I will be in and out of the office this week; blogging will resume soon.

And the Winners Are…

The stock scan conducted after the close on Friday found 16 winners and 74 losers.

The winners are listed in alphabetical order below. Click on the column headers to sort the list. Our scan criteria incorporates price movement, range and liquidity (500,000 shares on the day, 20-day average of 1.5 million).

Media Digest

• Bagehot, central banking, and the financial crisis
  The current crisis is a modern form of a traditional banking crisis. The 125-year-old Bagehot’s doctrine tells us how governments should react – lend to solvent but illiquid financial institutions. While easy to state, the doctrine is hard to apply. The key question to assess the future consequences of current central bank policy is whether the subprime mortgage crisis arises in the context of a moderate or a severe underlying moral hazard problem.
• Michael Pettis: China’s monetary trap
  Scattered throughout this blog are references about the way I view China’s currency regime, why I believe monetary policy is out of control, why I have insisted since 2003 that China’s trade surplus and foreign exchange reserves could only grow, and why I claim that the authorities are increasingly going to have to consider a maxi-revaluation as the only solution to a worsening problem. I have been asked several times to summarize this argument.
• Levitt Says Bear `Bailout’ Raises New Regulatory Issues
  Former U.S. Securities and Exchange Commissioner Arthur Levitt talks with Bloomberg’s Carol Massar from Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, about the Federal Reserve’s involvement in the rescue of Bear Stearns Cos., and potential implications for the financial-services markets and regulators.
• Grant Calls Fed’s Balance Sheet an `Economist Nightmare’
  James Grant, editor of Grant’s Interest Rate Observer, talks with Bloomberg’s Pimm Fox in New York about the Federal Reserve’s intervention in the credit market crisis and its impact on the value of the U.S. dollar.
• China Corn Oil Launches
  China Corn Oil listed on Europe’s Alternext Wednesday, instead of having a local Chinese public offering. Jean-Francois Theodore, deputy CEO of NYSE Euronext, considers why.
• After the Techno Lust, There’s Always E-Cycling
  Americans are using — and getting rid of — more electronic devices than ever. As technology improves and gets cheaper, old cell phones, computers, iPods and digital cameras end up in desk drawers, basements — or on the curb.
• Empty bowls, stomachs and pockets
  THE soaring price of rice and dwindling stockpiles of Asia’s staple food are causing anxiety across the continent. In particular the Philippines, a big, hungry country which cannot grow enough to feed itself, could be in trouble. The front pages of Manila’s newspapers scream about a “rice crisis”, as politicians float drastic solutions, such as forcing the country’s top 100 companies to take up rice farming. Farmers in Thailand, the world’s largest rice exporter, are delighted with the price surge, although some were this week said to be hiring guards to protect their valuable crops against “rice bandits”.
• Grim realty
  AFTER the gain for some, the pain continues for many American property owners. According to the newly published S&P/Case-Shiller index, house prices in ten metropolitan areas fell by 11.7% in January compared with the year before, the biggest fall since the index was created in 1987. The larger 20-city index tumbled by 10.7%. Sunbelt cities which earlier saw the most dramatic price rises are now enduring the hardest falls. Only Charlotte has yet to succumb to declining prices. The OFHEO’s index of homes guaranteed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac fell by 3% from 2007, also showing an accelerating slide.
• Heathrow Opens Fifth Terminal in Bid to Ease Congestion
  London’s Heathrow Airport opens its fifth passenger terminal today after almost two decades of planning amid criticism the 4.3 billion-pound ($8.6 billion) building will fail to ease congestion on the runways. Before today’s opening, Heathrow was handling 68 million passengers a year in buildings meant for 45 million. While Terminal 5 will expand capacity to 75 million people a year, the airport is forecast by BAA to surpass that number in 2013.
• Matsui of Goldman Says Japan Profits to Tumble Next Year
  
  Kathy Matsui, chief equity strategist for Japan at Goldman Sachs & Co., talked with Bloomberg’s Mike Firn in Tokyo on March 25 about the outlook for Japan’s Nikkei 225 Stock Average, corporate earnings and Matsui’s investment recommendations.
• Fearing inflation in Brazil
  Shortly after the release of Brazil’s 2007 GDP growth figures, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva celebrated “a double miracle”: income was rising and credit activity was booming, with longer loan maturities. Last year’s healthy 5.4% economic growth rate was supported by consumer demand, but also by a higher level of investment. However, celebrations were short lived, as government officials now seem to disagree over the best way to prevent a new bout of inflation and protect the economy from spill-over effects from the worsening international financial crisis.