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Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog,

If the "solution" doesn't enable the accumulation of capital in all its forms by individuals and households, it isn't a real solution–it's just another top-down scheme that institutionalizes subsistence serfdom.

Phrases like reviving the American Dream emit the lingering stench of empty political rhetoric mouthed by bought-and-paid-for candidates. But if we wave aside this foul smell, we're left with a very profound topic: reviving broad-based opportunity.

Longtime collaborator Gordon T. Long and I discuss what it will take to revive opportunity in a new 27-minute video Reviving the American Dream.

The status quo "solution" to the decline of opportunities for meaningful work is predictably top-down: guaranteed income for all, a.k.a. "welfare for all." This is of course a re-hash of the Keynesian Cargo Cult's 1930 fix for the Great Depression, except on a far grander scale.

There are three completely unsupported assumptions in every proposed "welfare for all" scheme:

1. The trillions of dollars/ euros/ yen etc. required to fund "welfare for all" can be raised from taxing profits and wages. Yet wages and profits are both set to decline sharply in the near-term as the global recession tightens its grip and longer term from the unstoppable forces of automation.

 

2. Paying people to do nothing will free people to become artists, entrepreneurs, etc. This is a noble ideal, but if we look at communities that have become dependent on top-down central-state welfare, we find despair, social depression and the collapse of real community.

"Welfare for all" debilitates the community by stripping away the sources of meaningful work and positive social roles. I explain this further in my book A Radically Beneficial World: Automation, Technology and Creating Jobs for All.

 

3. Though few if any supporters of "welfare for all" schemes state this directly, the underlying assumption is that "welfare for all" is a temporary measure to get the unemployed/under-employed through a rough patch, and that the economy will magically heal itself and create millions of new jobs if given time.

Automation has changed the economy in ways the status quo cannot dare admit. As a result, pundits profess their faith in the false premise that technology will always create more jobs than it destroys. As I explain in my book, this is no longer true, as the prime directive of automation is the elimination of costly human labor–not just in the developed economies, but in the developing economies.

The full-spectrum failure of "welfare for all" is the inevitable result of its essential nature as yet another central-state/bank top-down "solution." Real solutions no longer come from central states/banks that have long been captured to serve the interests of Elites. Real solutions are bottom-up: the community economy is the only sustainable foundation for broad-based opportunity and the wide spectrum of solutions that support employment, capital accumulation and vibrant local economies.

If the "solution" doesn't enable the accumulation of capital in all its forms by individuals and households, it isn't a real solution–it's just another top-down scheme that institutionalizes subsistence serfdom. Stripped of unrealistic ideological faith, "welfare for all" is revealed as nothing more than institutionalized subsistence serfdom.

Reviving the American Dream boils down to reviving bottom-up opportunities within the community economy.

Gordon and I discuss the bottom-up community economy in Reviving the American Dream (27:48 video).

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1PvQQI1 Tyler Durden

If Russian and Western airstrikes are “degrading and defeating” Islamic State, someone forgot to tell al-Hayat Media Center, the brain trust for a sprawling network of discrete propaganda production units that are spread across nearly a dozen countries.

While the group’s operational capabilities may be dwindling, its propaganda arm is apparently no worse for wear having released dozens of clips this month, including a brand new video out Sunday featuring the Paris attackers.

Over the course of 17 minutes, the group celebrates the November attacks with a montage of clips taken from the Western media’s coverage of the massacre. The video also shows each attacker including alleged ringleader Abdelhamid Abaaoud whose voice is can be heard throughout. “It allegedly features one of the Bataclan theater attackers and a suicide bomber Omar Ismail Mostefai, named in the video as Abu Rayyan Al-Faransi,” RT notes.

Of course there’s the obligatory execution footage including beheadings and firing squads and near the end, French President Francois Hollande’s face is superimposed over the severed head of a prisoner.

The group also threatens British PM David Cameron who appears with a red bullseye on his face.

“We are in the process of examining this latest propaganda video which is another move from an appalling terrorist group that’s clearly in decline and in retreat,” Cameron’s spokeswoman told Reuters on Monday.

“The following are the final messages of the nine lions of the khilafah who were mobilized from their dens to bring an entire country — France — to her knees,” the video reads, after which each attacker records their “final message” to the world prior to the suicide mission.

