Sept. 24 () – Olam International Ltd., the owner of 67% of NZ Farming Systems Uruguay, surged on the Singapore stock exchange after confirming it is in talks with rival Louis Dreyfus Commodities.

Olam “has engaged in preliminary confidential discussions with Louis Dreyfus in relation to a possible business collaboration which may take the form of, among others, a merger,” the global supplier of food and agricultural commodities said in a statement. The talks are “preliminary” and there’s no certainty a deal will be done, it said.

Shares of Olam jumped 8.5% to S$3.20 on the Singapore stock exchange and have climbed 22% in the past 12 months. The shares

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The Business Cycle Dating Committee of the National Bureau of Economic Research (they really to work on an acronym) announced yesterday that the US recession ended in June 2010 and was the longest and deepest since World War II. Someone needs to tell US employers though because whilst the decline in economic activity may be over, the growth in employment has yet to start and home builders reported last night that their confidence remains at an 18 month low, so they are not feeling it either. The US Dollar had a mixed day yesterday after these reports and ahead of today’s crucial interest rate announcement by the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC).

The decision is undoubtedly going to be an ‘On Hold’ one where US interest rates remain at a base of 0-0.25% but the announcement is more interesting than that. Will

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Oil N’ Gold

More Analysis and Technicals on Crude Oil, Natural Gas, Gold & Silver

Crude oil failed to follow strength in Wall Street and declined. News that the Enbridge 6A pipeline will resume operations soon disappointment oil traders and the front-month contract initially slumped to as low as 74.66. It was the stronger-than-expected inventory report that arrested the fall and narrowed the loss. Price ended the day at 76.02, down -1.02%. Oil product prices, however, performed better with gasoline slipping -0.33% and heating oil climbing +0.18%. Today in Asia, price extended the fall for the third consecutive day.

Gold pulled back after the rally on Tuesday broke a record high.

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Ten-year treasury yields increased to the highest in five weeks as the view that the North American economy – the world’s largest – is likely to face a second round of weakness took a further step back. Risk appetite seems once again to be back on the table after a round of Chinese data suggested that the domestic economy is recovering from a slowdown engineered by its own authorities to prevent a stimulus-induced recovery snowball out of control.     

Eurodollar futures – U.S. 10-year yields reached 2.845% this morning as S&P equity index futures jumped in response to strong industrial output growth and healthy retail sales data in China. The spread

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Indicative Rates Sell Buy GBPEUR 1.2140 1.2169 GBPUSD 1.5455 1.5482 EURUSD 1.2713 1.2734 GBPJPY 129.10 129.34 GBPAUD 1.6861 1.6885 GBPNZD 2.1468 2.1501 GBPCAD 1.6164 1.6193 NZDUSD 0.7185 0.7208 GBPZAR 11.19 11.24 USDZAR 7.2385 7.2703 GBPPLN 4.7800 4.8107 EURJPY 106.09 106.33

Rates are dependent on amount transacted.

The upcoming week features less US figures after the Non-Farm Payrolls. Rate decisions in Japan, Australia, Canada and Britain are the highlights. Here’s an outlook for the major market moving events.Monday is Labor Day in the US and Canada. The markets will be more quiet than usual, but Friday’s Non-Farm Payrolls will still echo in the markets. 1. Japanese rate decision: Published on Tuesday, early morning. The recent BOJ meeting, that was an emergency meeting, failed to bring a big change, especially no coordinated intervention. Also in this decision, intervention to weaken the yen will be closely watched. This already became a heated political issue in Japan, as Ozawa, a candidate for Japan’s No.1 position pressures Premier Kan to do something. There Read more…

(World Press Release) following an FDIC report extending the list of troubled banks to a 17 year high, KTC Capital released an investor warning on shares, mutual funds and derivatives holding U.S. bank stocks.

The latest quarterly survey of the American banking system led the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) to classify 829 at risk of failing. This is a nearly twofold increase over the 412 banks on the watch list a year ago and is up from 772 in the first quarter of this year.

Banks that find themselves on the watch list are considered the most likely to fail, but few of the lenders on the list actually reach the level of failure.

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