The Big Picture for the Week of July 11, 2010

Just a few odds and ends as this will be a busy weekend for me with the Fire Department.

This picture is a sort of updated Ring of Fire that Felix Salmon posted. This has fewer countries on it that Bill Gross' original but it is still interesting.

Over the last couple of days I have been having an email conversation with a friend from high school that has included my best attempt at a politically unbiased explanation of what is going on in the economy to someone whose job does not require them to sift through and decipher things like job reports and earnings releases.

As I wrote my most recent reply I had the thought that from 60,000 feet things are really a mess and no one knows what to do.

AdvisorShares has a new long short ETF out. It is the Mars Hill Global Relative Value Fund (GRV). It goes long and short ETFs to "target absolute returns (consistently positive) that outperform the total return of the MSCI World Index over complete market cycles." I'm doing a write up for theStreet.com that will have a closer look.

On a related note WisdomTree is moving closer to a commodity currency ETF and an actively managed emerging market bond ETF with bonds denominated in the local currencies as opposed to US dollars. There are some of these currency and bond ETFs that don't move much, pay a little interest and are good holds in case the dollar ever actually does implode.

One reader has asked that I not give updates of the Tour de France so he can watch after his work day. While I will honor that request I have a couple of observations with one week in the books. Does anyone know what team is wearing the black and flesh colored uniforms? They are beyond creepy. I am thrilled that they are not beating us over the head with Jonathan Vaughters as they have the last couple of years. Most of the little segments they shoot are worthless and I do fast forward but either way I'm glad there is less of this guy. If you are a fan and have forgotten you are better off recording the live show than watching the prime time coverage that is almost entirely Craig Hummer and Bob Roll. One last point, there is no rivalry, try as they might, between Mark Cavendish and Tyler Farrar. Assuming Cavendish doesn't get hurt he will beat Farrar every time and if Cavendish goes down then Alessandro Petacchi and Tom Boonen will beat Farrar. I may be wrong but I even think Farrar's own teammate Robbie Hunter could beat him if they let him. I'd like to see Robbie McEwen win a stage one more time but that may be a tall order.