For the week 5/4-5/8

[Posted 7:00 AM ET]

 

 

Before we get to the bank stress tests, let’s take a look at the global economy.

 

With each passing day there are further signs the economy has bottomed. For each negative reading, such as Taiwan’s exports for April falling 34% from year ago levels, you have manufacturing indices in China and India over the 50 level, connoting growth in April. In the case of these last two, nine- and eight-month highs, respectively. 

 

On the other hand, China’s Vice-Premier Wang Qishan said the global financial crisis is still spreading and the economy will get worse before it gets better, and that it was imperative countries worked closely together to coordinate macroeconomic policies. But in an interview with the Financial Times he hastened to add that “China’s huge stimulus package has now produced initial results” and “there has occurred positive change.” China’s central bank is now saying the economy’s performance was “better than expected” in the first quarter and that it has spent only 1/3rd of the stimulus money earmarked for the first year of a two-year plan. That’s encouraging.

 

Australia’s unemployment rate for April came in far better than expected, 5.4%, as March retail sales there rose 2.2%. But the European Union forecast GDP will now decline 4% this year vs. a January estimate for a fall of 1.8%. Ireland is leading the way with a projected plunge in GDP in ’09 of a staggering 9%. But at the same time, consumer confidence is ticking up in Spain despite a 17.4% unemployment rate there.

 

Cisco Systems reported that revenue for its quarter dropped to $8.16 billion from a year earlier level of $9.79 billion, but CEO John Chambers said his company’s customers “are seeing some stabilization,” a significant comment from the normally conservative Chambers. Chairman Rupert Murdoch of News Corp. said, “There are emerging signs in some of our businesses that the days of precipitous declines are done and that revenues are beginning to look healthier.” Further signs we’ve hit bottom. And pending home sales in the U.S. actually rose, along with construction spending.

 

But in congressional testimony, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke voiced concerns over a relapse as business investment has remained “extremely weak,” and he expected that the recovery would be slower than usual, though he also conceded housing has “shown signs of bottoming.”

 

The Fed’s Janet Yellen spoke of the economy reaching “an inflection point. I see a lot of downside risk, but at least there is some basis for optimism.” Yellen adds, however, that once it takes hold the recovery will be “frustratingly tepid.”

 

Then we had Friday’s jobs report for April. The unemployment rate hit 8.9%, but job losses came in at 539,000, still dreadful but a distinct improvement from a revised figure for March of 699,000. 

 

But does the fact we’re bottoming warrant the spectacular rally we’ve seen in equities? Yes, but only if we soon begin to see good news, not just ‘less bad,’ that will then translate into improving top line revenue numbers and rising earnings. Were the global economy to just stall out over the next 3-6 months with no real progress (and I keep harping on the global view because one must never forget the multinational nature of much of Corporate America), then stocks will suffer, though regardless the closing low of 676 on the S&P 500 is in.

 

One other point. We have officially entered an era where budget deficits matter. For so long, people harped on the deficits (including yours truly) but in terms of funding them and any negative impact on the markets it hasn’t been an issue, thanks in no small part to China’s economic engine that was churning out double-digit growth and gobs of yuan looking for a home. 

 

But as I wrote last week the International Monetary Fund said the Group of 20 leading economies would continue to run budget deficits of at least 6.5% next year compared with a similar figure for ’09. “That, my friends, translates into a ton of bonds that need to find a home, the paper being needed to finance said deficits. It also means higher yields, which in turn pushes up funding costs, which means more debt….”

 

Yes, as rates have begun to rise in the U.S., this becomes a real concern in terms of the strength of any recovery. It’s not a huge problem if mortgage rates move from 4.75% to 5.50%, for example, still historically very low, but you get to 6.00% and higher and we’ll be in trouble. One of the issues for the coming months as investors around the world try to sop up each other’s paper is do governments such as our own, committed to quantitative easing through the buying of sovereign debt, have the firepower to keep rates in check? And will inflation stay in check? More on this next time. For now let’s just say I remain sanguine on inflation as long as wage pressures are nonexistent, which should be the case for a long time to come. The current spike in commodity prices doesn’t concern me in the least in terms of the Big Picture.

 

Now to the banks and the stress tests. Thanks to quantitative leaking, we knew all the results ahead of time, which while it worked out in the end in terms of market behavior is nonetheless more than a bit unsettling.

 

I believe the parameters of the stress test were fair; an “adverse scenario” of a 3.3% contraction in the economy this year, and 10.3% unemployment in 2010, for example, and in one instance way too tough, that being another 20% decline in real estate prices, but as I wrote last week, if you believe as I do that the worst is over in the economy the stress test is largely irrelevant, though a necessary evil.

 

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, in finding that 10 of the 19 tested need to raise more capital, $75 billion worth, said “Americans should know that the government stands behind the banking system and that their deposits are safe.” But the government wants the likes of Bank of America and Wells Fargo to raise more capital so they will have the financial strength to increase lending and they aren’t about to do so until the economy improves, so you have a chicken and egg situation. Just roll this topic into the 3-6 month time category along with everything else as we wait for actual good news vs. less bad.

 

[On Friday, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo raised $15 billion of the $75 billion, which bodes well for the others.]

 

 

Opposition to the government’s restructuring plan for Chrysler collapsed on Friday as five firms gave up the fight, but the debate that initially ensued is an important one.

 

Andrew Bary / Barron’s

 

“In the bizarre pecking order offered by the administration, the unions, which are at the bottom of Chrysler’s capital structure, would get nearly full recovery value for their $10.6 billion retiree health-care claims, while the secured creditors at the top of the hierarchy would receive about 30 cents on the dollar.

 

“Credit that to politics and a likely desire by Obama to reward the powerful UAW. After all, who in America really cares about a group of deep-pocketed banks and investment firms holding the $6.9 billion of Chrysler debt? ‘I don’t stand with them,’ as Obama said of the dissidents who derailed the deal.

 

“Another surprising aspect of the Obama proposal was the willingness of the Treasury to forgive a $4 billion loan to the company made in December in return for an 8% stake in the restructured auto maker – an interest that could be worth only 20 cents on the dollar assuming new Chrysler’s equity is valued at $10 billion….

 

“Obama, meanwhile, asked little sacrifice of Chrysler’s unions. The administration proposed giving them a $4.6 billion note yielding 9% due in 2022, and 55% of the equity in a restructured Chrysler. That could mean a nearly full recovery of their $10.6 billion claim.

