The Traderszone Network

Six Pacific trading partners are resisting a U.S. push to set rules that would protect patented next-generation medicines from competition from generic drugs for eight years and are insisting on a shorter period of five years as part of a sweeping trade pact, two sources close to the negotiations said on Friday. Ministers from the 12 countries negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) entered a third day of talks in Atlanta still deadlocked over the treatment of biologic drugs, next-generation drugs which are made from living cells and used to treat cancer and other diseases.

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Tesla Motors Inc (TSLA.O) saw strong orders of its Model S sedan tied to the launch of its sports utility vehicle, relieving some concerns that the larger car might siphon away sales, Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk said on Friday. “We were worried that maybe there would be some cannibalization of Model S orders,” Musk said, speaking during an event in New York held by SolarCity Corp (SCTY.O), a solar energy company of which Musk also serves as chairman.

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A U.S. judge on Friday rejected a plan to pay millions of dollars in bonuses to top executives of bankrupt miner Molycorp Inc (MCPIQ.PK), two days after GT Advanced Technologies Inc (GTATQ.PK) failed to get approval of a similar plan. Molycorp, which filed for bankruptcy in June, had said the bonus plan would align executives’ goals with those of its creditors to maintain the value of the rare earth miner’s business.

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DoubleLine Capital co-founder Jeffrey Gundlach, widely followed for his investment calls, warned after a weak non-farm payrolls report on Friday that the U.S. equity market as well as other risk markets including high-yield “junk” bonds face another round of selling pressure. “The reason the markets aren’t going lower is people are holding and hoping,” Gundlach told Reuters in a telephone interview.

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The question of whether the Federal Reserve should adjust interest rates to deflate risky financial market bubbles split some of its top policymakers on Friday, suggesting the controversial idea is re-emerging as the U.S. central bank approaches an historic policy tightening. Giving the central bank an effective third mandate – beyond its formal objectives for inflation and employment – has won more adherents since the 2007-2009 financial crisis, which some blame in part on too-easy monetary policy in the preceding years that allowed risks to take root.

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Union members at one of Ford’s most important factories are set to strike this weekend. Reports say that Ford is taking the threat seriously and preparing to add extra production elsewhere. What happens next?

Given the recent dreadful US jobs report, as Marc Chandler stated, it would seem that Matthew Kerkhoff’s statement in today’s interview that the US economy is “doing just fine” was way off the mark. Certainly, given today’s big miss, the US economy must be in serious trouble, right?

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