Six months of 2008 are now behind us and the stock market has not been a friendly place to most investors. Stability that was once found in household names that were industry giants is gone, and they have now been brought to their knees.

Many of them were the stocks we might have looked to in the past for stability, so you can be sure I put forward my five candidates with a little trepidation, but forward I go anyway. First a little review is in order.

Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) dropped from around $53 per share last year to around $30 in January and we can buy it today for around $17. Even at that price Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) has downgraded it to a sell and thinks there is more bad news to come. Citigroup was the largest bank in the world. Not any more.

General Motors (NYSE: GM) was the largest car maker in the world. That was before the stock tumbled from $43 to its current $11 range. A crushing blow to long time investors hoping that someone in the company could stop the ship from sinking.

Lehman Brothers Holdings (NYSE: LEH) has approached a Korean sovereign wealth fund (SWF) about investing. But Lehman probably won't get the money it seeks. Reuters reports that Korean Investment Corp (KIC), an SWF that manages about $20 billion and is an investor in Merrill Lynch (NYSE: MER), is unlikely to invest in Lehman.

Meanwhile, Bloomberg reports that investors on the Einhorn side of Lehman -- those hoping its stock will drop -- are increasing their wager. It notes that options traders increased their bearish positions to a two-month high yesterday. With one analyst expecting Lehman to report a second-quarter loss of 50 cents a share during the week of June 16, put option volume rose to 283,676 contracts, or quadruple the 20-day average, and bearish bets on the company exceeded bullish ones by 1.6-to-1.

As I mentioned during my talk at Stanford in April, SWFs have been burned by their investments in the U.S. finance industry. One of them, the Citic Group, was lucky it was able to bail out of its commitment to invest $1 billion in Bear Stearns. But that close call is likely to keep other SWFs from throwing good money after bad.

MAJOR PAPERS:

• The Wall Street Journal reported that a federal judge said that the government had "sufficient evidence" for a jury to conclude that a conspiracy to fraudulently boost the financials of American International Group Inc (NYSE: AIG) began with former CEO Maurice R. "Hank" Greenberg. That led to a transaction that artificially inflated AIG's loss reserves.
• Citigroup Incorporated's (NYSE: C) Falcon Strategies fixed income hedge fund is down 75%, the Wall Street Journal reported, bad news for the three U.S. banks that invested in it to help increase returns on employee life insurance. One of the banks, Fifth Third Bancorp (NASDAQ: FITB), is suing Transamerica Life and Smith Barney, both of whom helped to arrange the investment, and some are now questioning whether Citigroup will be forced to give back some of the investments as they have with individual investors.
• After it stopped offering some mortgages last month because it was swamped by volumes of new applications, the Financial Times reported that First Direct, a unit of HSBC Holdings Plc (NYSE: HBC), has resumed lending to new customers. The bank said it has continued to receive "significant interest" in its mortgages from existing customers.

OTHER PAPERS:

• In an effort to raise capital from shareholders, the Telegraph reported that Barclays Plc (NYSE: BCS) is considering a takeover bid for a rival in the U.S. or UK. Sources believe Barclays may attempt to acquire an investment bank, a struggling bank or a deal in a fast-moving economy. Potential names mentioned include UBS AG (NYSE: UBS) and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc (NYSE: LEH).

MAJOR PAPERS:

• If Yahoo! Inc (NASDAQ: YHOO) accepts a buyout offer from Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT), it will have to be at the software maker's original offer of $44.6B. Microsoft won't raise the price, the Wall Street Journal reported, and the state of the economy might work in their favor.
• The FAA said that landing gear made by Illinois-based AAR Corporation (NYSE: AIR), and used on hundreds of Boeing Company (NYSE: BA)-built aircraft, includes "unapproved" parts, the Wall Street Journal also reported.
• Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc (NYSE: LEH) is thinking of not allowing its two British subprime mortgage units to provide any new loans. The Financial Times reported that the company may also order the units to put additional pressure on borrowers with a spotty credit history whose mortgages are coming to the end of fixed-rate terms.

OTHER PAPERS:

• According to the Detroit News, people familiar with the matter said that the strike at American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings Inc (NYSE: AXL) could threaten production of General Motors Corporation's (NYSE: GM) Chevrolet Malibu sedan.

Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc (NYSE: LEH) reported a 27% increase in 2Q profits, generally good results. However, the deteriorating subprime business and drop in bond prices and higher interest rates are beginning to show up in results.

"This is the beauty of having a diversified business mode," Lehman Chief Financial Officer Chris O'Meara said in an interview. "We're in a strong market environment with interest rates low, equity valuations staying strong, and activity levels continue in trading. We're optimistic."


Take the Lehman Brothers executive's optimism with a grain of salt. Much of the money made in the early part of this decade by the large investment firms have been from mortgage-related and other leveraged loan products. When the mortgage market began to roll-over, many mortgage trading companies went out and purchased subprime portfolios before the full impact of the subprime meltdown was felt. If one was extremely cynical, it could be suggested the mortgage trading operations were buying up loans to mask a slowdown in performance. But that has never happened on Wall Street before. Ha! Ha!

Expect more trouble in fixed income results for the big investment firms. Bear Stearns Companies Inc (NYSE: BSC) reported some of the strongest results in the mortgage market during the past five years, therefore, this stock is particularly worth watching.