Wednesday, February 01, 2017
China’s “One Belt, One Road” Is a Nice Thought, but Nothing More / Politics / China
BY JACOB SHAPIRO : In late 2013, Chinese President Xi Jinping showed off the One Belt, One Road (OBOR) plan in Kazakhstan and Indonesia.
Xi’s OBOR could be a bold economic development program that will vault Chinese political power ahead in the modern day. However, the OBOR plan is at an early stage.
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Wednesday, February 01, 2017
Interesting US Real Estate Market Trends That Will Appear In 2017 / Housing-Market / US Housing
2016 saw a really surprising twist in the US as Donald Trump won the presidential race. This in itself is a guarantee that the market will see different changes, given that Trump is a real estate magnate. Although associated created controversy affects various parts of US economy, the real estate market is expected to continue its upwards trend started in 2016.Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, February 01, 2017
Stock Market Highs Make Strong Case for Precious Metal Buys / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
Dow 20,000 was ushered in with great fanfare. Traders on the New York Stock Exchange sported "Dow 20,000" hats. Even President Donald Trump joined the celebration.
Trump told ABC News he was "very honored" that the stock market gave his presidency a symbolic vote of confidence. "Now we have to go up, up, up. We don't want it to stay there," he said.
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Wednesday, February 01, 2017
Gold Price Set For Very Bullish 2017, Trend Forecast / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017
I am very bullish on the gold price in 2017 and while the year has got off to a cracking start I believe we need to see a test of the recent low to lay a stronger foundation from which to launch even higher.
Let's review the charts beginning with the long term picture.
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Wednesday, February 01, 2017
The Great Rotation - Monetary to Fiscal, Major Cycles Turning Down / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2017
Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer dejectedly quipped during Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke's Humphrey-Hawkins testimony before congress in July of 2012:
"I'm afraid the Fed's the only game in town!"
Now nearly five years later things may be about to change! The other two policy pillars of Fiscal and Public Policy may be reasserting themselves with a change in the White House and congressional leadership. Suddenly just the promise of potential fiscal stimulus, tax policy and claw backs of regulatory over-reach have become the lead stories on the nightly news.
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Wednesday, February 01, 2017
He'll Bring Them Inflation, and They Will Love Him for It / Economics / Inflation
I used to make fun of the FOMC rate hike "decision" language in the mainstream media because under the Obama administration and its economic policies overseen by the Fed's monetary policy, there really was no decision, was there? It was ZIRP-eternity, interrupted by a lone and token rate hike in December 2015 (the Dec. 2016 hike does not count because the transition to a new administration and policy regime was already known; in effect, the Fed has already made its first hike under Trump).
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Wednesday, February 01, 2017
Britain Needs Trump for Smooth Brexit / Politics / BrExit
At the Washington joint press conference with Prime Minister May held on January 27th, President Trump told the watching world, "Brexit is going to be a wonderful thing." The meeting did much to clear the way for Britain to stand alone and enter trade with the United States without the European Union (EU). Their talk of a U.S.-UK free trade agreement could do much to ease the fears of some key English Members of Parliament and counterbalances the fears that Britain will be punished by a bitter EU. The positive meeting occurred at a fortuitous moment. Only four days prior, the UK's Supreme Court had ruled that Parliamentary approval must be specifically obtained before Her Majesty's Government can sign trigger negotiations to exit the EU.
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Wednesday, February 01, 2017
Stock Market Long Cold Winter / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
It appears that equity indices have printed their highs for the post-election rally. However, that doesn't necessarily mean that the correction must begin immediately. Cycles and Lindsay analysis point to a final high closer to February 10. The correction has the potential to be fairly painful as the low is not expected until closer to March 21 and springtime. The Lindsay analysis is as follows:
Point E on 3/27/01 of an ascending middle section counts 2,901 days to the low of the multiple cycle on 3/6/09. 2,901 days later is Monday, 2/13/17.
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Wednesday, February 01, 2017
Stock Market Melt-up Brings Volatility to Precious Metals / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017
Our recent analysis bases on a previous report of the potential for a further run in the US markets based on a number of technical and fundamental factors leads to the question of "what could happen with Gold and Silver". A broad US market rally may put some pressure on the metals markets initially, but, in our opinion, the increase in volatility and uncertainty will likely prompt more potential for upward price action in precious metals.
As with most things in the midst of uncertainty and transition, the US Presidential election has caused many traders to rethink positions and potential. As foreign elections continue to play out, wild currency moves are starting to become more of a standard for volatility. Combine this with a new US President and a repositioning of US global and local objectives and we believe we are setting up for one of the most expansive moves in recent years for the US general markets and the metals markets. This week, alone, we have seen a flurry of action in DC and the US markets broke upward on news of the Dakota Pipeline and other Executive actions.
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Tuesday, January 31, 2017
A Better Solution Than Trump's Mexico Border Wall / Politics / US Politics
Just one week in office, President Trump is already following through on his pledge to address illegal immigration. His January 25th executive order called for the construction of a wall along the entire length of the US-Mexico border. While he is right to focus on the issue, there are several reasons why his proposed solution will unfortunately not lead us anywhere closer to solving the problem.
