Rumors continue that the U.S. and UK will release some of their strategic oil reserves to help abate rising gas and oil prices. Gas prices increased again yesterday to $3.831, up from $3.518 a month ago. Some believe that the president’s reelection will swing on gasoline prices. If so, a release of oil reserves may help him. However, when the oil reserves were tapped in June 2011, oil prices dropped temporarily but then started to rise again until they reached their current levels. The threat still exists that Iran may increase its military activity because of sanctions that have interrupted its crude exports. And an increase in that activity might cause a rise in oil prices that new oil reserves could not offset.

AIG’s Toxic Assets

The period in which financial toxic assets were considered the most dangerous assets a bank could hold has ended. The Wall Street Journal reports that Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) and other banks will bid for assets once on the balance sheet of AIG (NYSE: AIG). These collateralized debt obligations now held by the New York Federal Reserve have a face value of $47 billion. But they could be sold for much less. The government would get back some of investment in AIG. The potential buyers will work on the theory that these baskets of securities will increase in value as the economy and housing markets recover — perhaps not a bad gamble given the new health of the economy.

Bye-Bye, LightSquared

LightSquared, the 4G LTE wireless company largely bankrolled by hedge fund Harbinger Capital Partners, which is run by infamous financier Philip Falcone, lost its final reasonable chance to stay in business. Its bid to deploy its infrastructure, likely to be blocked by the FCC, had been supported by its only real customer, Sprint-Nextel (NYSE: S). The wireless carrier killed its relationship with LightSquared, scuttling a 15-year contract and paying an exit fee of $65 million, according to the Wall Street Journal. LightSquared has hired high-powered attorneys to fight the FCC in court, but hardly anyone believes that the legal battle will be settled in LightSquared’s favor. Even if it is, the resolution will be years in the future.

Smartphone Customer Satisfaction

JD Power released its smartphone and traditional handset customer satisfaction survey. For the seventh year in a row, Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) rated in first place. A second part of the research looked at traditional mobile devices without smartphone features. Power looked at satisfaction based on these measures:

The two studies measure customer satisfaction with traditional wireless handsets and smartphones among owners who have used their current mobile device for less than one year. Satisfaction is measured in several key factors. In order of importance, the key factors of overall satisfaction with traditional wireless handsets are: performance (31%); ease of operation (24%); physical design (24%); and features (20%). For smartphones, the key factors are: performance (35%); ease of operation (24%); features (21%); and physical design (20%).

HTC was close behind Apple in the smartphone ranking, followed by its primary enemy Samsung.

Douglas A. McIntyre

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