Weekday NEWS to Comfort the Disturbed and Disturb the Comfortable.
Wednesday 02.13.2013
U.S. gold bars and coins
find new home overseas on Asian demand
By Frank Tang - Reuters.com
NEW YORK, Feb 11 (Reuters) - Booming demand for gold as a store of wealth among Asian investors is driving physical gold bars and coins out of the United States and into Asia. A growing number of gold vaults for affluent Asians and new precious metals investment products, particularly exchange-traded funds, have led to an exodus of gold owned privately from the United States into emerging economic powers such as China.
The Case for Silver Outpacing Gold
Miguel Perez-Santalla | SlverSeek.com
A LOT OF TALK on the web right now says silver is significantly undervalued versus gold.
Many of these pundits and talking heads like to point to the historical relationship between gold and silver prices, sometimes known as the "ratio". People even comment as to this connection as far back as thousands of years ago. Let's take a quick look at this.
Silver, thousands of years ago, was originally thought of greater value than gold, both because it was relatively scarce in great civilizations such as the Egyptians, and because it was easier to work into useful materials. Both silver and gold have been used abundantly for ornamentation and as a thing of beauty in homes, temples and palaces. Then of course as jewelry their beauty was very much esteemed.
Physical Silver The Investment Of The Decade
GoldSilverWorlds.com
We just attended a webinar organized by Eric Sprott and his respected partners John Embry and Rick Rule. These are well-known names within the precious metals community, partly because of their huge success but also because of their physical trusts (ETF's) which guarantee full backing of the precious metals.
In the introduction, Eric Sprott made the point that the crisis is not over, although media and officials pretend so. There are many events that point to the fact the crisis is not solved. Think about the large Italian bank Monte Paschi which was bailed out because of their derivatives bets, the Dutch SNS Bank which was bailed out a weekend ago, the currency devaluations in Venezuela and Japan, etc. Linking this to gold, Eric Sprott said: "The people in Venezuela that held gold instead of cash or money in the bank did not suffer the devaluation, neither did the people in Japan."
Lew Tells Senate U.S. Must Avoid
Self-Inflicted Sequester Wounds
By Meera Louis & Ian Katz - Bloomberg.com
U.S. Treasury secretary nominee Jack Lew says the U.S. must avoid the automatic spending cuts scheduled to take effect next month, saying they would impose "self-inflicted wounds" on economic expansion.
Lew was commenting in written testimony prepared for tomorrow's hearing before the Senate Finance Committee, which is considering his nomination to succeed Timothy F. Geithner as head of the Treasury Department. The prepared testimony was obtained by Bloomberg News.
Union leaders denounce sequestration at DC rally:
'They want to see us bleed'
By Kevin Bogardus - TheHill.com
Union members took to the streets of Washington on Tuesday to denounce the automatic spending cuts from sequestration that are set to force furloughs across the federal government.
Leaders of the AFL-CIO, the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) rallied workers on Capitol Hill who will likely see lost pay if the sequester takes effect.
Don't Be Fooled By DJIA Hitting Record Highs The Dow at 14,000: not as good as gold
By Seth Lipsky, New York Post
What an illuminating week for Wall Street — the Dow Jones Industrial Average has been bobbling just above and below the record high 14,000 mark, even as the country comes to grip with the reports that its economy has actually been slumping, with GDP shrinking 0.1 percent in the last quarter of 2012.
The Obama administration is trying to put a bright face on things — but the rest of us feel like we're smoking more now and enjoying it less.
Who Will Win The Currency Wars?
by James Gruber - ZeroHedge.com
As debate about potential currency wars heats up, commentators including myself have called out the likely losers, the Japanese yen and South Korean won being high on most lists. Much less discussed has been which countries will win from the currency wars. After all, the currency market is a zero-sum game - as one currency declines, another must go up. In this issue, I'm going to suggest that Singapore and to a lesser extent, Thailand and Malaysia, will be relative winners. And I'm also going to explain why some supposed currency safe havens - including Australia, China, Canada, Switzerland and Norway - are unlikely to perform as well.
