Lunes 07/03/11 Credito del consumidor

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Molycorp surge como un comprador mientras china aumentasu participacion en los metales raros.

El control de los metales raros por parte de China esta permitiendo a MCP que tiene las reservas mas grandes de metales raros enfocarse a hacer adquisiciones.

GWG y UCU se hanconvertido en targets de compraspor parte de MCO.

Molycorp Surging as Acquirer as China Raises Rare Earth Stakes: Real M&A
By Natalie Doss, Tara Lachapelle and Rita Nazareth - Mar 6, 2011 7:03 PM ET
China’s control of rare-earth metals is providing Molycorp Inc. (MCP), owner of the largest U.S. deposit of the minerals, with the most-valuable currency in the industry to pursue acquisitions.

Great Western Minerals Group Ltd. (GWG) and Ucore Rare Metals Inc. (UCU) may become targets after shares of Greenwood Village, Colorado-based Molycorp tripled since its U.S. initial public offering in July as China curbed exports, Byron Capital Markets’ Jon Hykawy said. Molycorp is now valued at 117 times earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization this year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg that includes net debt, the highest of any diversified metals producer.

The surge in Molycorp’s market value to $4 billion makes takeovers cheaper as it tries to compete with Chinese producers that control 95 percent of the world’s supply of elements used to make magnets for Raytheon Co. (RTN)’s Tomahawk cruise missiles and Toyota Motor Corp. (7203)’s Prius sedans. While Molycorp’s mine in the Mojave Desert once met almost all the world’s demand, it has yet to turn a profit and doesn’t have substantial amounts of the “heavy” rare-earth metals that command the highest prices.

“Time is not on their hands,” said Brian Hennessey, a Purchase, New York-based analyst for Alpine Mutual Funds, which oversees $6 billion. “Molycorp would do themselves a service by diversifying into heavy rare earth. There are a number of companies with much lower valuations in the marketplace. They can use their currency to do fairly accretive acquisitions.”

Periodic Table
Great Western, which plans to start production at a South African mine in 2013, and Canada’s Quest Rare Minerals Ltd. (QRM) and Avalon Rare Metals Inc. (AVL), which control heavy rare-earth deposits, may be possible takeover targets for Molycorp, Hennessey said.

Ucore of Halifax, Nova Scotia, may also attract suitors for its Alaska mine that contains both heavy and light rare-earth materials, according to Byron Capital’s Hykawy and Jack Lifton, an independent commodities consultant and strategic metals expert who has studied mining for almost 50 years.

Ross Bhappu, Molycorp’s chairman, declined to comment about potential acquisitions.

The rare-earth elements are 17 chemically similar metals, such as lanthanum, neodymium and dysprosium. They are used in magnets for everything from cell phones and electric cars to wind turbines, guided missiles and targeting systems for tanks.

BlackBerrys made by Research In Motion Ltd. (RIM) of Waterloo, Ontario; Cupertino, California-based Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s iPods; General Motors Co. (GM) of Detroit’s plug-in Volt; and Toyota City, Japan- based Toyota’s Prius all use rare-earth metals.

Radioactive Elements
While rare-earth materials are relatively abundant in the earth’s crust, finding deposits large enough to mine is less common, the U.S. Geological Survey said. Global demand for the elements may more than double by 2020 from 125,000 metric tons last year, according to Molycorp’s filing last month with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Rare-earth metals are expensive for producers to extract and are often laced with radioactive elements. China has come to dominate the market because it has been able to produce the metals more cheaply and with fewer environmental restrictions than its competitors.

Prices for rare-earth metals and shares of the companies that produce them have jumped since China said on July 8 that it would reduce export quotas for the second half of 2010 by 72 percent as it attempts to meet domestic needs while closing polluting and inefficient mines.

‘Light’ Versus ‘Heavy’
Prices of many “light” rare-earth elements, including lanthanum and cerium, rose 600 percent to 700 percent on average last year, Matt Gowing, a Toronto-based analyst at Mackie Research Capital Corp., said in a report to clients dated Feb. 8. The price of dysprosium, a “heavy” rare-earth element used in magnets for car motors, almost tripled to $305 a kilogram.

The Bloomberg Rare Earth Mineral Resources Index of 14 companies has surged 273 percent since July 8, seven times more than the 39 percent gain for the MSCI World Materials Index of 161 commodities producers over the same period.

Molycorp, which was formed in 2008, has climbed 252 percent since raising $394 million in its July 29 IPO to start its mine near Mountain Pass, California. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index has advanced 19 percent in the same period, Bloomberg data show.

The 2,222-acre site, an open-pit mine located 60 miles southwest of Las Vegas, produced a majority of rare-earth materials from 1965 to 1985, a report from the Government Accountability Office in April showed.

Scarcity Value
While U.S. deposits also exist in several states such as Idaho, Wyoming and Utah, they are still being explored and could take as many as 15 years before becoming fully operational, according the GAO report.

