Der USA Bären-Thread

Schickt Tepco Obdachlose ins havarierte AKW?  Laut ARD-Korrespondent Robert Hetkämpfer schickt die Betreiberfirma von Fukushima 1 Obdachlose und Minderjährige als "Wegwerfarbeiter" in das Atomkraftwerk.  Der ARD-Korrespondent Robert Hetkämper hat in der WDR-Sendung "Aktuelle Stunde" vom 17. März schwere Vorwürfe gegen die Betreiberfirma des havarierten Atomkraftwerks Fukushima 1 in Japan erhoben: Angeblich schickt Tepco seit Jahren Obdachlose und Gastarbeiter in das Atomkraftwerk Fukushima 1. Es sind oft Obdachlose. Es sind sehr viele Gastarbeiter, es sollen sogar Minderjährige dabei sein, die seit Jahren dort immer wieder angeheuert werden und dann, wenn sie eine Zeit lang dort gearbeitet haben und halbwegs verstrahlt sind, gefeuert werden. Wegwerfarbeiter hat man sie hier in Japan genannt.“, so Hetkämper. Das passiere schon seit Jahrzehnten, sagte er weiter.  In dem WDR-Bericht kam zudem der Atomphysiker Horst Ellgering zu Wort. Er schätzt die Überlebenschancen der angeblich freiwilligen Helfer in Fukushima als sehr gering ein. "Was man sieht, lässt darauf schließen, dass ihre Überlebenswahrscheinlichkeit von Mal zu Mal abnimmt. Und der Strahlentod ist kein schöner Tod.", sagte Ellgering.  Tatsächlich ist wenig bekannt über die Menschen, die mit der Kühlung der explodierten Reaktoren beschäftigt sind und dort ihr Leben riskieren.

Libyen ist für Merkel ein diplomatischer Totalschaden

ich im Grundsatz nicht einmal ablehnen würde. Männer und Frauen sollen die gleichen Chancen bei gleicher Qualifikation haben.
 

Wenn ich mir dann jedoch die Damen in der Politik anschaue: Merkel, Roth, Künast, Nahles etc.

DANN bin ich mir nicht so sicher ob Frauen wirklich einen besseren Job machen. Oder sind es einfach nur immer die falschen Frauen die sich nach oben kämpfen?

Permanent

Es gibt auch andere Ansichten über einen Einstieg in einen Bürgerkrieg mit Bodentruppen. Wer´s haben möchte kann´s auch kriegen.

The Treasury Department says it will begin selling its remaining $142 billion in holdings of mortgage backed securities purchased during the financial crisis.

Treasury officials said the first sales of up to $10 billion in the securities, primarily issued by troubled mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, would start this month.

Assistant Treasury Secretary Mary Miller said that the sales represented a continuation of efforts by the government to wind down the emergency programs put in place in 2008 and 2009 to help restore market stability.

Etwaige Auswirkungen der Erdbeben- und Reaktor-Katastrophe in Japan sind in dieser Einschätzung nicht enthalten. Die Bundesregierung geht dem März-Bericht zufolge für 2011 weiter von einem Wachstumsplus beim Bruttoinlandsprodukt (BIP) von preisbereinigt 2,3 Prozent aus.

Auf den vorgelagerten Preisstufen - als Frühindikatoren für künftige Inflationstendenzen auf der Verbraucherstufe - sei bereits seit längerem ein spürbarer Preisauftrieb zu beobachten. Der Bericht bezieht sich damit unter anderem auf die Großhandelspreise. Auch die Importe hätten sich im Januar um 11,8 Prozent im Vergleich zum Vorjahr verteuert.

Die Preise für Vorleistungsgüter erreichten dem Monatsbericht zufolge einen neuen Höchststand. Auch Verbrauchsgüter, insbesondere Nahrungsmittel, seien deutlich teurer als vor einem Jahr. "Vor diesem Hintergrund sowie angesichts gestiegener Preiserwartungen der Verbraucher und Unternehmen hat sich das Preisklima am aktuellen Rand etwas eingetrübt", heißt es.

Quelle: dpa

Expansive Geldpolitik: Bundesbank will Ende des billigen Geldes

almost dropped 10%

Die Zahl der Verkäufe bestehender Häuser

liegt im Februar bei 4,88 Mio

Der britische Atomexperte Shaun Burnie warnt davor, die Lage in Japan zu beschönigen: "Die offiziellen Beruhigungsversuche sind offensichtlich lächerlich. Es werden schließlich erhöhte Strahlenwerte in 100 Kilometer Entfernung von Fukushima gemessen. Und das, obwohl der Wind in eine andere Richtung geweht hat. Das sollte uns eine ernste Warnung sein."

