The damage control to the Fukushima explosion reported earlier is coming fast and furious. According to CNN, “the explosion at an earthquake-damaged nuclear plant was not caused by damage to the nuclear reactor but by a pumping system that failed as crews tried to bring the reactor’s temperature down, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said Saturday. The next step for workers at the Fukushima Daiichi plant will be to flood the reactor containment structure with sea water to bring the reactor’s temperature down to safe levels, he said. The effort is expected to take two days.” While the government is trying to play down the threat from the explosion, it has nonetheless double the evacuation zone radius from 10 to 20 kilometers: “Radiation levels have fallen since the explosion and there is no immediate danger, Edano said. But authorities were nevertheless expanding the evacuation to include a radius of 20 kilometers (about 12.5 miles) around the plant. The evacuation previously reached out to 10 kilometers.” Next steps are to flood the reactor with salt water. NHK reports: “The TEPCO Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Fukushima Prefecture is believed to be exploded, and in order to prevent corruption, the containment vessel will be filled with sea water to cool containers and vehicles used by the SDF pump I. According to the Ministry of Defense, work will begin at 8:00 pm, and that it expected to end around 1:00 am on March 13 (or roughly 11 am Eastern).” And while containment efforts peak, the radiation level is reported to be in the range of 1015 microsieverts / hr. In the meantime, confusion in Japan is pervasive as up to a million people are without power. And while we hope the outcome of the Fukushima situation will be prompt and favorable, the economic devastation to the country will be pervasive for weeks to come.
Radiation levels have fallen since the explosion and there is no immediate danger, Edano said. But authorities were nevertheless expanding the evacuation to include a radius of 20 kilometers (about 12.5 miles) around the plant. The evacuation previously reached out to 10 kilometers.
The explosion about 3:30 p.m. Saturday sent white smoke rising above the plant a day after a massive
Daniel Mudd, the former CEO of Fannie Mae got a Wells notice from the SEC on Friday. I have been waiting years for this to happen. There is a good reason this action is so late in coming. This case could open the door for culpability of the Federal Government in the collapse of the US mortgage agencies.
The Wells notice is a very significant ratchet up of this story. Prosecution is not assured, but a big investigation is certain.
Mudd, who is now the CEO of buyout firm Fortress Investment Group, commented on the bad news from the SEC in predictable fashion. He denied everything: (Bloomberg)
“I could not disagree more with this turn of events. The disclosures and procedures that are the subject of the SEC investigation were accurate and complete. These disclosures were previewed by federal regulators, and have been issued in the same form since the company went into government conservatorship.”
I have always believed that Mudd is dirty. He had ample foreknowledge that the wheels were coming off at Fannie (and the entire mortgage market). If he argues that he did not, he will just look dumb. When he spoke to Bloomberg he was reading from a script prepared by big-shot lawyers. Again his words:
These disclosures were previewed by federal regulators.
Mudd and his lawyers are spot on with this comment. It is a shot across the bow of the SEC. If Mudd had used real words in his statement he would have said:
“We prepared statements and sent them to our regulator, OFHEO. They reviewed them and agreed with them. Fannie has letters from OFHEO that says we were clean. Don’t blame me for the blowup. Blame our regulator!”
OFHEO (Office Of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight) was run by James Lockhart. I don’t think he is responsible for the collapse of the GSE’s. But I have always been convinced that he covered up the problems from the day he took over as the head of OFHEO. OFHEO did fail as a regulator. There can be no doubt about that at this point.
Following a report earlier that the Uranium at the Fukushima Power Plant may have melted, we sadly bring you this video of the explosion at Reactor one of the nuclear site.
A before and after picture, showing the loss of Reactor 1
From BBC:
There has been an explosion at a Japanese nuclear power plant that was hit by Friday’s devastating earthquake.
Pictures show a blast at the Fukushima plant and initial reports say several workers were injured.
Nuclear expert, Malcolm Grimston told the BBC that nuclear materials may have been able to escape .
And as predicted by Zero Hedge first yesterday, the power plant has just announced that there is indeed a meltdown at the plant.
The core at Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant’s No. 1 reactor may be partially melting, the nuclear safety agency said Saturday.
Radioactive substance cesium was detected around the reactor, it said.
