Leave it to the government. It’s proposing a “tax and cap” regime for energy producers which will require fossil-fuel generating plants to pay extra.  The idea is to encourage clean fuels and discourage dirty ones. That’s fine in theory. But instead of helping our future energy situation, it’s going to make it a lot worse.

On June 10, 2008, Alexei Miller, CEO of Russia’s Gazprom, told a French audience that crude oil prices would reach $250 a barrel in 2009. His former Gazprom cohort and then freshly minted Russian prime minister Medvedev did him one better… pegging crude oil prices at $500. Was it wishful thinking? Did the gentlemen overdose on “hard-money” investment newsletters and Peak Oil Theory? We may never know.

The Russia-Ukraine battle for natural gas played out well last year for these three natural resource stocks, and it’s happening again. J. Christoph Amberger of Today’s Financial News predicted back in November of 2008 that the Ukraine would go into a “deep freeze” and that forecast came to pass at the beginning of this year.

With stores tripping over themselves to offer steep holiday season discounts, their efforts were largely in vain, as many consumers simply weren’t financially able to take full advantage. Even the beast that is Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) struggled to make much headway. As we reported yesterday, Thomson-Reuters projected a 2.8% same-store sales rise for the firm in December. But the actual results proved otherwise.

In the energy market on Thursday, oil slid again, with crude for February delivery closing at $41.70/barrel, down 93 cents. February reformulated gasoline rose just over a penny, to $1.0882/gallon.

On New Years eve day, gold got sold off in the Far East a bit…and then the down trend accelerated through London trading, with the bottom being the London p.m. gold fix. From there…and to everyone’s surprise…the price took off to the upside with some real authority. True, there hadn’t been a lot of volume up until that point, but that changed from the London p.m. fix until the close of trading in New York. Silver’s chart was very similar, with the metal turning in an outstanding day as well. Gold put in an “outside day key reversal to the upside”…which is a very bullish technical indicator. The boyz have never…ever…allowed this technical indicator to work in gold…and have taken…

Dollar-Euro parity? Crude at $12 a barrel? 15% unemployment? J. Christoph Amberger presents the Today’s Financial News top predictions for 2009…

City fashion is a dangerous thing. Its followers rarely come out smiling. So although there is a chorus now calling for mergers and acquisitions in the small company sector, this seems more to do with fund managers’ concerns about illiquid stocks than any commercial rationale.

Central Asia and Africa look set to be the biggest winners as nervous energy importers look for alternative supplies far from the volatile Middle East. Let me show you an unusual way to profit from this trend.

As recently as a month ago, Erin Callan was on top of the world. The WSJ did a glowing piece on her rise through the ranks. Condé Nast’s Portfolio magazine dubbed her the most powerful woman on Wall Street.