The rally in Molycorp’s shares has left the company a market capitalization of almost $4.1 billion. Molycorp also had $346 million more cash than debt as of Sept. 30, giving it an enterprise value of about $3.71 billion. That’s 117 times its about $32 million in Ebitda that analysts estimate Molycorp will generate this year, higher than the 42 other diversified metal producers globally that are forecast to have earnings this year.

The median multiple is 6.3 times Ebitda, the data show.

Molycorp, which started its Mountain Pass mine in December for the first time since 2002 and has yet to report a profit on a net income basis, also sold $180 million of convertible preferred shares last month as it plans to increase production capacity to 40,000 metric tons a year by the end of 2013.

Cheap or Expensive

“Heavy” rare-earth metals account for only 1 percent of Molycorp’s mine, according to Mackie Research’s Gowing.

“If I were running Molycorp, I would act as quickly as I could to shore up what must be a light rare earth-dominated output from Mountain Pass,” said Toronto-based Byron Capital’s Hykawy, who covers rare-earth mining companies and is the only analyst tracked by Bloomberg with a “sell” rating on Molycorp. “The longer Molycorp management waits, the greater the chance the market switches its attention to some other critical material, and presently overvalued companies like Molycorp drop in value.”

Molycorp’s Bhappu said in an interview on March 5 that the company may still be undervalued. He pointed to estimates that showed analysts project Molycorp’s shares will reach $66.25. That implies a 34 percent gain, data compiled by Bloomberg show.

“Rare earth prices where they are today, you can make a compelling argument for Molycorp being undervalued,” he said.

Great Western
Great Western, with a market capitalization of C$300 million ($308 million), and Ucore, which has a value of C$157 million, would be likely targets for Molycorp, Hykawy said.

Great Western, which has posted annual losses since at least 1991, specializes in processing rare-earth elements into alloys used to make batteries, magnets and products for the aerospace industry. The producer said on March 2 it increased its stake in a rare-earth exploration company that owns the shuttered Steenkampskraal mine in South Africa to 93 percent.

In January 2009, Great Western said it was working with the mine’s owner to restart the mine, giving it exclusive access to rare-earth metals at the site. The company’s shares have advanced 249 percent in the past year.

“We are not aware of anyone looking at us as a takeover target,” Gary Billingsley, chairman of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan- based Great Western, said in an e-mail. Partly because of the South African mine “we might look attractive to certain groups,” he said.

Bokan Mountain
Ucore operates a former uranium mine at Bokan Mountain in southeastern Alaska. The 19-mile Bokan site is estimated to be one of the largest combined heavy and light rare-earth mineral deposits within the U.S., according to the company’s website. Ucore mines for “heavy’ rare-earth minerals such as dysprosium, which is used to make wind turbines and electric vehicles.

The company met with U.S. lawmakers in February to discuss initiatives that would allow the U.S. to recapture market share in the rare-earth magnet manufacturing industry. Ucore’s CEO Jim McKenzie has said his goal is to become the first company to produce dysprosium for magnets entirely on U.S. soil.

Shares of Ucore have almost tripled in the past year.

“There are players out there right now that I’m sure would be interested in acquiring our deposit at these levels,” McKenzie said in a phone interview. “That doesn’t mean we want to be acquired at these levels.”

Alpine Mutual’s Hennessey favors Quest Rare Minerals and Avalon as takeover targets for Molycorp. The companies hold two of the largest deposits of “heavy” rare-earth elements in the world, according to Mackie Research.

Strange Lake, Nechalacho
A portion of Quest’s Strange Lake project in northern Quebec holds about 1.15 million tons of the metals, according the company’s website. About 43 percent are “heavy” rare-earth elements. Avalon controls the Nechalacho deposit near Thor Lake in the Northwest Territories of Canada, its website said.

The site holds an estimated 1.3 million tons of rare-earth elements, with “heavy” types accounting for about 20 percent, according to Mackie Research.

Avalon is forecast to start producing from Nechalacho in 2015, with Quest’s Strange Lake deposit reaching production a year later. Quest has doubled in value in the past year, while Avalon has almost tripled, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Neither company has any reported revenue, the data show.

The weighted-average price of rare-earth metals at Avalon’s Nechalacho site is estimated to be $94 per kilogram and $120 a kilogram at Quest’s Strange Lake deposit, according to Mackie Research. That’s 45 percent to 85 percent higher than Molycorp’s Mountain Pass mine, which is valued at $65 a kilogram.

‘Everybody’s Looking’
“There should be consolidation because of this valuation discrepancy,” said Alpine Mutual’s Hennessey. “It makes a whole lot of sense.”

Peter Cashin, CEO at Montreal-based Quest Rare Minerals, didn’t respond to a phone message outside normal business hours.