Hours after the video was released, Europol said ISIS is planning “large scale attacks” in Europe. 

#BREAKING IS planning ‘large scale’ attacks focused on Europe: Europol

— AFP news agency (@AFP) January 25, 2016

“A report coinciding with the opening of a new counterterror centre in the Hague shows how the so-called Islamic State had developed a new combat style capability to carry out a campaign of large-scale terrorist attacks on a global stage — with a particular focus in Europe,” the chief of the EU police agency told reporters today.

What shouldn’t get lost here is that ISIS conducts near daily attacks across the globe, but those tragedies are generally relegated to the back pages because they occur outside of the “civilized” world. If and when the group does strike Europe again, you can bet that will be the last straw for voters exasperated with the flood of asylum seekers flooding across the bloc’s porous borders. In other words, Schengen is one suicide bomb away from being officially dismantled, which means that the next time someone dies in a suicide attack in Europe, Europe itself will die with them.

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Following a rerun of September 2015, when Draghi sent market expectations about ECB action sky-high only to massively disappoint in December (we will have to wait until March to see if it is deja vu all over again) last week, this week is just as big for central bank jawboning with the FOMC (Wednesday) and the BoJ meeting on Friday, with hopes that they will at least hint of more easing if not actually do much.

As DB’s Jim Reid summarized, “it feels unlikely they will be negative events for the market even if there is no actual hard signs of a Fed relent or fresh stimulus this month from Kuroda. As a minimum we should hear hints of more dovish soundbites relative to their last meetings.”

Here are the key events in the coming week, courtesy of Deutsche Bank:

• There’s no shortage of important data releases, central bank meetings and corporate earnings results this week. We kick off this morning in Europe with the German IFO survey and UK CBI orders data while in the US this afternoon the Dallas Fed manufacturing activity print is due.
• There’s no data of note in Europe on Tuesday but its set to be a busy day in the US with the FHFA house price index and S&P/Case-Shiller home price index data due, the flash January services and composite PMI’s, consumer confidence and finally the Richmond Fed manufacturing activity index.
• Early on Wednesday we get the only data of the week out of China with December industrial profits data and the January consumer sentiment reading. In Europe on Wednesday we will see consumer confidence readings from Italy, Germany and France. In the US new home sales data for December is due before the conclusion of the FOMC meeting later in the evening.
• Turning to Thursday in Europe we’ll get the final January consumer confidence data for the Euro area. In Germany we’ll see the preliminary January CPI report along with the advance Q4 GDP report for the UK. In the US it’s all about the preliminary durable and capital goods orders data for December, while pending home sales and initial jobless claims data is also expected.
• We close out the week in Asia on Thursday with a bumper set of data from Japan including CPI, employment indicators, industrial production and housing starts. If that wasn’t enough we’ll also get the BoJ meeting. The European session will be focused on the Euro area CPI report, while we’ll also get inflation and GDP data from France. Any hopes for a quiet end to the week in the US will be in vain with the advance Q4 GDP report due (expectations for +0.8%) along with the advance goods trade balance, core PCE, employment cost index, Chicago PMI and University of Michigan consumer sentiment print.

For those who prefer table format summaries, here it is from BofA…

… and Citi:

Source: DB, BofA, Citi

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Submitted by Wolf Richter via WolfStreet.com,

“Some very critical things are hidden.”

After the white-knuckle sell-off of global equities that was finally punctuated by a rally late last week, everyone wants to know: Was this the bottom for stocks? And now Moody’s weighs in with an unwelcome warning.

If you want to know where equities are going, look at junk bonds, it says. Specifically, look at the spread in yield between junk bonds and Treasuries. That spread has been widening sharply. And look at the Expected Default Frequency (EDF), a measure of the probability that a company will default over the next 12 months. It has been soaring.

They do that when big problems are festering: The Financial Crisis was already in full swing before the yield spread and the EDF reached today’s levels!

And so, John Lonski, chief economist at Moody’s Capital Markets Research, has a dose of reality for stock-market bottom fishers:

For now, it’s hard to imagine why the equity market will steady if the US high-yield bond spread remains wider than 800 basis points [8 percentage points]. Taken together, the highest average EDF metric of US/Canadian non-investment-grade companies of the current recovery and its steepest three-month upturn since March 2009 favor an onerous high-yield bond spread of roughly 850 basis points.

