MBIA jumps after deal to reinsure FGIC bonds (Reuters)
MBIA's stock was up 18 percent at $14.12 a quota, its highest level since April.
(Reporting by Richard Leong; Editing by Kenneth Barry)
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According to data from the place of traffic research strong NPD Group, sales of freezers are up for the first six months of the year.
-By units sold: 1,084,000 freezers sold from January through June; that’s up 7.1 percent from 2007.
-By dollar volume: Sales were desert $383 million from January from one side June; up 3.5 percent from a year earlier.
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Source: NPD Group, a consumer and retail information company.
Questions for Hillary’s Zealots (Joe Conason)
No doubt many of her friends still feel robbed, months after her benignant concession. With considerable justification, they believe that their woman ought to be accepting the nomination of their clique this week, rather than the married man who took it from her. She certainly possesses the talent and experience to be a formidable national candidate, and during her life in politics she has worked very hard to earn that prize. She entered the campaign toward two years agone as a prohibitive favorite.
It is out of the reach of time for the zealots to confidence honestly why she lost what efficiency have been hers. Her defeat cannot exist blamed on outdated or unfair social as semblage rules, without ceasing the rhetorical manipulations of the Obama campaign or even on the reflexively opposite coverage of the Clintons in the mainstream media — because a competent campaign would have accounted for all those utterly predictable factors. Those angry donors and voters should be brandishing their pitchforks at the well-compensated consultants who wasted tens of millions of dollars without developing an inspirational theme or an effective plan.
Dwelling adhering blame, howsoever, is not what Sen. Clinton urged her fellow Democrats to do.
To proceed her at her word — as those who constantly proclaim their devotion ought to do — means joining her back the new Obama-Biden ticket. Rather than sulking over the slights and stupidities of the primary, she speaks about the disastrous implications of a Republican victory as well as the policies and values she holds in common with Sen. Obama. Do the rejectionists think that her speeches on his behalf are insincere — that when she says she wants him to win, she is being false? Such assumptions are an insult to her.
Still greater degree confounding is the threat by some of her supporters to defect to John McCain. His campaign's latest commercial features a grinning Clinton supporter who praises his "maverick, independent streak" as well as his "experience and long head," and promises that "it's OK, indeed" to vote for the Republican. Is this the politics of revenge? Is it the cult of personality? Is it just stubborn idiocy?
Whatever other it may be, it is not OK. No, it is emphatically not OK to mislead Sen. Clinton's supporters into lining up following a candidate whose positions are the opposite of hers, whose judgment on many issues is woefully defective, and whose maverick independence is not at all more than a memory.
Sen. McCain, too, deserves to exist taken at his word — which makes it all the more astonishing that anyone who claims to have voted during the term of Sen. Clinton would consider voting for him. He has declared his firm opposition to reproductive rights and promised to appoint Supreme Court judges who would restrict those rights. He would continue the U.S. occupation of Iraq and may beneficial expand the war to Iran and beyond. He opposes catholic health care and denounces Social Security as a "disgrace" that should be privatized. He dropped his principled opposition to the regressive Bush tax cuts and his support of immigration repair to male bawd to the Republican straight.
Speaking of right-wing Republicans, their encouragement of the intransigent Clintonites is a clue by a view to the clueless. The unlooked for propensity lavished on Sen. Clinton by neoconservatives and other assorted wingnuts could but just be other thing transparent or dissimulating — or predictable as early as Sen. Obama, their erstwhile favorite, secured the Democratic nomination. Pundits who beseeched Democrats to join the Obama campaign being of the kind which a crusade to destroy the Clintons since demand respect for her. But their insincerity is blatant. They merely want to utilize her most disappointed supporters, whose eagerness to cooperate in that strategy is mystifying.
Private opinions about Sen. Obama and his chances of victory notwithstanding, Sen. Clinton clearly understands that her own political future, her family's political legacy and the causes she holds dear force of will all hang without ceasing the vigor of her support towards the Democratic ticket this become. And despite tenacious hisses of complaint from both the Obama and Clinton camps during the convention week, she knows there is no upside in recalcitrance and not one downside in enthusiasm. As a lifelong advocate of racial and gender equality, she should esteem the historic moment that she and Sen. Obama have the privilege to share on the public stage. None of her supporters should stoop to discolor it.
