Stocks are lower as a weaker U.S. dollar help lift commodity prices and Johnson & Johnson’s third-quarter sales figures disappointed investors

Stocks fell on Tuesday after disappointing quarterly sales figures from economic bellwether Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) sparked worries about consumer spending, offsetting a lift from higher commodity prices.

The Nasdaq gave up its initial gains at the open.

The Dow Jones industrial average was down 53.66 points, or 0.54 percent, at 9,832.14. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index was down 7.19 points, or 0.67 percent, at 1,069.00. The Nasdaq Composite Index was down 5.16 points, or 0.24 percent, at 2,133.98.

Yesterday’s Top Performing Small Cap Stock:

GWS Technologies, Inc, (OTC BB: GWSC) was a SmallCapVoice.com top performer yesterday closing up over 8% on trading volume of 19,747 shares.

GWS stands for GreenWindSolar. GWSC is a renewable energy technology company developing and marketing solar and wind-powered renewable energy products and solutions. Our

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According to various reports, central bankers from Saudi Arabia–whose capital Riyadh is slated as the home of a planned future regional central bank–are increasingly pessimistic as to the odds of the once much bally-hooed 2010 transition to a single Gulf currency and monetary union across the six-member GCC.  This despite the fact that prices rose 10.5% in the Kingdom in April, the fastest pace in over three decades, and UAE inflation touched the 20-year peak of 11.1% last year.  In the meantime, dollar pegs forced various countries to mirror declining U.S. interest rates despite windfall oil profits and domestic price increases.  Yet certain countries, such as Kuwait and Syria, have already dropped their dollar ties.  Moreover, there is scant evidence that dropping the peg did much for Kuwait’s inflationary pressures.  Some analysts reckon, for instance, that inflation is less tied to fuel and more tied to factors such as food prices, construction materials such

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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 ...

Saudi Arabia’s Tadawul All-Share Index (TASI) has posted impressive returns YTD (up over 16%), but last week’s correction, coupled with a recent report issued by Riyadh-based Samba Bank–which warned that the recovery of oil prices to above $60/barrel and a forecasted 24% increase in government spending will not be adequate to offset a sharp slowdown in private sector activity–raises concern.

The Bank asserted that while public spending in both oil and non-oil sectors has been robust, private investment, in contrast, remained tepid, constrained by lingering tougher lending standards due at least in part to poor export prospects, especially in petrochemicals (polyethylene prices are still down roughly 50% from their mid-2008 highs) and refined products, the country’s main exports after oil and natural gas. It added that the country’s GDP would contract by 1.2% in 2009 (following 4.5% growth last year), but predicted that growth would climb to 4.4%

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Three-quarters of the world consists of water, but growing populations, higher living standards, and global climate change have more than a few analysts worried that there still may not be enough to go around.

In fact, water shortages are erupting around the world, from San Diego to Riyadh.

Hundreds of farm workers and locals from all parts of California took to the streets last Thursday as part of a four-day march to protest federal cutbacks in water supplies.

“This is ground zero,” Mario Santoyo, an adviser to the California Latino Water Coalition, told the New York Times. “There’s a human tragedy going on here, and we need water.”

The state of California projected in March that, because of a drought in the state’s Central Valley, as many as 23,700 full-time workers would lose their jobs, and farmers would lose up to $477 million in revenue, The Times

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The current account surplus of $400 billion among the Middle Eastern and North African oil-exporting states will turn into a deficit of $30 billion this year, according to the latest IMF report, which classifies said exporters as Algeria, Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, the U.A.E. and Yemen.

That said, according to IMF Middle East and Central Asia Department Director Masood Ahmed, “for most countries, this deterioration is from a position of significant strength, and thus can comfortably be sustained by the large stock of reserves that these economies have built up.”  Riyadh-based investment bank Jadwa Investment, for example, stated that Saudi Arabia’s net foreign assets of roughly 433 billion dollars gives the Arab world’s largest economy “an advantage over most other countries in alleviating the impact of the extreme financing pressures.  It can push ahead …

Perhaps I'm overstating it, but I think this is the abridged version of the Bush Administration's perspective on how we got into the financial mess we find ourselves in. You might ask why I focus on the ideas of the outgoing government. Well, it's because I'm confident that this will be a thesis pushed by some commentators eager to absolve previous policymakers of blame [1]. And indeed (as Mish points out), this view has apparently adherents in high places.

But let me let the the Economic Report of the President [large pdf] (Chapter 2) speak for itself:

The roots of the current global financial crisis began in the late 1990s. A rapid increase in saving by developing countries (sometimes called the "global saving glut") resulted in a large influx of capital to the United States and other industrialized countries, driving down the return on safe assets. The relatively low yield on safe assets ...

Crude oil has tumbled to prices not seen for five years. But Byron King says the energy industry can’t function with prices this low. Investment in the future is drying up, and so is the existing oil supply. And that’s why the long-term price trend of crude is still way up.

This from Rude Awakening:

As crude oil languishes near a 5-year low of $35 a barrel, forward-looking investors have good reason to suspect that a new bull market is about to begin. Sure, oil prices might continue slumping over the near term. But don’t kid yourselves; the long-term price trend is up…maybe way up.

Back when oil was selling at $147, I said that the world does not run very well at such lofty energy prices.  A lot of things just stop working at $147 for a barrel of oil, particularly things with a large energy component.  The airlines

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Iran says OPEC could cut output again in March… Russia-Ukraine gas row not finally resolved…

Oil fell more than $2 to below $39 a barrel on Monday, dragged down by widespread evidence that deepening recession was reducing global energy consumption.

The decline came despite news that Saudi Arabia planned to cut output to below its agreed target, as well as gas supply disruptions in Europe as a result of the Russia-Ukraine dispute and tensions in the Middle East.

U.S. light crude for February delivery fell $2.18 to a low of $38.65 by 1020 GMT. London Brent crude fell $1.62 to $42.80.

U.S. jobless data on Friday set the tone for the market.

A U.S. government report showed employers slashed jobs by 524,000 in December, driving the national unemployment rate to its highest level in almost 16 years.

“The U.S. unemployment numbers on Friday started

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The short-term path of gold is still unclear says David Galland. But its a good sign that demand for physical gold soars when prices tip towards $750 an ounce. And this threshold is likely to creep upwards as the US dollar loses its worth, and foreign governments convert currency reserves for the precious metal.

This from Money Morning:

Of late, I have read a number of analysts, Jim Rogers even, who have expressed the view that gold could dip to the mid- to low $600 level.

It could happen, but I think not. Already, buyers of physical gold are finding anything near $700 to be cheap and are helping to build a floor under the monetary metal. On that topic, a friend sent this item along recently:

(Gulf News, Nov. 12) Riyadh: There has been an unprecedented demand for gold in the Saudi market recently, with over 13 billion Saudi riyals ($3.47

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