Moody’s EDF began spiking last summer and has nearly doubled since then to 8%, the highest since 2009.

The average spread between high-yield bonds and Treasuries has widened to 813 basis points (8.13 percentage points). But at the lower end of the junk-bond spectrum (rated CCC and below), the yield spread is a red-hot 18.4 percentage points.

This chart shows the average high-yield spread (blue line) and the CCC-and-below spread (black line). Note how far we were already into the Financial Crisis before both spreads reached the today’s levels: March 13, 2008, and September 30, 2008, respectively:

So how does the yield spread impact equities and the broader economy?

A wider-than 800 basis-point high-yield spread reflects elevated risk aversion that will reduce capital formation and spending by non-investment-grade businesses. In addition, ultra-wide bond yield spreads favor a continuation of equity market volatility that should sap the confidence of businesses and consumers.

Which has consequences for stock prices.
 

Yield Spreads and EDF sink M&A.

The premium over market price that acquiring companies pay has been rocket fuel for share price increases in entire sectors as analysts hype the potential for all these companies to receive buyout offers with huge premiums.

Last year, US M&A activity (involving at least one US company) soared to $3.34 trillion, a record 18.6% of US GDP. The prior record was 17.8% of GDP in Q1 2000, just before the dotcom bubble began to implode. The report:

A cresting by M&A may offer valuable insight regarding the state of the business cycle. The two previous yearlong peaks for US company M&A were set in Q3-2007 at $2.213 trillion and in Q1-2000 at $1.745 trillion. Recessions struck within one year of each of those peaks.

But the markets didn’t wait for those official recessions. Stocks began their multi-year crash at the end of those quarters!

The buyout frenzy is funded in part by large amounts of debt. As corporations lever up, risks rise and downgrades hail down on them. In 2015, M&A-related “net downgrades” (difference between M&A-related downgrades and upgrades) by Moody’s rose to 36. This year, Moody’s expects them to increase further.

The M&A activity last year was fueled by low borrowing costs, high stock market valuations, and “diminished prospects for organic revenue growth,” as Moody’s put it euphemistically: S&P 500 companies waded through four quarters in a row of revenue declines!

The importance of the latter helps to explain why record highs for M&A tend to occur close to the end of a business cycle upturn. The urge to merge will be greater the more convinced corporations are of the imperative to meet long-term earnings targets via mergers, acquisitions, or divestitures.

M&A is the easy way to growth. But it comes at a high price, increased financial instability, subsequent downsizing and cost-cutting, and slow-moving waves of layoffs that then sap consumer demand and the economy.

Yield spreads and EDF sink share buybacks.

“In order to supply a more immediate lift to shareholder returns,” Lonski writes, companies lower total shares outstanding by buying back their own shares. This lowers the dilution that occurs when they issue new shares for M&A and executive compensation. These financial engineering tactics have been another type of rocket fuel underneath the market.

“A more uncertain earnings outlook,” as the report euphemistically calls the ongoing three-quarter earnings recession for S&P 500 companies, “will increase the incentive” to engage in share buybacks “as opposed to investing such funds in a company’s production capabilities.”

This leads to even more problems:

Sometimes, efforts to enhance shareholder returns trigger credit rating downgrades. Typically, strategies which benefit shareholders at the expense of creditors employ cash- or debt-funded equity buybacks and dividends.

So Moody’s downgrades stemming from “shareholder compensation” rose to 48 in 2015 but were still shy of the record 78 in 2007, at the cusp of the Financial Crisis.

At some point, market volatility, which means downward volatility because no one lambastes upward volatility, will put a damper on M&A and share buybacks, thus knocking over two of the remaining props under the market.

And more ominous still:

The two latest recessions were partly the consequence of markets not knowing the full extent of deteriorations in household and business credit quality. Not everything can be quantified, if only because some very critical things are hidden.

Ah yes, we won’t even really know how bad it is with our over-leveraged corporate heroes until the house of cards comes down to reveal what’s left inside.

