Building 2011's Sub-$200 Computer

23585226 story Posted by timothy on Friday September 02, @08:59PM
from the trade-one-form-of-depreciation-for-another dept. adeelarshad82 links to PC Magazine's recent account (updating a similar quest detailed last year) "to see if a decent PC could put together for less than $200. Turns out that between some great deals, an AMD processor, and a Linux OS, it can actually be done." They actually come out with a decent-enough system for that money — but omitting an optical drive in a full-size desktop computer build seems something like cheating.

hardware money budget

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Jobs woes sink Wall Street

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks tumbled 2 percent on Friday after data showing zero jobs growth in August brought investors face-to-face with the prospect of another recession.

The declines left Wall Street lower for the sixth week out of seven as declining issues far outweighed winners on a light-volume day ahead of the long U.S. Labor Day holiday weekend.

Stocks had rebounded recently on expectations the Federal Reserve would introduce new stimulus to boost the sluggish economy. But the Labor Department's latest report underscores that action by the Fed alone cannot address the economy's deep problems.

"By itself the Fed can't restore confidence or create jobs, so any steps it might take won't be game-changing for the economic growth prospects," said Leo Grohowski, chief investment officer at BNY Mellon Wealth Management in New York, where he oversees about $171 billion in client assets.

Bank shares were again among the day's biggest losers, with Bank of America Corp tumbling 8.3 percent to $7.25, making it the top decliner on the Dow, where all 30 components fell. JPMorgan Chase & Co fell 4.6 percent to $34.63 and the KBW banks index lost 4.5 percent.

A U.S. housing regulator filed a lawsuit against Bank of America Corp, JPMorgan Chase & Co, Goldman Sachs Group Inc and other big lenders over mortgage practices that led to losses at government-owned Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

There was no growth in nonfarm jobs in August as sagging consumer confidence discouraged already skittish businesses from hiring, keeping pressure on the Federal Reserve to provide more monetary stimulus to the economy.

U.S. President Barack Obama, in a speech set for Thursday, will unveil a jobs program he hopes will provide "meaningful" tax relief and help the nation's long-term unemployed, a top aide told Reuters Insider.

"The likelihood of more stimulus has increased dramatically as a result of this and some other recent data, but at this point it's unclear how much that will really help markets," said Derek Hoyt, chief investment officer at KDV Wealth Management in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

The Dow Jones industrial average was down 253.16 points, or 2.20 percent, at 11,240.41. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index was down 30.46 points, or 2.53 percent, at 1,173.96. The Nasdaq Composite Index was down 65.71 points, or 2.58 percent, at 2,480.33.

Friday marked the S&P's biggest drop in two weeks.

Despite the day's sharp decline, stocks were only modestly lower for the week, after a rally in the first three day of trading. For the week, the Dow fell 0.4 percent, the S&P lost 0.2 percent, and the Nasdaq was flat.

Losing stocks outnumbered winners by more than six-to-one on both the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq. The CBOE Volatility index, a gauge of investor fear, rose 5.9 percent.

Volume was light ahead of the holiday, with about 6.88 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the American Stock Exchange and Nasdaq, below last year's daily average of 8.47 billion.

Netflix Inc weighed on the Nasdaq, falling 8.6 percent to $213.11 after the collapse of its content distribution talks with pay-TV operator Starz Entertainment.

Energy shares dropped as U.S. crude futures fell 2.5 percent on concerns economic weakness could curb fuel demand. Chevron Corp dipped 2.1 percent to $96.41, while the PHLX Oil service sector index declined 3.3 percent.

As investors sought safer assets, gold prices climbed 3 percent. Newmont Mining was the S&P's top gainer, rising 3.2 percent to $64.47.

(Editing by Leslie Adler)

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Feds sue big banks over sales of risky investments

NEW YORK (AP) — The government on Friday sued 17 financial firms, including the largest U.S. banks, for selling Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac billions of dollars worth of mortgage-backed securities that turned toxic when the housing market collapsed.

