Morning Journal--Potential changes in the derivatives market

News on Stocks in Our Portfolios

 
Sigma-Aldrich (SIAL): Q2 EPS of $1.05 beats by $0.01. Revenue of $681M (+3% Y/Y) beats by $1.5M

Altria (MO): Q2 EPS of $0.62 misses by $0.01. Revenue of $4.5B misses by $0.12B.

United Technologies (UTX): Q2 EPS of $1.70. Revenue of $16.0B (+16% Y/Y) misses by $0.41B

Canadian National Rail (CNI): Q2 EPS of C$1.66 beats by C$0.04. Revenue of C$2.67B misses by C$0.03B

McDonald's (MCD): Q2 EPS of $1.38 misses by $0.02. Revenue of $7.1B in-line.

Economics

   This Week’s Data

            June existing home sales fell 1.1% versus expectations of a 1.7% rise.

            http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2013/07/existing-home-sales-in-june-508-million.html

   Other

            Lance Roberts analyzes yesterday’s Chicago National Activity Index (medium and a must read):

            http://advisorperspectives.com/dshort/guest/Lance-Roberts-130722-CFNAI-Disguised-Imbalance.php

            Fed policies in the 1920’s and now (medium):

            http://money.msn.com/bill-fleckenstein/post--bunk-from-central-bankers

            Bill Gross on the likelihood of Fed tightening (medium):

            http://money.msn.com/bill-fleckenstein/post--bunk-from-central-bankers

            Changes may be coming to the derivatives markets (medium and today’s must read):

            http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-07-22/sec-warns-prepare-repo-defaults

Politics

  Domestic

The US no longer has a functioning judicial system (medium):

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/07/america-no-longer-has-a-functioning-judiciary.html

  International

            The situation in Spain continues to worsen (medium):

            http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-07-22/insolvent-spain-forced-borrow-social-security-fund-pay-pensions

                ***over night, Spain released second quarter GDP that declined at the lowest rate in some time.  China vowed not to allow growth to slow below 7%.

            Ditto, Egypt (medium):

            http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-07-22/violent-clashes-egypt-following-calls-lay-seige-us-embassy