Will Currency Wars End With A Return To The Gold Standard?
By Tyler Durden - ZeroHedge.com
Gold continues to flow from the west to east. Reuters reports that U.S. Commerce Department data showed U.S. exports of nonmonetary gold, which excludes central bank transactions, climbed by 43% to $4 billion in December from the prior month.
That's the highest total and the largest month-on-month jump in U.S. private gold exports since September 2011, when gold rallied to a record nominal high over $1,920/oz. Hong Kong accounted for nearly half of the $4 billion.
G7 pledges no currency war Add to ...
MICHAEL BABAD - The Globe and Mail
G7 promises no currency action
Finance officials from the Group of 7 pledged today not to engage in a currency war, responding to mounting pressure amid volatility in the currency markets and fears of deliberate devaluation.
The G7 finance minister and central bank chiefs said their actions on the monetary and fiscal policy fronts will be aimed at bolstering their economies, not driving down the value of their currencies.
There Is No World Currency War
By Larry Kudlow - RealClearMarkets.com
All this chatter about a so-called global currency war is utter nonsense. All that is happening is the Japanese are wisely taking steps to increase liquidity and depreciate their vastly overpriced yen. They are doing this in order to avoid deeper and deeper deflation. That deflation will sink the Japanese economy for years to come if remedial actions are not taken.
Among all the big economies, none needs quantitative easing more than Japan's. All the Japanese have done so far is make cheap loans to banks, but with no concerted QE. But QEis coming this spring, when Prime Minster Abe appoints a new Bank of Japan head man.
Group of Seven Roils Currency Markets
With Split on Yen Concerns
By Simon Kennedy & Gonzalo Vina - Bloomberg.com
Group of Seven policy makers roiled the currency markets they sought to calm amid conflicting messages on how much of an economic threat is posed by the weakening yen.
The yen whipsawed as the G-7 appeared at first to signal joint acceptance of the Japanese currency's recent decline, only to see its members offer contradictory interpretations of the group's stance. One G-7 official said there is concern about excessive moves in the yen, while the U.K. said the group wasn't singling out an individual country or exchange rate.
The Very Best War in the World How so-called "currency wars" could boost the global economy.
By Matthew Yglesias - Slate.com
Two years ago, Brazilian Finance Minister Guido Mantega delighted headline writers around the world by warning that quantitative easing and other stimulative monetary policy measuresrisked unleashing "currency wars" upon the world. Shinzo Abe's election in Japan and François Hollande's worries about the risks of an overvalued euro to the French economy have restarted the drumbeats of currency war. Mantega himself is issuing more dire warnings; Societe Generale foreign exchange strategists are warning that "it's hard to see what concrete steps can be taken" to halt them; and in the Weekly Standard Irwin Stelzer warns that "Lenin would be cheering the currency wars" as a step on the road to destroying capitalism.
Is the euro zone crisis really over?
By: Clif Droke - GoldSeek.com
Many investors are wondering what has been behind the relentless rally in stock prices. Look no further than corporate profits.
Consider that in the third quarter of 2013, corporate earnings were $1.75 trillion, up 18.6% from a year ago. That took after-tax profits to their greatest percentage of GDP in history. For the most recent quarter, earnings for S&P 500 companies are estimated to have risen 4.7 percent, above a 1.9 percent forecast at the start of the earnings season. See earnings chart shown below.
