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This is what the National Association of Home Builders said earlier this week: June 17, 2013 - Builder confidence in the market for newly-built single-family homes hit a significant milestone in June, surging eight points to a reading of 52 on the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI) released today. Any reading over 50 indicates that more builders view sales conditions as good than poor. “This is the first time the HMI has been above 50 since April 2006, and surpassing this important benchmark reflects the fact that builders are seeing better market conditions as demand for new homes increases,” said NAHB Chairman Rick Judson, a home builder and developer from Charlotte, N.C. “With the low inventory of existing homes, an increasing number of buyers are gravitating toward new homes.” The eight-point jump in the index was the biggest one-month gain since August and September

More bad news from China here as the Flash PMI falls to a 9 month low (via Markit): Flash China Manufacturing PMI™ at 48.3 (49.2 in May). Nine-month low. Flash China Manufacturing Output Index at 48.8(50.7 in May). Eight-month low. The HSBC Flash China Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index™

Taking into account the reaction at E3, Microsoft (MSFT) is backtracking on its "Always on" DRM scheme, with significant implications for GameStop (GME). Put simply, GameStop's business model - which was at risk in the previously announced DRM scheme, is once again viable.This is from Xbox Wire, which is now down due to heavy traffic (emphasis is mine): Last week at E3, the excitement, creativity and future of our industry was on display for a global audience. For us, the future comes in the form of Xbox One, a system designed to be the best place to play games this year and for many years to come. As is our heritage with Xbox, we designed a system that could take full advantage of advances in technology in order to deliver a breakthrough in game play and entertainment. We imagined a new set of benefits such as easier roaming,

Tesla Motors (TSLA) is expected to demonstrate battery swapping this evening and CEO Elon Musk has said that feature "works with all Tesla Model S cars, past and present"... "It was always there." Battery swapping may have always been built into the Model S, but the infrastructure for doing so was NOT available. Broadly available battery swapping is undeniably a boon for long distance trips, but the practice raises several important questions for both investors and consumers:What will be Tesla's associated build out and maintenance infrastructure costs? The company has said that build-out of solar powered charging stations will average about 300K each, but has been very short on details of maintenance costs. This is by far the most important question for investors. For the build-out of the 100 stations planned in 2013, that meant Capital Expenditure equal to 3% of the $1.08 billion that Tesla raised

China's seven day repo rate hit a record high of 12% according to Bloomberg, the biggest one-day increase since 2006. Meanwhile the overnight repo rate was quoted near 25%. The liquidity squeeze in China first began ahead of the Dragon Boat festival earlier this month. Spikes in interbank rates are common right before holidays. But Diana Choyleva at Lombard Street Research said this is symptomatic of a bigger problem. She said capital flows had "become a more important driver of domestic liquidity conditions in China's managed exchange rate system." In a new note to clients Bank of America's Ting Lu wrote: "There are many factors behind the interbank liquidity squeeze that might be cited, but we believe that the ultimate reason is the central bank’s tough stance as the PBOC can practically provide unlimited liquidity to ease every squeezeif it wishes to." So why isn't the Chinese central bank stepping in? As we previously explained the People's Bank of China seems to be in no mood to support banks' constant demand for liquidity. "It seems that the PBoC and some other regulators could be taking the opportunity of the tight funding conditions to ‘punish’ some small banks which had previously taken advantage of the stable interbank rates to finance their purchase of higher-yield bonds," wrote Lu. This also elicited some worrisome responses from some of our favorite China experts on Twitter. I hope you do realise that by now, China is on crisis watch. — Also sprach Analyst (@theanalyst_hk) June 20, 2013 SHIBOR at 25% basically means there is no functioning interbank market in China - it's like money markets seizing up post-Lehman — Patrick Chovanec (@prchovanec) June 20, 2013Join the conversation about this story »

