1-17-11 Recap of the day's events/postings

Facts:

1.       Appointing security ministers may take more than 2 months

2.       Strategic policy vote delayed 2 weeks

3.       205,950,000 sold in today’s CBI auction

4.       House votes to form all Parliamentary committees

5.       Kuwait Amir grants 1,000 KD to every citizen

6.       Kurdistan Alliance threatens to quit government

7.       National Alliance nominates four names for the Ministry of the Interior

8.       Kurdistan Alliance rejects budget

9.       More on the budget

Rumors:

Of Interest (rumors that I find of particular interest either because of who said it or because of how I think it relates to what is happening right now):

1.       Skype message

2.       First-hand experience rumor

3.       Skype message

4.       Southbound chat with Daytrader

5.       Topguner chat

6.       Southbound chat on PD
7.   Emailed rumor
8.   Nighthk11 chat 

The Rest (doesn’t mean these are not happening):

Nothing for today!

Where Are We At?

1.       It’s been quite a slow day today!  Not too many interesting news articles, and oddly enough, not too many rumors.  I say the latter because tomorrow is supposed to be RV day!  I would think there would be no end to the rumors of a potential RV for tomorrow.  It remains to be seen.  Although a little slow today, we continue to see news of the government formation.  Parliament voted on the committees and the National Alliance provided nominees for the Ministry of the Interior.  There was an opinion piece out there today suggesting that completing the security positions may take more than 2 months!  Remember how there was supposed to be a vote on Maliki’s nominee for the security position this week?  I haven’t seen anything yet.  In other government formation news, there was a move to delay by 2 weeks the vote on the Strategic Policy.

2.       The more interesting news is related to the Kurdistan Alliance.  They did not seem too happy with anything today.  They rejected the budget (even though it is moving on for the second reading tomorrow), and they threaten to leave the government.  The Kurds are supposedly the King makers in this whole government formation.  We need to watch how this plays out.

3.       The budget is moving forward, and there was an article that mentioned they want to complete it in record time.  That sounds good, but let’s sees what happens over the next few days.  The second reading is tomorrow.   Hopefully the second reading will go through without any need to redo the budget.  We’ll keep a watchful eye on that.

What’s Left?

1. Reading of the budget for the second time.
2. Closure on Security positions (5 in total) and the remaining unfilled positions (7)
3. Formal announcement of government
4. Announcement of agreement on outstanding Kuwait issues
5. Lifting of remaining Chapter 7 sanctions (Kuwait related)
6. RV/RI

What’s It All Mean?

1.       I’ll start with the Kurds and them threatening to quit the government.  We’ve seen this behavior before as it relates to Iraqi politicians.  They clearly seem to be flexing their muscles to get someone to compromise, which is not something the Iraqi’s do very well.  I doubt that they will quit the government.  I’m sure that the US would not let it get to that point and would likely send Biden back over to mitigate the issues and bring it to an agreeable solution for both parties (one way or another).  That said, this is something I’ll keep my eye on because even Maliki commented that if they pull out, he cannot form a government.  Another thought that crossed my mind is that this may be old news.  Recall that news for us is at least a few days late.  Could this have been an issue that Biden ironed out while there last?  Maybe. 

2.       Ok next up….exchange rates.  I’ve not seen a thing about them today.  Delayed again?  Waiting for the dust to settle before displaying them (i.e., waiting for the IQD RI/RV)?  Hope we don’t have long to wait.

3.       With regards to the RI/RV, see my blog from today.  There are still those that stand by their assertion that the RI/RV did take place in Kuwait and Jordan.  Dinar Daddy believes that situation to be true, but he doesn’t believe in the idea that there is a partial rollout of the RI/RV.  He believes in the big bang approach, which is not what is happening.  Therefore, he doesn’t believe it has started.  I look at Dinar Daddy’s write up today with some reservation on his statements.  I’m not sure how anyone can say something did not happen and be 100% confident they are right.  Over the last few days, we’ve all seen people say they’ve heard or seen first-hand that people have exchanged.  Yet, Dinar Daddy says that no one did, and he was pretty vocal about that (if one can be vocal in writing!).  At this point, the only thing that I personally can be 100% confident in saying is that I haven’t cashed out!