Could things be getting so good in the US that even noted curmudgeon Meredith Whitney is finding reason to believe?

Answering such an improbable question requires perspective, as optimism from Whitney would be considered pessimism from most people.

Indeed, she still sees a strong likelihood of municipal bond defaults, anticipates another 10 percent drop in housing prices, and believes inflation poses a problem that is just over the horizon.

But in an interview with CNBC's Maria Bartiromo, Whitney calls the US economy “dynamic and strong” and predicts a group of states will generate what she calls an emerging-market growth story right here in our own borders.

The (relatively) upbeat look begins with steps taken on the local and state governmental level to address pressing budget problems that could lead to defaults.

“[F]or the next couple of months, the markets should continue to do well,” Whitney said in the interview published on USA Today online over the weekend. “The more we can do to address fiscal austerity, the better our markets will do, and there is a real political shift to doing that.”

 

She also points to a “triangle” of states in the heartland that will benefit from higher oil prices and help put a floor under the economy. Kansas, Missouri, Iowa and Texas make up the “emerging markets of the US,” which she says “is a composite of many different economies.”

Of course, she qualifies her remarks considerably with worries over what effect the housing market drag will have on the broader economy.

But the notion that she finds anything positive in her outlook is striking, considering her history both recent—her much maligned call for a hundred or more municipal defaults—and not as recent.

Whitney is the godmother of the financial crisis, having issued beforehand a now-famous report saying Citigroup was in huge trouble because of all the toxic financial junk corroding its financial picture.

The crisis launched her career as a rock-star analyst, and her proclamations now garner huge attention. So to hear her say that the markets will fare well at least in the short term is remarkable, even if she still remains a little more true to form over the long haul.

“You don’t have a lot of bad news through May and June,” she said. “And then you have some real challenges coming after June as housing starts to decelerate again as foreclosures resume and inventory really comes on the market. Investors who are looking for a strong second half may be disappointed. You may see a repeat of what happened last year. And inflation is a real issue.”

Whitney’s fears about housing prices have been borne out by the latest data released Monday.

Home sales fell 9.6 percent in February and prices dropped 5.2 percent, indicating that if hopes for a complete economic recovery remain tethered to the housing industry, then the US is far from in the clear.

Credit Suisse also said it anticipates tighter lending conditions for loans backed by the Federal Housing Administration, which is raising its insurance premiums in a move that will hurt housing affordability.

Of course, as soon as the housing numbers came out, the market continued to rally, indicating there is no such thing as bad news anymore.

So the latest Whitney comments either indicate that there’s no sense being downbeat about the economy anymore—or that the last great bear has come in from the cold and a market capitulation on the upside is near, indicating an end to the rally.

Nouriel Roubini, best known for predicting the U.S. housing meltdown, said he expects Japan's central bank to ease monetary policy further by buying more government debt in the wake of the earthquake.

 

Roubini, one of Wall Street's most closely followed economists, said the Bank of Japan (BoJ) would have to set aside more money to buy bonds from the government to help pay for Japan's reconstruction works.

The BoJ's future purchases of government bonds, also known as quantitative easing (QE), are likely to be larger than the amount that was unveiled this week, Roubini said on the sidelines of a conference in Beijing.

"They have already done QE I, QE II, now there will be a third round, and the third round might be larger than the smaller amount of quantitative easing that they have done so far," he told Reuters.

The BoJ doubled the cash it sets aside for buying assets such as government bonds on Monday to 10 trillion yen ($124.1 billion) in an emergency move to shore up confidence in crisis-stricken Japan.

That was the second round of quantitative easing unveiled by the BoJ since October, when it first set aside a pool of 5 trillion yen to buy assets to partly rein in the yen .

"They need their massive fiscal stimulus for rebuilding, but they are starting with a very large public deficit and with a very large stock of debt," Roubini said.

"Once their deficit becomes much larger, and they need it to build parts of the country that are damaged, then the BoJ is going to be starting another round of easing - QE III," he said.

Analysts have estimated that the earthquake and nuclear emergency could cost Japan up to $200 billion, or about 4 percent of its gross domestic product.

Such a bill would strain Japan's already fragile fiscal health. Its government is one of the world's most indebted. The public debt is twice the size of the $5.3 trillion economy, and the fiscal deficit is about 9 percent of GDP.

But Roubini said massive reconstruction spending could lift Japan's economy later this year, jolting it from a slump in production in the near term caused by factory shutdowns in the aftermath of the quake.

