Bloomberg files this report on the recent rise of insider selling, company executives dumping the most shares since mid-2007, shortly before the broad stock market’s peak.
Executives at U.S. companies are taking advantage of the biggest stock-market rally in 71 years to sell their shares at the fastest pace since credit markets started to seize up two years ago.
Insiders of Standard & Poor’s 500 Index companies were net sellers for 14 straight weeks as the gauge rose 36 percent, data compiled by InsiderScore.com show.
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Sales by CEOs, directors and senior officers have accelerated to the highest level since June 2007, two months before credit markets froze, as the S&P 500 rebounded from its 12-year low in March. The increase is making investors more skittish because executives presumably have the best information about their companies’ prospects.Surely this can’t be a good development for your typical retail investor, many of whom have just recently convinced themselves that it’s OK to put some money back into stocks again.
The good news is that the 2007 stock market peak didn’t occur until some four months after insider selling peaked in June. Here we are, almost exactly two years later, and it appears that the timing could be again aligned for a fall season that does not treat equity markets kindly.
Why is insider selling so important? It’s quite simple…
“If insiders are selling into the rally, that shows they don’t expect their business to be able to support current stock- price levels,” said Joseph Keating, the chief investment officer of Raleigh, North Carolina-based RBC Bank, the unit of Royal Bank of Canada that oversees $33 billion in client assets. “They’re taking advantage of this bounce and selling into it.”
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“They’re looking to take some money off the table because they think the rally will come to an end,” said Ben Silverman, the Seattle-based research director at InsiderScore. “It’s the most bearish we’ve seen insiders, on a whole, in two years.”
The last time there were more U.S. corporations with executives reducing their holdings than adding to them was during the week ended June 19, 2007, the data show. The next month, two Bear Stearns Cos. hedge funds filed for bankruptcy protection as securities linked to subprime mortgages fell apart, helping trigger almost $1.5 trillion in losses and writedowns at the world’s biggest financial companies and the 57 percent drop in the S&P 500 from Oct. 9, 2007, to March 9, 2009.
There’s much more information in the report about stock sales at individual companies, but, perhaps the most important detail is that insider selling reached an all-time record back in the first quarter of 2000, as the 18-year bull market in stocks reached its climax, the official demarcation point between “dotcom” and “dotbomb”.
How to Create a Mind-Controlled Slave — by Fritz Springmeier & Cisco Wheeler See the 12 chapters below for the whole book. Note that a copy of these files was found in the internet archive. Further note that Fritz Springmeier and his wife were arrested by the FBI in the spring of 2001 whereby all their research material was confiscated.
Chapter 1 — The Science of Victim Selection & Preparation
Chapter 2 — The Science of Traumatizing and Torturing the Victim
Alexander Emerick Jones is an American paleoconservativeradio host and documentary filmmaker. His nationally syndicated talk show (titled The Alex Jones Show) airs via the Genesis Communication Network on over 60 AM, FM, and Short Wave radio stations across the United States, as well as having a large internet based audience. Alex Jones has been referred to as a “conspiracy theorist” by mainstream media outlets, while Russia Today has referred to him as an investigative journalist. Alex Jones was born February 11, 1974.
The elite put Alex Jones in place to be the leader and symbol of the alternative media.
Alex Jones repeatedly attacks the idea that TV Fakery was used on 9/11. It has become obvious to serious investigators of 9-11 that no airplanes were used in the attack. Is Alex Jones naive to catch on, or is he deliberately covering up evidence that links the mainstream media to 9-11?
Indeed, Alex Jones would appear to have a clear motive for wanting to cover up the media’s role in 9-11. His network, GCN Live, has close ties to ABC News. In fact, ABC NY provides satellite broadcasting services for The Alex Jones Show. Some say that this is only a business deal, and is not very important… but think about it — why would part of the controlled media provide satellites to a network that was dangerous to them?
This is easily explained by considering that Alex Jones is not really on the side of real truth. His job is to distract us from following the most important people in the world… the Jesuits.
ABC is owned by Walt Disney, which has had a Jesuit priest on it’s board of directors since 1996. This brings us to the question of why Jones is seemingly reluctant to talk about the role of the Society of Jesus in world corruption.
When Alex Jones released his famous “Dark Secrets: Inside Bohemian Grove” film, he gave us detailed background information about the Grove, yet, for some reason he left out the fact that Roman Catholic masses take place at the Grove, and that the Bohemian Club’s patron saint is John of Nepomuk, a Roman Catholic figure who symbolizes the Seal of Confession. The story of John of Nepomuk was developed by Bohuslav Balbín, a Jesuit.
