well as the Chinese government, would take 8%-9%. But Templeton’s Mark Mobius, who’s had one of the great jobs of all time as he was really the first globetrotter in the emerging markets realm, says that China’s moves to squelch the bubble will work because future demand will lessen the chances of an outright collapse. Importantly, China’s bank regulator is demanding quarterly stress tests on the largest financial institution’s property loans, a good thing. True, local governments and their financial ties to developers are a risk, perhaps a big one, but this is now such a big economy, and the leverage employed appears by most accounts to have been nowhere near the levels seen in the U.S. and places like Spain and Ireland.

 

As for the Greece debt crisis, at one point the yield on their two-year paper hit 10.00%, with the 10-year bond at 9.00%, as the last investors finally threw in the towel, turned off the lights, and said, “I’m outta here.” Greece was going to have to wait until May 15, at the latest, for a joint EU/IMF aid package, but it’s needed even sooner with the crisis in confidence and the new debt figures I discussed above.

 

So on Friday, Greece went running for help and Prime Minister Papandreou requested $60 billion, immediately. A total bailout. Greece’s bonds then tanked anew, with the 10-year hitting 10.20%, for a number of reasons. This is a humiliating comedown for the Greek nation, it is consigning itself to years of austerity that will only deepen their recession, and there is zero guarantee the same help won’t be needed in 2011 and 2012. The people are furious and violence seems a certainty down the road. More on this next time.

 

–The incredible rally in equities continued with the Dow Jones’ winning streak now at 8, the longest such skein in six years. For the week the Dow gained 1.7%, the S&P 500 2.1% (to a 19-month high) and Nasdaq 2.0%.

 

Stocks were powered by more solid earnings news, as well as good data on the housing front. Certainly the recovery in the U.S. is thus far exceeding expectations, but I’m sticking to my guns that we finish down on the year.

 

–U.S. Treasury Yields 

 

6-mo. 0.24% 2-yr. 1.06% 10-yr. 3.81% 30-yr. 4.66%

 

Treasuries were largely unchanged, save for the two-year whose yield rose 11 basis points, as gains resulting from the Greece crisis were offset by data showing further strength in the U.S. economy. The week also saw good news on the inflation front with the core rate on March producer prices coming in up 0.1%.

 

–On top of new data on Greece’s debt to GDP ratio, Ireland’s budget gap reached a record 14.3% of GDP in 2009, the largest for any country since the start of the euro. Recall the target is 3%.

 

We also learned that the new CEO of the Bank of Ireland was given a pension “top-up” of $2 million, which means that Richie Boucher can quit in 4 years at 55 and receive $500,000 annually.

 

Separately, new details emerged concerning failed Anglo Irish Bank; such as at the height of its funding crisis it told investors it had received a $200 million loan from a German bank, which at the time helped allay fears Anglo was going under as it made the balance sheet appear stronger than the public was hearing.   One problem. Anglo officials didn’t tell potential investors and shareholders that it was simultaneously paying the German bank the same $200 million. It was a total sham transaction designed to deceive all. One inter-company email that surfaced read, the bank “must not disclose details regarding the transaction.”

 

In the case of Anglo, the Irish government has had to pump $15 billion into it and it’s estimated a further $13 billion will be needed.

 

[The IMF projects that Ireland’s economy will contract another 1.5% in 2010, and then grow just 2% next year.]

 

–South Korea’s unemployment rate is but 4.1%. As noted below, tensions with North Korea are being handled with an eye towards the economy.

 

Separately, and as an example of the strength here, Hyundai Motor said net profit hit a record in the first quarter as global sales of the company’s vehicles jumped 36.6% from a year earlier. Hyundai, together with its Kia subsidiary, is now the world’s fifth-largest auto group. 

 

–Japan’s March exports were flat, month-on-month, though up 43.5% from year ago levels. I’ve written that those who doubt the validity of China’s data only need to look elsewhere for confirmation, such as in Japan’s exports to China rising 47.7%. [The aforementioned Hyundai’s sales to China rose 48.1%.]

