Category: Financial Markets 2014
The analysis published under this category are as follows.
Thursday, June 05, 2014
Is Your Investment Portfolio a House of Cards? / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Axel_Merk
The S&P 500 continues to hit new all time highs, but is your portfolio built on a house of cards? The politics to kick the proverbial can down the road may unleash dynamics that could be hazardous to your wealth.
The one thing politicians throughout the world have in common is that they rarely ever blame themselves. They tend to diffuse responsibility or place blame on groups such as political opponents, the wealthy, or foreigners.
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Thursday, June 05, 2014
Economic Recovery and Markets - The Madness of Crowds / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Ty_Andros
Never in my 30+ year career as a market observer have I seen so many out on a limb which is about to be SAWED OFF. Those who live within the matrix are fully loaded for a recovery which is not and will not appear. Nominally the Main stream media can proclaim ECONOMIC recovery has arrived, point to the rising developed world stock markets, seemingly benign bond markets of all categories: sovereign, investment grade and Junk, Private equity, corporate buy backs and more have priced in "Happy Days are here again". HFT, unrestrained leverage in a financially repressed world and Quantitative easing have done the rest in pushing financial assets to heights rarely, if ever, seen. Volatility is at all-time lows in most markets and investor confidence at superhuman levels. Like a boat where all the passengers are on one side of the boat and it is about to capsize, investors similarly have no fear.
Wednesday, June 04, 2014
Low Interest Rates Won't Hide This Looming Threat Forever / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Money_Morning
Michael E. Lewitt writes: Financial markets are experiencing a significant divergence in 2014 between the direction of stocks and bonds.
While the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average have traded to new record highs, the yields on benchmark Treasury bonds have dropped sharply.
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Saturday, May 31, 2014
U.S. Economy Back in the Red - Stocks vs Bonds / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Mike_Whitney
If you follow the stock market, you probably think the economy is sizzling. But if bonds are your thing, then you probably think we’re still in recession.
So which is the better gauge of what’s going on in the real economy; stocks or bonds?
The bond market is more accurate. And recently, long-term yields have been dropping like a stone which is not a good sign for the economy. Investors seem to think that slow growth and low inflation are here to stay, and they could be right. According to Bloomberg, “Falling yields on longer-term Treasuries historically reflect periods of lackluster growth. Since 1960, they have predicted seven of the last eight recessions when 10-year yields fell below 3-month bill rates.” As of today, the benchmark 10-year UST is a dismal 2.44 percent.
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Monday, May 26, 2014
Strategic Investment - A Bubble In Complacency / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: John_Mauldin
Notes from SIC 2014
I and many others are still trying to digest the massive amount of useful and original information that was offered at last week’s Strategic Investment Conference. In this week’s letter I want to recap some of what I learned but do so in a little different manner. I find it quite instructive to listen to and read what other people have to say about their takeaways from the conference. I have come across several very good summaries and reviews that I am going to excerpt rather liberally, along with sharing some of my own thoughts.
Tuesday, May 20, 2014
May The Interest Rate Rise With You / Interest-Rates / Financial Markets 2014
By: Raul_I_Meijer
If global financial markets cannot set interest rates, they are distorted and dysfunctional by definition. Of course one may argue that they have long been distorted regardless, and there’s plenty merit to that, but without being able to determine interest rates, it is impossible for markets to become functional again, other than through a collapse so severe nobody wants to be seen dead with any paper ‘assets’ anymore. That is the inevitable fork in the road: either you allow interest rates to be – freely – set by markets, or you run head first into a market crash. There are other requirements too, like getting rid of bad debt, restructuring, allowing defaults and throwing out bankrupt zombifies market participants, but none of that will do much good as long as central banks and governments can claim the right of granting themselves the authority to set rates at whim.
Tuesday, May 20, 2014
Gold, Stocks and Crude Oil Heading Lower / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Gregor_Horvat
GOLD is moving sideways in 1268-1331 range for more than a month between two contracting trend-lines that make a shape of a triangle. We are looking at a running triangle in wave (b) that can be near completion as rise from 1276 is already in three legs that represents wave e), final leg in the pattern. With that in mind, traders should be aware of a bearish reversal down in wave (c) towards 1220/40 especially once 1277 and pattern support will give way.
Sunday, May 18, 2014
Strategic Investment Conference: Day 2 - Debt and Innovation / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: John_Mauldin
By Worth Wray
Hello again from the Strategic Investment Conference in San Diego, California!
John Mauldin took the stage on day 2 with a powerful message: while the human brain struggles to anticipate exponential change, our economic future quite literally depends on a race between two accelerating curves – debt and innovation.
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Sunday, May 18, 2014
Strategic Investment Conference: Day 1 Special Update / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: John_Mauldin
By Worth Wray
Good morning from sunny San Diego, California!
As the sun rises on the second day of the Strategic Investment Conference, I am absolutely blown away. John and Altegris put on an amazing show, and this is simply unlike any investment conference I have ever attended.
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Friday, May 16, 2014
Gold, Oil And S&P500 Elliott Wave Analysis / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Gregor_Horvat
S&P500 has turned bearish in this week and even accelerated lower yesterday. More importantly, prices fell through the channel support line connected from 1803 low, and also moved slightly beneath wave (e) swing low of a wave B triangle. Such price action, especially broken upward channel suggests that market completed a three wave rise from 1803 to 1898. With that said, we assume that market will continue lower now within wave C) that is part of a corrective blue wave (4) that can be a flat.
