Today's action is precisely what was referenced in yesterday's post.
There's absolutely no telling where or when the market (forget individual stocks, that's another story) is going to move. At the close yesterday was a vast selloff, normally indicating trouble ahead, but, if you sold at the close yesterday, you were shut out this morning unless you wanted back in at a much higher price because the market gapped up tremendously at the open and stayed right up there for the remainder of the session, closing just about where it opened.
This kind of activity may be meaningless to the casual investor, but it's death to day-traders, options players and short-term speculators unless you're on the inside and know the game plan. It's all pre-arranged, pre-planned and if you're not on the short list, you're, well... screwed. Royally. On. A. Big. Stick.
Just look at what happened to JC Penny yesterday. Entering the close of trading, word goes out that CIT has cut their lines of credit and the stock gets hit for about 10% in just a five-minute span, right before the close.
Word has it that Goldman Sachs (yeah, those guys) had recently arranged financing for the troubled retail chain, to the tune of about $2.25 billion, with JCP putting up its real estate - which is extensive - as collateral. So, when word comes that CIT has pulled their lines of credit, hastening the path to bankruptcy court, one can assume that the great Lloyd Blankfein and the criminal John Thain (CEO of CIT, formerly of BOfA's Merrill Lynch and before that, head of the NY stock exchange) must have had lunch at some point over the past few months and arranged the untidy undoing of JC Penny.
Today, via the same source, the NY Post, comes word that the CIT story was a complete fabrication and that JC Penny is still receiving shipments and has ample cash on hand.
Either way this plays out, true story or not, per CIT, somebody lost a lot of money yesterday, and, somebody made a bunch today as the stock recovered most of the losses.
Best guess is that Thain and Blankfein and their firms (or their off-shore accounts) were the main beneficiaries of this bit of dis-or-mis-information. How anybody can trade in this environment is a question for the ages or sages. It's a sick-o world out there in the land of high-finance.
Tomorrow's non-farm payroll report comes out at 8:30 am EDT, prior to the opening bell. As we used to say in high school, BFD. Look it up.
Dow 15,628.02, +128.48 (0.83%)
NASDAQ 3,675.74, +49.37 (1.36%)
S&P 500 1,706.87, +21.14 (1.25%)
NYSE Composite 9,673.39, +114.56 (1.20%)
NASDAQ Volume 1,835,171,500
NYSE Volume 4,175,730,750
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ Advance - Decline: 4375-2251
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ New highs - New lows: 698-89
WTI crude oil: 107.89, +2.86
Gold: 1,311.20, -1.80
Silver: 19.62, -0.004
Showing posts with label CIT. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CIT. Show all posts
Thursday, August 1, 2013
Monday, February 8, 2010
Thain at CIT; Stocks in a Funk
Obviously, John Thain is a hired henchman of the crime syndicate responsible for the financial meltdown of 2008, and all the associated scandals, including TARP, that were ancillary and antecedent to that event.
Why do I make such an overt claim, and just who is John Thain?
Well, John Thain has been around the Wall Street crime syndicate long enough to have attained a position of some authority within that circle. According to this article, Thain was the last chairman and chief executive officer of Merrill Lynch before its merger with Bank of America. Thain managed to get $29 per share ($50 billion) for Merrill, a 70% premium over its market price. Ken Lewis, then CEO of Bank of America, is currently under investigation by the NY State Attorney General, Andrew Cuomo.
Prior to being at Merrill, Thain was president of the NYSE, from 2004 through 2007, meaning he oversaw much of the wheeling and dealing on the exchange and also turned a blind eye to the criminal practices of Bernard Madoff. Prior to that, Thain was at Goldman Sachs, as head of the mortgage desk from 1985 to 1990, and president and co-COO from 1999 to 2004.
Given his history, it's surprising that Thain isn't Secretary of the Treasury or head of one of the regional Federal Reserves, but that's probably because John Thain is basically a bag man. He hides money for his friends. So, what better place for him to resurface after his sudden departure from Merrill Lynch (after he helped inflate its value and 11 top brokers fled to London) in January 2009, than at the beleaguered commercial lender, CIT.
Today, Thain was named CEO of CIT, apparently because CIT's bankruptcy has not worked out to full advantage for the syndicate. Thain will make sure that taxpayers are screwed some more, as one would suppose that stealing $2.3 billion, via TARP would be considered small peanuts in his circles.