Cinedigm Digital Cinema (CIDM) Q4 2013 Earnings Call June 19, 2013 4:30 pm ET Executives Jill Newhouse Calcaterra - Chief Marketing Officer Christopher J. McGurk - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Adam M. Mizel - Chief Financial Officer, Chief Operating Officer and Director Analysts Joel W. Achramowicz - Merriman Capital, Inc., Research Division James Basch Kris Tuttle - Soundview Technology Group, Inc. Presentation Operator Good day ladies and gentlemen and welcome to the Cinedigm Digital Cinema Fiscal 2013 Fourth Quarter Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this webinar is being recorded. Now I'll turn the conference over to your host, Jill Calcaterra, Chief Marketing Officer. Jill Newhouse Calcaterra Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to Cinedigm's full year and fourth quarter 2013 earnings conference call. With me today are the company's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Chris McGurk; and Chief Operating Officer and CFO, Adam Mizel. Before I hand the

Resolute Energy Corporation (REN) June 19, 2013 3:00 pm ET Executives Nicholas J. Sutton - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Michael N. Stefanoudakis - Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary Jeff Roedell Theodore Gazulis - Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President Michael David Clouatre - Vice President of Reservoir Engineering Douglas Dietrich James M. Piccone - President and Director William R. Alleman - Vice President of Land Preston Evans Analysts Noel A. Parks - Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc., Research Division John Freeman - Raymond James & Associates, Inc., Research Division Presentation Nicholas J. Sutton We might as well get started. I normally don't need a microphone, but since we're broadcasting this -- we have people on the line. In order to make sure they could hear, we are going to continue to use microphones. So, bear with us if we get too noisy. Just raise your hands

Finisar (FNSR) Q4 2013 Earnings Call June 19, 2013 5:00 pm ET Executives Jerry S. Rawls - Chairman of The Board and Co-Principal Executive Officer Kurt Adzema - Chief Financial Officer, Principal Accounting Officer and Executive Vice President of Finance Eitan Gertel - Chief Executive Officer and Director Analysts William H. Choi - Janney Montgomery Scott LLC, Research Division Alexander B. Henderson - Needham & Company, LLC, Research Division Mark Sue - RBC Capital Markets, LLC, Research Division James M. Kisner - Jefferies & Company, Inc., Research Division Ehud A. Gelblum - Morgan Stanley, Research Division Troy D. Jensen - Piper Jaffray Companies, Research Division Ian Ing - Lazard Capital Markets LLC, Research Division Patrick M. Newton - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc., Research Division Dave Kang - B. Riley Caris, Research Division Georgios Kyriakopoulos Kent Schofield - Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Research Division Presentation Operator Good afternoon, ladies and

Red Hat (RHT) Q1 2014 Earnings Call June 19, 2013 5:00 pm ET Executives Tom McCallum James M. Whitehurst - Chief Executive Officer, President and Director Charles E. Peters - Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President Analysts Raimo Lenschow - Barclays Capital, Research Division Kash G. Rangan - BofA Merrill Lynch, Research Division Joel P. Fishbein - Lazard Capital Markets LLC, Research Division Heather Bellini - Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Research Division Mark R. Murphy - Piper Jaffray Companies, Research Division Ross MacMillan - Jefferies & Company, Inc., Research Division Steven M. Ashley - Robert W. Baird & Co. Incorporated, Research Division Keith Weiss - Morgan Stanley, Research Division Edward Maguire - Credit Agricole Securities (USA) Inc., Research Division Stewart Materne - Evercore Partners Inc., Research Division Abhey Lamba - Mizuho Securities USA Inc., Research Division Jason Maynard - Wells Fargo Securities, LLC, Research Division Tim Klasell - Northland

Brutal day for the Australian dollar. First it dived after the Fed's hawkish press conference. Then just now it's falling after that bad Chinese Flash PMI. This is the perfect storm: Weakening demand for commodities from China, and a strengthening US dollar thanks to an improving US economy and monetary tightening.Join the conversation about this story »