Morning Journal-The government-Wall Street connection

Economics

This Week’s Data

Weekly jobless claims fell 4,000 versus expectations of a 2,000 increase.
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2012/08/weekly-initial-unemployment-claims_9.html

The US June trade deficit came in at $42.9 billion versus estimates of $47.5 billion.

Other

Ken Rogoff (of Reinhart and Rogoff) on low interest rates (medium):
http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/how-long-for-low-rates-by-kenneth-rogoff

A response to the call for QEIII (medium):
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/guest-post-qe-forever-and-ever

Job openings continue to increase (short):
http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2012/08/june-job-openings-highest-in-four-years.html

Seven tricks your mind plays on you (medium):
http://lifehacker.com/5931962/7-tricks-your-mind-plays-on-you-and-how-to-fight-back

Used vehicle price index not looking good (short):
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/used-vehicle-prices-plunge-signaling-end-auto-party


Politics

Domestic

The problem with subsidies (short):
http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2012/08/why-taxpayer-subsidies-of-solar-are.html

More on your government at work (medium):
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2012/08/the-obama-administration-pays-illegal-aliens-to-come-here.php

A look at how the US financial crisis was (wasn’t) handled. This article gets into the weeds but clearly demonstrates the Washington/Wall Street connection (medium/long):
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2012/08/barofsky-v-geithner-and-administration-mouthpieces-yglesias-edition.html

International

China investing heavily in Africa (medium):
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/beijing-conference-see-how-china-quietly-took-over-africa

News on Stocks in Our Portfolios

More quarterly earnings per share reports:

Reported Expected

Expeditors Int’l $.30 $.34
HollyFrontier 2.39 2.32
Tom Horton .69 .69

Steve Cook received his education in investments from Harvard, where he earned an MBA, New York University, where he did post graduate work in economics and financial analysis and the CFA Institute, where he earned the Chartered Financial Analysts designation in 1973. His 40 years of investment experience includes institutional portfolio management at Scudder, Stevens and Clark and Bear Stearns. Steve's goal at Strategic Stock Investments is to help other investors build wealth and benefit from the investing lessons he learned the hard way.

U.S. weekly jobless claims drop 14,000 to 351,000

In the week ending March 10, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 351,000, a decrease of 14,000 from the previous week's revised figure of 365,000. 

The 4-week moving average was 355,750, unchanged from the previous week's revised average of 355,750.

The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.6 percent for the week ending March 3, a decrease of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week's unrevised rate of 2.7 percent.