The request, circulated to agencies around Los Angeles last week, stated that the directors are seeking “beautiful female fit models. Must be 5ft 7in-5ft 8in (170-172cm), (U.S.) size 4 or 6, no bigger or smaller. Age 18-25. Must have a lean dancer body. Must have real breasts. Do not submit if you have implants”.
In order to spot the fakes, the potential stars will be expected to run in front of the casting agents - a tell-tale sign of false boobs, which move less during high-octane sequences.
The actresses will line up alongside Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, due to be released in May 2011 and directed by Rob Marshall.
HEALTH-CARE REFORM FINALLY MADE IT INTO LAW and, contrary to the received wisdom that its effects would not be felt for years, it had an immediate and enormous impact: The Republicans got sick and the Democrats got bullet-proof vests.
The insurance company would rather let the baby die, than pay for the surgery, because these companies are always so magnanimous.
At birth, Houston Tracy let out a single loud cry before his father cut the cord and handed him to a nurse.
Instantly, Doug Tracy knew something was wrong with his son.
"He wasn't turning pink fast enough," Tracy said. "When they listened to his chest, they realized he had an issue."
That turned out to be d-transposition of the great arteries, a defect in which the two major vessels that carry blood away from the heart are reversed. The condition causes babies to turn blue.
Surgery would correct it, but within days of Houston's birth March 15, Tracy learned that his application for health insurance to cover his son had been denied. The reason: a pre-existing condition.
"How can he have a pre-existing condition if the baby didn't exist until now?" Tracy asked.
New federal legislation that will prevent insurance companies from denying children coverage based on a pre-existing condition comes too late for the Tracys. The legislation, passed by Congress and signed by President Barack Obama this week, won't go into effect until September.
But Houston, who is hospitalized at Cook Children's Medical Center in Fort Worth, needs coverage now.
Without surgery, babies with this condition often die soon after birth, although some may live as long as a year, said Dr. Steve Muyskens, a pediatric cardiologist.
The insurance companies needed to be forced under ObamaCare because they always put profits in front of the good of society.
And if it is a pre-existing condition, then doesn't that make the fetus a baby?
Yeah, I know, Obama has said that there would be no "material" impact to finances until 2014. Liar. Truth: Caterpillar and John Deere already announced non-cash charges of $100 and $150 million, respectively, for this year based upon the impact of this bill on forward retiree health care costs.
The law says you must account for such changes when you become aware of them, and that would be now.
What is reality?
Caterpillar's charge of $150 million is really only about $7 million:
WSJ The loss of tax deductions for Caterpillar would be closer to about $7 million a year, or less than 1% of last year's profit of $895 million, based on a 35% corporate tax rate and the $20 million in annual subsidies that the company said it expected to receive in papers filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Mr. Dugan confirmed by email that these figures are accurate.
Oh My!
Healthcare costs are going to hit earnings.
Whatever....
These companies are actually taking an excessive charge and putting it in their cookie jar to help out with earnings later.
And John Deere, Caterpillar, Verizon and AT&T were vocal opponents of ObamaCare, and now they are just using these charges for accounting gimmickry. And to make a statement.
But don't let the facts get in with a good hysterical story by the bears.
But then again, now that the NASDAQ has risen 100%, the S&P 80% and every other emerging market 80-90-10-110% across the globe, these astute, intelligent, tea-party toting bears bring out their magic math nwhile still callling this a bull rally in a secular bear market!!
That being said, Denninger is always a great read.
Which is more than he would ever say about this.
But a good read, and calling the market are two different things!
Did anyone think that maybe people were finally get bored of the rates for Govvie paper?
The WSJ had a picture of the White House behind bars, as it came out with this article:
A sudden drop-off in investor demand for U.S. Treasury notes is raising questions about whether interest rates will finally begin a march higher—a climb that would jack up the government's borrowing costs and spell trouble for the fragile housing market.
For months, investors have focused their attention on the debt crisis in Europe, but there are signs the spotlight is turning to the ability of the U.S. to finance its own budget deficit.
This week, some investors turned up their noses at three big U.S. Treasury offerings. Demand was weak for a $44 billion 2-year note auction on Tuesday, a $42 billion sale of 5-year debt on Wednesday and a $32 billion 7-year note sale Thursday.
Why would anyone own this paper anyway?
But Japan pulled back from buying since their fiscal year ends on March 31, and the world's biggest "currency manipulator" China, probably did the same, just to get Uncle Sam's attention.
So all this talk about failed auctions, will be just that.
It's already up to 4--And like Tiger's girls, the latest has hired Gloria Allred to represent her.
Show me the money!
