DoubleLine launches stock management division

NEW YORK (Reuters) – DoubleLine Capital LP, the $ 53 billion firm run by star bond investor Jeffrey Gundlach, said on Wednesday it is now managing stock portfolios in a new division called DoubleLine Equity LP.

The firm, which surpassed $ 50 billion in bond assets last year after launching in 2009, said in a news release that it has tapped former TCW Group Inc portfolio managers Brendt Stallings and Husam Nazer to expand its stock division.

In an interview on Wednesday, Gundlach, DoubleLine‘s chief executive officer and chief investment officer, said stock mutual fund strategies suffer from a lack of new ideas.

“We think the equity business is ripe for creative thinking,” he said.

Gundlach said he plans to start with one or two mutual funds that offer a strategy focusing on U.S. stocks, and quickly follow with a hedge fund whose strategy would focus on “best ideas” in international stock investing.

“We’re really not prepared to do a lot of individual stock selection outside of the United States,” he said.

Gundlach had hinted at the firm’s move into stocks in a webcast on September 11, citing the broad disinterest in equities and their potential as a hedge against inflation.

He said on Wednesday that some of the stock funds he plans to offer will have a strategy that focuses on specific sectors among small and mid-cap stocks, while others will have a broader strategy that could vary widely in its stock selection.

Gundlach said DoubleLine’s business plan had been to build the firm’s bond management side to between $ 50 billion and $ 60 billion in assets before diversifying into areas such as stocks, a goal it has achieved.

“This is our first move to diversify. There’s very likely to be one if not two more over the course of 2013,” Gundlach said. He said he is seeking to reach a maximum of about $ 10 billion in assets within DoubleLine’s equity division.

Gundlach has made pointed calls on stocks in the past, including one at the Ira Sohn investing conference in May to buy natural gas while betting on a decline in the shares of Apple Inc, the world’s most valuable technology company.

On Wednesday, Gundlach recommended trading the volatility in Apple’s stock price.

“Apple’s flopping around like a fish in a boat. When it has a big rally, you should probably sell it. When it goes down a lot, you should probably buy it,” he said, and reiterated a call he on CNBC in November that its stock price may drop to $ 425 a share. Apple’s stock was up 3.2 percent to $ 549.03 at the close of trading on Wednesday.

DoubleLine Total Return Bond Fund, the firm’s flagship, earned a return of 9.2 percent in 2012, beating 97 percent of other U.S. mortgage-focused funds, according to Lipper. The fund, which oversees $ 37.1 billion, took in $ 19.7 billion last year, making it the most popular mutual fund by asset growth.

Pacific Investment Management Co, the world’s largest bond fund manager with $ 1.92 trillion in assets as of September 30, 2012, began moving into equities when it launched its first actively managed stock mutual fund in 2010.

Gundlach told Reuters that his foray into stock investing could also come with a downturn in the stock market, which he said he could overcome through active management.

“There’s a really good argument that you could have a major correction in the S&P 500 in 2013,” he said. He cited the heavy influence of U.S. policymakers on markets.

Stallings and Nazer were previously group managing directors at TCW, the highest title for managers at the firm, where they oversaw $ 5 billion in assets in stock portfolios.

Gundlach founded DoubleLine after a nasty split with TCW, where he was fired as chief investment officer in December 2009. The two sued one another in 2010, but settled in December of that year without disclosing terms.

Private equity firm Carlyle Group struck a deal in August to buy a 60 percent stake in TCW from French bank Societe Generale. TCW management and employees will own the remaining 40 percent stake in the Los Angeles-based investment firm, which has $ 135 billion in assets.

DoubleLine, which is also based in Los Angeles, employs more than 80 people. Stallings and Nazer plan to hire at least five investment professionals this year, the news release said.

Nazer said in an interview on Wednesday that dividend-paying stocks in general and consumer staple stocks are particular bright spots.

(Reporting by Sam Forgione; Editing by Kenneth Barry and Mohammad Zargham)

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Israeli-Palestinian clashes erupt in West Bank

TAMOUN, West Bank (AP) — An arrest raid by undercover Israeli soldiers disguised as vegetable vendors ignited rare clashes in the northern West Bank on Tuesday, residents said, leaving at 10 Palestinians wounded.

Israeli army raids into Palestinian areas to seize activists and militants are fairly common. The raids are normally coordinated with Palestinian security forces, and suspects are usually apprehended without violence.