Among those targeted by the lawsuits were Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc., JP Morgan Chase & Co., and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Large European banks including The Royal Bank of Scotland, Barclays Bank and Credit Suisse were also sued.

The lawsuits were filed by the Federal Housing Finance Agency. It oversees Fannie and Freddie, the two agencies that buy mortgages loans and mortgage securities issued by the lenders.

The total price tag for the mortgage-backed securities sold to Fannie and Freddie by the firms named in the lawsuits: $196 billion.

The government didn't say how much it is seeking in damages. It said it wants to have the securities sales canceled and wants to be compensated for lost principal, interest payments as well as for attorney fees.

The government action is a big blow to the banks, many of which have seen their stock prices fall to levels not seen since the financial crisis in 2008 and 2009. Until now, the stocks have been undermined mostly by unrelated worries about the U.S. and European economies.

It is particularly damaging to Bank of America, which bought Countrywide Financial Corp. in 2008 and Merrill Lynch in 2009. All three are being separately sued by the government for mortgage-backed security sales totaling $57.5 billion.

After Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase was listed in the lawsuits with the second-highest total at $33 billion. Royal Bank of Scotland followed at $30.4 billion.

Bank of America has already paid $12.7 billion this year to settle similar claims. Last month insurer American International Group Inc. sued the bank for more than $10 billion for allegedly selling it faulty mortgage investments.

In a statement Friday, Bank of America rejected the claims in the government's lawsuits.

Fannie and Freddie invested heavily in the mortgage-backed securities even after their regulator said they didn't have the needed risk-management capabilities, the bank said. "Despite this, (Fannie and Freddie) are now seeking to hold other market participants responsible for their losses," it said.

Bank stocks fell sharply on Friday as news of the government's lawsuits emerged. Bank of America tumbled 8.3 percent, JP Morgan Chase fell 4.6 percent, Citigroup lost 5.3 percent, Goldman shed off 4.5 percent and Morgan Stanley's ended down 5.7 percent.

Residential mortgage-backed securities bundled pools of mortgages into complex investments. They collapsed after the real-estate bust and helped fuel the financial crisis in late 2008.

The FHFA said the mortgage-backed securities were sold to Fannie and Freddie based on documents that "contained misstatements and omissions of material facts concerning the quality of the underlying mortgage loans, the creditworthiness of the borrowers, and the practices used to originate such loans."

The FHFA filed a similar lawsuit in July against Swiss bank UBS AG, seeking to recoup more than $900 million in losses from mortgage-backed securities.

Also sued Friday were are Ally Financial Inc., formerly known GMAC LLC, Deutsche Bank AG, First Horizon National Corp., General Electric Co., HSBC North America Holdings Inc., Morgan Stanley, Nomura Holding America Inc., and Societe Generale.

JPMorgan, Goldman, Citigroup and Morgan Stanley declined to comment on the lawsuits. Ally Financial said in a statement said the government's "claims are meritless, and the company intends to defend its position aggressively." A spokeswoman for First Horizon said the bank intends to "vigorously defend" itself.

Ken Thomas, a Miami-based banking consultant and economist, said he expects the banks to settle soon with the government.

"This will be nothing but a distraction to them and the quicker you settle something like this the better," he said.

___

Christina Rexrode contributed to this report.

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Wednesday 7atSeven: twisting by the pool

Thanks for checking in with us for seven (or so) links at 7AM Eastern.  Good luck out there.

How much capital does Bank of America ($BAC) need to raise? (FT Alphaville, Clusterstock also All Star Charts)

Why banks should listen to their risk managers.  (Kid Dynamite, Deal Journal)

Paul Tudor Jones II is cutting fees, but don’t worry he will be OK.  (WSJ)

Sprint ($S) needs all the help it can get.  iPhone 5 to the rescue.  (Deal Journal, WSJ)

Reports of Facebook’s demise are greatly exaggerated.  (TechInsidr also Term Sheet)

Moody’s takes a whack at Japan’s credit rating.  (WSJ)

Eurobonds ain’t gonna cut it.  (FT, voxEU)

The markets are expecting the Fed to engage in “operation twist.”  (Real Time Economics, Pragmatic Capitalism)

Why so many people felt yesterday’s Richmond earthquake.  (The Atlantic)

Thanks for checking in with Abnormal Returns. For all the latest you can follow us on StockTwits and Twitter.

