It's off to the races.

Before recounting the latest mostly good news from our portfolio, here are good developments from India where, we hope, PM Narendra Modi will tackle political obstacles to his economic reform program rather than just talking about them. India cannot screw up its policies by decree, as China has done lately, because it is a democracy and the Congress opposition party controls its Upper House.

When I was last in China, over 7 years ago with a guided tour, the only way you can visit there, we were taken to lively performances by acrobats, dancers, soldiers, and students in cities we visited.

The music was almost always not Chinese, but from Bollywood movies. When we didn't recognize the music, a couple of Indian- American doctors in our group pointed it out. Now Bollywood is really in style for China as Dalian Wanda, the huge and acquisitive Chinese real estate and entertainment company run by one of China's richest men, Wang Jianlin. Wanda will invest $10 bn to build an industrial park in the north Indian state of Haryana. It will be called Wanda Industrial New City, and will cover 5 square miles. This project, to begin construction later this year, is the largest ever foreign investment in India.

What is important is that Wanda has managed to sign up an India state without interference from the country's obstructive rubber stamp “raj” bureaucracy.

Here is a second sign of the times. India will allow vaccinations against 4 kinds of dengue fever without drug trials because of serious outbreaks, according to India's Economic Times (quoted by Reuters.) The vaccine, Dengvaxia, is made by Sanofi of France and has also been given approvals in less bureaucratic countries like Mexico and The Philippines. By-passing India's Drug Controller General, however, is very unusual.

Brazil troubles have hit Keppel (KPELY) of Singapore which halted work on behalf of a sub of Petrobras (PBR) in the sub-salt offshore fields. Its write-downs wiped out Q4 profits at S$230 mn (US$160 mn) and up to 40% of its order book, We told you first when we exited Keppel and I reminded readers of the yesterday before the new hit.

The big lesson of today is not to pay too much attention to analyst downgrades. The market moves according to its own dynamics. More from Singapore, Poland, Canada, the Netherlands, Denmark, Australia, Colombia, India, Italy, Brazil, Britain, Ireland, Japan, Belgium, and Spain. I'm off to the supermarket to stock up for the Big Storm.

Fund Notes

*The Wanda move has boosted our Ascendas India Trust. This REIT runs industrial parks in other Indian cities (Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, and Delhi) by 7.75%. It trades as ACNDF on the pink sheets or CY6U in Singapore.

*Standard & Poors has downgraded Poland which hurt our remaining MSCI Poland Investible ETF (EPOL). As with our half sale earlier the reason is Poland right-wing government moves against the independent press and judiciary which violates European Community rules. Sell the rest at $16.0111/sh.

Curiously enough yesterday our website was subject to a distributed denial of service attack from Poland, a country which has problems moving away from its autocratic past under Communism and earlier.

*Macquarie Global Infrastructure Fund (MGU) will pass on to shareholders foreign taxes it has paid, which they can possibly get back from Uncle Sam, or not. I was sent the release in error as it is not the fund we own, Macquarie First Trust Global, MFD. It may mean that the fund managers want to boost their abysmal performance by dividends you have to fight to collect. You have been warned. I am not selling despite the loss of 25.5% last year.

*Fibra Uno reports Feb. 19. FBASF is a Mexico REIT.

Bonds

*Barrick Gold of Canada plans to write down up to $3 bn with goodwill and asset impairment charges, mostly because of lower copper prices, $2.16/lb in Q4 and $2.37 for the current year and problems with two of its major gold fields, at Pueblo Viejo in Dominican Republic and at Pascua-Lamy on the top of the Andes mountains between Argentina and Chile. It also said it would meet its 2015 production target of 6-to-t.15 mn oz of gold. The Latin America problems are not new. We own a US$ denominated bond from ABX which was downrated by Moody's today, put on credit watch negative. In my view it is inconceivable that ABX would not pay its US debt on its North American Financial Sub for the 4.4% bond we own which comes due May 30, 2021 (cusip 06849RAF9). The junk bond sell-off panic is going nuts. More from Moody's later.

