Obama proposes to freeze two years the salaries of public employees

U.S. President Barack Obama, proposes to freeze the salaries of federal government workers for two years.
The measure would affect only the civilian and not military, even if the Defense Department would save U.S. $ 2,000 million in fiscal year 2011, 28,000 million over the next five years and more than 60,000 million in next decade, according to White House estimates.
The administration has reviewed the various levels of public salaries, and has concluded that the most skilled workers have a wage slightly less than they deserve, while employees with less preparation are "overpaid" compared to the private sector.


Obama freeze the public salaries

"This freeze is not a punishment for federal workers or a lack of respect for the work they do," White House apologized in a statement. "From doctors to nurses who care for our veterans, men and women who care for our national parks", calls the White House.

"Because of the irresponsibility of the past decade, the president has inherited a deficit of $ 1.3 billion (...) that threatens to drag the nation into a second Great Depression," says a government statement."This is the first of several actions to take in the next budget to put our nation in fiscal path, so we asked some sacrifice to us all," he adds and the U.S. public salaries.

U.S. public salaries

These measures include the freezing of salaries of politicians and the elimination of subsidies and save U.S. $ 8,000 million cut in excess of public buildings with government agencies."The president presented a reduction of more than a trillion dollars of deficit in the 2011 budget, including a three-year freeze on public spending unrelated to security, which will lower spending in this concept in 50 years" , says the White House U.S. public salaries.

U.S. stock futures rise, gaining strength results season

The stock futures rose on Monday in a sign that the S & P 500 could rebound from its worst slide in three weeks, as the quarterly earnings season gains strength. Investors are watching the numbers of firms in the second quarter for signs about the strength of economic recovery last week after receiving weak indicators.

On Friday, U.S. stocks plunged after a drop in consumer confidence and disappointing levels of income of the conglomerate GE and Citigroup Inc and Bank of America Corp. this week, 122 companies in the S & P 500 are expected to report quarterly results.

"What we really have here is a market that is trying to assess how much it has slowed the economy and what this means in terms of future growth of earnings," said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist for Avalon Partners in New York. Futures on the S & P 500 rose 2.4 points, while the Dow Jones industrial average advanced 39 points and Nasdaq 100 climbed 2.25 points.

U.S. shares rose slightly after Intel results

Investors also awaited a statement from the Federal Reserve later on Wednesday about the outlook for the U.S. economy.The negative figure of the day was that U.S. retail sales fell for the second month in June dragged down by weakness in auto dealerships and gas stations, a reminder that the economy continues to face problems.

Other data showed that U.S. business inventories rose 0.1 percent in May, slightly less than the 0.3 percent increase had been expected.
Shares of Intel, a Dow component, climbed 3.57 percent, a day after reporting better than expected results.

Its figures allayed fears of a slowdown in business spending on technology.
'The gains have been much better than expected, but weak sales suggest that people expect a slowdown in the second half, said Bruce Bittles, chief strategist at Robert W Baird Nashville.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose or 0.32 percent, at 10396.24. The rate of Standard & Poor's rose 0.31 percent to 1098.72 and the Nasdaq Composite index advanced 0.79 percent, to 2259.85.
The Fed's economic forecast will be released along with minutes from its latest monetary policy meeting.

Some officials estimate that the Fed will cut forecasts for U.S. economic growth, in line with recent reductions in Wall Street economists.
"It is problematic if the Fed is concerned about the slowdown in the second half of the year, but profits have been removed from the scene a second recession, which was on everyone's lips, creating a deep pessimism," said Bittles.

Manufacturing activity in New York state grows in June

An indicator of manufacturing activity in the state of New York showed that the sector continued to grow in June, while employment fell sharply, a report said Tuesday the Federal Reserve in the state. The index "Empire State" of the New York Fed on general business conditions in the state in June rose to 19.57 from 19.11 in May, but well below the 31.86 April.
Economists polled by Reuters had expected the index showed a reading of 20.00 in June. Measuring employment fell, but remained in positive territory this month.
The index on the number of employees dropped to 12.35 in June from 22.37 in May. The survey of manufacturing plants in the state is one of the first monthly indicators of the conditions of the U.S. industrial sector.

U.S. stock futures hold gains after economic data

The future of U.S. stocks held their gains on Thursday after news that orders for unemployment insurance fell last week while the U.S. trade deficit rose to 40 290 million in April.