 

–India’s latest government projection for the next 12 months beginning April 1 is for 8.25% GDP growth.

 

–But first quarter growth in the UK was only 0.2%, not a big help to Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s reelection efforts, as further discussed below.

 

–General Motors Co. repaid $8.1 billion in loans it received from the federal government and Canada, five years ahead of schedule, in a rather clear signal it is on the road to recovery. GM also announced it is investing $257 million in a Kansas City, Kansas assembly plant for the purposes of building the mid-size Chevy Malibu.

 

GM still owes $45.3 billion to the U.S. and $8.1 billion to Canada, which together own 61 and 12 percent of the company, respectively, though an initial public offering later in the year could help get the automaker out from under this burden.

 

–Back in 2005, then-New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer went after then-AIG chairman Hank Greenberg for messing with the balance sheet. This week a New York State Supreme Court justice called the case against Greenberg “devastating” as, similar to the Anglo Irish Bank situation, it’s alleged AIG manufactured deals to distort its true financial picture.

 

–News on the U.S. housing front was better. Existing home sales in March rose more than expected, with the median price rising to $170,700, or even with a year ago, while new home sales surged for the month as the tax credit winds down.

 

–Shares in Apple soared anew as it reported revenue in the quarter rocketed 49% to $13.5 billion. For the period, Apple sold 8.75 million iPhones, 2.94 million Macs, and 10.9 million iPods. The iPad wasn’t introduced until April 3 so its numbers will first be reflected in the next earnings report. Shares in Apple finished the week at $270.

 

–Meanwhile, AT&T is struggling, as is Nokia, on signs of saturation in the wireless market as the rate of contract signings declines.

 

–Microsoft’s sales of critically-acclaimed Windows 7 are booming after the disaster of the Vista operating system. Overall, the company’s revenues rose 6% in the first quarter to a record $14.5 billion.

 

–The Transocean oil rig disaster 50 miles off the Louisiana coast that claimed 11 lives and left 4 critically injured, could have enormous implications for energy policy in the U.S. should a feared major oil spill materialize, though at last report it appeared this might not be the case. Here President Obama just took the first steps, albeit tentative ones, towards opening up parts of our coastal waters to oil and gas drilling, against opposition from environmentalists, and then this happens. It also comes as the industry itself has been touting the past few years how during the catastrophic hurricanes of Katrina and Rita, not one barrel of oil was spilled despite severe damage to some rigs, so the industry needs to pull out all the stops to keep the Transocean / BP well plugged up. [From a professional standpoint, talk about a great challenge. Imagine the sense of satisfaction should the engineers prove successful in preventing a further catastrophe.]

 

–Morgan Stanley took a $932 million loss on an unfinished casino-hotel in Atlantic City. It would have required an additional $1 billion to finish “Revel,” but now the project is too far along to just tear down. To say the least, with growing competition in the area for gamblers, Atlantic City’s future is rather bleak.

 

–Home sales in the tony Hamptons of Long Island are finally rising again after a 39% price drop from Q3 2007 to Q1 2009.

 

–Two health notes that garnered some press. The Institute of Medicine has recommended the FDA crack down on the amount of salt in processed foods as well as at restaurants, while the Journal of the American Medical Association said that sugar needs to be restricted.

 

A lot of folks bitch that government’s hand in such matters is reaching too far and on both of these I couldn’t disagree more. I’m one of those who for years has read labels with disgust on the amount of salt and sugar in foods such as canned soup, for example. There is absolutely no reason for the levels of salt you find, and the “reduced sodium” versions are really no better. I understand competition in the market, but let me salt the product myself.

 

We’re paying for those who develop health problems because of excessive intakes of these two ingredients and we all should be outraged. 