“We have no direct knowledge that Avalon is presently a takeover target,” said Donald Bubar, Toronto-based Avalon’s CEO. “We have heard such speculation occasionally, but to my knowledge, there is no substance to it.”

Molycorp’s Bhappu said last month rivals approached it seeking investment in their projects. The companies, which he declined to identify, are “all over the world, from Africa, Australia, Canada, the U.S., South America,” he said. “The real focus for us is, rather than acquiring, better evaluation and expansion of what we have on our own property.”

Companies that rely on rare-earth metals to make their products such as Toyota may also be looking to buy assets or secure supply agreements, according to Lifton. That may hasten consolidation in the industry, he said.

“Our purchasing groups are leading various efforts to mitigate any potential supply disruption and ensure that we have a stable supply for our production needs,” Jeff Makarewicz, vice president of materials engineering at Toyota, said in an e-mail.

Rare-earth mining companies are “already talking to each other and to companies like Molycorp and Toyota,” Lifton said. “Everybody’s looking for heavy rare earths right now.”

To contact the reporters on this story: Natalie Doss in New York at ndoss@bloomberg.net; Tara Lachapelle in New York at tlachapelle@bloomberg.net; Rita Nazareth in New York at rnazareth@bloomberg.net.

[admin]

Renuncia el ministro de Relaciones Exteriores de Japón

Por Takashi Nakamichi
The Wall Street Journal

El ministro de Relaciones Exteriores de Japón, Seiji Maehara, dimitió el domingo por un escándalo de donaciones ilegales, lo que supone un nuevo golpe al vacilante gobierno de Naoto Kan y una amenaza para la credibilidad del país asiático en los círculos internacionales.

Maehara, considerados por muchos como el sucesor de Kan como primer ministro, fue uno de los ministros de Relaciones Exteriores de Japón más efímero, ya que sólo ha durado en el cargo apenas seis meses.

Los últimos gobiernos de Japón, en los que los últimos cuatro primeros ministros han durado un año o menos, han generado dudas de que los políticos japoneses sean capaces de hacer frente a asuntos internacionales serios, como las relaciones con China, o asuntos económicos como la elevada deuda pública, que es del doble del Producto Interno Bruto del país.

Maehara se vio cuestionado a partir del viernes, cuando admitió ante el Parlamento que había aceptado donaciones de un ciudadano extranjero, lo que viola la legislación japonesa de financiación política.

"He deliberado durante uno o dos días y, como resultado, he decidido dimitir", dijo el domingo en una conferencia de prensa.

[admin]

Obama y la abdication de Libia

La batalla por Libia ha llegado a un sagriento impase. Moammar Gadhafi continua controlando Tripoli, pero sus hijos y sus mercanarios no han podido controlar a los rebeldes del este. Obama despues de declarar publicamente que Gadhafi tiene que irse, el presidente Obama parece haber retrocedido en una pasividad bizarra.

Decimos bizarra por que US ya ha dicho lo que quiere y sin embargo esta haciendo muy poco para lograrlo. El peligro mas grande para los intereses de US - y para el futuro de Obama - es que Gadhafi gane el control nuevamente. H. Clinton se refirio al problema como "una de nuestras preocupaciones mas grandes es que Libia se convierta en una Somalia, pero mas grande"

Obama se ha demorado tres semanas para autorizar la ayuda humanitaria a Libia.

US y las Naciones Unidas estan cometiendo el mismo error que cometieron en Bosnia con el embargo de armas a Libia. En 1990 el embargo no perjudico a los Serbias, que ya estaban armados si no a Bosnia que no tenia el armamento para defenderse.

Si US va a esperar a tener la autorizacion de las Naciones Unidas y de los Arabes para actuar. El permiso que se necesita es de la oposicion en Libia no de los amigos de Gadhafi y los Saudis. Moscu y China no quieren un no-fly zone en Libia, pero y que?

No neceistamos a China o a Rusia para apoyar a los Kurdos cuando Sadam Hussein los bombardeo en 1990. NATO puede actuar sin la aprobacion de Naciones Unidas, o al menos puede hacerlo antes que esta Administracion. Hasta Kerry (democrata) ha dicho que Obama esta exagerando lo del no-fly zone. "Esta no es una gran fuerza aerea dijo Kerry acerca de Libia. No es un sistema enormemente complicado"

Nosotros sospechamos que la verdadera razon para la pasividad de Obama es mas ideologica que practica. El y su equipo en la Casa Blanca creen que cualquier accion de US es equivocada si no tiene el sello de aprobacion de Naciones Unidas y el pan-Arabe. Ellos han internalizado su propia critica de la Administracion Bush hasta tal grado que ahora estan paralizados y no actuan contra un dictador tan sangriento como Gadhafi, y ni siquiera necesitan enviar las tropas americanas.

