Are U.S. Stocks Tracking Asian Markets?

September 30, 2011

USA Today

By: Matt Krantz

Q: Have U.S. markets been following Asian markets lately, or the other way around?

A: If you want evidence of the global economy, you can see it on a stock chart. U.S. and Asian markets are increasingly tied at the hip.

Your question is an excellent one. Giving a full and complete answer could be the topic for a doctoral dissertation, and perhaps it already is one. There’s been some work done in the area, if you’d like more details you can check out a study on interlinked global markets.

But for just a quick-and-dirty analysis, investors can put exchange-traded funds that track Asian and U.S. stocks on the same stock-price chart to see how the two interact with each other.

There are many ways to do this comparison, but I’m comparing the iShares S&P Asia 50 Index fund (AIA) with the Standard & Poor’s 500 ETF. The iShares S&P Asia 50 Index fund contains a broad mix of large Asian shares, primarily from South Korea, China, Taiwan and Hong Kong.

You can use USATODAY.com’s free stock charting tools to do the comparison. Type in AIA in the Get a Quote box at money.usatoday.com to get the snapshot of iShares S&P Asia 50 Index fund. Select the Charts tab and below the graph in the Symbol Compare box enter SPY and Update Chart.

The first thing you’ll notice is that the two ETFs have moved very similarly within the past year. This is consistent with academic research indicating that markets of different countries are increasingly moving in lockstep with each other.

However, there are two important other things to note from the chart. First, notice how the Asian stock ETF was first to top out and start to decline in February 2011, and how U.S. stocks followed that decline.
The Asian stock ETF, meanwhile, is more volatile than the U.S. ETF. The ups and downs are more extreme and violent.

So it would appear Asian stocks and U.S. stocks, at least recently and using these two indexes, are somewhat closely related. But the Asian stocks tended to be the first to crack earlier this year and continue to deserve their reputation as being more volatile.

Click here for the full report from USA Today

Dow Plunges 500 Points

August 5th, 2011

DailyFinance

By: AP

Fears about the global economy led to the biggest panic in financial markets since the 2008 financial crisis. The Dow plunged nearly 513 points Thursday, its biggest point decline since Oct. 22, 2008. Only three of the 500 stocks in the Standard & Poor’s 500 index had gains. Oil fell by 6 percent. The yield on the two-year Treasury note hit a record low as investors sought out relatively stable investments.

All three major stock indexes are down 10 percent or more from their previous highs, a drop-off that is considered to be a market correction. A drop of 20 percent or more signifies the start of a bear market, an extended period of stock declines.

Investors are increasingly concerned about the possibility of another recession in the U.S. and a debt crisis in Europe.

“We are continuing to be bombarded by worries about the global economy,” said Bill Stone, chief investment strategist at PNC Financial.

The Vix, a measure of investor fear, shot up 36 percent. It is up 92.6 percent for the quarter, which began July 1.

The Dow Jones industrial average was down 512.61 points, or 4.3 percent, to 11,11,383.61. Thursday’s losses turned the blue-chip stock index negative for the year.

The S&P 500 – the benchmark for most mutual funds – lost 60.20, or 4.8 percent, to 1,200.14. It is now down 12 percent from its recent high of 1,363 reached on April 29. The Nasdaq composite shed 136.68, or 5.1 percent, to 2,556.39.

Oil dipped to $87 a barrel on worries demand will fall because of the slowing economy. It had traded over $100 as recently as June 9.

Nearly 20 stocks fell for every one that rose on the New York Stock Exchange.

European stocks also fell broadly because of concerns that Italy or Spain may need help from the European Union. The benchmark stock indexes in Italy, Germany and England each fell 3 percent.

Stock trading has been volatile this week because of concerns that the U.S. economy is weakening. Manufacturing, consumer spending and hiring by private companies are below levels that are consistent with a healthy economy. Those reports have called into question estimates from economists, including Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, that the economy will grow more quickly in the second half of the year.

Money poured into investments that are seen as relatively safe when markets are turbulent. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 2.42 percent, its lowest level of the year. The yield on the 2-year Treasury note hit a record low of 0.26 percent. Bond yields fall when demand for them increases.

Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist for Janney Montgomery Scott, an investment firm in Philadelphia, said some clients are moving to cash “as a parking lot to sort things out.”

“With the scars of 2008 still fresh, some clients don’t want to miss the chance to pre-empt further damage should it come,” Luschini said.

Large investors have moved so much money into cash accounts at Bank of New York that on Thursday the bank said it would begin charging some clients a 0.13 percent fee to hold their cash.

“In the past month, we have seen a growing level of deposits on our balance sheet from clients seeking a safe-haven in light of the global interest rate and credit environment,” the bank said in a statement to The Associated Press. Bank of New York clients include pension funds and large investment houses.

“Investors are deciding that now is the time to take risk off the table,” said Brian Gendreau, market strategist for Cetera Financial Group. Gendreau said that some investors are now wondering whether stocks will have a prolonged slump similar to the aftermath of the Great Depression.

Technical trading, a term used to signify buying or selling based on the S&P 500′s prior highs and lows, also helped push stocks downward. The S&P 500 fell below 1,222, a so-called support level, early in the day. That signified to some traders that the stock market would continue to slide.

“Traders are respecting the technical levels even if they’re not technicians,” said Quincy Krosby, market strategist at Prudential Financial. “Even if you’re what we call a conviction buyer, you have to respect those levels.”

Companies that outperform when the global economy expands fell the most. Alcoa fell the most, with a 9 percent drop. Bank of America and Caterpillar were down 7 percent. Boeing ended down 6 percent.

Some traders are selling ahead of Friday’s employment report, which is expected to show that unemployment remained at 9.2 percent last month. A rise in the unemployment number would likely push stocks lower again.

The U.S. government said before the market opened that the number of people who applied for unemployment benefits for the first time was only slightly lower last week to 400,000. That’s still above the 375,000 level that economist say indicates a healthy job market. It was the latest indication of weakness in the U.S. economy.

All 10 industry groups in the S&P index fell. Energy, materials and industrial companies each lost 5 percent or more.

The sell-off comes at a time when corporate profits are growing. The forward price to earnings ratio of the S&P 500 has fallen to about 12, well below its long-term average of 16. That means that investors who buy now are paying less for each dollar in profits.

Based on what an investor now pays for corporate profits, stocks are now trading at their lowest levels in 20 years, said Tim Courtney, chief investment officer of Burns Advisory Group in Oklahoma City.

Few companies were spared in the sell-off. Just 3 of the 500 stocks in the S&P 500 moved higher. General Motors Co. fell 4 percent despite beating analyst’s earnings estimates.

The stock market as a whole had its biggest fall since the start of the current bull market in March 2009. The drop in the S&P was the largest since a 45-point decline on January 20, 2009. The Dow is down 1.7 percent for the year. The S&P 500 is down 4.6 percent. And the Nasdaq is down 3.6 percent. The Russell 2000, an index made up of small companies, has fared the worst. It was down 5.6 percent Thursday and is down 7.3 percent for the year.

Click here for the full report from DailyFinance.com

The Scam Behind The Rise In Oil, Food Prices

April 19th, 2011

Al-Jazeera

By: Danny Schecter

The global economy and its recovery, and the living standards of millions of plain folks, are now at risk from the sudden rise in oil and commodity prices.

Gas at the pump is up, and going higher. Food prices are following.

The consequences are catastrophic for the global poor as their costs go up while their income doesn’t. It’s menacing American workers too, who in large part have not seen a meaningful raise since the days of Reagan (keeping it this way is clearly behind the current flurry of attacks on unions).

Already, unrest in the Middle East and many African countries is being blamed for these dramatic increases. It seems as if this threat to global stability is being largely ignored in our media, one that treats the oil business as just another mystical world of free market trading.

Why is it happening? Why all the volatility? Is oil getting scarcer, leading to price increases? Is the cost of food, similarly, a reflection of naturally increasing commodity prices?