Futures were up driven by China's confirmation of a strong export data and a rebound of the euro.
Futures S & P 500 rose 11.7 points, the Dow Jones gained 73 points, and Nasdaq 100 totaled 14 points.

Euro rises vs dollar on U.S. employment report expected

The euro rose against the dollar Friday in a small volume, pending the report on the state of the U.S. labor market, while the yen fell after sources said the Bank of Japan may consider more monetary easing measures.

The data on U.S. payrolls, which will be published at 1330 GMT, give clues about the pace of economic recovery, although bad weather in February could affect the numbers.
The consensus of analysts polled by Reuters was for a loss of 50,000 jobs in February.

Analysts believe that a figure better than expected boost to the dollar, while a worse than expected could be dismissed as the effect of the snowstorms, which would limit any adverse impact on the currency.
"The market is looking for signs of impending cyclical upturn in the U.S. and a number on the payroll could point to that," said Peter Wuyts, analyst at KBC in Brussels.

"But the climate is difficult to predict the numbers do not surprise me to market uncertainty following the release, implying that the current pattern of consolidation in the euro / dollar would continue into next week," he added.
In London, the euro was up 0.1 percent against the dollar at $ 1.3588, in a small volume before the employment report, while the dollar index was steady at 80.547.

Wuyts KBC said the strengthening of the euro over a minimum of nine months and through $ 1.3432, reached this week, suggests that the market has now absorbed most of the bad news coming from Greece.

Athens sold on Thursday with a high demand a 10-year bond, a day after he announced new austerity measures.

However, concern still awaiting a meeting between Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.Meanwhile, the yen fell after sources said the Japanese central bank would discuss this month a new flexibility in its monetary policy amid government pressure to exit deflation.

"Statements on the Bank of Japan should have an impact on the yen and believe that the dollar / yen will be around 90.30 yen in the next couple of days," said Carl Hammer, a strategist at SEB in Stockholm.
The euro rose 0.3 percent to 121.36 yen while the dollar appreciated to 89.31 percent as yen, recovering from a three-month low of 88.14 yen reached the previous day.

U.S. mortgage applications fall back, rates go up

The U.S. mortgage applications fell for the second straight week, hurt by a slump in demand for home refinancing loans, while interest rates rose, according to an industry group.

The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA, for its acronym in English) said Wednesday that the 30-year mortgages with fixed-rate loan more used, stood at over 5 percent, a level seen as psychological.

The MBA said its seasonally adjusted index of mortgage applications, which includes purchase and refinance loans, for the week ended Oct. 16 fell 13.7 percent to 641.0, its lowest level since the week ended 11 September.

The fall does not come from either a beaten U.S. housing market, the prime mover of the worst U.S. recession since the 1930s. While the industry has found some balance after a crisis three years, is still very vulnerable to setbacks.

An Obama advisor recommends companies to compete decentralized

The international relations expert Parag Khanna, an adviser to U.S. President Barack Obama has today recommended to the companies that opt for decentralization to gain positions in emerging markets.

Khanna, director of the Global Governance Initiative, World Economic Forum, took part today in San Sebastian in the first day of FARO International Congress 2009, organized by the Chamber of Guipuzcoa.

Before an audience full of entrepreneurs Gipuzkoa, Khanna has exposed the thesis contained in his book "The Second World", which defines the balance between the superpowers of the globalized world and emerging countries across the globe.

Has detailed the features of many international markets into which European companies can direct their eyes in its commitment to internationalization.

Khanna has argued for changing the mindset and leave the outline of companies that have headquarters overseas plants because, in his view, in the globalized world companies must prefer a completely decentralized scheme in which they have "20 nodes but no central headquarters.

Thus, companies must "understand the local market" and "train local managers" in order to compete effectively in emerging markets.

According to this expert paradigm described in his book currently there are three world superpowers, three cores that extend its influence throughout the world: USA, which owns 20% of global GDP, the European Union, with 23%, and China, that even has 11% of global GDP, is growing and has presence in all areas of the planet.

Over Japan, the Obama adviser has commented that traditionally has been considered a superpower, but currently "not anymore" because "it has been far behind," among other reasons because he suffers "a major demographic problem."

Following these three superpowers, Khanna puts a large group of countries comprising the "second world", which divided into five regions: Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Latin America, Middle East and Southeast Asia.

As noted, the industrialization of emerging countries may be perceived as a threat to SMEs of the superpowers, it should ask "how much they want to go global" to compete.

