The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: Summary for Policymakers September 27, 2013

"I don't know if climate change is caused by burning coal or sun flares or what," said the Moscow-based carbon cowboy. "And I don't really give a shit. Russia is the most energy inefficient country around, and carbon is the most volatile market ever. There's a lot of opportunity to make money."

-The Bored Whore of Kyoto

Over the next few months we will be exploring the money making possibilities of the science, the policy responses, the politics and the laws, rules and treaties that are sure to come. This is the fifth assessment report (AR5).
We've been studying this stuff since the Rio meeting in 1992,  and we may repeat ourselves in our dotage but will attempt to keep things interesting.

The Summary for Policymakers is a political document written before the main body of the report is completed, the Technical Summary, chapters and annexes are then crafted to conform to the Summary.
More to come.
For now, just a bookmark.
Summary for Policymakers (36 page PDF)
IPCC home.

McKinsey Sees No End to the Global Commodities Supercycle

Life is easiest if you get on the right side of major trends. Gold from $42.22 to $875, 1971-1980; John Templeton, Japanese stocks at 2x earnings, $100K to $55 mil. 1954-1999. Anything-but-gold 1980-2001 etc, etc.
Or you can trade and commodities are for trading, not investing, something that CalPERS and the other big funds forgot when the friendly Goldman GSCI swaps salesman came calling and said "they were an asset class and would you like to bypass speculative position limits by using our designation as a Commercial?".
For the last couple years the short side has been more remunerative than the long but going forward, who knows.
Just to make things interesting we have a real love/hate thing with McKinsey.*

From Bloomberg:
Commodities ‘Super Cycle’ Is Seen Enduring by McKinsey

Commodity supply constraints and demand from emerging markets mean it’s premature to talk about the death of the super cycle that brought a longer-than-average period of rising prices, McKinsey & Co. said.

Energy, metal and agricultural prices that more than doubled since 2000 are still close to highs reached before the financial crisis, even after commodities from gold to wheat dropped into bear markets, McKinsey said in a report today.

The surge in raw-material output in the past two years and signs of cooling economic growth in China, the world’s biggest consumer of everything from cotton to zinc, prompted Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Citigroup Inc. to say the super cycle ended. McKinsey said producers are being forced deeper into remote areas to secure supplies that require increasingly sophisticated technology to extract as consumption expands.

“When we look forward, we see a separation between new technology and productivity on the one hand, and emerging-market demand and supply constraints on the other,” Fraser Thompson, a senior fellow at the McKinsey Global Institute, said in a telephone interview from London. “We don’t want to bet against technology, but what we think often gets overlooked is the scale of the challenge we’re facing.”
The Standard & Poor’s GSCI Spot Index of 24 raw materials has dropped 2 percent this year. Since 2000, the gauge posted only two annual declines...MORE

From Mckinsey & Co:

Resource revolution: Tracking global commodity markets
September 2013 | byRichard Dobbs, Jeremy Oppenheim, Fraser Thompson, Sigurd Mareels, Scott Nyquist, and Sunil Sanghvi

Download

Executive Summary PDF–1MB

Full Report PDF–2MB

It may be tempting to view recent declines in commodity prices as the end of the resource “supercycle”—the period of sharp price rises and heightened volatility since the turn of the 21st century. Yet rumors of the supercycle’s death are greatly exaggerated. Despite recent falls, commodity prices are still near their levels of early to mid-2008, just before the global financial crisis hit. (To track the movements in commodity prices over time, see the interactive, “MGI’s Commodity Price Index—an interactive tool.”) At a time when the world economy remains below full power, this phenomenon is striking, and a sign that the supercycle is alive and well....MUCH MORE

*See for example:
"Is McKinsey & Co. the Root of All Evil ?"
 
Yves Smith Says Nice Things About McKinsey & Co. (they're in the business of propping up diseased managements)

McKinsey says Germany in terminal decline
That one was from 2008.

And on the other hand:

McKinsey--"Disruptive technologies: Advances that will transform life, business, and the global economy"

Sure we poke fun at McKinsey ("Is McKinsey & Co. the Root of All Evil ?") but all-in-all and averaged over the whole firm, especially if you include support staff, they're smarter than I am....

Today in the Financial Crisis, Friday September 26, 2008: Jamie Dimon Picks Up a-third-of-a-Trillion in Assets

It had been 11 days since the Lehman bankruptcy
The Dow Jones Industrial Average notched its second consecutive gain on that Friday, 121.07 points at 11,143.13.
After all the madness on the Street the DJIA was only down 278.86 from where we closed on the 12th, before the Lehman weekend.
Not to worry though, things were about to get really exciting.

