Today's Headlines

Bloomberg: 

• Spain Prime Minister Rajoy Says Bailout Request Is Not Imminent. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said he has no plans to request a bailout soon, fending off mounting speculation that a bid was near. Asked at a press conference in Madrid today if a bailout request was imminent, Rajoy said: “No.” Rajoy is weighing the terms of a Sept. 6 proposal by the European Central Bank President to buy bonds of cash-strapped nations including Spain if they make for a formal aid request from the euro region’s government-run rescue funds. Reuters news agency yesterday reported that Spain is ready to seek a bailout as soon as this weekend. As Rajoy faces unrest on the streets of Madrid over budget cuts and a separatist movement in Catalonia, leaders of the 17- nation euro area are confronting a tougher approach from the German-led pro-austerity bloc and talks in Athens over keeping emergency aid on track. The first of three summits in the next three months is set for Oct. 18-19.
• Weber Says Euro Crisis to Persist as ECB Fails to Bring Calm. UBS AG Chairman and former European Central Bank Governing Council member Axel Weber said the euro region’s festering debt crisis will “continue to linger” as the ECB fails to ease market disquiet and volatility. “While many expect that the ECB’s strong action would bring stability to financial markets, the risk is that the pattern of short-term rallies and long-term uncertainty will stay with us for some future,” Weber said today at an investment conference in Moscow organized by VTB Capital. The program of unlimited bond purchases unveiled last month by ECB President Mario Draghi has sought to stamp out the crisis by limiting government borrowing costs and giving debt-ridden nations the chance to fix their economies and preserve the euro. Weber, who during his tenure at the ECB opposed the central bank’s previous bond-buying plan, predicted the monetary union will overcome the crisis even as there won’t be a “quick fix.” “The underlying fundamental perspective is not great at the moment,” Weber said. “Austerity programs which are badly needed to restore market confidence and create fiscal room to maneuver will take a toll on the economy. So this will be a rough patch that Europe is going through, but it will get better.” 
• Popular Defying Oliver Wyman Tests Allianz’s Spain Appetite. Banco Popular Espanol SA (POP) is defying the findings of Spain’s bank stress tests as it seeks new money from Allianz SE (ALV) and other investors to plug a capital shortfall. The stress test by consultant Oliver Wyman showed Popular had a capital deficit of as much as 3.22 billion euros ($4.15 billion) and would earn 5.8 billion euros in pre-provision profit from 2012 to 2014 or 4.2 billion euros in its worst-case scenario. Popular, Spain’s sixth-largest lender by assets, said yesterday it would have an operating profit of 7.2 billion euros over that period as it unveiled plans for a share sale of as much as 2.5 billion euros to boost capital.   
• U.K. Would Benefit From Haven Flows in Euro Breakup, Bootle Says. Britain may initially benefit from capital flows in the event of a euro-area breakup as investors seek safety from turmoil in the currency region, said former U.K. Treasury adviser Roger Bootle. “We would find the U.K. being regarded as a safe haven with continued capital inflows for a while,” Bootle, founder of Capital Economics Ltd., said in an interview at an event in London today. “But we’re certainly not a safe haven in terms of the real economy -- we would be one of the hardest hit of all.”
• U.S. Hot-Rolled Steel Prices May Extend Decline Amid Weak Demand. The price of hot-rolled coil steel in the U.S. may drop to as low as $530 a metric ton by year-end amid weak demand as manufacturers hold off on purchases until after the presidential election, according to Jefferies & Co. "A lot of projects and other expenditures that were earlier planned by companies have been put on hold because of uncertainty ahead of the elections and the fiscal cliff," Luke Folta, an analyst at Jefferies, said today in an interview. "Demand has weakened across all key markets." 
• Banks Face Worst Equities Trading Since 2006. Wall Street banks’ equities-trading units aren’t getting much relief from the strongest stock rally since 2009, as sinking volume and already thin margins threaten to make their annual performance the worst in six years. Third-quarter equities-trading revenue probably fell 14 percent from the same period in 2011, the fifth straight drop of more than 8 percent, according to estimates by Kian Abouhossein, a JPMorgan Chase & Co. analyst. Full-year revenue at the five largest U.S. investment banks may be the lowest since 2006, UBS AG’s Brennan Hawken wrote in a Sept. 19 note to clients.  
• AIG(AIG) Says Oversight Panel Weighing Systemic Risk Label. American International Group Inc. (AIG) said a U.S. panel told the insurer it’s under consideration to be labeled a potential risk to the financial system, the first non-bank to report such notification in a process that could lead to tighter capital rules. The Financial Stability Oversight Council informed AIG of its status, the New York-based insurer said today in a statement. The council said last week that it voted to advance “certain” non-bank financial companies to a third stage of review for possible designation as a systemically important financial institution, without publicly identifying the firms. 

