Apparently U.N. inspectors have found 'nothing to be worried about' upon their first examination of the formerly clandestine uranium enrichment site in Qom in Iran.  'The [Obama] administration must consider whether it makes sense to grant the regime two more months of grace' says an op-ed in the Washington Post.  'Prospects for a breakthrough with Iran have narrowed dramatically since a high-level meeting in Geneva on Oct. 1', the paper adds, quoting a senior European diplomat.  Good news for Nord Stream - after considerable environmental concerns, it has received approval from both Finland and Sweden.  The construction of the Russia-Germany pipeline could spell the demise of Ukraine as a transit country, suggests the Wall Street Journal.   Lukoil has lost out on initial rights to develop Iraq's much-coveted West Qurna field, with an an Exxon ...

World leader in the telecom information and logistics sector, Global Capacity, Inc. (GC) announced this morning the launch of a new, global tariff pricing system, GCPrice.

GCPrice will give direct access to GC’s massive database of prices and logistical information, allowing customers to scope and range telecom tariffs for Leased Line and Ethernet services in a real-time, high fidelity data environment. This database represents 75 carriers in 67 different countries, inputting over 5,000 discrete tariffs. With geographic and telecom location data points in excess of 10 million, this database represents the most comprehensive quotation development and point-of-sale information aggregating resource available online, capable of generating detailed reports for GC’s customers.

GC has a great deal of experience crafting integrated supply chain management systems and managing complex distributed data architectures, and offers its customers a one-stop-shop approach to telecom information and logistics. This Chicago, IL- based company has operating centers worldwide to

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As an investor I've always been interested in, Prince Alwaleed carries an interesting story. His Citigroup investment has been well documented, first as a wild success, and then, well we all know what happened to Citigroup in 2008. I read his biography and reviewed it awhile back (a href="http://briskycapital.blogspot.com/2007/11/book-review-alwaleed-by-riz-khan.html"Click here to read review and purchase book/a).br /br /Today, I found a a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087amp;sid=aGiKNISJrIkc"piece from Bloomberg /agiving us an update on how he has survived the recession. So far, it looks like he's done well:br /br /br /blockquotepAug. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, Citigroup Inc.’s largestbr /individual investor, was ranked the richest Saudi national by Arabian Business,br /even after losing 4.6 percent of his personal wealth in the past year.br /br /Alwaleed’s assets are valued at $16.3 billion, compared with $17.1 billionbr /last year, the Dubai-based magazine said today in its 2009 Saudi Rich List,br /citing the accounts of ...

Kazakhstan was once a nation of nomads wandering vast steppes. They herded cattle, goats and camels. On the country’s western edge lies the Caspian Sea. Towns grew up along the shore there, hauling in catches of sturgeon and black caviar.

But otherwise, Kazakhstan was an empty desert. Even in the days of the old Silk Road, traders would skirt Kazakhstan’s southern border rather than try to cross that hell of a desert. It was remote. Desolate. The Soviets used parts of the northeast to test nuclear weapons.

The Aral Sea, site of one of the greatest environmental disasters ever, is in Kazakhstan. A century ago, carp, perch, caviar-bloated sturgeon and much more filled the Aral Sea. Fisherman hauled hundreds of tons of fish per year, fed themselves and loaded trains full of fish headed to Moscow. Then the Communists had some harebrained scheme to use the water for irrigation.

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According to Mohieddine Kronfol (pictured left), managing director of Algebra Capital, a Dubai-based investment firm, pricing of Bahrain’s $750m, five-year sovereign sukuk (Islamic bond) issue–which is being managed by Calyon S.A., Deutsche Bank and HSBC and is expected to yield somewhere 340-350 basis points above similar maturity U.S. Treasuries–is on the “low end of expectations” and will thus limit liquidity. Abu Dhabi’s conventional April issuance yielded 400 points, for instance. “It would have been better had they left some juice in there to attract a wider audience,” he said, adding that more generous pricing would have helped to ensure secondary trading and liquidity “for the long-term interest of the region.” Yet critique of the pricing aside, Kronfol did admit that “the issue would be a success regardless the pricing, as Islamic banks in the region have enough liquidity

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Jobs Jamboree gets a lift…  The real numbers…  The dollar comes back with vengeance!  RBNZ to meet this week… And Now… Today’s Pfennig!

