Meta Data: Stormy BlackBerry Sales?

The BlackBerry Storm is no iPhone. But it's not the great failure some had predicted, either.

In a Dec. 17 research note, RBC analyst Mike Abramsky reported that 33% of Storm owners described themselves as "very satisfied" with their phones. In contrast, 77% of iPhone owners surveyed by researcher ChangeWave in July 2007, when Apple (nasdaq: AAPL - news - people ) first released the handset, characterized themselves as "very satisfied." Though low, the Storm results are in line with the satisfaction ratings for owners of other just-released phones, Abramsky wrote. (See "Smart-Phone Calling.")

Even so, a good number of Storm owners plan to return the phone. In a December survey from ChangeWave, 2% of respondents said they were "very likely" and 7% said they were "somewhat likely" to return the device. The reasons for returns: low battery life, touch-screen and difficulty of use. In a sign of how divisive the Storm's screen is, users that liked the device listed its touch technology, large screen and sharp image resolution as their favorite features.

Typically, 1% to 2% of owners of a particular phone return the device, making the Storm figures "higher than average," but "not alarming," according to Abramsky. He estimates that BlackBerry maker Research In Motion (nasdaq: RIMM - news - people ) sold 300,000 to 400,000 Storms in the third quarter. RIM is expected to address the phone-return issue Thursday when it reports third-quarter results.

Most Storm owners are smart-phone devotees, according to Abramsky, with 31% of buyers identifying themselves as prior BlackBerry owners and 29% as prior Palm (nasdaq: PALM - news - people ) Treo owners. That trend could have ramifications for Palm, which will release its fiscal second-quarter earnings Thursday.

Steve Jobs' decision to skip the convention could mean the company doesn't have a hot new product to show off.

Lehigh Technologies, which recycles tire scraps, brings in a new CEO to crank up production.

BURLINGAME, Calif.--Taking garbage and turning it into something useful is certainly an appealing concept as the whole world becomes more conservation minded.

Lehigh Technologies sees opportunity in millions of old tires. The 5-year-old company, which is based in Naples, Fla., and has a factory outside Atlanta, has a proprietary technology that freezes and grinds tire scraps into fine powders. Right now, the main customers for Lehigh's product are tire companies (who wish to remain unnamed), which use the powder to replace some of the virgin rubber in new tires. But Lehigh's factory, capable of producing 100 million pounds per year of the powder, isn't yet operating at capacity.

To boost growth, Lehigh is announcing Wednesday that it is bringing in Alan Barton, a chemicals industry veteran, as its new chief executive. Barton, who earned a doctorate in chemistry at Harvard and worked for 23 years at Rohm and Haas (nyse: ROH - news - people ), says there is great potential for Lehigh's rubber powders to be used in both the plastics and the coatings markets. One big attraction: The powder is priced at a discount to the cost of virgin materials.

"Producing powder particles in the size and quality that can be used in highly technical end uses is not an easy thing to do," Barton says. "Few, if any, other companies in the world can do this."

John Doerr, the esteemed green tech guru at Lehigh investor Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, said in an e-mail: "We're in 30 million tires on the road today and see vast potential in expanding in the tire market to help with cost pressures, and in specialty plastics and coatings where we can provide cost benefits and better capabilities and qualities for materials." Kleiner invested in Lehigh alongside Index Ventures in a $34.5 million round last May. So far, Lehigh has raised a total of $60 million. The company didn't disclose sales figures but said revenues have doubled since last summer.

The company buys tire scraps that are one-quarter to one-inch chips and freezes them using liquid nitrogen, then puts them through special milling machines that can operate at extremely low temperatures to produce the right size powder particles. The process was invented by a German engineer for use in pharmaceutical production.

Lehigh is treading a familiar path--one that hasn't always ended happily. Back in the 1990s, Michelin (other-otc: MGDDF.PK - news - people ) began making tires with partially recycled content for use on Ford (nyse: F - news - people ) trucks. But Michelin couldn't obtain a consistent supply of recycled material, so Ford stopped buying the tires, says Andy Acho, a former Ford executive who oversaw use of recycled materials.

Despite an investment boom, GDP growth is hurt by falling E.U. demand for the nation's exports.

Economic reforms and European Union membership have generated an investment boom in Slovakia's manufacturing, construction and service sectors. Gross domestic product growth peaked at 10.4% in 2007 as new automobile and electronic plants started full-scale production.