But nothing goes to heck in a straight line. Read…  After $7.8 Trillion Got Wiped Out in three Weeks, “Global Stocks Surge Most since 2012”

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As we said two days ago when looking at the paltry recoveries on their total debt that bankrupt energy debtors are generating in liquidation and bankruptcy asset sales, “the energy bankruptcy party is only just starting.” And sure enough, overnight we learned that another company is preparing to throw in the towel following a Reuters report that SandRidge Energy – a shale oil and gas producer in the Mid-Continent region of the U.S. – is exploring debt restructuring options, “as the heavily indebted U.S. oil and gas exploration and production company struggles with the fallout from plunging energy prices.”

In reviewing the company’s options, Reuters writes that one choice is a pre-packaged bankruptcy. However, a decision on a way forward is not imminent and that the company has access to enough cash to continue doing business for at least several more months under its current structure. Other avenues SandRidge could pursue would include a debt exchange or filing for bankruptcy protection without any agreement with its creditors.

What this really means is that having struggled to come to a prepackaged bankruptcy agreement for the past few weeks with its various stakeholders (Debtwire reported on Jan. 13 that Sandridge hired Houlihan Lokey to craft a restructuring plan), the company will likely have no choice but to file a “freefall” Chapter 11 and let a bankruptcy judge decide the fate of its $4 billion in debt.

According to Reuters, the vast majority of the company’s debt is in the form of bonds owned by a plethora of mutual funds, hedge funds, and other institutional investors. They do not yet have a single representative who could be reached for comment. They will soon, and shortly thereafter the official creditor committee will become very familiar with recovery matrices that see it getting as much as 15 cents on each dollar it gave to the soon to be bankrupt energy company.

A little bit of history on SandRidge, “which made risky bets in the Mississippi Lime formation in northern Oklahoma and southern Kansas, is particularly vulnerable.”

For months, SandRidge has been caught in a bind, having just enough money to pay interest on its debt, but not enough to drill new wells or replace older ones.

 

Mississippi Lime wells typically do not produce as much oil as some other shale formations, and the rock also contains a lot of water, which is costly to haul away.

 

After an initially encouraging exploration phase, the shale play has not delivered the low cost production gains that SandRidge and Wall Street analysts expected.

 

About 40 energy companies entered bankruptcy in 2015 and more are expected in the next few months as oil prices have dropped by 75 percent since mid-2014.

Oklahoma-based SandRidge was founded in 2006 by former CEO Tom Ward, a previous executive and co-founder of natural gas giant Chesapeake Energy Corp. Perhaps that explains why just as troubled Chesapeake may follow SandRidge into bankruptcy shortly.

Ward was ousted by SandRidge’s board in 2013 after some of SandRidge’s largest investors alleged governance lapses and strategic missteps, including transactions SandRidge had made with entities controlled by the Ward family. His exit package from the firm was worth around $90 million. A request for comment at Ward’s new Oklahoma City-based company, Tapstone Energy, was not immediately returned.

More notably, SandRidge attracted the ire of Oklahoma regulators over its use of wells to dispose of wastewater, an activity that is believed to trigger earthquakes. Last week, the company agreed to shut seven wells in the state and reduce the amount of wastewater injected into roughly 40 others.

For now, the biggest threat facing the company especially as it enters a protracted reorganization and potential bankruptcy, will be to raise cash so it can avoid a liquidation. To do that SandRidge has put its headquarters in Oklahoma City up for sale in May, but has yet to find a buyer. In April, it laid off at least 130 employees, or 20 percent of its workforce based there, public records show. It has also previously used a distressed debt exchange with creditors to lighten its debt load. Had it only waited a little longer, it could have bought its bonds back even cheaper:  its Jan. 15 2020 notes at below 5 cents on the dollar.

SandRidge had $790 million in cash and access to undrawn credit facilities that gave it access to capital totaling $1.9 billion, chief financial officer Julian Bott said on the company’s latest quarterly earnings call on Nov. 5. This has given the company breathing room of several more months to decide on a way forward, as well as scope to pursue another debt exchange.

Of course, if it waits the full seven months in desperate hopes that oil rebounds and it doesn’t, instead of a Chapter 11 Sandridge may not pass go and proceed straight to a Chapter 7.

