Linkfest

The Market notched another good week, with the Dow and SPX gaining about 1.5%. The big winner was the Nazz, which tacked on a hot 3.2%.

The losers? Aside from those of us in cash, the commodities got shee-lacked this week. Gold, Copper, Oil, Natural Gas were all lower, as Oil traipsed  to 6 month lows.

Where does this leave us? Wondering what comes next: Housing data Tuesday, the Fed announcement Wednesday, and a holiday shortened week for the Hebraic amongst us — Friday is what an old boss used to call "Rosh-a-Home-a," as all his Jewish employees (me included) split early for the New Year holiday.

No matter its the weekend, and you what that means: Linkfest!

ECONOMY

• Business Week looks at What’s Really Propping Up The Economy, and astonished me with this stat: Since 2001, the health-care industry has added 1.7 million jobs. The rest of the private sector? None

• Bloomberg’s Caroline Baum is the latest sharp eyed observer to note the idiocy of the Core rate: U.S. Inflation Measure May Be Rotten at the Core   

• Cramer and I disagree about what Best Buy plasma screen sales mean; He says it bullish news on the Consumer; I say its all about the free money. Yaser Anwar takes apart BBY’s numbers;

• ECRI (and Real Money’s) Anirvan Banerji discuss economic forecasting at the IMF: Part I and part II;

• Marek Fuchs looks at Rewriting Post-9/11 Economic History;

• CPI & the Soft Landing;

• Be sure to check out the Economic Cycle graphic in: A Kinder, Gentler Mr. Market?

• And what has to be the oddest of the readings I came across this week: Time For Us To Go, wherein an eclectic group of Conservatives call for a GOP rout. (If anyone can explain this one to be, I would be eternally grateful).   

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Investing

• Lots of reasons why the Market’s have been in Rally mode

• As mentioned, Commodites suffered big whackage this week; Barron’s blames ETFs;

• Front page WSJ:  The Hedge-Fund King Is Getting Nervous

• By definition, everyone can’t be a contrarian.  While so many people were looking for a September sell off, it was that much less lkely to happen. (that is, until everone gets bullish)

• An amusing hypotheticasl meeting of the plunge protection team: The Exchange Stabilization Fund

• Alan Farley urges you to Play Defense Amid Confused Action; Harry Schiller Sizes Up the Short Side; Richard Suttmeier on The Technical Dilemma (if no Real Money sub, then go here);

• Dan Gross observes that is you Dump Your CEO, Today — Your stock price will rise

• Dell keeps Losing Money by Buying Stock Back

• Merrill on Mutual Fund Cash Levels;

• ‘BRIC’ ETF Needs to Build Results

• 7 stocks for the really really long run

• And if you get tired of the Stock Market, you can always play the Spock Market;

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HOUSING

• Home prices staying the same? Don’t kid yourself: There are Freebies Galore as Home Builder’s keep piling on Incentives;

• Would you buy a New Home — if the Builder Helped You Sell the Old One?

• Exotic Mortgage Brokers have become the new boiler rooms;

• A brutal piece by Comstock: The Hard Landing For Housing is Already Here;

• A San Diego sales manager of a branch office of a top-10 national lender describes the typical profile of mortgage applicants; Pretty shocking

• No surprise given the above: Foreclosures spiked in August;

•  Rising Inventory of Unsold Homes reaches multi year peak

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ENERGY

• Too many commentators are Inconsistent on Oil: It cannot be heads we win, tails you lose . . .    

• $15 Oil? Philip Verleger, the first analyst to forecast the major rise in Oil, thinks prices  will plummet;

• That huge new discovery of oil in the gulf last week? Um, not so fast:  Clarification of the Huge Chevron Gulf Oil Discovery

• Beware the oil trap

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Investing Psychology

• A long but fascinating article on what neuroeconomics tells us about money and the brain.   

• I normally think Ben Stein is an amiable goofball, but he gets it dead right in How Not to Ruin Your Life;

• The Most Common Mistake Traders Make (and how to avoid them)

• Are individual investors trading much less?

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Technology and Science

• Zune, Microsoft and Corporate Culture (or why Microsoft is Microsoft)   

• This cant be good

:  Indonesian Bird Flu Case May Have Spread Among People

 

• Uh-oh, idiot copyright alert: Universal to upload lawsuits to YouTube, MySpace?

• Official questions regulatory scrutiny of Apple — they urge Europe to let new technology develop without interference;

• A puffy shirt, I understand, but a Puffy planet? That poses a pretty puzzle;

• The Train to the Roof of the World

• NASA researchers find Artic ice has shrunk abruptly;

• Princeton Prof Hacks E-Vote Machine

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Music, Film, Books, Television, Fun stuff

• I have little interest in seeing the film The Last Kiss, but I already ordered the soundtrack. It has many of the same artists as the terrific Garden State;

• I am also checking out the brand new CDs from:

– The Black Keys – Magic Potion

– John Mayer – Continuum

– Barenaked Ladies – Barenaked Ladies Are Me

But I do like old school:

– Count Basie Swings, Joe Williams Sings

– Frank Sinatra – Live in Australia, 1959

• A documentary I do want to see is The U.S. Vs. John Lennon; Here’s the official site, and you can see the Trailer here;         

• A band I previously mentioned in this space — Bittersweet — is in the season opener of Grey’s Anatomy this Thursday; (streaming here) Live performance video at KCRW: Morning Becomes Eclectic 

• And I am totally jazzed about the new Casino Royale;

• Most people know Aaron Sorkin from West Wing, but I always loved his TV spoof Sports’ Night. Now, he puts TV back in his gunsites with Studio 60;

•  The next book up inthe queue: Peter Atkins’s Galileo’s Finger: The Ten Great Ideas of Science;

• Car facing a 747 backwash (Cool!)

• This killed me:  Star Trek Cribs – The Director’s Cut (Artwork: Dope!)

• And the funniest bit of broadcast TV this week, David Letterman and Ann Heche discuss lesbians . . .

And whatever else you do this week, for God’s sake, don’t eat your Spinach!