Wall St. Journal: 

• WSJ Guide to First Romney-Obama Debate.

Fox News:

• Diplomats asked repeatedly for more security before Libya attack, lawmakers claim. U.S. diplomats in Libya repeatedly asked the Obama administration for more security in Benghazi in the run-up to the Sept. 11 attack on the consulate but were "denied these resources," two congressional lawmakers said. House oversight committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, pressed Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for more information on those requests and other concerns in a letter Tuesday. They detailed a string of attacks and other security incidents in Benghazi starting in April, and asked the State Department what measures it took to address the threat. They claimed officials have told the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee of "repeated requests" for additional security. "Based on information provided to the Committee by individuals with direct knowledge of events in Libya, the attack that claimed the Ambassador's life was the latest in a long line of attacks on Western diplomats and officials in Libya in the months leading up to September 11, 2012," they wrote. "In addition, multiple U.S. federal government officials have confirmed to the Committee that, prior to the September 11 attack, the U.S. mission in Libya made repeated requests for increased security in Benghazi.  The mission in Libya, however, was denied these resources by officials in Washington."

CNBC:

• Voters Say Presidential Debates Will Be Key: Poll. Voters say the presidential debates will be important in deciding whom to vote for in this year’s election, according to a new NBC-Wall Street Journal poll released Tuesday. (Read More: Obama-Romney Debate Faces Off-Script Challenge) The poll found that voters say the importance of this year’s debate is greater than it was in 2004 or 2000. That may yet indicate some room for movement in the race: Twenty-two percent of those surveyed said the upcoming debates will be “extremely important,” and 16 percent said “quite important.”
• What a Post-'Fiscal Cliff' Deal Will Cost US Households.
• Affluent Plan to Spend Less If Obama Wins.

Zero Hedge: 

• The ECB - EUR22 Trillion Is Missing.
• Sam Zell On "Class Warfare Crap", QE3 Unreality, And Why Everything Is Mispriced Due To The Fed.
• China Just Killed All "China Bails Out Europe" Rumors For Good.
• This Is Why High Frequency Trading Will Never Go Away.
• Dancing On The Grave Of Keynesianism.

Business Insider:

• Here's The Massive Presentation On REITs That Bill Ackman Delivered At The Value Investing Congress. 
• Chipotle(CMG) Is Getting SLAMMED After David Einhorn Reveals He Is Short The Stock.
• Dylan Grice Writes His Most Negative Note Ever: 'I Am More Worried Than I Have Ever Been'.
• Bleak Photos Capture The Fall Of Detroit.
• Jon Stewart Slams The Obama Administration For Contradicting Itself Over And Over On The Libya Attack. (video)
• French Entrepreneurs Launch Online Protest Against Hollande's Capital Gains Tax Plans.
• FORGET ALL THE HOUSING COMEBACK TALK: Here's Why The Market Is Still A Disaster.
• The Fed Just Doubled-Down On A Plan That Led Us Into The Financial Crisis.

