Not much. The world keeps turning. And the world economy keeps falling apart. Here in Australia, shares of port and rail outfit Asciano (AIO) fell off the table after a Citigroup analyst changed his valuation of the company and moved it from “buy” to “sell.” Asciano is down 93% from its all time high and was down nearly 60% yesterday before going into a trading halt.

Asciano has $4 billion debt on the books (much of it inherited from when the company was spun from Toll in 2007). But yesterday the company assured investors it wouldn’t be beefing up the equity on the balance sheet with another dilutive capital raising. And chairman Tim Poole told investors earnings were in line with forecasts.

The trouble is that with all that debt and, shall we say, challenging business conditions, investors aren’t convinced the equity in the company is worth anything anymore. This

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It's been a bumpy ride for solar stocks recently.

The industry received a boost when clean energy tax credits were added to the $700 bailout bill to help its passage from Congress. But fears of falling demand and oversupply have weighed on solar stocks. The Claymore/MAC Global Solar Index ETF (NYSE:TAN) fell 35% in the first eight trading days of October.

William Patalon III, however, says new mapping technology and advances that have made solar power more eco-friendly will boost solar stocks in the long run.

By Toni Straka

Having blogged earlier on a physical silver shortage and the drying up of gold bullion purchases, recent events in the precious metals markets justify an update that again arrives at the conclusion that last Friday’s silver and gold price plunge on COMEX has pretty little to do with the actual physical investment demand for gold and silver. Tim Iacono had a good post with the headline “Gold prices getting fishier and fishier,” that does away with the myth that the US mint faces unprecedented demand. I stumbled across several more reports that show the ongoing dichotomy between official spot or futures prices and premiums actually paid by investors, if they can get their coins or bars at all.

The British Evening Standard ran a story over the weekend

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As the financial crisis continues, investors are searching for safety anywhere they can get it. Real estate is obviously out. Equities are getting hit. The currency markets are roiling.

Throughout history, gold has acted as a safe haven in times of economic stress.

Should you be investing in it?

Investors around the world are flocking to the yellow metal. The South African Rand Refinery which manufactures the popular Krugerrand coin, is now operating its plant 7 days a week to keep up with demand for its gold coins. Similarly, the Austrian mint has added weekend production.

In Perth, Australia, the Perth Mint has hired more staff and has doubled its coin production. About 80% of its business is done outside of Australia in North America, Europe and Asia.

The U.S. Mint recently announced it was temporarily suspending all sales of the 24-karat American Buffalo gold coins

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I had a meeting yesterday with one of the largest shipping agencies in China yesterday and learned that they Australia was such an important natural resource provider for China that it is opening a major office in Perth. For proof, you don't need to look any further than the stellar profit report from BHP Billiton. BHP reported a seventh straight year of record profits. Production was up by 25% on a year-over-year basis."I want to emphasis the unbroken record of increased production, and we will continue this trend in 2009 with an estimated 10 per cent growth next year across the portfolio," said BHP CEO.