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To: Cautious_Optimist who wrote (224129)	5/18/2012 12:26:26 AM
From: PartyTime	of 236741

forbes.com Brendan Coffey, Contributor I wrote for Forbes from 2000 thru 2011. I work for someone else now. Follow on Forbes (41) LISTS \| 10/26/2011 @ 10:52AM \|56,257 viewsThe Four Companies That Control the 147 Companies That Own Everything There may be 147 companies in the world that own everything, as colleague Bruce Upbin points out and they are dominated by investment companies as Eric Savitz rightly points out. But it’s not you and I who really control those companies, even though much of our money is in them. Given the nature of how money is invested, there are four companies in the shadows that *reallycontrol those companies that own everything. Before I reveal them, some light math: According to the 2011 annual factbook from the Investment Company Institute, there is $24.7 trillion in all the mutual funds in the world (a little less than half from the US). Based on data from the ICI, $1.24 trillion of this is directly invested in index funds, plus another $992 billion in assets beyond that $24.7 trillion in Exchange Traded Funds, which aren’t mutual funds but are index funds. That means the bulk of that money is in “active” managed funds or fund of funds. But then consider this: the chief of hedge funds at a very large asset manager told me last week (alas, I cannot identify either) that an internal study his firm recently performed found that the vast majority of mutual funds defined as actively managed see 95% of the assets they hold determined by an index. That means just 5% of actively managed funds really are driven by the active manager’s judgment. This less-than-active management is for two reasons: one is to maintain the fund in a style box (i.e. large value stock, medium value stocks) and comply with the reality all mutual funds are required to have a benchmark index they compare their relative performance to. The other reason is to adhere to risk metrics to which most of the fund industry is beholden. This second point is partly due to Modern Portfolio Theory (a complex topic we won’t debate here) and to the human nature that active managers tend to build portfolios close to the indexes they benchmark against to avoid really awful downward relative performance years that ends up costing them their jobs. So of the $25.69 trillion in worldwide assets we’ve identified, $2.23 trillion are directly in indexes ( ETFs and index mutual funds) with another $22.3 trillion indirectly beholden to indexes (that 95% of actively managed fund holdings said to be determined by an index). You can see where I’m headed here. That means the real power to control the world lies with four companies: McGraw-Hill, which owns Standard & Poor’s, Northwestern Mutual, which owns Russell Investments, the index arm of which runs the benchmark Russell 1,000 and Russell 3,000, CME Groupwhich owns 90% of Dow Jones Indexes, and Barclay’s, which took over Lehman Brothers and its Lehman Aggregate Bond Index, the dominant world bond fund index. Together, these four firms dominate the world of indexing. And in turn, that means they hold real sway over the world’s money. While that may seem benign – they are indexers after all you may say – a financial index isn’t cut and dried like the index of a book. It’s a misperception indexers merely do some simple math like identifying the 500 largest US companies and voila!* you have the S&P 500. Every indexer has a fudge factor that allows them to say one company is more “economically significant” for the index at hand than another company. To again take the S&P 500 as an example, the 502-largest company by market cap could get the nod over number 500 by size if S&P decides it wants to. The power is even more obvious in bonds. The now- Barclays Aggregate Bond Index attempts to mirror volume of bond issuance in a region or the world, but it can’t include even a sizable percentage of all the bonds issued. Essentially, there’s a big judgment call in there in what bonds it adds to its index. A judgment that influences bond fund flows worldwide. What does all this mean? Researchers at a desk in midtown Manhattan are the butterflies that cause the hurricanes in the markets. For instance, 37% of all index funds in stocks are in a S&P 500 index fund. That’s $370 billion directly buying and selling stocks based on when the S&P analysts decide to drop ITT from the S&P500 and replace it with just one of three ITT spin-off, Xylem, as announced on Monday. Then add on top of that all of the so-called active mutual funds aiming to beat the S&P 500 (but still reflect 95% of the S&P in their funds) who react to the change and then all of the hedge funds who trade ahead of time trying to guess what S&P may drop or add. I don’t have a grudge against any indexer (and full disclosure, I’ve done work for some of them). And the folks at McGraw-Hill don’t seem to spook people the way George Soros manages to. But when you discuss power in the world markets, the answer isn’t what you think it is. Follow me on Twitter.