To be sure, a SandRidge bankruptcy will hardly come as a surprise: as of earlier this month, SandRidge’s shares are no longer listed on the New York Stock Exchange, and trade on the OTC Pink marketplace instead with a market capitalization of around $30 million.

Finally, assuming $4 billion in debt SandRidge does file, that would make it the second largest bankruptcy since the default wave started in earnes last year, putting it behind only Samson Resources with its $4.3 billion, and ahead of both Sabine Oil and QuickSilver.

 

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1JxAGf4 Tyler Durden

Investing in Silver – 3 Must See Charts

Precious metals continue to look  very undervalued vis a vis most asset classes – particularly stocks and bonds.

This is especially the case with silver which has fallen by more than 70% from what we believe was an intermediate price high of $49 in 2011 – despite surging demand for silver bullion coins and bars from canny buyers investing in silver.

Silver Eagle Sales – Full Year 1996 and First 19 Days of 2016

Silver is currently trading at just over $14.25 per ounce – 1/77th of the price of gold at $1,100/oz. GoldCore continue to believe that silver will surpass its non-inflation adjusted, nominal high of $50 per ounce in the coming years. Indeed, we believe that silver will surpass its inflation adjusted high or real record high of over $150 per ounce in the next 5 to 7 years.

We are currently doing a research note on silver which will outline why we are so positive on silver.

In the meantime, let us whet your appetite and give you an understanding of the rationale for our bullishness. Steve St Angelo of the SRSrocco REPORT has just done an excellent blog with three very interesting charts which contribute to our positive outlook for silver bullion.

Silver Eagle Sales – 1996 (Full Year) Versus 2016 (Full Year)

He points out that

In 1996, total Silver Eagle sales for the year were 3,466,000. Now compare that to the 4,950,000 Silver Eagles sold in the first half of January. We must remember, Silver Eagle sales in 2016 started on January 11th. So, in just six working days (this Monday was a holiday), the U.S. Mint sold 43% more Silver Eagles than all of 1996. 

 

Furthermore, if we compare sales of Silver Eagles in 1996 versus 2015, this was the result:

Investors purchased a record 47 million Silver Eagles in 2015 compared to 3.5 million in 1996. Basically, investors bought 13.5 times more Silver Eagles in 2015 than they did in 1996.

 

This next charts compares the 20-year change of silver investment versus Jewelry and Silverware demand:
Silver Investment & Jewelry Demand – 1996 (Full Year) Versus 2015 (Full Year)

In 1996, total global Silver Bar and Coin investment was only 23 million oz (Moz) versus 264 Moz of Jewelry & Silverware. However, 20 years later… we see a much different picture. While global Jewelry & Silverware demand increased to 280 Moz, Silver Bar & Coin investment surged to 236 Moz.

Steve’s blog in full and charts can be seen here

Breaking Gold and Silver News Today – Click here

 

Silver bullion coins – like Silver Nuggets (Kangaroos), Eagles, Maples and Britannias are great forms of insurance against currency debasement and financial collapse. They also make very nice gifts for loved ones and are a great way to pass on wealth to the next generation.

We have the best prices – some of the most competitive in the U.S. and internationally.

Call us today to order – 1 302 635 1160 – or buy silver coins online here.

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Traders on the NYSE clapped and cheered when the closing bell sounded on Friday as though a couple of green closes somehow made up for the outright chaos that’s reigned throughout the month.

Oil may technically have entered a new “bull” market and the yuan may have momentarily stabilized, but a quick look at the fundamentals for crude and the backdrop for the global economy suggests any respite will be fleeting.

Echoing that sentiment is FX trader Mark Cudmore who is out this morning warning that while the blizzard of 2016 may have come and gone, markets are likely just in the “eye of the storm.”

*  *  *

From Mark Cudmore, writing for Bloomberg

While the worst of the U.S.’s epic winter blizzard has officially passed, it’s less likely that the storm in financial markets can also be said to have ended.