Art Cashin Previews The February 15
Close Encounter Of A Meteor Kind
by Tyler Durden - ZeroHedge.com
While UBS' Art Cashin sees the 'uptrend' in stocks as largely in tact, though warns of the start of what appears to be a stalling formation, there is another 'bigger' potential crash on his mind. Having survived the Mayan apocalypse, and a Papal resignation, our home planet is due for a record setting space encounter on Friday (Feb. 15) of this week... which means it is now too late to even send Bruce Willis (or better yet, Bob Pisani) into space for an Armageddon sequel. We are told to keep calm and carry on - Bernanke-like "there is nothing to worry about", but no known asteroid has traveled this close to earth in recorded history. Let's hope the slide rule guys have it nailed - or the grand central planner.
Bonds: So Much More Dangerous Than You Think
By Morgan Housel - The Motley Fool
You may not have noticed it, but bonds haven't done well lately. Since last July, the iShares Barclays 7-10 Year Treasury Bond Fund has lost 2% of its value, while a version that invests in bonds with longer maturities has lost more than 7% (both include interest payments). With the yield on 10-year Treasuries rising from 1.5% last summer to about 2% today, many are realizing for the first time that it's possible to lose money investing in bonds.
But here's what's unnerving: Shown in historical context, the rise in yields since last summer is so irrelevant that it's hardly visible (far right corner):
TARP: The bailout success story that wasn't Wall Street's bailout sinkhole keeps sinking
By David Weidner, MarketWatch
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — About those bank bailouts ...
Remember the Troubled Asset Relief Program, better known as TARP? When we last heard from the Treasury Department, on Jan. 23, TARP was being wound down. It was, in the estimation of Timothy Geithner & Co., a success: 93% of the $418 billion disbursed had been collected including $70 billion last year.
But hold the Champagne. It ain't over till it's over.
The idea that TARP is somehow a wash because a few banks repaid the bailouts with interest is misleading. The reality is that bailed-out firms essentially wrote off their losses on taxes. As of Dec. 30, TARP was still owed $67.3 billion, including $27 billion in realized losses — which is to say, that money is gone and is never coming back.
Underwater Homes Remain a Dark Spot in the Recovery
By Steve Yoder, Fiscal Times
When Sally Herigstad and her husband wanted to buy a house recently in their Seattle suburb, they ran into some unfriendly numbers. They owe the bank about $360,000 on their existing home, but a sale would bring in only the low to mid-$300's: they'd have to close the deal with a big check. So the couple went ahead and bought the house they wanted--and then rented the first. Still, Sally finds being a landlord a hassle. "If I could sell it and get my money out, I'd do it today," she says of the first home.
Underwater Homes Remain a Dark Spot in the Recovery
By Steve Yoder, Fiscal Times
When Sally Herigstad and her husband wanted to buy a house recently in their Seattle suburb, they ran into some unfriendly numbers. They owe the bank about $360,000 on their existing home, but a sale would bring in only the low to mid-$300's: they'd have to close the deal with a big check. So the couple went ahead and bought the house they wanted--and then rented the first. Still, Sally finds being a landlord a hassle. "If I could sell it and get my money out, I'd do it today," she says of the first home.
FHA MAY NEED BAILOUT
by WILLIAM BIGELOW - Breitbart.com
The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) may have to borrowmoney from the U.S. Treasury in order to survive, which would be unprecedented. The FHA was created in 1934 and has always been solvent, but it guaranteed too many loans during the recession that fell apart. As a result, the FHA is $16 billion in the red.
The FHA insures lenders in case they incur losses on their loans. The situation is not as dire as the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac debacle, which cost $137 billion to bail out. Although the FHA requires mortgage seekers to prove they can meet the monthly mortgage fee, there is still a problem: down payments only have to reach 3.5%. This low rate caused lenders to flock to the FHA when private markets dried up. In addition, the FHA, from 2007 to 2009, let home sellers offer "gifts" of down payments to prospective buyers.
Your New Landlord Works on Wall Street Hedge funds are snatching up rental homes at an alarming rate
BY DAVID DAYEN - NewRepublic.com
Housing analysts have been giddy for the past year about the comeback of their industry, whose collapse led to the Great Recession. Sure, 2012 was actually the third-worst year for housing ever—but it still beat 2010 and 2011. New and existing home sales, housing starts, and prices jumped in 2012, and experts expect an even stronger recovery for 2013.
