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Firms like Goldman Sachs and Vanguard Group are lining up to oppose aproposed reinstatement of the Uptick Rule which would restrict short selling. The short selling that ocurred for companies like Morgan Stanley and others is one of the reasons for the financial crisis that ocurred last year. Rowe Price and Charles Schwab support the reinstatement of the Uptick Rule.

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Efforts in Congress to get the SEC to restore the Uptick Rule that prevented shortselling of stocks unless the price of a stock in its most recent trade was higher than the previous price. In a short sale investors borrow shares and sell them, hoping for the price to fall. Schumer, Barney Frank support the effort.

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As factories fail and owners flee China, leaving behind unpaid suppliers, the suppliers are ripping up all the equipment to pay what they are owed. The lack of good bankruptcy laws makes the situation ugly, see pictures.

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The SEC is conducting an investigation of the rumors that on three separate occasions led to drop in Lehman's share price of 10-21% in one day. This happened also to Bear Stearns and the SEC is cracking down on this practice by short sellers who hope to profit from their actions by driving down the price of Lehman's shares. This should also help to calm the financial markets and hold those responsible as it can have a serious negative impact on the markets.

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The need for the uptick rule to prevent abuse by short sellers who target certain stocks and can have a destructive effect on market confidence and destroy value in companies.

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U.S. president Obama invited NYT's columnist Thomas Friedman to the White House for an interview on Saturday afternoon April 4, 2015. Here Friedman gives president Obama's response to his questions, and Obama's concerns about the heated rhetoric in the U.S. and Israel on the negotiations with Iran detracting and distracting from his key goals of protecting U.S. interests and Israel. On the Sunni states, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, Obama points out that there are some tough conversations needed about changes inside their societies which pose a greater threat to the governments than Iran. Obama says he understands perfectly that Israel and the Jewish people after their experience of the last hundred years are determined to not let Iran develop a nuclear weapon, and their right to be concerned that the agreement could let Iran clandestinely develop one. Obama says the verification is extensive and covers any facility in Iran, any suspicion about secret facilities, yet it leaves the subsequent decisions if Iran created difficulties, to a international body over which the U.S., UK, France, have no control. This is a principal issue for critics of the negotiated agreement. No mention is made of why Iran simply discarded the option of sending the atomic material to Russia to be processed into nuclear rods for the Bushehr nuclear plant built by Russia only a few days before the final outline was developed. And why the U.S., with allies Germany, France, UK and Japan, did not offer the Iranians an economic aid package if needed in return for the billions Iranians invested for that atomic material, to ensure that the atomic materials are shipped out of the country- to create a nuclear agreement that would be credible to all parties. The economic aid would benefit Iran modernize its oil industry, including refining operations, meet basic import needs, and provide tangible proof to the Iranian people of our best intentions for the future, that president Obama strongly espouses in the interview. The interview does show the quandary president Obama faces in Iran for strong action, that is a result of failed policies with Iran since the Eisenhower administration's intervention 1953 during the Cold War that displaced the elected government of Mosaddegh in Iran and setup the Shah's regime in 1956, the support of Saddam Hussein in Iraq in the war against Iran, which Obama mentions in this intervew. In the light of the repeated failures of the U.S. policies a Democratic party leader faces increasing reservations for taking strong action against Iran's development of nuclear weapons capabilities, preferring to exhaust every diplomatic channel, and take risks in the hope that time will give the Iranian people an opportunity to to reintegrate in the global community and pursue the peaceful development of nuclear energy. This strain in president Obama's thinking is evident throughout the interview with Friedman. Other aspects of president Obama's policy in the Middle East shared in the interview are about supporting the Sunni states in some areas, and Iran in some areas, at the same time as the nuclear issue is "put in a box" and separated from the regional conflicts. Friedman presents this as the Obama doctrine, yet it appears to be coming after a series of improvisations in foreign policy following a failure to act in 2011-2013, when the "once in a lifetime" opportunities presented by the Arab Spring were not taken up by the Obama administration, leading to the region's current disintegration....

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The large increase in auto sales in 2013 to 15.6 million follows a strong rebound in the U.S. market. The gains in sales over 2009 at the peak of the financial crisis, shows Chrysler at 93% gain in sales over 2009, VW at 92%, Nissan 62% and Ford 54%, according to Autodata. Smaller gains of 33% and 26% for Honda and Toyota. Chrysler's sales were 1.8 million in 2013- the company which depended on policymakers in the Obama administration for survival showed remarkable gains under Fiat's CEO Marchionne. VW returning to the market and stumbling repeatedly in the previous ten years, made serious gains with Jetta and Passat models designed and priced for the U.S. market. VW achieved sales of 0.6 million in 2013. Ford sales were 2.5 million, Nissan 1.2 million, Honda 1.5 million and Toyota 2.2 million for 2013. GM sales 2.8 million increasing by 35% in 2013 over 2009. The automobile story may be the biggest story in the U.S. manufacturing recovery. It also may have made a difference in the election campaign of 2012- with winning campaign points in key midwestern states such as Michigan and Ohio for the Obama administration's backing of a renewed auto industry around fuel efficiency improvements, new management, and new relationship with unions. In the period 1998-2007 average sales were 16 million in the U.S. market, with a nosedive to 10.4 million vehicles in 2009, and a rebound to 15.6 million in 2013, according to Autodata. Under previous union contracts with higher wages and pension costs, and a flurry of price incentives, car makers needed higher volume to make profits. Changes since the bankruptcy of 2 automakers include bringing in management from outside the auto industry- Marchionne at Chrysler, Whittaker and Akerson at GM came from other fields (telecom, finance) bringing new perspectives. Mulally at Ford was from Boeing commercial aerospace. Other changes were lower wages and pension costs with renegotiated contracts and relationships with unions, discipline to lower incentives, younger managers moved up and brought in from outside including Reuss and Barra at GM, Farley at Ford, lower sales to fleets, improved fuel efficiency for SUV's and pickups to change the cost of operating, a mix shifted to smaller and midsized cars, improved quality, and changing the buyer perception of American brands....

