PM Abe of Japan will probably call a snap election after dissolving the Diet.

China caused waves across our portfolio. First of all, in an admission that something was needed to set GNP growth back on track, China cut interest rates in a new stimulus initiative.

Then some of the details of the deal on cutting carbon emissions made with the other gross polluter (the USA) were revealed. Bloomberg wrote: “China, which does nothing in small doses, will need about 1,000 nuclear reactors, 500,000 wind turbines, or 50,000 solar farms as it takes up the fight against climate change.”

*Any boost in China demand for anything is good for China stocks. So Tencent is up in US trading. TCTZF.

*My personal holding in a US uranium mine (Uranerz) went ballistic on the Bloomberg forecast. However, Canadian Cameco remains boringly flat, maybe because it has gained lately.

*The market is skeptical whether China will be able to replace coal fired filthy power stations with alternative energy. The bet is that China will require more oil and gas imports as well as clean energy.

This has boosted several of our oily shares, starting with Anton Oilfields, up 18.6% to a high of $50.75 this morning. We sold half at $44.75 and then bravely decided to stop selling.

Helping its gain is the new link between Shanghai and Hong Kong, the latter its listing site, and also the spate of deals in the oil and gas service sector.

*A boost went to Schlumberger, SLB, which provides also wellhead services.

*Also up is Ecopetrol, EC, of Colombia.

*And even Australia's Origin Energy (part owner of a gasification plant for China) rose 3.6%. OGFGF is more likely to benefit from growth than from more gas consumption.

*On the growth side, lower interest rates boosted .

*Hopes that a new Brazilian finance minister would be more business-friendly than the last coupled with prospects of renewed construction growth boosted our Vale, also known to be an exporter of iron ore pellets for steelmaking mainly to China. It rose by an enormous 8.4% earlier. Even after the jump, over-sold VALE trades at less than 9x earnings.

*Cosan rose by 5.8% in sympathy along with plenty of other Brazilian stocks. This occurred despite the gloomy remarks made here by CFO Marcelo Martins about CZZ facing “economic headwinds.” He told analysts: “We had a challenging year. 2015 is not going to be any better.”

*Also up was Santander, a bank active in Brazil, but by a more modest 2.5%.

*'Financial Times revealed how junior hedge funds created by followers of now-retired Julian Robertson had used Cayman Islands companies to secretly short-sell European companies. Among the victim companies was Nokia last year. The share rose 3.6% in European trading earlier. NOK.

*Royal Bank of Scotland revealed that it had overstated its capital to regulators as being 6.7% of its assets (loans). In fact the level was only 5.7%. The passing grade was 5.5% so RBS came pretty close to failing to be allowed to continue in business. Our RBS (and NatWest) non cumulative preferred shares, issued at $25/sh on the US market, count as capital, so the new means they will not be called any time soon. RBS is 82% owned by the UK government so there is little risk of default or even suspension of the dividend now. Before the generalized financial crisis some RBS prefs were required by the European competition authorities to suspend their dividends because being nationalized gave RBS an edge. That is now ancient history. The UK coalition govt. desperately wants to reprivatize RBS but, alas, the numbers don't jibe, even apart from the latest ovestatement.

*Following Bank of Nova Scotia, Royal Bank of Canada is also exiting wealth management in the Caribbean area. RBS is a min now in a business where BNS is a whale, however.

Chimps

*Novartis won CHMP approval for its Cosentyx (secukinumab) as a first line treatment for systemic plaque psoriasis. This is a potential
blockbuster drug for the Swiss firm. CHMP stands for Committee for Human Medical Products, and is the EU's name for its FDA, but has nothing to do with chimps.

*BL wrote: “Benitec's extensive TT-034 preclinical data on HCV (hepatitis C virus) in chimps was more than impressive when I first heard of them back in April 2013. All 80 chimps cleared the virus in 10 days, with no side effects, and the probable continuing expressing giving some measure of protection from re-infection!

“They had me sold. And so far, no negative news from the second dosing....move forward to therapeutic levels, and they will be confirming not only a treatment, but more importantly, a platform. I'll be adding as much as I can, when I can.” Me too.

*Mystery. Why does Veresen headline every release including its declaration of a dividend of C$0.833/sh with a warning not to distribute this information in the USA. I called the IR seeking guidance, but she rang my number back and listened to the ID before hanging up. Wierd Canadians.

*Global Logistic Properties co-founder Jeffrey Schwartz died suddenly at age 55 about 6 weeks after stepping down for health reasons. Schwartz, an American businessman and Harvard MBA, and Ming Z. Mei, who will succeed him, 6 years ago persuaded the Singapore sovereign wealth fund, GIC Pte, to invest with their fledgling group and transfer to it $1.3 bn of Japanese warehouse investments. What later became GBTZF then moved heavily into Brazil and China, along the way picking up other institutional and pension plan investors, some
through joint ventures with China and Canada. GIC Pte is still the largest shareholder in GBTZF.

Mr. Schwartz had headed Prologis, and before that Security Capital, (where Amb. Harry Geisel, our reporter who recommended the stock first was impressed by him). Mr. Schwartz was also on the board of Las Vegas Sands.

Fund Notes

*JP Morgan China Regional Fund went up 2.7% so far on China bullishness. JFC.

*New Ireland Fund produced its monthly report, still nearly 20% invested in Ryannair, followed by Arysta (Swiss agriculature). Now no. 3 is an 8% stake in aggregates firm CRH. We told you first. CRH is up nicely in London trading. Despite being Irish it is part of the FTSE.

Trade alerts

*Yesterday we sold half our PowerShares UltraShort Yen ETF, YCS, at $87.17/sh.

I linked the trade message to read an article by Russ Winter the wrong way, sending readers to his site filled with wild and silly market conspiracy theories. If you want to read what I recommend reading only, please click to:

Abe Calls Election Because of Revolt In Rulling Coalition?

*We also bought Copa Holdings, CPA, at $110.82/sh.