It's clear why people are so excited: Housing typically leads economic recoveries. As more people build equity in their homes, they feel more free to spend disposable income and increase economic activity, a phenomenon known as the "wealth effect." So a bullish outlook for housing would seemingly augur a long-awaited recovery to Main Street. But the more you look into it, the clearer it becomes that it's not being driven by the typical American families who lost their homes in the economic crash. In fact, it's being fueled by the banks and hedge funds whose speculation caused that crash in the first place.
Let us Prey
By Cal Thomas - PatriotPost.us
Our politics have become so polarized and corrupted that a president of the United States cannot even attend an event devoted to drawing people closer to God and bridge partisan and cultural divides without being lectured about his policies.
Last Thursday at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C., Dr. Ben Carson, director of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, and a 2008 recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, broke with a 61-year-old tradition and publicly disagreed with some of the president's policies, such as "Obamacare," taxation and the national debt. Disclosure: I have attended this event since 1971 and host a dinner the night before for members of the media.
U.S. states worry about weakening sales tax collections
by Lisa Lambert
(Reuters) - Only about a third of U.S. states were on target for their sales tax collections in January, part of a trend that has some officials worried, an economic newsletter, The Liscio Report, said on Tuesday.
All but five states collect sales taxes, and for those that do, the surcharges on purchases can provide a solid revenue source.
Americans Simply Don't Like Electric Cars The electric car mistake
By Charles Lane, Washington Post
The Obama administration's electric-car fantasy finally may have died on the road between Newark, Del., and Milford, Conn.
The New York Times's John M. Broder reported Friday that the Tesla Model S electric car he was test-driving repeatedly ran out of juice, partly because cold weather reduces the battery's range by about 10 percent.
As U.S. gasoline prices soar, hedge fund oil bets near record
By Cezary Podkul and David Sheppard
NEW YORK | Tue Feb 12, 2013 6:15pm EST
(Reuters) - U.S. motorists searching for someone to blame for the highest gasoline prices ever at this time of year have an easy target: hedge funds who have been quietly amassing winning bets on hundreds of millions of barrels of oil.
At a filling station in Midtown New York last week, several people were prepared to blame traders on Wall Street as they paid more than $4 per gallon to fill up their cars.
Crashing the Broadband Party
By Bret Swanson, Contributor - Forbes.com
Last month, Julius Genachowski, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, issued a challenge. By 2015, he urged, each state should boast at least one "Gigabit City," where residents enjoy broadband links transmitting data at a gigabit per second — "100 times faster than today's average connection" of 10 megabits per second.
It's not an unworthy goal. Yet, would you believe most of the nation's homes already enjoy gigabit data connections?
Phone subsidies cost Americans $2.2 billion a year,
much of it wasted
By Cheryl K. Chumley-The Washington Times
Taxpayers spent an estimated $2.2 billion to give phones to those with low incomes in 2012 — but some shouldn't have received them. According to one report, a large number of program participants may have received phones even though they didn't meet income limits.
The government's Lifeline telephone provision program started in 1984 but has grown substantially, from $819 million in payouts in 2008 to more than $2 billion in 2012, the Wall Street Journal reports. The Federal Communications Commission tightened eligibility rules and proof of income requirements in 2012, and in the subsequent months, service carriers have reported a large number of program dropouts.
Spammers Target Taxpayers Expecting Tax Refunds
By Kelly Phillips Erb, Contributor - Forbes.com
Ugh.
Now that tax season is in full swing, the spammers and schemers are out in force. I received four emails today alone purporting to be from the Internal Revenue Service, all of which were spam. Most of them were rehashed emails (of the "canceled by your banking institution" variety, asking for new banking information). One, however, was new to me this season: "Income Tax Refund NOT ACCEPTED."