From the Los Angeles Times:
Dow rallies after sharp early drop

Washington Mutual shares, which could be made worthless by the government seizure, skidded 91% to 16 cents a share. A year ago, they were trading above $35....

PETA calls on ice cream maker to use breast milk
Downgrades hit financial sector
HSBC Holdings cuts 1,100 jobs
Loan boom paid off for Wall Street execs
Executives of the top five firms were paid $3 billion in the last five years as mortgage securities proliferated.
Swindler gets life for bilking the elderly
Wife of Lehman chief to sell pricey art, dealers say 

What we were posting:
5:23 a.m.
Why Washington Mutual (WM) Does Not Matter

Washington Mutual (WM) failed yesterday and most of its assets where sold to JP Morgan (JPM). The price was $1.8 billion. JPM will have to write down $31 billion in badloans, but, since Jamie Dimon is now the king of the banking world, he should be able to raise the capital to cover that. In the meantime, he has picked up $307 billion in assets. 
 According to The Wall Street Journal, "The deal will vault J.P. Morgan into first place in nationwide deposits and greatly expand its franchise." 

5:28 a.m. 
On banking crises c. 1908

More from the "there are no new problems, only our problems" drawer, the Sept. 23, 1908 NYT reports:

"Europeans believe that the world panic of last Autumn was caused by our banking system; that there is no assurance against a recurrence of the trouble until the banking system is reformed. And I agree with Europeans," remarked Jame B. Forgan, President of the First National Bank, upon his return from a trip abroad today. He continued: 

"Over there in Europe, when a monetary scare occurs and spreads, there is at once a unanimity of action among bankers. Money begins to flow to the country's financial centre. The Bank of England, for instance, raises its discount rate; it gets gold from everywhere; the monetary resources of the country are laid under contribution for the benefit of the big bank or banks. The people are then shown the strong position of the large institution or institutions, and are calmed thereby.

"Here in the United States we are the victims of a process the direct reverse of that obtaining abroad. when apprehension seizes the Nation our one or two big piles of cash are pounced upon by a myriad of little bankers throughout the country, who make hundreds of piles of them, and who, after getting the money, do nothing but stare at it, having really no use for it....MORE

5:32 a.m.
Speculator? Oil Firm? Theories on Crude Spike
6:11 a.m.
Wipeout: Washington Mutual Bondholders


7:43 a.m.  
German DWS issues retail carbon fund with Aquila

I'm not sure that having speculators and financial intermediaries romping about in the carbon markets is a societal good but what the hell, I'm tired of watching politicians and bankers deal with the last mess, on to the next one!

Plus, we can liberate the hausfrau's pin money for higher purposes like reliquifying banker's and broker's balance sheets. Win, win (well, except for the hausfrau)...

9:33 a.m. 
WaMu Bondholders are `Stranded' in Thrift Seizure, Hendler Says
10:00 
House oks extending renewable energy tax credits

It's not the same bill passed by the Senate so the next step is a conference committee. Not that it will matter to the equities, right now the market's attention seems focused elsewhere....

10:59 a.m. 
Marc Faber: US Needs as Much as $5 Trillion Financial Rescue
12:11 p.m. 
JPMorgan House Price Projections (JPM; WM)
1:41 p.m.
Now for Something Completely Different: Intrade Betting is Suspicious 

Why We Really Need JPMorgan to Trade Carbon

From MoneyBox:

A Guide To Everyone Suing JP Morgan

J.P. Morgan is the large bank that probably gained the most in terms of size, scope, and reputation from the housing and mortgage market collapses and subsequent financial chaos. As a big firm that had unwound most of its exposure to the housing market unusually early, it was in a position to grow as other institutions failed. Except over the past year and a half it's been sucked into an increasing whirlwind of litigation, revealing that its success has been built in part on a culture of very lax compliance with the law all across the board.

Today many papers have stories reporting (NYT, FT, WSJ) that the bank is about to settle one class of these lawsuits—brought primarily by state attorneys general, and charging the bank with fraudulent sales of mortgage-backed securities to investors. The numbers being tossed around seem to be $7 billion in cash payments plus $4 billion worth of mortgage relief. But these talks aren't quite done yet because there's still disagreement on the crucial issue of culpability. There's been a drive lately to try to force corporate defendants to admit guilt in these settlement arrangements and Morgan doesn't like the idea.

They don't like the idea of admitting guilt in part because there's so many more legal efforts against them at the moment. Massachusetts is investigating their debt collection practices, the Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating them for violating laws against bribery, and the CFTC is looking into whether the London Whale trades violated market manipulation rules.