 

“The UAW was offered a lush deal even though its claim is junior to the claims of Chrysler’s other major creditors, including the Treasury.”

 

Francesco Guerrera / Financial Times

 

“I have heard the arguments supporting the decision to short-change debt holders and carve out Chrysler between the unions, Fiat and the government.

 

“They boil down to this: extraordinary times require extraordinary measures (the end justifies the means, if you like).

 

“In other words, with Chrysler employing more than 50,000 people in the U.S. and Canada, it was paramount to avoid a long bankruptcy that would have destroyed the company.

 

“If that meant giving junior creditors such as the unions favorable treatment at the expense of senior debt-holders, so be it. As for those hedge funds that rejected the plan, they are nothing but ‘speculators’ according to Mr. Obama….

 

“There are several problems with the logic of the Chrysler ‘rescue.’

 

“First of all, it did not stave off bankruptcy. Chrysler duly filed for Chapter 11 on Thursday.

 

“Mr. Obama said it would be a ‘surgical’, quick in-and-out, process but that will be up to the court, not him.

 

“More importantly, the Chrysler saga sets a dangerous precedent for U.S. capital markets. For once, the law is unambiguous: senior secured creditors should be paid before junior unsecured creditors and employees (the words ‘senior’ and ‘junior’ are a bit of a give-away on this point). By turning legal wisdom on its head – and vilifying investors that opposed the move – the administration is signaling the principle is no longer sacred.

 

“While that, in itself, will not cause a massive capital flight away from the U.S., it will have some serious repercussions.

 

“Fund managers and hedge funds are already reluctant to participate in the authorities’ plans to rid banks of toxic assets for fear of government retribution on pay. The Chrysler ‘cram-down’ of lenders is hardly going to fill them with confidence.

 

“After this week’s completion of ‘stress tests,’ holders of preferred securities in some banks will be asked to exchange them into equity to recapitalize those cash-strapped institutions. How can they be sure the terms will be fair?…

 

“(The) rulers of the world’s largest economy ought to avoid short-term fixes that undermine the long-term strength of its capital markets.

 

“No end justifies the end of the rule of financial law.”

 

Irwin M. Stelzer / New York Post

 

“Typically, lenders who make money available to a company in return for a first claim on the company’s assets get about 80 cents back for every dollar they lend should it hit the rocks. Others to whom the company owes money, but who have no claim on the assets – workers, suppliers, junior lenders – get much less.

 

“Yet Obama forced the senior lenders to take something like 30 cents for every dollar they’d lent Chrysler. Many lenders – the big banks who’d taken federal bailout money – rolled over. But some hedge-fund managers pointed out that they have a legal, fiduciary responsibility to do the best they can for their investors (which include pension funds) and decided to take their chances with a bankruptcy judge.

 

“Never mind that this is their long-established legal right. Obama is furious with these ‘speculators,’ and hinted that he knows where they live and will get even when the new financial-industry regulations are drafted….

 

“Obama is pressuring the same ‘speculators’ who are holding out to accept the crumbs that he’s offering. But there is more here at stake than the money immediately involved. As George Schultze, managing member of Schultze Asset Management, a hedge fund, told the Wall Street Journal, ‘This is about contract and bankruptcy law, and upholding agreements – which is important in the grand scheme of things.’

 

“It certainly is. For one thing, the president is counting on some of these ‘speculators’ to partner with the Treasury and take a big stake in the toxic assets that are preventing the big banks from resuming normal lending. Unprotected by a rule of law, these investors will sit on their assets, rather than partner with a government that might some day decide, after the fact, that they made too much money, or should bear a larger portion of any losses than they had signed on to do.

 

“More broadly, if lenders know that any deals they strike can be overturned by a president who, like Langella/Nixon, can do things that are otherwise illegal because he decides ‘they are in the interest of the nation,’ they’ll raise the price they charge for their money – and not only when lending to the government.”

 

George Will / Washington Post

 

“It is Demagoguery 101 to identify an unpopular minority to blame for problems. The president has chosen to blame ‘speculators’ – a.k.a. investors; anyone who buys a share of a company’s stock is speculating about the company’s future – for Chrysler’s bankruptcy and the dubious legality of his proposal. Yet he simultaneously says he hopes that private investors will begin supplanting government as a source of capital for the companies. Breathes there an investor/speculator with such a stunted sense of risk that he or she would go into business with this capricious government?”

 

This past week, a letter by hedge-fund manager Clifford Asness whipped its way around the Net. Asness, while not having an investment in Chrysler, felt compelled to defend his brethren.

 

Asness said that “the president screaming that the hedge funds are looking for an unjustified taxpayer-funded bailout is the big lie, writ large. Find me a hedge fund that has been bailed out.” 

 

Asness added: “Here’s a shock. When hedge funds, pension funds, mutual funds and individuals – including very sweet grandmothers – lend their money they expect to get it back.” Wall Street, wrote Asness, “is not an owned lackey of the Oval Office to be scolded for disobedience by the president.”

 

Obama obviously doesn’t care about the criticism he’s receiving, at least not yet. He knows the vast majority of Americans want to demonize Wall Street for all the nation’s ills and that his stance plays well with much of the segment that put him in office. 

 

But while Wall Street does indeed deserve a large share of the blame for coming up with the financial products that almost brought down the global financial system, it’s quite another thing to ignore the law of the land; the very contract law that is the foundation of any free society. 

 

It’s kind of funny. Many in Washington have said of China over the past decade that the government there must improve its contract law. But like with so much of America these days, such as in our trade policies, we, i.e., the government, are as hypocritical as any in the world. With his treatment of Chrysler, and General Motors, bondholders, Obama isn’t even walking a fine line. He’s trampling some very basic tenets going back to the Founding Fathers….all for a few votes. That’s not exactly change I can believe in. 

 

Many of us fair-minded sorts are disappointed. If Obama is the pragmatist he wants us all to believe he is, he’ll take a long walk in the woods at Camp David and recognize the errors of his ways. But for some Chrysler and GM investors, it’s already too late.

 

 

Just a few thoughts as the virus continues to spread but the lethality is such most of us have largely ignored it.

 

Henry I. Miller, a former flu researcher now at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, notes in an op-ed for the New York Post:

 

“What do we know, then, two weeks after the outbreak? For one thing, we’re bedeviled by cost-benefit decisions. Only hindsight will pick the winners and losers, but it appears that U.S. public-health officials – especially those at the Centers for Disease Control and the National Institutes of Health, and also those in New York City – have acted with appropriate judgment and restraint.

