Saturday, December 12, 2015
Soaring Bond Yields - This Is How Fast It Happens / Interest-Rates / Corporate Bonds
By: Raul_I_Meijer
For a while there, companies deemed to be highly risky were nonetheless able to borrow money for less than 6%. And borrow they did. Frackers, ultra-high-leverage retail chains and various other close-to-the-edge entities slurped up trillions from yield-starved investors who had forgotten about the other side of the risk/return equation.
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Friday, December 11, 2015
UK House Prices, Immigration and London Property Bubble Mania Housing Market / Housing-Market / UK Housing
By: Nadeem_Walayat
London's housing bull market continues to gallop along at an astonishing pace which depending on which measure one looks at ranges from an annual rate of between 8% and 12%, and that the most recent surge higher has now lifted the average London house price to over an eye watering £600k! Pushing London house prices affordability ratio's upwards of X10 average London earnings, pushing London properties out of the reach of even the professional middle classes, let alone the army of working class necessary to keep the metropolis ticking over. Where many prospective home buyers are being forced to adopt extreme measures such as shared ownerships or be convinced by highly polished sales pitches that a tiny box studio flats priced at £300k+ in an run down (up and coming) area are a very good deal! So buy now before it is snapped up by someone else, probably who has yet to even set foot in Britain which highlights London's ultimate safe haven status, not just for the worlds people but capital of tax evading billionaires and people of more ordinary means plowing billions into London's better than gold property market each year.
Friday, December 11, 2015
Gold Thrives in Fed Interest Rate Hike Cycles / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
By: Zeal_LLC
Gold’s deep new secular lows of recent weeks were fueled by American futures speculators’ overpowering fear of Fed rate hikes. They believe zero-yielding gold is doomed in a higher-rate world, so they dumped gold futures at astounding record rates. The problem is history proves just the opposite, that gold tends to thrive during Fed-rate-hike cycles. This revelation is a super-bullish near-term omen for gold.
Some brief context is essential to frame gold’s apparently dire predicament today. Late July saw gold crushed to new secular lows by a record extreme gold-futures shorting attack brazenly executed to blast through long-side stops and foment panic selling. But this burst selling soon fizzled, leading to a major gold bottom in early August. Over the subsequent few months, gold carved an impressive new uptrend.
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Friday, December 11, 2015
America Living a Lie / Politics / US Debt
By: James_Quinn
"Above all, don't lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love." - Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov
The lies we tell ourselves are only exceeded by the lies perpetrated by those controlling the levers of our society. We've lost respect for ourselves and others, transforming from citizens with obligations to consumers with desires. The love of mammon has left our country a hollowed out, debt ridden shell of what it once was. When I see the data from surveys about the amount of debt being carried by people in this country and match it up with the totals reported by the Federal Reserve, I'm honestly flabbergasted that so many people choose to live a lie. By falling for the false materialistic narrative of having it all today, millions of Americans have enslaved themselves in trillions of debt. The totals are breathtaking to behold:
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Friday, December 11, 2015
Gold and Silver Exceptional Hypocrisy / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
By: Jesse
Gold and silver finished largely unchanged in a lightly traded session.
There were no deliveries worth noting at The Bucket Shop yesterday. Nothing in gold, and a few bars of silver.
The gold warehouses were completely quiet, sitting tight with warranted (registered) bullion sitting at decades long lows, and with little historical precedent for their ratio to open interest.
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Friday, December 11, 2015
How Far Can The Syria Conflict Spiral Out Of Control - Interview With Pelicourt / Politics / Syria
By: OilPrice_Com
Business is business, so why not buy oil from ISIS. The Russians claim the Turks are doing it, and in all likelihood even Assad is buying it. No one can fight a war without oil, according to Robert Bensh, partner and managing director of Pelicourt LLC oil and gas company. But while the politically unhinged are coming out the woodwork, the more important aspects of this story remain elusive to the public. Is the dangerously unspoken theory that ISIS is a bulwark against Iran what's keeping the West from tackling the Islamic State wholeheartedly on its territory? With no nation that can control it, the threat is now out of control and a war of ambiguous targets is emerging.