The information in this blog post represents my own opinions and does not contain a recommendation for any particular security or investment. I or my affiliates may hold positions or other interests in securities mentioned in the Blog, please see my Disclaimer page for my full disclaimer.

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Buy vs. build: the ETF index decision

Just a quick note on what could be a profound change in the way the ETF industry works.  Olivier Ludwig at IndexUniverse reports that Blackrock ($BLK) owner of the iShares ETFs has filed to become an index provider.  In so doing they have upped the ante on what it takes to be a player in the ETF industry.  I am surprised that this story has not gotten more play in the financial media.

Right now most ETF provider license the indices they use that underlie ETFs from outside providers.  Blackrock is now changing the game by moving to an in-house index model.  It will be interesting to see if and when they move to switch over the indices for some of the world’s largest and most popular ETFs.  Ludwig writes:

If iShares chooses to segue to its own indexes on existing funds, the effects would reverberate widely in the U.S. ETF industry. After all, the firm now has almost $430 billion in ETF assets, according to data compiled by IndexUniverse. It didn’t shed any light on its long-term intentions in the filing.

If I were in the index business I would not be a happy camper today.  This business has been quite lucrative for the index providers as assets under management in the ETF industry have swelled.*  If Blackrock is going to take their index business in-house, you can bet that other firms will seriously contemplate doing this as well.

At the same time it is widely believed that more firms will join the ETF fray in anticipation that actively managed ETFs will eventually take off.  It will be interesting to see if this move by Blackrock into the index business is part of a broader strategy that take into account the active ETF side of things.

*See an earlier piece by The Reformed Broker on the wacky ETF index business.

Updates:  Ian Salisbury at WSJ picks up on the story and explores some of the reasons why Blackrock is making this move.  Miles Weiss at Bloomberg provides some additional detail on why the SEC is concerned about in-house index providers.

The information in this blog post represents my own opinions and does not contain a recommendation for any particular security or investment. I or my affiliates may hold positions or other interests in securities mentioned in the Blog, please see my Disclaimer page for my full disclaimer.

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Apple Investigators Allegedly Posed as Cops in iPhone Prototype Hunt

Former CEO Steve Jobs handles the iPhone 4 at WWDC 2010. Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

A little more light has been shed on the odd story of Apple losing another iPhone prototype in a Bay Area bar.

The man who’s home was searched by what he believed to be San Francisco Police Department officers was Bernal Heights resident Sergio Calderón, SF Weekly discovered. And the police officers? They may have been investigators working for Apple who were actually impersonating police officers.

Impersonating a police officer is a misdemeanor in California, and is punishable by up to a year of jail time. Another option is that Apple was working with police officers, and a proper report was never filed. When the SFPD has been called and asked about the Apple incident, representatives said they had no knowledge of the search.

“This is something that’s going to need to be investigated now,” SFPD spokesman Lt. Troy Dangerfield told SF Weekly. “If this guy is saying that the people said they were SFPD, that’s a big deal.”

On Wednesday CNET News.com reported that in late July an Apple representative lost a “priceless” next generation iPhone prototype in San Francisco bar Cava 22. Apple reportedly used GPS to track the phone to a Bernal Heights area home, where police officers were given permission to search the home for the device. The resident was offered money by Apple for the iPhone’s safe return, but it was not turned in. The phone was sold on Craigslist for $200, according to CNET, but no independent evidence of the post has surfaced.

The incident is reminiscent of what happened last year when an iPhone 4 prototype was left at a Redwood City bar, and purchased for $5,000 by Gizmodo.

Here’s what went down, according to the new report by SF Weekly:

Calderón said that at about 6 p.m. six people — four men and two women — wearing badges of some kind showed up at his door. “They said, ‘Hey, Sergio, we’re from the San Francisco Police Department.’” He said they asked him whether he had been at Cava 22 over the weekend (he had) and told him that they had traced a lost iPhone to his home using GPS.