 

“Federal officials have accumulated, analyzed and disseminated information, offering advice to the public and to health professionals. They’re preparing for a worsening of the situation but aren’t overreacting. They’ve made testing kits widely available around the country and abroad. Their laboratories are working around the clock, performing sequencing and other analyses of swine-flu isolates, and they’re preparing contingency plans should the situation change suddenly.

 

“Perhaps most important, they aren’t making dubious, alarmist pronouncements.

 

“The ease of international travel raises the stakes for the prospect of emerging diseases. The swine-flu outbreak could serve as a valuable wake-up call, making us think critically about who’ll be entrusted with public-health decisions.”

 

The WHO has warned that H1N1 could return “with a vengeance” and that in a true global pandemic, two billion of us could become infected. I told you last week that I have certainly added the virus to my risk factors when it comes to investing and I won’t hesitate to pull the trigger on my equity holdings at the first sign of a second wave next fall should it appear to be more serious than the existing bout. You’d be a fool not to take it seriously.

 

But for now we can only trust that those in charge are “over-preparing,” as the WHO’s Margaret Chan put it. Some experts, for instance, say we can’t discount the possibility the lethal H5N1 bird flu virus combines with H1N1. That would be scary, friends, though it’s far from certain this will ever occur.

 

I do have to note, though, that I was at a dinner on Wednesday and a friend of mine in the hotel business in New York said he couldn’t believe the reaction to Vice President Biden’s comment that he would advise family members to avoid mass transit at all costs. Seriously, Rob S. said that as soon as Biden spoke, his Marriott received quite a few cancellations. That tells you a lot about the panicky psyches of our fellow Americans, which isn’t helped by irresponsible pronouncements on the part of elected officials.

 

 

–Stocks rose for the 8th week in nine (nine in a row for Nasdaq) as the stress test results fueled the latest stage of the rally, along with further signs the economy had bottomed. The Dow Jones picked up 4.4% to 8574, while the S&P 500 gained 5.9% to 929. The S&P is now up 37% from the March 9 low. Incredible. Nasdaq, though, underperformed in tacking on another 1.2% as funds rotated out of tech and into cyclical issues that would benefit from a recovery, including energy, as well as financials.

 

Some of the individual gains since the March lows have been remarkable. 200%, 300%, 400% and then some. We were at the heights of despair back then, as I wrote, but your editor stayed the course with his bullish forecast that stocks would register 20% plus gains for the year. No doubt we are a long ways off from that prediction, and in need of a rest (like a 5% to 7% correction). We also need some legitimate news that reflects real growth or the earnings won’t come in to warrant some of the valuations we are now seeing.

 

–U.S. Treasury Yields

 

6-mo. 0.29% 2-yr. 0.98% 10-yr. 3.28% 30-yr. 4.26%

 

Yields on the longer end of the curve continue to rise as money flows out of bonds and into stocks, while the Treasury’s ongoing massive auctions make it harder to keep rates down, too. Inflation, though, is not an issue. And short-term credit conditions continue to improve as the TED spread between Libor and the T’bill narrows to levels not seen since September.

 

–After bottoming below $35 in mid-December, and then trading in a narrow range around $52 for about seven weeks, oil finally broke through the $55 barrier for the first time since mid-November to close at $58.60 on hopes a global recovery will lead to a surge in demand. Clearly the fundamentals don’t warrant the rally as the world remains awash in crude, but at the same time you have the likes of Devon, an independent oil and gas producer, saying they won’t be increasing production in 2009. Personally, I’ve missed the strong rally in these stocks the past two months. I wanted to pull the trigger in March and buy one or two issues but didn’t, and I’m just not good at chasing stocks once they begin to run.

[Venezuela\’s Hugo Chavez sent troops to take over oil service companies on Friday.  More on this next time.]

–Toyota reported its worst loss, $7.7 billion, for the first quarter and warned that for the year ending March 2010, it could lose $5.5 billion owing to the crash in vehicle sales in the U.S. and Europe.

 

–America’s two giants, Wal-Mart and McDonald’s, posted solid same store sales growth for April, up 5% and 6%, respectively, with McDonald’s European sales up 8.4%. Mickey D’s also launched its long-awaited McCafe coffee lineup. I’ll continue to go to McDonald’s for burgers, but for coffee it’s still Dunkin’ Donuts for the kid. Now if I could only get Sonya to include the wax paper with my chocolate donut so the icing doesn’t stick to the bag, instead of throwing the paper out. But I don’t want to upset her routine, or she might not bring me back any more rum cream from Jamaica. It’s a major predicament.

 

–A highly publicized study out of real estate website Zillow.com concluded over 21% of American homeowners had negative equity on their homes by the end of the first quarter, up from 14% in the third quarter of ’08.

 

–Barack Obama’s proposal to cut $17 billion in government spending is rather comical, especially considering how various Democratic lawmakers won’t even let him do that much. For example, as the Washington Post reported, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said she is “committed” to retaining a $400 million program that reimburses states for jailing illegal immigrants, a task she called “a total federal responsibility.”

 

You see, sports fans, this is yet another example of why you need to hold down the initial level of federal spending as much as possible because once the program gets entrenched, it’s virtually impossible to strip it out.

 

–I’m holding off on President Obama’s proposal to close corporate tax loopholes until I get more facts, plus it won’t be debated until later in the year. Like in the case of cap and trade, Obama faces as much criticism from some of his own party members as he does the other side of the aisle and at first blush it’s doubtful anything near what he discussed this week will come to fruition.

 

–Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett blasted bankers and insurers for the crash.

 

“I think that virtually everybody associated with the financial world contributed to it. Some of it stemmed from greed, some from stupidity, some from people saying the other guy was doing it.”

 

Vice chairman Charles Munger added:

 

“They were going to take a lot of sewage and mix it up in a different way and said it’s not sewage. The laws of nature are such that it keeps its sewage-like qualities.”

 

Munger said firms packaging subprime mortgages into securities “were either delusional or flim-flam artists.” But Munger also said, “These times when it looks terrible are the times when you are laying your foundation” for future gains.

 

Which is why I keep thinking of John Templeton. In fact in all honesty, I think of Templeton every day, and it’s not like I have his picture or some of his sayings lying around the office, though now that I mention it I probably should. It was Sir John, after all, who made his first fortune in buying up stocks at the height of the market crash in the 1930s.

