The rally in gold just doesn't want to quit. You are probably wondering what is going on. Central banks around the world hold gold reserves. Periodically, they buy or sell gold, depending on how they view world markets. Right now, central banks are net buyers, the first time since 1988.

A weak US dollar is the main stimulus for central bankers' gold purchases. India just bought 200 metric tons from the International Monetary Fund. Central bankers in Mexico, Russia, the Philippines, all have increased their gold purchases.

European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet jolted the markets Friday with the announcement that the ECB will gradually withdraw the emergency cash injections it has added to the financial system, in order to prevent an acceleration in inflation.

"Not all our liquidity measures will be needed to the same extent as in the past," Trichet said at a conference in Frankfurt Friday, Bloomberg News reported. "Any non-standard measure whose continuation would pose a threat to the achievement of price stability must be undone promptly and unequivocally."

I was wrong about Ann Taylor Stores Corp. (ANN). Thought it might make a possible earnings trade. Well, Q3 earnings are out, and it looks like the market has given a thumbs down to my thesis. At the time of this writing, shares were off by almost 4%.

It's funny, because Ann Taylor has done so well in 2009 as a stock that one could have supposed that a wide earnings beat would serve as a catalyst for capital appreciation. The retailer made 20 cents per share on an adjusted basis. According to my earnings preview, 6 cents was the analyst number. I mean, come on, that's an example of solid performance, correct?

In the past, I've covered Rochdale Securities analyst Dick Bove's inane ramblings about how fantastically awesome Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) CEO Ken Lewis is. Last month he called Mr. Lewis "phenomenally good" and his notes to investors are beginning to have more in common with 12-year old girls' Valentines to Zac Efron than conventional research.

But he has outdone himself this time. While Bank of America's chairman of the board goes on a cruise instead of devoting all his energy to finding a successor, Mr. Bove has found the solution to replacing Ken Lewis: "In sum, Mr. Lewis was a key architect in the creation and management of Bank of America. He knows this company better than anyone else and he knows how to operate it," Bove wrote in a research note issued this morning. "At this point in the company's history, this is the type of leader needed. Convincing him to return would be the biggest morale builder that management could get."

We've put three quarters behind us in 2009, and the most recent one was merely another miserable step downward for the beleaguered newspaper industry. Total ad revenue plummeted in the third quarter to $6.4 billion for the print jockeys, a decline of 28%. This info from the Newspaper Association of America drives home the notion that conditions will only worsen for the newspaper industry. So, if you're hoping those shares of New York Times Company (NYT), Gannett (GCI) and Washington Post Company (WPO), holding your breath will leave you little more than dizzy.

Of the total advertising revenue generated in the third quarter of 2009, $5.8 million came from print, the lowest quarterly amount this year. The $623 million in online advertising sold by America's newspapers was also 2009's worst. Both are down substantially from the same quarter in 2008, when the newspapers posted print ad revenue of $8.2 million and online ad revenue of $750 million, according to NAA data. At this time last year, we lamented year-over-year declines approaching 20%. Now, we have the same feelings as ad revenue drops approach 30%.

What is the Philly/Fed Index and why is it important? The Philly/Fed Index measures manufacturing activity in the Philadelphia area. While it measures only one area of the country, over the years it has been a leading index for manufacturing overall.

Why bother measuring the manufacturing sector? The main reason is that manufacturing accounts for 12% of our GDP. Growth in manufacturing indicates that orders are picking up. If orders are picking up, the next step is to hire more workers. Hiring more workers speeds the growth of our economy and at the same time puts unemployed persons back to work.

Today was a very unusual day. There was no real economic data to absorb. And the markets did see some unusual options trading ahead of expiration date at 4:00 PM today. Disappointing earnings kept a negative bias in the air despite a brief recovery into positive territory in the final hour today... Yet the negative close seemed almost a certain fate today.

Here are today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow 10,318.16 -14.28 (-0.14%)
S&P 500 1,091.37 -3.53 (-0.32%)
Nasdaq 2,146.04 -10.78 (-0.50%)

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If, in fact, jobless claims have peaked, that's good news for payroll services specialist Automatic Data Processing (ADP), and that's one reason I'm reiterating my buy rating for the company's shares, first recommended on June 22, 2009 at a price of $36.84. If you bought ADP in June, you're up about 20%.

Despite the worst recession in more than 25 years – one that has devastated payrolls – ADP has held its own, with its stock price this year recovering about one-half its loss following the drop from its peak in 2007.

