One of my favorite blogs, Business Monitor International's Risk Watchdog, had a post yesterday discussing the wider historical context of the Berlin Wall's fall. The discussion of the persistence of Communism and the comparison between 1979 and 1989 I personally found to be the most thought-provoking observations but the entire posting is worth reading, accessible here.

Observation 6: Communism did not entirely die.

China, Vietnam, North Korea, Cuba, and Laos all retain Communist leaderships, although in the former two countries the free market has largely prevailed. Many of the 'Communists' in Eastern Europe merely changed their names to 'social democrats' and returned to power, albeit in reconstructed form. Overall, the phenomenon of significant state interventionism in economies lives on long after 1989,

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ConocoPhillips (COP) reported third-quarter earnings of $1.00 per share, above the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 93 cents. However, earnings per share were well below the year-earlier figure of $3.39. This pronounced fall was mainly due to significantly lower commodity prices and a steep decline in refining margins, which more than offset production improvements and lower costs. The Exploration and Production segment reported earnings of $978 million during the quarter, down nearly 75% year over year. The fall was mainly due to lower commodity prices, partially offset by higher volumes and lower operating costs. Daily production from the E&P segment (including Canadian Syncrude) averaged 1.79 million barrels of oil equivalent per day (MMBOE/d), up from 1.75 MMBOE/d in the year-ago quarter. The year-over-year increase in production from new developments in the U.K., Russia, Norway, Vietnam, China and Canada has more than offset the impact of normal ...

Micro Imaging Technology, Inc. announced today that Biotek Sdn Bhd has purchased its first MIT 1000 System. Biotek Sdn Bhd was recently signed as the company’s distributor for Malaysia and other Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) which includes Indonesia, Singapore, The Philippines, Thailand and Cambodia, in addition to others.

Recognized as a premier distributor in the food protection market, Biotek distributes products that are complementary to the MIT 1000 Rapid Microbial Identification System. “Our sales strategy is to demonstrate the features and benefits of this System in typical applications, enabling prospective clients to immediately understand its value. We have found this approach produces much faster sales than other traditional methods,” commented Biotek’s Director, W.C. Fong. “We are pleased to add the MIT 1000 System to our product portfolio. Its rapid test time coupled with its low operating cost will be attractive to many of our customers.”

Biotek has been scheduled

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For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – October 14, 2009 – Zacks Equity Research highlights VimpelCom (VIP) as the Bull of the Day and Rite Aid Corporation (RAD) the Bear of the Day. In addition, Zacks Equity Research provides analysis on Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Elan Pharmaceuticals (ELN) and Gilead Sciences, Inc. (GILD).

Full analysis of all these stocks is available at http://at.zacks.com/?id=2676

Here is a synopsis of all five stocks:

Bull of the Day:

We reaffirm our Outperform recommendation for VimpelCom (VIP), Russia's second largest cellular carrier with over 25% market share. Reported earnings in the last quarter outpaced the Zacks Consensus Estimate, driven by foreign exchange gains.

We continue to be intrigued by VimpelCom's successful sales growth trend and its ability to retain subscribers on a recurring basis, even as overall economic factors remain weak. The company is also progressing

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This analysis from Dr. Marc Faber is adapted from our exclusive webcast Global Investing Outlook. Dr. Faber, based in Hong Kong, is a prominent international investor and a member of the influential Barronrsquo;s Roundtable. These are some of the thoughts he shared: If you look at the next 10 to 20 years in the West, I donrsquo;t see how the lifestyle of the average person will improve meaningfully. On the other hand, if you look at a country like Vietnam, they have a GDP per capita annually of $800 which may go to $3,000 over the next 15-20 years. The same is true for China and India. You suddenly have a middle class of 230 million people in India who will be buying cars like the $2,500 Nano (pictured) and other goods. Once a family moves from the bicycle to the motorcycle, itrsquo;s an improvement in their standard of living. But when you ...

We reaffirm our Outperform recommendation for VimpelCom (VIP), Russia's second largest cellular carrier with over 25% market share. Reported earnings in the last quarter outpaced the Zacks Consensus Estimate, driven by foreign exchange gains.

We continue to be intrigued by VimpelCom's successful sales growth trend and its ability to retain subscribers on a recurring basis, even as overall economic factors remain weak. The company is also progressing well in expanding its 3G wireless and residential broadband network deployments, as reflected by healthy subscriber accretion in the last quarter.

Additionally, the ongoing expansion initiatives into emerging Asian markets (including Cambodia and Vietnam) are expected to boost opportunity in wireless, given the lower mobile penetration levels in these regions.Zacks Investment Research

This post is a guest contribution by John Derrick, Director of Research at US Global Investors.

We believe global growth is the most powerful investment theme now and for the foreseeable future. You can see this playing out as countries like China, India and Brazil grow in economic stature. As we saw in Pittsburgh last week, the G-7 is being supplanted by the more inclusive G-20 when it comes to global economic decision-making.

Emerging market stocks were hit especially hard during the financial crisis but have been among the best performers during the rebound. We are currently in the midst of a synchronized global recovery, and with aggressive government stimulus, strong balance sheets and an ever-growing share of global GDP, emerging markets are likely to outperform the developed markets due to strong domestic consumption and forward-looking infrastructure investments.

The chart below from Goldman Sachs on consumer spending

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This commentary is from John Derrick, U.S. Global Investorsrsquo; director of research. If you believe now is a good time to invest in U.S. stocks, emerging markets may offer even more opportunity. We believe global growth is the most powerful investment theme now and for the foreseeable future. You can see this playing out as countries like China, India and Brazil grow in economic stature. As we saw in Pittsburgh last week, the G-7 is being supplanted by the more inclusive G-20 when it comes to global economic decision-making. Emerging market stocks were hit especially hard during the financial crisis but have been among the best performers during the rebound. We are currently in the midst of a synchronized global recovery, and with aggressive government stimulus, strong balance sheets and an ever-growing share of global GDP, emerging markets are likely to outperform the developed markets due to strong domestic consumption and forward-looking infrastructure ...

This commentary is from John Derrick, U.S. Global Investorsrsquo; director of research. If you believe now is a good time to invest in U.S. stocks, emerging markets may offer even more opportunity. We believe global growth is the most powerful investment theme now and for the foreseeable future. You can see this playing out as countries like China, India and Brazil grow in economic stature. As we saw in Pittsburgh last week, the G-7 is being supplanted by the more inclusive G-20 when it comes to global economic decision-making. Emerging market stocks were hit especially hard during the financial crisis but have been among the best performers during the rebound. We are currently in the midst of a synchronized global recovery, and with aggressive government stimulus, strong balance sheets and an ever-growing share of global GDP, emerging markets are likely to outperform the developed markets due to strong domestic consumption and forward-looking infrastructure ...

The United States is the New Tanzania? Ugh…

by Robert Williams, Publisher

Switzerland sits atop the overall ranking in The Global Competitiveness Report, just released by the World Economic Forum, representing the first time since 2004 that the United States doesn’t hold the top spot. But hey, that’s what being at the epicenter of a global financial crisis will do, right?

Singapore, Sweden and Denmark round out the top five.

The shocker, however, is how badly the United States scored for the soundness of its banks. It placed 108th, just ahead of Venezuela, Serbia and Vietnam and right behind Tanzania.

“Given that the financial crisis originated in large part in the United States, it is hardly surprising that there has been a weakening of the assessment of its financial market sophistication…” said the WEF.

Yeah. But Tanzania?

For the record, Tanzania borders nations

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