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Greentech Media submits: by Shyam Mehta For many in the PV industry, the term "shakeout" conjures up not-so-fond memories of the winter of 2008. The reverberations of the global financial crisis and the difficulty in filling a Spain-sized hole led to a sharp drop-off in global demand, and the resulting oversupply and precipitous price drops led both market participants and pundits to foresee an apocalyptic future for many PV manufacturers. A shakeout ('consolidation' to the politically correct), they said, was arriving, and layoffs, restructurings, acquisitions, and insolvencies were on their way. Many of the more than 250 wafer, cell, and module firms around the globe would simply be unable to survive in the brutally competitive dynamic that would surely ensue, leaving behind a leaner, fitter supply chain. To quote GTM Research's own words circa January 2009: "What will likely emerge...is a substantially smaller list of companies with relatively higher concentrations, and a trimming of the overall capacity amounts to match real market demand". Fast forward a year and a half. Have the prophecies come true? No doubt, almost every PV manufacturer had to endure severe hardship for the first half of 2009. Prominent firms have felt the heat of significant restructuring and layoffs (Q-Cells (QCLSF.PK), REC, Solon (SGFRF.PK), BP (BP), United Solar). Consolidation of sizable proportions has taken place across the value chain (MEMC's (WFR) acquisition of SunEdison, First Solar's (FSLR) acquisition of Nextlight and Optisolar pipelines, the entry of cell and wafer manufacturers into module production). And the prophecies of untimely demise have indeed come true for noteworthy firms and facilities (Applied Materials's (AMAT) Sunfab business, customers Signet and Sunfilm, BP's and GE's plants in Spain and Delaware, respectively).Complete Story »

The Moneygardener submits:Well General Electric (GE), who cut their dividend from C$0.31 per share to C$0.10 per share in early 2009, has now boosted their payout to C$0.12 per share. This 20% increase brings their dividend back to levels last visited in before the turn of the century. Yes, GE shareholders including myself are partying like it's 1999. This increase came earlier than expected as GE had mentioned that they were looking to a dividend hike in 2011. They also announced an extension of their share repurchase program as they are sitting on loads of cash. I'll take a dividend increase any way that I can get one and I remain confident in GE's future. I especially like their involvement with alternative energy and developing market infrastructure. Their high weighting in financial services really hurt them during the financial crisis.Complete Story »

Jesse Felder submits: The 10-Year Treasury Note currently yields just under 3%. The 15 Dow components above all sport dividend yields greater -- with a hypothetical portfolio yield nearly a full percentage point higher. Which would you rather own over the next decade? Disclosure: NoneComplete Story »

Hickey and Walters (Bespoke) submit:
Below we highlight the performance of S&P 500 sectors from the market's 2010 high (4/23) to its July 2nd low as well as since July 2nd. As shown, the Financial sector is up the most since July 2nd with a gain of 10%, followed by Materials (9.5%), Technology (7.8%), and Energy (7.6%). The Financial sector was also down the most during the correction. The four defensive sectors -- Utilities, Consumer Staples, Health Care, and Telecom -- have all underperformed the S&P 500 since July 2nd.click to enlargeComplete Story »

Hickey and Walters (Bespoke) submit:
With earnings season kicking off this afternoon, we thought we'd highlight a few stats on the subject. Over at Bespoke Premium, we have a database with every single earnings report for US stocks going back to 2001. This totals out to 65,210 individual quarterly reports. Of these 65,210 earnings releases, 62% of companies beat EPS estimates while 25% missed. Sixty-two percent have also beaten revenue estimates, while 38% have missed. Predicting whether any random stock will go up or down on the day in response to its report is just about like a coin flip. Of the 65,210 reports in our database, the stock has gone higher on the day 32,563 times and lower on the day 32,251 times (396 times the stock closed the day flat). Unless you dig deeper into the numbers, it's basically hit or miss.Complete Story »