They did not say they were there on Apple’s behalf, but they said that the “owner of the phone” would offer Calderón $300 for the phone.

Calderón told SF Weekly that he was threatened by the law-enforcement officers when they visited his house, and said that he has no knowledge of the prototype.

One of the officers who visited the Calderón household was a man named “Tony”. He left his phone number with Calderón in case he discovered any information about the lost phone. It turns out the phone number belongs to an ex-cop named Anthony Colon, who apparently now works for Apple. A search on LinkedIn found that Colon works as a special investigator for Apple and is a former San Jose police officer. That page is now removed from the site, but caches can still be viewed.

This tale keeps getting weirder and weirder. Apple hasn’t returned phone calls on the matter from Wired.com.

via The Giz

Christina is a Wired.com staff writer covering Apple, robotics, and everything in between. She's also written for Gizmodo and Wired magazine. Check out her Google+ profile here.
Follow @redgirlsays and @gadgetlab on Twitter.

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Alt Text: How Apple and HP Win Big by Losing

In a significant victory for corporate personhood, Apple has developed a drinking problem. For the second time, a prototype iPhone has been left behind in a bar, presumably abandoned after the owner was propositioned by an Android smartphone with more “swagger.”

I take away two things from these twin incidents. First, whatever flaws iPhones have, they’re gin-proof. This is a relief; I lost my first Newton to a Singapore Sling in ‘94.

Secondly, Apple has a suspicious knack for headline-friendly loss incidents. A bar is an ideal place to lose a hip new piece of consumer technology. “Apple Loses Another iPhone Prototype at a Bar” sounds a lot better than “Blackberry Prototype Lost at Marketing Seminar.”

Meanwhile, in nearly related news, HP has discovered that the only way to win against Apple in the tablet market is not to play. Or, more precisely, to play to lose. By selling doomed hardware coupled with abandoned software for less than the price of a week’s parking in San Francisco, HP is selling out of tablets that a month ago got less love than a herpetic bedbug.

The approach has been so successful that, like an aging rock band, HP is planning a second farewell tour. It promises to lose more money on a new batch of obsolescent tablets any day now. After all, the “lose money with no real plan” approach has worked so well for web companies — give or take the odd economy-shattering dot-com crash — that it’s about time hardware companies joined the party.

All this is taking place against the backdrop of the departure of Steve Jobs from Apple, which has led to widespread speculation as to whether his replacement will have enough chemistry with Jim and Dwight to carry the trendsetting international company through its eighth season.

What changes will we see at Apple over the next year or so? It’s anybody’s guess.

Wait, strike that. It’s my guess. I’m the guesser here.

Look for porn to get its own category in the App Store.

First off, porn and lots of it. Jobs’ bluenose App Store policies have left millions of dollars on the mattress, and the new Apple is going to want to make up for lost revenue. Look for porn to get its own category in the App Store, a “Porn App of the Week” and some very distracting billboards.

Secondly, Apple will soften its stance toward news outlets that publish unauthorized information about upcoming products. The descendants of the editors and reporters will only be cursed unto the seventh generation, instead of the current Apple policy of cursing them until the coming of the Great Shutdown.

Thirdly, the iMac will finally get a floppy drive.

And finally, the standing policy of giving out product prototypes to forgetful, bar-hopping employees will be modified somewhat, forbidding the practice unless at least two publicity agents and a professional photographer are present.

- - -

Born helpless, nude and unable to provide for himself, Lore Sjöberg eventually overcame these handicaps to become an innovator, an excavator and an elevator.

Award-winning humorist Lore Sjöberg is the author of The Book of Ratings, a founder of The Brunching Shuttlecocks, and the creator of The Cyborg Name Decoder. His work has appeared in Wired magazine, Adbusters, and has appeared on NPR's Talk of the Nation and All Things Considered.
Follow @loresjoberg and @theunderwire on Twitter.

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