Drugs

*Novo Nordisk confirmed the report I spotted on Seekingalpha on Thursday that NVO's Saxenda is being reimbursed by insurance companies. From Norway the company confirmed that its weight-loss injectable drug has been reimbursed since late last year as the lowest branded co-pay (tier 2) by CVS and has just been added as the highest branded copay (tier 3) by Express Scripts this month. NVO also said some smaller plans have also put Saxenda on their formulary and it estimates that about 50 mn people are now covered for the jab. Being Danish NVO is not always at the top of the heap in investor relations. Norwegians are better, as you can read below.

*Martin Ferera gave his reasons for not taking profits on Indivior (INVVY) yesterday. He says: 1) there is a chance it will win patent lawsuits against copycat suboxone film to treat addictions; 2) it is launching phase III trials for cocaine overdose treatment; and is launching 3) phase II trials of a monthly tablet to replace suboxone for heroin addiction; 4) phase II trials for alcohol dependence; and 5) developing a monthly way to dose risperidone against psychosis.

Oops. I reversed the name of the UK as Indivior in my blog. It's up some more.

*Drug stocks are up generally. Perhaps because I have been buying its 2020 warrants, Benitec Biopharma common stock has jumped 7% in today's trading, following a rise in Australia. BNTCW is not trading at all. The ADR to raise money was poorly handled but its ddRNAi technology still has great potential.

*GlaxoSmithKline dropped its partnership with Swiss Basilea Pharma over alitretinoin in the US but keeping the UK license for eczema of the hands which doesn't respond to steroids, because of problems meeting FDA tests. GSK's data breach by 5 US-based Chinese Americans turns out to have been over work it had licensed from a small cap, Count FivePrime Therapeutics, and was led by a top US protein biochemist. The GSK biotech conspirators who sought to transfer the know how from FPRX to a Chinese company they owned were sacked by GSK and now have been indicated by a US grand jury.

*Galapagos nv (GLPG) was tipped by EuroBiotech Report today for landing Gilead as a partner for the JAK1 inhibitor program and getting to trials this year with AbbVie in its cystic fibrosis jv, plus 4 more trials to come. I find the firm's boosterism obnoxious but we did buy into it after our former Milan-based biotech maven joined the company in Belgium.

*Alkermes of Ireland which I averaged down on Thursday, is up 4.4% on Friday. I am not sure if the insiders are buying but somebody is. I paid $35 and the share now is over $35.30.

Raw Materials Alert

*Moody's did a wholesale review of 120 energy and mining companies for a downgrade, despite the fact that the impending big storm has boosted the US price of fuel oil and gasoline at the pump. Our portfolio has several firms on the list.

*A Moody's downgrade target is Schlumberger Ltd, at $64 and change, up over 5% on Friday after reporting a $1 bn Q4 loss on Thursday after the close. SLB announced that it came because clients are canceling orders. Q4 revenues came in at $7.7 bn, off 9% from Q3 and off 27% from prior Q4. EPS at 65 cents (excluding charges and credits) dropped 17% sequentially and 39% from Q4 2014. Operating margins before taxes fell 342 basis points to 18.4% y/y. The average consensus forecasts had been massaged down by SLB to EPS at 63 cents (a beat if you leave out charges) and revenues at $7.8 bn, a mini-miss.

The verkers will be made to suffer. SLB will cut staff levels by 18% to cover the loss.

With the charges, the loss was 81 cents/sh. SLB declared a 50 cent/sh dividend and will spend ups to $10 bn buying back its shares.

CEO Paal Kibsgaard pointed out that the main reason for the revenue drop was falling foreign currencies when translated into the US$s used in the oil industry, accounting for a third, notably in Russia and Venezuela. He also noted that service companies, (SLB and competitors) were cutting prices with concessions. This hurt sales in Europe, the CIS, and Africa, the worst hit. Latin America suffered lower losses because of oil company budget cuts affecting Mexico, Brazil, and Colombia. Higher sales were made in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Oman, however only via pricing concessions.

Mr Kibsgaard, a Norwegian, prepared SLB shareholders and analysts for the drop which did not surprise anyone. Now he predicts that there will be no pickup in oil and gas exploration until 2017.

