Reader PL asked if there will be a double dip. I do not know. But here is what Stephen Taub of BondsonLine learned from brokerages:

-Barclays is skeptical that we are in for another economic decline. So, it recently advised clients to continue accumulating stocks on corrections, favoring sectors with a strong demand base across the major economies.

-Credit Suisse Securities recently told clients we are in an environment of healthy corporate balance sheets and a fair amount of excess cash, but a decidedly un-exciting medium-term growth outlook for the average US corporation. As a result, it expects U.S. corporations will increasingly focus cash flows on increasing dividend payments and share repurchases.

-Bank of America Merrill Lynch reminds clients the strong role dividends have played over the years.

Okay sports fans. You get your wish. Frida Ghitis reports on the Dutch reaction to being finalists in the World Cup. Colombian-born Frida's first language was Spanish, so I am surprised she is not supporting Spain. She writes:

Americans may pay scant attention to the World Cup but my friends in the Netherlands are nothing short of euphoric. The Oranje team will play in the finals against Spain on Sunday and the Dutch, in keeping with their focus on economics and global trade, are counting their Guilders (ok, euros) in advance of what 77% of them are sure will be a Dutch victory.

Economics reporters in the Netherlands, having surveyed the matter, conclude that winning the World Cup will boost Dutch economic growth by 0.1 to 0.5%. This, they explain, is because a euphoric country experiences a surge of economic confidence, which in turn spurs spending, which can boost GDP.

It’s hard to imagine the cautious Dutch going on a national shopping binge. On the other hand, beer sales are already visibly – and audibly -- up. (Drinking beer is a requirement under FIFA rules.)

Houseboat owners plan to build barricades to keep revellers off their boat tops during Tuesday’s victory parade, to happen whether the Dutch win or lose. When the Dutch team won the European Cup in 1988, houseboats sank in the party. Maybe that was good for the houseboat salvage industry.

Your editor last night went to a dinner hosted by Marta from Sevilha and Chris from Munich who are married to each other. Luckily Germany is out of the World Cup race, or there might have been an Andalucian-style Blood Wedding in Brooklyn. Your USA editor and her English husband observed scrupulous neutrality.

AutoNavi Holdings Ltd , a Chinese developer of photogrammetry (digital maps, and navigation and location software), last week became the 145th Chinese co. to list on Nasdaq with an ipo of 10 mn ADRs are $12.50/sh. AMAP is the 22nd new Chinese listing and the 8th on Q in 2010.

There are two drivers of gains on the stock market. One is corporate earnings and results. The other is liquidity. With newly-listed Chinese stocks, liquidity is in short supply despite the general and Asian market boomlets. Shanghai peaked on Oct. 16, 2007. While I know nothing about AMAP I am sure that the huge AgBank capital raising exercise occurred on Beijing's orders, to forestall the need for govt. money.

With a weekend looming and stocks up sharply over the past three days, Wall Street can fall today. There will be profit-taking. Maybe it will be offset by money coming in from the sidelines helping support prices. There is a lot of liquidity in the hands of investors still shell-shocked out of stocks.

According to EPFR of Cambridge Mass, which tracks fund flows reported on last week's moves which seem to have reversed:

Going into the second week of July global equity markets were staging a modest recovery as investors shrugged off fears of a double-dip recession and went bargain hunting. But flow data for EPFR Global-tracked funds reflected the uncertainty of the preceding weeks, with Money Market and US Bond Funds seeing big inflows as most equity fund groups struggled to attract significant amounts of fresh money.

Greece's Socialist government voted to cut government pension rights and overall job protection to try to force down government debt despite tradition and a general strike yesterday. The strikes were moderate and peaceful after an earlier round left three bank employees dead.

The tradition means that many of the measures to be struck down (details still to come) were put in place by earlier Papandreou family governments, current Premier George P.'s grandfather with the same name, and his father Andreas P. The first time I visited Athens, as a student, I recall demonstrators against the Colonels shouting “eena, eena, tessera” after the article in the Greek Constitution violated by their coup against George I. Andreas went into exile and spent some years as an American academic. The younger George was born in the USA.
 

Learn from these Euro-American Greeks. A suggestion. How about US states running deficits (often illegal) doing like the Greeks. We should be prepared to cut abusively manipulted state pension rights too. US manipulation typically involves older workers piling up overtime to boost their pensions which are based on take-home pay rather than formal wages.

South Korea has raised its interest rates 25 basis points to 2.25% to control inflationary tendencies. It joins Norway, Australia, Israel, and India in this elite group of fast-growing countires.

Nudged by your editor, reader PS managed to get the interest rate on his margin account with TD Ameritrade cut to a still-high 3.5%. Bargain with your broker in the current low-interest rate environment. We can save you money with fees and commissions to help cover the cost of a fully paid subscription. More for paid subscribers follows from North America, Britain, South Africa, Singapore, and Thailand: 

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Just as some Elliott or Kondratieff wave theorists predicted the Dow would fall to 1000 and we should to take to the hills with gold coins and machine guns, the bearish gloom-mongers were caught by good news.

The International Monetary Fund late yesterday increased its 2010 world growth outlook to 4.6% reflecting a stronger-than-expected H1. Its earler estimate was for 4.2% growth, made in April. That would be the biggest rise in 3 years. Growth in 2011 is projected to be 4.3%, the same as the April forecast.

Then today the U.S. Dept. of Labor data showed that 21,000 fewer Americans applied for jobless benefits last week (to July 3). That is still 454,000 unemployed people.

European banks are up on an assumption they will pass their not-very-demanding “stress” tests. And perhaps because shareholders are happy that new rules will cut instant bonuses by 70-80%, alligning executives' interests more closely with theirs. Even the embattled euro is up, to $1.27.

German figures showed that imports had risen by a whopping 14.8% sequentially in May, while exports only grew 9.2%. The German trade surpluse narrowed to a mere 10.6 bn euros for the month, well below forecasts.

And as for gold, it now turns out that rather than being a beneficiacy from the printing press at central banks, the yellow metal also was a support for their profligacy. CB swaps with the central banks' central bank, the Basel-based Bank for International Settlements (reported in its latest annual report to end Mar.) helped them monetarise their gold hoards. The BIS acted as a pawnshop, although so far there have been no revelations that it actually sold any of the 346 metric tonnes of gold placed with it.

More for paid subscribers, mostly from Canada for some reason, but with tidbits from Britain, France and Switzerland. And the usual Latin fireworks from Portugal and Spain. And a sale in South Africa.

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I just put in an order for the BP Yankee bond with the cusip number 05565QBG2, the 2.125% of March 10, 2012. I had to buy $20,000 of face value rather than 10,000 anticipated when I wrote the trade up this morning.

Although Barrons' said it was priced at $94.25 per bond, the best quote I could get from E-trade was $95. That means the yield to maturity is 6.274% rather than 6.818% as reported at the close of last week. In addition as always I have to pay $211.81 in interest to the seller for 120 days. This shows that the bond pays not quarterly as I supposed but semi-annually.

The boom in BP is affecting not just the stock but also the bond. I am not sure if I will get my bonds at $95 and if I don't I will not be too upset. This play is too widespread to work. If the trade does not get done I will come up with another idea for yield.