Oil speculating

While it’s true that natural disasters and droughts play some role in this unchecked price inflation, it also seems apparent that something else is attracting increasing attention, even if most of our media fails to explore what is a political time bomb, while most political leaders shrug their shoulder and ignore it.

President Obama recently said there is nothing he can do about the hike in oil and food prices.

Critics say the problem is that government and media outlets alike refuse to recognise what’s really going on: unchecked speculation!

Not everyone buys into this suspicion. In fact, it is one of more intense subjects of debate in economics.

Princeton University economist Paul Krugman pooh-poohs the impact of speculation counter-posing the traditional argument that oil prices are set by supply and demand.

The Economist agrees, summing up its views with a pithy phrase, “Speculation does not drive the oil price. Driving does.”

Others, like oil industry analyst Michael Klare of Hampshire College in the US, sees demand outdistancing supply:

Consider the recent rise in the price of oil just a faint and early tremor heralding the oilquake to come. Oil won’t disappear from international markets, but in the coming decades it will never reach the volumes needed to satisfy projected world demand, which means that, sooner rather than later, scarcity will become the dominant market condition.
Usually you hear this debate in scholarly circles or read it in political tracts where orthodox views collide with more alarmist projections about the oil supply “peaking”.

But officials in the Third World don’t see the subject as academic. Reserve Bank of India Governor Duvvuri Subbarao charges that: “Speculative movements in commodity derivative markets are also causing volatility in prices”.

The World Bank has held meetings on the issue, because it is seen as a matter of “utmost urgency”.

“The price of food is a matter of life and death for the very poorest people in the world,” said Tom Arnold, CEO of Concern Worldwide, the international humanitarian agency, ahead of his participation at The Open Forum on Food at World Bank headquarters.

“With many families spending up to 80 per cent of their income on basic foods to survive, even the slightest increase in price can have devastating effects and become a crises for the poorest,” he said.

Journalist Josh Clark argues on the website “How Stuff Works” that much of the oil speculation is rooted in the financial crisis:

The next time you drive to the gas station, only to find prices are still sky high compared to just a few years ago, take notice of the rows of foreclosed houses you’ll pass along the way. They may seem like two parts of a spell of economic bad luck, but high gas prices and home foreclosures are actually very much inter-related. Before most people were even aware there was an economic crisis, investment managers abandoned failing mortgage-backed securities and looked for other lucrative investments. What they settled on was oil futures.

Whistleblowers on oil speculation

The debate within the industry is more subdued, perhaps to avoid a public fight between suppliers and distributors who don’t want to rock the boat.

But some officials like Dan Gilligan, president of the Petroleum Marketers Association, representing 8,000 retail and wholesale suppliers has spoken out.

“Approximately 60 to 70 percent of the oil contracts in the futures markets are now held by speculative entities,” he argues. “Not by companies that need oil, not by the airlines, not by the oil companies. But by investors who profit money from their speculative positions.”

Now, a prominent and popular market analyst is throwing caution to the wind by blowing the whistle on speculators.

Finance expert Phil Davis runs a website and widely read newsletter to monitor stocks and options trades. He’s a professional’s professional, whose grandfather taught him to buy stocks when he was just ten years old.

His website is Phil’s Stock World, and stocks are his world. He’s subtitled the site: “High Finance for Real People.”

He is usually a sober and calm analyst, not known as maverick or dissenter.

When I met Phil the other night, he was on fire, enraged by what he believes is the scam of the century that no one wants to talk about, because so many powerful people armed with legions of lawyers want unquestioning allegiance, and will sue you into silence.

He studies the oil/food issue carefully and has concluded:

It’s a scam folks, it’s nothing but a huge scam and it’s destroying the US economy as well as the entire global economy but no one complains because they are ‘only’ stealing about $1.50 per gallon from each individual person in the industrialised world.
It’s the top 0.01 per cent robbing the next 39.99 per cent – the bottom 60 per cent can’t afford cars anyway (they just starve quietly to death, as food prices climb on fuel costs). If someone breaks into your car and steals a $500 stereo, you go to the police, but if someone charges you an extra $30 every time you fill up your tank 50 times a year ($1,500) you shut up and pay your bill. Great system, right?

