If GM is really serious about competing against the likes of Honda and Toyota, they still have to pare down the brands they have. The case in point is their Saturn Aura. GM’s midsize car has everything going for it, styling, performance, quality and pricing. Yet it is only selling a fraction of what its major compeititor the Toyota Camry is selling. Even Saturn’s management admits that the Aura’s sales performance is not as good as they have hoped.

The problem is GM is spreading its valuable resources among too many brand names and models. Instead, it should focus on making a few of their brands stronger and making their products better. There is no question that GM is in a product renaissance. The problem is they don’t have the sufficient marketing resources to make their products a true hit.

With the weaker housing prices in the U.S., vehicle sales are likely to be negatively impacted. If people feel less rich, they will spend less. In these difficult times, GM needs to do more with less. This means shutting down another marketing division. Hard choices needs to be made.

News Corp and NBC Universal said on Wednesday they have named their new online video joint venture Hulu, created to take on Google’s successful You Tube. Hulu will be offering free advertising-supported TV content, such as complete episodes from NBC and News Corp. It will also sell downloads of TV shows and movies.

The networks will also start making its video programming available in October to the public through its distribution partners, who are expected to account for the bulk of its online traffic. Those partners include MySpace, Yahoo!, MSN, AOL, Comcast and CNET. Instead of keeping their content restricted to their respective Web sites, which have generated only a tiny fraction of the traffic headed for YouTube, the two sides have decided to sign distribution agreements with outside partners to push their content out to major portal sites.

Only time will tell whether Hulu will be a success. There is no denying that the television networks are losing their viewers to the Internet. The networks need to capture back some of their audiences if they want to attract advertisers. Ultimately, good content, user friendliness of the site and simplicity are what will decide its success or failure. The incredible success of Google is its sheer simplicity and focus.

Despite the alarming headlines, food companies and restaurants removing transfat from their food offerings and government initiatives, America is still getting fat. According to research group that focuses on disease prevention, Trust for America’s Health, obesity rates continued their climb in 31 states last year. No state showed a decline.

Mississippi became the first state to go into the 30% barrier for adult residents considered obese. West Virginia and Alabama are just slightly behind. Colorado continued its reign as the leanest state in the nation with an obesity rate projected at 17.6%. This year’s report, also looked at obesity rates among children ages 10 to 17. The District of Columbia registered the highest percentage — 22.8%. Utah had the lowest percentage of obese youth — 8.5%.

Health advocates are saying that the government needs to take a more active role in fighting the overweight problem. But the truth is fighting fat begins at home. School programs are not enough. Parents need to take an active part in keeping their kids healthy.

This means serving healthier meals and encouraging them to exercise. Too often meals are replaced by fast food take outs. Instead of getting kids involved in sporting activities, they are left alone to watch TV or play on the computer. Regardless of the efforts of government, America needs a complete change in attitude in how they live. We need to change our culture of entitlement.

Unless this happens, the trend of Americans getting fatter will not change. The country’s medicare system will be if not already stressed. Higher health care costs are due to more cases of diabetes, heart problems and other chronic diseases linked to obesity.

It seems that the housing market in the US is getting worse everyday. Housing starts are at 10 year lows, thousands of jobs in the mortgage industry are being eliminated and foreclosures are surging. Many homeowners feel like a boxer being pummeled in a fight. They want to know when it will end. The hard truth is that the current housing downturn can still continue well into next year. Like with most bubbles, it takes years before the bubble bursts, and years for the supply and demand imbalance to resolve itself after the bubble pops.

On the credit side, there were several announcements of layoffs and/or closures by financial entities of their subprime mortgage departments. The surge of home buying fed by easy credit is no longer there. The reality is with the lax and even abusive lending practices of the mortgage industry enabled many people with poor credit who did not normally qualify for mortgages to become homeowners.

With borrowing rates being reset at higher levels and dropping values in home prices, many of these homeowners realized they can no longer afford the higher mortgage payments. With the high foreclosure rates and tighter borrowing terms, there are plenty of houses that are going and staying on the market.

Before we can truly see the bottom, real estate prices will have to drop more in order to attract buyers. According to National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) Chief Economist David Seiders, he now estimates that housing starts will not begin to recover until the third quarter of 2008.

Only months ago, the uranium bull market was surging along. Prices crossed into the $100 a pound territory. Some market pundits were predicting that the price of yellow cake was going to $200 by next year. According to this week’s Ux Weekly report, the radioactive metal fell $15 to $90 a pound. The decline is the biggest ever recorded by Ux. The price of uranium for immediate delivery has plummeted 35 percent since hitting a record $138 a pound in June. Uranium supply exceeded demand and the U.S. Department of Energy is prepared to sell inventories of the metal used to fuel nuclear reactors, said industry pricing service Ux Consulting LLC.

So what happened to the bullish scenario where the price of uranium will surge due to growing global demand? Greenhouse emissions must be dealt with and there is not enough oil to go around. There is little doubt that the long term scenario for uranium remains positive. All the reasons mentioned hold true. Just that in the short term, speculators drove up the price of uranium, creating a buyers’ strike from the natural users.

Probably over the next few months, there will be an more sellers than buyers of uranium. Speculators such as hedge funds will be liquidating their positions to raise cash. Given the current credit crunch, investors are avoiding risk. Industry pundits are expecting buyers to come in at around $90 per pound. This current move down is nothing more than a correction. The long term fundamentals still remain compelling.