The clashes began early Tuesday after Israeli forces disguised as merchants in a vegetable truck arrested one man. Regular army forces then entered the town, prompting youths to hurl rocks to try to prevent more arrests.

Israeli forces fired tear gas, rubber bullets and live ammunition as youths set tires and bins on fire to block the passage of military vehicles. In several hours of clashes, dozens of masked youths hid behind makeshift barriers, hurling rocks and firebombs at soldiers.

Faris Bisharat, a resident of Tamoun, said 10 men were wounded, some by live fire. Bisharat said the wanted men belong to Islamic Jihad, a violent group sworn to Israel’s destruction. It wasn’t clear how many men Israeli forces sought to arrest. There were no immediate details on how seriously the 10 were hurt.

The Israeli military said it arrested a “terrorist affiliated with the Islamic Jihad terror group.” It said two soldiers were injured during the raid.

The fighting, which broke out in several parts of the town of some 8,000 people, were a rare, angry response. It was also unusual for Israeli forces to use live fire toward Palestinian demonstrators. Israel says it uses live fire only in extremely dangerous situations.

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All of 2012 in One 4-Minute Video

We realize there’s only so much time one can spend in a day watching new trailers, viral video clips, and shaky cell phone footage of people arguing on live television. This is why every day The Atlantic Wire highlights the videos that truly earn your five minutes (or less) of attention. Today:  

RELATED: ‘Roseanne’ Predicted Internet Addiction; A Weather Alert from Hell

Filmmaker Ryan James Yezak boiled down the biggest stories of 2012 into four minutes. And, yes, Honey Boo Boo made it in there:

RELATED: Even Batman Gets Tripped up by Apple Maps

RELATED: The Videos You Shouldn’t (and Probably Couldn’t) Try at Home

So, raise your hand if you knew Patrick Stewart and company were having this much fun behind the scenes at Star Trek: The Next Generation. 

RELATED: Here’s a Video of George Takei Reading ’50 Shades of Grey’

RELATED: Cookie Monster Batman and the Dog You Wish You Had

Marvel’s Stan Lee — the guy who created characters like the Amazing Spider-Man, Thor, the Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, and the X-Men — turned 90 the other day. In honor of him and his heroes, here are all his cameos from all of the Marvel movies he helped create: 

And, finally, it’s 2013 somewhere… right? Please take caution when announcing that news to this very excitable baby. Happy New Year!

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LA photographer killed while shooting Bieber’s car

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Police say a paparazzo was hit by a car and killed after taking photos of Justin Bieber‘s white Ferrari on a Los Angeles street.

Los Angeles police Officer James Stoughton says the photographer, who was not identified, died at a hospital shortly after the crash Tuesday evening. Stoughton says Bieber was not in the Ferrari at the time.

The sports car was parked on the side of Sepulveda Boulevard near Getty Center Drive after a traffic stop. The photographer was struck as he walked across the boulevard after taking pictures.

Stoughton says no charges are expected to be filed against the motorist who hit the man.

A call to a spokesperson for the singer was not immediately returned Tuesday night.

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Analysis: In era of gridlock, Congress “created a monster”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Setting a looming deadline to avert self-created calamity has become a frequent device for the U.S. Congress to get things done in recent years. When all else fails, as it often does, it’s supposed to frighten members into action.

That was the idea when Congress created the “fiscal cliff” in August, 2011 to resolve a partisan struggle, also with a deadline and also self-created, over raising the federal debt ceiling.

Catastrophic budget cuts, timed to coincide with the threat of hefty income tax increases, would finally produce big cuts in the soaring federal budget by December 31, 2012, or else.

It didn’t work.

Congress scared everyone but Congress, which while cutting taxes for most and raising them for a few, made no pretense of trying to make any progress toward reducing the deficit.

“We created a monster,” Democratic Representative Charles Rangel of New York said on the floor of the House of Representatives on Tuesday night just before a House vote averted most of the effects of the fiscal cliff.

“This fandango was an immense embarrassment,” American Enterprise Institute scholar Norm Ornstein said in an interview with Reuters, calling it “cringeworthy.”

And “the fact that we are going to have another disastrous confrontation over the debt limit in two months, with the radical right wing of the House Republicans determined to send us over the edge if they don’t get their way, is actually frightening.”

