Bernrnke warned that intensifying credit and financial market pressures are likely to restrain economic growth and left the door open for a sizable rate cut next month.

Israelis went on high alert as Hezbollah's leader warned of open war after the assassination of a top commander who also was one of worlds most wanted terrorists.

The Dow ind. fell 175.26 points to 12376.98 despite Bernanke's hint of more rate cuts.

The U. S. trade gap narrowed 6.9% in December to 58.8 billion dollars, its largest monthly decline since October 2006, as exports rose.

From the Wall Street Journal "cash crop....Heartland sees boom with grains in demand". Grain prices are surging to historic levels. Famers are making up now for past losses.

Have a great day.

Good Morning runner
I heard some discussion regarding grain pricing. Seems that there is substantial demand for some grains used to produce fuel, not food. Mabey its good for the environment to burn ethanol based fuels but at present it seems costlier. Great for the farmer, But, it costs a good bit of money and energy to produce these fuels that have fewer BTUs than oil based energy sources. Increasing soaring food costs for the love of cleaner alcohol based fuels may not be the way to go in my opinion. Again, in my opinion, solar may be the way to go. Using the grains to solve other problems like world hunger may be a reasonable idea.

Dry bulk shipper day today - DRYS, DSX, ESEA, QMAR, etc. - DRYS and DSX had nice earnings.

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There are some other stars in the group.

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"They say", there is two hundred years worth of coal (worldwide shortage) in the U.S. We have to figure out better/cleaner ways to burn it. Most power plants burn either coal or nuclear. We use coal gasification now which is somewhat clean and cheap.

Western coal is being shipped to the east. Look at the rails? (railroad stocks)

China has a coal shortage and is shutting down some manufacturing plants because of there shortages.

So a terrorist orginization threatens Israel for killing one of it's leaders.
Keep up the good work Israel. Thousands more to go.

Israel gets rid of one nasty person, and the rest of the nasties decide to open up full scale war... that's why the middle east makes NO sense at all. The nasties are entirely too willing to die for their cause. Something Patton said: "Let the other poor dumb bastard die for his country."

How much more can the fed cut the rate? I mean, jeez, it's already epically low.