Apr 17, 2008

Growth becomes attractive when growth is scarce. Feel it like GOOG today. Up 70 pts.

As many other companies have done this year, CIT sacrificed its dividend to its balance sheet, cutting it 60%.

Morgan Stanley has established a team in its Dubai office to cover sovereign wealth funds and financial sponsors in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).

Again Infrastructure is a bog play and attracting huge amt of assets. 3i India Infrastructure Fund raises US$1.2B. 3i Group has raised US$1.2 billion for its 3i India Infrastructure Fund, exceeding the US$1 billion target by 20%.

If the US dollar had remained strong in the global economy, oil might, in theory, be around $65 per barrel. However, oil is priced in dollars, and oil prices continue to rise.

China Inflation- As expected CPI inflation came in at 8.3% year on year. This implies that prices declined by about 0.7% during the month of March. It also implies that inflation for the first quarter of 2008 is running at 12.9%. High level of food inflation – 21% – combined with the rising level of non-food inflation. This rising inflation in the non-food sector, even though it is still under the PBoC target of 3%, is completely inconsistent with the argument that China is only experiencing a temporary food-supply problem.

Economy and Construction Weaken, Prices Rise The economy weakened in March as consumers curbed spending and businesses faced higher costs, according to the Fed's latest "beige book" report, out this afternoon. Consumer loan demand slowed and lending standards tightened. In earlier reports today, home construction plummeted 12% during March, dropping to its lowest level in 17 years. U.S. consumer prices rebounded in March on the back of rising oil prices, a sign of growing concern for Fed policy makers in the midst of an easing cycle aimed at calming troubled financial markets. The same inflationary pressures are building in the euro zone, with prices rising at an unprecedented rate.