Alas, as many may be affected by fallout, we present the wind data for Asia for Saturday:
After Julian Assange crashed and burned in his threat to release documents that expose fraud at Bank of America, many thought he had been only bluffing, and that BofA is actually clean. Not so fast. A member of the hacker collective Anonymous, which singlehandedly destroyed “hacker defense” firm HB Gary, who goes under the handle OperationLeakS “is claiming to be have emails and documents which prove “fraud” was committed by Bank of America employees, and the group says it’ll release them on Monday” reports Gawker. As to the contents of the possible disclosure: “”He Just told me he have GMAC emails showing BoA order to mix loan numbers to not match it’s Documents. to foreclose on Americans.. Shame.” If indeed this makes the case against BofA’ foreclosure practices stronger, it certainly explains why the banking consortium is scrambling to arrange a settlement, and also why Bank of America recently split off its $2 trillion in mortgages into “good bank” and “bad bank” entities.
As a “teaser”, the Anonymous member released a November 1, 2010 email between two Balboa Insurance (a BAC subsidiary) employees, which while not proving any fraud, indicates he/she does indeed have access. The timeline on the email makes sense as it is a few weeks prior to the original disclosure that Wikileaks would expose BofA. Perhaps the Assange team merely handed off its materials to Anonymous, which has previously demonstrated its solidarity with the Australian on various occasions.
The full letter is below.
Gawker with more on why Brian Moynihan may not sleep too soundly overnight:
OperationLeaks, which runs the anti-Bank of America site BankofAmericasuck.com, says the employee contacted the group to blow the whistle on Bank of America’s shady business practices. “I seen some of the emails… I can tell you Grade A Fraud in its purest form…” read one tweet. “He Just told me he have GMAC emails showing BoA order to mix loan numbers to not match it’s Documents.. to foreclose on Americans.. Shame.”
An Anonymous insider told us he believes the leak is real. “From what I know and have been told, it’s legit,” he said. “Should be a round of emails, then some files, possible some more emails to follow that.” The documents should be released Monday on Anonleaks.ch, the same
This is not mere conjecture or prediction. It’s fact. Utah has already passed a bill allowing Gold and Silver to be used as legal tender. Similarly, Virginia has passed legislation (though the Governor has yet to sign the bill) that would permit the state to mint its own Gold and Silver coins.
You can see this on the international stage as well. China’s Gold demand rose 500% last year. And world central banks became net buyers of Gold for the first time in 2010 as well.
These are of course baby steps. China and all central banks’ reserves are only minimally invested in Gold at this time. However, these changes DO mark the beginning of necessary structural changes to the global monetary system that will eventually culminate in a Gold standard of some kind being adopted again.
It’s not difficult to see why. We’ve been on this insane “paper only” since the early ‘70s. While everyone wants to claim we’ve seen a massive boost in GDP and stocks since that time, the reality is that when you account for inflation, it’s clear that most GDP and stock strength has been a result of inflation, NOT real organic growth.
Indeed, Bill King, Chief Market Strategist M. Ramsey King Securities recently published the following chart comparing REAL GDP (light blue), GDP when you account for inflation (dark blue), and the Dow Jones’ performance (black) over the last 30 years.
What follows is a clear picture that since the mid-70s MOST of the perceived stock gains have come from inflation. You should also note that MOST of the GDP growth we’ve seen since the early ‘70s has been the result of inflation as well (REAL GDP, the light blue line, is MILES below the “claimed” GDP, dark blue line).
What does all of this mean? That the inflationary system in place for the last 30+ years is crumbling, that paper money is going…
In the fantasy world of right-wing commentators, a bloated public sector has saddled the taxpayer with a £1tn liability for lavish pension payouts for town hall pen-pushers.
But in the real world, public sector workers are entitled to say: “Pensions crisis? What crisis?”. On page 23 of this week’s 200-page Hutton report there is a projection of how much public sector pensions will cost as a percentage of GDP in future years. I’ve reproduced it below. Even taking into account different assumptions for life expectancy and workforce growth, the cost of public sector pensions has peaked, and between now and 2060 will fall year in, year out.
Even in the worst-case cost scenario, where we all live longer and workers survive Osborne’s axe, in 2060 public sector pensions will cost around 1.5% of the GDP, compared with 1.9% today.
The truth is that public sector pensions have, over the past decade, been trimmed back again and again, so the potential future burden has already reduced. Many schemes have increased the age at which members can take their pension. Higher contribution rates from 2012, likely to average 3%, have already been announced and will save around £2.8bn from the public purse. The biggest cut (or fiddle, many would argue) has been the switch from using RPI to CPI for cost-of-living increases once the worker has retired.
So why is Lord Hutton, a Labour peer, so keen to ally with the Tories and cut even further?