Jack Lifton submits:According to Reuters, China yesterday made a couple of official announcements that will directly affect the global rare earths supply issue. It was announced that China will create a price discovery mechanism for the rare earths metals andwill [in order to accomplish these goals] establish a unified transportation and sales system and [is] are expected to consolidate production into 3-5 conglomerates in the long term.Complete Story »

Diane Mermigas submits: Apple (AAPL), Hulu (GE, NWS) and Google (GOOG) are intensifying the race for a share of the $65 billion in broadcast TV advertising gradually shifting to online and mobile. Their success depends on grasping consumers' changing digital behaviors and attitudes toward video. So far, they are missing the mark, and television is struggling to find its way into the digital age.Complete Story »

Markos Kaminis (Wall St. Greek) submits: The latest signs from manufacturing, housing and the labor market all point to the return of economic recession. This report focuses on the dimming of the economy's only shining star, manufacturing. Yesterday offered an ominous ISM Manufacturing Report, and we think you should note the change the report illustrates.The daily barrage of data piles on the double-dip economic recession reality, beating down hopeful strategists and forecasters with truth. It's an ugly truth, unfortunately, but it's what we must deal with. This latest day's dumping included more signs of slowing in manufacturing and housing, and ongoing labor woes. You cannot fool the market with rhetoric for long; she is efficient at processing data, however policy makers, corporate leaders and investment professionals may try to sway her. Eventually, each and every one of them must bow to the truth. We remain an independent voice, seeing both opportunities and warning signs, and offering both long and short ideas without any bias.Complete Story »

Frederic Ruffy submits: SentimentThe bearish underlying tone continues following another round of grim economic news Thursday. The table was set for morning losses on Wall Street after European markets traded lower and the latest weekly jobless claims numbers showed an increase of 13,000. Economists were looking for a decline of 1,000. Making matters worse, the ISM Index unexpectedly fell to 56.2 in June from 59.7 the month before (vs. 59 consensus) and May pending home sales stumbled 30 percent. Consequently, poor economic numbers weighed on the major averages for a third day and the Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 74 points to 9,700 heading into the final thirty minutes of trading. The Dow is now down 8 of the past nine trading sessions and has given back 750 points during that time. The market slide has clearly stirred up some bearish sentiment in the options market. 9.2 million puts and 7.5 million calls have traded across the eight options exchanges so far.Bullish Order FlowSPDR Homebuilders Trust (XHB) is down 7 cents to $14.25 after data showed pending home sales falling 30 percent in May, much worse than the 10.5 percent decline that economists had expected. The order flow is interesting. In XHB, a block of 18.8K Jan 17.5 calls traded at the 60-cent ask price. 21.6K traded and, while open interest is 30.6K, some of it is from Monday when 15.7K changed hands, including a block of 13.1K at the 81 cent ask price. So, it looks like one or more investors might be accumulating a bullish position in the homebuilder fund. A number of individual builders are seeing interest today as well: A block of 11K Lennar (LEN) Aug 13 puts was sold at 88, cents, Pulte Homes (PHM) July 9 calls ahve traded 5085X, and Bullish flow detected in D R Horton Inc with 9646 calls trading, or 4x the recent avg daily call volume in the name.Complete Story »

First Coverage submits: Both Market and Sell-Side Sentiment Hit the SkidsAnother Week of Market Correction The market got off to a great start on Monday as a result of the announcement from China that they would let the Yuan increase by an unspecified amount. Unfortunately, skeptics soon viewed it as window dressing, for ahead of last weekend’s G-20 meeting, bad housing data drove the market lower as the week wore on. A Friday rally on announcements that the Dodd-Frank finreg bill had been agreed upon and that the bill was not as bad as many had expected came too late to pull the market even for the week. The DJIA declined 2.9%, while the S&P 500 and NASDAQ both fell 3.7%. Prices for all ten industries fell, with Oil & Gas and Consumer Services leading the way with declines of 6% and 5%, respectively. Financials and Health Care only fell 2%.Complete Story »