17Jul2015 Market Close: Afternoon Trading Moves Averages Into Positive Territory And NASDAQ Closes At Historic Highs

Wells Fargo wins dismissal of Chicago predatory lending lawsuit

(Reuters) – Wells Fargo & Co on Friday won the dismissal of a lawsuit by Cook County, Illinois that accused the largest U.S. mortgage lender of violating the federal Fair Housing Act by engaging in predatory lending practices in the Chicago area.

Attention Greek Bankers: Bridge In Brooklyn For Sale On The Cheap

Submitted by George Kinits of Alcimos

First of all, the facts. According to Ms. Danièle Nouy, head of the Single Supervisory Mechanism, Greek banks were proclaimed as recently as 7 June “to be solvent and liquid”. Ms. Nouy went on to say that “[t]he Greek supervisors have done good work over the past years in order to recapitalise and restructure the financial sector. That was also visible in the outcome of our stress test. The Greek institutions have experienced difficult phases in the past. But they have never before been so well prepared for them”. When pressed about the DTA/DTC issue facing Greek banks (DTA make up more than 40% of their capital), she seemed unperturbed: “That is not only a Greek issue but a general problem.[…] [W]e are now in a transitional phase, in which new capital rules are being introduced. When this has been completed, part of this problem will be fixed. But that requires a global approach”. Ms. Nouy’s view accords with the results of the ECB AQR back in October.

If you were a shareholder of a Greek bank, you wouldn’t lose sleep over your relationship with your regulator. In that context, the statement of the 12 July Euro Summit may have come as a shock—particularly the bit about the new program for Greece having to include “the establishment of a buffer …

Google pushes Nasdaq to record high

(Reuters) – The Nasdaq composite hit a new record high on Friday on strong results from Google while weak energy stocks weighed on the Dow and S&P 500.

Wheels: Trying to Win the Public’s Trust With Autonomous Cars, at 120 M.P.H.

Engineering a self-driving car is difficult enough. Now the public has to be convinced that the technology works.

Exclusive: Fiat Chrysler exploring $3.3 billion sale of auto parts unit Magneti Marelli

LONDON/MILAN (Reuters) – Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) is considering whether to sell its auto parts maker Magneti Marelli after receiving interest from potential buyers, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Mattel takes baby steps to recovery with Fisher-Price

(Reuters) – Mattel Inc’s turnaround plan is off to a crawling start.

Tesla adds new top and entry versions of Model S sedan

DETROIT (Reuters) – Tesla Motors Inc said it plans to offer new versions of its battery-powered Model S sedan, including a $70,000 entry version and a range-topping edition.

Iran Is Hiding 51 Million Oil Barrels At Sea, Maritime Tracker Reports

With yesterday’s appearance what seems like the first Iran oil tanker to set sail post-nuke-deal, Haaretz reports that Iran has been hiding millions of barrels of oil it never reported to the United States or in the world oil market, according to a company that has developed sophisticated maritime tracking technology. With the world’s fourth-largest oil reserves, Iran denies it’s storing oil at sea, despite reports that surfaced in The New York Times as early as 2012; but Ami Daniel, Windward founder and cochairman, shows “the Iranians are taking huge, 280-meter-long ships and filling them with oil, to sit at sea and wait. Because the sanctions allow for production of only three million barrels a day, they began storing the remainder… oil tankers have been sitting in the Gulf for anywhere between three and six months, just waiting for orders.”

Searching for ships that do not want to be found…

As Bloomberg explains, based in Tel Aviv, Windward was founded four years ago by two Israeli naval officers…

The algorithms Windward developed were initially intended to tackle illegal fishing by analyzing and profiling normative patterns in sea traffic. The entrepreneurs discovered that their technology could also be used to monitor unusual behavior near, say, oil-drilling ports in Libya.

These anomalies of maritime b …

Google gains billions in value as YouTube drives ad growth

(Reuters) – Google Inc’s shares soared as much as 16.8 percent on Friday, crossing the $700 mark and adding nearly $68 billion to its market value, as strong growth in YouTube viewership allayed concerns about Facebook Inc’s push into video.

GM’s Opel to cut output at two German plants over Russia

BERLIN (Reuters) – General Motors Co’s Opel division is to cut production at two German factories as it grapples with lost volume after exiting the plunging Russian market.

U.S. inflation, housing data bolster rate hike argument

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. consumer prices rose for a fifth straight month in June as the cost of gasoline and a range of other goods increased, further signs of firming inflation that strengthen the case for an interest rate hike this year.

Thank Goodness Everything’s Fixed

Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog,

The trick is to borrow as much as you can and leverage it to the hilt, and buy, buy, buy.

Thank goodness everything’s been fixed. Now that the bigshots in the Eurozone have given Greece the Humphrey Bogart treatment– When you’re slapped, you’ll take it and like it, Bogart’s line as he bullied Peter Lorre in The Maltese Falcon–and a chastened Greece is in line for another 17 billion, or is it 17 trillion, I’m losing track of the numbers … but anyways, it’s all fixed, and squeezing Greek pensioners was the trick needed to save Europe from itself.

Now everyone can get back to their summer vacations and the good life resumes. It doesn’t get much better than this.

That spot of bother in China’s stock market has been fixed by criminalizing negative comments about stocks, removing all the stocks that might sink further from trading and extending more margin to more banana vendors, so they can get rich quick. And since to get rich is glorious, we can anticipate thousands of banana vendors becoming millionaires and rushing to New York to buy a Manhattan cubbyhole for $2 million.

When stocks rise, everybody wins! Except those who can no longer afford to live in Manhattan, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Vancouver, etc., but hey, the path is open to them, too–just margin up to the hilt, mortgage your future and buy stocks now–the People’s Bank of China, the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank all have your back.

Thank goodness that brief sto …

Fed proposes tweaks to stress test rules for banks

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Federal Reserve on Friday proposed a rule to make changes to its annual exam of the financial health of the banks it oversees, the so-called stress tests.

Exclusive: Monsanto says any hostile bid for Syngenta some way off

ST. LOUIS, MO (Reuters) – Any hostile bid by Monsanto Co for Swiss rival Syngenta AG is some way off, the U.S. seed company’s president and chief operating officer told Reuters, adding he was focused on trying to secure a negotiated deal.