Reuters:

• Spain jobless rate spikes again as tourist season ends. Spain's jobless rate rose further in September as services sector layoffs accelerated at the end of a busy summer tourist season, suggesting one in four of the country's workforce is now unemployed. Tuesday's Labour Ministry data showed the jobless rate rose by 1.7 percent to leave 4.7 million people out of work. "There is a certain slowing down in the rate of increase in unemployment but the negative side is that jobs are still disappearing," said Estefania Ponte, head of economy at trading house Cortal Consors. The figure had also risen in August after it fell during the summer season. She said Tuesday's monthly figures suggested the rate of unemployment in Spain - already the highest in the European Union - would likely have hit 25 percent in the third quarter. 
• U.S. officials see more financial crisis cases after JPMorgan suit. Federal and state officials pledged on Tuesday to bring more cases against misconduct that fueled the financial crisis, after New York sued JPMorgan Chase & Co late Monday over mortgage-backed securities packaged and sold by Bear Stearns. The case was filed by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, and was the first action to come from a federal-state working group created earlier this year to bring such cases, roughly four years after the peak of the crisis. 
• Iran's Ahmadinejad says Syria crisis may engulf region. Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Tuesday warned that hostilities in Syria could engulf the region and accused some Syrians of trying to use their country's conflict to settle scores with Tehran. 
• US gasoline demand falls in 2 weeks to Sept 28-MasterCard. U.S. retail gasoline demand fell over the past two weeks and continued a downward year-on-year trend, according to the bi-weekly SpendingPulse report from MasterCard released on Tuesday. Gasoline use in the world's top oil consumer dropped 0.9 percent over the two weeks ending Sept. 28, compared with the same period last year, MasterCard said. Demand dipped by 1.1 percent during the week to Sept. 28 and 0.8 percent in the week to Sept. 21 when compared with year-ago levels.
• Portugal finmin likely to detail new austerity steps. Portugal's Finance Minister Vitor Gaspar will hold a press conference on Wednesday on the country's bailout plan, when he is expected to detail fresh austerity measures. The centre-right government has been looking for alternative ways to meet budget goals under the 78-billion-euro bailout since it was forced to back down on a plan to hike social security taxes, which sparked a backlash among many Portuguese.
• US groups fear Mexican trade war over Obama tomato move. U.S. business groups said on Tuesday they were worried about a damaging trade war with Mexico if President Barack Obama's administration follows through on a preliminary decision to end a 16-year-old tomato trade agreement. They also expressed concern that last week's Commerce Department decision was politically motivated to sway voters in Florida, the second largest U.S. tomato producer and one of a handful of battleground states expected to play a decisive role in the Nov. 6 presidential election.
• GM(GM), Ford(F) see slower truck sales as Toyota gains. General Motors Co, the largest U.S. automaker, posted a small gain in September U.S. sales as demand for passenger cars offset a drop in pickup trucks, while Japanese automaker Toyota Motor Corp reported a large sales increase. 
• Iran to enrich uranium to 60 pct if nuclear talks fail - MP. Iran would enrich uranium up to 60 percent purity if negotiations with major powers over its nuclear programme fail, an Iranian lawmaker said on Tuesday, in comments that may add to Western alarm about Iranian intentions.

Telegraph: 

• Debt crisis: troika demand even tougher austerity on stricken Greece. Greece's international creditors are demanding the imposition of even tougher austerity measures despite the delivery this week of Antonio Samara’s hard-won €13.5bn package of cuts. 
• EU plans curbs on bank risk-taking. Risky activities such as proprietary trading will have to be separated from safer operations under EU proposals for banks published today.
• PIMCO: America could 'resemble Greece' before 2020. America could begin to resemble Greece before the turn of the decade if it does not cut spending and raise taxes to tackle its debt, according to Bill Gross, the head of the world's largest bond fund.

Europa:

• Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy told regional leaders from his People's Party that he won't request a bailout for Spain this weekend.