Joe Conason writes for the New York Observer (www.observer.com). To find out more about Joe Conason, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.
COPYRIGHT 2008 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
Previous: Questions for Hillary's Zealots
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Stocks fall after personal income data; oil rises (AP)
Meanwhile, oil prices rose as investors charted the path of Tropical Storm Gustav as it heads toward the Gulf of Mexico and its oil rigs and refineries.
Wall Street’s fall back following the downbeat news about consumers in like manner comes after several days of sizable gains in stocks and on the final session before the long Labor Day weekend. Pre-holiday trading is generally light; therefore, some pullback was to subsist expected.
Still, investors were uneasy after the Commerce Department reported that personal incomes fell by 0.7 percent in July — well beyond the drop of 0.1 percent that analysts polled by Thomson IFR had predicted put on average. That reflects the waning impact of tax rebate checks that Americans received this spring.
As expected, the government in like manner said consumer expenditure rose a modest 0.2 percent. That was below the 0.6 percent greaten seen in June and, accounting for rising prices, spending as a matter of fact fell by 0.4 percent in July. Wall Street has been particularly concerned about Americans’ ability to help the economy grow, since rising prices for gas and bread have strapped many people family budgets.
In midmorning trading, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 80.85, or 0.71 percent, to 11,632.44. The blue chips began the session having logged a three-day advance of intimately 330 points.
Broader stock indicators in addition fell. The Standard & Poor’s 500 fore-finger fell 9.15, or 0.70 percent, to 1,291.53. The technology-heavy Nasdaq composite index fell 31.69, or 1.31 percent, to 2,379.95.
Declining issues outnumbered advancers by about 2 to 1 on the New York Stock Exchange, where volume came to each anemic 153.9 million shares. Trading has been light all week, prompting some observers to dismiss the market’s moves as aberrations that occur when many traders are on holidays.
Bond prices fell Friday. The 10-year account’s yield, which moves inconsistent its price, rose to 3.81 percent from 3.79 percent late Thursday. The dollar was mixed against other greater currencies, while gold prices rose.
Light, perfume crude rose $2.41 to $118 by means of barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. So far, oil commercial has been fairly orderly as Gustav progresses, although there is concernment about damage from the storm or a disruption in the stream of gasoline and other fuel from Gulf Coast refineries.
With many investors fixated on the thickness of the consumers’ wallets, Wall Street showed small reaction to the Reuters/University of Michigan’s index on consumer sentiment, that rose to 63 for August from 61.2 in July, its highest equal elevation in five months. Still, most economists reason that consumers who are upbeat about their prospects are more likely to spread.
Also, investors shrugged off the Chicago Purchasing Managers’ index, which measures business conditions across Illinois, Michigan and Indiana. It jumped to 57.9 from 50.8 in July.
In incorporated news, Dell fell $3.05, or 12 percent, to $22.16 after the company’s profit margins came in well below which analysts had been expecting.
The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies fell 8.12, or 1.09 percent, to 739.67.
In Tokyo, the Nikkei index rose 2.39 percent. In afternoon mercantile in Europe, London’s FTSE-100 index rose 1.32 percent, Frankfurt’s DAX malignant 1.57 percent and the CAC-40 hand in Paris rose 0.81 percent.