Click here for the full report from Al-Jazeera

The Fed Has Painted Itself Into a Corner

February 25th, 2011

DailyFinance.com

By: Charles Hugh Smith

As prices for commodities such as cotton, sugar and grains skyrocket, many financial commentators have been pointing the finger at Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke’s “easy money” policies of zero interest rates (ZIRP) and quantitative easing (QE2) as a major cause.

The Fed intended these two policies to lower long-term interest rates and to nudge investors into riskier assets, thus stimulating growth. At least one part of that strategy is working. By lowering the yields on traditional financial investments such as bonds to near-zero, the Fed has essentially forced trading desks and hedge funds to scour the globe for higher yields.

Many traders and investors have found that higher yield in commodities, which is where speculative money is now flowing in abundance, helping to push up prices. Because the price of wheat, for example, is roughly the same everywhere in a global market, these rapid price increases are destabilizing poorer countries where much of household income is devoted to food.

Charges and Countercharges

Global demand for many commodities is outstripping supply, and that imbalance is a key factor in higher prices around the world. But a global economy awash in low-interest, speculative “hot money” seeking higher yields is further fueling imbalances.

Fed officials have faced pointed criticism from nations such as China and Germany, which see the Fed’s policies as firing up inflation and suppressing the U.S. dollar. Fed Chairman Bernanke has countered these charges by identifying the problem as one of currency valuations. He suggests that other nations should offset rising commodity prices by letting their currencies climb in value.

Bernanke’s protests, however, have a hollow ring: Clearly, skyrocketing commodity prices aren’t just a currency-trade issue. For example, consider this cotton-price chart, which has “gone parabolic.” Can anyone seriously claim that the “solution” to this situation is for China to allow its currency, the yuan, to appreciate? Is the yuan the real cause of wheat and corn both shooting up 80% in 2010?

The reason why Bernanke’s claim is so transparently nonsensical is that commodities are rising everywhere, not just those originating in China. Despite official assurances that inflation in the U.S. is now running at a modest 0.7% annually, by one measure, it’s actually hitting an annual rate of 2.5%. By another, it’s already a white-hot 10.6%.

This chart shows how rising prices are built into the supply chain, with the result being costs of intermediate and crude goods are rising smartly.

Inflation is running hot around the world, not just in China and the U.S. This also suggests that the issue isn’t one that can be resolved with currency adjustments.

Even though inflation appears to be lower in the U.S. than in other major economies, it’s hitting the average U.S. household hard because wages aren’t rising along with prices. Indeed, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, real median household income in 2009 was $49,777, a 5% decline from the 1999 peak of $52,388 (adjusted for inflation).

This is in marked contrast to nations such as China, where workers are gaining substantial raises (21% in Beijing, for example), to counter rapidly rising costs.

Click here for the full report from Daily Finance

Stocks Rise More Than 2% In First Days Of September

September 1, 2010

CNBC

by Abby Schultz

Stocks surged the first trading day of September after a report showed U.S. manufacturing has surprising strength, and after news of strength in the global economy. The markets also shrugged off news of a decline in auto sales.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose more than 240 points. All 30 Dow components were higher, led by Caterpillar [CAT  68.0601  2.9001  (+4.45%)], Bank of America [BAC  13.05  0.59  (+4.74%)], and General Electric [GE  15.01  0.53  (+3.66%)].

The S&P 500 and Nasdaq were also higher. All key S&P 500 sectors rose, led by industrials, energy and consumer discretionary stocks.

The CBOE Volatility Index, widely considered the best gauge of fear in the market, fell more than 6 percent, below 25.

The mood in the market was brighter Wednesday after a glum August, and a day after the Dow eked out a 5 point gain. In a piece of good news, the Institute for Supply Management’s monthly manufacturing index for August came in at 56.3, much better than the expected drop to 52.5 for August. The July reading was 55.5.

