• Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) said it yesterday (Wednesday) that it will invest $550 million to build smaller cars and an electric vehicle in Michigan. The investment will “support” about 3,200 jobs in the Michigan, and will be followed by production of a battery-electric vehicle in 2011, Reuters reported.

• A report from ADP Employer Services showed that U.S. companies cut about 491,000 workers from payrolls in April. The figure was lower than economists’ forecast and the lowest total monthly job losses since October, Bloomberg reported.

• General Motors Corp.- (NYSE: GM) owned Saab Automobile said it would welcome takeover talks with Italy’s Fiat SpA (OTC ADR: FIATY). Saab spokesman Eric Geers told Reuters that Fiat isn’t among the Saab’s 10 suitors, but “if Fiat comes into the picture, we would welcome a dialogue.”

• Building permits in Canada surged 24% in March, exceeding expectations by 10 times and breaking a five-month decline, Bloomberg reported. The total value of the permits issued by municipalities rose to $3.8 billion (C$4.5 billion), the biggest monthly gain since March 2007.

• The CEO of eBay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) said yesterday (Wednesday) that $2 billion would be a low valuation for Skype.  San Jose-based eBay wants to spin off the Internet phone call company through an initial public offering by the first half of 2010. Analysts have valued Skype at around $2 billion, lower than the $2.6 billion eBay paid for it in 2005. Chief Executive Officer John Donahoe said: “I think that’s low,” when asked at a retail conference in Barcelona about a $2 billion tag, Reuters reported.

• Hertz Global Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: HTZ), the largest U.S. car-rental company, said it’s talking with two automakers to cut a lease deal this year that would help restock inventory and reduce the need for $5 billion in fleet financing next year. The company is trying to lease as much as 20% of its U.S. cars with the goal of cutting fleet financing costs by not taking title of the vehicles, leaving the inventory on the carmakers balance sheets. Credit markets are currently closed to rental-car companies, Chief Executive Officer Mark Frissora told Bloomberg.




• Crude oil prices topped $56 a barrel on Wednesday, as a surprise drop in U.S. gasoline supplies and a slowdown in private sector job losses in April boosted hopes for a turnaround in the economy. U.S. light crude for June delivery rose $2.44 reaching $56.47 a barrel in New York trading. Brent crude climbed $2.02 to $56.14, Reuters reported.

• Eddie Bauer Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: EBHI), which opened its first sporting goods store in Seattle in 1920, is in talks with potential buyers including Gordon Brothers Group and Hilco Consumer Capital LLC, Bloomberg reported, citing people with knowledge of the discussions. The outdoor-clothing chain operates about 370 stores in the U.S. and Canada. Eddie Bauer has a market value of about $21 million after the stock dropped more than 80% in Nasdaq Stock Market trading during the past 12 months. The company has reported annual losses for the past three years.

Investment News Briefs Thursday, May 7, 2009

The gold ‘point & figure’ chart I posted on Thursday looks entirely different after Friday’s rally…but we ain’t out of the woods yet…as the updated P&F graph below clearly shows.

click to enlarge

Thursday’s open interest changes in gold showed an increase of a very tiny 74 contracts. This brought gold’s open interest up to 313,798. In silver, o.i. fell 665 contracts, reducing open interest to a smallish 85,480 contracts.

The new Commitment of Traders report came out yesterday. This time there was noticeable improvement in both silver and gold. In silver, the boyz reduced their net short position by 3,240 contracts…they went long 210 contracts and covered 3,030 short contracts. The Non-Commericals and Nonreportables obviously did the opposite…dumping longs and increasing their short positions.

In gold, the story was similar. The boyz improved their short position substantially by going long 4,667 contracts and covering 3,252 shorts, for a net improvement of 7,919 contracts. The other two categories more or less did the opposite. This was the improvement Ted and I were expecting last week, but didn’t get. The link to the lastest COT is here.

In gold news, a story over at forbes.com says “The U.S. Mint said its gold and platinum numismatic coins will now be directly related to the average weekly London fix prices for the metals. The Mint said the pricing change was effective Jan. 12th.” Mail & Guardian (Johannesburg)…the headline read “Widespread job losses expected in S.A. mining…Production output, particularly for gold and platinum, will continue to decline.”

