Wednesday September 23 Housing and Economic stories

TOP STORIES:

Shale Drillers Turn to Asset Sales as Swagger Wanes – (www.bloomberg.com)  Contracts that locked in higher prices are expiring, leading banks to reduce credit lines in coming months. Drillers caught in the squeeze may be forced to auction off some of their best holdings to raise cash or accept more expensive financing to avoid bankruptcy, according to more than a dozen bankers, lawyers and company officials who specialize in energy deals. ... The first wave of deals is already looming: sales of land holdings in prolific oil regions. Oil market gyrations since July have made valuations hard to pin down, dimming the outlook for sales of whole companies. Instead, executives are looking to shore up their balance sheets by selling land or wooing deep-pocketed private equity groups or hedge funds to invest in their operations in exchange for a share of revenue, Samji said.

Brazil downgrade triggers prospect of further turmoil for EMs - (www.ft.com)  Brazil’s downgrade to junk status this week by Standard & Poor’s, the credit rating agency, is not only a severe blow to investors, policymakers and citizens in Brazil, but it also opens the prospect of a wave of further downgrades across emerging markets, as credit spreads widen and investors become increasingly gloomy about a global economic slowdown. “We are entering a different phase,” says Bhanu Baweja, emerging market strategist at UBS in London. “For the longest time we have thought that even if EM growth is weak, EM balance sheets, or their ability to service their debts, have been broadly OK. But now things are getting more serious.”

Europeans: Refugees 'welcome' but not at my house - (www.wnd.com)  As Europe continues to contend with the flood of refugees from the Middle East, WND took to the streets of Barcelona Thursday to gauge local response to a proposal by the city’s activist mayor for volunteers to house the incoming migrants. The vast majority of Barcelona residents interviewed expressed deep sympathy for the refugees and strongly supported the Spanish government’s decision to take in nearly 20,000 of those fleeing Syria. Most residents queried also supported the mayor’s aid plan. Yet when asked if they would personally house the refugees, every Barcelona resident interviewed responded in the negative. Earlier this week, Spain agreed to accept as many refugees as proposed by the European Commission, with the number now set at more than 19,000 to be resettled in Spain. In August, Barcelona’s new mayor, Ada Colau, backed by the left-wing Podemos party, posted an emotional plea on her Facebook page calling for European citizens to put aside their “fear” of the “other,” stop using terms like “illegal alien” and instead create a “network of cities of refuge.”

As a Boom Fades, Brazilians Wonder How It All Went Wrong - (www.nytimes.com) The president of Brazil should have been ecstatic. She had just won re-election after an intense campaign in which she fiercely defended her role in making Brazil, for a few fleeting years, a rising star on the global stage. But in the days after her victory last October, President Dilma Rousseff was worried, confronted in private deliberations with her closest advisers by signs that Brazil’s triumphs were at risk of coming undone. “We went too far,” Aloízio Mercadante, Ms. Rousseff’s chief of staff, acknowledged publicly this month, describing the sense of alarm as the dust settled after the election and Ms. Rousseff and her aides grappled with the weaknesses in Brazil’s economy. It was not just the drop in global prices for Brazilian commodities like iron ore, the slumping demand in markets like China, or even the brewing corruption scandal at the national oil company that were hurting the country. Ms. Rousseff’s own economic policies were taking a toll, too, officials concede.

Hedge Funds for the Masses' Get a Stress Test - (www.nytimes.com) Hedge funds aren't just for the 1 percent. The mutual-fund industry wants average investors to get into its own version of hedge funds, saying they can offer protection when the stock market is tumbling. Kind of like it has been doing the last few weeks. The industry's push has helped draw more than $10 billion in investment to these "hedge funds for the masses" over the last year, and they're now in the midst of a stress test. These funds, also called liquid alternative funds, are supposed to deftly maneuver rocky markets thanks to the more complicated strategies they use. So, did they do that this past month, when the Standard & Poor's 500 index had its first correction since 2011?

OTHER STORIES:

China's Stocks Head for Weekly Advance After Offshore Yuan Gains - (www.bloomberg.com)
Exclusive: Petrobras spending plan already obsolete, new cuts likely - sources - (www.reuters.com)
What Puerto Rico’s New Plan Means - (www.nytimes.com)
Goldman's Next 11 Markets Are Sinking Even Faster Than the BRICs - (www.bloomberg.com)

Germany's Schaeuble says central banks alone cannot solve economic woes - (www.reuters.com)
30 years on, parallels with Plaza but currency universe very different - (www.reuters.com)
Russia tells Washington: talk to us over Syria or risk 'unintended incidents' - (www.reuters.com)

China Central Bank Seen Ready to Intervene Again if Offshore Pushes Yuan Too Far - (www.reuters.com)