Wednesday, May 14, 2014
The True Parasites Of Finance / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Raul_I_Meijer
This morning I saw an article by Barry Ritholtz on Bloomberg that got my few remaining active neurons going (or I think it was them). The title alone, The Parasites of Finance, did that, actually. I sort of knew, since I’ve known Barry’s work at the Big Picture site for quite some time, what he would talk about, and I knew I wouldn’t – fully – agree.
Or rather, it’s like this: I have nothing against Barry, and he does make some valid points in the article, but in my view his focus is too narrow for the title he’s chosen, willingly or not. But then Barry works in finance, and I don’t. For me the parasites of finance form a much larger group than for him. And that is the direct result of government policies, such as the promotion of creative fantasy accounting and the refusal to restructure debt, multiplied by the tens of trillions of dollars of future wealth that have been pumped into the financial system in the form of QE and other stimuli, lest the system collapse on the spot.
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Tuesday, May 06, 2014
Massively Long Tech Stocks Smaller Bubble, Bernanke's Frightening Answers / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Bloomberg
David Einhorn, president of Greenlight Capital, spoke with Bloomberg Television's Stephanie Ruhle and Erik Schatzker today about technology stocks, investment strategy, Federal Reserve policy, and activist investing and high-frequency trading.
On a March 26 dinner conversation with Bernanke, Einhorn said: "I got to ask him all these questions that had been on my mind for a very long period of time, right? And then on the other side, it was like sort of frightening because the answers weren’t any better than I thought that they might be. I asked several things. He started out by explaining that he was 100 percent sure that there’s not going to be hyper inflation. And not that I think that there’s going to be hyper inflation, but it’s like how do you get to 100 percent certainty of anything?"
Tuesday, May 06, 2014
Gazprom, Puerto Rico and Ackman / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Bloomberg
Jim Grant, Editor/Founder of Grant's Interest Rate Observer, spoke with Bloomberg Television anchor Stephanie Ruhle from the Sohn Investment Conference in New York today.
Grant talked about why he's long Gazprom when many are shying away, saying, "the beginning, middle and end of the bull case on Gazprom is that good things happen to cheap stocks. Gazprom is by acclimation the world's worst company managed by the worst kleptocrats ever assembled on one continent. So - and - and Jay Carney, the president's own press secretary, advised us all as a nation, regardless of individual suitability, to go short this stuff, Russia. So how can one not at least investigate the contrary side of that proclamation."
Monday, May 05, 2014
Stock Market Megaphone Top, Gold, Oil Commodities Down into Mid Year Correction / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Toby_Connor
So far my 2014 expectations are playing out pretty much as planned, with a few adjustments. With the threat of war in the Ukraine I think the final bubble phase in stocks is now off the table. I doubt we can get the euphoric buying pressure necessary to generate a parabola as long as tensions in Eastern Europe continue to escalate. No bubble phase in stocks = no capitulation phase in gold. The Ukraine event was a game changer.
Thursday, May 01, 2014
Markets Offering High Risk Low Reward? / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Submissions
Rajveer Rawlin writes: Lets look at the following charts:
The Dow long term chart shows a broadening top megaphone pattern, we are near the top of this pattern and a triple top could be underway in the daily chart
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Wednesday, April 30, 2014
The Boy In The Bubble / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Raul_I_Meijer
That’s how I feel these days, or I should say these years. Since the name of this site comes from Paul Simon’s song by that title, it comes easily. Funny enough, I watched one of the Making of Graceland docs on Sunday night, and then on Monday morning read that the grand small 70-year old songwriter has been arrested because his wife’s mother had called 911 for a domestic disturbance situation. Given that Edie Brickell is about a foot taller than Simon, that made me smile. All the more so because in the documentary he’s talking about how he’s not good at writing angry songs, and that’s why Graceland came out the way it did, instead of being filled with loud protests against the injustices of South Africa. But, he said, outside of my songs, I’m very capable of expressing my anger, and I do get angry. Got ya, Paul.
Wednesday, April 30, 2014
Inflation? MEH! Rising Interest Rates? MEH! / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Jonathan_Davis
I wrote, here 2 weeks ago, how Government Bond yields have been falling and look as if they will continue to do so. This suggests the Bond markets forecast, at least, falling inflation and, possibly, outright deflation.
Why might they think this?
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Wednesday, April 30, 2014
Japan - Gyver & Guffin / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: John_Mauldin
This week’s TTMYGH revolves around “Macs.” The first is a man-turned-verb who was capable of extricating himself from seemingly hopeless situations, armed with an array of tools seemingly singularly unsuited to the purpose; and the second is an ingenious, though ultimately futile, plot device which has been used by everyone from Welles to Hitchcock to Tarantino.
Though at first blush it’s hard to see a link between the two, in today’s world there are Angus MacGyvers everywhere, beetling away with duct tape and Swiss army knives, trying to extricate themselves from completely hopeless situations; and if they are to succeed before the credits roll, they must rely upon one very important thing: the suspension of disbelief by their audience.
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Monday, April 28, 2014
Virtually all asset classes may be in decline... Except the Dollar / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Anthony_Cherniawski
SPX was stopped twice at 1872.00, but the third attempt apparently was the charm. It now appears that the first attempt at 1872.00 completed a sub-Minute Wave (a) of a Minute Wave [b] and the last attempt was sub-Minute Wave (c) of Minute Wave [b]. The rally attempt may be over.
Monday, April 28, 2014
Don't Look Now But The Stocks and Housing Wealth Effect Is Over / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2014
By: Michael_Pento
The government's "ingenious" solution to end the Great Recession was to recreate the same wealth effect that engendered the credit crisis to begin with: The definition of the wealth effect is an increase in spending that comes from an increase in the perception of wealth generated from equities and real estate.