The Rockefeller Family Fund concluded there’s “no sane rationale” for companies to explore for oil as governments contemplate cracking down on carbon emissions, according to a statement on the website of the New York-based philanthropic foundation Wednesday.

ExxonMobil has been ordered by the Securities and Exchange Commission to include a shareholder resolution on climate change in its annual proxy statement to stockholders. The SEC said in a letter that XOM can't block a vote on the proposal backed by New York's comptroller at its annual meeting in May.

What's more, the Rockefeller Family Fund concluded there’s “no sane rationale” for oil exploration as governments set out to cut carbon emissions. The now-green Rockefeller charity singled out XOM for allegedly “morally reprehensible conduct,” for covering up data showing global warming risks from as early as the 1970s, according to InsideClimate News' website. The Rockefeller Family Fund and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund both are financial backers of InsideClimate News. Old John D must be rolling over in his grave.

There was no blog yesterday because markets here were closed for Good Friday. There will be a blog Monday as US markets do not celebrate Easter Monday. Israeli markets are closed today for Purim, a happy festival which bizarrely overlaps with Christian solemnities this year.

More today from Austria, Britain, Canada, Chile, Brazil, Finland, the French Caribbean, Switzerland, and the USA. In a holiday-shortened week most of the news is about heavy industry.

Heavies

*Renishaw shares fell 8%+ in US trading after the UK precision measuring device maker warned that lower Asian demand meant it would not meet earlier forecasts of sales and earnings this year. It sells gauges used for metal cutting accuracy needed to make smartphones, which rose sharply last year. However, this year is not matching those sales. RSW has now cut its forecast for full-year revenue to a range of £420-£440mn from £440-£465mn and for pre-tax profits by ~20%, to £67-£85mn from £85-£105mn. Smartwatch maker Pebble is laying off a quarter of its staff, although UK RSW is still hiring.

Martin Ferera comments: This is still for me a long-term keeper. RSW doesn't adjust its accounts with non-GAAP dressing up. The slowdown may persist for a while but it will come backup. The GI entry level was too high but patience will be rewarded. I am adding at the GBX1700 level. [ed: Now he tells us the entry level was too high!]

*Martin also reports a first West Coast liquefied natural gas project, Woodfibre LNG, won approval from Ottawa, in Squamish, BC, on the site of an old sawmill. It is about 1/3 the size of Jordan Cove to the south in Oregon, with no plans to expand. The owner is Singaporean. It still needs to build a pipeline. Getting this far took 2 ½ years.

He argues this will not change the outlook for Veresen's LNG project. Commenting on the Jera initiative to pay for a quarter of Jordan Cove, TD brokers rate VSN a buy because news of Japanese interest will lure in other potential buyers. Jera is a still-not-finalized jv of utilities Tokyo Electric and Chubu Electric. The US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, FERC, last week denied permission for Veresen to build its LNG plant in a surprise move. RBC's C$12 target price is based on it getting “a re-hearing or a re-filing” out of FERC.

*No less than 9 companies are bidding for the Oro Blanco ~10% stake inSoQuiMich of Chile according to a local newspaper, from China, Japan, the US, and Israel. No contender from Canada is showing up, according to Pulso, so a full takeover by Potash of Saskatchewan is not on the cards. POT already owns 22% and if it bought the OB's stake it would have to make a full bid. The Chileans don't seem to have an entry, meaning the Santiago govt favorite Luksic, is not bidding. The Israeli contender is probably troubled Israel Chemicals, ICL, which is facing a battle royal between its management and that of the Ofer family's Israel Co., its largest shareholder. That is also unlikely. And Mosaic, the US entrant, is felt to be too small. The Japanese bidder is said to be Kowa, which already owns 2% of SQM. Even with few bids, Ben Isaacson of Scotia Bank says SQM is headed to the upper 20s in price.