Friday, December 11, 2015
SDR - China Takes a Big Step Forward / Currencies / China Currency Yuan
By: John_Browne
On November 30th the International Monetary Fund (IMF) announced that it would admit China's Renminbi currency, commonly known as the Yuan, to the select basket of reserve currencies that make up its Special Drawing Rights (SDR's). Having been stalled by U.S. influence for many years, the long-awaited IMF decision acknowledges the massive transfer of financial power from the old West to the new East. The move heralds an era of potentially great change with global implications for politics, economics and investments.
Friday, December 11, 2015
Forex Trading Alert: EUR/USD - North or South? / Currencies / Euro
By: P_Radomski_CFA
Earlier today, the U.S. Department of Labor reported that the number of initial jobless claims in the week ending December 4 rose by 13,000 to 282,000, missing analysts' forecasts. As a result, the USD Index moved slightly lower, but did it change anything in the short-term picture of the euro?
In our opinion, the following forex trading positions are justified - summary:
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Thursday, December 10, 2015
USDCZK Dips Worth Eyeing / Currencies / Forex Trading
By: AnyOption
With the end of the year rapidly approaching, traders and investors are busy squaring positions and taking profits in the lead up to the holidays. One of the most notably impacts has been the sustained downward pressure on the US dollar after the currency proved amongst the best performers of 2015, with the dollar index up 8.00% year-to-date. However, in the uncertainty leading up to the FOMC decision next week, the remains softer versus peers despite the potential for the unveiling of a new rate hike cycle. However, by comparison, Europe looks no closer to exiting crisis-driven policies and seems intent on keeping policy accommodative over the medium-term. The Czech Republic in particular has been mirroring the slowdown in Europe, marked by weak inflation and record low interest rates. With a major policy divergence approaching, USDCZK losses might present an exceptional opportunity to gain greater exposure to dollar upside in 2016.Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, December 10, 2015
Do You Have to Settle for Mediocre Returns in The Stock Market? / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2015
By: Sol_Palha
"In the republic of mediocrity, genius is dangerous." ~ Robert Green Ingersoll
Morgan Stanley surprised everyone or, at least, tried to by stating that it was no longer going to be easy to make money in the equity markets. Let's stop, right there; was it ever really easy. If it were everyone that jumped into the markets would be wealthy, instead the opposite is true. Right of the bat, we can state that the best place for such advice is the dustbin.
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Thursday, December 10, 2015
Screaming Fundamentals For Owning Gold Bullion / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
By: GoldCore
We’re at a moment of historic opportunity.
By Chris Martenson
Every year or two we update this report which lays out the investment thesis for gold. Here is this year’s version.
Silver is touched upon only as necessary; as a separate report of equal scope is required for that precious metal.
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Thursday, December 10, 2015
Stock Market Investors' Sentiment Worsens, New Downtrend or More Fluctuations? / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2015
By: Paul_Rejczak
Briefly: In our opinion, speculative short positions are favored (with stop-loss at 2,140 and profit target at 1,990, S&P 500 index)
Our intraday outlook is bearish, and our short-term outlook is bearish:
Intraday outlook (next 24 hours): bearish
Short-term outlook (next 1-2 weeks): bearish
Medium-term outlook (next 1-3 months): bearish
Long-term outlook (next year): bullish
Thursday, December 10, 2015
Global Market Instability - Reversing the Damage of Economic Austerity / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2015
By: Clif_Droke
A significant undercurrent of internal weakness is plaguing the NYSE broad market. This weakness is primarily visible in the dangerously high numbers of stocks making new 52-week lows. Lately that number has exceeded 300 on a daily basis, though it has been above 40 for the last few months in a sign that the market's health is less than optimal. The best way of showing this internal weakness is in the following exhibit which graphs the cumulative new 52-week highs and lows on the NYSE.