Obama no va a liderar al mundo por que verdaderamente el cree que el liderazgo de US es moralmente sospechoso. Pero si Obama piensa que George Bush era no popular en el mundo Arabe, el deberia contemplar la posicion de US - y la reputacion de Barack Obama - si Gadhafi y sus hijos matan a todos y regresan al poder.

Obama's Libyan Abdication
Will the U.S. let Gadhafi slaughter his way back to power? Will the U.S. let Gadhafi slaughter his way back to power?

The battle for Libya has reached a bloody impasse. Moammar Gadhafi continues to hold Tripoli, but his sons and mercenaries have been unable to break the uprising or retake the country's east. Having loudly declared that Gadhafi "needs to step down from power and leave," President Obama now seems to have retreated into a bizarre but all too typical passivity.

We say bizarre because the U.S. has already announced its preferred outcome, yet it is doing little to achieve this end. The greatest danger now to U.S. interests—and to Mr. Obama's political standing—would be for Gadhafi to regain control. A Libya in part or whole under the Gadhafi clan would be a failed, isolated and dangerous place ruled by a vengeful tyrant and a likely abettor of terrorists. We presume that's what Secretary of State Hillary Clinton meant the other day when she said that "one of our biggest concerns is Libya . . . becoming a giant Somalia."

Ghadafi can also only prevail at this stage through a murderous campaign that will make U.S. passivity complicit in a bloodbath. Media reports relate stories of his secret police terrorizing Tripoli's population and killing indiscriminately. Al Jazeera is already comparing the West's failure to act in Libya to the slaughter of Iraq's marsh Arabs in 1991 and of the Bosnian Muslims by Serbs later that decade.

The Administration is explaining its reluctance to act by exaggerating the costs and the risks. It rolled out Pentagon chief Robert Gates last week to mock "loose talk" of military options. "It's a big operation in a big country," he said. "We also have to think about, frankly, the use of the U.S. military in another country in the Middle East." Centcom Commander James Mattis offered a similar warning.

We can understand if our war-fighters are trying to make sure that civilians understand the costs and are totally committed before they order U.S. forces to action. But no one is talking about introducing U.S. ground forces a la Afghanistan or Iraq. The Libyans want to liberate Libya. The issue is how the U.S. can help them do it, which includes humanitarian, diplomatic and perhaps military assistance.

Three weeks into the uprising, Mr. Obama has finally approved a humanitarian airlift. The U.S. should also recognize the provisional government known as the National Transitional Temporary Council, which has issued a declaration of principles that is at least as enlightened as the average Arab constitution. U.S. officials may not know these men well, but we will have more influence with them if they see us helping their cause when it matters.

The U.S. should also bar Gadhafi's agents from U.S. soil and world councils. His government has requested that senior diplomat Ali Abdussalam Treki be recognized as Libya's new ambassador to the U.N. A U.N. spokesman naturally says this is Libya's right, but the U.S. ought to deny Mr. Treki a visa. If Libyan officials realize they are going to be persona non grata around the world, more of them might defect.

The U.S. and U.N. may also be repeating their Bosnian mistake with their arms embargo on Libya. In the 1990s, a U.N. embargo didn't hurt the Serbs, who were already well-armed, but it crippled the Bosnians, who lacked the weapons to defend themselves.

The current U.N. embargo may have been intended to apply only to Gadhafi's government, but we saw conflicting reports on the weekend that some countries may be interpreting it to apply to the opposition too. Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama ought to correct the world's understanding straightaway, or rewrite the resolution. Even short of providing arms—which we would support—the U.S. could help by jamming Gadhafi's propaganda or military communications, as well as providing intelligence.

As for the no-fly zone, the Administration is far too solicitous of U.N. and Arab approval. The approval that matters is from the Libyan opposition. The Arab League is heavily influenced by the Saudis, who have their own budding problem with popular dissent. Moscow and Beijing don't want a no-fly zone in Libya, but so what?

We didn't need Chinese or Russian support to keep Iraqi Kurds safe from Saddam Hussein's bombers in the 1990s. NATO can act without U.N. approval, or at least it could before this Administration. Even Senator John Kerry thinks the Administration is making too much of the risks of a no-fly zone. "This is not a big air force," he says about Libya. "It's not an enormously complicated defense system."

We suspect the real reason for Mr. Obama's passivity is more ideological than practical. He and his White House team believe that any U.S. action will somehow be tainted if it isn't wrapped in U.N. or pan-Arab approval. They have internalized their own critique of the Bush Administration to such a degree that they are paralyzed to act even against a dictator as reviled and blood-stained as Gadhafi, and even though it would not require the deployment of U.S. troops.

Mr. Obama won't lead the world because he truly seems to believe that U.S. leadership is morally suspect. But if Mr. Obama thinks George W. Bush was unpopular in the Arab world, he should contemplate the standing of America—and the world reputation of Barack Obama—if Gadhafi and his sons slaughter their way back to power.

