Kung Hai Fat Choy. And happy Robbie Burns Day. And watch out for solar flares. 

My Dragon Power breakfast yesterday (focused on commodities) was sponsored by HSBC and moderated by the Economist Intelligence Unit which benefits from over 150 years of commodity price data. Two questions caught everyone's attention: 1) when will China overtake the USA in per capita production, if it hasn't already done so; and 2) the degree to which a fatal commodity shortage can be offset by alternatives, substitution, new technology, or more intelligent consumption—all of which of course operate on the demand side. But I struggled to find new stock ideas.

Maestro Placido Domingo conducted a 'Harmony' concert for two elementary school orchestras, inspired by the Venezuelan program to teach children to cooperate and focus. Hugo Chavez isn't my favorites presidente, but give him credit for this program. One of the orchestras was from P.S. 152 Manhattan from which I graduated. Inwood (north Manhattan) was then a center of the German-Jewish emigre 4th Reich; today it's mostly Dominican.

The head of British Man Group, a leading hedge fund manager, backs the reintroduction of the 'uptick rule' to reduce the risk of a market crash prompted by high-frequency computerized trading. Peter Clarke Monday at a London School of Economics Alternative Investment Conference called for bringing back the old U.S. rule, which only allow short-selling (bets that a stock price would fall) if the last trade price was higher than the previous one. He said this could help stop rapid-fire computerized hedge fund trading causing sharp, irrational market drops.

Quantitative hedge funds twice caused market sell-offs during the financial crisis. In mid-2007 quantitative hedge funds suffered heavy losses after being caught in a vicious circle of selling. Our Securities and Exchange Commission also partly blamed the March 2010 "flash crash," when the DJIA fell nearly 1,000 points in a matter of minutes, on high-frequency trading firms, which can make tens of thousands of ultra-fast trades daily. Clarke argued that high-frequency traders, whose strategies include making markets for other investors, do not contribute to overall market liquidity despite their claims that they do.

Clarke said the uptick rule could halt some "quant strategies from becoming systemic in certain markets over the short term".High frequency trading accounted for 56% U.S. equity volume and 36% of European in 2010, according to TABB Group (quoted by Reuters).

While I was otherwise engaged, the Bank of Israel boosted the Shekel-$ exchange rate by 0.32% yesterday to NIS 3.787/$. For euros the new rate is NIS4.925. It also cut the interest rate charged starting in Feb to 2.5%, down a half a percent.

The Reserve Bank of India, their CB, also cut the Cash Reserve Ratio it requires banks to hold with RBI by a half a percent, in this case to 5.5% while keeping its repo rate at 8.5%. The RBI seems to think the Indian inflation threat is moderating. While we do not have any way to play Israeli we do gain from CB easing in India.

More for paid subscribers from our companies,.with news from India, Finland, Britain, Greece, Israel, Canada, France, Belgium, Spain, the Netherlands, Ireland, Greece, South Africa, and Brazil. Because it is two day's worth, this is a (Kung Hei) fat (Choy) issue.