Those newish investigations all draw strength from recent fines Morgan has already paid, including nearly a $1 billion related to the London Whale episode, modest fines over deceptive credit card billing, and $410 million in fines from the Federal Electricity Regulatory Commission for manipulative bidding practies....MORE

Connecting the Physical and Digital Worlds: "What Google Will Look Like In 10 Years" (GOOG)

From BuzzFeed:

Google wants to wipe away disease and fill the roads with self-driving cars. Here’s the product that will allow them to do that. 

The image above is arguably the most recognizable page on the internet. Take a nice long look at it. Commit it to memory. Because there’s a good chance your kids will never see it.

By the year 2023, Google will most likely feel like a very different company. It’s outward-facing projects will probably focus on finding solutions to intractable problems, like transportation and health care. From the outside, 2023 Google will be an aspiration enterprise with a utopian vision. But in all likelihood, one decade from now the true beating heart of Google will have very little to do with its high-profile moonshots.

None of that is to suggest that Google is going away anytime soon. The company, which essentially invented modern online advertising, is poised to take home $39 billion in ad revenue this year — roughly one-third of all online ad dollars — and is as powerful, profitable, and healthy as ever. Just last week, it announced Calico, its latest side project, which aims to eradicate disease and extend human life expectancy — not exactly the sort of project you’d propose if you weren’t planning on hanging around for the next few decades.

Currently, Google is a large, complicated entity, with projects ranging from self-driving cars to the most basic email. The common thread? All of its programs, big or small, are subsidized in some way by search and keyword ads. Whatever the future holds, the next wildly ambitious iteration of Google — you could call it “moonshot” Google — will operate in the same way, only this time subsidized by its most valuable, virtually untapped asset: maps.

One of the earliest investors in the space, Google has thrown considerable money and unprecedented manpower into developing the most precise, detailed, and intelligent set of maps in human history. Powered by fleets of always-roving, camera-equipped Google vehicles, a wealth of census data and live traffic data, and its very own satellite imagery, Google has effectively — to borrow from The Atlantic’s Alexis Madrigal — recreated a web crawler for the physical world.

That’s really what Google Maps is: a reimagined, highly contextual, and personal version of Google that, instead of indexing the web, indexes your surrounding environment at a given time. Think of it this way: Every input into Google Maps’ search bar is still a search, but instead of a website, the result is a physical destination. “What search is for the web, maps are for mobile,” Waze CEO Noam Bardin told a conference last April, just months before his company was acquired by Google, for nearly $1 billion....MUCH MORE

The Secret Formula For Winning a Nobel Prize

Okay, so you didn't win the MacArthur 'genius' grant yesterday.
Do not despair.
Working together we can get you that phone call from a Swedish Chef sounding gentleman this October 7th.

First posted October 9, 2012:

Hot on the heels of my astounding lack of success winning a MacArthur 'Genius Grant' we visit BBC-Future.

My advice is to stay away from the hard science prizes and shoot for something that can't be falsified, maybe a Peace or Economics Prize.

From the BBC:

We sift through the stats to discover the hidden factors behind capturing arguably the most prestigious prizes in the world.  

Genius, passion, hard work, and a little bit of luck – that’s what we are told sets Nobel prize recipients apart from us mere mortals. But could there be any secret, hidden factors that come into play?...MORE

 (click to enlarge)

HT: I Love Charts

EIA Natural Gas Storage Report: A Big Build, Gas Drops, Sticks the Landing at $3.4020

From the EIA:

Weekly Natural Gas Storage Report
for week ending September 20, 2013.   |   Released: September 26, 2013 at 10:30 a.m.   |   Next Release: October 3, 2013

Working gas in underground storage, lower 48 states Summary text CSV JSN
								Historical Comparisons
	Stocks billion cubic feet (Bcf)							Year ago (09/20/12)				5-Year average (2008-2012)
Region	09/20/13		09/13/13		change			(Bcf)		% change		(Bcf)		% change
East	1,742		1,688		54			1,914		-9.0		1,857		-6.2
West	519		511		8			501		3.6		469		10.7
Producing	1,125		1,100		25			1,149		-2.1		1,030		9.2
Salt	267		259		8			230		16.1		162		64.8
Nonsalt	859		841		18			919		-6.5		869		-1.2
Total	3,386		3,299		87			3,565		-5.0		3,356		0.9
The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) is announcing changes to the format of its Weekly Natural Gas Storage Report (WNGSR) to better serve customers who make use of automated computer systems to collate information on changes in natural gas storage. Additional information on the changes to the WNGSR