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Tuesday, January 31, 2017
Stock Market 4% Drop Ahead: Down into February 6? / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
The chart below explains why I now believe we drop down into February 6th to the 2202 SPX level. The next few days may be choppy as we form a bear flag around the rising trend line. SoLunar turn days ahead include Jan 31, Feb 2, Feb 4-7 and Feb 10. Mercury squares Uranus on Jan 31, and Jupiter on Feb 2.
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Tuesday, January 31, 2017
The Philippines “BRIC” Effort / Politics / Asian Economies
From Regime Change Ploys to Accelerated Economic Development
While the Obama White House prepared plans for regime change in the Philippines, President Trump is working on an assertive strategy in Asia. Meanwhile, President Duterte is accelerating the country’s economic growth – dramatically.
After the election triumph of President Rodrigo Duterte, the Philippines has initiated a series of economic reforms to accelerate development, decentralise governance and a tough but controversial struggle against corruption and drugs.
Tuesday, January 31, 2017
Gold Price is One Tweet Away from New Highs / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017
President Trump's recent comments on Mexico and building a wall should give gold investors optimism, says Daniel Ameduri, cofounder of Future Money Trends.
President Trump's recent open display on Twitter regarding Mexico and the wall should give gold investors a surge of optimism.
Over the next year, it's highly likely that we will see trade wars erupt with the U.S. and several of its major trading partners, like Mexico, China and the EU.
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Tuesday, January 31, 2017
New Cold War with a Different Enemy / Politics / New Cold War
As all the alarm bells ring continuously that the Russian Federation is the cause for the latest cold war, the actual risk for a hot conflict or an intentional brinkmanship of worldwide proportions should focus on the real enemy of humanity. The Brexit campaign was about more than just leaving the European Union. Likewise, the Trump movement is about a great deal more than just keeping Hillary Clinton from the oval office. Formerly the nation-state was the organizational format for government. Europe emerged from the dark ages to carve out kingships and spend centuries of warring with mostly bloodline relatives. When the bonds of feudalism loosened and economic advancement expanded the enlightenment of human thinking altered the political landscape. Notions of democratic principles germinated into ushering aside Kaisers, Czars and Kings. The popular vote in a strange ritual came to be known as an election, was culturally adopted as registering the popular will of the people.
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Tuesday, January 31, 2017
Stock Market Major Inflection Point Coming / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
Fund manager John Hussman is always good for dramatic charts. Here’s a recent one:
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Tuesday, January 31, 2017
EURUSD Forex Trading Strategy Simplifies a Choppy Market / Currencies / Euro
The forex market accounts for trillions worth of transactions on a daily basis, which makes it one of the most liquid markets to participate in. The EUR/USD currency pair accounts for most of those transactions but that does not make the pair immune to the rigorous volatility experienced amongst the exotic currency pairs.Due to less liquidity, currency markets involving less popular pairs tend to be more volatile than their more popular counterparts. However, as demonstrated in the chart below, the EUR/USD pair, which is one of the most popular currency pairs in the Forex market has been very choppy of late. At least, when you look at it from the perspective of the hourly chart.
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Tuesday, January 31, 2017
Cycles for Gold and USD / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017
Did Gold find a Trading Cycle Low last Friday? Perhaps. Silver was definitely leading the way as it often does at bottoms. But Silver also delivers many head-fakes and with the USD is due for a new Trading Cycle bounce, Gold will likely move lower next week.
My first chart on the USD, shows it is deep in its timing band to find a DCL or short term Trading Cycle Low. Thursday may well have been the TC Low I was looking for. If so, to confirm a new Trading Cycle the USD should close above the 10ema and then test/break my Red down trend cycle line.
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Tuesday, January 31, 2017
Stocks Bear Market of 2017 Begins? Shorting the Dow At its Peak! / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
This is a quick heads up for what could prove turn out to be the start of the stocks bear market of 2017. Those who have followed my analysis will know that after having ridden the bull for nearly 8 years, that following the election of Trump and the resulting rally right to the very edge of Dow 20k, that I concluded early December that it was the time to start distributing stocks holdings accumulated during the life time of the of the bull market, specifically seeking to reduce my stocks portfolio holdings by at least 50% as the Trump Reset looked set to soon usher in a bleak period for stock prices for much of 2017.
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Tuesday, January 31, 2017
US 10-Year Bond Yield Transitioning Out of Multi-Year Bear Market / Interest-Rates / US Bonds
My intermediate and longer term technical set-up work on 10 year U.S. Treasury YIELD argues that benchmark yield is in transition from a 35 year Bear Market (dominant downtrend) into a multi-year Bull Market (dominant uptrend).
From 1981, when 10 year yield peaked at 15.84% amid concerns about rampant, un-containable inflation and stagnant growth ("Stagflation") precipitated initially by the 1973 OPEC Oil Embargo, benchmark yield steadily and relentlessly declined to a post-Financial-Crisis 2016 low at 1.32% (see Charts 1 and 2).
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Tuesday, January 31, 2017
Is This The Best Way For Investors To Play The Electric Car Boom / Companies / Auto Sector
As Tesla fires up itsUS$5-billion battery gigafactory to mass produce lithium-ion batteries in a historical turning point, lithium prices are set to explode, there has never been a better year to be a lithium company.
Tesla began mass production of lithium-ion batteries in the first week of January 2017, and by the end of the year it will have led to a doubling of global battery production capacity. By 2018, Tesla predicts it will churn out 35 gigawatts of batteries per year. It’s a massive amount that surpasses more than what the rest of the world combined produces.