Oil euphoria puts Lula’s legacy at risk

JERUSALEM (AP) — Recent discoveries of massive offshore natural gas deposits, set to begin flowing in the coming days, are turning into a mixed blessing for Israel.

CARACAS, Venezuela — Opposition leader Henrique Capriles must make what could be the most important decision of his political life, now that Venezuela’s elections commission has called an April 14 vote to pick a successor to the late Hugo Chavez. The 40-year-old state governor is expected to announce on Sunday whether he will run against Chavez’s hand-picked successor, who’s a heavy favorite amid lingering sympathy for the charismatic president.

CARACAS, Venezuela — Opposition leader Henrique Capriles must make what could be the most important decision of his political life, now that Venezuela’s elections commission has called an April 14 vote to pick a successor to the late Hugo Chavez. The 40-year-old state governor is expected to announce on Sunday whether he will run against Chavez’s hand-picked successor, who’s a heavy favorite amid lingering sympathy for the charismatic president.

After 2 months without Chavez, Venezuela government voices optimism but some expect new vote CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Two months have passed since Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez climbed the stairs of the presidential jet, blew kisses to his supporters and flew to Cuba to undergo his fourth cancer-related surgery.

CALGARY — Nobody can say with any certainty exactly how much oil is embedded in dense rock buried thousands of metres underneath frozen tundra in the central Mackenzie Valley. But John Hogg, vice-president of exploration and operations at Calgary-based MGM Energy Corp., figures the so-called Canol shale in the Northwest Territories could hold “billions and billions of barrels” of light, sweet crude. If it all works the way we think it will, we think this play is as viable as any of the major plays in Canada or North America

By Jeff Miller: As I wrote in my preview two weeks ago, we needed to expect a period with more noise than signal.

Jim Trippon submits:The US isn't in the only game in town when it comes to important elections this year. In fact there's another election that ETF investors may want to keep an eye and that's Brazil's October 31st presidential run-off.

MARKETS in America are up about 4% since the Fed's August meeting, at which the central bank acknowledged that economic activity was weaker than it had expected and tentatively committed to leave rates low into 2013. They're down nearly 11%, however, from early July. I think it's fair to say that markets aren't expecting a blockbuster policy announcement from Chairman Ben Bernanke's speech today at the Fed retreat in Jackson Hole.