 

–Speaking of groceries, a Miami businessman, Nevin Shapiro, who has a little supermarket empire, was accused by the SEC of running a $900 million Ponzi scheme to finance his lavish lifestyle. Evidently, Shapiro convinced about 60 wealthy investors that he could produce 26% annualized returns off his grocery business. So you could say that he found 60 incredibly wealthy idiots, because any moron knows that, for starters, the industry is the lowest margin one around.

 

–According to Hewitt Associates, as of the end of 2009, the average 401(k) balance was 11% lower than 2007’s peak, $70,970 vs. $79,570…at least an improvement over 2008.

 

–Some of the Saudi and Kuwaiti women I’ve come across in the hotel have an attitude even worse than the wives of Goldman Sachs.

 

–On the clothing label front, “Diesel” is huge in both Albania and Lebanon. Lots of t-shirts with the name splashed across.

 

Iraq: Two leaders of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, including al-Masri, were killed in a joint U.S.-Iraqi operation, with a third figure evidently being taken out a day or two later. Some expected the moves to have an impact on violence. A few days later, Friday, 58 died in a coordinated series of attacks in Baghdad. 

 

But on the political front you have the recount of 2.5 million votes in Baghdad, which was just approved by the election commission and seems destined to hurt Iyad Allawi, who officially had garnered 91 seats to Prime Minister al-Maliki’s 89. In Baghdad, with 70 seats out of 325 in the parliament, Allawi initially captured 24 to Maliki’s 26. Maliki is the one who filed for the recount, believing he can manipulate (my term, and Allawi’s concern) the recount to pick up a few seats and thus finally form a government, which Allawi has been unable to do as the technical winner.

 

The top U.S. commander on the ground here, Gen. Odierno, said he believed it would take another few months to form a government but that he was still confident of meeting President Obama’s goal of drawing down U.S. forces to 50,000 from a current 95,000 by end of August.

Thailand: After a six-week face-off between government forces and Red Shirt protesters, violence erupted again as the demonstrators hurled a number of grenades. Central Bangkok has been brought to a standstill as luxury hotels forced their guests to leave. The protest also spread out of the city as the Red Shirts blocked a train carrying military vehicles up north. Some 40,000 are massed behind their fortifications.

 

On Friday, though, a counter-demonstration was held, with pro-government allies demanding a dispersal of the red shirts who have crippled the economy and the livelihoods of all workers. The military, as I go to post, is avoiding a full-scale assault on the Red Shirts’ redoubt and the Red Shirts are looking to negotiate an end to the crisis.

 

North/South Korea: A number of developments on this front. It seems clear now that North Korea torpedoed the South’s naval vessel recently, perhaps a crude “human torpedo,” and pressure is on South Korean President Lee, in some quarters, to do something, though Lee is too smart to seek retaliation at this point and risk starting a war that would devastate his nation, both in blood and treasure. This is, however, one of the toughest political decisions any world leader will face this year. 

 

The South also announced that two North Korean agents were arrested; their mission being to assassinate the regime’s highest-profile defector who is hanging out in Seoul. They confessed to investigators that they were to “slit the betrayer’s throat.”

 

Separately, South Korean defense officials believe Pyongyang is gearing up for another nuclear test by June.

 

Pakistan: In a decent development, President Zardari signed into law sweeping constitutional reforms that grant the prime minister more powers in stripping them away from the president’s office as a way of bolstering parliamentary democracy while weakening military rule. Among the changes is the removal of the power in the president’s office to sack the prime minister and unilaterally dissolve parliament. Prime Minister Gilani hailed the signing of the bill as a “momentous occasion” and praised Zardari’s “magnanimity.” It also should save Zardari’s skin as he faced another round of corruption charges.