Alex Alex Jones’ suspicious connections do not end there. He has close ties with the John Birch Society. His father was a member of JBS and he had it’s President, John F. McManus, on his show. McManus was trained by Jesuits at Holy Cross College and was involved in US Air Force Weapons Development.
The Best Video on the New Age Movement ever made. An eye-opening film of the Yoga Meditation, Eastern Mysticism, psychological Therapy, Self-Help, Mind Control and much more… Explores the eerie world of ego-maniacal gurus and their western counterparts, New Agers. The definitive work. Explores its birth, its invasion, and its effect on western society. It explores the pagan roots of eastern mysticism, meditation, yoga, and more. An eye-opening expose of the New Age movement. Shows how it was conceived in the early 1960’s at a planning session by Hindu gurus in India as a means of converting Americans to Eastern mysticism. The seemingly innocuous devices used range from Yoga meditation to a belief in reincarnation. We are given an extraordinary inside glimpse into cult mentality and mindless obedience (opening up to demonic possession), and we see how an outright attack against traditional American beliefs has been successfully launched, not only from Hindu missionaries, but from unsuspecting Americans who have accepted the surface manifestations of this religion as trendy and fun. The film covers the chilling parallels between the belief structure in today’s New Age subculture and that in Hitler’s Third Reich two generations ago. 1 hour 43 minutes.’ With explosive facts, it explains why yoga, meditation, psychologiaI therapy and self-help are turning millions to a pagan world view. This film expores the eerie world of ego-maniacal gurus and their western counterpats, New Agers. In a series of exclusive, candid interviews, we share the thoughts of “master” and witness the blind devotion and mindless obedience of “disciple.” Gods of the New Age takes us from a clandestine, early sixties planning meeting held by Indian gurus to today’s dignified U.S corridors, American schoolrooms and Christian churches. The film uncovers the chilling parallels between today’s Western culture. and the similar climate that bred Hitler’s Third Reich a generation ago! “This is the most powerful Christian documentary I have ever seen!” –Rabi Maharaj, author of The Death of a Guru THE NEW AGE MOVEMENT, YOGA, DEVIL WORSHIP: THE RISE OF SATANISM and EVOLUTION
We all know I have been warning of this bear market rally. I know it has been a rough ride, but at the end of the day, a dollar is a dollar and a loss is a loss. I do hope nobody is surprised. This may not even be the end of the bear market rally, but the internals have been looking weak for the last week or two, and we all know how I felt about the fundamentals and the macro outlook.
ECB warning prompts shift from equities. Risk appetite suffered a sharp deterioration on Monday as fresh uncertainty about the global economy and the financial system prompted investors to shift away from equities, commodities and emerging market assets into the perceived safety of government bonds and the dollar.
Eurozone banks face additional losses of more than $283bn this year and next as continental Europe’s severe recession intensifies strains on its financial sector, the European Central Bank has warned.
The fates of the eurozone economy and its banks have become increasingly interlinked, the ECB reported on Monday in its latest “financial stability review” with banks losses expected to be focused on their loan exposures. Risks to the stability of the financial sector remained high, it said, while “uncertainty prevails” over the shock-absorbing capacity of the banking system.
And from that bastion of unbiased reporting, CNBC: Asian Markets Slide, Optimism May Be Misplaced
No need to worry, we still have reasons to be bullish in the media. Check this out:
From WSJ’s Market Beat:
Rochdale Research analyst Richard Bove’s weekend note on Bank of America got a bit of attention today, largely for the section in which he writes “Bank of America is now experiencing horrific loan losses. It may have loan loss provisions of $46 billion this year.”
As Jon Ogg over at 24/7 Wall Street notes, the core call of the note is surprisingly positive. Bove upped his price target on Bank of America shares to $19 from $14, citing growing confidence in management. Bove also kept his “Buy” rating on the stock and wrote that Bank of America’s purchase of Merrill Lynch — and even Countrywide — will help it offset the losses it’s suffering on loans.
Concerning those losses, Bove has a couple interesting observations as to why Bank of America’s loan losses may be more pronounced than some competitors:
A key to the company’s success in driving its operating costs lower has been the implementation of automated systems and uniform products. The reduction in labor intensity in the process has carried with it a reduction in the personalized approach to lending.
The credit card industry or auto lending are examples of this process. Credit card loans are in fact personal loans that historically were provided after a customer spoke with a loan officer who generally knew the client’s background. Now the bank provides the loans to people it has never met and never interacted with using a systemized process. This is also true of automobile loans and in many cases of mortgages and home equity lines of credit.