That means the world's third-largest economy could escape a recession, he said. "If they start the reconstruction fast enough, the policy stimulus might lead to a recovery of growth," Roubini said.

"There are downside risks to Japanese growth, but I would not necessarily predict another real recession for now."

Pundits as Contrary Indicators

By Rev Shark
Street.com Contributor
3/21/2011 11:42 AM EDT

The indices continue to hold up extremely well, but I'm surprised that the mood seems so mild. I'm not seeing much talk at all about new buys or building of positions. That gives the action the feel of a routine oversold bounce rather than an meaningful turn, but the longer the hold-up, the more the bulls will inch back in. I'm not interested in doing any shorting at this point. I'm looking for the bulls to hold us fairly steady for the rest of the day, but if we close weak, it will definitely cause some concern.

Of course, with the market up, CNBC is parading the usual bunch of perma-bulls who are praising the glories of a buy-and-hold approach to the market. Vince Farrell even gave the pathetic example of Coca-Cola (KO - commentary - Trade Now) as a long-term hold, although the stock is down over the last 14 years.

It is interesting how discussions of buy-and-hold investing often tend to be contrary indicators. Back at the lows in 2009, there were many articles and comments about how buy-and-hold investing was dead. Of course, that turned out to be the ideal time to buy and hold for a couple years.

Now that we've had an almost straight-up move for a couple years, the pendulum has swung the other way, and we have those folks telling us how it is so much easier and better to just buy "good" stocks and hold them for the long term. That talk alone makes me think this market is likely to favor more active trading in the months ahead.

In dem Post von "Bankhaus Rott" steht eine Grafik, die einen bestimmten Sachverhalt sehr schön visualisiert, auf den ich verschiedentlich schon hingewiesen habe: Ich könnte mich stets kringeln vor Lachen, wenn ich lese, mit dem US-Konsum gehe es erfreulich aufwärts, da die Verbraucherausgaben deutlich gestiegen seien. Nochmals: Die statistischen Zahlen der Verbraucherausgaben enthalten u.a. auch Ausgaben für Versicherungen, medizinische Leistungen und Bildung.

Geradezu kriminelle Ausbeutung von Atom-Leiharbeitern gibt es in Japan bereits seit vielen Jahren:

 

Yuko Fujita

... (automatisch gekürzt) ...

Housing-Daten völlig. Hätten die Zahlen positiv überrascht, wären DOW und Co. 4 % im DOW nach oben geschossen. So gab es halt nur 1,7 % Plus im DOW.

12:24 Existing-home sales sink 9.6% in February

March 21, 2011, 10:00 a.m. EDT
February existing-home sales fall to 4.88 million
By Jeffry Bartash

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - Sales of previously owned homes in the U.S. fell 9.6% in February to an annual rate of 4.88 million, a real-estate trade group said Monday. January's data was revised up to 5.4 million, according to the National Association of Realtors. Economists surveyed by MarketWatch expected existing sales to drop to a rate of 5.1 million. The median price of homes sold was down 5.2% from last year at $156,100, the lowest level since April 2002. Inventories of existing homes for sale rose 3.5% to 3.49 million, representing 8.6 months' supply.

Zu den "gestiegenen Einzelhandelsumsätzen" in USA tragen zu einem erheblichen Teil die stark gestiegenen Tankstellen-Umsätze bei - eine Folge des deutlich teureren Benzins. Das ist freilich kein Grund zum Jubel (die Tankstellen verdienen kaum mehr), denn auch diese Weise fließt US-Kaufkraft ins ölfördernde Ausland ab (und kommt von den Petrodollar-Staaten in letzter Zeit auch nicht mehr so stark via US-Staatsanleihenkäufe zurück).

Überhaupt ist die Rohstoff-Inflation - ein Zweitrundeneffekt von Bernankes Nullzins- und QE-Politik - eher dazu angetan, den US-Konsum auszubremsen. Es ist eine Illusion zu glauben, man könne sich aus dem Schlamassel "herausinflationieren".

www.querschuesse.de/griechenlands-abwartsspirale/

fast auf den Tag genau das Ende des damaligen schweren Bärenmarktes vorhergesagt.

www.thestreet.com/story/10470393/...portant-market-bottom.html

Nun sagt es das Ende der seitdem laufenden Bärenmarkt-Rallye an:

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Doug Kass, street.com
It's Gonna Take Time
3/21/2011 12:19 PM EDT

I am in agreement with Ken "IBD" Shreve on the technical damage -- not only for the FADS CAN but for nearly every other sector of the market.

Anything can happen over the short term, but my assessment is that the damage that has occurred technically will most likely be corrected in a consolidating and range-bound market.