Ukraine: Way back I said that Russia would achieve a silent coup in the election of President Viktor Yanukovich and that would now definitely appear to be the case. Upon his election, there was some uncertainty just how far Yanukovich would tilt to Moscow over the West and the European Union, but there is little doubt now as he accepted a deal whereby Ukraine’s cost for its natural gas imports was slashed 30%, highly important for the nation’s economy, in return for extending a critical lease on the strategic Black Sea port of Sevastopol used by the Russians. The lease was to expire in 2017 and would have been a major source of future tensions, but now Yanukovich extended it through 2042.

 

Opponents of the president slammed the move as a surrender of Ukrainian sovereignty, while Yanukovich said, “With our economy in such a grave state, this decision will give a push forward…We have reinforced the certainty about the future of our country. We have launched the basis for coming out of the crisis and starting the economic recovery.”

 

Georgia: President Saakashvili said his country seized a shipment of highly-enriched uranium last month coming into his country (a relatively small amount). This had been rumored, but in stepping forward, Saakashvili blamed the security “black hole” in Russia.

 

Britain: I watched the debate on Thursday night between the three candidates for prime minister, Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Nick Clegg, and I was impressed by all three. Virtually all the polls are reaching the same conclusion. This is a dead heat, basically a third for each. [For example one reads 33% for Cameron’s Tories (Conservatives), 30% for Clegg’s Liberal-Democrats and 27% for Brown’s Labour Party, but this was before Brown’s rebound in the second of three debates; the first time Britain has had such televised theater.]

 

Clegg’s performance should have major implications in the U.S. and any third party movement here. But while I was impressed with the man, he would be a disaster for Britain. For one thing, unlike the other two, he favors getting rid of Britain’s Trident nuclear weapon deterrent, which is the last thing they should be doing before we get a resolution of Iran’s nuke program (which French President Sarkozy fully understands in insisting France keep its own nukes), while at the same time I was very impressed with Cameron, who I hadn’t seen in any extended appearances before.

 

The election is May 6 as we see how a third party in such a compressed time frame can make huge waves amidst an economic crisis and a growing sentiment for throwing out the establishment.

 

It also needs to be pointed out, however, that Britain is essentially broke and there is little any new government could do to effect real change.

 

France: Speaking of Sarkozy, he is going ahead with a proposal to ban the full veil, or niqab (the Muslim dress for women where you only have an eye slit) in public places, but advisers say it could be unconstitutional. This is a case where women’s rights groups around the world lend their support to such a move, but I’ve seen quotes in the local paper here in Beirut that some women feel the ability to wear the niqab is a right they have. I say it’s all part of the terrorism nightmare faced by security forces everywhere. Last Sunday in Istanbul, for example, my flight to Beirut was next to the gate for a flight to Jeddah and suddenly 30 women for that one appeared, fully covered up. While I recognize they had been through security of one kind previously, they (as did we) had to undergo a separate check. Most of these women appeared to be elderly, and kindly (their faces weren’t all covered), but who’s to know these days? 

 

Back to Sarkozy, his reason for the proposal, at least on the surface, is more about women’s rights than anything else.

 

Armenia: In a blow to peace efforts between Armenia and Turkey, the ruling coalition in Yerevan said it was halting ratification of an accord largely brokered by the U.S. on normalizing ties with Turkey, citing pressure from Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan who has been insisting that for the process to move forward, Armenia must settle its conflict with Azerbaijan. It was back in 1993 that Turkey sealed its border with Armenia as a show of support for Azerbaijan and the accord was to reopen it. This also has an impact on developing oil resources in the energy-rich South Caucasus.

Mexico: In yet another brazen attack, gunmen raided a Holiday Inn in Monterrey, systematically going through rooms and seizing four guests, plus 2 staff members (and a third receptionist at a hotel across the street). This was unprecedented. Imagine the terror as at 3:00 a.m., the gunmen barged into one room after another, leaving some guests alone, in looking for their targets. Monterrey is the site for a major league baseball game each season and while I’m not sure what the schedule is this year, it will be interesting to see how MLB handles it should there be a contest set up for down the road.