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The U.S. Federal Reserve's actions in 2013 to counter the growing size and complexity of large banks. JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo assets have grown by 75% and 275% betwen 4th quarter of 2006 and 4th quarter 2012.

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A study by the National Employment Law Project shows most of the job creation in the economic recovery to 2014 in the U.S. is replacing the better paying jobs with lower paying jobs in fast food retail and similiar low paying industries.

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Working America, an arm of the U.S. trade union the AFL-CIO, conducted conversations with 350,000 voters in 17 U.S. states. Here a representative of Working America, says the overwhelming response to the question "does it make a difference whether Democrats or Republicans are in power for my well being," is reflected in one of the responses- "does it even matter?"

The suggested approach here is for Democrats in particular who have represented working class voters in the past, to start with a fresh approach by creating new conversations with working class Americans.

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House Speaker Paul Ryan's "Confident America" campaign in 2016 aims to reassure the Republican base and build support for Congressional Republicans as the Trump movement disrupts the Republican Party.

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The Commerce Department report shows personal consumption expenditures price index, an inflation guage preferred by the U.S Fed increased by 0.9% in Feb. 2014 over the prior year month. Inflation excluding food and energy costs was at 1.1% in Feb. 2014. This is well below the Fed's 2% target for 22 consecutive months.

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Bernanke's plan to address the deep downturn is very aggressive and he is pulling out all the stops. This includes the purchase of mortgage backed securities, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac corporate debt and other assets, Since it stated its intention in late November to buy such securities, the 30 year mortgage rates have fallen to 5.2% from 6%, and refinance applications have tripled. Now the purchases will be greatly expanded. See the related link to this in Hubbard and Mayer article based on their research paper, in the WSJ, that shows that at a mortgage rate of 4.5% the housing market prices could stabilize. Next step the Fed will, starting early 2009, pump money into markets for student, auto, credit card ansd small business loans in hoping to bring life to those markets. How much money is involved? Quite a bit. All told the Fed's assets could add up to $5 trillion says Ed Yardeni of Yardeni Research, up from $2.2 trillion now. Its these sweeping moves and decisions that have overshadowed the December 16 announcement cutting the target federal funds rate to a range from zero to 0.25%, the lowest in its history. Whats the thinking behind this? Coy of BW points to Bernanke's research on the depression years and the lost decade years in Japan. In 1999, in a book he contributed to, Bernanke referred to Japan's monetary policy and passive approach as a self induced paralysis, including all the zombie loans that were allowed to continue on company books and no effort to clear up the bad assets quickly. He always thought highly of the aggressive approach taken by Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and felt that more tools available and a better understanding of the market system since FDR's day enabled a lot more actions to be taken to reverse the kind of steep global downturn that might occur. Yardeni's view is that even though this huge asset buildup could lead to inflation down the road, the economy in the medium term faces a deflationary environment, and the only way to cope with this series of bubbles bursting is to create another bubble, rather than risk anything going seriously wrong. Basically Bernanke is making an assessment of the current situation, and he sees bad credit situation getting worse, bad unemployment situation getting worse, consumer spending falling off and getting worse, continued home foreclosures and falling prices, the transition between administrations and lack of policy direction for a few critical months complicating things, and he sees the economies of all trading partners in Asia and Europe weakening in great speed, and sees very tough years for 2009 and 2010 no matter what the administration and the Fed do. Not enough aggressive actions to forestall the worst is as bad as inaction in Bernanke's view. And with all the aggressive moves, including the $1 trillion stimulus and infrastructure spending to create 2.5 million jobs that Obama administration plans, the US and global picture for the next 24 months will still be a long uphill climb. So the risks for Bernanke are all in the region of not doing enough and not doing it vigorously and speedily to get the best results. ...

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Stevenson and Caselli describe the mood in Buenos Aires as negotiations with hedge fund holdout bondholders fail in July 2014.

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Japan's economy grows at an annualized pace of 3.5% in the first quarter of 2013 after aggressive monetary easing by the Bank of Japan under Haruhiko Kuroda.

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Claire Cain Miller points to the high cost of child care in the U.S. and the benefits to society from providing affordable child care. It has a high impact on women's employment and incomes, and ability to pursue opportunities in education and career. The effect on children especially for low income families is enormous. Average cost for child care in the U.S. is by one estimate $16,514. The higher the quality of care in early years the better the outcomes are for children in education, careers, income, and later in life.

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This analysis of coal use using graphs shows a clear move away from coal in the world, except for two growth markets China and India which account for 60% of the increase in coal use since 2008. India has gone black in its shift to increasing use of coal. China has begun the shift away from coal to address the smog over large urban areas, poor air quality and health impact of coal use. Because China used five times the coal used by India in 2017, the overall impact in China and India is showing a shift away from coal to hydropower, other renewables including solar energy. It is likely that India will make the shift following China's example in the future. 

The trend is clear when one looks at the incremental terawatt hour and where it comes from. The shift is clear to renewables, hydropower, and non fossil uses in the rest of the World and China which account for most of the coal use in the world.

 

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Bank of Japan chief Kuroda tells foreign media, April 11, 2013, that it will not implement monetary policy to achieve the 2% inflation target in 2 years mechanically. Other economic factors will be considered. The BOJ will be watchful and vigilant for asset bubbles. If this happens the 2% inflation target will be achieved in the medium term so that it is done in a stable way.