Increasingly It Is A Favorite Source

Asia's imports of crude from West Africa are at record highs as sanctions on Iran cut supplies from the Islamic Republic to China, a Reuters survey of West African oil flows suggest. Asian imports of West African crude oil will hit an all-time high in the first quarter as purchases of Iranian oil decline and as Chinese and Indian refiners build stocks from alternative sources, trade and shipping sources said. North American, Asia and European refiners compete to buy West Africa's high quality, low sulphur crude oil. Increasingly it is a favorite source of fuel for Chinese, Indian and other Asian refiners. The region is a natural alternative source of oil for Asian buyers who wish to avoid sanctions imposed by the West over Iran's nuclear program that the United States and its allies say ...

My friend Brent Cook is buying gold right now… But not for the reasons you’d expect. Brent is no “doom and gloom” gold bug. He doesn’t think the dollar is going to collapse any time soon. Brent simply knows the world is running low on gold… which could drive the price of his favorite stocks much, much higher. He has unique insight into the gold business. He’s one of the best mining geologists in the world…and he spends an extraordinary amount of time visiting mines and analyzing mining data. He shares his thoughts in his Exploration Insights newsletter. Last week, Brent told readers about the latest on a huge story happening in the gold business: Gold companies are spending enormous amounts of money to explore for gold…with little to show for it. According to numbers from the world’s ...

“Mint Poison Cookie” is not the name of a Ben & Jerry’s ice cream flavor. But it might as well be…if you happen to be a Chihuahua with a sweet tooth. Last Saturday night, your editor’s Chihuahua, Tango, consumed a near-fatal quantity of chocolate, which got your editor to thinking that debt is a lot like chocolate: Sweet and delicious in some circumstances; fatal in others. Ben & Jerry’s “Mint Chocolate Cookie” ice cream is the favorite flavor of your editor’s youngest son, Ethan. He loves chocolate. So does Tango. When Ethan eats chocolate nothing much happens. When Tango eats chocolate he spends the night in “Animal Urgent Care,” undergoing emergency chocolate de-toxification. No kidding. Sometime on Saturday, Tango chowed down a few brownies while no one was looking. The poor little ...

(Reuters) - Asian governments have imposed a raft of measures aimed at preventing their property markets from taking off too quickly, but the region still offers investors some of the most prospective real estate globally. House prices in Asia have doubled in many cases in the past two years. So after various measures to take the heat out of markets, especially in China and Hong Kong, it is almost inevitable that returns will cool next year. But beyond that, price growth should pick up once again off the back of Asia's traditional attractions for real estate investors; enviable economic growth, a steady rise in currency values and importantly, increasing urbanization in several countries. Analysts see prices rising again between 5 percent and 10 percent in 2012. Still, there is no sign ...

(Reuters) - There is no sign that investors' headaches from Europe are going away, but early indications of strong holiday spending and an improving labor market could soothe Wall Street this week. Fears that Europe's debt crisis could spiral out of control have pushed stocks off two-year highs hit earlier this month. Since November 5, the S&P has fallen 3.1 percent after running up 17 percent over the two months before that. At Friday's close, the S&P 500 was down 0.9 percent for the week, almost matching the Dow's 1 percent drop. However, those fears have been countered by signs of a gathering recovery in the labor market at home. The government's nonfarm payrolls report on Friday is set to be another sign of a turnaround in hiring that could boost stocks through the end of the year. ...