 

Lastly, I need to tie up some loose ends concerning some facts I learned when in Albania.

 

Property rights, as is the case in all emerging nations, or, say, in the Israeli-Palestinian divide, are a huge issue in Albania. My driver Elton was describing how the state just lets you build wherever you want and old landowners get screwed. But the government has been trying to rectify the situation so two years ago, Elton’s father was sent a notice that he was owed $300,000. But in the succeeding two years he’s received nothing. After 45 years of dictatorship, you can imagine the records are a mess.

 

When we were driving along there were a number of police checkpoints where the officers hold little paddles with a stop sign at the end. They then selectively wave you over. What is that for? I asked Elton. Turns out so many cars are stolen in Tirana that it’s one way for the police to catch the offenders. Plates from Tirana are specially designated so the officers seek them out.

 

The Greeks and Albanians absolutely detest each other. Same with the Macedonians and Greeks. As I was preparing for the trip I read how at a recent Greek military parade, the Greek soldiers were chanting things such as “We will make new clothes out of their skins,” and “We’re going to spill your blood, Albanian pig!” Geezuz. Chill out, Greeks. It’s not like you don’t have your own rather serious issues these days. Take care of your own house. Leave my Albanian friends alone!

 

Albania is 70% Muslim, but looking back I did not see one woman all covered up. Not one. Last Saturday, after posting my column, I took a long walk and came across a huge crowd coming out of a large mosque after attending a lecture or service and it could have been a group coming out of any church in the world. You wouldn’t have known it was a Muslim audience. 

 

I did have a very uncomfortable moment on my walk, though. A boy or young man with deformities I had never seen in my life (and I’ll leave it at that), crawled up to me asking for money. I looked down at him, briefly, and then stared straight ahead as I walked past. Fifteen seconds later I felt truly awful. I guarantee most of you would have had the same thought. “That’s not what Jesus would have done.”

 

But I’ve been in similar situations before in my travels (this is more severe than being approached by a panhandler in New York, trust me), and I know I have to be smart about it. I stood out like a sore thumb in Tirana and the last thing I should have done is whip out my wallet to give the guy something because clearly he had help just to get around and what if the controller was up to no good. He could have knocked me down and taken the wallet, though I purposefully wasn’t carrying much for this reason. The incident nonetheless bothered me.

 

Well, to get over it, I went back to the bar/café where I had encountered the lone service worker earlier that was a pain in the neck. I went back because the place was the best people watching venue and it was a beautiful afternoon. 

 

So wouldn’t you know, the same guy greeted me warmly and couldn’t have been nicer. Two other guys sitting at a table nearby waved. What the hell? I thought. Turns out the other two worked in the bank I had been going to, and as for the bartender, he was just in a better mood, I guess. Or my previous tip left a good impression. Probably the latter.

 

Ah, but it was yet another lesson learned that you have to be careful with first impressions. And you can’t just blow in and out of a joint (country) and feel like you know it. At my age I can’t imagine I’ll be going back to Albania, but I left with a good feeling and I wish them the best.

 

Oh, and by the way, I learned the truth on their whole E.U. application. At least two guys told me Saturday night that all Albanians really want is to have visa restrictions lifted, nothing more. It is a royal pain for these folks to obtain a visa to travel and they just want to be able to go all over the place like you or I can. It’s pretty simple. It’s also something we obviously take for granted. I didn’t need a visa to get into Albania, nor did I need one for Lebanon. It’s a major reason why I went to both places.

–According to the latest Pew Research Center poll, only 22% of Americans trust Washington ‘always’ or ‘most of the time.’

 

–In the local paper there was a bit concerning a farmer in eastern Lebanon who found the remains of a body in his field believed to be that of a Syrian soldier who died in fighting with Israeli troops in 1982. And how do authorities know the poor fellow was Syrian? “The skull was still inside the helmet and we found the identity card.” Never take your helmet off in battle.