I am of the view that this is not the start of a new upleg in the market.

Rather, we have seen the end of the trend in place since the generational low of March 2009.

It doesn't mean the market will get whacked again but it suggests that the market will take time to base before another up-move commences.

From my perch!

Position: None

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Die damals punktgenaue Rallye-Ansage verleiht Kass' Worten mehr Gewicht, ist aber keine Garantie, dass er mit seinem nun bärischen Ausblick Recht behalten wird.

March 21, 2011, 1:05 p.m. EDT
Japan quake stops 25% of silicon wafer production
By Benjamin Pimentel

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- The Japan earthquake has led to the suspension of 25% of the production of silicon wafers, the key material used for making semiconductors, IHS iSuppli reported Monday. The disruption of manufacturing operations in the Asian nation will have a particularly big impact on the global supply of memory processors, such as Flash memory and DRAM, the report said.

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Der US-Halbleiterindex SOX schwächelt daher aus gutem Grund:

The Treasury Department’s move to start unloading its portfolio of mortgage debt likely will add one more point of pressure—albeit a small one—to a housing market hardly in a position for additional stress.

Later this month the government plans to shed about $10 billion in its $142 billion portfolio of mortgage-backed securities that were guaranteed by government-sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The sales then will happen incrementally over the next year or so.

In the broader scope of things, the new supply is a brief shower inside a typhoon of debt that the Treasury and, to a far greater extent, the Federal Reserve—which owns $1.25 billion in MBS—took off the GSE balance sheets during the worst of the credit crisis.

But it represents the first move to send the debt back to the open marketplace where it belongs, even if it pushes artificially low rates higher. The law of supply and demand would indicate that with a greater level of product out there, the holders will have to start paying bigger returns to attract buyers.

The escalation in mortgage likely will only be a question of degree, which in turn will be determined by how anxious investors are to start buying debt that only two or three years ago was so toxic it brought down the world’s biggest financial system.

How the initial sale turns out will be a key indicator for Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner as he tries to restore the debt markets back to normal.

“To the extent that there’s a market for anything, there is” a market for the MBS about to be sold, says bond trader Kevin Ferry, president of Cronus Futures Management in Chicago. “What you’re seeing is a series of very incremental, very Geithneresque steps towards what is the exit strategy.”

 

Treasury officials don’t anticipate any adverse reaction to the housing market, though most analysts expect at least some upward pressure on mortgage rates.

“The question is, who is going be their buyers? Obviously it’s going to be major funds. But are they willing to take the paper at this time or are they willing to gamble in terms of returns?” says Peter Cardillo, chief economist at Avalon Partners in New York. “That’s the major question overhanging the market. They’re going to have a hard time unloading this without moving rates higher.”

Treasurys’ timing couldn’t have been much worse, considering housing numbers Monday that showed a sharp drop both in price and sales.

In its statement announcing the sale, Treasury contends that the purchases were done to stabilize the market. Critics argue, though, that the prolonged intervention only hampered the housing market recovery while bailing out too-big-to-fail institutions that caused the problem.

Ferry also questioned why the Fed is maintaining its zero-interest-rate policy on the funds rate even as it is allowing banks to increase dividends and recapitalize while also unloading the MBS.

“It just shows that banks still have an inordinate amount of power in the process of how things are going down,” he said.

Still, he expects the Fed do have a fairly efficient go of it when selling the MBS.

“There are going to be days when I think it will be a little sketchy,” he said. “I think they’ll get it done, no problem.”

Alle anderen wirtschaftlichen Folgen sind dagegen meines Erachtens Peanuts. Aber dieses Szenario müssen Sie einfach als mögliches im Hinterkopf behalten, für den Fall, dass sich solche Entwicklungen abzeichnen.

Noch ist es nicht so weit

Im Moment sieht die Welt in Japan zum Glück etwas anders aus. Die Märkte steigen, da die Anleger vermuten, dass die Katastrophe in Japan zumindest teilweise kontrollierbar bleibt. Wir wollen es hoffen. Und dieses Szenario scheint im Moment auch tatsächlich das wahrscheinlichere zu sein. Nach wie vor bleiben aber die Risiken bestehen. Lassen Sie sich nicht von den sehr volatilen Kursbewegungen in die ein oder andere Richtung verleiten, zu große Risiken einzugehen.

Mehr dazu in den nächsten Tagen.

Viele Grüße

Jochen Steffens

 

Portugal erwägt Flucht unter den Rettungsschirm

no panic

ideal wäre ein Unterschreiten der 12022.33 zum Tagesschluss (MA 50)