“This House could have done worse, by rejecting the plan” to avoid the cliff, he said, “but it has done nothing to challenge its record as at minimum the worst Congress in our lifetimes.”

The next confrontation to which Ornstein referred is likely to start heating up in a matter of weeks in anticipation of the need to once again raise the borrowing limit for the government beyond the current level of about $ 16 trillion. The risk will be a default by the government.

‘PSYCHOLOGICAL FALLOUT’

Republicans in Congress, many of whom acknowledged publicly that they took a beating from President Barack Obama in the contest over the cliff, are promising to pursue spending cuts with extra vigor as a condition for approving the debt ceiling increase in the Republican-controlled House.

Historically, each partisan grudge match over spending has tended to make the next one even more bitter.

Alice Rivlin, a former U.S. budget director and Brookings Institution budget expert, also worries about “psychological fallout” from the battle over the cliff that could spill over into the debt ceiling struggle as well as contribute to the global perception that when it comes to the economy, the U.S. can’t govern itself.

“It’s very bad for the economy,” she said in an interview with Reuters, “and for our image in the world. We don’t look like a country in charge of its own destiny. That’s hard to quantify but it’s bad.”

“This is a Congress that can barely get its work done – especially when confronting the most important issues of the day,” said Sarah Binder, a George Washington University expert on Congress.

“In many ways, public disgust with Congress is already baked in: the public’s expectations are so low that it’s hard for Congress to surprise us,” she said in an interview with Reuters.

That wasn’t the way Minority Leader Mitch McConnell – the chief architect of the cliff – expressed it on August 1, 2011 as he spoke on the Senate floor.

“It might have appeared to some as though their government wasn’t working,” he said, “but in fact the opposite was true. The push and pull Americans saw in Washington these past few weeks was not gridlock, it was the will of the people working itself out in a political system that was never meant to be pretty.”

Republican Representative David Dreier of California expressed a similar sentiment Monday night as the House closed the loop on the plan McConnell designed.

“This is the greatest deliberative body known to man,” he said.

(Editing by Eric Walsh)

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World stocks jump as US staves off ‘fiscal cliff’

BANGKOK (AP) — World markets registered relief Wednesday over the U.S. congressional vote to stop hundreds of billions of dollars in automatic tax increases and spending cuts that risked plunging the world’s biggest economy into recession.

Benchmarks in Australia and Hong Kong boomeranged on the first trading day of the year, just before Congress passed an emergency measure to avert much of the impact of tax-and-spending changes that were so steep they were dubbed the “fiscal cliff.” Asian markets had slipped on Monday, fearing that negotiations over the measure might collapse.

Economists have been warning that the tax increases and spending cuts could take a chunk out of the U.S. economy; some experts predicted financial markets would plunge unless a clear-cut deal was reached.

Instead, markets in Asia and Europe blessed the stopgap measure approved late Tuesday in Washington to retroactively counter some of the “fiscal cliff” effects. The bill Congress passed awaits President Barack Obama‘s signature.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index shot up 2.9 percent to close at 23,311.89, its highest finish since June 1, 2011. Australia‘s S&P/ASX 200 surged 1.2 percent to close at 4,705.90, its strongest finish in 19 months. South Korea’s Kospi jumped 1.7 percent to 2,031.10.

European stocks jumped shortly after opening. Britain’s FTSE 100 rose 1.6 percent to 5,989.24. Germany’s DAX advanced 1.7 percent to 7,740.12 and France’s CAC-40 also gained 1.7 percent at 3,701.90.

“People are very relieved this morning because the U.S. is very likely to fix its own problems in the next few days, so investors in Hong Kong are pretty optimistic,” said Jackson Wong, vice president of Tanrich Securities in Hong Kong.

But some analysts said that expectations for a compromise were so low that any deal was viewed as positive.

“Among business leaders, I’m gonna say this deal isn’t enough to move the needle on confidence. It may improve consumer confidence a little, investors obviously are celebrating a tentative deal but you know how transitory investor confidence can become,” said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at BMO Group.

Benchmarks in Singapore, Taiwan, India, the Philippines, Thailand and Indonesia posted solid gains. Markets in Japan and mainland China reopen Friday.

Uncertainty about the outcome of negotiations drove down Asian regional stocks Monday, the last trading day of 2012.

Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.5 percent to close at 4,648.90, as investors sold off stocks to lock in profits. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng closed marginally lower. Singapore, New Zealand and India also declined. Japan and South Korea were closed.