Thursday, December 10, 2015
Strippers Suffering From Low Oil Prices / Commodities / Oil Companies
By: OilPrice_Com
With Prices Below $50, what is a stripper to do?With OPEC breaking down and any kind of coordination among its members on price cuts looking increasingly unlikely, it now appears that oil prices could remain below $50 a barrel for a year or more. As producers confront this unpleasant reality, some will finally start to significantly curtail or even shut down operations. And that is going to severely hurt an all but invisible group; strippers in the United States.
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Thursday, December 10, 2015
Will the Fed Rescue the Stock Market? / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2015
By: Gary_Savage
If the Fed is going to rescue the market ahead of the FOMC meeting (they won't be able to raise interest rates unless they do) then they have two days left to repair the weekly charts. The intervention should start in earnest today. Personally I wouldn't advise trying to play the bounce as the forces trying to pull the market down are huge. This may be the first time the Fed fails to keep the market propped up.
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Thursday, December 10, 2015
EURUSD Final Bear Rally Leg Underway / Currencies / US Dollar
By: Austin_Galt
Price recently traded down to support outlined in previous analysis before reversing and trading higher in impulsive style. While a turn back up was expected in order for the bear rally to embark on the final leg higher, this move was on the back of the ECB announcement.
There is always a reason for a move and the market does indeed work in mysterious ways. Some will say this was just a lucky coincidence and I must admit I don't truly understand it. However, what I do understand is that I have seen this type of stuff happen on too many occasions for it to be just a coincidence.
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Thursday, December 10, 2015
Currency Markets Anticipating a U.S. Interest Rate Hike Next Week / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
By: Dan_Norcini
Watching the price action in the currency markets it is becoming clearer to me that the Forex crowd has now moved beyond any expected rate hike by the Fed next week and has shifted its focus to "WHAT COMES AFTER THAT?"
In other words, we have probably seen the high in the US Dollar for a bit since the impact on the currency has effectively already been discounted into its price. Seeing the Fed Funds futures showing a probability of a Fed rate hike next week above 80%, for all practical trading purposes, it is now a done deal.
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Thursday, December 10, 2015
Stock Market 20-Day Back-Test Failure.....2020 Getting Closer.... / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2015
By: Jack_Steiman
The market is slowly, but surely, turning. We haven't taken out 2020 on the S&P 500, yet, so there's nothing to get bearish about. But you can see the subtle changes. The market head faked the masses today as these markets tend to do by blasting, and I mean blasting, up and through the 20-day exponential moving average. The bulls are in full control, or so it seemed. That's when a tiring market, such as we have kicked in, and left the buying bulls feeling bad about those purchases. About chasing the rally. The market fell, and fell hard, initially letting the bulls know they had made an error in their constant bullish behavior. A swift move below the 20's, and the selling was on. It's always about knowing where you are in the market in terms of bull, bear, or agnostic. Then you have to determine if the agnostic market is really a market sending a new message.
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Thursday, December 10, 2015
U.K. Buy-To-Let King Liquidates Entire £250 million Property Portfolio - Video / Housing-Market / Buy to Let
By: Mario_Innecco
Excerpt: Just a little video here about the UK housing market
really an interesting article in The Daily Telegraph that the title is
Fergie's Wilson Britain's most iconic buy to let investor sells up all nine
hundred houses for 250 million pounds for people around the world by two lakh
basically is one you you buy a house just to rented to someone else as an
investment in its quiet quite popular in the in the UK the last ten fifteen years
the rules and regulations have been quite favorable for buy to let investors
Thursday, December 10, 2015
Why Getting Valuation Right Is So Important To Retired Dividend Growth Investors / Companies / Pensions & Retirement
By: Charles_Carnevale
Although getting valuation right before you buy a stock is critically important to the long-term oriented retired dividend growth investor, it is not a short-term market timing concept. My point is that short-term market movements are typically volatile and unpredictable. The reason is simple. Over short periods of time, which I define as less than a business cycle (3- 5 years), emotion has a major effect on stock prices.