As for uranium stocks, look to buy the producers first. Once the market recovers, actual producers’ share prices are the first to move up. A lot of uranium explorers that issued stock during the hot market could run out of funds.  Expect to see industry consolidation in the near future.

Thanks in due part to the Federal Reserve lowering the discount rate last week, the “sky is falling” mentality that was rampant among the world’s investors has more or less dissipated. With the Fed ready to cut interest rates to support the markets and prevent the economy from dropping into a recession, the panic selling stopped and credit was available again. With cooler heads prevailing, what’s going to happen next?

The subprime credit fiasco is in no way resolved. Nobody knows for sure who and how much are they stuck with these bad loans that were repackaged by the Wall Street types as Collateral Debt Obligations (CDOs). The figures running around are between $100 billion to $200 billion. Will banks, hedge funds, pension funds and an assortment of other financial players report massive losses from holding these CDOs? If so, how would the markets react?

The Fed basically drew the line on the sand stating where it would support the capital markets. Investors and traders will take solace in that. The value investors and contrarians have already entered the markets. The big earthquake has struck but their will be after tremors. It is the time to be scouting out quality assets at attractive prices. It is not the time to be speculative. At this point, fear and greed are permeating the markets.

Acting on concerns that the subprime lending crisis could further spread out, the Federal Reserve slashed its discount rate by half a percentage point, to 5.75 percent. The discount rate is the rate the Fed charges qualified lenders, mainly banks, for temporary loans, The central bank did not change its more closely watched federal funds rate, still at 5.25 percent, which affects consumer loans. It is widely expected that they will cut the Fed fund by 25 points at their next meeting.

Lack of liquidity in the financial markets were a major concern for Bernanke. If businesses and consumers cannot get financing, the risk of the economy going into a recession has risen considerably. In reaction, the markets staged a relief rally. The worse of the bloodletting in the capital markets is likely to have subsided. There will still be ripple effects after the financial earthquake.
Expect to see some hedge funds closing operations and banks and brokers to report substantial losses from their fixed income operations. Investor appetite for risk will probably stay diminished. The flight to quality will persists. As for Wall Street, layoffs will occur in reaction to trading losses and slower M and A activity.

What investors will be looking for is whether global economic growth remains intact. Besides the U.S., they will want to see whether China and India are affected. If the subprime crisis is handled quickly and swiftly, this should only be a hiccup for the global economy. Let’s keep our fingers crossed. So far, Bernanke and the Fed are making the right moves.

Only a few months ago, working as a trader, hedge fund manager or investment banker meant you are raking in seven figure bonuses. There was plenty of liquidity in the markets. Investors were lining up to put money into private equity firms and hedge funds. They were willing to take on more risks to get higher returns. Brokers and bankers were getting rich from catering to these fund managers. How times have changed.

With the blow-out in the subprime mortgage market, investor appetite for risk has suddenly evaporated. Mortgage companies are going bankrupt, hedge funds are blowing up and investors are fleeing and putting their money into cash. The current motto in the markets is “Cash is king.”

At this point in the markets, fear is taking over greed. Likely soon, there will be some attractive bargains to be had in the markets. However, the markets need to settle down first. As for the investment professionals making mega million salaries, these days for now will be fond memories.

During the last decade, China’s low labor costs and lax operating standards translated to cheaper prices for an assortment of goods. Despite higher commodity prices and a lower unemployment rate, inflation has stayed remarkably low thanks to China exporting their low cost goods. In the hyper competitive world of business, many companies outsourced their production to this emerging economic giant. Wal-Mart, one of the world’s most successful retailer exports, gets approximately 80% of their goods from China.

Thanks to China’s very low wages, we have more purchasing power and inflation was kept under control. The Central Bank did not have to raise interest rates to fight higher prices. During the last few months, the reputation of China as a reliable source of goods have come into question. Incidences of tainted pet food, toxic tooth paste and poisonous lead filled toys have made consumers question how safe China really is as a supplier.

We as consumers also have to take some blame. Because we wanted cheap products, companies likely cut certain corners in order to be competitive on prices. In the end, it was likely too good to be true. Given China’s hyper-growth, it was unrealistic to assume that all safety standards and practices would be met. If we want safer, good quality products coming out of China, we will have to pay more for it. As a result, the deflation effect from Chinese exports will gradually wane.

Yes there are implosions happening in the U.S. financial sector. Subprime mortgage lenders are declaring bankruptcy, the worth of certain hedge funds are being wiped out and the banks are holding on to high yield debt that nobody wants. Given the meltdown in the debt markets, the debt rating agencies could be ready to downgrade the debts of certain banks and brokers. If this does happen, the cost of borrowing for these financial institutions will go up, squeezing further their profit margins.

At this point, certain investors might be tempted to start picking at some of these financial players. We are going to the bottom but we’re not there just yet. The problem is it’s almost impossible for brokers, banks and investment funds to properly price the debt securities on their books. If you do not know what these securities are worth, how can you properly price their shares. It is also unlikely that their trading desks are totally forthcoming about their exposure.

As a result, it’s still too early to buy the shares of U.S. financial companies. Unless there is a sudden reversal in these markets, businesses catering to Wall Street professionals will have a rough 2007. We just need to see more skeletons coming out of these closets before we can pile money back into the American financials.