[admin]

La esposa del dictador se pone Louboutins

Vogue magazine no ha notado la nueva moda: Los dictadores del Medio Oriente no estan de moda...

Talvez hay que ser un dictador de moda para conocer a un dictador a la moda. Como si no se puede explicar la decision de Anna Wintour, editor de Vogue el publicar un articulo de 3,000 palabras acerca de una de las "mas frescas y mas magneeticas de las primeras damas," la esposa del dictador de Siria Asma al-Assad?

Asi es. Mientras los valientes rebeldes pelean para sacar al tirano Moammar Gadhafi de Tripoli, la reyna de Conde Nast penso que era de buen gusto poner a la bella esposa del dictador de Siria. Aparentemente Vogue no se ha puesto al dia: Los dictadores no estan de moda esta estacion.

La familia Assad - primero Hafezy ahora su hijo Bashar - ha gobernado Siria desde 1970. En ese tiempo, ellos han matado a 20,000 Sirios, han provocado una guerra civil en Lebanon y ha ocupado el pais para "encontrar paz" construir una planta nuclear modelada por North Korea y ha establecido a Damascus como el centro de terrorismo desde Hezbollah a Hamas y el Islamic Jihad. Todo como parte de mantener dominados a sus ciudadanos por 40 anios.

No importa. Los unicos pies que le interesa a la escritora de Vogue Hoan Juliet Buck son los de la primera dama. Mrs. Assad revela un "flash de zuelas rojas" con "gracia y energia"

Las zuelas rojas son una alusion al diseniador Christian Louboutin - facilmente $700 - por zapatos. Mrs. Assad tambien prefiere los lentes de sol Channel y viaja en su jet Falcon 900. Pero podemos asegurarles, que ella no es del tipo ostentoso.

La primera dama dice que en su casa rigen los principios democraticos, reporta Vogue: "Todos votamos acerca de lo que queremos y adonde vamos a ir" dice Mrs. Assad sobre ella su esposo y sus tres hijos.

Pero para la gente de Siria no hay democracia, fuera de su casas, los Assads creen en la democracia de la manera que Saddam Hussein lo hacia. Bashar al-Assad gano el 7% de los votos. Vogue piensa que eso es maravilloso. De acuerdo a Freedom House, su gobierno esta entre los peores junto con North Korea Burma y Saudi Arabia.

The Dictator's Wife Wears Louboutins
Vogue magazine missed the trend: Middle Eastern tyrants are out this season..

By BARI WEISS AND DAVID FEITH
Maybe it takes a fashion dictator to know a fashionable dictator. How else to explain Vogue editor Anna Wintour's decision this month to publish a 3,000-word paean to that "freshest and most magnetic of first ladies," Syria's Asma al-Assad?

That's right. As Libyans braved fighter jets and machine-gun fire in their drive to overthrow the tyrant Moammar Gadhafi in Tripoli, the queen of Condé Nast thought it was in good taste to feature the beautiful wife of Syria's Bashar al-Assad. Apparently Vogue missed the trend: Dictators are out this season.

The Assad family—first Hafez and now his son Bashar—has ruled Syria since 1970. In that time, they've killed 20,000 Syrians to put down an uprising in Hama, provoked civil war in Lebanon and then occupied the country to "keep peace," built a secret nuclear-weapons facility modeled on North Korea's, and established Damascus as a hub for terrorists from Hezbollah to Hamas and Islamic Jihad. All part of keeping their countrymen under foot for 40 years.

No matter. The only feet that seem to interest Vogue writer Joan Juliet Buck are the manicured toes of the first lady. Mrs. Assad reveals a "flash of red soles," we're told, as she darts about with "energetic grace."

The red soles are an allusion to the signature feature of Christian Louboutin designer heels—easily $700 a pair—that Mrs. Assad favors. (Mr. Louboutin, says Vogue, visits Damascus to buy silk brocade, and he owns an 11th-century palace in Aleppo.)

Mrs. Assad also sports Chanel sunglasses and travels in a Falcon 900 jet. But, we're assured, she's not the ostentatious sort: "Her style is not the couture-and-bling of Middle Eastern power but deliberate lack of adornment." She once worked at J.P. Morgan, never breaks for lunch, and starts her day at 6 a.m.—all while raising three children! Just another 21st-century woman trying to do it all in style.

And her parenting? "The household is run on wildly democratic principles," Vogue reports. "We all vote on what we want and where," says Mrs. Assad of herself, her husband and their children.

For the people of Syria, not so much. Outside their home, the Assads believe in democracy the way Saddam Hussein did. In 2000, Bashar al-Assad won 97% of the vote. Vogue musters the gumption only to call this "startling." In fact, it's part of a political climate that's one of the world's worst—on par, says the watchdog group Freedom House, with those of North Korea, Burma and Saudi Arabia.