His basic rationale is fairness. In the 1950s, after a career in the NHS a woman could expect to spend around 30% of her adult life in retirement. Today the same NHS worker will spend 45% of her adult life in retirement. Then, public sector workers generally earned less than workers in the private sector. Today, they generally earn the same or more. They live longer, too. A graph on page 109 of the report shows that, at age 60, the typical worker (male or
Volcanoes have reportedly erupted in Japan, Indonesia, and Kamchatka Russia today, presumably due to the massive Japanese earthquake. There have been no reports of damage from the eruptions.
In addition, there are problems at three Japanese nuclear power plants.
“The situation is still several stages away from Three Mile Island when the reactor container ceased to function as it should,” said Tomoko Murakami, leader of the nuclear energy group at Japan’s Institute of Energy Economics
Two other Japanese nuclear reactors are now in trouble as well. As MSNBC notes:
Coolant systems failed at three quake-stricken Japanese nuclear reactors Saturday, sending radiation seeping outside one and temperatures rising out of control at two others.
Radiation surged to around 1,000 times the normal level in the control room of the No. 1 reactor of the Fukushima Daichi plant, Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said. Radiation — it was not clear how much — had also seeped outside, prompting widening of an evacuation area to a six-mile radius from a two-mile radius around the plant. Earlier, 3,000 people had been urged to leave their homes.
Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Saturday that the temperatures of its No.1 and No.2 reactors at its Fukushima Daini nuclear power station were rising, and it had lost control over pressure in the reactors.
***
About an hour after the plant shut down, however, the emergency diesel generators stopped, leaving the units with no power for important cooling functions.
***
Hours after the evacuation order, the government announced that the plant will release slightly radioactive vapor from the unit to lower the pressure in an effort to protect it from a possible meltdown.
Good luck to the Japanese scientists bravely trying to avert catastrophe. As MSNBC notes:
Japan has a “tremendous amount of technical capability and resources” to respond to the issue ….
Volcanoes have reportedly erupted in Japan, Indonesia, and Kamchatka Russia today, presumably due to the massive Japanese earthquake. There have been no reports of damage from the eruptions.
In addition, there are problems at three Japanese nuclear power plants.
“The situation is still several stages away from Three Mile Island when the reactor container ceased to function as it should,” said Tomoko Murakami, leader of the nuclear energy group at Japan’s Institute of Energy Economics
Two other Japanese nuclear reactors are now in trouble as well. Two other Japanese nuclear reactors are now in trouble as well [UPDATE: It is now up to 5 nuclear reactors].
Coolant systems failed at three quake-stricken Japanese nuclear reactors Saturday, sending radiation seeping outside one and temperatures rising out of control at two others.
Radiation surged to around 1,000 times the normal level in the control room of the No. 1 reactor of the Fukushima Daichi plant, Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said. Radiation — it was not clear how much — had also seeped outside, prompting widening of an evacuation area to a six-mile radius from a two-mile radius around the plant. Earlier, 3,000 people had been urged to leave their homes.
Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Saturday that the temperatures of its No.1 and No.2 reactors at its Fukushima Daini nuclear power station were rising, and it had lost control over pressure in the reactors.
***
About an hour after the plant shut down, however, the emergency diesel generators stopped, leaving the units with no power for important cooling functions.
***
Hours after the evacuation order, the government announced that the plant will release slightly radioactive vapor from the unit to lower the pressure in an effort to protect it from a possible meltdown.
Good luck to the Japanese scientists bravely trying to avert catastrophe. As MSNBC notes:
Japan has a “tremendous amount of technical capability and resources” to respond to the issue ….
In an interview with Mark Hibbs, a Berlin-based senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a nonprofit think tank, Newsmaxmagazine asks – what happens next at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant. The answer according to the nuclear expert, is that as Fukushima is now well on its way to a full core-melt nuclear accident, a worst case scenario could possibly lead to the same results last seen in 1986 Chernobyl.
Below we present a brief overview of the Fukushima plant from Wikipedia:
The Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant (Fukushima I NPP, 1F), often referred to as FukushimaDai-ichi, is a nuclear power plant located in the town of Okuma in the Futaba District of Fukushima Prefecture. With six separate units located on site with a combined power of 4.7 GW, Fukushima I is one of the 25 largest nuclear power stations in the world. Fukushima I is the first nuclear plant to be constructed and run entirely by The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO).
Fukushima II Nuclear Power Plant, 11.5 kilometres (7.1 mi) to the south, is also run by TEPCO.