 

–AIG lost another $4.35 billion in the first quarter, reflecting further writedowns of its credit insurance sold through Joe Cassano’s House of Horrors financial products division. But, hey, it’s better than the $62 billion loss they took in the fourth quarter! CEO Edward Liddy said “We are making good progress and stabilizing the business.”

 

–A “cash for clunkers” proposal is beginning to work its way through the House. For one year, vouchers for a maximum $4,500 would be offered to those that buy a car that gets at least 10 more mpg or a truck that is at least five mpg more efficient. I think it’s a terrific idea (already adopted in some European countries), but Republicans are balking on anything smacking of a climate initiative. My party is a bunch of losers.

 

–Inflation Alert: The cost of a first-class stamp is rising from 42 to 44 cents on Monday.

 

–Deflation Alert: The Star-Ledger newspaper is slashing salaries from 5 to 15 percent.

 

–Inflation Alert: Home runs are flying out of the new Yankee Stadium at a record pace.

 

–Deflation Alert: The Yankees will have to continue to slash ticket prices if they are to fill the highest-priced seats behind home plate, an embarrassing sight on television.

 

–Congressman Barney Frank introduced a bill to reverse a three-year-old ban on wagering on the Net. The Internet Gambling Regulation Consumer Protection & Enforcement Act would establish a federal regulatory and enforcement framework for online gaming. Sounds like a good jobs program to me. Create a bureaucracy with about 60,000 monitoring the activity of all operators.

 

–Wynn Resorts said revenues at its Vegas and Macau casinos fell 5% in the first quarter. Las Vegas Sands, with properties in the same locations, had flat revenues. In Macau, overall, casino revenue plunged 9% in April from a year ago, and 13% from March.

 

–Elsewhere on the entertainment front, Disney’s parks and resorts division saw profits plunge 50%, though it was able to maintain a high 89% occupancy rate at its hotels because of promotions. On the media side, ESPN provided a bright spot with revenues up 4%.

 

–Staying on this theme, when it comes to Fox’s “American Idol” franchise, here are a few stats, courtesy of Portfolio (its last issue…sniff sniff).

 

“Advertisers pay $750,000 (up from $500,000 a few years ago) on average, for a 30-second spot – and as much as $1.3 million during the finale. According to TNS Media Intelligence, the show has racked up $3.6 billion in ad sales since 2002.” Additionally, Coca-Cola, Ford, Apple, and AT&T have branding deals priced at $26 million each on average, which have added up to roughly $800 million since the launch.

 

–Sirius XM Radio saw the number of subscribers decline for the first time during a quarter, not good. Thanks to the economy (and poor car sales), 1.7 million subscribers cancelled, thus offsetting the 1.3 million new ones. The company has a total of 18.6 million.

 

–CBS Corp., however, joined the likes of News Corp. and Disney in saying that it finally saw some rays of sunshine on the horizon for the media industry, this as TV-ad revenue fell another 15% in the first quarter.

 

–The SEC filed fraud charges against the pioneer of money market funds in the early 1970s, Bruce Bent, and his son, for actions taken last September when the $62 billion Primary Fund “broke the buck,” the $1 net asset value level due to its investments in Lehman Brothers turning worthless. The SEC alleges father and son were involved in fraudulent behavior by withholding material information to customers, board members and rating agencies after Lehman collapsed. At first Reserve and the Bents said they would provide the support necessary to keep the $1 NAV. When it then broke the buck, Reserve froze withdrawals.

 

–Retail rents in Manhattan are down 11% since fall 2008. They had soared 54% from fall 2001 to ‘08.

 

–Interesting tidbit in the Journal. “Home Depot Inc. shut down the Spanish-language version of its Web site Thursday, four months after launching it, due to disappointing sales and visits.” As it turned out, half of the visitors to the site weren’t even from this country. “They were not customers or even potential customers,” said a Home Depot spokesman. It’s just an example of how you don’t have to do everything just because everyone else is, or because some new technology is introduced. I wrestle with this all the time in looking at my own operation.

 

–For the first four months of the year, 11,600 registered brokers have left the financial services industry. The previous worst year was 2002 when 11,500 exited for other careers.

 

–Lebanon’s economy is expected to grow as much as 6 percent this year, assuming a stable government following the June 7 election. Bank deposits continue to expand at a double-digit rate thanks to the renewed confidence. I’d wait 24 hours on this one, however.

 

–The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a survey on cellphone usage. For the first time, the number of U.S. households opting for only cellphones has surpassed those that just have traditional landlines. 

 

20% of households had only cells during the last half of 2008, compared with 17% that only had landlines and no cells. In 2003, just 3% of households were wireless only, while 43% stuck to landlines. [Alan Fram / AP]

 

–Crain’s New York Business reports that Bill O’Reilly is receiving $7 million for his next book, on Barack Obama and due out next year. Not too shabby.

 

–As expected, an auction of Impressionists at Sotheby’s took in $61.4 million, or about a quarter of the tally of a year ago. Said one dealer, “Now we go back to reality. No more speculation.” [Bloomberg]

 

–While Australia’s economy has hung in there far better than most, the following passage from a piece by Adele Horin in the Sydney Morning Herald reminds me of Ireland (or Iceland) and its rise and fall.

 

“Based on a survey of 450 Sydneysiders, it shows almost half had no savings and one in eight were on the verge of insolvency by spending more than they earned. Many would find it hard to cope with an emergency, such as an unexpected medical bill, the report said. An alarming 20 percent of credit card holders could never pay off their balance in a 12-month period, yet more than half the residents surveyed had neglected to draw up a budget in the previous year.”

 

–House prices fell by 17.7% in Britain for the three months to April compared with a year earlier; 22% from the peak in August 2007 with further declines expected.

 

–Airbus now plans to produce just 14 A380 superjumbo flying hot dogs vs. a previous target of 18 as some carriers such as Qantas and Emirates Airline defer delivery.

 

–Speaking of wieners and losers, you’ve gotta feel for the pigs in Egypt who were slaughtered before they had a chance to eat a last meal as authorities used the excuse of swine flu to take out the world’s most versatile animal. Pig farmers rioted.

 

Actually, Egyptian authorities sought to “resolve the question of disorderly pig rearing,” according to the nation’s health minister. Turns out Egyptian pigs are indeed rather disorderly, seeing as how most of them are reared by rubbish collectors in Cairo’s shantytowns.