In the ‘other news’ category…the first five are Bloomberg stories…I see that G.E. (NYSE:GE) is going to toss between 7,500 and 11,000 workers over the next little while. Hertz (NYSE:HTZ) is about to send 4,000 of their employees into the unemployment lines. Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) got another $20 billion cash and $118 billion in new loan guarantees. Circuit City is now officially history after 60 years. And another hedge fund manager has disappeared…this one in Florida. Money is reported to be missing. Reuters (Washington) “U.S. December industrial production drops a bigger-than-expected 2%.” Reuters “California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said on Thursday the state ‘faces insolvency within weeks…California is in a state of emergency’.” Then yesterday, this story came out of the Los Angeles Times…”State Controller John Chiang announced today that his office would suspend tax refunds, welfare checks, student grants and other payments owed to Californians starting Feb. 1st, as a result of the state’s cash crisis. Chiang said he had no choice but to stop making some $3.7 billion in payments in the absence of action by the governor and lawmakers to close the state’s nearly $42-billion budget deficit. More than half of those payments are tax refunds.” Bloomberg (Moscow) “Russian ruble falls most in 10 years this week after five devaluations” And lastly, at bbc.co.uk, the headline reads “Zimbabwe rolls out Z$100 TRILLION dollar note”. [Buy gold!!! – Ed]

click to enlarge

Today’s first item is by Mike Hewitt over at dollardaze.org. The title of his essay is “The Fate of Paper Money”. It’s a very interesting and educational article about the fate of paper money over the last 1,000 years or so, and the link is here.

Today’s second story is another GATA release. A Federal Reserve Board document from 1961, contained in the archive of the board’s late longtime chairman, William McChesney Martin Jr., shows the Fed planning to intervene surreptitiously in the currency and gold markets to support the dollar and to conceal, obscure, and falsify U.S. government records so that the intervention would not be discovered. The document seems to outline everything that GATA has complained about for years. GATA consultant James Turk, founder of GoldMoney and editor of the Freemarket Gold & Money Report, analyzes the document in “The Fed’s Blueprint for Market Intervention”…and the link is here.

Our contemporary brand of socialism has one fatal flaw. It’s too expensive. When you try to shower benefits on so many recipients, you eventually must resort to subterfuge. Foremost among those tricks is money and credit expansion. Inevitably, you debase your currency. – James Cook

Today’s ‘blast from the past’ is from 1978. It was the group’s only great hit, and the band faded into total obscurity after that. But what a beat it has…and what a hit it was…and the link is here.

Well, you have to be completely naive not to see that the Dow was ’saved’ again yesterday…for the second day in a row. The banking index (KRX) came within an eyelash of hitting a new low as well. So…do we crash from here…or do we get an “Obama Bounce?” Who knows. I’ll be ready for anything when the markets reopen on Tuesday after Martin Luther King Day.

Because of the holiday, there will be no Casey’s Daily Resource Plus on Tuesday. I’ll see you on Wednesday…and enjoy the rest of your long weekend…if you’re fortunate enough to get one.

Source: And Then There’s This…Monday, January 19th, 2009

Why U.S. automakers can’t import smartly designed, well-made little cars that get 50 miles per gallon into the United States is absolutely beyond my comprehension.

Particularly because they already make those cars, and because oil prices (as well as gasoline prices) are destined to move even higher from here.

If you don’t believe me, let me tell you about the little beauties I saw in downtown Shanghai early one recent morning.

They’re made by Buick – a General Motors Corp. (GM) nameplate that’s on its way to extinction in its home U.S. market.

Here in China, on the other hand, Buick is a luxury car of choice. Buick’s also known for making sporty “econo-boxes” that offer a little bit of zip.

Ford Motor Co. (F), too, seems to have gotten back to its once-successful roots by “bringing a better idea” to the Chinese market. It’s not a luxury car, but it does demonstrate some global thinking. The car I’m referring to is the Ford Focus, a “world car” designed so that a common chassis can be adapted for virtually every key market around the world. The car started out as the “Euro Focus,” so it was imbued with a sporty, sophisticated design and image right from the starting line. And it shows – it gets very high marks from Chinese buyers.