Stocks were already higher before the manufacturing report following news of a rebound in Chinese manufacturing. The Chinese data, coupled with positive economic reports out of Australia, India and Germany, confirmed “global demand remains intact,” said Quincy Krosby, market strategist at Prudential Financial.

The market also likely gained support from a first-of-the-month influx of buying, which is typical, Krosby said. The key, she added, will be if Wednesday’s gains are driven by strong volume, unlike what has been seen throughout the summer when volume picked up on the downside and decreased on the upside.

August auto sales at Ford[F  11.624  0.339  (+3%)] fell 7.1 percent year-over-year, more than the 4.1 percent decline expected. Earlier Wednesday, General Motors reported its August sales fell 7 percent year-over-year, the automaker reported Wednesday morning. Analysts expected a drop-off, given that August 2009 saw accelerated sales from the “cash for clunkers” program.

Apple [AAPL  250.8741  7.7741  (+3.2%)] has scheduled a media event at 1 p.m. where it is expected to unveil the newest versions of the iPod, and possibly new features for Apple TV. The Financial Times reports that Sony [SNE  28.84  0.85  (+3.04%)], meanwhile, will launch a new music and video download service designed to challenge Apple, as it holds its own media event in Berlin.

Elsewhere among technology stocks, Amazon.com [AMZN  130.48  5.65  (+4.53%)] is reportedly entering the business of delivering TV over the Internet, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.

In other news, shares of Burger King Holdings [BKC  18.865  2.415  (+14.68%)] spiked after news the fast-food chain is considering a possible sale and has been holding talks with potential buyers, according to reports.

Rivals Jack-in-the-Box [JACK  20.99  0.81  (+4.01%)], Chipotle [CMG  158.051  7.221  (+4.79%)] and Brinker International [EAT  16.5899  0.8399  (+5.33%)] are all higher.

Many retailers surged Wednesday after news that state sales-tax holidays and back-to-school buying boosted sales. The report by SpendingPulse, an information service by MasterCard Advisors, was less optimistic about the future, noting consumers remain cautious.

Abercrombie [ANF  36.2896  1.6896  (+4.88%)], Polo Ralph Lauren [RL  78.51  2.77  (+3.66%)], and Macy’s [M  20.16  0.75  (+3.86%)] were all up significantly.

Shares of Saks [SKS  7.41  -0.49  (-6.2%)], however, were lower a day after the luxury retailer rose more than 14 percent on unconfirmed takoever talk. Meanwhile, JP Morgan downgraded Saks to “neutral.”

Meanwhile, Caterpillar is surging after news it is expanding manufacturing capacity in Brazil. Leading the industrial sector Wednesday is Cummins [CMI  79.80  5.39  (+7.24%)], which is up more than 7 percent. An official with General Electric [GE  15.015  0.535  (+3.69%)], meanwhile, said the conglomerate could spend as much as $30 billion on acquisitions within two to three years. Shares of GE, the parent company of CNBC, were up more than 3 percent.

Among financial stocks, up more than 3 percent as a group, Bank of America rose more than 4 percent after a federal judge approved a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The SEC was concerned with bonuses paid to Merrill Lynch employees before BofA’s purchase of the investment bank in January 2009.

Citigroup [C  3.81  0.101  (+2.72%)] and JP Morgan [JPM  37.29  0.93  (+2.56%)] were also up significantly.

In earnings news, shares of Heinz [HNZ  46.16  -0.08  (-0.17%)] were slightly lower following news the maker of ketchup and Ore-Ida French fries earned more than expected thanks to strong sales in emerging markets. Heinz is expecting to reports earnings of 75 cents a share, better than the 73 cents forecasted by analysts polled by Thomson Reuters.

On the economic front, construction spending, meanwhile, slumped 1.0 percent in July to $805.2 billion, the lowest level in 10 years, the Commerce Department reported. Figures for June were revised to an 0.8 percent fall, instead of the 0.1 percent gain previously reported.

Earlier Wednesday, the Mortgage Bankers Association reported applications for home purchassing and refinancing rose last week amid the lowest interest rates since 1990.