But none of those countries has Asma. "The 35-year-old first lady's central mission," we're told, "is to change the mind-set of six million Syrians under eighteen, encourage them to engage in what she calls 'active citizenship.'"

That's just what 18-year-old high-school student Tal al-Mallouhi did with her blog, but it didn't stop the Assad regime from arresting her in late 2009. Or from sentencing her, in a closed security court last month, to five years in prison for "espionage."

Ms. Mallouhi goes unmentioned in Vogue. But readers get other crucial details: On Fridays, Bashar al-Assad is just an "off-duty president in jeans—tall, long-necked, blue-eyed." He "talks lovingly about his first computer," Vogue records, and he says that he studied ophthalmology "because it's very precise, it's almost never an emergency, and there is very little blood."

So it's the opposite of his Syria: murky and lawless, operating under emergency law since 1963, and wont to shed blood through its security forces and proxies like Hezbollah.

It's hard to believe that a veteran journalist would so diminish these matters, but it seems that Ms. Buck's aim was more public relations spin than reportage. As she reveals, her every move was watched by state security: "The first lady's office has provided drivers, so I shop and see sights"—including, in a trip reminiscent of Eva Perón, an orphanage—"in a bubble of comfort and hospitality."

In the past weeks, as people power has highlighted the illegitimacy and ruthlessness of the Middle East's strongmen, various Western institutions have been shamed for their associations with them. There's the London School of Economics, which accepted over $2 million from Libya's ruling family, and experts like political theorist Benjamin Barber, who wrote that Gadhafi "is a complex and adaptive thinker as well as an efficient, if laid-back, autocrat."

When Syria's dictator eventually falls—for the moment, protests against him have been successfully squelched by police—there will be a similar reckoning. Vogue has earned its place in that unfortunate roll call.

Ms. Weiss and Mr. Feith are assistant editorial features editors at The Journal.

[admin]

8:12 a.m. EST 03/07/11Treasurys
    Price Chg Yield %
2-Year Note   -1/32 0.705
10-Year Note   -8/32 3.522
* at close
8:16 a.m. EST 03/07/11Futures
  Last Change Settle
Crude Oil 106.84 2.42 104.42
Gold 1444.6 16.0 1428.6
DJ Industrials 12154 0 12154
S&P 500 1320.40 0.10 1320.30
8:28 a.m. EST 03/07/11Currencies
  Last (bid) Prior Day †
Japanese Yen (USD/JPY) 82.07 82.32
Euro (EUR/USD) 1.4024 1.3986
† Late Friday in New York.

[admin]

8:29 a.m. EST 03/07/11Major Stock Indexes
  Last Change % Chg

Japan: Nikkei Average* 10505.02 -188.64 -1.76
Stoxx Europe 600 282.87 0.97 0.34
UK: FTSE 100 6020.08 29.69 0.50
Get this by E-mail * at close
Quotes & Research

[admin]

Los futures del Dow Jones 5 puntos al alza.

Oil up 106.12, Au up 1,441,futures cu down 4.4660

Euro up 1.4018

+10

[admin]

Copper March 07,08:19
Bid/Ask 4.4404 - 4.4427
Change -0.0197 -0.44%
Low/High 4.4336 - 4.4942
Charts

Nickel March 07,08:19
Bid/Ask 12.9467 - 12.9566
Change -0.0694 -0.53%
Low/High 12.8868 - 13.1608
Charts

Aluminum March 07,08:19
Bid/Ask 1.1563 - 1.1567
Change +0.0045 +0.39%
Low/High 1.1504 - 1.1649
Charts

Zinc March 07,08:19
Bid/Ask 1.0886 - 1.0895
Change -0.0288 -2.58%
Low/High 1.0869 - 1.1456
Charts

Lead March 07,08:17
Bid/Ask 1.1830 - 1.1850
Change -0.0100 -0.84%
Low/High 1.1785 - 1.2026
Charts

[admin]

Asia a la baja, China subio 1.8%

Europa al alza.

Oil up 106.50

+4

Yields up 3.53%

Ag up 36.42

Euro up 1.4022

[admin]

SPANISHMARCH 6, 2011, 7:17 P.M. ET
La demanda y el clima despiertan el fantasma de la crisis alimenticia

Por Scott Kilman

El mundo está consumiendo granos a una velocidad mayor a la que los agricultores pueden cultivarlos, lo que pone bajo presión las reservas e impulsa los precios a niveles cercanos a los que provocaron disturbios y protestas por la crisis de alimentos en países pobres hace tres años.

La posibilidad de que se desate otra escasez de alimentos a nivel mundial depende en gran medida de las cosechas de los próximos meses, a medida que los agricultores de Estados Unidos, el mayor exportador agrícola a nivel global, empiecen a recoger sus cosechas de trigo, soya y otros granos. Estas perspectivas probablemente se vean reforzadas el jueves cuando el Departamento de Agricultura de EE.UU. (USDA) divulgue su informe mensual sobre los mercados agrícolas mundiales.

