China Goes Green, Dumps Hummer

by The Investment U Research Team

In what may be one of the sickest cases of irony we’ve seen this year, China has decided to block Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co from buying General Motor’s (OTC: GMGMQ) Hummer brand for – wait for it – environmental concerns.

We’ll give you time to stop laughing.

We know. It’s pretty much what we thought. China has a well-deserved reputation for being one of the most polluted nations in the world. It’s cities round out the worst of the worst lists.

But apparently there is a strong push inside the great wall to at least appear like they’re doing something. They’ve cut back the construction on a number of projects like the Xiaonanhai dam and the Yunnan

General Motor's bankruptcy is all but a sure thing, and with it, the company's 81-year run as a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average will come to a merciful end.

According to Reuters, sources say that GM (NYSE: GM) will likely file for bankruptcy some time after midnight tonight and before June 1. The company has apparently failed to convince bondholders to exchange their debt for an equity stake in a restructured company, ensuring the bankruptcy filing.

(In an interesting quirk, the AP reports that many bondholders hold credit default swaps on their GM debt. If the company files for bankruptcy, these CDS swaps will be triggered. The Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. says these CDS swaps will pay out $2.33 billion if the company enters bankrupt. Talk about perverse incentives.)

As always, I can't help but to speculate

Asian stocks declined Tuesday after North Korea test fired two missiles, heightening geopolitical tensions in the region.  The move, coming a day after the communist regime's nuclear test drew widespread criticism, added to investor worries that the recent rally in stocks may be overdone.  The aftershocks reverberated through the markets on Tuesday with neighboring South Korea's Kospi declining more than 2%.  The Nikkei 225 Stock Average in Japan edged 0.4% lower.  Benchmarks in India, China, Hong Kong and Taiwan also declined.   

U.S. markets enter the holiday-shortened week with a number of key economic data that is likely to be of market moving potential.  Troubled automaker General Motor's (NYSE:GM) fate will also be in focus.  Stock futures point to a lower open on the Wall Street.  Dow Jones industrial average futures fell 10, or 0.1%, to 8,250. Standard & Poor's 500 index futures fell 1.40, or 0.2%, to 883.50.

Asian stocks declined Tuesday after North Korea test fired two missiles, heightening geopolitical tensions in the region.  The move, coming a day after the communist regime's nuclear test drew widespread criticism, added to investor worries that the recent rally in stocks may be overdone.  The aftershocks reverberated through the markets on Tuesday with neighboring South Korea's Kospi declining more than 2%.  The Nikkei 225 Stock Average in Japan edged 0.4% lower.  Benchmarks in India, China, Hong Kong and Taiwan also declined.   

U.S. markets enter the holiday-shortened week with a number of key economic data that is likely to be of market moving potential.  Troubled automaker General Motor's (NYSE:GM) fate will also be in focus.  Stock futures point to a lower open on the Wall Street.  Dow Jones industrial average futures fell 10, or 0.1%, to 8,250. Standard & Poor's 500 index futures fell 1.40, or 0.2%, to 883.50.

The Dow Jones Industrial rallied late, moving up 0.60% on the day, making it the only major index up for the day.  The NASDAQ was down -0.88% closing at 1715.92, with the S&P also down, falling -0.10% to close at 908.35.  In futures news, both gold and crude oil were up settling at $923.90 and $58.85, respectively.  The 10-year price rallied today as the Fed purchased bonds, the yield fell to 3.176%.

In automotive news, six General Motor [GM: 1.15, -0.29 (-20.14%)] executives took advantage of the trading window and sold 205,000 shares of GM stock.  The Securities and Exchange Commission reported that the executives sold off their entire holdings of the company for a reported $315,000.  These top executives took advantage of the selling window as their stocks value would have been severely handicapped if they had waited for the next window, either by having their value diluted from a debt-for-equity swap or be

With U.S. employers cutting fewer jobs in April and banks' stress test results throwing up less-than-expected surprises, U.S. stocks advanced helping S&P 500 erase this year's losses and tech-heavy Nasdaq recorded its ninth straight weekly gain.  Reassuring signs emerging from the employment front indicated the economy is starting to find its footing as even a $75 billion deficit in capital failed to deter investors.  Stock buyers helped broad-based S&P 500 end the week 5.9% higher - the index is up 37% from a 12-year low hit on March 9. During the week, the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 362.24 points, or 4.4%, to 8,574.65. The Chicago Board Options Exchange Volatility Index, a measure of market volatility, declined 9.2% to 32.05. Volume on the NYSE was a heavy 1.9 billion as advancing issues outpacing declining stocks by a five-to-one margin. Among S&P sector groupings, financials were the leading gainers

It’s becoming clear that subprime lending wasn’t limited to the housing market. Companies in the auto-loan business are battling hard to keep their heads above water. Andrew Snyder says small firms like AmeriCredit (NYSE:ACF), United PanAm (NASDAQ:UPFC) and Consumer Portfolio Services (NASDAQ:CPSS) will struggle to survive.

This from Today’s Financial News:

If you thought lending in the home-mortgage lending industry was tight, you will be shocked by the woes in the auto-lending world. This subprime debacle is destroying one company after the other.

Just this morning, GMAC (NYSE:GJM) announced it has stopped issuing car loans in seven European countries. October 31 will be the last day for folks from Finland, Norway, Greece, the

It’s becoming clear that subprime lending wasn’t limited to the housing market. Companies in the auto-loan business are battling hard to keep their heads above water. Andrew Snyder says small firms like AmeriCredit (NYSE:ACF), United PanAm (NASDAQ:UPFC) and Consumer Portfolio Services (NASDAQ:CPSS) will struggle to survive.

This from Today’s Financial News:

If you thought lending in the home-mortgage lending industry was tight, you will be shocked by the woes in the auto-lending world. This subprime debacle is destroying one company after the other.

Just this morning, GMAC (NYSE:GJM) announced it has stopped issuing car loans in seven European countries. October 31 will be the last day for folks from Finland, Norway, Greece, the