So what happens next? First, Hibbs explains precisely what already has taken place:
“What happened in Japan is very alarming because it would appear . . . that about 2:30 this afternoon Japan time, when the earthquake struck . . . three of the reactors that were operating were disenabled because of a loss of offsite power
CSL Financial presents a comprehensive look at the last century in US history (98 years to be precise, since the foundation of the Federal Reserve in 1913), highlighting the key events, and critical outcomes, explaining in simple terms how while Japan may have encountered an actual tsunami earlier today, the metaphoric version that has afflicted America is far more dangerous and will have far worse consequences for America’s 300+ million citizens.
Jobless claims improve while leading indicators decline in today’s economic report card
by Wall Street Sector Selector Staff
Weekly jobless claims declined to 424,000 from last week’s 432, 000 but stubbornly stayed above the all important 400,000 level for another week.
August Leading Indicators came in at +0.3% compared to 0.5% for July, as the economy continues registering weakness.
Good news came from July Home Prices which rose to +0.8% from the previously reported +0.7%.
But the biggest economic news of the week came yesterday when the Federal Reserve said it saw “significant downside risks to the economic outlook, including strains in global financial markets.”
Global stock markets responded negatively yesterday an...
Shares of Priceline.com Incorporated (NASDAQ: PCLN) are trading higher in the after-hours following the release of its Q1 earnings results. Currently, shares are up 2.74%, trading at $548.60; they closed the regular session down 0.67 %, at $533.97.
The company said that its Q1 EPS came in at $2.66 on revenues of $809.3 million; this compares to the Street's estimate of $2.46 per share on revenues of $779.5 million. Revenues rose 38.6% year over year.
"In the 1st quarter, the Group benefited from strong growth in our global hotel business, particularly at Booking.com and Agoda," said Jeffery H. Boyd, Priceline President and Chief Executive Officer.
He added, "Room nights booked grew by 55.8% and our international gross bookings grew by 79% compared to prior year...
The damage control to the Fukushima explosion reported earlier is coming fast and furious. According to CNN, "the explosion at an earthquake-damaged nuclear plant was not caused by damage to the nuclear reactor but by a pumping system that failed as crews tried to bring the reactor's temperature down, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said Saturday. The next step for workers at the Fukushima Daiichi plant will be to flood the reactor containment structure with sea water to bring the reactor's temperature down to safe levels, he said. The effort is expected to take two days." While the government is trying to play down the threat from the explosion, it has nonetheless double the evacuation zone radius from 10 to 20 kilometers: "Radiation levels have fallen since the explosion and there is no immediate danger, Edano said. But authorities were nevertheless expanding the evacuation ...
Note from dshort: I retired this chart series last summer in deference to my prefered inflation-adjusted series that aligns the S&P 500 2000 high with the Nikkei peak in 1989. However, I continue to receive requests for this version, despite the "V" shape of the the recovery since the March 2009 low. This chart series overlays the current S&P 500 with the L-shaped "recoveries" after the Dow Crash of 1929, the Nikkei 225 after Japan's 1989 bubble, and the post Tech Bubble NASDAQ. Click the chart below for a larger version and use the links to see various comparisons.
Top 5 RisersStockRatingAnalysisVLOSTRONGBUYAn increasingly positive growth rate of past earnings, along with improving expectations for long term growth, make Valero a good prospect for high returns.KROSTRONGBUYKronos Worldwide has been gaining recognition from analysts as a good canditate for achieving higher than expected earnings along with higher overall projected valuation.SFIBUYiStar is one of the top candidates projected to achieve both higher than previously projected earnings in the short run and a higher earnings growth rate in the long run.AMATSTRONGBUYApplied Materials has been...
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February is now past, and the Biotech Porfolio is loaded with winners and a miss (PLX). MRK is down a bit, but I expect that trade to recover, and one could be more agressive and double down on it, or play another round at the Jan13 $30 options for roughly the same price. Below is the summary, and note the grey boxes are ones that did not fill. I am still a fan of BMRN, and like DEPO as well. Now let's look at a few others.
Table 1. PSW Biotech Plays Since January 2011
 
Our newest play is Momenta Pharmaceuticals (MNTA), who is pursuing a three-part business model which includes complex generic equivalents in partnership with the Sandoz division of Novartis, proprietary compounds, and follow-on- biologics (FOB). It seems that this company is tied up in competition/litigation wit...
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Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...
Ilene is editor and affiliate program
coordinator for PSW. She manages the Favorites backup site
(