With Thain at CIT, one should expect all manner of nastiness, including, but not limited to, falsified accounting, seizure of assets, pleas to the federal government for more bailout money and other not-so-niceties. If John Thain is running a company, one can only expect what he's always provided: fraud, falsity, obfuscation of facts, missing money, missing documents and generally, another round of financial panic.
You have been duly warned. With his track record or greed (he's one of the highest paid on Wall St.) and reputation (a lot of people will speak highly of him in public, because crossing him or the people he's associated with could be harmful to one's health - financial and otherwise) Thain should not be trusted. In any case, having him at CIT virtually assures that financial stocks will be hammered and the economy will suffer through a reprise of the fall of 2008.
With that as background, stocks, led by, you guessed it, large banks, generally fell, putting to rest any notion that Friday's 180-point "turnaround" was anything other than intervention by the PPT (Thain's buddies). It's been 18 months since the breakdown of finance, and since nothing's been done to fix the system - though the bankers and various federal government officials will tell you that MUCH has been done - the usual crowd is back for another round of feeding at investor and taxpayer expense.
Their greed knows no bounds. Not content with breaking the global financial system, they're committed to plunging much of the world - particularly the rich United States of America - into a financial holocaust. Naturally, none of the widespread carnage will affect any of them; they will be above the fray, sitting like vultures with cash in hand to buy up distressed assets at bargain-basement prices. Their true goal is to incite anarchy and revolt, and they're doing a nice job of it thus far. Don't think for a moment that Sarah Palin addressing the Tea Party Convention this weekend was an accident. If the American public is too squeamish to foment revolution, they've got Palin, the absolute perfect Manchurian Candidate, to push us over the edge.
Already, the Tea Parties, originally an amalgamation of loosely-aligned local groups opposed to bank bailouts and financial fraud, have devolved into right-wing bravado-fests, complete with guns, anti-government (and anti-democrat) signs and the tacit support of the the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and FOX News.
It's a two-pronged attack on liberty and rights, using politics and money to separate middle-class people from theirs. The ultimate goal is a state of neo-anarchy and martial law in America, and they're well on their way.
Dow 9,908.39, -103.84 (1.04%)
NASDAQ 2,126.05, -15.07 (0.70%)
S&P 500 1,066.18, -0.01 (0.00%)
NYSE Composite 6,713.87, -68.88 (1.02%)
Advancing issues were trampled upon by decliners, 4120-2442. New highs actually eked out a slight edge over new lows, 86-73, but volume was light, since all the big money already exited on Friday.
NYSE Volume 4,913,621,000
NASDAQ Volume 2,059,284,875
Commodities staged a little bit of a comeback. Oil, gold and silver all finished their trading sessions slightly higher.
The repugnant conditions which prevail in America today have long ceased being casual conspiracy banter or any kind of laughing matter. Lawlessness prevails. Rules, if there are any, are made up on the fly, to suit those who seek to break them. More than just your money is at risk. Beware.
Why do I make such an overt claim, and just who is John Thain?
Well, John Thain has been around the Wall Street crime syndicate long enough to have attained a position of some authority within that circle. According to this article, Thain was the last chairman and chief executive officer of Merrill Lynch before its merger with Bank of America. Thain managed to get $29 per share ($50 billion) for Merrill, a 70% premium over its market price. Ken Lewis, then CEO of Bank of America, is currently under investigation by the NY State Attorney General, Andrew Cuomo.
Prior to being at Merrill, Thain was president of the NYSE, from 2004 through 2007, meaning he oversaw much of the wheeling and dealing on the exchange and also turned a blind eye to the criminal practices of Bernard Madoff. Prior to that, Thain was at Goldman Sachs, as head of the mortgage desk from 1985 to 1990, and president and co-COO from 1999 to 2004.
Given his history, it's surprising that Thain isn't Secretary of the Treasury or head of one of the regional Federal Reserves, but that's probably because John Thain is basically a bag man. He hides money for his friends. So, what better place for him to resurface after his sudden departure from Merrill Lynch (after he helped inflate its value and 11 top brokers fled to London) in January 2009, than at the beleaguered commercial lender, CIT.
Today, Thain was named CEO of CIT, apparently because CIT's bankruptcy has not worked out to full advantage for the syndicate. Thain will make sure that taxpayers are screwed some more, as one would suppose that stealing $2.3 billion, via TARP would be considered small peanuts in his circles.