• Thursday’s rally continued strongly into the weekend close, resulting in most global assets recording a positive week. But once analyzed in the broader context, it seems likely this may only be a bear-market bounce
• Bear-markets often provide the most extreme moves in both directions because lower risk-appetite reduces liquidity on both sides of the market. Also, technicals gain supremacy over fundamentals which loosens anchors to “value” and encourages out-sized reactions to any changes in sentiment
• Technically, there is little out there for bulls to cling to. While oil may now officially be in a “bull” market after its biggest two-day rally in seven years, it is still down 12% year-to-date and firmly in a medium-term downtrend. That applies even more clearly to other important commodities, such as copper
• Likewise, across longer-term charts for stock markets, emerging-market currencies and high-yield credit, the recent bounce is barely noticeable. And the risk-barometer that is EUR/JPY closed below the critical 200-week moving average for a second straight week
• Fundamentals didn’t drive this year’s weakness, so it will be harder for positive fundamentals to prompt a recovery’’
• Perhaps the two most significant supports for the market have been that the Chinese yuan stabilized and the European Central Bank indicated that further monetary easing is imminent. But both of these are arguably reactions to negatives rather than genuinely new positive drivers
• The relief rally probably has more to run but it’s hard to believe the worst of 2016 is behind us. And there are even reports that Storm Jonas may crop up again in a couple of days – on the other side of the Atlantic

*  *  *

As a reminder, this is still the 2nd worst start to a year ever…

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• Oil Drops as Saudis to Maintain Spending, China Diesel Use Falls (BBG)
• Saudi Arabia is able to withstand low prices says Saudi Aramco Chairman (WSJ)
• Recession Warnings May Not Come to Pass (WSJ)… or they May
• Problems Found at Theranos Lab (WSJ)
• New York rebounds after blizzard, Washington shuts down government (Reuters)
• China business confidence, recruitment hit record lows in January – SMI survey (Reuters)
• Twitter to Revamp Leadership Under CEO Jack Dorsey (WSJ)
• Johnson Controls to Combine With Tyco, Move Domicile to Ireland (BBG)
• Birinyi More Worried About Markets Than Any Time Since 2009 (BBG)
• Wal-Mart: It Came, It Conquered, Now It’s Packing Up and Leaving (BBG)
• Sanders, Clinton cool to Bloomberg’s possible entry into 2016 race (Reuters)
• Ford Shutting Operations in Japan, Indonesia on Lack of Profit (BBG)
• China’s Working-Age Population Sees Biggest-Ever Decline (WSJ)
• More holes than fingers? Beijing struggles to plug capital flight (Reuters)
• Chinese Developer Aims Lower Amid Manhattan’s Luxury-Condo Glut (BBG)
• Merkel’s party, sliding in polls, weighs German ‘border centres’ (Reuters)
• German Business Sentiment Falls as Market Woes Cloud Outlook (BBG)
• Syria opposition to meet Tuesday, blames Russia for ‘obstacles’ (Reuters)
• U.S. Relies Heavily on Saudi Money to Support Syrian Rebels (NYT)
• U.S. IPO Market on Track for Slowest Month Since Recession (BBG)
• Canada’s Trudeau to DiCaprio: Your climate remarks don’t help (Reuters)

 

Overnight Media Digest

WSJ

– Twitter Inc Chief Executive Jack Dorsey is revamping his top ranks as he tries to find ways to revive the social media company and earn the trust of investors. (http://on.wsj.com/1RHubsr)

– U.S. health inspectors have found serious deficiencies at Theranos Inc’s laboratory in Northern California, according to people familiar with the matter. (http://on.wsj.com/1RHGjtC)

– Johnson Controls Inc and Tyco International PLC are in advanced talks to combine, according to people familiar with the matter, in a deal that could value Tyco as high as $20 billion and signal that companies are still willing to embark on large mergers despite being shaken by recent market volatility. (http://on.wsj.com/1QsUkda)

– Canada’s efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions are calling into question oil majors’ ability to tap the world’s third-largest oil reserves. (http://on.wsj.com/1OQkSk3)

 

FT

Twitter is on the verge of a major management shake-up. Three of its most senior executives – head of product, head of media and head of engineering are leaving the company. The San Francisco-based company might announce the appointment of two new members to its board as soon as this week.

U.S. asset manager Third Avenue Management’s asset under management have dropped by more than $1 billion. The company had $6.3 billion under its management at the end of 2015, however, investment losses coupled with client redemptions have led to a reduction in its assets under management to $5 billion.

