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| 1,755 views | 0 recommendations | 1 comment Apple (AAPL) has increased its global shipment goals for the iPhone for the calendar first quarter to 20-21 million units from 19 million units, according to DigiTimes, which citing “sources with Taiwan-based component suppliers.” The company plans to ship 14-15 million of the current version of the phone, with a target of 5-6 million units of the yet-to-be-announced CDMA version of the iPhone that is widely expected to be offered on Verizon Wireless and possibly other carriers early in 2011. The story said December quarter shipments were about 15.5 million units,...

New York - The former president of Shell Oil, John Hofmeister, says Americans could be paying $5 for a gallon of gasoline by 2012. In an interview with Platt's Energy Week television, Hofmeister predicted gasoline prices will spike as the global demand for oil increases. "I'm predicting actually the worst outcome over the next two years which takes us to 2012 with higher gasoline prices," he said.

Time magazine's failure to choose the Tea Party as its Person or Persons of the Year surely reflects a desire that they will cease to be significant any day now. David Von Drehle's "runner-up" article in its Person of the Year issue concluded the Tea Party has already peaked and is well on its way to collapse: "The Tea Party is a hot brand, but there's no one in power to enforce the trademark. Now that the bailouts are history and Democratic hegemony is broken, what does it stand for? It's a sign of the incredible velocity of politics these...

Andy Xie's latest sees the liquidity war getting worse in 2011. America will continue to pump the financial system with liquidity via tax cuts and quantitative easing. China will keep the yuan cheap and avoid clamping down on inflation. The tense equilibrium can't last for long, as either sovereign debt or inflation gets too heavy to bear. Whoever lasts longer, wins. Caixin: The most likely candidates to trigger the next global crisis are the U.S.'s sovereign debt or China's inflation. When one goes down first, the other can prolong its economic cycle. China may have won the last race. To...

2010 was a tough year for most Americans. Sure, the Dow ended up the year on a high note, but unemployment rates hovering at 10% meant that most Americans either were out of work, had family out of work or feared that they would soon join the unemployment lines. What will 2011 look like? Below are some predictions. 1) In order to balance budgets (or at least get closer) almost all cities, counties and states will increase usage fees for everything from car registrations to recycling fees. At the same time, the quality of such services will dramatically decrease. 2)...