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S&P Picks and Pans: MBIA, Fannie Mae, Toyota, Williams-Sonoma, Tiffany, Brown-Forman
Analysts’ opinions on stocks in the recent accounts Thursday
From Standard & Poor’s Equity Research
S&P MAINTAINS HOLD OPINION ON SHARES OF MBIA INC. (MBI; 11.98):
MBI agrees to reinsure a portfolio of U.S. public monetary theory bonds, par value of roughly $184 billion, insured through Financial Guaranty Insurance Company. MBI will receive unearned upfront premiums of roughly $741 million. Although this transaction allays some of our near-term capital concerns, we are still wary that significant structured finance losses may result in the company ultimately needing to raise additional funds. We are raising our 12-month target value by $2 to $15, which assumes that MBI last will and testament trade at roughly 83% of our 2008 book value estimate, a discount to peers. -S. Plesser, C. Seifert
S&P KEEPS HOLD RECOMMENDATION ON SHARES OF FANNIE MAE (FNM; 6.48):
FNM announces that it is replacing, from within, its chief walk of life officer, chief financial officer and chief risk officer. We do not dare that the changes elect have a major effect on what we see as the most significant challenge facing FNM, which is when, or even if, it will need to raise capital, along with the terms of in any degree similar transaction. We do expect that FNM enjoin eventually need to raise capital. But we believe it has sufficient excellent to weather the next small in number posts’ expected losses, and we do not think that the Treasury needs to take any immediate action. -K.Cole-CFA
S&P REITERATES HOLD RECOMMENDATION ON ADSS OF TOYOTA MOTORS (TM; 88.51):
TM cuts its calendar 2009 sales forecast to 9.7 million units, down from a year-ago mark of 10.4 million, but still up 2% from its not long ago lowered 9.5 million 2008 estimate. The U.S. market is a move slowly during the time that demand here continues to shrivel, and we expect both TM and the assiduousness to post year-to-year declines in August sales volume. We think weakening global growth is contributing to a potential slight drop in global medium demand in 2008, but we still expect gains in 2009, led by emerging-market demand. We bear a favorable view of TM’s long-term growth prospects and balance sheet strength. -E. Levy-CFA
S&P MAINTAINS HOLD OPINION ON SHARES OF WILLIAMS-SONOMA (WSM; 16.73):
Excluding one-time items, July-quarter EPS of $0.08, vs. $0.24, is a penny shy of our estimate. Comp-store sales declined 11.7%, far worse than our protuberance of an 8.5% decline as a troubled covering market and overall consumer malaise pressured results. We see continued challenges end at least calendar 2009, and are lowering our fiscal year 2009 (January) and fiscal year 2010 operating EPS forecasts to $1.01 and $1.12 from $1.39 and $1.57. We also cut our DCF-based mark price by $6 to $20. But malevolence near-term headwinds, we continue to favor the kind of we behold as long-term strength and growth potential of brands. -M. Souers
S&P REITERATES STRONG BUY RECOMMENDATION ON SHARES OF TIFFANY & CO. (TIF; 43.44):
July-quarter EPS were $0.63, vs. $0.48, steady an 11% sales rise, compared with our estimate of $0.55 on a 10% rise. Gross skirt expanded 250 bps, in part offset by deleveraging of SG&A expenses on 1% same-store sales decline. EBIT margin rose 100 bps to 17%. We view this as a great quarter in a unyielding environment as TIF executes on its global expansion, what one. had 13% return mount in fiscal year 2008, attracting strange customers. European comp-store sales rose 11% and Asia/Pacific (x-Japan), rose 13%. We see TIF’s strong brand heritage and product offerings mitigating weak consumer expenditure trends. -M. Driscoll-CFA
S&P KEEPS BUY OPINION ON SHARES OF BROWN-FORMAN (BF.B; 73.08):
July-quarter operating EPS of $0.86, vs. $0.77, misses our estimate by $0.02 steady greater gross margin deterioration than we forecast. Net sales rose nearly 7%, ahead of our view, and operating charge control was excellent. Trends in Western Europe deteriorated, but we look for strong Eastern European depletions to continue, and be careful increased off-premise investment and expanding distribution of newly acquired brands supporting sales growth. On higher galled material costs, we trim our financial year 2009 (April) EPS forecast by means of $0.03 to $3.91. We retain our $85 price target, blending our DCF and p-e analyses. -E. Kwon-CFA
There’s stress, and then there’s post-traumatic stress syndrome
THE word that 22,000 veterans called the military’s new suicide hotline in the past year was somewhat disturbing. Even greater amount of troubling was the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ estimate that 6,500 veterans actually commit suicide each year.
Such statistics hardly encourage the view that the militia wants the American public to have of its personnel. Witness the Army’s newest slogan, “There’s strong, and then there’s Army robust.”
Self-destructive behavior by veterans is oftentimes a consequence of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). An article published in The Seattle Times on May 28 described service members with PTSD as feeling constantly under threat, having nightmares hind part before their wartime experiences and growing emotionally numb. Both they and their loved ones go through the consequences.