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To: Cautious_Optimist who wrote (224129)	5/18/2012 7:25:59 AM
From: T L Comiskey	of 236741

8 May 2012 Wild spring weather baffles bugs By Victoria Gill Science reporter, BBC Nature The wettest April in more than a century has caused problems for UK butterflies, bees and other bugs. Conservation charities, Butterfly Conservation and Buglife, said the weather was likely to limit some species' opportunities to forage. If the unfavourable conditions continue, they could lead to population crashes. Experts are particularly concerned about honeybees, which will not forage in the cold and could run out of food. But some of the country's invertebrate population, such as snails and slugs, are likely to benefit from the deluge. According to the Met Office, April 2012 was the wettest on record since 1910; the UK received an average 126.5mm of rain. Butterfly Conservation's Richard Fox said that this was "flying season" for some of our rarest butterflies and that it had been "clobbered by awful weather". "Spring specialists", normally seen flying in April, such as the common blue and brown argus, only emerged in early May. More worryingly, some of our rarer species were "confused" into emerging early by unseasonably warm temperatures in March. "The worry about this April is that the butterflies that did emerge will have poor breeding success due to the bad weather," explained Mr Fox. For example, he said, "the Duke of Burgundy and the pearl-bordered fritillary (both endangered in the UK) produce just one generation a year, and they're flying now". "They can't change when they emerge. [So] unless conditions improve in the next few weeks their opportunities to breed will be very limited and, we may see population crashes later in the year or next spring." 'Winners and losers'While the recent weather extremes will be bad news for some invertebrates, Buglife pointed out that some would benefit. Some freshwater-dwelling species, such as mayflies, caddisflies and stoneflies, which struggled in the recent drought, could bounce back as their waterways and pond habitats fill up. And slugs and snails, which have very leaky, permeable skins and need moisture to survive, are likely to feed and breed more in damp conditions. For bees, it is a more mixed picture. Dale Harrison from Buglife said that native bumblebees were likely to fare well, as they are "robust and well adapted to our environment and unpredictable weather". "Whereas, the honeybee is non native, and just is not designed to live with such weather extremes." The British Beekeepers Association (BBKA) agreed that they were concerned about honeybees' ability to withstand the cold, especially in the spring when they have had so little time to build up food stores. Gill Maclean, a BBKA spokesperson, said: "If they can't get out, they have to rely on the stores they have in their hive. "They've been cooped up in the hive all winter living on those stores, so that could be a problem. "We would advise beekeepers to check their bees have sufficient food." There is evidence that beetle populations suffer during years when spring and summer are relatively cold and rainy, so conservationists are also concerned to see how threatened species such as the oil beetle will fare. Mr Fox said that he would be watching the forecast closely. He added: "Time will tell."

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From: SiouxPal

5/18/2012 10:37:48 AM

of 236741

Greece No Longer a Nation; Announces Plan to Become Social Network
IPO Imminent for FetaBook

ATHENS ( The Borowitz Report) – After struggling for months with an intractable financial crisis, Greece announced today that it would cease to exist as a sovereign nation and would instead reboot itself as a social network.

The new entity, FetaBook, is expected to raise much-needed billions in an upcoming IPO.

The social network formerly known as Greece announced that it would cancel its upcoming elections and instead install a CEO, a 24-year-old hacker from suburban Athens named Ciro Mavromatidis.

Speaking from the newly opened offices of FetaBook, Mr. Mavromatidis explained how the social network would be attractive to the investment community in ways that Greece was not.

“We’re keeping all the aspects of Greece that made it a cool brand – the ruins, the Olympics, the olives,” he said. “We’re just losing the things that were a drag on the Greek economy: namely, the Greeks.”

He said under the new plan, all Greeks would cease to be citizens of Greece and would instead become friends of FetaBook: “They won’t receive any government benefits anymore, but they’ll be able to grow all the imaginary food they want.”

Mr. Mavromatidis said that by converting from a nation to a social network, FetaBook will enjoy other cost savings as well.

“We Greeks waste billions of dollars a year smashing plates after meals,” he said.

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