With Thain at CIT, one should expect all manner of nastiness, including, but not limited to, falsified accounting, seizure of assets, pleas to the federal government for more bailout money and other not-so-niceties. If John Thain is running a company, one can only expect what he's always provided: fraud, falsity, obfuscation of facts, missing money, missing documents and generally, another round of financial panic.
You have been duly warned. With his track record or greed (he's one of the highest paid on Wall St.) and reputation (a lot of people will speak highly of him in public, because crossing him or the people he's associated with could be harmful to one's health - financial and otherwise) Thain should not be trusted. In any case, having him at CIT virtually assures that financial stocks will be hammered and the economy will suffer through a reprise of the fall of 2008.
With that as background, stocks, led by, you guessed it, large banks, generally fell, putting to rest any notion that Friday's 180-point "turnaround" was anything other than intervention by the PPT (Thain's buddies). It's been 18 months since the breakdown of finance, and since nothing's been done to fix the system - though the bankers and various federal government officials will tell you that MUCH has been done - the usual crowd is back for another round of feeding at investor and taxpayer expense.
Their greed knows no bounds. Not content with breaking the global financial system, they're committed to plunging much of the world - particularly the rich United States of America - into a financial holocaust. Naturally, none of the widespread carnage will affect any of them; they will be above the fray, sitting like vultures with cash in hand to buy up distressed assets at bargain-basement prices. Their true goal is to incite anarchy and revolt, and they're doing a nice job of it thus far. Don't think for a moment that Sarah Palin addressing the Tea Party Convention this weekend was an accident. If the American public is too squeamish to foment revolution, they've got Palin, the absolute perfect Manchurian Candidate, to push us over the edge.
Already, the Tea Parties, originally an amalgamation of loosely-aligned local groups opposed to bank bailouts and financial fraud, have devolved into right-wing bravado-fests, complete with guns, anti-government (and anti-democrat) signs and the tacit support of the the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and FOX News.
It's a two-pronged attack on liberty and rights, using politics and money to separate middle-class people from theirs. The ultimate goal is a state of neo-anarchy and martial law in America, and they're well on their way.
Dow 9,908.39, -103.84 (1.04%)
NASDAQ 2,126.05, -15.07 (0.70%)
S&P 500 1,066.18, -0.01 (0.00%)
NYSE Composite 6,713.87, -68.88 (1.02%)
Advancing issues were trampled upon by decliners, 4120-2442. New highs actually eked out a slight edge over new lows, 86-73, but volume was light, since all the big money already exited on Friday.
NYSE Volume 4,913,621,000
NASDAQ Volume 2,059,284,875
Commodities staged a little bit of a comeback. Oil, gold and silver all finished their trading sessions slightly higher.
The repugnant conditions which prevail in America today have long ceased being casual conspiracy banter or any kind of laughing matter. Lawlessness prevails. Rules, if there are any, are made up on the fly, to suit those who seek to break them. More than just your money is at risk. Beware.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Markets Pare Gains on Profit Weakness
Earnings continued to roll out on Wednesday, with the following highlighting a heavy day of releases:
Most of the big names offered disappointing results, and it took a toll on the overall market.
Dow 13,918.22 -53.33; NASDAQ 2,699.49 -12.80; S&P 500 1,546.17 -3.20; NYSE Composite 10,148.28 -22.08
The results thus far for companies reporting 2nd-quarter earnings have been mixed with some major misses, not a positive trend for a market that's just made new highs. Add to the sour mood of today, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke's remarks that the sub-prime lending ordeal is likely to worsen, though the US economy is in good overall shape. He has his doubters, however, and signs of a significant slowdown are everywhere.
Today's trade was also somewhat deceptive. All of the indices were down more than twice their closing losses. Some serious tape-painting occurred in the last hour of trading.
Declining issues once again overwhelmed advancers, by nearly a 2-1 margin. New lows surpassed new highs for the first time in weeks, 375-229. This is a definite sell signal that's been building for weeks.
Oil continued to weigh on the market as well, with the price of crude for August delivery gaining another $1.03 on the NY Merc, to close at $75.03.
Gold moved up to $673.70, a gain of $7.80, while silver added 27 cents to close out at 13.29. There's a growing number of commodity specialists who believe the precious metals are due for another run-up on inflation concerns, though both are near historic highs and have been stuck in trenches for more than 18 months.