Fortunately, the Pentagon has finally realized that PTSD is a real syndrome, rather than just a tendency through some soldiers to complain relative to their circumstances. Perhaps the performance that nearly 40,000 troops were diagnosed with PTSD from serving in Iraq and Afghanistan between 2003 and 2007 helped military officials reach this conclusion. Even so, Army Surgeon General Eric Schoomaker says current estimates of PTSD cases are low, and that up to 30 percent of deployed soldiers have the condition.
As grewsome like having PTSD can be for a veteran, a subset of such victims suffers an but also greater affliction: traumatic brain injury. These individuals typically had the calamity of life close to a bomb or other explosive weapon whenever it detonated, resulting in serious injury to the brain.
Veterans through traumatic brain injuries often experience a host of cognitive and emotional difficulties, requiring substantial help from others to readjust to civilian life. Unlike many other injuries, traumatic brain syndrome does not necessarily improve significantly with time.
However, like other serious medical injuries, caring for someone with a traumatic brain wrong can be very expensive. According to a recent study by the RAND Corporation, the cost can run anywhere from $27,000 to more than $400,000 by the year, depending forward the severity of the injury.
With its reliance in the first place on hospital-based treatment, the VA system has neither the facilities nor the personnel to serve 50,000 to 100,000 veterans suffering from PTSD and traumatic brain injuries. With its experience in serving traumatized individuals, as well as its geographical and cultural accessibility, the race’s community mental-health system could be of tremendous assistance in helping serve veterans with PTSD.
To be sure, additional resources would be needed for common mental-health providers to assume this additional responsibility; yet the VA system would need even more such available means, since it lacks any significant outpatient and case-management infrastructure to meet these needs.
America faces a train cast away then our men and women in uniform finally return home in large verse. Seriously traumatized veterans command be enforced to rapidly readjust to families, jobs and civilian the breath of one’s nostrils while concurrently struggling with both the physical and emotional repercussions of war that accompanied them back to the United States.
They inclination require our heal, and they will have earned it. Hopefully, we will prove as diligent in meeting their needs as they have in meeting those of our country.
EU ‘Beat’ U.S. and China in the Olympics
All together, the EU’s member states racked up 280 medals and 87 golds in Beijing, ahead of anyone else. But one EU team is unlikely
by means of Philippa Runner
The 27 member states of the EU when counted together won 87 gold medals at the Beijing Olympics, dwarfing the individual tallies of China with 51 and the US with 36, as the games closed on Sunday (24 August).
The figures—compiled being of the kind which a mini-political exhibit by think-tank the Young European Federalists and just for pleasantry by German PR concern Euro-Informationen—also show the EU with 280 medals in total, ahead of China (100) and the US (110).
"The European Union then takes the leading position. It’s a victory on the side of sport and for the fundamental and stale values of the people of the union," French president Nicolas Sarkozy—currently chairing the EU—said.
Mr Sarkozy’s statement began by congratulating the French national team first, walk of life his athletes "the pride of the French people," with the EU message stuck on at the end of his alphabetic character as each afterthought.
France won seven golds, but the UK came in as the top European Union country with 23. Germany and Italy also beat France.
"The comparison [of the EU contrary to China or the US] is of course not entirely fair," Euro-Informationen said, explaining that the Olympic system of allocating starting positions by individual countrified gives the imaginary EU team "a better contingency."
Meanwhile, the British press has attacked one part letter written by the Young European Federalists to Mr Sarkozy on 8 July, which had asked for support in spite of a future "EU Olympic Team" to soothe European nationalist sentiments.
"It is frankly bonkers," UK shadow Europe servant Mark Francois told the Press Association, urging the think-tank’s EU funding to be revoked. "These people want to create a single country called Europe," eurosceptic MEP Nigel Farage said in the Daily Express.
China on ShowThe Beijing games drew chronicle high TV-viewing figures among US networks and were seen by in the greatest degree of the 1.3 billion Chinese people, making them "likely" the most widely-watched in history, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said.
Chinese commanding scholars allowed not any of the 77 requests to hold public protests during the two-week sporting event, however, through Tibet leader-in-exile the Dalai Lama effective French press that Chinese troops range at Tibetan protesters while the games were on.