Investors in China’s rural commercial banks are selling their stakes on Taobao showing signs of desperation amongst cash-straped investors. The sale in lenders at the bottom of China’s financial system require minimum to no regulatory approval at all.

Iran plans to sign a contract with Airbus to buy 114 new aircrafts. Following the lifting of economic sanctions against the middle-eastern nation, president Hassan Rouhani’s government is determined to show Iranians the economic benefits of its diplomacy.

 

NYT

– Avocados From Mexico and two other advertisers – Skittles and Wix.com – have decided to return to the Super Bowl, indicating that live television remains important for advertisers. (http://nyti.ms/1WIMWLr)

– Traders and portfolio managers worry that sophisticated institutional investors, who generally tend to take a long-term view, have been the ones driving the selling over the past six months. (http://nyti.ms/1Nu7j86)

– Whether or not negotiators reach a pact by Feb. 1 on how companies such as Google and Facebook use Europeans’ online data, Isabelle Falque-Pierrotin, who chairs the group of European data protection regulators as well as France’s watchdog called the CNIL, is in a position to propel privacy protection efforts. (http://nyti.ms/1ZMrViZ)

– Twitter will undergo a major overhaul of its top ranks in the next few weeks, from its eight-member board to key executives in engineering and product. (http://nyti.ms/23mTROW)

 

Canada

THE GLOBE AND MAIL

** Sears Canada Inc is stepping up its efforts to close another round of stores. The company has instructed real estate firm CBRE to look for alternative uses for Sears’s weakest stores, such as its clearance outlets, Brandon Stranzl, executive chairman of Sears Canada, said in an interview. (http://bit.ly/1nJ5Rdj)

** Canadian investigators are analyzing cellphone data in an attempt to track down the masterminds of a militant attack that killed six Canadians, Burkina Faso foreign minister Alpha Barry, said in an interview with The Globe and Mail. (http://bit.ly/1nJ6bIW)

NATIONAL POST

** Peter MacKay, a high ranking cabinet member in the previous Conservative government, is joining the Toronto office of global law firm of Baker and McKenzie as a partner. (http://bit.ly/1lJKdE6)

** By arguing that publishing peer viewed research conflicted with her role as an indigenous scholar, former law professor Lorna June McCue has won her bid for a human rights tribunal hearing after losing her job at the University of British Columbia. (http://bit.ly/1lJKjeW)

 

Britain

The Times

The Financial Conduct Authority has been accused of betraying the confidence of whistleblowers by passing on evidence and sensitive information to the high street banks that were the subject of their complaints. (http://thetim.es/1OQsuDl)

Competition to win the £4 billion contract to build superfast trains for the HS2 rail line has been blown open by a promise from Alstom, the French industrial giant, to bring rolling stock production back to Britain if it wins the tender. (http://thetim.es/1SGgXfG)

The Guardian

Unilever, the consumer goods group behind Persil and Magnum ice-creams, has said it will not scale back its UK operations if Britain votes to leave the EU. (http://bit.ly/23lUh8v)

Iran plans to buy 114 aircraft from the European company Airbus by March, and is looking for other deals, senior Iranian officials said on Sunday as their country emerges from sanctions and international isolation. (http://bit.ly/1Pwfy4Q)

The Telegraph

HSBC is poised to make a decision on whether it will stay in the UK as early as this week, The Daily Telegraph has learnt. (http://bit.ly/1ZXvoAC)

Former Ofcom chief Ed Richards has ruled himself out of the race to become the next chief executive of City regulator the Financial Conduct Authority, the Telegraph understands, further narrowing the field of candidates to take over from ousted boss Martin Wheatley. (http://bit.ly/23mji3e)

Sky News

The Government is considering taking thousands of unaccompanied Syrian refugee children from migrant camps in Europe, the International Development Secretary has told Sky News. (http://bit.ly/20nGiMI)

Severe weather warnings are being issued as the snowstorm that deluged the U.S. heads to Britain, bringing up to 8 inches (20cm) of rain in some areas. (http://bit.ly/1PtRFkH)

The Independent

A controversial policy reportedly forcing asylum seekers in Cardiff to wear brightly coloured wristbands has been axed after a public outcry. (http://ind.pn/1Jw3NiN)

 

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