Bernard Hickey details the key news overnight in 90 seconds at 9 am in association with Bank of New Zealand, including news that US video and DVD rental chain Blockbuster is about to file for bankruptcy.
It is weighed down by over US$900 million of debt and cannot compete with the likes of Netflix, computer games and YouTube for movie watchers' dollars.
Once worth US$8.4 billion as recently as 1994, it was spun off onto the US stock market in 2004.
Blockbuster has 25 stores in New Zealand. It is not immediately clear how they will be affected.
Meanwhile, the Dow fell after software company, Adobe, which makes Photoshop and Flash, announced poor results.
Chipmaker PMC Sierra also released bad results, raising investor fears about the outlook for companies that benefit from economic growth.
The US dollar continued to weaken overnight in the wake of comments by the US Federal Reserve that it is prepared to effectively print more money to devalue the currency and try to boost the US economy.
The New Zealand dollar rose over 74 USc overnight and the gold price rose to a fresh record high of US$1,293/oz as investors hunted for hard assets away from the globe's reserve paper currency.
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38 Comments
MMMM, printing press = devalued US dollar and a more competitive US economy, inflation (which is what is driving the increase in Gold) which reduces debt repayment issues and gives the finger to the chinese whom own the debt.
Read Martin Wolf's Fixing Global Finance, it still remains true.
Yes, quite right MMMM.
The US and UK have been using currency devaluation as a form of protectionism for awhile, so they shouldn't be too upset about the Chinese doing it.
The US and formerly the UK, haven't been superpowers for no reason and they naturally won't be wanting to give it up either. Globalisation and outsourcing in particular might have made their shareholders better off, but it is also one of the causes of their unemployment problems.
Yesterday we had people like that Duke dude telling us the bottom of the market had been reached and to buy ,buy buy... then today it all dips back..this is a regular and monotonous pattern indicating there is no pattern..i.e. the new normal?
Equities on Wall Street have declined for a second day as investors bought US Treasuries in anticipation of the Federal Reserve buying more government debt to prop up the economy...so what do you think that really means,huh?
In late trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average slid 0.25%, the S&P 500 declined 0.54% and the Nasdaq Composite Index dropped 0.89%.
The benchmark 10-year note yield dropped 6 basis points, or 0.06 percentage point, to 2.52% in early afternoon trade in New York, according to BGCantor Market Data.
The only certainty seems to be gold...my advice is to forget about buying the actual product;buy key stocks in high-tier gold producers like Newcrest in australia or Barrick etc.
This world is weird on the outside and wild at heart..which is good!
It`s going to happen very soon. The great
event which will end the horror. Which will
end the sorrow. Next Tuesday, when the sun
goes down, I will play the Moonlight Sonata
backwards. This will reverse the effects of
the world`s mad plunge into suffering, for
the last 200 million years. What a lovely
night that would be. What a sigh of relief, as
the senile robins become bright red again,
and the retired nightingales, pick up their
dusty tails, and assert the majesty of creation!
The latest news on the "Apocolypse"..It seems the israeli PM :Bibi" has done a dash to Russia..The Russian President has blocked the sale of Russian defence rockets to the Iranian government....Great news indeed The bad news is that massive troop movements have been reported along the Suez Canal, shadowing the USS Eisenhour and a fleet of nuke capable Submarines head for the Red sea. All comercial shipping movements were halted during this latest development.Israel has done a deal with Georgia to use old Russian airfields as a base.
I would sugest a visit from the Israeli president to the Russian President is interesting...and The Russians compliance is very helpfull as Russia will get a boost from the coming spike in oil prices.But Can we read in this buildup that a nasty taste lingers beetween the lines... and that is....this urgency might point to the fact that Syria or Iran..have Nuclear Capability via North Korea? ...Israel is also accepting foriegn personell for training in their armed forces.
And still nothing in the main stream media...whats going on?
Ah finally something... Der Spiegal reports on a Sunday Telegraph article. .http://www.spiegel.de/international0,1518,458373,00.html it might get mainstream now and effect the markets.
I'm a newbie here, and I have a question which someone might have an insight into......
18 months ago, every NZ Herald I picked up (which wasn't many) the front pages were filled with doom and gloom, quite rightly so probably.....yet it seems to me the media has backed off painting things so bleakly.
Yet, for the man on the street (I'm involved in social research) in the main feels things are worse than 12 months ago, and with GST and the like set to kick in, which seems hugely underestimated of how that will effect your working class household......
I mean, I dont think there should be mass panic, but our daily papers seem to be either tired of reporting on the ongoing hardships facing most average households....or for some reason they dont wish to take that stand.
ANy ideas why the media is not interested??
That's an easy one ante...your media moguls make their mullah on the property ponzi play...so it dawned on them that it was better to pork the property play then publish the truth about Noddy.
Ask granny herald to tell you what their property advert revenue is? don't expect an answer.