Here's what Gloria Allred said in her money shakedown:
“He pursued her and had strong feeling for her. She is in the process of trying to decide if she will come forward. She has proof of their relationship including hundreds of text messages, emails and photos. The relationship JUST RECENTLY ENDED after the scandal broke."
Gloria Allred is now the defacto pimp middleman for those who didn't hire a pro in the first place.
Oh My! I thought this wasn't supposed to happen! It's just one big happy bailed out world!
BRUSSELS (AP) -- Greece won a major pledge of financial support from the other countries that use the euro and the International Monetary Fund in a deal that aims to halt a government debt crisis undermining confidence in Europe's currency union.
The joint eurozone and IMF bailout program comes with strict conditions and makes no money available right now.
It could be tapped only if Greece or other financially troubled eurozone members cannot raise funds from financial markets. It would require the unanimous agreement of the 16 eurozone countries to release the loan funds.
The deal at a summit meeting Thursday night in Brussels was a clear victory for German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who had taken a tough line on any bailout. She demanded that a rescue for Greece only come when the country runs out of other options and said it must include the IMF.
It was also a comedown for the French and the European Central Bank, which had opposed turning to the IMF out of fear it would damage the euro's prestige and show that Europe was unable to solve its own financial woes.
These three important conditions render an immediate negative answer when viewed from an investor’s lens focused on Greece for instance: 1) Greece can’t issue debt in its own currency, 2) its initial conditions and demographics are abominable, and 3) its central bank – The ECB – believes in positive, not negative, real interest rates. Greece therefore must extend a beggar’s bowl to the European Union or the IMF because the private market vigilantes have simply had enough. Without guarantees or the promise of long-term assistance, Prime Minister Papandreou’s promise of fiscal austerity falls on deaf ears. Similarly, the Southern European PIGS face a difficult future environment as its walls whisper “the house needs more money, the house needs more money.” It will not come easily, and if it does, it will come at increasingly higher cost, either in the form of higher interest rates, fiscal frugality, or both.
CASES of syphilis have increased four-fold in Britain's Facebook capital as users meet up for unprotected sex, it was revealed yesterday. Figures released last month showed that people in Sunderland, Durham and Teesside were 25 per cent more likely to log on regularly. And an NHS trust chief said Facebook and similar sites were to blame for a shocking rise in cases of potentially-lethal syphilis in the region. Professor Peter Kelly, director of Public Health for NHS Tees, said: "There has been a four-fold increase in the number of syphilis cases detected, with more young women being affected." He said staff had found a link to social networking sites among those infected.
we have reviewed numerous option filings by Facebook, and some of those prices of the common listed on these typically fell within a 75% to 80% discount as to the most recent round of Preferred Stock that had been issued. So, where are we going with this? The latest option filing that was filed in January 2010 priced the common at $16.17. If, and this is a big IF, we assume this price falls within a discount range applied to the pricing of some of the previous filings, this would bring the per share value of the latest round of Preferred Stock issued in May 2009 to $80.85. Using that share price and the total estimated fully diluted shares that we have calculated, this gives Facebook, Inc. a value of close to $35 BB.
This market is resoundingly hated by traders, bears and the public, but it is lovingly embraced by the long only mutual fund managers. Wall Street hates non-volatility, as it makes trading and profit opportunities that much more difficult, so sometimes they try and create it.
And so today, once again, we have another reversal day.
Big deal. In a few days, we'll have end of the quarter mark up days, and the bears beating their chest today, won't be able to button up their pants.
Until they puke out the shorts they laid out today!
And the long only funds will once again, force the bears to come to Pappa!
That's what the bears have got. The last six weeks. Just 4 hours. Just four hours of selling pressure in this market, according to Sentimentrader.com.
But every intra-day swoon, makes these pikers gasp, and any gap down opening, allows them to beat their drums!
Let's look at reality. People sell a book touting a four-hour work week, but we get just four hours of selling in six weeks, and yet the Cassandras are still yapping?
So why even bother? Yesterday the Euro hit its lowest level (1.33)since the bears began telling us that the a rally of the dollar would crush this market. They've been saying that since 1.52!
And now, the lead clown, Nouril Roubini, who said before that we had a 66% chance of a Great Depression,now says that their is a 50% chance that we are going to call China a currency manipulator, and that we are on a collision course with them? (pic courtesy Businessinsider.com)
When can someone bet against his bets? When will he put some money up, when he runs off at the mouth like that?
Let's look at the facts. We buy poisoned toothpaste from China, we buy poisoned drywall from China, we buy poisoned baby food from China, and China sells poisoned milk to the world.
But do we do anything? And now we are going to tell China, who holds $800 billion of our paper, that they are a currency manipulator, just because--OMG---Google redirects traffic from China to Hong Kong?
