Tuesday, August 23, 2011
DOG DAYS
It was just top pretty a day yesterday to be inside writing. Besides, I had nothing to write about. Today isn't so hot, but I still have nothing to write about except that the stock market was WAAAAAY up based on, whay I can see, is speculation that Granddad Bernake will announce early Christmas presents to allon Friday in his highly touted speech WAAAAAY out west. Jackson Hole must be like Davos: a bunch of important and self-importnt people preening, walking about and smiling at one another, accomplishing nothing but convinced that the world is a better place for them having been there. They spend an enormous amount of other peoples' money as well. Sorry, but it makes me a bit ill.
My bet is that the Street is going to be disappointed because while this is no question that the Chairman wants to do something, down deep he must realize that there is very little he can accomplish other than to keep the stock market happy on what has been an entirely liquidity-driven run. Ok, profits have been good...great in some cases...but a lot of that comes from international operations and currencies because as the Philly Fed numbers showed last week there aint much goin on here. There is of course the problem that if he does not institute or hint at QE III or something like it, the market will tank, so I feel kind of sorry for the poor guy as he finds himself in a bit of a box, albeit one of his own making and that of his predecessors in that we have become used to seeing (or expecting) the Fed to pull rabbits out of a hat to cure our financial woes. 'Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished but not this time I'm afraid. We're at about the last page of the legerdemain volume.
Silence still in Euroland even as Frau Merkel and all around her keep telling the world that Germany has done just about all its going to do. August. Gotta be the reason. The ECB keeps buying everything in sight and will continue to do so. Even the banks were quiet today with share prices up generally across the board. I must admit it keeps me up nights. Am I wrong and there's nothing but clear sailing ahead or are we just in the very large eye of a very large storm? I hope I am wrong but I just can't see it. In the meantime it's raining cats and dogs and I have nothing new to write about. I have made a promise to myself not to comment on the Bank of America but I may have to break it over the next few days otherwise it's a shift to advice to the love-lorne. Don't know much about that either. These really are the dog days.
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From Der Speigel
ReplyDeleteMerkel Seeks to Forestall a Conservative Revolt
Chancellor Angela Merkel will meet conservative parliamentarians on Tuesday evening to try to allay their concerns about her management of the euro crisis. Many are unhappy about the EU deal to increase the scope of the bailout fund -- and are dissatisfied with Merkel's leadership style.
Many in Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative Christian Democratic Union party are unhappy about Germany's growing commitment to euro bailout packages and fear that the nation is being locked into a "transfer union" in which German taxpayers will end up bankrolling high-debt nations that got themselves into trouble through their own profligacy.
The dissatisfaction is dangerous for the chancellor because it could put her parliamentary majority at risk in a crucial September vote on the July 21 agreement by euro zone leaders to widen the scope of the €440 billion ($637 billion) euro rescue fund.
...
If coalition rebels were to deprive Merkel of her own parliamentary majority in the vote, due to take place in late September, it would be a massive political blow that may force her to call an early election.
Merkel plans to regain the confidence of her party with a series of regional conferences, congresses and election campaign appearances in the run-up to two state votes, in Mecklenburg Western-Pomerania on Sept. 4 and in the city-state of Berlin on Sept 18.
Her party has been hit by regional election defeats in Hamburg and, more significantly, in the core CDU bastion of Baden-Württemberg this year.
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Opinion pollsters say the CDU is haemorrhaging core voters. According to the Electoral Research Group, a polling institute, one million elderly conservative supporters of the CDU and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union, died between the general elections of 2005 and 2009 -- and the party isn't attracting enough new supporters to make up for the loss.
At present, the conservatives' support remains stable at between 32 and 34 percent, similar to the result they achieved in the 2009 election.
But that is largely due to voters from the pro-business FDP, the ailing junior partner in Merkel's coalition, switching over to the CDU. If those disgruntled FDP voters are taken out of the equation, conservative support stands at just 28.5 percent.
SPIEGEL