But it, too, remains “unavailable” in the U.S. market – at least the sporty designs that I’m seeing here [although our crack Money Morning research team back in the States did some digging and were able to tell me that the Focus could debut in the U.S. market by 2010 or 2011]. European competitors such as Germany’s Volkswagen AG (OTC: VLKAY), and France’s PSA Peugeot Citroen SA, with its Citroen and Peugeot nameplates, both, also are clamoring for share on Chinese streets.

There’s a good reason for all this interest: Here in China, auto sales are growing by 15% to 20% a year, with no signs of slowing down. Where as this used to be bicycle heaven, it’s now bicycle hell.

Much of that torrid growth is being “driven” by locals who are buying their first cars. But, believe it or not, rental-fleet operators are becoming more-frequent customers, especially in such major cities as Shanghai and Beijing, and in Hong Kong, one of the two “special administrative regions” in the People’s Republic of China.

And “rental fever” is reflected in the emergence and fast growth of such companies as the Anji Rental and Leasing Co Ltd., which expects profits to soar beyond its usual 50% growth rate in 2008 and revenue to exceed the normal 25% to 30% rate the company consistently has been booking in recent years.

Much of that recent acceleration in sales and profits, according to company representatives, is being fueled by the looming Summer Olympic Games in Beijing. But Anji – a joint venture between Shanghai Automotive Industry Sales Co. Ltd., and Avis Europe PLC, expects this higher-than-normal business volume to continue after the Olympic games, because of the World Expo to be held in Shanghai in 2010.

To prepare for this, Anji is opening offices all over China, including locations at Beijing’s International Airport and at both of Shanghai’s airports. The rental firm is also taking steps to align itself with Avis’ globally available services, including – for the first time ever – enabling foreigners to reserve cars before arriving in China.

And in China’s red-hot competitive markets, companies like Hertz Global Holdings Inc. (HTZ), Bole International Car Rental, RuiJie Auto Rental and ShangCar are right behind them – pun absolutely intended.

Unfortunately, both the auto-manufacturing and car-rental businesses remain small and highly fragmented, meaning there is no clear pathway to profit – not yet, anyway.

But there is an alternative.

Many cars here lack critical safety features that are standard in both Europe and North and South America. Take air bags. Here in China, less than 60% of the cars come equipped with them. But as demand for cars and trucks continues to grow, consumers will become more informed about safety features.

The upshot: Beijing is expected to mandate higher automobile-safety requirements that fall in line with international standards within five years. That means that companies that have already started incorporating global safety requirements into their daily business operations have given themselves a real competitive advantage – both here in China, and in the growing global markets that even include the United States.

Our tour group just met with the top two executives – the chief executive officer and the chief financial officer – of one such company: Jinheng Automotive Safety Technology Holding Ltd. (HK: 8293).

If you’ve never heard of the company, don’t worry. You probably will in the near future.

Jinheng is the leading automotive safety airbag supplier in China, and will likely become a global force in the very near future.

The company already makes products used in more than 60 different vehicle models produced by 30 different manufacturers in China, the Middle East and Europe. And the company is growing rapidly, with the expectation that it will be adding new international customers this year.

Jinheng’s shares are trading at a compelling eight times earnings, right now, and is arguably undervalued. Furthermore, the company has fulfilled the requirements needed to advance from Hong Kong’s secondary board (exchange), to the larger and more prestigious main board.

When that happens, expect the company’s visibility to increase, making it much easier to attract large blocks of capital it can then use to finance its global aspirations.

And stay tuned … as this Money Morning series continues, we’ll have many more such “on-the-ground” observations to bring your way. And we continue to believe that China will be a key to any investor’s ultimate success.

["The View From China" is an investing travelogue chronicling Investment Director Keith Fitz-Gerald’s current journey through Mainland China. Next up: A look at how China has played a key role in causing worldwide energy prices to increase.]