Here's what it looks like:
Google Moves to Destroy Online Anonymity …
Unintentionally Helping Authoritarian Governments
By Global Research News and Washington's Blog
….But governments – especially authoritarian governments – hate anonymity.
A soon-to-be-released book by Google executive Eric Schmidt - called "The New Digital Age" – describes the desire of authoritarian governments to destroy anonymity. The Wall Street Journalprovides an excerpt:
Some governments will consider it too risky to have thousands of anonymous, untraceable and unverified citizens — "hidden people"; they'll want to know who is associated with each online account, and will require verification at a state level, in order to exert control over the virtual world.
Last December, China started requiring all web users to register using their real names.
But the U.S. is quickly moving in the same direction. As Gene Howington reported last year:
Do you have a right to anonymous political free speech?
According to the Supreme Court, you do. According to the Department of Homeland Security, you don't. They've hired General Dynamics to track U.S. citizens exercising this critical civil right.
Eric Schmidt Confirms Identity Verification
Impacts Google Rankings
by Michelle Stinson Ross - SearchEngineJournal.com
Sneak peeks into the soon to be released book, "The New Digital Age", by Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt, confirm what many industry writers have been passionately clattering away about for months now. Google+ is an identity verification network. As the network continues to grow, content associated with a verified identity will rise to the top of Google search rankings.
GALLUP: AMERICANS DISAPPROVE OF OBAMA POLICY
ON NEARLY EVERY ISSUE
by TONY LEE - Breitbart.com
President Barack Obama will deliver his State of the Union address on Tuesday to a nation that disapproves of the way he is handling nearly every issue, including gun control and the federal deficit.
According to a Gallup poll, 42% of Americans approve of Obama's gun policies while 54% disapprove.
On taxes, 41% approve and 57% disapprove. On the economy, 39% approve and 60% disapprove. On "the situation in the Middle East between the Israelis and the Palestinians," 36% approve and 55% disapprove.
Sebelius: Healthcare 'getting stronger'
By Elise Viebeck - TheHill.com
Innovations in care delivery and President Obama's signature health law are transforming American medicine for the better, the top U.S. health official said Tuesday.
In wide-ranging remarks to a medical conference in Washington, D.C., Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius thanked physicians for tolerating the challenges of a changing U.S. healthcare system.
Obama seen likely to urge Congress
to pass cybersecurity laws in State of the Union address
Nonetheless, the President is likely to issue an executive order Wednesday to implement for voluntary cybersecurity standards
By Jaikumar Vijayan - Computerworld.com
Computerworld - President Obama could use tonight's State of the Union address to continue a push for new cybersecurity legislation, even as he's widely expected to issue an executive order Wednesday to impose rules aimed at protecting critical infrastructure targets, security experts say.
The long-expected executive order stems from what the White House has long said is the need for immediate action to protect critical assets against cyber threats because of Congress' continued failure to pass legislation.
Courting Disaster A new idea to limit drone strikes could actually legitimize them
BY JEFFREY ROSEN - NewRepublic.com
On Sunday, Robert Gates, the former Pentagon chief for Presidents Obama and Bush, endorsed an idea that has been floated by Democratic lawmakers in the wake of John O. Brennan's confirmation hearings to be CIA Director: a drone court that would review the White House's targeted killings of American citizens linked to al Qaida. The administration has signaled its openness to the idea of a congressionally created drone court, which would be modeled on the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court that reviews requests for warrants authorizing the surveillance of suspected spies or terrorists. But although senators at the Brennan hearings were rightly concerned about targeted killings operating without any judicial or congressional oversight, the proposed drone court would raise as many constitutional and legal questions as it resolved. And it would give a congressional and judicial stamp of approval to a program whose effectiveness, morality, and constitutionality are open to serious questions. Rather than rushing to create a drone court, Congress would do better to hold hearings about whether targeted drone killings are, in fact, morally, constitutionally, and pragmatically defensible in the first place.