 

–Speaking of Israeli troops, at one point during the civil war they occupied the winery (vineyards, to be more accurate) where I had lunch on Tuesday.

 

–South Park’s creators were threatened with death on an Islamic Web site for depicting the Prophet Muhammad in a bear suit. At least it wasn’t a clown outfit.

 

–39 volcanoes around the world have erupted this year. But from an article out of AFP, “A senior Iranian cleric has claimed that dolled-up women incite extramarital sex, causing more earthquakes in Iran, a country that straddles several fault lines, newspapers reported on Saturday.

 

“ ‘Many women who dress inappropriately…cause youths to go astray, taint their chastity and incite extramarital sex in society, which increases earthquakes,’ according to Ayatollah Kazem Sedighi.’”

 

Shazam! I mean, Kazem! Come back to us, lad. Then again, the women here in Lebanon are so gorgeous, they could….

 

–Speaking of the volcano, the Iceland variety, I had to do some juggling after I last filed this column and am forever grateful to Ilyda at Albanian Excursions. When I was in Tirana, I plopped myself down in her office and asked how I could get to Beirut since my original plan wasn’t going to work. A gentleman was in her office who traveled a lot to the U.S. and he started talking about taking a train to Munich, and then Paris, where I’d eventually get a flight to Beirut, and that didn’t exactly thrill me. So then I asked, ‘What are the options through Istanbul?’ and Ilyda got me on flights from Tirana to there and then Istanbul to Beirut, which worked out far better than my original plan to go from Tirana to Paris, via Rome, and then on to Beirut the next day. So I also got to spend a few hours in Istanbul’s airport, which keeps growing, and found what appears to be a nice airport hotel there as an option down the road. In the end, my experience was nothing like what so many Europeans, and Americans, went through. But now when I return home, I know I’ll have to fight to get my money back for certain flight segments.

 

And kudos to the BBC for its superb Web coverage of all the air traffic chaos, though I noticed at one point:

 

“Denmark: Airspace above 16,600 feet open. No landings.”

 

I’m assuming you just signed a release form and you were given a parachute. Hopefully a mask as well for when you went through the ash cloud.

 

–At last, confirmation some of our teachers when we were younger were trying to kill us. In Albania, the local paper said that “Air in many classes of Albanian schools contain high levels of carbon dioxide” and that one of the problems for the poor air quality is “dust created from the white chalks when teachers write on the blackboard.” Of course it wasn’t what the teacher was doing, it was when he or she told you to clap the freakin’ erasers. But I imagine the statute of limitations is up and there is nothing we can do, except cut their salaries. [Just kidding, my teacher friends!]

 

–Each morning I’ve been working in my room when the attendant comes in to clean it. Interesting boy from Nepal. Seems incredibly bright, speaks great English. Hope he rises in the ranks here.

 

–On the main road to Bekaa on Tuesday, my driver and I came across a bunch of police cars going slowly in our direction, sirens wailing…seven in all…and a paddy wagon. “That is a very important prisoner,” said Charbel. Boy, was I dying to know.

 

–The Lebanese Army has a ton of checkpoints on the main roads, especially the one to Baalbek/Damascus. They are obviously stopping Hizbullah figures from time to time…but the arms are shipped via a myriad of back roads, as Charbel pointed out to me, and I can’t imagine the army would do anything, anyway. It is pretty cool, though, to see snow-capped mountains in the distance and know that on one side is Lebanon, the other Syria. You forget how high the mountains are here, including Mount Lebanon that rises up from the sea and Beirut. It can be 50 degrees in Beirut and snowing heavily just a 30-minute drive up the road.

 

–During the siege of Bastogne in Dec. 1944, at the height of the Battle of the Bulge, U.S. Gen. Anthony McAuliffe famously replied to the Germans when they requested his surrender with one word, “NUTS!”