 

Now who wants some bacon?

 

–Speaking of an ingredient for a Denny’s Grand Slamwich, New York City has a big budget problem but the Bloomberg administration has found a way to save $400,000 a year. Reduce the number of slices of bread each prison inmate receives from 12 to eight per day. Seriously, prisoners were entitled to 12 slices of bread a day. I eat 4 or 5, and I thought that was a lot, but 12?!

 

–And if you’re going to have a BLT, or fried egg sandwich with bacon, there’s nothing better than washing it down with the good taste of beer. I’ve been telling you that due to the market crash, I was forced to switch from premium to domestic to save a few bucks and on Thursday, the Journal’s David Kesmodel had a story titled “Economy Beers Give Brewers Lift in Downturn.” Now Mr. Kesmodel defines premium and domestic quite differently from yours truly. His piece is about sales of Miller Lite and Budweiser being down 6.5% and 7.4%, respectively, while sales of Busch and Miller High Life are up 5.3% and 2.8%, year-to-date vs. 2008. Frankly, all four are simply “domestic,” and cheaper, than a good premium beer, read import, such as Heineken or Pilsner Urquell. That’s what I’m talkin’ about, beer lovers.

 

But while I agree with Mr. Kesmodel’s basic premise, I sort of have a Dow Jones target of 9500 before I would consider switching back to the premium brands of yore. Such fond memories.

 

–$613 million of debt used by the New York Mets to finance their new ballpark, Citi Field, is about to be lowered to junk status, which is fitting given the status of the franchise the past few years. After two straight historic September collapses, 2009 is hardly looking better, despite our current five-game winning streak.

 

–It would seem the entire Madoff family falls into the dirtball category as we’ve learned those related to Bernie ran up expenses on the corporate American Express card. Other employees are among the 18 card-holders who over a three month period last year accumulated charges of $307,000, according to a bankruptcy court filing. Wife Ruth, for example, charged $2,000 at the Giorgio Armani store in Paris. Separately, sister-in-law Marion Madoff received an annual salary of $163,599 in ‘08, even as there is no sign she did any work for the company. And we also learned that Bernie was a rather perverted sort, though I’ll leave the details for other Web sites.

 

–For you CNBC junkies, former “Fast Money” host Dylan Ratigan got his own morning program on MSNBC, 9:00-11:00, an informal talk show, meaning he will talk for the full two hours and the viewer will have to guess if he actually had a guest, and if so, who?

 

–And Paul Kangas, co-anchor of “Nightly Business Report” on PBS is stepping down at year end after 30 years. Personally, I always had a thing for his partner Susie Gharib.

 

–Gregory Katz / AP: “Busty women have banded together to battle Britain’s largest clothing retailer over a surcharge for extra-large brassieres. Frustrated with failed attempts to convince Marks & Spencer to drop a 2-pound ($3) extra charge for sizes DD and larger, the women plan to take their fight to the company’s annual meeting.”

 

Huh. 

 

–My portfolio: Gotta love my China biodiesel/specialty chemicals play. For the umpteenth time there is a delay in the completion of the new plant due to weather and now a construction accident. No word on how many may have died, but you would have been horrified what I did when I was there last November. I climbed a couple exposed flights, without handrails and no hard hat. I’m suspecting a scaffolding mishap. The company reports first quarter earnings this week and I don’t expect anything positive out of this either. Shares in a competitor that I purchased just about six weeks ago, however, have already doubled. Otherwise, I’m standing pat, and haven’t changed my model of 50% equities, 50% cash. [For new readers, I was at 80% cash for 2007 and 2008.]

 

 

Pakistan: President Zardari and Afghan President Karzai traveled to Washington for a joint meeting with President Obama and Co., and action has picked up in the Swat Valley as the Pakistani government and military vowed to “eliminate” the Taliban; this after a peace agreement giving the Taliban free rein in Swat broke down. Tens of thousands of refugees (potentially as many as 500,000+) have been fleeing the area. Prime Minister Gilani, in a nationally televised address on Thursday, said: “To restore the honor and dignity of our homeland and to protect our people, the armed forces have been called in to eliminate the militants and terrorists.”

 

Gilani added, “The militants have waged war against all segments of society. I regret to say that our bona fide intention to prefer reconciliation with them was perceived as a weakness on our part….Our reputation among the international community has deteriorated, and we are labeled as terrorists.” [New York Times]

 

At least this was a truthful admission on Gilani’s part, but with Taliban sympathizers deep inside the Pakistani army, and many soldiers unwilling to go to war against their own people, this becomes yet another classic case of ‘wait 24 hours.’ As for the security of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, that is increasingly in doubt, despite the assurances you’ve heard over the years from both the Bush and Obama administrations. A former CIA officer in Pakistan, Rolf Mowatt-Larssen, currently at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, told the Times’ David Sanger, “For years I was concerned about the weapons materials in Pakistan, the materials in the laboratories. I’m still worried about that, but with what we’re seeing, I’m growing more concerned about something going missing in transport.”

 

Afghanistan: As for this hellhole, one thing we’ve learned, both here and in Pakistan, is to ignore the first casualty reports you hear from any activity taken against the militants. They are never accurate. A bomb goes off, perhaps the result of a U.S. or NATO airstrike, and the next thing you see are some mounds. Just who is then buried underneath? Taliban? Civilians, as is often the claim from those on the ground?

 

The latest incident is one of the more controversial. Supposedly, 147 were killed this week in two firefights between U.S. and Taliban forces that then escalated. Chances are both are responsible for any civilian casualties, with the Taliban deliberately killing some in the hope the U.S. would be blamed.

 

Meanwhile, President Karzai selected a powerful warlord as his running mate in the Aug. 20 election. Mohammad Qasim Fahim has been accused of human rights abuses and giving cover to drug traffickers. Then again, Stalin was once an ally. [PBS began airing an excellent documentary on Stalin and the war this past week. Catch it if you can.]

 

Iraq: Despite the uptick in violence, the government said it will not extend the June 30 deadline for U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraqi cities. And in a disturbing trend, another two American soldiers were killed and three more wounded when an Iraqi wearing an army uniform fired on them. Similar attacks have taken place in the last six months, resulting in at least three other U.S. deaths.