"El escenario anticipa serios trastornos, en caso de que ocurran desastres climatológicos", explica Keith Collins, ex economista jefe del USDA. "Me parece claro que han aumentado las posibilidades de que se propague una crisis global de alimentos".

Incluso si un clima ideal en EE.UU. diera lugar a cosechas récord, el crecimiento de la demanda mundial y las menguantes reservas significan que aún hay riesgo de que haya una escasez de alimentos. Si bien los economistas proyectan que los precios de los granos se moderarán si las cosechas mundiales aumentan este año, se espera que se mantengan altos durante años. Además, cualquier cosecha que no sea grande podría provocar grandes fluctuaciones en los precios.

Debido al rápido crecimiento de los mercados emergentes, los precios de los alimentos están aumentando junto a la demanda global. En 2008, los precios de los alimentos en EE.UU. escalaron 5,5%, la mayor alza en 18 años.

Los precios del trigo han dado un salto de 80% frente a un año antes. El encarecimiento de los alimentos fue uno de los motivos que desataron las protestas callejeras que han arrasado el norte de África, donde el trigo domina la dieta de la región. Egipto es el mayor importador de este grano. Los gobiernos en Asia están recurriendo a subsidios y controles de precios para proteger a sus consumidores de la inflación.

En EE.UU., se espera que los precios minoristas de los productos alimenticios suban cerca de 4% este año, mucho más rápido que en 2010, cuando el Índice de Precios al Consumidor del gobierno para los alimentos avanzó 0,8%, la tasa más baja desde 1962. El auge en los precios de la energía, provocado por las tensiones en el mundo árabe, podría contribuir al encarecimiento de la producción de alimentos.

Presidentes ejecutivos de cadenas de supermercados y otras empresas de alimentos como los restaurantes son reacios a traspasar el aumento de los costos a sus clientes en un momento en que la tasa de desempleo en EE.UU., actualmente en 8,9%, sigue alta. Eso podría cambiar si la economía mejora.

En las regiones agrícolas de EE.UU. abundan las evidencias de lo que podría deparar el futuro. Los precios de los commodities están en ascenso, en parte porque las economías que importan alimentos tienen pocas alternativas para ir de compras. EE.UU. controla en torno a 55% del comercio mundial del maíz, así como 44% de la soya, 41% del algodón y 28% del trigo.

En febrero, el índice de precios de productos agrícolas del USDA, que cubre 48 materias primas, era 24% más alto que en el mismo mes de 2010. Ese incremento se traduce en ganancias inesperadas para los agricultores de EE.UU., pero representa un revés para sus ganaderos, que alimentan sus animales con grano.

China compra casi un cuarto de la cosecha estadounidense de soya para alimentar cerdos y pollos, que son consumidos por su clase media. Sus plantas textiles se quedan con casi un tercio de las exportaciones de algodón de EE.UU. Las exportaciones de trigo que salen de este país acumulan un alza de 46% frente al año anterior porque el mal tiempo dejó fuera de juego a competidores como Rusia y Canadá.

Debido a los precios más altos de la gasolina, alrededor de 40% de la principal cosecha de EE.UU., el maíz, se está dedicando a la producción de etanol. El USDA pronostica que al país le quedará suficiente maíz para satisfacer el apetito de los consumidores por apenas 18 días para cuando arranque la próxima cosecha.

La reacción tradicional de los agricultores ante precios tan altos solía ser cultivar más terreno y producir excedentes que redujeran los precios. Pero este ciclo parece estar desmoronándose, lo que sugiere que el auge de precios podría convertirse en una tendencia más duradera.

Aun así, los agricultores están produciendo cosechas más grandes. El USDA prevé que EE.UU. incrementará el área cultivada con las ocho mayores cosechas este año en casi 4 millones de hectáreas, o 4%, el cambio más grande en 15 años. El departamento pronostica que los agricultores de maíz producirán un récord de 13.730 millones de bushels en el tercer trimestre.

Sin embargo, la demanda de maíz es tan fuerte que este incremento de 10% en la cosecha sólo prolongaría las reservas del país en apenas cinco días. Como resultado, el USDA prevé que el precio de la cosecha de maíz todavía por sembrar suba a un promedio de US$5,60 por bushel, un récord.

"La era de los excedentes (agrícolas) se ha acabado", sentenció Dan Glickman, ex secretario de Agricultura durante el gobierno de Bill Clinton y ahora integrante del Bipartisan Policy Center, un centro de estudios en Washington.

[admin]

SPANISHMARCH 6, 2011, 7:20 P.M. ET
Venezuela les complica la vida a las multinacionales
En su búsqueda de crecimiento, enfrentan la devaluación del bolívar y las expropiaciones

Por Dana Mattioli

La devaluación del bolívar vapuleó los balances de las multinacionales en 2010 y sigue siendo un desafío para las empresas que operan en Venezuela.

