Saturday, September 24, 2016

The Fed Decision / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2016

By: David_Chapman

As widely expected, the Fed left interest rates unchanged at the September 21, 2016 FOMC meeting. The Fed felt things were balanced, and was looking for a pick up into the fourth quarter of 2016. The Fed also left open the possibility of a rate hike at the December FOMC. There were three Fed dissenters, the highest number since 2014. The BOJ also made an announcement to maintain its QE programs and do some switching of long maturities for short maturities (the BOJ’s version of Operation Twist?).

Saturday, September 24, 2016

US Economy GDP Growth Estimates in Free-Fall: FRBNY Nowcast 2.26% Q3, 1.22% Q4 / Economics / US Economy

By: Mike_Shedlock

GDP estimates for third and fourth quarter are now in a free-fall.

Last Friday the FRBNY Nowcast was in a blackout period because of the FOMC meeting on Wednesday.

Today we see estimates tor the last two weeks. Let's also take a look at my guess of the estimates vs. how the estimates came in.

Saturday, September 24, 2016

Gold and Gold Stocks Corrective Action Continues Despite Dovish Federal Reserve / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2016

By: Jordan_Roy_Byrne

There were some hopes that a non-move by the Fed would end the current correction in precious metals and spark a move to new highs. Unfortunately, the Federal Reserve cannot override the supply and demand component of the market. Gold and gold stocks popped higher but less than two days later the sector (and specifically the miners) has given those gains back. That tells us plenty of sellers remain and this sector needs more time and perhaps lower prices before this correction ends.

Saturday, September 24, 2016

Stock Market Unwinding....Still Nowhere Big Picture... / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Jack_Steiman

70 RSI is as 70 RSI does. Sure, you can go well above. I understand that, but yesterday most of the key index charts hit 70 RSI on the short-term, sixty-minute charts. Normally you pull back from there and today was no different. The market gapped down a little bit and spent the day below the flat line. Nothing dramatic, but it did succeed in allowing the overbought oscillators to begin and unwinding process, which, of course, many will question as to whether we've seen the ultimate top. Probably not, but you never know. Markets sell when they get too overbought to allow for more energy on the next attempted move higher. This seems to be no different.

Saturday, September 24, 2016

Stock Market Clear and Present Danger! / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Chris_Vermeulen

The cycle since 2009 has been different from other market cycles, throughout history, in only one significant manner. That having been said, it is the Global Central Banks that have intentionally pushed interest rates to zero and below. This encouraged investors to speculate in the equity markets which have now become ‘dangerously overvalued, overbought, as well as ‘over bullish’ extremes according to all measures. In my opinion, this has “deferred” and not eliminated the disruptive unwinding of this “speculative” episode.

Saturday, September 24, 2016

Global Bonds: Why Our Analyst Says Things Just Got "Monumental" / Interest-Rates / International Bond Market

By: EWI

Our interest rates strategist explains more in this new interview

Peter DeSario, editor of our Interest Rates Pro Service, explains why this was a "monumental" week in the bond markets -- and offers a preview of which markets he's keeping his eye on.

Saturday, September 24, 2016

MI6 to Recruit 1/3rd More Redundant Intelligence Agents Destined to Lose AI Cyber Wars / Politics / Intelligence Agencies

By: Nadeem_Walayat

Britain's secret service, MI6 is about to see their number of intelligence agents boosted by 1/3rd in attempt to fight and counter future digital cyber terror attacks and wars. This is in addition to the expansion of other arms of Britain's secret police such as GCHQ and MI5.

However, the government is making the SAME mistake it always tends to make when it engages in such job creation exercises for bureaucratic institutions in that they are ALWAYS looking in the rear view mirror of what happened in the past and thus how they could have averted for instance 9/11 or 7/7 if they had x,y,z number of personnel in place and then go ahead and implement such capacity expansion a decade after the fact, whilst failing to realise that the nature of the threat has moved on.

Friday, September 23, 2016

The Fed’s Market Myth is Unraveling Before Our Eyes… Bloodbath Coming / Stock-Markets / Financial Crisis 2016

By: Graham_Summers

So much for the narrative.

The latest myth being promoted in economic circles is that median income growth exploded higher last year. The people promoting this myth obviously didn’t bother reading the actual report and don’t understand what the word “median” means.

A big hat tip goes to John Williams who actually DID read the report and found that the Census has adjusted its methodology to include what interest income WOULD be if rates were not at zero.

Friday, September 23, 2016

Where Did All the Money Go? / Stock-Markets / Market Manipulation

By: David_Galland

Dear Earthlings,

As we’re still readjusting to life in a small Argentine pueblo miles from anywhere, I’ve asked Stephen McBride, my associate and now neighbor (he just moved here), to take the reins for the bulk of this week’s assemblage of news, analysis, and wry commentary about the never-boring antics of the human ape.

You may recall Stephen’s wonderful exposé on George Soros, an article that continues to bounce around the Internet doing good service by alerting people to Soros’s nefarious deeds.

Friday, September 23, 2016

Pension Shortfalls Could Be 4X To 7X Greater Than Reported / Personal_Finance / Pensions & Retirement

By: Dan_Amerman

• The reported shortfall for the California Public Employees Retirement System (Calpers) is $139 billion - but that is based upon investment assumptions that may be unlikely in current markets.
• As developed using a 40 year financial model and recent actual results, the real present value shortfall could be in the $500 billion to $1 trillion range, which is 4X to 7X as great as reported.
• Calpers is used as a real world example to explore nationwide issues that could change our financial futures - and our choices - as investors, taxpayers and pension beneficiaries.