The anti-crisis measures raise the U.S. fiscal deficit to 9.9% of GDP

U.S. closed the fiscal 2009 (ended September 30) with a hole in the public accounts of $ 1.4 billion (945,000 million), equivalent to 9.9% of GDP. It is triple the record set in 2008. A heavy burden it puts more pressure on the dollar and that may complicate a Barack Obama health reform.
The 16.6% drop in revenues from the recession, 254,000 million injected into the financial sector, the 200,000 million in incentives to revive the economy and the 120,000 million in aid to explain unemployed, according to the Congressional Budget Office The strong degradation.
The deficit is, in terms of GDP, a level not seen since World War II. This could force the Federal Reserve (central bank) to raise interest rates more strongly to attract investors. Y eso podría lastrar la recuperación económica.
The deficit, which must still confirm the Treasury, is below the anticipated 1.6 trillion in August. Even so, it avoided giving fresh ammunition to members of Congress who oppose health reform, which could cost taxpayers about 900,000 million during the next decade.
The huge U.S. deficit that accumulates is a source of concern among the main countries that buy debt, like China. The White House responds by saying that once the recession passes, take measures to put it below 3%. And specific actions and promises in the Budget 2011.
What both on Wall Street is that if Obama wants to respond to all these promises and pay for his ambitious health reform, which will have no spending cuts (which shot up 17% last year) and raise taxes on incomes high to raise revenue.

Dollar operates under pressure after G-7, hit by rising shares

The dollar weakened on Monday after a meeting of the G7 over the weekend reaffirmed the view that market officials are comfortable with a gradual fall of the dollar.
This trend was encouraged by the resilience of global equity markets.
The biggest beneficiary was the Australia dollar, which was also boosted by the growing speculation that the Reserve Bank of Australia this week could raise interest rates, becoming the first major economy to adjust liquidity.
Global stocks were held on Monday despite a weak U.S. jobs report that was disclosed on Friday.
The weak jobs data suggest that U.S. monetary policy will remain very flexible, encouraging traders to buy currencies perceived as more risky assets like stocks as well.

"The risk was recovered strongly enough (...) and that leads to a general weakening of the dollar today. The market wants accumulate 'risk positions' again," said Geoff Kendrick, currency strategist at UBS in London."The G-7 may have been a red light (to sell dollars), but no change," he added.
Following a meeting of finance chiefs from Group of Seven held in Istanbul, traders were betting on a further weakening of the dollar, which serves to resolve imbalances between consumers and indebted countries like the U.S., and producing nations and saving like China.
At 1044 GMT, the dollar index, a measure of performance of the currency against six major currencies, fell 0.25 percent to 76.85.

The euro rose 0.4 percent to $ 1.4620, supported in part by a gain of 0.4 percent in European equities, while stock futures in the United States totaled 0.5 percent.The euro recovered after falling below $ 1.45 on Friday when it was announced that nonfarm payrolls fell by U.S. 263,000 in September, prompting a wave of dollar buying as a safe haven.
The market was also the expectation of monetary policy announcements made on Thursday the European Central Bank (ECB) and Bank of England.

U.S. STOCKS-Futures fall awaiting housing and consumption data

The future of U.S. stocks down slightly on Tuesday as investors awaited data on home prices and consumer confidence, after strong gains the previous session.
Economists expect the Consumer Confidence Index Conference Board show a reading of 57 in September, up from 54.1 in August, according to Reuters.
Despite the improvement, the reading is still considered far from being healthy, since it suggests that there is continuing concern among consumers for any economic problems. The data will be published at 1400 GMT. The S & P / Case-Shiller Home Price U.S. for July is scheduled for 1300 GMT. Economists estimate that prices rose 0.5 percent in July compared to 1.4 percent in the previous month.
The energy sector is likely to recede, after the fall of crude oil futures. A weak demand picture that could be reinforced by weekly inventory data on U.S. fuel, condemning the crude to yield 0.3 percent.
Stock futures in the S & P 500 and Dow Jones industrial average fell 2 units and the Nasdaq 100 fell 6.25 points.

The dollar fell to its lowest annual

The dollar fell on Friday to one-year lows against a basket of currencies, because of continuing concerns about its future value back to cloud the short-term technical picture, preventing a brake on sales of the greenback.

The dollar index, which measures its value against six major currencies, headed for its weekly fall deeper in nearly four months and the euro headed for its biggest weekly gain in the same period, after reaching the maximum of 2009 of 1 , $ 4627.