The bill that Congress approved calls for higher taxes on incomes over $ 400,000 for individuals and $ 450,000 for couples, a victory for Obama. Earnings above those amounts would be taxed at a rate of 39.6 percent, up from the current 35 percent. It also delays for two months $ 109 billion worth of across-the-board spending cuts that had been set to start affecting the Pentagon and domestic agencies this week.

Lorraine Tan, director at Standard & Poor’s equity research in Singapore, said she believes U.S. growth in 2013 will be able to offset the impact of the tax increases and that companies would feel freer to spend now that the U.S. has taken a step back from the edge of the cliff.

Companies “can start to move ahead with any expansion plans they may have,” Tan said. “You’ll see some of that pent-up spending in 2013. And I think there’s a lot of relief related to that.”

Even if Washington bypasses the fiscal cliff, the next crisis is just around the corner, in late February or early March, when the government reaches a $ 16.4 trillion ceiling on the amount of money it can borrow.

Republicans say they won’t go along with raising the limit on government borrowing unless the increase is matched by spending cuts to help attack long-term debt. Failing to raise the debt ceiling could lead to a first-ever U.S. default that could roil financial markets and shake worldwide confidence in the United States.

“Republicans vow not to raise the limit without sharp cuts in spending and Obama vows not to cut spending without further tax hikes. Two more months of shenanigans and waffling / seasick markets? It certainly looks that way,” analysts at DBS Bank Ltd. in Singapore said in a market commentary.

U.S. stocks shot higher Monday on the belief that lawmakers would work out a deal. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 1.3 percent to 13,104.14. The Standard & Poor’s 500 rose 1.7 percent to 1,426.19. The Nasdaq composite index rose 2 percent to 3,019.51.

Political gridlock has been rattling U.S. markets and shaking consumer and business confidence the past two years.

To end a 2011 standoff over raising the federal debt limit, lawmakers agreed to a Jan. 1, 2013 deadline to reach a deal over taxes and spending. If there was no agreement, more than $ 500 billion in tax increases would hit the economy in 2013 alone, along with $ 109 billion in cuts from the military and domestic spending programs — hence the fiscal cliff.

After a fight over raising the debt limit last year, the credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s took the unprecedented step of lowering the U.S. government’s AAA bond rating because of the lack of a credible plan to reduce the federal government’s debt.

___

Follow Pamela Sampson on Twitter at http://twitter.com/pamelasampson

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UPDATE 7-Tennis-Auckland Classic women’s singles round 1 results

Jan 1 (Infostrada Sports) – Results from the Auckland Classic Women’s Singles Round 1 matches on Tuesday

2-Julia Goerges (Germany) beat Anastasija Sevastova (Latvia) 6-3 6-4

Marina Erakovic (New Zealand) beat Stephanie Dubois (Canada) 6-2 6-1

1-Agnieszka Radwanska (Poland) beat Greta Arn (Hungary) 6-2 6-2

8-Mona Barthel (Germany) beat Grace Min (U.S.) 6-1 6-3

6-Yaroslava Shvedova (Kazakhstan) beat Lara Arruabarrena Vecino (Spain) 6-3 6-2

Romina Oprandi (Switzerland) beat Nudnida Luangnam (Thailand) 6-0 6-2

Heather Watson (Britain) beat 5-Sorana Cirstea (Romania) 6-3 (Cirstea retired)

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20 WTF New Year’s Resolutions

Ringing in 2013 properly requires a few things: bottom-shelf champagne, “I survived the apocalypse” t-shirts, excessive sequins and — most importantly — New Year’s resolutions that may or may not last beyond February.

[More from Mashable: These Are the Worst Case Scenarios for New Year’s Eve]

You promise to lose weight or quit smoking or stop stalking your ex on Facebook, but what about those people that shoot for a slightly different goal in the new year? Sometimes these resolution-makers come up with brilliant challenges and other times — well, ummm — they share goals that are more “WTF?” than an adult dressed like the New Year’s baby.

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BONUS: 14 Solutions to Your New Year’s Midnight Kiss

Find a Baby

There’s got to be one crawling around somewhere. What’s cuter than kissing a baby’s fat cheek? Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images

Click here to view this gallery.

Image Credit: Mashable composite. Photos via iStockphoto, Adventure_photo and Seanicer

This story originally published on Mashable here.