 

As to the increase in attacks by groups once aligned with the U.S., Richard Haass, of the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations and former Bush 41 and 43 official, said upon returning from Iraq: “It is obvious there are still multiple faultlines in society. In my view, Iraq and the United States are going to have to adjust the timelines and leave a residual force of tens of thousands beyond 2011.” [London Times]

 

Israel: Historian and Middle East expert Michael Oren told the American Israel Public Affairs Committee conference (AIPAC) that “Israel will not remain passive while a government that’s sworn to wipe it off the map acquires the means for doing that.” That’s the bottom line when viewing the rest of 2009.

 

On the issue of the Palestinians, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the same AIPAC gathering, “We want peace with the Arab world. We also want peace with the Palestinians,” but “the Palestinians must recognize Israel as a Jewish state,” which the Palestinians continue to reject. Fair enough.

 

But Vice President Joe Biden told his AIPAC audience that while “Israel has to work towards a two-state solution,” it had to “dismantle existing outposts and allow the Palestinians freedom of movement.” Israel, he said, can not build more settlements. Biden added the administration was “intensely focused” on preventing Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. If diplomacy fails, the U.S. has “international support to consider other options.” President Obama has a critical meeting with Netanyahu on May 18.

 

Iran: Meanwhile, President Ahmadinejad, facing what increasingly appears to be a tough fight in the June 20 election here, said his country and Syria are united behind Palestinian “resistance” to Israel. During a trip to Damascus, Ahmadinejad met with the leaders of Hamas and other Palestinian groups.

 

Egypt: The government has been increasingly vocal on the politics of the region and the threat posed by Iran. Foreign Minister Gheit said in a statement, “Possession of any nuclear weapons in the Middle East is unacceptable by Egypt…particularly as the current confrontation between Iran and the West and Israel has consequences for the stability and peace in the region.” Egypt is more concerned with “Iran’s performance” in the region rather than “the Iranian nuclear file,” as Tehran continues to encourage Hizbullah in Lebanon.

 

“This is something that worries us. We need America, when it engages with Iran, to have this fully in mind – their activities, the way they perceive things, the way they instigate here and there, their whole philosophy,” said Gheit. [Jerusalem Post]

 

Russia: NATO expelled two Russian diplomats from its headquarters in Brussels over espionage accusations, which Russia then called a “clear-cut provocation,” expelling two Canadians in return, this as NATO and Russia resumed their first formal contacts since the Georgia war.

 

The move comes amid renewed tension over Georgia.    The Georgian government accused Russia of plotting a military coup as soldiers at a military base rebelled, though the uprising was quickly put down. Georgian authorities say Russia now has 10,000 troops in the two breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. In October, Russia said it would deploy 3,700 in the two, which it recognizes as sovereign countries.

 

NATO began month-long exercises with over 1,000 soldiers, including some from the United States, which Russia has strongly criticized. A Russian envoy to NATO said the alliance would be better off holding the maneuvers “in a madhouse” than in a country where troops were “rioting against their own president.”

 

This week also represented the first anniversary of President Medvedev’s inauguration, May 7, 2008. Nabi Abdullaev and Nikolaus von Twickel write in the Moscow Times that while Medvedev has to an extent begun to distance himself from Prime Minister Putin on the domestic front, when it comes to foreign policy there is no difference between the two. A year ago, Putin said of his successor: “Medvedev is no less a Russian nationalist than I am, in the positive sense of the word, and I do not think that our partners will have it any easier with him.”

 

Sure looks that way. In Medvedev’s first 12 months, Russia moved into Georgia, Ukraine lost its Russian gas supplies again, Kyrgyzstan was rewarded for pledging to close a U.S. military base, Moscow didn’t bend on the missile shield in Eastern Europe, Russia’s atomic cooperation with Iran has continued, and on North Korea, Russia has done little to help.

North Korea: A leading South Korean newspaper reported “brisk” activity has been detected at North Korea’s nuclear test site, while Washington could not confirm the claim. North Korea is, however, capable of conducting a test quickly.

 

China: Long ago when I started the site, I used to say that a car bomb going off in Tel Aviv could have an impact on our financial markets, but one going off in Sri Lanka wouldn’t…and thus I have chosen over the years to basically ignore the ongoing battle in Sri Lanka between the government and the Tamil Tiger rebels. It has zero impact on our lives, period. Except…I’ve also noted from time to time that many terror tactics, such as bicycle bombs, do seem to originate here. Fighting, recently, has picked up in a big way as the government appears determined to finally crush the militants.

 

But I bring Sri Lanka up this week because China is building a $1 billion port here that it plans to use as a refueling and docking station for its growing blue water navy, which will be important as it protects its supplies of Saudi oil, for example. In return, China is heavily aiding the government in its battle against the insurgents.

 

Italy: The Mafia in Sicily has been implicated in a scheme to assert control over the wind farm business here. Prosecutors claim the Mafia controlled the construction of the farms, many of which were never completed despite heavy European Union subsidies, in exchange for votes. The Mafia would get the permits cheap, then when the farms were built, sell them at much higher prices to large multinationals.

 

So…the Mafia has progressed from boot-legging to gambling to heroin to wind farms.  The Mafia is going green. It’s a beautiful thing. [Just don’t get too near the turbines because it would appear the construction is so shoddy, a blade could go flying off and decapitate you.]

 

But then you have the case of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and his wife, Veronica Lario. Veronica filed for divorce, accusing him of “consorting with minors,” prompting Silvio to demand an apology. Veronica was most upset over reports Berlusconi attended the 18th birthday party of a friend’s daughter, but failed to attend his own daughters’ 18th birthday celebrations. I’m taking Veronica’s side on this one.

 

Turkey: 45 died in an attack on a wedding party as it appears there was a fight between families of the bride and groom and was not terrorism related. No word on whether the band was paid.

 

 

–The Obama administration released new information that contradicts the assertions of Nancy Pelosi that “We were not – I repeat were not – told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used.” Evidently, on Sept. 4, 2002, the CIA briefed Pelosi and other congressional leaders on the agency’s interrogation of Al Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah, and that the session covered “the particular [enhanced interrogation techniques] that had been employed.” A Pelosi spokesman says the CIA said “waterboarding had not been used.” A CIA chart shows that there were 40 briefings over a seven-year period during which intelligence officials described the agency’s interrogation program to senior lawmakers. Saturday’s Washington Post also reports a senior Pelosi aide knew of waterboarding.

