Over the past month I have been deeply engaged in conversations surrounding the book Civic War and the Corruption of the Citizen, authored by the brilliant Peter Alexander Meyers, a political theorist and professor at the Sorbonne in Paris as well as a place known as Princeton University in the United States.I cannot overstate the debt of gratitude I owe to Meyers for this brilliant work, and later this week I plan to publish a review as well as post some video interviews and discussions from a meeting we had with him earlier this month.  If I may ask one, small favor of my regular readers:  PLEASE PICK UP A COPY OF THIS BOOK!  Not only will you ...

This post provides links to a number of interesting articles I have read over the past few days (while touring through Switzerland) that you may also enjoy.

• Samuel Brittan (Financial Times): A new guide for the perplexed, July 10, 2009. Attempts to make sense of the financial crisis often lead to even more confusion, writes Samuel Brittan. Here is an attempt to outline the main issues.

• Beat Balzli and Michaela Schiessl (Spiegel): Global banking economist warned of coming crisis, July 8, 2009. William White predicted the approaching financial crisis years before 2007’s subprime meltdown. But central bankers preferred to listen to his great rival Alan Greenspan instead, with devastating consequences for the global economy.

• Janet Morrissey (Time): Advice from an economist who saw 1929, July 9, 2009. The Obama Administration should stop bailing out corporate disasters and

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Despite rising Treasury Note yields, US stock markets yesterday closed at their highest level for 2009. Also, commodities were driven higher by reports indicating that the recession is abating, but the US dollar retreated on concerns of the huge issuance of government bonds.

Elsewhere, Chrysler completed its deal with Fiat, the US Treasury Department announced that ten banks would repay TARP funds, and the Obama administration is dropping its plan to cap salaries at firms receiving bailout funds and has backed away from a large-scale reduction in the number of agencies overseeing financial markets.

Coverage of these events on camera this week included discussions with John Hussman, Chris Whalen, Peter Peterson, Paul Krugman, Mohamed El-Erian, Laszlo Birinyi, Jim Rogers, Jim Grant and Francisco Blanch.

The selection kicks off with the highly regarded John Hussman sharing his wisdom and concludes with an interesting snippet on Africa as an investment destination.

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U.S. stocks pared early losses and ended the day mixed, helped by a late-day surge in banking shares.  Treasury prices declined for another day, pushing yields higher.  Financials also took a cue from Princeton University economist Paul Krugman who noted, "there's some reason to think that we're stabilizing."  Trading was volatile on Monday and the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which had shed almost 130 points earlier in the session, closed the day just above unchanged.  The S&P 500 index closed 0.95 point lower and the tech-heavy Nasdaq lost seven points.  Volume on the NYSE was light as only 1.1 billion shares exchanged hands.

With the government's plan to sell $65 billion in debt this week, investors remain concerned that interest rates could be hiked sooner than expected.  Investors are also awaiting news from the Treasury Department, which is expected to announce which banks will be allowed to repay funds

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The base metals were mixed on Wednesday. Copper rallied from the pre-dawn hours to mid-morning, but then gave it all back by day’s end to finish at $2.0599/lb., down just over a quarter-cent.

Nickel followed copper closely but didn’t fall as far, closing at $5.8423/lb., up more than a penny and three-quarters. Zinc had the same up and down day, ending at $0.6842/lb., down a third of a cent. Aluminum was little changed, shedding a quarter-cent, to $0.6774/lb., while lead used a very late rally to push higher, adding almost 2 cents, to $0.6666/lb.

Copper set the tone for a day of sharp ups and downs among the industrial metals, showing strength early but fading inexplicably even as equities were recovering lost ground. The metal had benefited early on after a report that the US trade gap widened in March, putting downward pressure on the dollar.

China factored in on the upside, as

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Back in December, with the U.S. recession in its 12th month – and showing no signs of abating – Money Morning Contributing Editor Martin Hutchinson warned that an “L”-shaped recession was very possible.

The U.S. recession is now in its 15th month, and many economists now expect the downturn to last until 2010 – if not longer. In fact, some economists now say the U.S. malaise could easily evolve into the virulent “L-shaped” downturn that Hutchinson predicted – a development that would guarantee both the maximum pain and the slowest recovery, experts say.

“I said in December that the recession could be ‘bloody-L shaped.’ With the huge deficits, that now looks the most likely outcome – and believe me when I say that it will be very bloody,” Hutchinson said this week. “The economy will bottom quite soon, but every time it tries to

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I don't know whether anyone ever had the temerity to argue that central banking is boring. Of course, one could always argue that central banking and monetary policy are supposed to be boring in the sense that the central bank should be blindly following some version of a Taylor rule and/or a specific nominal target for the inflation rate as well as the growth rate in the monetary base. Kind of like a good referee in soccer; if you don't notice him (or her), we should consider it a job well done.

Ultimately of course life is never that easy. I only need to invoke the M3 measure in the Eurozone to show this. For those of my readers who don't get the wonky joke here, the ECB is formally targeting a growth rate in the M3 somewhere between 3-4%. As far as I know, it has been way above this

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bReason for comment/bbrbr bBoard strengthened/b pOn November 24, 2008, the company announced the appointment André Caillé, former President of Hydro-Quebec and Gaz Metropolitain, as senior strategic advisor. It should be recalled that Gaz Metroplitain was for eight years a major shareholder in Sofame. pThe appointment lends much needed weight and ‘cred’ to Sofame’s presence in the market place. It should facilitate contact with key industry players and enable the company to better expand its distribution network - a key plank in Sofame’s ambitious marketing plan. pThe consultancy agreement with Mr. Caillé means that he will not receive any salary as such, rather he has been granted a total of 1,690,000 stock options. A total of 845,000 options will vest as at the date of the consulting agreement while the remaining 845,000 options will vest quarterly over the next two years. The options may be exercised for a period ...

Paul R. Krugman, a Princeton University professor and New York Times columnist known as much for his attacks on Bush Administration policies as for his academic achievements, was named the winner of the Nobel Prize in economics for his theories on global trade.

University Endowment FundsUniversity Endowment Funds ListQuick Link: Hedge Fund Marketing GuideYesterday a hedge fund sent me this list of university endowments from Wikipedia and I thought I would share this with others involved in hedge fund marketing and sales.Institution Endowment (2005)billion USD Endowment (2006)billion USD Endowment (2007)billion USD Amherst College $ 1.155[1] $ 1.337[2] $ 1.662[3] ...