A report from ADP and Macroeconomic Advisors showed the private sector lost 10,000 jobs from July to August largely due to a drop of 40,000 jobs in the goods-producing sector. The news was offset somewhat by a separate report from Challenger, Gray & Christmas showing that planned layoffs hit a 10-year low in the month.

Click here to read the full report

Chavez Says US Weapon Test Caused Haiti Earthquake

January 21,2010

Press TV

Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez Wednesday accused the United States of causing the destruction in Haiti by testing a ‘tectonic weapon’ to induce the catastrophic earthquake that hit the country last week.

President Chavez said the US was “playing God” by testing devices capable of creating eco-type catastrophes, the Spanish newspaper ABC quoted him as saying.

A 7.0-magnitude quake rattled the desperately poor country on January 12, killing an estimated 100,000 to 200,000 people. As Haiti looks to the world for basic sustenance, the authorities say the biggest dangers facing survivors are untreated wounds and rising disease.

Following the quake, appeals for humanitarian aid were responded to globally. However, the nation is struggling with violence and looting as aid is still not enough for the tens of thousands left homeless and injured.

Chavez said the killer earthquake followed a test of “weapon of earthquakes” just offshore from Haiti. He did not elaborate on the source of his claim.

The outspoken leader had earlier accused the US of occupying Haiti “under the guise of the natural disaster.”

At least 11,000 US troops have been dispatched to the country to provide security for aid distribution efforts.

Venezuelan media have reported that the earthquake “may be associated with the project called HAARP, a system that can generate violent and unexpected changes in climate.”

HAARP, the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program, is a study run in Alaska directed at the occasional reconfiguration of the properties of the Earth’s ionosphere to improve satellite communications.

Former US Secretary of Defense William Cohen in 1997 expressed concerned over countries engaging “in eco-type of terrorism whereby they can alter the climate, set off earthquakes, volcanoes remotely through the use of electromagnetic waves.”

Click here to read the full report

All Expenses Paid for 20 Congressmen in Copenhagen

January 12,2009

CBS NEWS

By Sharyl Attkisson

(CBS) Few would argue with the U.S. having a presence at the Copenhagen Climate Summit. But wait until you hear what we found about how many in Congress got all-expense paid trips to Denmark on your dime.

CBS investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson reports that cameras spotted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at the summit. She called the shots on who got to go. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, and embattled Chairman of the Tax Committee Charles Rangel were also there.

They were joined by 17 colleagues: Democrats: Waxman, Miller, Markey, Gordon, Levin, Blumenauer, DeGette, Inslee, Ryan, Butterfield, Cleaver, Giffords, and Republicans: Barton, Upton, Moore Capito, Sullivan, Blackburn and Sensenbrenner.

That’s not the half of it. But finding out more was a bit like trying to get the keys to Ft. Knox. Many referred us to Speaker Pelosi who wouldn’t agree to an interview. Her office said it “will comply with disclosure requirements” but wouldn’t give us cost estimates or even tell us where they all stayed.

Senator Inhofe (R-OK) is one of the few who provided us any detail. He attended the summit on his own for just a few hours, to give an “opposing view.”

“They’re going because it’s the biggest party of the year,” Sen. Inhofe said. “The worst thing that happened there is they ran out of caviar.”

Our investigation found that the congressional delegation was so large, it needed three military jets: two 737′s and a Gulfstream Five — up to 64 passengers — traveling in luxurious comfort.

Add senators and staff, most of whom flew commercial, and we counted at least 101 Congress-related attendees. All for a summit that failed to deliver a global climate deal.

As a perk, some took spouses, since they could snag an open seat on a military jet or share a room at no extra cost to taxpayers. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) was there with her husband. Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) was also there with her husband. Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) took his wife, as did Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI). Congressman Barton — a climate change skeptic — even brought along his daughter.

Until required filings are made in the coming weeks, we can only figure bits and pieces of the cost to you.

# Three military jets at $9,900 per hour – $168,000 just in flight time.
# Dozens flew commercial at up to $2,000 each.
(CBS)

# 321 hotel nights booked – the bulk at Copenhagen’s five-star Marriott.
# Meals add tens of thousands more.

Steve Ellis of Taxpayers for Common Sense, wasn’t against a U.S. presence. But he said, “Every penny counts. Congress should be shaking the couch cushions looking for change, rather than spending cash for everybody to go to Copenhagen.”