Give me a break!
Did anyone see GOOG reverse to the upside yesterday? So now the world is going to collapse around China, because one of the greatest crybaby capitalists in the world, GOOG, is pretending that they are doing no evil?
Well, compared to Roubini, I guess they're not.
But when will he ever admit that he's missed this entire rally, and that he's been dead wrong?
When will he clean up after himself?
Even "5,000 Dow" and 4% annual equity returns, Bill Gross came out on CNBC yesterday, and finally admitted that stocks now were a better buy than bonds.
But Roubini? He gets a free pass.
Not here! He's just full of what the dog decided to clean up!
Dick Bove was out talking up the bank stocks saying they could quadruple by 2012.
March 24 (Bloomberg) -- Bank stocks, the leaders of the biggest U.S. market rally since the 1930s, may quadruple over the next two to three years as loan defaults decrease, according to Dick Bove of Rochdale Securities LLC.
“Stocks are going to go much higher,” Bove, who is based in Lutz, Florida, said in a telephone interview. “The catalyst is the reduction in loan losses. That’s all that investors in banks care about.”
Now before you dismiss this as just happy poppycock, did anyone notice that the SEC was sniffing around at the hedge funds who shorted bank stocks before their offerings?
WSJ Federal regulators are probing bets made against stocks before new offerings, in inquiries focused on hedge funds including Appaloosa Management LP and Carlson Capital LP.
Appaloosa, a $13 billion New Jersey firm run by David Tepper, has been scrutinized by the Securities and Exchange Commission over trades it made around the time Wells Fargo & Co. agreed to acquire Wachovia Corp. in 2008, according to people familiar with the matter.
If you bet with the banks, and you bet with this economy, and you bet bullish, the regulators will leave you alone. The sacred cows of a fiat system, and our economy, are the banks. Look at Bank of America. They were engaging in their own version of Repo 105s, and then yesterday, they announced primcipal forgiveness on mortgages. Who wants to look at their books, when they throw a sop to the underwater homeowner?
And if you don't like the banks, you can always buy Visa. Moore Capital, probably puked up its Mastercard stock the other day, and now Visa looks ready to roll again. Anyone who sold V, on the MA reversal, will be scrambling to cover the short they laid out. It's set up perfectly on the charts.
Another stock ready to roll is Hartford Financial. And I've been touting this stock since 6, so cut me some slack--so I'm no Johnny-come lately to this name. Go ahead--check it out -on March 12, last year! Book is still $36, and they just sold 55 million shares at $27.75, led by Goldman and JP Morgan. The shorts pressed the stock down, hoping that a break of that print would cause a scramble, and also make the market "think" that these secondary offerings weren't well received. That's just another dumb and stupid by the brilliant shortsellers, who are the black swan of this market. (Did any see the follow on offering of Massey Energy (MEE) which was priced at $49.75? The stock closed at 52.76. So much for that theory!)They have the biggest rally, that they will ever see in their lifetime, and yet, each and every day, they see something they don't like.
Well, I see something I don't like each and every day in this market also. Except its just the shortsellers, who continue to amaze me with their stupidity!
In this market, the one with the most outlandish bullish bet, and the most outlandish forecast is the one that wins. Oh wait that sounds like something I said last May! When it wasn't popular to be bullish, but when it was popular to believe in Depressions!
This economy, and this stock market, will reward the most outlandish bull, and the most bullish economic forecasts. It's not a market, or an economy for the timid....Today, this strategy will be known as reckless. Next year, it will be deemed prescient.
As advertised again!!!
But if you want too read about the Great Delusion, it is right here. And, while I'm at it, let me just give you a quote that I said in January:
Delusions, it has been noted, begin early and spread widely. And now they're being spread again. Trifling, beggarly, scant, meager, miserely, piddling...take your pick...choose your adjective...just make sure it is synonymous with plebeian, because that is what the biggest loudmouth intellectuals on the market are telling us will be the returns for stock investors for 2010.
The same intellectuals that touted the Depression last year.
No one learned last year's lesson? What happened to all those Depression stories? Or the Depression books checked out at the libraries? The books are back on the shelves! Google "depression" and now you'll get a prescription! And along with the Depression came the tribulations of Armageddon! What happened to that? Now there's not even a peep or a reference to their folly! So now, this year we have the Great Delusion. The delusion of the bears. And once again, they're following the script of the 666 market. They're trotting out the Great Delusion before its time!
You may not like it--but you better deal with.
Because to stay sane, you need to get bullish!
And quite buying into the Great Delusion before it's time!
The Abomination of Desolation , in this case, is just the parting of the money from the bears pockets!
