Why Is Goldman Advising CanWest On Its Programming Line Up?

When a few weeks ago we presented the concept of certain banks stealthy encroachment into the media world we were half joking. After all, the FCC would never allow Wall Street entities, even with equity control, to have a say in program line up and content, right? Needless to say, the potential for abuse (call it brain washing, or what you will) is simply staggering. Separately, two days ago, we highlighted the bankruptcy of Canada's biggest media company, CanWest, whose bankruptcy filings we are still combing through, looking for some of the usual suspects. Which is why we read with great interest Andrew Willis' article in today's Globe and Mail "Inside Goldman's deal with CanWest" which may have helped us, and our readers, elegantly put some of the pieces together. (more)

Celente The Dollar is Finished

Treasuries Fall After Weaker-Than-Average Demand at Bond Sale

Treasuries declined, with 30 year bonds falling the most in two weeks after the government’s $12 billion auction of the debt drew weaker- than-average demand.

The bid-to-cover ratio, which gauges demand by comparing total bids with the amount of securities offered, was 2.37, compared with 2.92 at the September auction and an average of 2.42 at the last 10 auctions. The 30-year bond yield touched 3.89 percent on Oct. 2, the lowest level since April.

“The auction was very tepid,” said Tom di Galoma, head of fixed-income rates trading at Guggenheim Capital Markets LLC, a New-York based brokerage for institutional investors. “The auction shows that the market can sell off when levels are overpriced. This can be a disappointment in these reopened issues.” (more)

GE: 10,000 applications for 90 factory jobs

Job seekers filed 10,000 applications over three days with General Electric for 90 openings paying about $27,000 a year building washing machines, General Electric spokeswoman Kim Freeman said Thursday.

GE advertised the jobs Sunday, and began accepting applications and resumes solely via a company website Monday. Wednesday was the deadline, she said.

GE announced last week it would hire additional workers in a new second shift later this fall to assemble Energy Star washing machines in Building 1 at the historic Louisville complex. (more)

Dylan Ratigan On Corporate Communism

• "The beneficiaries of an ongoing $24 trillion taxpayer-funded bailout...$24 trillion dollars."

• "That is national capital that is being sucked into a broken banking system at the expense of the rest of our country. They continue to use "Too Big To Fail" as blackmail to the taxpayer in order to get us to provide capital to them."

• "It is a system that takes resources from the citizenry and redistributes it to a tiny elite."

• "A handful of weak, un-competitive, outdated companies and industries are purchasing control of the American political system in order to stay in business using their cronyism.

• "It is coming at the direct expense of the rest of us in this nation. And it's a total betrayal of everything that represents America." (more)
  

Gold: three reasons why the price will go higher

As forecast, the gold price smashed through its previous record high of $1032/oz to trade at $1043/oz. We believe it should continue to perform well against most assets into the final quarter of 2009.

Moreover, the price of gold is still just over half of its prior peak in 'real' terms, even after the rally of the past eight years - the nominal peak price in 1980 at $850/oz adjusted to account for inflation equates to an equivalent price today of $1,884/oz. (more)

Experts: Gold Blasting Toward $2,000

Gold prices have surged to record highs, and many experts say you ain’t seen nothing yet.

Barclays Capital, not known for its extreme views, sees the precious metal possibly hitting $1,500. Investment guru Jim Rogers — who is known for extreme views, and for being right — now says gold will likely breach $2,000.

Gold topped $1,050 amid the dollar’s decline and fears of inflation, as the U.S. racks up massive budget deficits. The government’s debt burden is forecast to reach 56 percent of GDP this fiscal year.

“Having rallied ‘off the charts,’ we are left to resort to projections and extrapolated trend lines to forecast where the move might stop,” Jordan Kotick, Barclays’ head of technical analysis, wrote to clients. (more)

Foreclosures Mark Pace of Enduring U.S. Housing Crisis

A foreclosure filing takes place every 13 seconds in the United States.

That's the rhythm of a crisis that threatens to choke off hopes for a recovery in the U.S. housing market as it destroys hundreds of billions of dollars in property values a year.

There are more than 6,600 home foreclosure filings a day, according to the Center for Responsible Lending, a nonpartisan watchdog group based in Durham, N.C. With nearly 2 million already this year, the flood of foreclosures shows no sign of abating any time soon. (more)

The Tiny Silver Market, Part IV

by Jason Hommel, October 8th, 2009

The BIS complained about us sharing their own explanations for their own numbers, showing a $111 billion notional value of over the counter "other precious metal" derivatives yesterday. I guess we hit a nerve.
http://silverstockreport.com/2009/tiny-silver-III.html

The notional derivatives market ($111 billion) dwarfs the physical investment silver market ($1 billion).

It is important to continue to put the $1 billion annual PHYSICAL silver investment market into perspective, This time, I'll break it down by time, and across people. (more)

Rise Of The Rich

The credit crisis has forged an even larger gap between the rich and poor, though it might not last for long. The richest 10% of Americans made at least $138,000 each this year, according to Census data released last week. That’s a record-high 11.4 times the average income for the opposite end of the spectrum: the poverty line around $12,000. Pre-crisis multiples were closer to 11.2.

The middle class is getting credit crunched too. The median household income has fallen $1,860 over the last year -- wiping out a decade of slow gains -- to $50,303.

But if history is any guide, this trend may be near its peak. At present, about a quarter of America’s total income is earned by 1% of its population (amazing, eh?). That level has only been attained once in U.S. history -- ironically, 1928, right around the start of the last economic depression. What followed then was a 50-year trend in the other direction.