Friday, September 23, 2016

Gold Unleashed by the Fed / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2016

By: Zeal_LLC

Gold surged sharply this week after the Yellen Fed yet again chickened out on raising its benchmark interest rate.  Gold-futures speculators’ irrational fear of Fed rate hikes has been a major drag on gold.  And rate-hike risks just plummeted in the coming months, since the Fed can’t risk acting heading into this year’s critical US presidential election.  So gold’s next major upleg was likely just unleashed by the Fed.

Oddly, Wall Street’s expectations for a rate hike at this week’s latest meeting of the US Federal Reserve’s Federal Open Market Committee were surprisingly high.  The interest-rate target directly controlled by the FOMC is the federal-funds rate.  Commercial banks are required to hold reserves at the Fed.  They lend these reserves to other banks overnight in the federal-funds market, at the FOMC’s federal-funds rate.

Friday, September 23, 2016

Gold around U.S Presidential Elections / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2016

By: Arkadiusz_Sieron

In previous articles, we examined gold's performance in the presidential election cycles. The only relatively reliable conclusion we were able to draw from the long-term analysis is that the post-election year is the worst for the price of gold in the whole cycle. Let's now focus on gold's short-term dynamics around election time.

The two charts below show the dynamics of gold prices thirty trading days before Election Day and thirty days after.

Friday, September 23, 2016

Here’s Why Eastern Europe Is Doomed / Politics / Eastern Europe

By: John_Mauldin

BY LILI BAYER : The EU is falling apart. Europe’s exporters face a crisis. Its southern economies are troubled. Germany has economic challenges of its own. But as Europe’s crises deepen, something else will become more important.

The erosion of the Schengen zone could hurt Eastern members’ ties with the West. Their economic and social stability depend on access to the EU. This includes funding, investments, trade, and labor markets. So the East is sensitive to economic changes in Western Europe and the continued fracturing of the bloc.

Friday, September 23, 2016

Nasdaq NDX 100 Big Cap Tech Breakout ? / Stock-Markets / Tech Stocks

By: Rambus_Chartology

Below is a daily chart which shows the NDX 100 big cap tech stock index trading at a new all time high today.

Friday, September 23, 2016

Are Your Savings Safe? U.N. Warns Next Financial Crisis Imminent / Stock-Markets / Financial Crisis 2016

By: GoldCore

Savings Guarantee? U.N. Warns Next Financial Crisis Seems Imminent

“There remains a risk of deflationary spirals in which capital flight, currency devaluations and collapsing asset prices would stymie growth and shrink government revenues. As capital begins to flow out, there is now a real danger of entering a third phase of the financial crisis …”

Friday, September 23, 2016

Positive Stock Market Session Ends with Strong Finish / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Harry_Boxer

The markets had a strong day on Thursday, with a gap up, run up, consolidation, they pulled back, held, and started back up near the end of the session. Many of our stocks did very well. We have quite a few to go over, so let’s get started.

Clovis Oncology Inc (CLVS) had a nice day, up 2.68, or 7.5%, to 38.36, on 6.5 million shares traded. You can see that it’s into the gap, and my target half way through the gap is as high as 47, but let it get through 40 first. I do believe this stock has room to extend. It has 3.5 days to cover.

Friday, September 23, 2016

Hedonics, Food, and Pluralistic Ignorance / Economics / Inflation

By: Dr_Jeff_Lewis

Inflation is alive and well – despite what we hear from the mainstream. Due to pluralistic ignorance, it persists much longer than anyone would have ever predicted.

From Wikipedia:

Pluralistic ignorance 

“In social psychology, pluralistic ignorance is a situation in which a majority of group members privately reject a norm, but incorrectly assume that most others accept it, and therefore go along with it.[1] This is also described as ‘no one believes, but everyone thinks that everyone believes’.”

Friday, September 23, 2016

Possible Stock Market Aggressive Sell for the Brave / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Anthony_Cherniawski

SPX made its high at 10:35 am. Although it has not gone higher, it has only taken baby steps lower, so it may not be “out of the woods,” yet. As noted earlier, it has achieved at least one Wave relationship, but has not filled the gap.

I cannot give an “all clear” for conservative investors, since the SPX has not declined back beneath its 50-day Moving Average and the NYSE Hi-Lo Index went considerably higher today. However, those who are aggressive may consider at least a partial position today.

Thursday, September 22, 2016

Germany Has No Power to Solve the European Crisis / Politics / Eurozone Debt Crisis

By: John_Mauldin

BY LILI BAYER : Germany faces a growing number of crises, both at home and abroad. But it has limited power to address them. The country needs stability in Ukraine. It wants to influence Russia. And Germany needs to deal with the influx of refugees from Turkey. This requires an agreement with that country.

Recently, the German leadership met with officials in Europe and abroad to address these crises. On Sept. 15, the foreign ministers of Germany and France toured Ukraine's war-torn east. In August, the German foreign minister went to Moscow to discuss the problems in Ukraine and Syria.

Thursday, September 22, 2016

The Last Time We Saw This Was Before World War II / Politics / GeoPolitics

By: John_Mauldin

BY GEORGE FRIEDMAN : Europe and Asia, taken together, are the heart of humanity. That’s where 5 billion out of the 7 billion people in the world live. When instability comes to this part of the world, it shakes humanity.

That’s why the geopolitical pattern developing in Eurasia is so ominous. It is like a hurricane—absorbing huge amounts of energy from the ocean, using that energy to build a vast, integrated structure, and then destroying whatever it touches.