However, Slovakia's performance is tied closely to E.U. demand for its exports, and the slowdown in E.U. growth is starting to be felt in Slovakia. The Statistical Office reported GDP growth in the third quarter slowing to 7% year-on-year after 9.3% and 7.6% in the first and second quarters, respectively. The government estimates that the economy will grow by 4.7% in 2009, with export growth slowing from 10% in 2008 to 5.9%. Recent data do not yet fully reflect the impact of the crisis, and some fear that growth could slow below 4%.

Anti-crisis package. Prime Minister Robert Fico argues that higher domestic consumption will help Slovakia get through the crisis and perhaps reverse disturbing trends in employment. Accordingly, the government has drafted a package of new economic measures to stimulate demand. These include completing a nuclear power station on the Bohunice site and using public-private partnerships to build new roads and expand Bratislava's Stefanik airport. The government also seeks to reform the labor market and provide loans to small and medium-sized enterprises.

Euro perspective. Meanwhile, Standard & Poor's 500 and Moody's have upgraded Slovakia's sovereign rating from A to A+. They cite Slovakia's modest debt burden, investment-oriented policies and the switch to the euro in January 2009.

Critics have argued that Slovakia is needlessly surrendering control over monetary policy and setting itself up for high inflation due to the switch-over. However, the timing for euro adoption now looks fortunate:

--The drive for the euro has meant long-term fiscal frugality and restrained the spending desires of Slovakia's left-leaning government.

--Slovakia's relatively low fiscal deficit of 2.25% of GDP in 2008 has reduced its need to borrow during the global financial crisis.

In a stunning rebuke, the Securities and Exchange Commission chairman blames his career regulators for a decade-long failure to investigate Wall Street money manager Bernard L. Madoff, now accused of running one of the largest Ponzi schemes ever.

On Tuesday night, SEC Chairman Christopher Cox ordered an internal investigation of what went wrong and offered a scathing critique of the conduct of his staff attorneys. He said they never bothered to seek a formal commission-approved investigation that would have forced Madoff to surrender vital information under subpoena. Instead, the staff relied on information voluntarily produced by Madoff and his firm.

Credible and specific allegations regarding Madoff's financial wrongdoing going back to at least 1999 were repeatedly brought to the attention of SEC staff, said Cox.

A former SEC attorney, Eric Swanson, married Madoff's niece, Shana, last year, The Wall Street Journal reported. The SEC's compliance office issued a statement Wednesday saying that Swanson was part of a team that looked into Madoff's securities brokerage operation in 1999 and 2004. The SEC cited its "strict rules" prohibiting employees from participating in cases involving firms where they have a personal interest.

The SEC's inspector general, David Kotz, told the Journal that he intends to examine the relationship between Madoff's niece and Swanson.

Madoff remains free on $10 million bail. A hearing is scheduled in federal court in New York on Wednesday afternoon to iron out the terms of his bail package.

Shock waves from the Madoff affair have radiated around the globe as a growing number of prestigious charitable foundations, big international banks and individual investors acknowledge falling victim to an unprecedented fraud.

The market seemed to prefer to wait for the group's official announcement on a cut late on Wednesday. Crude futures on the Nymex were down 4 cents at $43.56 on Wednesday morning, after rising by $1.50 to more than $45.00 a barrel in European trading. United States Oil Fund (nyse: USO - news - people ), an exchange-traded fund that seeks to mirror the returns of crude and other products, was flat at $36.55.

If OPEC were to formally announce that it was cutting by 2.0 million, it would be the biggest single output cut ever made by the organization. Still, such a size would not be particularly alarming. Earlier this month OPEC President Chakib Khelil said there would be a "surprise" cut in production on Dec. 17 and the market has since then upped its forecast for a cut to 2.0 million, from 1.5 million. (See "OPEC's 'Surprise' May Disappoint.") A truly "surprise" cut would have to be one of around 2.5 million to 3.0 million.

Along with tackling an oversupply of oil in the market, OPEC's big challenge will be for all 15 of its members to comply with such a significant cut. For those whose budgets are already stretched--think Iran, Venezuela and Nigeria--that will be especially difficult. The group said that its rate of compliance with that last production cut of 1.5 million in late October had been 85.0%.