Summary

Working gas in storage was 3,386 Bcf as of Friday, September 20, 2013, according to EIA estimates. This represents a net increase of 87 Bcf from the previous week. Stocks were 179 Bcf less than last year at this time and 30 Bcf above the 5-year average of 3,356 Bcf. In the East Region, stocks were 115 Bcf below the 5-year average following net injections of 54 Bcf. Stocks in the Producing Region were 95 Bcf above the 5-year average of 1,030 Bcf after a net injection of 25 Bcf. Stocks in the West Region were 50 Bcf above the 5-year average after a net addition of 8 Bcf. At 3,386 Bcf, total working gas is within the 5-year historical range.

...MORE

Here's Metro Energy Desk commentary from earlier this morning:

By Energy Metro Desk - Thu 26 Sep 2013 08:46:48 CDT

Previewing the Energy Information Administration's 9/26/13 report.
Each week, we poll 40 professional storage forecasts for our weekly Natural-Gas Storage Box Scores (as seen in each bi-weekly issue of Energy Metro Desk*). This is North America's biggest and most comprehensive natural-gas storage survey and report.

Average: +78 Bcf
Median: +79 Bcf
Range: +61 to 86 Bcf

Editors Forecast This Week: +80 Bcf

Natural Gas Storage Tealeaves for 9/26/13
It's gonna be a beefy build this week folks, no doubt about it. The weather cooperated (warmer than last year by half and warmer than the 5 year average), production cooperated (weak), imports and exports were cooperative (also weak), we didn't have any lingering holiday effects and the nuclear/total outage picture wasn't as big as originally believed last week.

What's it spell? A build bigger than last year and the five year average, that's what. We note that the average of all the big surveys this week came in at 76 Bcf while the EMD Consensus was a bit higher at 78 Bcf. We see risk to the high side this week. Around the quad, analysts were coming forward with their scrape models besting their S/D models, fairly consistently by like 10 Bcf. Don't see that very often; it made us wonder if a surprise is in the cards this week. Very possible. The overall range was pretty wide this week at 61 to 86 Bcf and the spread between the three categories we track was also fairly wide at 2.5 Bcf. It's under the 3 Bcf signal, but still, it's higher than it should be for this time of the year.

The Standard deviation was 5.5 this week. The 8 week running average is just over 4. Bentek thinks that the risk may be to the low side this week, and they are about as high as it gets -- their Flow Model came in at our HighBaller forecast of 86 Bcf and its S/d Model was lower at 79 Bcf - though still above the consensus. 80 Bcf tomorrow shouldn't surprise; over 85 Bcf, should. Lower than 75 Bcf should be somewhat of a surprise as well. We note that total outages were up 12 GW week-on-week to 46 GW, though we also note that total US power demand is down 5.8 Bcf/d to 24 Bcf/d, from the Sept. 13 to the Sept. 20 storage week, the lowest weekly average since late June. Total US population-weighted cooling degree days declined by 48 percent from the prior week, with East Region CDDs down a whopping 87%. As we said, risk to the high side. -the editor...MORE

If the futures hadn't been dropping for the last week we'd have seen a 25 cent drop on this size build. As it is it looks like a lot of the number was priced in.
5-minute chart from FinViz:

The Future of Newspaper Economics: Newsprint as a Luxury Good

That's it!
Time for artisanal paper newspapers!
The key to newspaper finances will be small-batch newsprint.
Combined with inks infused with essential oils!
That's the ticket.

From Breitbart:
Bezos: Print newspapers could become 'luxury'

 Amazon chief executive and new Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos said Wednesday that print newspapers could one day become a luxury item.

"Some day, I don't know how many years in the future -- it could be decades -- but I think printed newspapers on actual paper may be a luxury item," Bezos told NBC in an interview.

"People still have horses but it's not their primary way of commuting to the office," Bezos added.

Bezos was questioned on whether he envisions a day when the Washington Post, which he bought in August, is no longer printed....MORE

Climateer Line of the Day: H2Oh Give Me a Break Edition

We visited with this guy back in July's "I'm in the Wrong Business Part 625: '$20 for a bottle of water? Your water sommelier will bring the menu right away'", some bits were pretty funny.
Business Insider caught up with him a couple days ago:

"Iskilde from Denmark is a great water for a vegetarian mushroom dish because it has earthy taste notes. Beverly Hills 90H20 is the perfect pairing for a seasonal salad because it will cut through the acidity of a vinaigrette dressing and help balance out the flavors."