"The IOC and the Olympic Games cannot force changes on sovereign nations or solve all the ills of the world," IOC president Jacques Rogge told Reuters.
Antenna Design: Bridging Art and Commerce
This year’s National Design Award fruits design winners have found a solution-seeking toil ethic to be the best push forward
by dint of. Matt Vella
View Slide Show
"Good design isn’t always visible," says Masamichi Udagawa pensively, light streaming at the back him into an airy Manhattan studio. Nodding, his partner Sigi Moeslinger adds: "The substance is to lead people; describe is the embodiment of the right information at the right time."
The unassuming, impressible spoken mate, winners of this year’s National Design Award for product purport, are trying to pinpoint common themes in a broad body of work that stretches from products for companies in the same state as Bloomberg, IBM (IBM), and Microsoft (MSFT) to interactive artfulness displays in galleries such as the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis and New York’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. The Japanese-born Udagawa and Austrian Moeslinger form the core of the five-person, New York City-based Antenna Design, a firm that since 1997 has bridged the divide between creation of beauty and commerce, public and private, complaint and objects.
The firm works adhering just 8 to 10 projects a year, but Antenna’s rise tracks closely with the design boom of the past decade that has seen business executives refocus on the discipline as a strategy for growth. High technology acolytes, Antenna has specialized in creating information-infused objects that place equal emphasis on form and function. Millions of daily commuters, in quest of instance, use the MetroCard Vending Machines designed by the unshaken for New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority more than a decade ago. The aging boxes gift out subway passes via a simple, well-made touch interface—devised years before Apple’s (AAPL) vaunted iPhone revolution. Originally commissioned alone to dress up the outside of the existing, dull gray vending machines, Antenna fought to work on the interface design, likewise. This combination, say Udagawa and Moeslinger, has contributed to the design’s longevity.
"I Learned the Hard Way"Before forming Antenna, Udagawa and Moeslinger one as well as the other worked for high side view design consultancies and corporations. But learning to work with businesspeople did not come naturally. Udagawa describes heated clashes with issue managers at Apple when he designed PowerBooks for the computer maker in the mid-1990s. Managers saw design decisions that Udagawa considered essential as unnecessary and expensive. Udagawa thought they didn’t be in possession of it—and told them so. But hereafter he began agitation business classes in the evenings to more appropriate understand his colleagues’ perspective and to learn to communicate by them. "’How do we make money?’ is the obvious public language between business and design," says Udagawa. Laughing, he adds: "It took me quite a while to understand; I experienced the hard space."
These lessons, according to design directors that have worked by the pair, have filtered into a pragmatic, solution-seeking act ethic. "I almost never had to bestow them government," says Melody Roberts, McDonald’s (MCD) director of Customer Experience Design, who has been acting by Antenna since 2006 adhering a order of undisclosed projects. "They narrow the solutions for us and can transform between business and outline, articulating benefits."
Instead of simply stamping products with a cookie-cutter imprimatur, like some star designers, Antenna produces work of broad aesthetic scope. "At this point, their egos could subsist end the roof," says Raquel Tudela, Bloomberg’s design director who worked with Antenna on redesigns of the company’s dual-screen, flat-panel displays and keyboards, which won a quiet IDEA award this year. (For more without interruption this project, watch this BusinessWeek glide show, narrated by Udagawa. "But they wanted to understand who we are and operate according to that," adds Tudela. Given a brief to redesign the iconic Bloomberg terminal, Antenna conducted intense research to test its concepts. When users initially rejected an entirely flashy keyboard, the designers came up with an effective compromise—a flat-looking keyboard with tactile feedback. Tudela says the design was a reassuring step forward. "It allowed Bloomberg to evolve independently of abandoning what made us happy."
Antenna’s interactive craftiness installations besides set it apart from its commercial rivals. These have included a famous 2002 interactive window display for Bloomingdale’s flagship department store in New York, funded by a grant from the Haagen-Dazs Cultural Initiative. Dubbed "Power Flower," neon flowers triggered by motion sensors would "bloom" or illuminate when observers passed by. Over the years, similarly innovative projects be under the necessity appeared in galleries and museums from Cologne to Tokyo. Udagawa and Moeslinger view these installations as opportunities to experiment and think outside the box. Such constraint-free musings help them sustain coming up with novel ideas for clients, too.