"The issue going forward is: 'What is the aim of the supply cut?'" said BNP Paribas analyst Harry Tchilinguirian. "Is it to push for higher prices, or is it to establish a price floor?" Pushing too aggressively for higher prices could backfire in a market that is falling because of waning demand, but the cartel also needs to make a cut significant enough to get the market's attention, he said.

Tchilinguirian believes a cut of 2.0 million would be on the "high side" if OPEC wanted to find that balance, while a reduction of 1.5-1.6 million would be more appropriate.

In the weeks since Barack Obama and his family walked out on that Grant Park stage, our euphoria about the world's euphoria must surely count as the most endearingly silly outcome of this election.

News from overseas fed the excitement. The birthplace of Obama Père, Kenya, declared a national holiday. Western Europeans, the Chinese and Russians (the people if not their rulers), even that fabled Arab Street, all seemed to rejoice. So many of us have heard from family and friends overseas awed--as Bill Clinton once said--by the "mystery of American renewal." A black man, the son of a foreigner, a virtual unknown a mere four years ago, rose to the highest office on the planet. Only in America, they say, What a country! They mean it, and they're right.

Of course, Andrew Sullivan told us it would be so on the cover of last December's Atlantic--and subsequently told us, repeatedly, that he'd told us that "Obama matters" because the world will see us differently. He has plenty of company in the commentariat and among (admittedly) Democratic politicians. All together, they channel Gidget: "You like me, right now, you like me!" I imagine Sally Field (of 1985 Oscar ceremony fame) partakes fully in the Obama-as-America's-salvation-overseas mania, though I haven't bothered to ask.

One hates to spoil a good party, but here's a bet that's far safer these days than a U.S. Treasury bill: Even with Obama at the White House, they won't really like us any more than before.

It's not because America's not a special country, a City upon a Hill, from the Pilgrims to Obama, the Blagojevich couple and other American horrors notwithstanding. It's because it is. And as ever, our earnest assertion of our superior ontological uniqueness--not to mention its reality in and of itself--is exactly what always grated on the unfriendlies grouped together under the banner of anti-Americanism.

The past few years for sure were especially happy ones for the flag burners, intellectual bomb throwers and suicide attackers. George W. Bush gave this crowd a great excuse to hate America--and the Democrats a highly effective partisan political weapon against the ruling party.

Morgan Stanley seems to be the No. 2 Wall Street firm in more ways than just size. While Goldman Sachs generally pleased investors with earnings that could be read as not too far from expectations, Morgan Stanley on Wednesday posted a far-greater-than-projected loss of $2.4 billion for its fiscal fourth quarter.

The newly christened bank holding company said sliding asset values had driven losses and pledged $2.0 billion in cost-cutting in the coming year.

The New York-based firm lost $2.34 per share for the quarter ended Nov. 30 and posted a full-year deficit of $3.6 billion, or $3.61 per share. Analysts had forecast a loss of only 34 cents per share. Total assets under management fell by 28.0% ,to $546.0 billion year over year and the bank's leverage was reduced significantly to 11.4 from 32.6 according to TradeTheNews.com.

On Tuesday, Goldman Sachs (nyse: GS - news - people ) also announced a larger-than-consensus quarterly loss, though it fell within the range of Wall Street's worst forecasts and Wall Street seemed happier with the company's prospects than it did on Wednesday with Morgan's.

Investors pushed Morgan Stanley down 3.9%, or 63 cents, to $15.50, in premarket trading. On Monday, the shares had closed at $13.64, so that’s still a good two-day gain, but the stock traded over $55 less than a year ago. Goldman, by contrast was down only 1.4% Wednesday morning, to $74.95, a $1.05 loss.

Morgan Stanley's dissapointing performance came during a quarter reversals of fortune for once hubris-filled financial industry. The bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers (nyse: LEHMQ - news - people ) and the sale of Merrill Lynch (nyse: MER - news - people ) to Bank of America (nyse: BAC - news - people ) revealed the weakness of these highly leveraged businesses. The wild swings in markets left only Goldman and Morgan as independent bulge-bracket brokerage houses.

In October, Morgan Stanley spent $23.0 billion to buy securities from money-market and similar funds it manages to cover $46.0 billion in outflows. (See "Morgan Stanley Forked Out $23B To Float Funds") Earlier in the the beleaugered firm received a $9.0 billion investment from Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group in exchange for a 21.0% stake. (See "Morgan Stanley Can't Please Everyone.") That amount of money would now buy a little more than half of Morgan Stanley.