-Some People With Too Much Money Are Consulting A 'Water Sommelier'

 (90H20 is Riese's own water brand. So what we have here is a water sommelier who's talking his own book.)

How Old Do Empires Get? 250 Years

Following up on the "Whole World Getting Tired" of the Anglosphere post immediately below.
From AlFin 2100:

Sir John Glubb was a British author and lecturer, who was decorated for his service in the Royal Engineers in WWI, and was commander of the Jordan Arab Legion from 1939 to 1956. His famous and succinct essay, The Fate of Empires and Search for Survival (PDF), looks at the lifespan of empires from their origins to their eventual decline.

Glubb estimates that most empires do not last longer than roughly 250 years, with many of them lasting much shorter periods of time. He describes many of the stages of empire, and many of the reasons why they break down and eventually disappear.

Sir John Glubb "Fate of Empires" (PDF)

As seen in Glubb's image above, most of the world's great empires lasted no longer than 250 years. Glubb looks at the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire as two different empires, based upon their distinct forms of government.

One of the reasons for decline of empire described by Glubb is the influx of masses of people from outside cultures, religions, and ethnic groups, who are different from the core populations making up the founders and conquering peoples who brought about the original empire....MORE

Sick of Getting Spied On: "Can There Be a Non-US Internet?"

I've got to think there are a lot of countries for whom the NSA and to a lesser extent GCHQ are loathsome .
From Motherboard:

Screenshot of BRICS cable network map, via

After discovering that the US government has been invading the privacy of not just Americans, but also Brazilians, Brazil is showing its teeth. The country responded to the spying revelations by declaring it'll just have to create its own internet, and slap a big sign on it that says "United States Not Welcome."

At least, that's the version of the story that's been making the rounds. In reality, although Brazil President Dilma Rousseff is none too happy with the NSA’s sketchy surveillance practices, Brazil and other up-and-coming economies have been pushing to shift the power dynamics of the World Wide Web away from a US-centric model for years.

With a new light shining on those efforts, it’s a good time to ask: Is it possible? Plausible? And if so, how will it work?

The prevailing opinion among experts is that those answers are yes, no, and it's complicated. The debate about whether you can build an independent, compartmentalized network has been overshadowed by the debate over whether you should. Would it cause a doomsday Balkanization effect that undermines the global connectivity of the open web, or level the economic playing field for developing nations in the information age?...MORE

An Entire Industry Devoted to Advertising Startup Financing Deals Has Popped Up (the lifting of the General Solicitation Ban)

I know a lot of people are more interested in the fact that hedge funds can advertise and we'll get to that but as someone who grew up with the General Solicitation Ban I am fascinated by what is happening as a result of  the amendments to Rules 506 and 144 of the '33 Act on September 23rd.
From Reuters:

Shackles drop off fundraising for startups. Should we worry?

Entrepreneur Nicole O'Rourke has a novel idea for raising cash that would have been illegal until this week: smacking a "fund me" sticker on every bottle or can of hair products from her start-up business, Rock Your Hair.

O'Rourke is among the first to take advantage of the lifting of a years-long ban, mandated by the 1933 Securities Act, on using advertising to find investors in private companies. Intended originally to prevent opportunists from targeting the gullible, it has long been considered a bedrock protection against scams. Lifting it, with some protections, should help startups and thus boost the overall economy, proponents say.

Scores of websites have sprung up to connect budding financiers with struggling entrepreneurs who are eager to tap new sources of cash and close funding rounds far more speedily than under the traditional venture model. There are now dozens of sites with all sorts of business models, ranging from charging companies to create listings to taking a cut of an investor's eventual profits.

While many have been around for months, in some cases years, they could not highlight details about the deals on their sites until Monday. Before then, potential investors had to be registered on the site as accredited investors -- those with net worth, not including their homes, of $1 million or more-- to learn about the start-ups seeking funding.

"Public Fundraising. It's here. Tell the world you're raising money," trumpets the AngelList web site. On Monday, it took the wraps off a new type of investment vehicle, a syndicate, where one angel investor - typically an affluent person who provides capital for a startup - leads a group of accredited investors to back a company in a type of minifund.

"General solicitation has arrived!" reads the text at the top of the Rockthepost home page, which lower down features an endorsement from Barbara Corcoran, an investor who is also a regular guest on the start-up show Shark Tank.

The relaxation of the ban, however, may not work out so well for thousands of investors who could be drawn into companies without understanding the hazards.

"It's an area that has a lot of potential for misuse and fraud," warned Daniel Carlson, a San Diego-based securities-fraud lawyer.