 

Porter J. Goss, former House Republican and CIA director, wrote last month in an op-ed that he was “slack-jawed to read that members claim to have not understood that the techniques on which they were briefed were to actually be employed; or that specific techniques such as ‘waterboarding’ were never mentioned.” Goss described the lawmakers’ as having “a disturbing epidemic of amnesia.”

 

Many Democrats are hiding behind the take that they were not presented with the full picture.

 

Separately, the Justice Department is nearing completion of a probe that is expected to recommend no criminal prosecution for officials who may have authorized harsh CIA tactics.

 

–And then there is the case of Senator Arlen Specter and his switch from the Republican to Democratic Party. In the first poll of Pennsylvania voters, Specter jumped to a 20-point lead over Republican Pat Toomey in a potential match-up for next year’s election, this after earlier polls had showed Specter to be trailing Toomey by a similar number in a Republican primary match-up. But then we had the following progression of events.

 

Howard Fineman / Newsweek

 

“Just dealing with (Specter) could be a full-time job, as it was for top Republicans. Obama and Sen. Harry Reid promised to support Specter’s candidacy for reelection next year as a Democrat. Their operating assumption was that Specter would help pass health care, which may be true, and that his status as a new Democrat facing a primary would pull him to the left. But his first votes – on the budget and mortgage rewrites – were against the administration.

 

“Specter poses housekeeping problems as well, which seem trivial but loom large in the status-obsessed Senate. Reid promised to honor Specter’s seniority while not ‘bumping’ any committee or subcommittee chairs. How Reid does this without offending the prickly Specter or the existing chairs is unclear. ‘We don’t play bumper cars here,’ said Sen. Barbara Mikulski. (Translation: get in line, Bud).”

 

Paul Kane / Washington Post

 

“The Senate last night stripped Sen. Arlen Specter of his seniority on committees, a week after the 29-year veteran of the chamber quit the Republican Party to join the Democrats.

 

“In announcing his move across the aisle last week, Specter asserted that Majority Leader Harry M. Reid had assured him he would retain his seniority in the Senate and on the five committees on which he serves. Specter’s tenure ranked him ahead of all but seven Democrats.

 

“Instead, though, on a voice vote last night, the Senate approved a resolution that made Specter the most junior Democrat on four committees for the remainder of this Congress. (He will rank second from last on the fifth, the Special Committee on Aging). Reid himself read the resolution on the Senate floor, underscoring the reversal.”

 

Too funny, and a big blow to Specter because he can’t claim during the coming campaign that his position of seniority enables him to bring home more bacon for the state. We also have a rather clear example of why many view Harry Reid as nothing but a snake.

 

–Colin Powell said the GOP is “getting smaller and smaller” and “that’s not good for the nation.” He added that the party must realize the country has changed and that “Americans do want to pay taxes for services. Americans are looking for more government in their life, not less.” Powell has been criticizing GOP leaders for bowing too much to the right. On Rush Limbaugh, Powell said, “I think what Rush does as an entertainer diminishes the party and intrudes or inserts into our public life a kind of nastiness that we would do better to do without.” [NationalJournal.com]

 

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said it’s time for the Republican Party to give up its “nostalgia” for the heyday of the Reagan era and look forward. Jeb said President Obama’s message of hope and change resonated with Americans, “So our ideas need to be forward looking and relevant. I felt like there was a lot of nostalgia and the good old days in the [Republican] messaging. I mean, it’s great, but it doesn’t draw people toward your cause,” Mr. Bush said.

 

Mitt Romney said Republicans must do a better job of listening to the people. “For America to move forward, they’re going to want to see a party that has answers, not politics.” [Washington Times]

 

I read all this, and look at what has happened the last few years, and just think the Republican Party is an absolute mess.

 

–Years ago, when I would read of how former NBA great Dave Bing had started his own successful business in Detroit, I’d think ‘what a terrific role model.’ But in winning a special election to fill the remaining term of disgraced Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick (until November), I learned that Bing claimed to have an MBA when he did not, graduated from Syracuse University 29 years later than he said, and he had more than 150 safety violations at his auto supplier plant. So he’s not much different than all the others.

 

–Fascinating trip to the Holy Land (Jordan, Israel and the Palestinian territories) for Pope Benedict XVI the next few days. I see in Jordan he’s visiting some of the spots I did in spring 2008, like Mount Nebo, the spot from which Moses is believed to have viewed the Promised Land.  [I couldn’t see it…too hazy.]

 

–Defense Secretary Robert Gates said military officials screwed up in failing to alert the public about the use of Air Force One in the New York City flyover fiasco.

 

“I am concerned that this highly public and visible mission did not include an appropriate public affairs plan nor adequate review and approval by senior Air Force” and Defense Department officials, he wrote in a letter to Sen. John McCain. The man responsible in the White House, a former secretary of the army, resigned.

 

–From the wires: “A 15-year-old girl wearing headphones and looking down at her cellphone while crossing a street was struck and killed yesterday by a school bus carrying students to a suburban Providence (R.I.) high school, police said. Kimberly Pisaturo apparently did not hear a car horn warning her of the imminent collision.” The bus driver initially didn’t realize she had struck the teen until after but immediately pulled over.

 

I bring this one up because I see far too many cases where mothers are walking across a busy intersection, pushing a stroller, with cellphone to ear and not a care in the world. I can only shake my head.

 

–I was going to write about something that “Joe the Plumber” said this week, but then I thought, why? The fact he is even in the news at all represents just another sign of the apocalypse.

 

–A local New Jersey girl landed on the front page of the Star-Ledger because she is posting updates of her pending childbirth on Twitter; speaking of signs of the apocalypse.

 

–Bristol Palin told Matt Lauer of “Today” that she wouldn’t talk about her personal life when it came to dirtball father Levi, but she’s running around the country with her baby, which is kind of personal.

 

–I totally agree with the New York Times’ Maureen Dowd on the issue of Elizabeth Edwards and the book tour for her tome, “Resilience,” the story of her life with dirtball John.

 

“But it’s just a gratuitous peek into their lives, and one that exposes her kids, by peddling more dregs about their personal family life in a book, and exposes the ex-girlfriend who’s now trying to raise the baby girl, a dead ringer for John Edwards…

 

“She’s still helping her husband hedge on Rielle’s baby, whom she refers to as ‘it,’ telling Oprah that she has ‘no idea’ if the baby is John’s, and adding: ‘It doesn’t look like my children, but I don’t have any idea.’

 

“Asked by Oprah…whether she’s still in love with her husband, she replied, ‘You know, that’s a complicated question.’

