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June 29, 2007

Global Financial Bipolar Disorder Even Greater than Usual
by Econotech

(FHPN)--Is it just me, or do global financial markets currently seem to have even greater bipolar disorder than usual?

Increasingly the past few months I have been highlighting increased global financial market risks, while also noting more recently that momentum investors have been shifting into U.S. large cap and tech stocks, which in general have been laggards in the 2002-07 cycle.

Exhibits A and B just from today, compare these two stories below. First the lead story on Yahoo!Finance this afternoon; before the price rise, RIMM's trailing p/e was already 50, according to Yahoo!Finance:

"Research in Motion's 1Q Earnings Jump
Thursday June 28, 5:06 pm ET
By Rob Gillies, Associated Press Writer
Research in Motion Says 1Q Earnings Grew 73 Percent on Increased Sales; Shares Soar 14 Percent

NEW YORK (AP) -- Shares of Research In Motion surged more than 14 percent in after-hours trading Thursday after the BlackBerry maker said its first-quarter earnings grew 73 percent on increased sales and subscriber additions."

Now second, the lead front page story in this morning's "Financial Times," one of the world's most authoritative financial sources:

"Axed deals reflect concerns over credit
By Lina Saigol and Joanna Chung in London and Richard Beales in New York
Published: June 28 2007 03:00

Companies are pulling financing deals across the globe, in one of the clearest signs yet that investors' worries about rising interest rates and US subprime mortgages could be infecting other areas of the credit world and driving up the cost of corporate borrowing ... The bonds and loan deals were pulled after investors refused to buy them under the proposed terms, demanding higher premiums and more protection. Stephen Green, chairman of HSBC, yesterday ... In an interview with the Financial Times, he said he was "worried by the degree of leverage in some big ticket transactions nowadays" and felt that "something is going to end in tears". He also warned that losses could be higher because the parcelling out of risk to so many parties across the financial system could make it more difficult to arrange a rescue - a comment that highlighted widespread and growing unease among senior banking executives ... Many investors are now reassessing risk, which could force up the cost of doing deals and cause a sharp slowdown in private equity activity. Investors appear to be rejecting deals involving the riskiest structures ... Amitabh Arora, New York-based head of interest rate strategies at Lehman Brothers, said: "The bigger risk now is that it calls into question CDOs as a financing vehicle in the corporate credit market.""

Econotech

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