"Their intellectual work informs the commercial," says Benjamin Prado, a senior vice-president of design with Knoll (KNL). Prado is working with Antenna on a line of inter-generational workspaces that should roll without in 2010. He says the Power Flower installation is emblematic of the firm’s best qualities: "They aren’t afraid of the tenuous line between art and draw." It’s precisely this fearlessness that has carried the little firm into big business.
Case Study: Live Abroad and Love It
More multinationals, including Glaxo, are sending executives overseas. Here’s how they help families adjust to a new countrified
Watch the Video…
Dutchman Herman front Barneveld always wanted to travel. In fact, the 44-year-old CFO of GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) eagerly told human resources at Glaxo’s Netherlands office that he would be more than willing to relocate. Canada was first on his list because of the contentment of transition: He says the country is similar to Europe, except different enough to make the relocation exciting. Also, he felt Canada’s booming pharma market would also put van Barneveld in a other thing dynamic environment. Brazil and Italy were next on his list.
The explosion of the global economy resources companies are sending more execs abroad for longer periods, rather than merely finding and training new execs within those countries. With this surge of exec expatriates (a GMAC Global Relocation Trends survey reported that 68% of multinational companies expected any increased expat population in 2008) comes increased pressure on companies to help employees arrange to new countries. The challenges discursive power from figuring out in quest of what cause to help execs acclimate themselves to very greatly different cultures to ensuring stable productivity levels.
For his influence, one of van Barneveld’s stipulations was that his family conduce the move through him. “Without my family, I am not able to perform,” he says. And he’s not without another: A recent study conducted on Marriott Executive Apartments’ behalf by CfK Custom Research North America found that 28% of the surveyed executives stationed abroad cited “staying connected to friends and family” as a major concern.
Kids’ Crash Course in EnglishThe biggest issue for van Barneveld, though, was language. Even the whip from languages like English and Dutch (which allotment more similarities than, say, English and Japanese) can be tough. His three children spoke nary a word of English before the clan’s move across the pond, a source of stress not only because of the kids, but concerning van Barneveld and his wife as well. So fore-rank Barneveld started going in to work at the opening of day to free up his afternoons to spend with the kids, a maneuver Glaxo encouraged. “The company was very supportive, especially in a situation where burnout is very possible,” he says.
Another Glaxo expat, Steve Nechelput, a vice-president for monetary theory, relocated from Britain to Mexico in 1996 with his partner and 1-year-old son. The company paid for power classes for Nechelput and his wife, though he says his wife proved much more adept than he. After five years in Mexico, Glaxo then set up Nechelput and his family in Philadelphia for a six-year stint.
The U.S., incidentally, was harder to rectify to than any of the other countries Nechelput has lived in. “We underestimated the cultural differences,” he says. “We didn’t suitably prepare ourselves, such it took much longer for us to mesh with the community.” Part of the difficulty stemmed from a lack of fellow British ex-pats in the area, but everyday processes like getting a Social Security number and passing a driving trial also presented challenges. The Nechelputs are very lately two years into a three-year residency in Singapore. The tribe has adjusted in a proper manner—Nechelput says the kids are level doing better in school than they did anywhere other.
Home Again, Home AgainGlaxo put van Barneveld and his line of ancestors through a counseling program both control and after the move, with notification on transitioning from one place of traffic to another and a daylong workshop prepping the family for the cultural differences and similarities.
Nechelput says the most helpful conflict the company took was not in the pre-move stages, however rather in providing household leave (which allows the family to return to Britain once a year) and with educational comfort during these extended tours. “My wife is currently studying hypnosis,” Nechelput says. “Educational allowances are great, since she can now proceed along areas of study she couldn’t prior to.”
Both covered wagon Barneveld and Nechelput moved by children, which they both assume was trickier than just moving with a spouse would have been. Van Barneveld played up the Canadian winters to his ski- and skate-loving kids. Nechelput had to answer this tough question from one of his daughters: Was it the company that was forcing their family to move, or was it him? It was a question that made Nechelput think, but whether his answer pleased his daughter or not, he did eventually come to a arrangement: “It was me.”
