Juggling Dynamite

It’s back… Here is direct video link.

Apparently a high profile British banker pled guilty today in a London court as part of his “deal” with prosecutors. A gag order so far prevents the press from releasing his name or further details. This could mark some progress in the road back to personal accountability in the finance sector and away from the outrageous pattern the past 6 years of having corporations plead guilty to rampant financial crimes with no directing minds having to admit any fault.

The first guilty plea in the Libor investigation is a “milestone” says David Enrich, European banking editor at the Wall Street Journal, adding that the senior banker’s identity is to be protected. Here is a direct video link.

In the US we also learn that the the Justice Department is preparing a fresh round of legal actions against the world’s biggest banks:

“With evidence mounting that a number of foreign and American banks colluded to alter the price of foreign currencies, the largest and least regulated financial market, prosecutors are aiming to file charges against at least one bank by the end of the year, according to interviews with lawyers briefed on the matter. Ultimately, several banks are expected to plead guilty.”

In a related story, we see that former New York Fed president and Treasury Secretary “Tiny” Tim Geithner is on the stand today answering questions about the AIG bailout. Here is a direct video link.

No doubt the popular executive “I don’t recall” card will be heavily played by all…

As we warned that it would, the strong U.S. dollar is posing a triple threat to U.S. earnings.  Here is a direct video link.

Most importantly for stock prices, this is coming at a time when S&P earnings have been above trend for the past 4 years (not because of robust sales but mostly because of cost cuts in the 2008 recession and because corporations have been spending 90%+ of their net income to buy back their own shares to prop up earnings).  As we saw at all previous cycle peaks and most recently in 2000 and 2008: mean reversion in earnings is inevitable and hard on over-valued investment markets.