Este es el más reciente de una serie de problemas —desde la fijación de precios hasta la nacionalización de ciertas industrias— que enfrentan las multinacionales en Venezuela, en un momento en que buscan mercados de crecimiento fuera de Estados Unidos y Europa y ponen la mira en la creciente clase media de América Latina.

Hacer negocios en el exterior puede conllevar desafíos como tener que hacer frente a la inestabilidad cambiaria y turbulencias políticas, pero en Venezuela, los riesgos son mayores de lo común.

Durante el año pasado, hubo dos devaluaciones de la divisa venezolana, lo que llevó al bolívar de 2,15 unidades por dólar a 4,3 por dólar. La variación del tipo de cambio provocó en 2010 una reducción de US$24 millones en las ganancias antes de impuestos del fabricante de leche en polvo para niños Mead Johnson Nutrition Co. y una caída de US$33,4 millones en las ventas de la empresa de cosméticos Revlon Inc. Asimismo, el fabricante de juguetes Mattel Inc. y el gigante de productos químicos Clorox Co. indicaron que la devaluación del bolívar perjudicó sus resultados.

"Desafortunadamente, enfrentamos vientos en contra del bolívar al inaugurar 2011", dijo el director financiero de Mead

Johnson, Peter Leemputte, durante la teleconferencia con inversionistas sobre los resultados del cuarto trimestre.

Para mitigar los costos asociados a la devaluación del bolívar, la empresa de recipientes de plástico Tupperware Brands Corp. está importando menos productos a Venezuela y en su lugar está aumentando la producción en su planta local, afirma su director financiero, Michael Poteshman. La medida hace que la compañía dependa menos de las importaciones, que se han vuelto mucho más caras con la depreciación de la divisa.

En 2009, Venezuela representó más de US$50 millones en ventas para Tupperware, pero la cifra fue menor en 2010, principalmente debido a cuestiones cambiarias, indica Poteshman. La empresa no divulga sus resultados de ventas por país.

En el tercer trimestre de 2009, Tupperware tuvo un cargo contable de US$4,9 millones relacionado al tipo de cambio, y otro de US$3,5 millones en el cuatro trimestre. "Es impredecible lo que sucederá exactamente con la tasa de cambio", dice Poteshman sobre el impacto del bolívar sobre los ingresos de 2011.

El productor de bebidas alcohólicas Diageo PLC ha estado ligando los precios de sus licores de primera calidad a sus equivalentes en dólares y ha lanzado marcas más baratas en Venezuela, a medida que el bolívar ha perdido valor, explicaron los ejecutivos de la empresa en una entrevista con The Wall Street Journal en febrero. En el primer semestre del año pasado, la debilidad del bolívar tuvo un impacto negativo de US$343 millones sobre sus resultados.

Para contrarrestar los problemas de las fluctuaciones cambiarias y el entorno inflacionario, Revlon subió los precios de sus productos en la región, informó la compañía en su informe de resultados del cuarto trimestre.

El mercado venezolano también presenta otros obstáculos. Aproximadamente la mitad de los artículos en el Índice de Precios al Consumidor del país, como los productos médicos y los alimentos, están sujetos a controles de precios, señala Patrick Esteruelas, analista de Moody's. Esto limita la capacidad de una empresa para elevar los precios y puede reducir los márgenes.

Las multinacionales también se arriesgan a la expropiación si el presidente de Venezuela, Hugo Chávez, no está de acuerdo con la forma en que operan. En octubre, por ejemplo, plantas del fabricante de envases de vidrio Owens-Illinois Inc. fueron estatizadas y Chávez insinuó sobre futuras expropiaciones.

Pese a las dificultades, Venezuela sigue siguen un mercado importante para las multinacionales, aseguran los analistas. El país depende de importaciones y ha mostrado un sano apetito por las tendencias de consumo, apunta Esteruelas, de Moody's. Además, algunos ejecutivos esperan que Chávez sea reemplazado en las próximas elecciones presidenciales.

[admin]

Con el petroleo arriba de 106 y ya casi en 107 como va a subir el mercado? nos tendremos que acostumbrar.

BP no vendera activos en Algeria.

Septimo dia de alzas para los commodities.

Pero los futures estan al alza.

+16

[admin]

TTM -2.25%

DRN -1.59%

SLW +2.49%

EGO +2.05%

AAPL +0.04%

NG +1.64%

SCCO +0.59%

ERX +1.10%

AKS +0.52%

FAS -0.23%

[admin]

Moody's downgraded Grecia nuevamente. Pero creo que ya a nadie le preocupa mucho eso, el euro esta al alza, y todos los ojos estan en el petroleo y el Medio Oriente.

[admin]

El precio del petroleo esta asimilando la interrupcion de 1.6 millones de barriles de petroleo por parte de Libia.