Citigroup today wrote up Yara, the world's leading producer of full fertilizer lines. YARIY.PK is Norwegian. Citi ranks it 1 (best) but high risk with a target of NOK 150 vs current price of NOK 110.50. It says that the supply channel for fertilizers is blocked because apart from wheat, all crops are at no more than breakeven for farmers. So they cannot buy fertilizer for next year.

    However, because stocks are low, grain prices will have to rise and ease up the supply channel situation. Citi expects that in urea there will be no oversupply as other analysts fear, because the rise in Middle EAster exports next year will just about offset the drop in Chinese exports it also expects. The current price/earnings ratio for YARIY is 2.6 which means this is a buy.

    Note that I quote analysts' reports on stocks we own because I think they affect the share price, and because I think the analysts want to get word out. I get these reports from the brokers or from Reuters and they are not copyrighted. Of course, I tell you who is the source, not only to give credit where it is due, but because it helps you judge the validity of the report you are getting. 

     News from our companies:

   Guala Closures, the Italian maker of non-cork bottle closing systems for alcoholic beverages and wine, was privatized. We got $56.45 per share on Oct. 14 for stock that costs us $66. In today's market with a falling euro, that's hardly awful.

   We got a Demco pcl stock dividend also this month, from Thailand. We reported earlier that it was coming.

   Our Thai analyst, Paul Renaud, has now put a sell on Ticon Industrial Connection Public Co. Ltd., which trades in the U.S. as TCIDJ.PK. The company builds factoires to lease. Paul is annoyed that rather than buying back shares, TCIJF is expanding. He thinks it is reckless, but trims his sails a bit by admitting that longer run, he likes Ticon still. So reading between the lines, I sold half my position for a whopping profit despite irritating brokerage fees because under U.S. rules from Fidelity, which holds this baby, TCIJF is subject to a $50 fee for being foreign plus it counts as a penny stock even if you trade it online, as I did. For all that, I nearly doubled my money.

    Because of the fees and the horror of trying to get quotes out of Fido, I am moving my GIP account again, this time to my bank, HSBC (formerly Williamsburgh Savings BAnk of Brooklyn, which gave us a coop mortgage and required that one of us have an account with it; and then Republic National Bank.) Republic offered lots of pricey brokerage services but until now, HSBC has avoided that business. But now it offers a Premier account clearing with Pershing (BNY) which I will test as soon as the ACAT has gone through.

       While not as exciting as Israel's Koor group taking a 3% stake in Credit Suisse, further evidence of the relatively high liquidity in Israeli markets came from Elbit Imaging today. EMITF announced that its Board of Directors approved repurchase of up to NIS 50 mn (approximately $14 mn) of EMITF's Series A through F Notes, traded on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange. The re-purchases will be made from time to time in the open market on the TASE, in privately negotiated transactions or a combination of the two.

    Or to quote Israel's Central Bank chief, Stanley Fischer, "the situation is not as bad as I feared." South African-born Fischer, formerly managing director of the International Monetary Fund, flew back from its Annual Meeting last week because of the financial crisis.

      Regen Therapeutics plc reported various new shareholders had taken stakes in the company, which is in the process of splitting its shares into more shares (after earlier doing a reverse split.) Because of this I will report on the basis of percentages rather than the number of shares which is about 13 million total outstand pre 2:1 split.

  REGUF reported that 4% of its stock has beena cquired by Headstart Global Fund and another 4% by Headstart Global Aggressive Fund. I have no idea who these are. Barclays, the British bank, has now pushed its shareholding in ReGen to over 5%. And the existing supporters, Mr. Andrew Clement Wilson of Belfast, with 15% of the total out, and two entities controlled by Tigran Kalaydjan, with 3.54%, continue to own that proportion of shares post-split. So just under a third of the stock of this British developer of nutraceuticals like Colostrinin (now being launched in Cyprus and Australia) and an old drug which may help some seemingly brain-dead patients, is closely held by big boys.

   I am not sure if the BARC stake is for investment or for some British rule related to the ReGen's London listing. It also has a very illiquid ADR.

   Iceland is the most disintegrated market on earth and we await with bated breath the country;s CB receiving a relief loan from Russia.

   Meanwhile Exista, an Iceland investment company, sold its euros 1.65 bn stake in Sampo Oy, which is a Finnish insurance and finance company. Sampo, which has lots of cash to hand bought back about 1% of its own shares at euros 11.50 and the stock closed down at 12 about $16.50. The stock is well below its book value, down 17% (euros 2.42)on the day.

    Exista hired Morgan Stanley and Citi as 'bookbuilders' to help it sell its stake in Sampo, initially a shade under 20% of the stock outstanding. Sample has fallen by a third this year to about euros 6.9 bn in market valution. Of course both Finland and Iceland are small narrow markets where price anomolies proliferate. 

            The Exista bailout followed annoucements by Iceland's leading banks, Kaupthing Bank and Landbank Islands, plus the country's pension funds, that they would sell overseas assets and repatriate the proceeds to bolster the Iceland kronor, which is in free fall.