 

“The really complicated question is what she hopes to gain from this book.”

 

–Our own Dr. Bortrum and I have long suspected this, so it was good to see a study out of Cambridge University that “corvids” (crows, ravens and magpies) are more intelligent than humans. Well, not quite in all respects, but they’ve “astonished scientists with extraordinary feats of memory, an ability to employ complex social reasoning [ed. like ‘don’t do drugs’] and, perhaps most strikingly, a remarkable aptitude for crafting and using tools [ed. which is better than what I can do on this front.]”

 

The appropriately named scientist, Christopher Bird, told BBC News that some corvids will hide their food if they know they are being watched, but will also do some “fake hides” as well, “a confusion strategy.”

 

But wait…there’s more! The birds also seem to be aware of themselves. Scientists used the Gallup mark test, where an animal is marked on a part of its body that it cannot normally see and is then shown its reflection in a mirror.

 

“If it notices this mark and tries to remove it, then it suggests that the animal knows it is looking at itself and could possess some kind of self-awareness.

 

“So far, only some species of primates have consistently passed this self-recognition test, although more recent studies suggest elephants and dolphins may also respond.

 

“But last year, a German team revealed that magpies, marked with a colored sticker under their beaks, tried to remove it when presented with a mirror – the first time a bird had been seen to pass this test.” [Alas, the poor birds need hands.]

 

–Alex Rodriguez returned to the Yankees on Friday (and homered on his first pitch) but he caught a bit of a break; slugger Manny Ramirez took some of the spotlight off A-Roid when we learned Ramirez had been suspended for 50 games for violating baseball’s drug policy. It seems Ramirez was taking a female fertility drug, HCG, that is used to mitigate the side effects of ending a cycle of steroids. So you can imagine the tabloids had a field day with some of the headlines… “Girlie Manny…” and such.

 

But while no follower of the sport is in the least bit surprised, for the record virtually all of the greatest of this steroid era have now either had to admit to use or been heavily implicated…Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Rafael Palmeiro, Gary Sheffield, A-Rod, Manny…and the handwriting is on the wall with regards to the likes of Mike Piazza, Jeff Bagwell, and countless others [see also David Ortiz].

 

I suspect, though, that my readership is no different than the general baseball fan population in that 50% care, 50% don’t. For the record, I do care. It’s cheating. 

 

–Lastly, I note the passing of former NFL great, congressman, and vice presidential candidate Jack Kemp at the age of 73.

 

Back in the spring of 1980, as I graduated last in my class (or next to last…never did find out) at Wake Forest with a degree in political science, I was lost in the wilderness (I still am 29 years later). I did great on my GRE, but had this atrocious grade average, yet nonetheless was interested in getting a job in politics or foreign affairs if I couldn’t get into grad school first.

 

So a week after graduation I took a train down to Washington and had an interview with American University for their graduate program and was basically laughed out of the room because of the GPA. Of course I deserved it. The man said to take some courses, which I did at NYU and Pace, and try back later but by then I was on a different career path.

 

Around this same time, and before I got my first job as a clerk/typist at an insurance brokerage firm in Manhattan, I sent out letters to three Republican congressmen, looking for a position. The three were Jack Kemp, Trent Lott and Newt Gingrich…all obviously rising stars at the time. Things didn’t work out but at least they all sent nice form letters which I’m assuming an autopen was applied to.

 

So with Kemp’s passing just thought I’d share that little look into my not so glorious past. As to Kemp himself, certain words come to mind…passion and class, to cite two. This was a good man, and as George Will said he didn’t have a bad bone in his body. A bit verbose at times, which held him back on the national scene, but this is what happens when your brain is operating at 95 mph, as his often was.

 

In the Evans and Novak book “The Reagan Revolution” (1981), they wrote that Kemp was “a tireless, itinerant preacher of tax reduction gospel to party audiences, business groups and even labor audiences.” As Laurence Arnold of Bloomberg wrote, “Kemp’s message resonated with blue-collar audiences because it promised more economic growth without a tradeoff of fewer government services.” Evans and Novak added, “For the first time in a half century, a Republican had a positive response to big-government liberalism.”

 

Jack Kemp was also as compassionate as any political leader of the past 50 years. Certainly no other Republican reached out towards minorities and the poor like he did. And he was a progressive on immigration. He liked to call himself “a bleeding-heart conservative.”

 

The message of Kemp and Ronald Reagan (who embraced Kemp’s economic theories whole-heartedly) is being debated in Republican circles today, as in my above comments, and as the Wall Street Journal’s Daniel Henninger opines, it’s unfortunate.

 

“It is not conceivable that a Reagan or Kemp would have directed the U.S. economy’s legendary energies into building hybrid cars, windmills and bullet trains.   It would not have occurred to them that America’s next Silicon Valley – Apple, Intel and Oracle – could have grown out of ‘investments’ listed in the federal budget. This would not have occurred to either man because their politics were rooted in the 300-year-old, singularly American tradition of individuals freely deciding how to spend their productive hours and money inside a public system that mainly provides security and safety.

 

“Mr. Obama won the election and deserves time to see what his vision adds to the nation’s productive life. If while it awaits that, the Republican Party can’t renew what Reagan and Kemp gave them, its listening tour could last a very long time.”

 

About now it would be appropriate for me to finish…Jack Kemp, RIP. But one thing is for sure. Kemp’s not resting. He’s talking a mile a minute upstairs to anyone who will listen, his brain generating books full of ideas, yet finding time to look after the souls whose lives on Earth may not have been half as fulfilling as his was. Reagan? He’s sitting back…nodding approvingly and waiting for Nancy.

 

—

 

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

 

God bless America.

 

—

 

Gold closed at $915

Oil, $58.60

 

 

Dow Jones +4.4% [8574]

S&P 500 +5.9% [929]…highest since 1/6/09

S&P MidCap +5.0%

Russell 2000 +5.1%

Nasdaq +1.2% [1739]

 

 

Dow Jones -2.3%

S&P 500 +2.9%

S&P MidCap +9.0%

Russell 2000 +2.5%

Nasdaq +10.3%

 

Bulls 40.4

Bears 31.5 [Source: Chartcraft / Investors Intelligence]

 

Have a great week. I appreciate your support.

 

Note: The timing on my next two reviews is going to be a bit disjointed due to some functions I’m attending.  

 

Happy Mother’s Day!

 

Brian Trumbore