 

Here in Lebanon, the word nuts has a different connotation. As in take them away, please! I mean you get served the world’s most delicious nuts every time you sit down and I’m gaining about three pounds an hour, for crying out loud. Stop the madness! Stop serving me nuts!

 

[As your editor turns to look at a table where he has a big bowl of them in his room and starts to drool.]

 

I also have to add that in my regular trips to Arlington National Cemetery, I forget that Gen. McAuliffe is buried there. I need to pay my respects to this great American.

 

–The owner of a winery in Bekaa, Ramzi Ghosn (seriously, don’t know if he’s related to automaker Carlos Ghosn, who was recently giving a lecture in Beirut), once said:

 

“Even if you’re a Sunni or a Shia in Lebanon, you always knew that your neighbor might be a Christian and would be consuming wine. We’re not so good at producing airplanes or tanks, but in terms of food and drink, we surpass everyone in the world.”

 

Can’t disagree. And I’ll come back to Lebanon again. Each time I learn a little more and come closer to really wrapping my arms around the place.

 

–Lastly, I was reminded on this trip of all the good America can do. While I didn’t make it to Kosovo, I was nearby and Kosovo is comprised of mostly ethnic-Albanians. Of course the people of Kosovo adore Bill Clinton, as they should, and in the capital of Pristina there is Bill Clinton Boulevard. I saw a picture in the Tirana newspaper concerning an event on this street which is why I bring it up.

 

But I forgot to tell you last time of a great story from my ride with Elton. Outside of Tirana is the village of Kruje and it wasn’t the greatest looking spot but suddenly I see a “Kafe/Bar” with a separate sign that reads “George W. Bush.” I mean we’re in the middle of Albania, what the heck is this, Elton?

 

I totally forgot that in June 2007, Bush became the first U.S. president to visit the country. I believe the purpose was because we were pushing for Albania to become part of NATO and they had contributed some troops to the effort in Iraq or Afghanistan, and Bush, who had been jeered in earlier stops in “Old Europe,” was treated as a rock star here. He was only in the country 8 hours but he totally embraced it as the people warmly embraced him in return.

 

So his motorcade, which had been mobbed from the minute he landed in Tirana (you have to picture the excitement there of seeing Air Force One) arrives in this village, he got out of the car, went into this place for a drink or to chat, and Elton said there are two chairs there today where no one is ever again allowed to sit. Now how cool, and touching, is that? Bush then walked outside among the crowd and let them hug him, while he hugged them back. [The account was confirmed in a Washington Post piece from the trip I just looked up.] I’m guessing if you brought it up with Bush today, he’d say, in all sincerity, it was one of the highlights of his presidency.

 

Very cool. It’s just funny how I caught this out of the corner of my eye because it seems that Elton would have driven right past without commenting.

 

So “43” did his nation proud in Albania. He won over some hearts and minds, though perhaps not Elton\’s.

Pray for the men and women of our armed forces, and all the fallen.

 

And God bless America!!!

Gold closed at $1157

Oil, $85.05

 

Dow Jones +1.7% [11204]

S&P 500 +2.1% [1217]

S&P MidCap +3.6%

Russell 2000 +3.8%

Nasdaq +2.0% [2530]

 

Dow Jones +7.4%

S&P 500 +9.2%

S&P MidCap +16.9%

Russell 2000 +18.6%

Nasdaq +11.5%

 

Bulls 53.3

Bears 17.4 [Source: Chartcraft / Investors Intelligence…fyi, bulls topped out at 62.0 right at the market highs in Oct. 2007. The current bear reading is the lowest since last Dec., early Jan. of this year, which presaged a 9% move down in the S&P. More importantly, the level of bearishness, including the aforementioned periods, is nearing the lowest marks since 1987, and we know what happened then. So, taking it all together, this is one of those times when the sentiment readings I have been posting since day one of this column warrant some consideration.]

 

Have a great week. I appreciate your support. Next time from home, I hope.

 

Brian Trumbore