Top 10 at 10; ECB's Trichet sees 'inflection point'; Jim Rogers eyes US$ collapse; US budget deficit 12.9% of GDP; Cash cows

Here's my Top 10 links at 10am. I welcome your suggestions and comments below. 1. Central bankers, including our own Reserve Bank Governor Alan Bollard, are meeting in Basel to talk about the economic outlook. That's going to be some party. However, European Central Bank President Jean Claude Trichet said overnight that the global economy had reached an inflection point, the WSJ.com reported. 2. Arnold Schwarzenegger is not so tough when he's faced with a US$15 billion deficit for California. He is openly talking about freeing 40,000 prisoners in the states jails and sacking 51,000 teachers to save money in this Bloomberg story. 3. Chinese exports fell 22.6% in April from a year ago, which was worse than economists had expected and worse than the 17.1% fall seen in March, the FT.com reported. 4. Jim Rogers, the renowned investor who said Britain was virtually bankrupt and the pound worthless, now says the US dollar is in for a big fall and he wants to be nowhere near the stock market in the next couple of years, FTAlphaville reports. 5. Here's the most interesting number around at the moment. The US budget deficit this year will be around 12.9% of GDP. This is an astonishing number and the reason why long term interest rates are rising. Here's the details on Reuters.com. Felix Salmon has a view on this too. He points out that deficit of of US$1.84 trillion is worth around US$16,000 per household. I am still amazed there are not riots. 6. How interesting. Tyler Durden at Zerohedge makes a credible case to say Barack and Michelle Obama may have been sub prime borrowers who withdrew equity from the value of their apartment to survive in the years before Barack wrote his book and he made it into the US Senate. 7. Here's a cracking chart showing what US inflation is really doing. HT Steve Netwriter

8. This is an amazing exchange between a US congressman Alan Grayson and the Inspector General of the US Federal Reserve. HT Tyler Durden. It turns out no one is watching or measuring what the US Federal Reserve is doing with the US$9 trillion it has lent banks on and off balance sheet. Watch it and then close your open mouth. If you're an American citizen now would be the time to protest... 9. We're saved. French savers are now investing in cows as a source of long term cash flow and investment returns, the New York Times reports.

For Pierre Marguerit, 60, cows make a safe, secure investment, allowing for long-term growth from a renewable resource. The cow contracts are hardly new, but go back to Richard the Lionheart; the French word for livestock, "cheptel," is the root for "capital." These are not exactly cash cows. But investment in Mr. Marguerit's Holsteins will bring a 4 to 5 percent return a year after taxes, he said, based on "natural growth" "” the sale of their offspring. That compares to an interest rate now of 0.75 percent on the basic French bank account. Last year, his business went up by 40 percent, and so far this year, it has "practically doubled ," said Mr. Marguerit, the managing director of Ã‰levage et Patrimoine, a cattle investment firm in this part of eastern France, near the Alps, and president of Gestel, which works with farmers and investors. "People have saved money and don't want to waste it," he said. "Stocks have fallen a lot, and people see it. We need somewhere to put our money for a long-term investment, something more stable."

Now if only we could do that here. 10. This is what happens when you allow large Zombie banks to stagger on. JP Morgan has simply pulled credit lines for thousands of small to medium businesses since March, BusinessWeek reports.

For small businesses a line of credit can be a lifesaver, giving them a buffer against cash-flow problems and enabling them to handle regular expenses such as payroll. But beginning in March, according to documents obtained by BusinessWeek, JPMorgan Chase suspended credit lines for a large number of business owners. According to someone familiar with the matter, the move affected thousands of businesses. They had been clients of Washington Mutual before Chase bought the ailing bank in September 2008. The documents show that Chase tasked a special group inside the bank with responding to inquiries from borrowers. The bank can expect plenty of those, at least partly because in many cases the businesses whose lines were cut had not missed loan payments. Instead, their credit score or their financials had deteriorated, and credit-line agreements typically give banks the right to change the terms of the line if there is a change in the borrower's financial situation. In this case, the changes in the terms are dramatic. If business owners can't convince Chase of their creditworthiness, they have three options: 1) pay off the balance in full; 2) agree to a conversion of the line of credit into a term loan; or 3) go into default. Business owners who accept the conversion to a term loan will likely see dramatically higher monthly payments. A business owner may be able to keep a line of credit open with interest-only payments, but term loans typically have to be paid off -- interest and principal -- within three to five years. Plus, they may carry higher interest rates.

I get a lot of grief for saying New Zealand businesses don't know how lucky they are.