There may have been consolidation in these commodities as positions have been unraveled, though most of the speculators are calling for doubling or even tripling in price over the next 2-3 years. Those predictions have been around for years, and, following the movements of the metals, they are highly cyclical and they seem to be on the downside of their most recent bullish cycle.
On the other hand, the gold cycle is very long, and neither gold nor silver has yet to show signs of breaking the long term uptrend. With inflation running rampant, they are not the worst investments, but stocks have performed much better over the last year and a half. These should be only held in large quantity if the potential for a complete market crash is high, and that's certainly not the case at present.
Watch out for the remainder of this week. Any more profit disappointments may just cause outright flight from equities for the summer.
- CIT Group (CIT): Second-quarter loss after paying preferred dividends of $134.5 million, of 70 cents per share was reported, compared with a profit of $236 million, or $1.16 per share, in the year-ago period. The results include a charge of $495.3 million, or $2.58 per share, from the planned exit of its home lending business, making CIT yet another casualty of the subprime mortgage industry implosion. Analysts expected 1.35. The stock dropped 6.26 (11.29%) on the news.
- eBay (EBAY): Reported earnings of $375.8 million, or 27 cents per share, compared with earnings of $250 million, or 17 cents a share, for the same period last year. Analysts expected 0.32
- Gannett (GCI): Excluding a $73.8 million gain from the sale of several newspapers and earnings from discontinued operations in both periods, Gannett earned $289.9 million from continuing operations in the quarter, down 4.8 percent from $304.5 million in the same period a year earlier. Per-share earnings on the same basis came in at $1.24 versus $1.28 in the same period a year ago. Analysts expected 1.21
- Pfizer (PFE): Excluding items, adjusted profit fell 20 percent to $2.94 billion, or 42 cents per share, from $3.66 billion, or 50 cents per share, a year ago. Analysts expected 0.50
- Piper Jaffray (PJC): Second-quarter net income was $9.3 million, or 52 cents per share, compared with earnings of $4.1 million, or 21 cents per share, in the second quarter of 2006. Analysts expected 0.74. Shares were off 3.69 (6.72%).
- Southwest Airlines (LUV): Earned $278 million, or 36 cents per share in the April-June quarter, compared with $333 million, or 40 cents per share, a year earlier. After adjusting for fuel-hedging transactions, Southwest said it would have earned 25 cents per share. Analysts expected 0.22
- United Technologies (UTX): Earnings per share for the quarter that ended June 30 were $1.16. Analysts expected 1.15
Most of the big names offered disappointing results, and it took a toll on the overall market.
Dow 13,918.22 -53.33; NASDAQ 2,699.49 -12.80; S&P 500 1,546.17 -3.20; NYSE Composite 10,148.28 -22.08
The results thus far for companies reporting 2nd-quarter earnings have been mixed with some major misses, not a positive trend for a market that's just made new highs. Add to the sour mood of today, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke's remarks that the sub-prime lending ordeal is likely to worsen, though the US economy is in good overall shape. He has his doubters, however, and signs of a significant slowdown are everywhere.
Today's trade was also somewhat deceptive. All of the indices were down more than twice their closing losses. Some serious tape-painting occurred in the last hour of trading.
Declining issues once again overwhelmed advancers, by nearly a 2-1 margin. New lows surpassed new highs for the first time in weeks, 375-229. This is a definite sell signal that's been building for weeks.
Oil continued to weigh on the market as well, with the price of crude for August delivery gaining another $1.03 on the NY Merc, to close at $75.03.
Gold moved up to $673.70, a gain of $7.80, while silver added 27 cents to close out at 13.29. There's a growing number of commodity specialists who believe the precious metals are due for another run-up on inflation concerns, though both are near historic highs and have been stuck in trenches for more than 18 months.
There may have been consolidation in these commodities as positions have been unraveled, though most of the speculators are calling for doubling or even tripling in price over the next 2-3 years. Those predictions have been around for years, and, following the movements of the metals, they are highly cyclical and they seem to be on the downside of their most recent bullish cycle.
On the other hand, the gold cycle is very long, and neither gold nor silver has yet to show signs of breaking the long term uptrend. With inflation running rampant, they are not the worst investments, but stocks have performed much better over the last year and a half. These should be only held in large quantity if the potential for a complete market crash is high, and that's certainly not the case at present.
Watch out for the remainder of this week. Any more profit disappointments may just cause outright flight from equities for the summer.
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