Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez is known for his erratic behavior, but his latest move to extend official recognition to Georgia's separatist regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia during his visit to Moscow is a bit of a head-scratcher.  In theory, it shouldn't come as a surprise, as probably the strongest predictor of Chávez's future behavior is anything perceived to be contrary to U.S. interests.  That includes sometimes illogical policies and relationships, such as red carpet welcomes for Sudan's Omar al-Bashir, cooperation with Iran on missile and nuclear technology, hugs for Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus, and tea parties with Coronel Muammar Qaddafi. 

What is strange is that Chávez waited a whole year before joining up with his surrogate state

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TODAY: Russia pushes for recogition of breakaway regions; Ukraine denies allegations of involvement in war; USSR plan to invade Manchester revealed; Russia's silent monuments to nuclear victims; Arctic Sea, dark spots. Russia's Foreign Ministry has reiterated a request that the sovereignty of breakaway Georgian regions Abkhazia and South Ossetia be internationally recognized.  Traditional partners Belarus and Kazakhstan have been silent on the matter; only Nicaragua has joined Russia's call.  Georgia's minister for refugees and accommodation has granted refugee status to a Russian soldier who deserted on July 1.  According to Bloomberg, Ukraine has denied claims that its soldiers fought alongside Georgian troops in last year's war.   ...

Russian Vice Prime Minister Igor Sechin's visit to Venezuela has concentrated on energy cooperation.  Gazprombank has agreed to offer a $4 billion loan to finance the development of minerals and other raw materials in the oil-rich nation.  The governments have also agreed to create a joint venture between PDVSA- Servicios, Venezuela's state owned oilfield services subsidiary, and Gazprom's Latin American division.  Sechin will also pursue energy cooperation in Nicaragua, where, the Russian ambassador to Managua says, 'there are very good prospects for prospecting and extracting oil on the Atlantic and Pacific shelves'.  Gazprom has announced that the Bolivian deposits it is exploring with Total SA and YPFB contain 285 billion cubic meters of natural gas.  Prime Minister Putin has proposed that VEB lend Gazprombank $2.41 billion.  Turkmenistan has promised Britain gas supplies once the Nabucco ...

Andrei Illarionov: "Interest in Venezuela - this is part of the big strategy"

Grigory Pasko, journalist

President of Russia Dmitry Medvedev recently carried out visits to the countries of Africa. Before this we observed his voyage to the countries of Latin America. What is this intense interest of the Russian president in such faraway countries brought about by? Why not seek friends and partners in business closer to Russia? Medvedev himself said it this way: "...We did not devote that much attention to sufficiently faraway continents, ones such as Africa, Latin America, but now we are simply duty-bound to do this. This is our close-in-spirit neighbors, this is countries that we really have helped and which, on the

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The bigger board resource stocks continued to ascend to higher levels but the more junior exploration stocks fell victim to a lack of buyers during Monday’s session on the Canadian Markets. For the tale of the tape, the TSX Exchange added 0.84%, while the TSX Gold Index tacked on 0.4% and the TSX Venture Exchange, Canada’s largest junior exploration bourse, lost 0.54% with the decliners edging out the advancers by a 443 to 342 margin on 161 million shares traded.

North American Tungsten is temporarily suspending production form its CanTung tungsten mine in the Northwest Territories starting October 15 due to declining prices. North American ended the day down C$0.035 at C$0.125.

Fortress Minerals cut 40 metres of 3.68 grams gold per tonne at its Amy prospect in Russia. Fortress ended the day up C$0.03 at C$0.35.

Centamin Egypt has poured its first gold from the Sukari Hill gold mine

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The BBC looks at the cold snap hitting Russia's economy, which contracted by 9.5% in the first quarter, the worst shrinkage in 15 years, with GDP shrinking by 23% from the previous quarter.  Alfa bank cut its predictions for Russia's economy to a 5.7% contraction after output decreased in the first quarter.  The Moscow Times reports that the strong performance of the Russian stock market could be heading for a tumble.  Putin has tried to show support to Russia's ailing automobile industry by showing off his Lada; the Prime Minister also claimed it on his expenses, whilst many other politicians prefered foreign luxury cars.  GAZ buses have had a photo opportunity in Nicaragua, which has received a gift of 130 buses from Russia to assuage their pubic transport problems.  Workers at St. Petersburg's Ford Motor ...

With the U.S. stimulus package in place and the politically contentious cap-and-trade program looming, one sector is poised to benefit from both measures. Calling it the “Rodney Dangerfield” of renewable energies, Greg Reid, director of Clean Technology at Wellington West Capital Markets, says geothermal doesn’t get a lot of respect right now—but that’s about to change. In this exclusive interview with The Energy Report, Greg discusses how the political push, and monetary allocation, for clean energy are aligning the political and social stars over geothermal.

The Energy Report: Greg, in one of your articles, you call geothermal the “sleeping giant” of renewable energy. What makes geothermal so interesting to you?

Greg Reid: I think the political and social stars are starting to align here. One of the key things is political will. You now have the governments that are pushing renewable energy. There was a lot of concern that as …

Investing in Crude Oil: The Best Way to Play Oil’s Imminent Rebound

by Louis Basenese, Advisory Panelist
Senior Analyst, The Oxford Club

Billionaire investor George Soros and I don’t normally see eye to eye. He supports drug decriminalization, assisted suicide, America bashing… and a host of other off-the-reserve liberal causes.

I don’t. I’m an old-school Reagan conservative. (Full disclosure – I’m so old school, I named my first born after the late President.)

But here’s the thing. When it comes to investing, great political divides matter little. Because it’s not about getting our guy elected or unashamedly pushing a partisan agenda.

Instead, business – and by extension, investing in businesses – is only about increasing profits, as Milton Friedman put it. And based on the latest SEC filing for Soros’ hedge fund, we both agree on the best way for investing in crude oil’s imminent rebound…

Interested in Making Money

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Remember our dictum: the force of a correction is equal and opposite to the deception that preceded it.

As we looked out over the absurd hallucinations, delusions and lies of the Bubble Years – oh, those happy days! – we warned that the coming correction “would be a doozy.”

And a doozy it is.

‘Doozy’ is a technical term we feral economists use. “Depression” is what most people call it.

“Slump worst for 50 years,” is the big headline in the Financial Times over the weekend.

“Data reveal recession worst than feared.”

And the full weight of it has yet to fall upon the economy. A correction takes times…especially when it is not merely a cyclical recession, but a structural depression. The whole structure of the world’s economy is being reshaped. The banking system is insolvent. Thousands of businesses are broke. Millions of households are upside down financially. Joblessness is rising into the tens of

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As the last country highlighted by Emerginvest in 2008, Costa Rica holds a place as one of the best markets to have invested in – both in terms of relative performance for the last year, as well as strong growth in the last month.

Nestled between Nicaragua and Panama, south of Mexico, Costa Rica lays claim to only 4.3 million people, and a national GDP of approximately $21 billion. The economy is mainly driven by three industries: a widespread agricultural sector which accounts for 8.7% of the GDP, a strong industrial sector (producing items such as electronic components, food processing, textiles, etc), which accounts for 28.9% of GDP, and an extremely deep tourism and services sector which accounts for 62.4% of GDP. Their stock exchange, the Bolsa Nacional de Valores, has been in operation for the last 29 years.

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