Securities and Exchange Commission lawyer David Blass said officials are watching the area carefully.
Under Monday's rule change, private companies can now ask for dollars from accredited investors through moves such as sending out tweets or Facebook updates, advertising on websites, or, in the case of O'Rourke, attaching stickers to products. Previously, such private companies largely would have been limited to investments from friends, family, and venture firms.

Currently, the change in law on advertising for dollars affects only accredited investors. Startups who take money under the new rules will have to go through some extra steps to verify that their investors are accredited, such as collecting tax forms and bank statements.

Eventually, more investors will be allowed to make small investments in private companies under certain circumstances, perhaps next year, lawyers say. That is the so-called crowdfunding provision of last year's Jumpstart Our Business Startups, or JOBS, Act.

FLYING CARS, ARTISANAL PICKLES
The shift allows retirees, doctors, lawyers and the like to get a piece of investments with a little more razzledazzle than they are used to-- say Terrafugia, the flying car company using Wefunder to find investors, or Rick's Picks, "artisanal pickles crafted with nuance and wit," working with CircleUp.
Both Wefunder and CircleUp are among the relatively new sites that put young companies in front of potential investors.

Of course, to entrepreneurs, the lifting of the ban on advertising serves as a tremendous boon.
"Considering that startups sometimes take months to raise seed and Series A rounds, this offers a glimpse into an option magnitudes of order faster," says author and entrepreneur Tim Ferriss. On Monday, he helped logistics startup Shyp raise $250,000 in little under an hour, coming from an AngelList syndicate in Shyp that he led himself....MORE

Goldman Sachs: "Bakken shale production will surprise Wall Street" and Carl Icahn does a drive-by (CLR; OAS; ARII; TRIN)

It appears that despite the extraordinary decline rates of individual wells the overall field has some productive time ahead of it.
And this is with current technology. Should the well service companies adopt the British approach* the sky is the limit.
One fact to be aware of, both CLR and OAS are trading at all-time highs. Goldman put Oasis on their "Conviction buy List"

We like all-time highs though; because a) big winners tend to set a lot of them (duh) and b) by definition there are no shareholders doing their deals with the Gods of Equities, "Please, if you just let me get back to breakeven I'll ______ " (double duh)

Although the chart doesn't show it, production from the field will cross 1mm bbl/day, almost all from widely spaced wells in the middle Bakken, by year end.

From MarketWatch:

North Dakota’s Bakken shale formation will surprise investors, analysts at Goldman Sachs wrote in a note Tuesday.

“We came away from our trip to North Dakota last week with greater confidence in our outlook that Bakken production/completion activity will likely exceed Street expectations,” the analysts said.

Goldman picked favorites among oil exploration and production companies exposed to the Bakken: they initiated coverage of Continental Resources Inc.  CLR  and Oasis Petroleum Inc.  OAS , rating both a buy based on their growth potential and valuation. They set a price target of $130 on Continental stock and $65 on Oasis Petroleum stock.

Other firms ready to reap the Bakken benefits are refiner Northern Tier Energy LP  NTI , oilfield-services firm Halliburton Co. HAL , and transportation and pipeline companies Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. CA:CP  and Enbridge Inc. ENB .

Northern Tier’s price target was set at $30 a share, while Halliburton’s target was $63 a share. Enbridge and Canadian Pacific’s targets were 54 Canadian dollars and 144 Canadian dollars, respectively....MORE

 *See:
Fracking In England: You Either Love It or Hate It

WARNING: The 'reveal' at the end of the post is disgusting.
Let's just say "Microbial injectate"....

Mr. Icahn also likes the Bakken. From Platts:

Icahn creates new US railcar JV, cites growing oil movements

Today in the Financial Crisis, Thursday September 25, 2008: The Government Seizes the Country's Largest Savings & Loan

From the Los Angeles Times:
WaMu free checking -- give or take $5

Washington Mutual Inc., which has made free checking a cornerstone of its marketing campaign, is about to start imposing a $5 fee on noncustomers who come into a branch and cash a check drawn on a WaMu personal account....

Toyota to unveil natural gas Camry
Stocks end mixed as investors await bailout
Chrome is new but not so shiny
Remixed MySpace Music tries to catch the beat again
McCain's image as reformer takes a hit
Obama sounds populist tone

After declining 553 points in three days the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 196.89
What we were posting:
4:18 a.m.
GE (GE) Cuts Guidance, Its Credibility Destroyed

 GE (GE) was one of the last men standing in corporate America. The company said the credit issues facing the economy would not damage GE Financial. The conglomerate indicated that it could make its way through the downturn.
No one lied, but a lot of people at GE must have miscalculated....