So much for that crisis. $80 oil cures a lot of ills.
WSJ
DUBAI—Dubai's government Thursday said it will inject about $9.5 billion into Dubai World and real-estate developer Nakheel while offering creditors a full repayment financed by fresh borrowing over eight years.
Aidan Birkett, Dubai World's chief restructuring officer, said that banks have given a positive response so far to the plan to repay up to $26 billion of debt, adding that "it's a very attractive deal for creditors."
Markets reacted positively to the plans, which follow months of doubt over whether Dubai World can pay its debts. Dubai's benchmark stock index closed up 4.3% to 1845.21. Dubai's five-year credit default swap rate tightened by about 0.50 percentage point to around 3.5 to 3.75 percentage points.
------
Dubai's market rocketed 4.3% on this news.
The other day Victor Neiderhoffer's Daily Speculations website had some investment advice, that ended with this conclusion:
Always hire a pro to second you when you are playing tennis or investing. The pro makes you look good and can always win his serve and two or three points on the return of serve. It's important not to make a fool of yourself when doing something you're not so good at, as people mistakenly think your abilities in one thing are related to your abilities in another. (People, including myself, have mistakenly made that mistake about me, thinking that because I was so good at hardball squash I might be almost as good at something else).
Someone commented with these:
1. Invest in stuff you do not understand. The Complexity Premium will carry you for awhile, see Enron and Alphabet Soup of securitization for proof. In the mean time people will think you are really smart and that is why you out perform in the short term.
2. Never let someone go over your long term results. Focus on what you just bought in any analysis or comparison.
4. Blow up only when the economy stinks, that way you have a good excuse. Many decent years followed by one excusable bad year. The opposite of course can apply to hedge fund guys. Only have one spectacular year, and everybody will think you out smarted the optimist.
5. If someone models your risks and says it is too high, call the models garbage. After all nobody could model the stuff you bought.
6. Buy everything complex from your friend you played on the same intramural team in college. After all he has a McMansion and would never hurt a friend. He has great contacts, and loves being the middle man and controlling what you and your boss sees. Besides he will then take you to all the greatest golf courses when you are in town.
7. Call being in front of the herd, "herd following" and "group thinking". But bottom selling and top ticking is simply an irrational market and bad economy. If you are in front and something goes wrong, you simply look stupid. But if you get caught at the tail, nobody could have seen it coming, because everybody was doing the same thing.
8. Always be quick with a joke, but make sure it is at somebody Else's expense, not your own.
9. The better people are, the more you need to dig to find their weakness. Once it is found, make sure to define them by this problem.
10. Never win at golf, but prove your expertise in the clubhouse by knowing your liquor. Be sure to always be in the "power" group when you play and drink.
11. Make sure you are friends with your bosses mistress…you never know when you will need to call in a favor and have someone fired.
12. Control the minutes of every investment meeting, nobody reads them anyway, but it is a great way to not have to do something you do not want to, but those in charge want you too.
What a great top twelve! And since these folks like squash, I'm returning the favor as I've found a teacher for them!
FEMALE suicide bombers are being fitted with exploding breast implants which are almost impossible to detect, British spies have reportedly discovered.
The shocking new al-Qaeda tactic involves radical doctors inserting the explosives in women's breasts during plastic surgery — making them "virtually impossible to detect by the usual airport scanning machines".
It is believed the doctors have been trained at some of Britain's leading teaching hospitals before returning to their own countries to perform the surgical procedures.
MI5 has also discovered that extremists are inserting the explosives into the buttocks of some male suicide bombers.
Lethal
Terrorist expert Joseph Farah claims: "Women suicide bombers recruited by al-Qaeda are known to have had the explosives inserted in their breasts under techniques similar to breast enhancing surgery."
The lethal explosives called PETN are inserted inside plastic shapes during the operation, before the breast is then sewn up.
The discovery of these methods was made after London-educated Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab came close to blowing up an airliner in the US on Christmas Day.
He had stuffed explosives inside his underpants.
Hours after he had failed, Britain's intelligence services began to pick up "chatter" emanating from Pakistan and Yemen that alerted MI5 to the creation of the lethal implants.
The small cap spec play on this is Valley Forge. (VLYF). I had posted a video of their technology when it was on Fox on January 14. Here's that clip.
Their technology was developed in conjunction with Livermore Labs. The company website is here.
RPM2 Inc, a New Delhi, India based company, represents Valley Forge for all VLYF related security products. They are in talks with several major airports in India as well as the Bureau of Civil Aviation in New Delhi to bring in the ODIN. Currently, discussions are ongoing with the AERB in Mumbai, for demonstration dates and for formal approval.
As with any small cap name, you need to do your own due diligence.