The other factor involved here is a dimwitted population...yes we really do have some who believe the earth is flat and that the great depression of the 30s was humbug. So try telling them that the current great recession is set to roll over the top of them and...well they just look at you and sort of gawp open mouthed....... Doh
The Proles were dumbed down..and did as they were told..the years of nightly brainwashing on the box, finally diminished their dendrites to a point of no resistance.They are as children...in the land of Mamon..The cell phone at the ear,makes them technical telepaths...The Internet takes them to the other side of the planet in seconds, and makes them technical superbeings. They live like Gods on a virtual Olympus in a virtual reality. ".I consume therefore i am... .I have a credit card therefore i am blessed in the ways of plenty....My Credit limit proves my worth..verily.. i am favoured by the Gods of my age.....Never tell them that its just not real...because all you'll get in reply is..."Whatever!"
The day when the "Greed is good gang" took over, we were considered "Human recources" Just another recource to be exploited.
In their arogance they dont give a dam about the low income earners,or even the middle classes.The mindset is well entrenched.."That if your poor then its your fault"..Shake up time is coming.Change allways comes from the bottom up.
how about if they keep freaking people out then the people stop buying the products of the advertisers who pay for the lion's share of the paper's costs?
hence the value of public/state owned media - they get to break stories and open the discourse which the more timid private media can follow....
It's probably not news anymore; everyone knows it and it mightn't sell papers.
When they are really desperate they move onto how low the dams are, and the danger of the lights going out. Everyone knows that the rain always comes and fills them up.
Meanwhile they fill in the other gaps with stories about 'famous' NZ celebrity broadcasters, that read the news and the weather.
what you're talking about ,ante, is negative reinforcement and you'll find that a great lot of people will grumble that over the last 18 months it's the media who have talked up the recession....and they blame them partially for the misery in their lives.
the reality is that it's often their own faults for over extending on debt and also due to global forces beyond their control
i think the media bosses have realised this and that the populace were starting to "blame" them ( quite rightly) so they've throttled back.
misery loves company...ask gummy bear?
Sadly , no . Oddly enough , live broadcasts of the NZ Parliament , don't filter thru to the Visayas region of the Philippines . ............. No matter how hard I exhort them , the locals show no interest ............. Back to the cheap Tanduay rum & cock fighting ...........
You poor bugger..fancy missing out on the free (almost) entertainment...and plenty of cock fighting too...though I do wish they'd give Lockwood a zimmer so he could reach the chair a tad quicker...We could be in for a display of Cunliffe's 'muppetnomics' for sure today. He's into demanding more govt borrowing and spending...a firm believer in Obama make work is Cunny. He knows how to spend your munny Gummy Bear!
Sadly for Cunny , me munny is off limits to him . ............ I live here now . On a beach . 28'c water . And fresh buko in the coconut palms above me . Bugger , life is hard without the multitudinous benefits of the all-expansive NZ welfare state .............. aha ha haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa !
Sign of the next dip?
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/4159559/GDP-growth-lower-than-expected
Signs of the new normal rc....throw in the quake boot in the goolies and the storm bashing the farm sector...it don't look too good....I expect the Kiwi will tumble to 75au and may go lower if the RBA hikes in Oct as they are now expected to do....with an extra .75 move during 2011.
From Rooters : Study shows wealthy benefit most from US tax breaks : Billions of dollars in US tax breaks to encourage home ownership , retirement savings , business start-ups and education mostly benefit top income earners and do little to help lower and middle-income people build wealth . ( study sponsered by CFED ) ....
... ummm , Michael Cullen , was this your conclusion too , after 9 years of extending the welfare net , and equalisation schemes and packages ? Admit you were totally wrong ?
Head of research at Australian boutique fund manager PM Capital, Ashley Pittard, believes a significant discrepancy in the valuation of blue chip stocks in Australia compared with the US market offer contrarian investors significant opportunities over the coming decade..
In a delightfully expressive commentary on the wisdom of using Android, Nokia's outgoing chief smartphone person, Anssi Vanjoki, declared that those who use Android are, philosophically speaking, "peeing in their pants" like Finnish boys do to keep warm.
There seemed to be no explanation why it was only boys who perform this peculiarly Finnish ritual. However, he did offer that cell phone manufacturers who use Android are only giving themselves temporary relief, being somewhat blind to the stinging possibility that Android-use will not bring them long-term profits.
Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-20017114-71.html#ixzz10JGfVDSs
Thanks for all de comments up there re why the good ol Herald is not printing stories on just how bad it is.....makes a bit more sense to me now. Heres another question for ya
WHY are banks increasing, encouraging credit card usage/limits when they know people are already living beyond their means, and why is their not legislation to guidelines to stop them taking advantage.....not everyone has the good sense to put themselves on a reign,
after all that went on with finance companies etc, you'd think that there would be some tightening on loan sharks, bank sharks etc.....
and another question - does anyone know if we, the rate payer really are paying for the leaky homes payouts ?? is it my imagination or are there a heap more metre maids and tickets being written out.......p.s. i wrote in and got off the bus lane one, as they had no evidence and well, they must have got thousands of letters.
and what about our insurance - its goin up and up. I now have third party car insurance.
all due to twin towers, etc etc and now CHC earthquake.....we all pay in the end.
Im goin bush.
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