4:53 a.m.
Faber Says U.S. $700 Billion Rescue Plan Isn't Enough (But Stocks to Rally 14% after Passage)
5:53 a.m.
Bailout will encourage stupid acts by big firms, says Wilbur Ross (AGO)
5:08 a.m.
Washington Mutual seeking private equity takeover - WSJ (WM)
7:59 a.m.
The Great Deleveraging (and what it means)

 Deleveraging is Deflationary. Ignore the talk of any immediate Inflationary effect. That comes later. Anyone telling you to buy gold now is a fool, a liar, a knave or a nut. The time for AU will come but it is most assuredly not now....

10:49 a.m.
House Speaker Pelosi reassures market on rescue plan
12:36 p.m.
FDIC May Need $150 Billion Bailout as Local Bank Failures Mount
12:56 p.m.
What would Jesus short?

The Church of England was accused by a think-tank today of using short-selling tactics to maximise profit on its £5 billion investments....

2:51 p.m.
Oil Deals (not) for the Geographically Challenged

In a move aimed at fueling China's insatiable appetite for energy assets, China's Sinopec group has agreed to acquire Tanganyika Oil Co., a Canadian company producing oil in Syria, for C$1.9 billion ($1.8 billion)....

6:23 p.m.
J.P. Morgan to buy WaMu's operations: report (WM)
6:30 p.m.
Report: U.S. seizes Washington Mutual (WM)
6:38 p.m.
The Wall Street Journal's Early Reporting on the Seizure and Sale of Washington Mutual (WM)
6:46 p.m.
Rescue Plan Talks Set Back by Republican Alternative (Update4)
7:05 p.m.
Progress unravels on mortgage-relief plan
7:13 p.m.
Replay of JP Morgan/ Washington Mutual Conference Call Available (JPM; WM)
7:16 p.m.
FDIC: Bank Acquisition Information (Washington Mutual)
7:21 p.m.
FDIC on Washington Mutual (JPM; WM)
7:32 p.m.
Asian Stocks Fall, US Futures Down; Bailout Plan Worries

You Thought the Rio Tinto Red Diamonds Were Baubles, You Dismissed the 118 Carat 'Perfect' Being Auctioned Tomorrow as Crass, Perhaps Monsieur et Madame Would be Interested In...

...The Pink Star

From Bloomberg:
Sotheby’s to Auction $60 Million Pink Diamond in Geneva

A 59.60-carat pink diamond is estimated to raise more than $60 million, a record for any gemstone at auction, when it is sold in Switzerland in November.

The oval-cut stone, the largest internally flawless fancy vivid pink diamond ever graded by the Gemological Institute of America (GIA), will be sold by Sotheby’s (BID) in Geneva on Nov. 13, the New York-based auction house said today in a statement.

The sale of the ``Pink Star” will follow a Sotheby’s auction in Hong Kong in October containing a white and a blue diamond valued at more than $28 million and $19 million each.

“This is a good time to sell important stones at auction,” the Karlsruhe-based jewelry dealer Otto Jakob said in an interview. “Wealthy people with a lot of cash fear their money is endangered. They’re putting it into goods."...MORE

Previously:
Rio Tinto's Extremely Rare Red Diamonds (RIO)

Carbon: "Perfect" Rock Expected to Fetch $35 Million At Auction

Oil--EIA Analysis: Unexpected Jump in Crude Supplies

Ya think?
WTI $102.54 down 59 cents Brent $108.36 down $0.28
There is an awful lot of the stuff sloshing around.
From Platts:
Analysis of U.S. EIA data: U.S. crude oil stocks rose 2.64 million barrels last week

U.S. commercial crude oil stocks rose an unexpected 2.64 million barrels to 358.26 million barrels the week ended September 20 on lower refinery runs and higher imports, U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) data showed Wednesday.

A Platts analysis and survey of oil analysts Monday showed crude oil stocks had been expected to fall 1.5 million barrels for the reporting week ended September 20.

The build was predominantly in the U.S. Gulf Coast (USGC), where stocks rose 2.6 million barrels to 179.91 million barrels.

Crude oil runs at USGC refineries plummeted 400,000 barrels per day (b/d) to 8.07 million b/d during the week ended September 20, EIA data showed. Platts data shows Phillips 66's 239,000 b/d Lake Charles refinery in Westlake, Louisiana, had begun planned maintenance on a crude oil distillation unit as of September 18.