American Catholicism is at crossroads
By Marc Fisher - WashingtonPost.com
As the church suddenly faces an unexpected transition, American Catholicism is shrinking in size and splitting into two often harshly opposing camps — growing more polarized in faith, just as the nation has divided itself politically and socially.
The sexual abuse scandals that have rocked the U.S. church, along with its hard-line stands on celibate priests, homosexuality and ordaining women, have pushed many Americans away from the church, which is still the nation's largest single denomination.
Panel votes to approve Hagel
By Jeremy Herb - TheHill.com
The Senate Armed Services Committee voted 14-11 Tuesday to approve former Sen. Chuck Hagel's nomination as Defense secretary after a lengthy meeting that featured sharp exchanges about compensation the nominee has received for speaking engagements.
The party-line vote sends Hagel's (R-Neb.) nomination to the floor for a vote by the entire Senate this week.
Syrian air base falls, Assad forces under pressure
By Khaled Yacoub Oweis
AMMAN | Tue Feb 12, 2013 5:59pm EST
(Reuters) - Syrian opposition fighters captured a military airport near the northern city of Aleppo on Tuesday in another military setback for President Bashar al-Assad's forces which have come under intensifying attack across the country.
The airport is the latest military facility to fall under rebel control in a strategic region situated between Syria's industrial and commercial center and the country's oil- and wheat-producing heartland to the east.
Iran calls for the destruction of all nuclear weapons
By Cheryl K. Chumley-The Washington Times
Just hours after North Korea conducted its third nuclear test, Iran officials have called on world powers to abolish all nuclear weapons.
"We need to come to the point where no country has any nuclear weapons and at the same time all weapons of mass destruction and nuclear arms need to be destroyed," said Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman, Ramin Mehmanparast, in a Times of Israel report. He added: Countries should still have the right to develop nuclear programs for peaceable uses, the report continues.
New Iran centrifuges
could shorten path to atomic bomb: Netanyahu
By Ori Lewis
JERUSALEM | Mon Feb 11, 2013 4:02pm EST
(Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that new centrifuges Iran was installing for its uranium enrichment program could cut by a third the time needed to create a nuclear bomb.
As Iran and world powers prepare to resume talks aimed at easing a dispute that has raised fears of a new Middle East war, Tehran announced late last month it planned to install the new machines at its main enrichment plant.
North Korea nuclear test draws global condemnation;
U.N. convenes
By Ashish Kumar Sen-The Washington Times
The U.N. Security Council convened an emergency meeting Tuesday morning in New York to deal with North Korea's third nuclear test, which President Obama called a "highly provocative act" that "undermines regional stability."
"The danger posed by North Korea's threatening activities warrants further swift and credible action by the international community," Mr. Obama said. "We will strengthen close coordination with allies and partners and work with our Six-Party partners, the United Nations Security Council, and other U.N. member states to pursue firm action."
North Korea stages nuclear test in defiance of bans Regime confirms it set off its third nuclear bomb, signalled by an earthquake detected by South Korea, Japan and the US
By Justin McCurry in Tokyo
and Tania Branigan in Beijing - Guardian.co.uk
North Korea has drawn widespread condemnation after conducting a nuclear test in defiance of international bans – a development signalled by an earthquake detected in the country and later confirmed by the regime.
The test, which took place in the north-east of the country just before noon local time, could bring North Korea a step closer to developing a nuclear warhead small enough to be mounted on a long-range missile and possibly bringing the west coast of the US within striking distance.
North Korea conducts nuclear test
North Korea conducts nuclear test in what they say was "an act of self-defence against US hostility."
Obama vows swift action over nuclear tests
but North Korea remains defiant President to address Pyongyang's 'highly provocative' actions in state of the union speech following emergency UN meeting
By Chris McGreal in Washington - Guardian.co.uk
Barack Obama has vowed to take "swift and credible action" over North Korea's "highly provocative" nuclear test which appeared to bring Pyongyang closer to producing a viable weapon.