Strengthening China's economic data also fed the hopes of global recovery, which tempts investors to exit the dollar to move to riskier currencies.

On Friday, an official with the U.S. Treasury said it makes sense that China diversify its huge foreign reserves, which, at least marginally, fueled the feeling pessimistic about the dollar strengthened this week.

"It does not help the dollar, but he (the official) ties him to the idea of the creation of new reserve currencies, which, as we know, take a long time," said Paul Mackel, currency strategist at HSBC in London.

David Dollar, emissary for economic and financial affairs of the U.S. Treasury in China, said that greater diversification of China's international reserves, and the internationalization of the yuan, are meaningless.

"The general theme is that China has a huge amount of reserves and diversify makes some sense" these reservations, Dollar said at a meeting of World Economic Forum in the Chinese city of Dalian.

"It's healthy to have a wide variety of different types of reserve currencies," he added. The dollar index was down 0.25 percent to 76.63 daily, even after falling earlier to 76.511, its lowest since September 2008.

The euro rose 0.2 percent on the day at $ 1.4600, accumulating a rise of 2 percent in the week. The dollar declined by 0.9 percent a day against the yen at 90.90 units from Japan, after earlier falling to its lowest in seven months of 90.69 yen according to Reuters data.

U.S. acknowledges could uncover fraud 17 years ago Madoff

The biggest financial scam in history would not have been so if the Securities and Exchange Commission of USA (the SEC, for its acronym in English) had acted with diligence. That's the conclusion of the report of the agency's own inspector general, David Kotz, noting that the SEC failed to investigate six credible allegations pointing to Madoff. Kotz recognizes that with the first complaint of 1992, the supervisor "lost the opportunity to uncover Madoff Ponzi scheme 16 years before he confessed," last December. Supervisors wasted five more times before the confession of the infamous fund manager. Worse, Madoff exhibited successive-and unsuccessful-SEC investigations to its customers to overcome the doubts that might arise.

"The fact that the SEC had conducted inspections and investigations to detect fraud without giving credibility to their operations and had the effect of encouraging more individuals and entities to invest with him," says the report's summary, 450 pages, whose content Full be made public within days.

The SEC staff is back and half in the devastating document, which states that the regulator up to three inspections conducted two investigations and business Madoff, "but none so thorough and diligent." The agency, according to Kotz, "received detailed information for years to justify a broad and deep investigation to Bernard Madoff.

In 1992 the defendant was illegal intermediary Avellino & Property, which marketed investment Madoff. The research team from the SEC, which was "inexperienced," the report said, did not follow the money trail and settled close to the intermediary. As the inspector general, the SEC faced this and five other complaints in a way superfluous, without paying due attention.

The second was presented in three versions in May 2000, March 2001 and October 2005. The first two were discarded and only paid attention to the third version, which (under the title "The biggest hedge fund world is a fraud") Details 30 warning signs suggesting that Madoff executing a pyramid scam.

But neither that nor the May 2003 of a fund manager, the April 2004 of another financial firm, the October 2005 of an anonymous informant, or the December 2006 of a "concerned citizen" was used to discover the scam.

As if that were not enough, the inspector's report cites two reports published in the press in 2001, which challenged the returns promised that Madoff, described as "unrealistic" because they were adversely affected by market turmoil which swept over the collapse of the bubble.

Although more than perhaps Kotz draws attention to is the fact that in the following tests on all these claims, researchers overlooked details that were clearly "suspicious" and not to ask about aspects Madoff "contradictory" and " inconsistent "detected in hedge fund operations.

Then-SEC Chairman Christopher Cox was recognized after uncovering the plot that the agency had committed "multiple failures" to reliably detect which it says is the biggest fraud in the history of Wall Street, valued at 65,000 million dollars (about 45,000 million euros).

Cox had no alternative but to instruct Kotz, one of the most critical work in the SEC, to investigate what happened at the agency and why they were ignored numerous warnings activated. Without wasting a minute, the inspector general launched an internal investigation, which included the personal relationship he had with the Madoff family. Should clarify to what extent the fact that Shana Madoff-niece of the fraudster, had an affair with a former inspector was able to influence the SEC. Kotz's report starts by mentioning the relationship, but reiterates that it has evidence that could have "interfered with the ability of staff to do their job."

Mary Shapiro, the current chairman of the SEC, he lamented the failures and made clear that compel us to reform oversight. "We have tightened our procedures and put more skilled personnel in the line of fire", hammered, in an attempt to reconstruct the image of the agency.