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DiDonato a luminous Mary Stuart at Met

NEW YORK (AP) — The Metropolitan Opera may have pretty much turned opening night over to the glamorous Anna Netrebko, but New Year’s Eve belongs to a very different diva — Joyce DiDonato.

Last year the Kansas-born mezzo-soprano headlined a starry lineup in the baroque pastiche “The Enchanted Island.” On Monday night she brought a gala audience to its feet with a luminous performance in the title role of Donizetti’s “Maria Stuarda.”

Never before performed at the Met, this second opera in the composer’s so-called “Three Queens” trilogy portrays the lethal conflict between Mary, deposed queen of Scotland, and Queen Elizabeth I of England.

From the moment she makes her entrance in the second scene, singing of her joy in strolling outside her prison in Fotheringay Castle, DiDonato rivets attention. She imbues every syllable with a concentrated eloquence that makes her compact voice seem larger than it is. She displays seemingly effortless command of coloratura embellishments throughout a wide vocal range. And she is equally impressive in fiery outbursts and in hushed, long-held phrases — like the ones she spun out as she sang through the chorus in the final scene.

The opera’s dramatic heart is a confrontation between the two queens that never took place in history but that figures in the Friedrich Schiller play on which the libretto is based. Mary at first abases herself in hope of winning a pardon; then, as Elizabeth hurls insults, her pride reasserts itself and she seals her doom by denouncing her rival as “figlia impura di Bolena” (“impure daughter of Anne Boleyn”) and “vil bastarda” (“vile bastard”).

DiDonato was impressive in this scene when she sang the role for the first time last spring in Houston, but her performance Monday night was even better — more confident and more filled with vocal and dramatic shadings. There was a wonderful touch when, after she had spent her fury, she allowed herself a beatific smile, as if to convey: “There! I said it and I’m glad!”

Of course, it takes two to stage a confrontation, and DiDonato’s partner at the Met is Elza van den Heever, a South African soprano making her debut. She has a voice that’s impressive in many respects, with a large and vibrant upper register. But she tended to fade out in the lower part of her range, where much of Elizabeth‘s music lies.

More damagingly, she was victimized by a quirk of David McVicar’s production that has Elizabeth lurching awkwardly about the stage for much of the evening, as if thrown off balance by John Macfarlane‘s elaborate period costumes. Perhaps this bizarre gait is intended to contrast with Mary’s immaculate poise, but it mainly proves distracting.

The opening scene in Elizabeth’s palace is garishly staged, with what look like red rafters hanging down from the ceiling and gratuitous acrobats in devil costumes, but once past this, matters improve. For the scene outside Fotheringay, Macfarlane fills the stage with spindly trees barren of leaves and provides a painted backdrop that evokes a cloudy landscape. The final tableau is also striking: Mary, shorn of her long hair and wearing a simple red dress, climbs a staircase with her back to the audience to meet her executioner and the chopping block.

Though the two queens dominate the opera, there are some other characters, and they are all in extremely good hands. Having the elegant tenor Matthew Polenzani take on the thankless role of the ineffectual Leicester is luxury casting indeed. Bass Matthew Rose is warmly sympathetic as Mary’s confessor, Talbot; baritone Joshua Hopkins sings with robust tone as her nemesis, Cecil; and mezzo Maria Zifchak lends her customary strong support as Mary’s attendant, Anna.

Maurizio Benini conducts a lithe and lively performance of the score, even if he can’t quite disguise the fact that the second half of the opera is decidedly anti-climactic.

There are seven more performances, including a matinee on Saturday, Jan. 19, that will be broadcast live in HD to movie theaters around the world.

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Obama calls on House to pass fiscal deal “without delay”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Barack Obama called on Tuesday for the House of Representatives to follow the Senate‘s lead and pass a “fiscal cliff” deal to extend tax cuts for middle-class Americans and raise tax rates on top earners.

“While neither Democrats nor Republicans got everything they wanted, this agreement is the right thing to do for our country and the House should pass it without delay,” Obama said in a statement after the Senate voted overwhelmingly to approve the legislation.

“There’s more work to do to reduce our deficits, and I’m willing to do it. But tonight’s agreement ensures that, going forward, we will continue to reduce the deficit through a combination of new spending cuts and new revenues from the wealthiest Americans,” Obama said.

(Reporting by Jeff Mason; Editing by Eric Walsh)

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