Nobody we asked would defend the super-sized Congressional presence on camera. One Democrat said it showed the world the U.S. is serious about climate change.

And all those attendees who went to the summit rather than hooking up by teleconference? They produced enough climate-stunting carbon dioxide to fill 10,000 Olympic swimming pools.

Which means even if Congress didn’t get a global agreement

Click here to read the full report

ClimateGate Crooks Makes Themselves as Victims

December 3, 2009

PrisonPlanet

by Paul Joesph Watson

In a pathetic effort to make the climategate scandal go away, the crooks involved in manipulating data to “hide the decline” in global warming are recasting themselves as the victims of the whole affair, attempting to shift the blame to criminal hackers who stole data, when all the evidence suggests the CRU emails were leaked from the inside.

Of course, the only real criminals are those who were caught fraudulently massaging climate data in order to comply with the United Nations’ agenda for a global carbon tax, a world government and complete takeover of the global economy.

One of the principle climategate suspects, Penn State University meteorology professor Michael Mann, currently under investigation by his own university in what will probably amount to little more than a whitewash, tries to absolve himself by claiming he and his colleagues are being targeted in an interview with AccuWeather.com’s Katie Fehlinger.

“I think it is unfortunate that some scientists out there are using this situation to settle personal scores, to settle a vendetta,” Mann said, claiming that the emails had been “taken out of context”.

“Phil Jones is a very honest scientist,” Mann said. “He was probably talking about getting rid of measurements that they didn’t consider reliable,” said Mann in response to emails between him and Jones that discuss deleting information.

In reality, as Lord Monckton has documented, “Contrary to all the rules of open, verifiable science, the Team had committed the criminal offense of conspiracy to conceal and then to destroy computer codes and data that had been legitimately requested by an external researcher who had very good reason to doubt that their “research” was either honest or competent.”

Additionally, scientists also “discussed ways of dodging Freedom of Information Act requests to release temperature data,” reports the Daily Mail.

The emails show that scientists relied on cronyism and cosying up to FOIA officials to prevent them from being forced to release data.

“When the FOI requests began here, the FOI person said we had to abide by the requests,’ the email says. “It took a couple of half-hour sessions to convince them otherwise.”

“Once they became aware of the types of people we were dealing with, everyone at UEA became very supportive. I’ve got to know the FOI person quite well and the chief librarian – who deals with appeals.”

Mann’s characterization of this issue as that Jones was “getting rid of measurements that they didn’t consider reliable” is completely inconsistent with the known facts.

Despite his haughty manner in dismissing the gravity of the scandal, other climate scientists are quickly abandoning Mann.

Eduardo Zorita, scientist at the Institute for Coastal Research, is calling for Mann, Jones and others to be banned from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) process for the review and publication of climate change data.

“The scientific assessments in which they may take part are not credible anymore,” said Zorita.

Marc Morano, climate change skeptic and executive editor of ClimateDepot.com, agrees.

“Mann has been dogged for years about his scientific work. Climategate exposes his glaring weaknesses as a scientist,” he said in an e-mail to AccuWeather.com.

Meanwhile, climategate ringleader Phil Jones of the Climate Research Unit, the CRU scientist who infamously wrote about the need to “hide the decline” in global warming in one of the leaked emails, was escorted by plain clothes officers to a police station near his home yesterday.

Unfortunately, officers were only questioning Jones as the ‘victim of a crime’ rather than for his role in producing manipulated data that is being used to bankrupt national economies and launch larcenous and fraudulent tax scams upon the populations of developed countries, as well as his efforts to engage in academic witch hunts by blocking data he politically disagreed with from appearing in IPCC reports.

“Sources said the interview concerned the theft of emails from the university and alleged death threats since the contents of the emails were released, adding he was being treated as a ‘victim of crime’ rather than a suspect in any criminal investigation,” reports the Daily Mail.