The United Nations security council held an emergency meeting in New York on Tuesday morning to "strongly condemn" Pyongyang's most powerful underground blast to date as a "clear threat to international peace and security".
American Official: 'Very Possible that the North Koreans
Are Testing' for Iran
BY DANIEL HALPER - WeeklyStandard.com
An unnamed "senior American official" suggests that North Korea is not just testing nukes for itself, but also for (and possibly with) the Iranians. The New York Times reports:
No country is more interested in the results of the North's nuclear program, or the Western reaction, than Iran, which is pursuing its own uranium enrichment program. The two countries have long cooperated on missile technology, and many intelligence officials believe they share nuclear knowledge as well, though so far there is no hard evidence.
U.S., Asian allies look for leverage
against North Korea after nuclear test
By Anne Gearan and Colum Lynch - WashingtonPost.com
The North Korean underground nuclear test confirmed by U.S. intelligence agencies on Tuesday served as a stark reminder that the unpredictable and largely inscrutable government remains a wild card for President Obama's second term — a nuclear threat to U.S. allies in Asia and a potential arms merchant to the highest bidder.
The timing of the nuclear test was interpreted in Washington as an attempt by North Korea's young new leader to upstage Obama before his State of the Union address. And the claim that it involved a smaller, lighter device — an important element of any deliverable weapon— suggested that the demonstration could be the most dangerous yet by Pyongyan
Few Korea hands on Obama administration's
Asia leadership team
By Josh Rogin ForeignPolicy.com
As the world wakes up to the reality of a heightened crisis with North Korea following its latest nuclear test, the Obama administration finds itself with remarkably few Korea experts at the top of its Asia policy team.
North Korea confirmed Monday it had detonated a nuclear bomb for the third time, blatantly disregarding United Nations resolutions and the repeated warnings of the international community. The U.N. Security Council scrambled to call a Tuesday meeting on the incident and U.S. President Barack Obama issued a strongly worded statement of condemnation early Tuesday morning.
China's patience with North Korea
wears thin after latest nuclear test China may agree to stiffer sanctions or reduce aid to Pyongyang but is unlikely to cut off its long-time ally, say analysts
By Tania Branigan in Beijing - Guardian.co.uk
China is likely to agree to new or tightened economic sanctions on North Korea or possibly curb its own assistance as its frustration with its ally grows, experts believe.
China summoned the North Korean ambassador and delivered a stern protest, and as after previous tests, the foreign ministry called for a calm reaction and denuclearisation talks. However, it stopped short of the harsh criticism it unleashed in 2006 when it described the North's first nuclear test as "brazen".
UN Meets After North Korea Nuclear Test The UN Security Council is holding urgent talks after the latest nuclear test as Pyongyang calls on troops to prepare for combat.
Sky.com
The UN Security Council has opened emergency talks on North Korea's nuclear test, as world powers made calls for swift action against Pyongyang.
The 15-nation council passed a resolution last month threatening "significant action" against North Korea in the event of a new nuclear test or missile launch.
The meeting comes after North Korea confirmed on Tuesday that it carried out a third nuclear test. Monitoring agencies had earlier reported an "unusual seismic event".
North Korea is a serious threat to U.S., says American Defence Secretary Panetta after secretive state's successful nuclear test
By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
President Obama has condemned North Korea's latest nuclear test as a 'highly provocative act' and pledged swift international action to bring the rogue communist regime in line.
Today's detonation - which has prompted fears the secretive state is moving closer to mounting a nuclear device on a missile - came hours before Obama's State of the Union address, in which he was expected to touch on U.S. denuclearisation plans.
Defence Secretary Leon Panetta today warned Pentagon staff of the 'serious threat to the United States of America' posed by North Korea.