*Vale was given a buy rating by BofA-Merrill Lynch today. VALE had been rated neutral. The reason appears to be VALE preserving cash under a dividend policy to be presented to shareholders at its April 25 meeting. Instead of an annual minimum payout denominated in currency, Vale wants to set a target based on its profits. This will have to be approved by shareholders along with a proposal to totally omit a dividend for 2015 to preserve cash.

The other reason is that Dilma and Lula face impeachment possibly as soon as next month because of plea bargains by execs of Oldebrecht, a construction firm in the center of the graft investigation. Vale is up 1.8%+ in a dropping market for third world raw materials.

*Austrian Lenzing, maker of fiber and fabrics from wood rather than petrochemicals, rose 7.2% in pre-holiday trading. Our expert Harry Geisel turns out to have sold LNZ without telling me. He writes: “an efficiency program really worked for them. Profits rocketed even thous sales were almost flat. Too bad I got tired of waiting.” We're ahead about 10% in euros, better than the alternative.

*Greencore Group stock soared yesterday in sympathy with a takeover for another British firm making ready meals, Premier Foods, approached by McCormick, the US food firm, with a rumored £496 mn offer. Premier is seeking to deflect the bid by signing up to sell Nissin instant noodles giving a share stake to the Japanese. Premier shares rose 64% yesterday and GNC tagged along. GNC is up another 1.4% today in a rotten market as the UK faces a 4-day weekend.

*Writing in www.seekingalpha.com Brian Nichols argues that a bonus to Nokia from its acquisition of Alcatel-Lucent is the French company's leading small cwell technology, lightRadio. This he says boosts hotspot capacity 10-fold by amplifying broadband coming from cell towers with a baseball-sized device that is a cheaper alternative to buying more spectrum.

That will help the Finns as much as cost-cutting and cross-selling, Nichols says. NOK meanwhile is waiting for Mexico to name the winners of its $7 mn 700 mHz broadband network on which work is to begin in Sept. NOK was down 2.75% in Finnish pre-holiday trading but is now recovering here.

*Ormat Technologies, a bonus stock (Israeli owned but incorporated here) is taking an 85% interest in a geothermal plant on the French Caribbean Island of Guadaloupe. The seller is Sageos Hldg. The remaining stock is owned by France's govt-owned Bureau de Recherche Géologique et Minière. ORA is replacing Israeli family execs with geothermal experts and presenting its systems to US institutions.

Banks

*The strong US dollar as Fed hawks make noises about inflation risks has taken down both the C$ (which was on a roll) and the prices of raw materials, notably oil stocks. Another victim is Canadian banks, in our case Bank of Nova Scotia.

*US dollar-operator Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio, of Panama, is up, however.

Drugs

*Swiss Novartis settled with the SEC over charges it had used bribery in 2009-13 to boost Chinese sales. Without admitting anything, NVS is paying $25 mn to uncle and also boosted its compliance and accounting controls. Some employees were sacked.

*I was unable to open the latest SEC filings by Alkermes insidersbut I assume this time they are keeping their shares because the “Irish” stock is rising, now $31.54, in a down market. Richard Pops et al tend to sell most of the shares they get via stock options as soon as they hit.

Funds

*Canadian General Investments (CGI-Toronto) got caught up in the Valeant Pharma hype, and invested $6.4 mn in VRX despite the Morgan siblings's independence and qualifications. As a Canada fund it is supposed to invest in stocks from our neighbor to the north but only after studying them. Another disappointment, in fact losing even more money in 2015, was Tourmaline Oil, into which it put over C$4 mn, which in the course of the year lost over a third. I exited TRMLF in good time despite not having access to as much Canadian advice and research as Vanessa Morgan, CFA, gets.

She is not an activist publicity hound like Bill Ackman of Pershing Square Holdings but still got dinged. The saving grace is that CGI has many positions, not just a handful, and no shorts. PSH will hold its quarterly conference callApril 6 and a London meeting April 26.

*Our GlobalX MSCI Argentina ETF is coming close to $19/sh just weeks after we paid $17.21/sh after Macri won the polling. This is a pure macro bet on ARGT which last made good money in 2013.