Good day… And a Marvelous Monday to you! You know the Jobs Jamboree data that printed on Friday, and created some HUGE euphoria among the media types that love to just “read the news” and not actually do the research to report it? Yes… It was a very good number, on the outside… Not that losing 345,000 jobs in a month is a good thing, but it is far better than the near 700,000 jobs lost a couple of months ago.

So… I’ve got that to talk about today… And the rebound by the dollar that has taken the euro to the 1.38 handle and looking as if it is going to go lower… And, then finally, I have to get on my soapbox again, because I don’t think I want my

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How did it get here, and where is it going? What a difference a year makes. While March lions and April showers were at work in 2008, so were these factors in the U.S. and global economies:

The Dow Jones Industrial Average remained steady above 12,000. The leading indicator of existing home sales was down over 21% from the previous year, and the official unemployment rate was just beginning its upward creep by crossing the 5% mark. The first official admissions of the “R” word. In early April 2008, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) declared a 25% chance of a global recession, and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress that gross domestic product “could even contract slightly.” The novelty of bailouts began. Bernanke also assured Congress that the Fed’s emergency authorization of a loan against $29 billion of Bear Stearns assets wasn’t putting taxpayer money at risk: “I feel reasonably confident that ...

How come?  The Economist explains:

The ironic truth is that the country’s double curse, of chaotic internal politics and being located in a nasty neighbourhood, are proving helpful for a change. For one thing, they have made Lebanese bankers unusually wary and resourceful. Four years ago, for instance, the Banque du Liban’s (central bank) stern and far-sighted head, Riad Salameh, banned any dealing in such tricky foreign instruments as mortgage-linked securities. And while banks, property developers and service vendors raked in business as private cash spilled out of the oil-enriched Gulf, competition between influence-seeking powers brought a windfall in aid for reconstruction following the ruinous 2006 war with Israel. Iran alone has injected perhaps $1 billion to rebuild the heavily bomb-damaged parts of Beirut run by its protégé militia, Hizbullah.

Lebanon’s economy gets as much as $6 billion in remittances a year from about 10 million Lebanese living abroad,

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Per the Financial Times, under a soon-to-be-unfrozen IMF plan, “Kiev will use half of a second $2.8bn (€2.1bn, £1.9bn) tranche to service its budget deficit. The rest will be directed towards traditional currency stabilisation and balance of payment needs.”  Bonds markets reacted well to the news; Ukraine’s 6.58% dollar bonds due 2016 rose on Friday, pushing the yield down 54.4 basis points to 17.162%, the lowest since Oct. 9.

Meanwhile, Pakistan won commitments for $5.28bn in aid over two years from more than 20 countries in order to help stabilize its rapidly fleeting economy (Pakistan’s rupee plunged 22% last year and the benchmark stock index tumbled 58%) and support investment in healthcare, education and infrastructure development.  The Pakistan Donors’ Conference, co-hosted over the weekend by Japan and the IMF in Toyko, also reaffirmed $15bn (€11.5bn, £10.1bn) already committed to existing aid programs.  The new funds come on top

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The stocks of oil tanker companies are cheap…very, very cheap. But before moving into the heart of this investment observation, let’s gain a sliver of insight about the value of shipping itself.

The dividends of the old spice trade, for example, financed much of the architectural splendor of Venice, Italy. If you stroll the Piazza San Marco, a complex pattern of Istrian stone plays out beneath your feet. Nearby, grand palazzos and public squares show off a dazzling array of tall columns, carved marble, impressive domes and spires.

As William Bernstein tells us in his fascinating book, A Splendid Exchange, Venice’s dazzling look was built up “largely on profits from pepper, cinnamon, nutmeg, mace and clove.” Spices then were what oil is today. At its peak, cinnamon oil traded for its weight in gold. Venetian traders made fortunes. “Profits well in excess of 100% were routine,” Bernstein notes. “A typical

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