Tyson Foods' (TSN) stock has meandered since first recommended on May 11, 2009 at a price of $12.35, but I'm sticking with the stock. Here's why:

First, Tyson has the product diversity to adjust to increasingly demanding, educated U.S. consumers, who may, for example, favor chicken over pork one month, then do an end-run and return to red meat when steak prices drop.

Activist hedge fund Harbinger Capital disclosed in an SEC filing yesterday that it has sold 2.5 million shares of The New York Times Co. (NYT), reducing the company's largest outside shareholder's stake from to 14.6%. It also sold shares in September, when it reduced its position in the company from a 20% stake.

Harbinger declined a request for comment from The Wall Street Journal (subscription required), but it's possible that Harbinger is finally realizing that the shares' dual-class voting structure will make it impossible to affect change on the company's operations or corporate governance -- and as long as the Sulzberger family controls the company's fate, it will continue to be a value destruction machine trading at approximately the same share price it was at in 1984.

The loans that got us into this mess were generally the first to fall. Variable rate mortgages written without documentation for people with sketchy credit histories shocked nobody as their slide became an avalanche. But, the good stuff is starting to follow. An increasing amount of fixed rate mortgages offered to borrowers with solid credit histories are feeling their ways to foreclosure. Blame unemployment for this one. When people can't work, it gets pretty hard to pay the mortgage.

Fixed rate, high quality mortgages had a foreclosure a year ago. Last quarter, it jumped to 33%, according to a Mortgage Bankers Association report. As this happened, the amount of homeowners behind on their payments or in foreclosure just set another record high ... for the ninth month in a row. Subprime mortgages are headed in the other direction. Low quality adjustable rate mortgages are now 16% of new foreclosures -- compared to 35% last year. And, more than 18% of Federal Housing Administration loans are anywhere from one payment behind to in foreclosure, with California, Nevada, Arizona and Florida worst off: together, they accounted for 44% of new foreclosures.

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Apple (AAPL) continues to bring the iPhone to countries outside the U.S. Although its launch in China didn't generate as much fanfare as the company had hoped, things take time to roll into a big ball of success. Apple won't be slowing down international introductions of the handset that changed the wireless game, that's for sure.

As such, South Korea's own LG Electronics and Samsung Electronics are about to see their homeland assaulted by the official introduction of the iPhone for sale into that country. South Korea's KT Corp. and SK Telecom are the reported carriers for Apple's iPhone there, and although the South Korean market may seem like a small potato of opportunity for Apple, the company has been cleared by the Korean Communications Commission to start selling its popular handset.

Look before you leap! All year long rumors have been swirling around that E*TRADE (ETFC) was on the auction block being prepared for an acquisition by a bigger fish interested in its customers and superior trading platform. I have not used E-TRADE so I do not have first hand experience. However, this has been acknowledged broadly and I have received very positive comments from regular users when I have written about it.

The leading suitor seems to be TD AmeriTrade Holding (AMTD), with Charles Schwab Corp (SCHW) mentioned as perhaps having similar but less conspicuous interest. For Schwab it may be as much about keeping E-TRADE out of a competitors hands as chasing the business.

Here's a shocker! Over the next decade the U.S. government is expected to rack up $9 trillion in debt. More than half that amount, $4.8 trillion, will be in interest payments.

To further emphasize the depth of the problem, in 2015 interest due will be $533 billion, equal to 1/3 of the federal income taxes!

Right now, the Treasury is in a sweet spot with regards to interest payments. With interest rates at near zero, we are able to finance trillions of dollars of debt with practically no interest payments. That scenario is about to change. The change could be rather quick. If the economy heats up, interest rates will rise and so too will interest payments. Because the debt is so large, only a small rise in interest payments could increase the interest burden by a large amount.

ADC Telecommunications (ADCT - option chain) stock is trading lower today after the company posted a fourth-quarter loss last night of $19.8 million, or 20 cents per share, on revenue of $183.9 million. ADCT also forecast a first-quarter adjusted loss of 10 to 0 cents per share on revenue of $250 million to $275 million. Analysts are forecasting a profit of 11 cents per share on revenue of $274 million. If you think this stock won't be rising too far in the coming months, then it could be a good time to look at a bearish hedged play on ADCT.

This morning, ADCT opened at $5.46. So far today the stock has hit a high of $5.93 and a low of $5.35. As of 12:05, ADCT is trading at $5.71, down 93 cents (-14.0%). The chart for ADCT looks bullish and S&P gives ADCT a positive 5 STARS (out of 5) strong buy ranking.