A recent Barrons article points out that “gold and copper are each down 12% from the all-time highs seen on March 17 and March 6, respectively, while crude has fallen 11% from its March 17 high. London International Financial Futures Exchange sugar and cocoa are off 25% and 21%, respectively, from recent highs, while Chicago…

A 2008 report from Canada shows an alarming decrease in insect-eating species of birds.

Photo:endlesstorture, Creative Commons, Flickr The folks at Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services crack me up. In December they said that they don’t expect a U.S. recession. Now they say there is a light at the end of the subprime tunnel, claiming that we are halfway through a forecasted $285 billion in writedowns. I must admit…

If you are invested in a hedge fund, you should read Martin Wolf’s explanation of why today’s hedge fund industry may not survive. Mr. Wolf argues that the hedge fund industry is bound to attract “the unscrupulous and unskilled,” because it’s hard to distinguish luck from skill. He further argues that most hedge funds follow…

Ask yourself a simple question: Do you believe that the U.S. dollar will appreciate over the next decade? That’s the question I asked myself on thepanelist.net.

The March 1979 incident at Three Mile Island (TMI) in Pennsylvania was the worst commercial nuclear power plant accident in U.S. history.

The New York Times recently reported that the cost of Chinese-made goods sold in the U.S. has risen steadily for the last eight months.

The recent New York Times Magazine entitled “The Money Issue,” covers topics ranging from how good works are measured, to why people give, microfinancing, and the relationship between celebrity and philanthropy. But what struck me off the bat is the chart illustrating how Americans allocated their contributions to charitable causes in 2006. The research was…

Photo:Andrew, Creative Commons, Flickr New York governor Elliot Spitzer had an itch that had to be scratched. Let the media frenzy begin! Big deal. This is between him and his young family. But then again, the alliteration "Spitzer Sex Scandal" has a nice ring to it, and who really wants to listen to another minute…

Several analysts expect the U.S. dollar to rebound in the second half of the year. A slowing U.S. economy always affects the rest of the world with a delay, they say, and most of the bad news may already be priced into the greenback. "For Euroland, historically, the delay has been one or two quarters,"…

Note to Congress:  Please get rid of the penny and stop supporting the wasteful use of zinc and copper for something that is thrown away.  According to this article about the penny at Mainstreet.com, there are 1.2 cents worth of copper and zinc in a U.S. penny and it costs 1.7 cents to produce one.…

The theory of decoupling suggests that emerging markets have broadened and deepened to the point that they no longer depend on the United States for growth, leaving them insulated from a U.S. recession. Several analysts have claimed that decoupling is a load of rubbish, while others swear by it. One of the factors complicating the…

Photo:abbyladybug, Creative Commons, Flickr I’m compiling a list of bad environmental ideas. The first was sowing the ocean with tons of iron fertilizer to encourage phytoplankton, which only incidentally absorb the carbon dioxide (CO2) associated with global warming.

Photo:VaguelyArtistic, Creative Commons, Flickr Financial firms have so far announced losses totaling around $160 billion, and UBS feels there could be a total of $600 billion in losses triggered by the subprime collapse. There is more bad news to come and central bankers know it. If UBS is correct we've only seen the tip of…

I'm not going to pretend to know how to pick a bottom for stocks, but if we dissect the anatomy of a bear market we might understand why stocks markets eventually recover.

It's probably fair to say that the most important diplomatic relationship in the world is between the U.S. and China. Unfortunately, the relationship is souring and could get much worse. "Alas, the U.S. is mostly to blame for this," said Nicholas Kristof in a New York Times column. "There are plenty of legitimate reasons to…

Big-ass, diesel-guzzling SUVs shouldn't be the main focus of environmentalists. We can keep bickering about the carbon emissions of industrialized nations, but that won't get us far. Environmentalists are wasting their time by hugging trees and buying hybrid cars. Installing solar panels or building wind farms is great, but these are only band-aids. I believe it…

We all know Ireland is green. Last week, thanks to diligent New York Times reporters, we learned that Ireland is also "green," as in, environmentally responsible.

Last week, a funny thing happened on the way to the mailbox. A memo, meant for Eli Lilly & Co. (LLY – $51.22) attorney Bradford Berenson (who is helping negotiate a private settlement for Lilly with the government), went instead to Alex Berenson of the New York Times.

Photo:bbaltimore, Creative Commons, Flickr Ever wanted to know more about "Financial Engineering" and "Leverage"? The following story captures the essence of these disciplines:

Judging by today's selling frenzy on Wall Street, it looks like the market has finally started pricing in a worst case scenario for the U.S. economy. And the time has come to ask some important questions. Is it safe to say that the recession is finally here? If we are in a recession, how long…

Once upon a time, in a land far far away, lived a hairy caveman. After a long hard day of hunting mammoths and avoiding saber-tooth tigers, he scratched his nose and it started raining. He didn't think much of it at first and ran back to his cave into the arms of his loving cavewoman.…

A recent article in the Christian Science Monitor discusses the eternal question of ethical investing: "Can you have market rate returns and be socially responsible?"  Perhaps it should be framed as, "Must people in the business of SRI (mutual funds) emphasize the ability to meet market benchmarks in order to exist?"  G. Jeffrey Macdonald's conclusion…