ExxonMobil's 502,500 b/d refinery in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, started planned maintenance September 15 to upgrade a furnace at one of the facility's crude oil units and to replace two diesel hydrotreaters.

Unplanned work on at Delek's 60,000 b/d Tyler, Texas, refinery took a fluid catalytic cracker out of service for a period of time during the week ended September 20, with flaring associated with the work lasting around seven hours during the night of September 19.

A 502,000 b/d jump in USGC crude oil imports – which rose to 3.97 million b/d – also supported a build in crude oil stocks. Total U.S. imports rose 347,000 b/d to 7.93 million b/d, outpacing domestic production, which fell 50,000 b/d to 7.78 million b/d during the week ended September 20...MUCH MORE

Yesterday:
"What an Iranian olive branch could mean for oil" (Kaminska wins)

Graphic Web: Ex-Goldman Personnel Connections With the Fed, Bank of England, Bank of Canada, Bank of Japan and the European Central Bank.

From Muckety:

As the map demonstrates, Goldman personnel, past and present, have ties not only to the Fed but to other central banks, including the Bank of England, the Bank of Canada, the Bank of Japan and European Central Bank. (Solid lines in the map represent current connections; dotted lines are former. Roll your mouse over connecting lines to see relationships.)

Former World Bank President Robert Zoellick was a vice chairman of Goldman, as was Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank.

In the years since the financial crisis, the company has shown a special interest in central bank economists.

Andrew Benito, senior European economist for Goldman, left the Bank of England to join the company. Naohiko Baba, who headed of financial systems analysis at the Bank of Japan, is now the firm’s chief economist for Japan. Huw Pill, former deputy director general of research at the European Central Bank, is now chief European economist at Goldman.

Today in Robotics: Stryker Buys RoboDoc, Mako Surgical Up 82% (MAKO; SYK)

From Reuters:
Stryker buys Mako Surgical to gain robot surgery skills

Medical device maker Stryker Corp (SYK.N) will buy smaller peer Mako Surgical Corp (MAKO.O) for about $1.65 billion to gain access to Mako's technology for robot-assisted orthopedic surgery.

Mako shares jumped 83 percent at $29.57 in morning trade, just shy of the offer price Of $30 per share.
Analysts said that while the premium was hefty, the deal can give Stryker a competitive advantage over rival makers of orthopedic implants and may trigger a wave of takeovers in the medical technology companies.

Mako, founded in 2004, makes orthopedic surgical systems and knee and hip implants for treating early to mid-stage osteoarthritis. Its Rio surgical system includes a robotic arm that helps surgeons with precise insertion of implants....MORE

We have a total of one comment on MAKO on the blog, 2012's "The Doctor's Robot Will See You Now (IRBT)":

I've mentioned I played Devils Advocate when a partner pitched Intuitive Surgical. I was overruled and ISRG went from $15 to a bit over $300. It's trading around $500 now.
Another medical-robotics company we've looked at but not mentioned on the blog is MAKO Surgical.
It has had a couple waterfall declines in the last few months...

...The  departure of a director and the VP of sales and a slowdown in the company's growth were blamed..
Not a fun ride but maybe it smooths out ....

Real insightful huh. The stock closed that day at $13.15.
I'm starting to think there may be something to this medical robot stuff.
In my defense, here's the 2-year chart:

Yahoo Finance
Not much of a defense, I know, but it's all I've got.

UPDATED--What traders shouldn't say over the phone or email, via the CFTC

Update below.
Original post:
From the Commodity Futures Trading Commission:

Examples of Misconduct From Written Communications

Examples of ICAP Yen brokers’ Belief of their Influence on the Yen Market 

and the Yen LIBOR Fixings:

“[Cash Broker 1] has been doing a number on some of the contributors because 

a couple of them were edging their libors slightly lower yesterday before he intervened;”

“i hope that 6m libor has got me back in your good books!! 

used all my powers of persuasion on that one;) ... think 

[Bank A and Bank B] must have looked at [Cash Broker A's] 

first suggestion . . . . they both moved up 11bps to 1.10”

“[Cash Broker 1]

sending out higher than he thinks so hopefuly 

the sheep will just copy”

...MANY MORE

HT: Counterparties

UPDATE-- Joseph Cotterill at Alphaville has more:

No more Mr Libor

MacArthur foundation Announces 2013 'Genius' Grants

From the MacArthur Foundation:

Meet the 2013 MacArthur Fellows

More to come, it's meeting time right now.
Previously:
MacArthur Fellowship $625K Grants to Be Announced September 25, Are You on the List? Do You Want to Be Next Year?