These systems, now many decades old, are widely supported by consumers and have combined to lower the cost of originating loans and in increasing loan volumes. The problem with these systems is that they fail to detect changes in the borrower’s condition until losses start to appear. Then it is generally too late so that losses soar before the bank gains control of the process once again.
This is now happening throughout the industry and to a greater degree at Bank of America.
Countrywide is a veritable boiling cauldron of putrid assets and potentially devastating liabilities that are actually labeled as assets. Merrill Lynch was collapsing under its own weight in real time and BofA needed government assistance to close the deal. Bove says that these companies will help offset the losses it (BofA) is suffering on its loans, but the loans it is suffering from stem largely in part from Merrill and Countrywide. Circular logic moving in an ovular pattern????
by Justice Litle, Editorial Director, Taipan Publishing Group June 10, 2009
Among its many other sins, the greenback is a press hog. The world’s reserve currency, loved and loathed as it is, simply gets most of the ink these days.
In that light many a U.S.-based commentator, not least your cynical Taipan Daily scribes, have repeatedly waxed eloquent on the long-run death of the dollar.
But in our zeal we sometimes forget that, in order for the dollar to die, it has to die relative to other fiat currency offerings… and some of those others are looking pretty sick too. (The main exception, of course, being gold – the one and only “stateless currency” not subject to the whims of a printing press. As Grant’s Interest Rate Observer quips, “Show us a monetary asset whose value is not subject to governmental debasement and we will show you a Krugerrand.”)
In short, the dollar is not the only basket case out there. Take the euro, for example. Now there’s a troubled currency if ever one existed.
As pollyanna stock market bulls are finding out the hard way, rising interest rates (via falling bond prices) can have ugly consequences. The same is true of a rising currency when coupled with a weak economic backdrop.
In this particular case, the stronger the euro gets, the more it cuts into European export sales. At a time when most all of Europe is sick, the economic pain of a too-strong currency becomes intense above a certain threshold.
On top of that, various bits of Europe are in the process of blowing up… or falling apart… or both. There is deep trouble brewing in multiple corners of the continent. Let’s take a quick look on a country-by-country basis to see why Europe is being held together with duct tape.
Britain on the Brink
We’ll start with Britain – not an adopter of the euro, but a member of the EU (European Union) nonetheless.
Britain has been hurled into political chaos, thanks to an unholy combo of deep financial crisis, explosive Labour Party scandals, and the hapless lame-duck status of embattled Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Cabinet Ministers are resigning left and right in protest as Brown’s popularity plummets, calling for the PM to step down. Election results tallied this week showed the Labour Party (Brown’s party) putting in its worst showing since 1918.
June 03, 2009 “Information Clearing House” — Last week’s ructions in the bond market, leave little doubt that the financial crisis has entered a new and more lethal phase. Of particular concern is the spike in long-term Treasuries which are used to set interest rates on mortgages and other loans. On Thursday, the average rate for a 30-year fixed loan jumped from 5.03% to 5.44% in just two days. The sudden move put the mortgage market in a panic and stopped the refinancing of billions of dollars in loans. The yields on Treasuries are going up because investors see hopeful signs of recovery in the economy and are moving into riskier investments. More money is moving into equities which is why the stock markets have been surging lately. (The Federal Reserve’s multi-trillion dollar monetary stimulus has played a large part, as well.) The bottom line is that investors are looking for better returns than the paltry yields on government debt. That will make it harder for the Fed to sell up to $3 trillion in Treasuries in the next year to finance Obama’s proposed economic recovery plan. For now, foreign central banks are still buying enough short-term Treasuries to cover the current account deficit, but that could change in a flash, especially given Fed chief Bernanke’s propensity to print more money at the drop of a hat. That’s making foreign holders of dollar-based assets more jittery than ever.
Bernanke is in a bit of a pickle. He needs to sell boatloads of US debt, but if he raises interest rates; he’ll kill the recovery and send the stock market reeling. What to do? Eventually the Fed chief will arrive at the conclusion that there’s only two ways out of a credit bust of this magnitude; either raise rates and crush the economy or print more money and face a funding crisis. Either way, there’s a world of hurt ahead.
Here’s how economists Christian Broda, Piero Ghezzi and Eduardo Levy-Yeyati sum it up in their report “The New Global Balance: Financial de-globalisation, savings drain, and the US Dollar”: Read the rest of this entry »