How Jones is a victim of a crime is beyond explanation since it’s widely acknowledged that the CRU emails were most probably leaked from an inside source and were not obtained illegally from the outside by a hacker with a criminal vendetta.

click here for full report

China Will Lead New World Order

October 29, 2009

Prison Planet.com

By Paul Joseph Watson

Billionaire globalist George Soros told the Financial Times during an interview that China will supplant the United States as the leader of the new world order and that America should not resist the country’s decline as the dollar weakens, living standards drop, and a new global currency is introduced.

Asked what Obama should discuss when he visits China next month, Soros stated, “This would be the time because I think you really need to bring China into the creation of a new world order, financial world order,” adding that China was a reluctant member of the IMF who didn’t make enough of a contribution.

“I think you need a new world order that China has to be part of the process of creating it and they have to buy in, they have to own it in the same way as the United States owns…the current order,” said Soros, adding that the G20 was a move in this direction.

Soros said that there was a flight from currencies across the board, and that this is why the price of commodities, notably gold and oil, were generally rising. He also stated that an orderly decline of the dollar was “desirable” and that the entire system needed to be reconstituted towards a global currency.

“You need a new currency system and actually the Special Drawing Rights do give you the makings of a system and I think it’s ill-considered on the part of the United States to resist the wider use of Special Drawing Rights, they could be very useful now when you have a global shortfall of demand, you could actually internationally create currency through Special Drawing Rights,” said Soros, explaining that this was already in process after the IMF injected an allocation of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) equivalent to $250 billion into the global economy.

Soros also stated that richer countries were already transferring wealth to poorer countries via SDR’s, with the IMF paying for the half per cent transaction cost.

Soros said the world would have to go through a “painful adjustment” following the decline of the dollar and the introduction of a global currency. Reading between the lines, he essentially threatened to kill the dollar completely if the United States did not get on board with the global currency.

Soros predicted that China would become the new engine of the global economy, replacing the U.S., and that this would slow economic growth and reduce living standards. Soros characterized the United States as a drag on the global economy because of the declining dollar.

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US Economic Decline Forces Change

October 5, 2009

MSN News

Agence France-Presse

The crisis is redrawing the world map of economic power as the influence of US consumer spending declines and major emerging markets like China and India take the lead, finance chiefs said.

“One of the legacies of this crisis may be a recognition of changed economic power relations,” World Bank president Robert Zoellick said Friday in Istanbul ahead of annual meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

“Recent forecasts show that China and India are helping to pull the global economy out of recession…. A multipolar economy less reliant on the US consumer will be a more stable world economy,” he added.

Consumer spending accounts for around two-thirds of economic activity in the United States — by far the world’s biggest economy — and experts say lower spending could have radical effects on the US’s world standing.

The IMF on Thursday forecast emerging and developing economies would grow 5.1 percent in 2010 — in contrast with just 1.3 percent in advanced economies.

China’s economy was projected to grow by 9.0 percent next year and India’s by 6.4 percent — far ahead of 1.5 percent expansion in the US economy.

“The American engine is not as strong as it was before,” IMF managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said in a speech in which he called for emerging markets to be given more say in the IMF’s decisions.
“Emerging economies are becoming more and more the real partners,” he said.

In a BBC World debate on the crisis held in Istanbul, Niall Ferguson, a professor of business administration at Harvard Business School in the United States, said: “The crisis has accelerated a shift from west to east.”

“That means rebalancing not only economically… but rebalancing geopolitically, which I think makes some people nervous,” Ferguson said.

“For the foreseeable future the US will be growing at a much lower rate while China is in fact growing at a much faster rate,” he added.

The shift is having far-reaching effects around the world.

In Latin America, IMF economists said the crisis is affecting countries differently depending on whether, like Mexico, they are more closely tied to the United States or, like Brazil, they have more links with China.

“If it was not for China we wouldn’t have seen positive growth in the second quarter in Brazil,” Ilan Goldfajn, chief economist at Brazilian bank Itau Unibanco, said at an IMF-organised conference in Istanbul.

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