Cool and collected, Kavya Shivashankar wrote out every word on her palm and always ended with a smile. The 13-year-old Kansas girl saved the biggest smile for last, when she rattled off the letters to “Laodicean” to become the nation’s spelling champion. (more…)

Nouriel Roubini, the famously glum economist who predicted the financial crisis, said that while the recession in the United States may well be over at the end of the year, another dip was still possible next year. (more…)

It was originated by former British Chancellor of the Exchequer Norman Lamont, who was quoted as spotting green shoots in the British economy back in 1991, recalls Mark Turner, who heads the Pentagram Fund, a hedge fund that scored a 70% return in last year’s collapse. Of course, Lamont would go on to oversee the ignominious withdrawal of the pound from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism the next year, which netted an infamous $1 billion windfall for George Soros.

Bill Gross, manager of the world’s biggest bond fund, warned on Thursday the United States will eventually lose its top AAA credit rating, a fear that had already spooked financial markets on Thursday and could keep the dollar, stocks and bonds under heavy selling pressure. (more…)

Stock

* The market will pare some of the gains of the bear market rally. This will seem like a good opportunity for those folks who missed the earlier rally in the S&P in Mar, Apr, May to get in on the “bull” market ride. Alas as people buy into the dip the market will keep going up as if they were right. More people will add money into this rally and then the reality of the impact of 600,000+ people losing jobs every month will hit the corporate earnings numbers, house foreclosures will increase as Option ARM and other fancy mortgage products hit the market. The markets will then tank, testing the Mar 2009 lows. Keeping an open mind as to if those lows will hold, though chances are higher that it will be broken to the downside. Don’t hold onto stock positions yet. There will come a time when stocks will be a 10 bagger, just let your money sit in cash instruments as deflation ravages through.

Bonds
Once stocks start falling again, treasuries prices will rise again. But in purchasing power terms dollar value will start gradually fall with the threat of an S&P downgrade like the UK downgrade.

Precious Metals
Gold will fall below 700$ which will be a good opportunity to buy as people smoke the green shoots thinking it to be of another kind! So when it goes below 700 jump in, and when folks sober up you could have a good upside.

Protesting PFRDA’s decision to reduce allocation of pension funds to it under NPS for organised sector from 55 per cent to 40 per cent, SBI Pension Funds has made a representation to the regulator.
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Is your plan worthy of your participation? Here are some of the new risks and rewards and what to do about them.
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Protesting PFRDA’s decision to reduce allocation of pension funds to it under NPS for organised sector from 55 per cent to 40 per cent, SBI Pension Funds has made a representation to the regulator.
Continue Reading

Is your plan worthy of your participation? Here are some of the new risks and rewards and what to do about them.
Continue Reading