From The Business Insider, Feb. 26, 2009: We haven’t heard the details of Obama’s ambitious plan to “fix” the healthcare system, except that it will require another $600 billion to do it.But we have a pretty good hunch of some of the plan’s comp
Like most well-heeled technology reviewers, BusinessWeek’s Steve Wildstrom knows one thing
about Apple: That he has no clue what product they’ll be launching next. But, of
course, such epic secrecy only drives the rumor mill more. …
From The Business Insider, Feb. 26, 2009: As we mentioned this morning, GM’s total loss for the fourth quarter of 2008 was $9 billion. It’s hard to imagine any number that large, so we decided to break it down by the day. It turns out that GM lost somethi
Alternative energy is one of the key pillars of Barack Obama’s budget “blueprint”, formally unveiled today. “We know the country that harnesses the power of clean, renewable energy will lead the 21st century,” Obama said in his
Ben Bernanke says there’s a “reasonable prospect” the recession will end this year and 2010 will be a “year of recovery.”His caveats aside, the Fed chairman is making a big leap of faith considering the economic data continues to show
General Motors said it expects auditors to cast doubt on its ability to remain viable as it endures the worst market in decades. Posting a deeper-than-expected quarterly loss as revenue plunged by more than a third, the automaker said it could receive a “going concern” notice from its auditors.
It will be interesting to see how the auditors, in assessing GM’s viability, value the billions of dollars of government bailout injections. The automaker has asked for up to $30 billion in aid and says it can’t survive without it.
GM argues it is turning the corner on production efficiency, design and quality, but that may be an even harder computation for auditors to crunch than state support.
This morning GM posted a net loss of $30.9 billion for 2008. That would be a record for the 100-year-old company, except it lost $38.7 billion in 2007. Analysts have said the key to valuing GM shares and debt is the progress the company is making in talks with creditors and the autos task force assembled by President Barack Obama to slash debt and secure new funding.
The question of whether GM is a going concern — is that a foregone conclusion?
Deals of the Day:
* Britain’s BG has acquired a 29 percent stake in Australian coal seam gas producer Pure Energy Resources Ltd, Pure said in a statement.
* Children’s television producer Entertainment Rights Plc said it was in advanced talks with bidders for the sale of its units or business and assets.
* Australia’s Babcock & Brown Infrastructure said that it expected to settle the sale of its stake in New Zealand’s Powerco by the end of the day.
* Officials from Indian gas firm GAIL (India) and Oil and Natural Gas Corp will meet on Thursday to discuss a 19 percent stake in ONGC’s planned petrochemical plant, GAIL’s chief said. “We are meeting with ONGC in the evening,” Chairman U.D. Choubey told reporters.
Most hedge funds agree that the credit crisis has thrown up some interesting assets at bargain-basement prices, particularly in credit markets.
The problem? When you have to report net asset value performance to jittery investors and prices of these cheap assets are getting even cheaper, when do you buy?
That’s the dilemma facing many fund managers, some of whom have got burned by snapping up asset-backed securities and other assets too quickly.
After all, a security that has fallen 90 percent is one that has dropped 80 percent and then halved.
Chris Woods, chief investment officer at Man Global Strategies, speaking at Wednesday’s Euromoney bond conference in Westminster, helps us out.
“Just as 50 is the new par, so early is the new wrong,” he says.
As investors have found, it may be cheap, but it could get a lot cheaper.
Do the markets hate Barack Obama? Consider the following:The Dow has fallen about 11% since Election Day.The Dow’s fall on Obama’s Inauguration Day was the worst
By mid-morning in Silicon Valley, there was one big story that no one was
talking about: What was going on at the Apple Shareholder meeting. That’s
because Apple refused to allow any computers or devices in. That’s right, not
even iPhone
Perhaps Jeff Bezos is the Internet age’s Steve Jobs after all. He’s certainly got reviewers whipped up into a frenzy about the new version of
the electronic book reader, the Kindle. The device itself is a
In his first address to a joint session of Congress last night, President Obama called for expensive and broad efforts in three major areas — energy, health care and education. He also suggested government bailouts are far from over. In short, Obama outl
From The Business Insider, Feb. 25, 2009: We are very much in favor of the US government forcing banks to tell the truth about how little their assets are worth (take the writedowns) and then going to the shareholders and bondholders to fill the capital h