Meanwhile SLB is plotting to buy back its Well Services of Iran sub if US sanctions allow this, which is not clear. Being incorporated in the Dutch Antilles, SLB could proceed without waiting for uncle, which is why oil services firms locate abroad. Today SLB signed a MOU with Golar LNG (of Norway) to work together to develop (monetize) “stranded” gas reserves worldwide by selling GLNG floating liquefaction systems together to owners, investors (LPs like Golar offers), and governments. SLB will provide upstream tech, contacts, and probably money.

Before SLB reported, gutsy analysts at Clarkson Capital raised their target price to $78. It is trading at just over $64.5 now.

*Another Moody's target is BP plc, formerly British Petroleum. It performed bullishly in London on Friday and is up 2.4% here.

*Another Moody's revision target is Vale of Brazil. On Friday it was revealed that Vale's 50% sub Samarco, under the gun over its burst dam which killed 17 people and polluted the Rio Doce, is negotiating a settlement with the government over the 20 bn reais fine ($4.8 mn). A deal is expected next month. Meanwhile, to keep up the pressure. As part of its negotiating strategy, Brasilia ordered Vale to shut down its Tuberão port because of leaking iron ore and coal dust. This is also used by Arcelor Mittal which may also suffer. All iron ore producers are up today on the news. VALE is up 6.4%.

*Moody's did not mark Cosan Ltd for a downgrade and the share is up 6.8% on Friday. It refines sugar and makes ethanol the smart way, using sugar-cane waste (begasse) as well as running railroads and ports in Brazil. CZZ gained nearly 8.3% today.

*A third Moody's target is Ecopetrol. EC of Colombia is gaining from the handshake reached in Havana between the FARC rebels and the government negotiators. Now we await a UN peace-keeping mission. EC is up 7.9% on Friday.

Gasoline Still Cheap

*Fiat Chrysler (FCAU) (Italian despite being legally domiciled in The Netherlands) and Tata Motors (Indian) (TTM) are both up despite the price of crude going over $30 perhaps because the oil price is not going to stay low for long. Both firms are working on better fuel economy.

*Also behaving bullishly in London and now here are Renishaw (RNSHF), RSB, and CRH (formally of Ireland), and Royal Dutch Shell which I own, as well as resource funds, and UK-listed small caps invested in oil in Africa and Russia. Poor Moody's which took forever to spot the sell-off in commodities, and issued a warning too late.

Banks

*National Bank of Canada lowered its target price for Bank of Nova Scotia to C$60 on Friday, in reaction to the Latin America investment plan BNS reported on Thursday. Assuming the loony doesn't continue to slide we can live with that. BNS is up 4% on in US trading.

*Banco Santander is up sharply along with other Spanish blue chips. It is a female-headed business.

IT

*Toray (TRYIF)of Japan is now in the black for us, helped by the stronger yen, bullish stock markets, and its tech which beyond drugs, includes carbon fibers, water treatment membranes, films and optical fibers for IT, plus more classical fibers and chemicals. It straddles the gap between chemistry and tech.

*Also up was locally-traded Dena Co as 2432-Tokyo which closed up 3% there. However the DNACF ADR is flat at $14.14. This reflects mixed perceptions of how fast and well its phone gaming systems will do when incorporated into cellphones byNintendo, plus profit taking. This is a female-founded gaming company which also does healthcare Internet.

*SAP in its interim half-year outlook forecast higher revenues for the 2016-7 fiscal year today to a range of euros 23-23.5 bn. It also said operating margins would dip as more business came from internet cloud customers rather than buyers of packaged software and licenses. It now expects operating profit in the range of euros 6.7-to-7 bn.

I think over time cloud business customers will also wind up paying more for support giving SAP profit growth off longer time. But the interim statement disappointed the short-term-minded German market. SAP shares are down because it expects its operating margins to be under 30% vs the target 35%, and the 30.5% level achieved in the last FY.

SAP says it will not need to invest heavily in its HANA system for the cloud as it had to in the past. I think the shift is a sensible one for the long-term and gets SAP to the head of the queue for businesses moving to the cloud, and am cheered that the price has mostly recovered on Wall St.

*CAE has sold another full-flight simulator to el cheapo Vueling Airlines for its Barcelona (Spain) training center. Founded in 2004, the airline now flies 410 Europe, the Middle East, and Africa routes.

*Infosys rose 1.5% in India trading. INFY barely blipped here.