Analysis Topic: Stock & Financial Markets
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.Sunday, August 17, 2008
Credit Crunch Anniversary and Mega Trends Investing / Stock-Markets / Credit Crunch
Newsletter - 4th August 2008Dear Subscriber,
The 'official' anniversary of the credit crunch is linked to when the European Central Bank stepped in to provide an unprecedented amount of liquidity by pumping in $130 billion into the European banking system following news of the French bank Paribas freezing three of its hedge funds due to exposure to the US subprime mortgage market as panicking investors had been dumping holdings of mortgage lenders and mortgage backed derivatives and so began the self feeding credit crunch cycle of mortgage backed losses leading to asset price deflation leading to further tightening of the money markets as banks sought to hoard cash, as they lost confidence in their pricing models of the products they were trading with one another, which is more or less where we are today as the derivatives market continues to deleverage.
Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Recessionary Contracting Earnings Lift Stock Market P/E Ratios / Stock-Markets / Stock Market Valuations
Richard Russell (Dow Theory Letters): Danger of deflation“We've recently seen the greatest expansion of credit in history. It was a product of Asian and Mid-Eastern countries holding down the value of their currency by creating more of their own money and buying dollars. The Fed got into the act in 2003 when it held down Fed Funds to 1% for month after month. It was a wild expansion of money and credit. Now the party is over.
Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Stock Market Seasonals 60% Probability of Up Week / Stock-Markets / US Stock Markets
The good news is: Most of the indicators suggest a continuation of the advance.
Short Term Advance - decline lines (ADL) are a running total of declining issues subtracted from advancing issues. Their behavior can vary widely and change over time. For example an ADL calculated from issues traded on the NASDAQ (OTC ADL) has had a negative bias while an ADL calculated from issues traded on the NYSE (NY ADL) used to have a negative bias, but, over the past 10 years or so the bias has become very positive.
Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, August 16, 2008
De-leveraging of America Does Major Technical Damage to Gold / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets
Doubling down on bad bets is taking place on the public pension level. It appears that they believe the worst is over and are willing to send good money after bad. What seems to be happening is a scramble to make up for the poor performance of these funds in the last 12 months. The unfortunate problem is that they are heading in uncharted water in the name of “diversification.”Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, August 15, 2008
Hard Cold Numbers on the Credit Crunch / Stock-Markets / Credit Crunch
Mike Larson writes: Last week, I gave you several real-world examples of lenders who were refusing to take the Federal Reserve's "bait."
A quick recap: The Fed has been driving the cost of money down in an effort to spur more lending. But many banks have instead reduced their exposure to various business lines — and eliminated some loan products altogether.
Read full article... Read full article...
Friday, August 15, 2008
New Cold War Investment Profit Opportunities / Stock-Markets / New Cold War
Martin Hutchinson writes: Like it or not, with the invasion of Georgia, we have a new Cold War – as well as the profit opportunities that accompany such a conflict. International investors were able to make a lot of money during the “first” Cold War, so if any more politicians or TV commentators tell me they don't want a return to those halcyon days, I shall scream.
And since the situation in Georgia has effectively created a new Cold War status, it's worth reviewing where the profit opportunities will be this time, and which countries the sensible, geo-strategically conscious investor will avoid – especially since Vladimir Putin looks a lot more dangerous than the sluggardly Leonid Brezhnev .
Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Investors Should Pay Attention to Important Stock Market Divergences / Stock-Markets / US Stock Markets
Market divergences tell a story of something, or some investor segment acting contrary to the market's movements.
Currently ... the DJI, NASDAQ, S&P, and the Russell are showing an up trending condition.
But, what if Institutions were selling while you were buying ... how would you feel then?
Read full article... Read full article...
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Slump in Private Equity Deals / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2008
Bloomberg is reporting KKR, Apollo Seek Debt Investments as Private-Equity Deals Wane .Aug. 14 (Bloomberg) -- KKR & Co. and Apollo Global Management LLC, two private-equity firms planning to go public later this year, are turning to debt and distressed-asset investments as financing for leveraged buyouts remains scarce.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Stocks New Bull Market or Bear Market Rally? / Stock-Markets / UK Stock Market
Despite a series of worrying news items last week, U.S. stock markets managed to deliver strong gains. Time and again, U.S. investors seem to turn lemons into lemonade by assuming each bad data point is an indication that the bottom is in. Is such behavior indicative of a stock market revival or simply evidence of a bear market rally?Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Why Today’s Stocks Bull Market is Tomorrow’s Bear Trap / Stock-Markets / Stocks Bear Market
Keith Fitz-Gerald writes: Depending on your perspective, U.S. equities are either at the edge of another cliff or at the dawning of a new bull market.
We could make the case for either. But in as much as that would be an interesting exercise, the more relevant question is what the data suggests.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
The Oil War - Russia Georgia Geopolitics / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets
Analysis Dated 10th August 2008 - Welcome to the Weekly Report. Last week, in the subscriber only edition we looked to see if the roadmap I use had moved forward:
- "A recap of the scenario:
bubble, easy money, inflation in fiat money supply, inflation in commodities and hard assets, inflation, fear of inflation, rising rates, YC inverting, flattening, rising and inverting again, tightening, withdrawal of liquidity, corrections, crashes, talk of stagflation, FEAR, withdrawal of speculative funds, further corrections and crashes, demand collapse.......Deflation."
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
China Growing Risk of Corporate and Economic Distress / Stock-Markets / China Economy
China is all the rage for the next few weeks as the Olympics are going on. Many are calling this China's time to showcase itself to the world. I have a lot of friends and analysts who are big China bulls, believing that the next few years will see continued high growth in China, although less than the above 10% of the past few years.
In Outside the Box, we like to look at some contrarian analysis from time to time. Value Investor Vitaliy Katsenelson gives us some reasons why the outlook for China might not be so bright. This has implications for lots of markets that are driven by Asian demand.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
India’s Reliability Provides a Razor Thin Investment Edge Over China / Stock-Markets / Emerging Markets
Martin Hutchinson writes: With sky-high growth potential, China and India are the two markets no investor can afford to miss out on. But that doesn't mean they're impervious to market turbulence, and in times of trouble, India is the more reliable investment.Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Stock Market Counter Trend Rally Heading for Consolidation / Stock-Markets / US Stock Markets
Current Position of the MarketLong-term trend - The Dow Jones Industrials may be deviating from their typical decennial pattern in an election year. Important cycles going into the Fall could be the reason for this, but one also has to consider the possibility that the downward pressure from the 120-yr cycle, which is due to make its low in 2012-2014, has begun to take effect and that October 2007 was the top of the bull market. This is not yet confirmed and remains a low probability.
Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Stock Markets Set to Consolidate Rally / Stock-Markets / US Stock Markets
The good news is: Friday, most of the major indices closed at their highest levels since the mid July lows.
Short Term - Last week all of the major indices were up, but, in a change for he worse, the blue chips were stronger than the secondaries. The Dow Jones Industrial Average(DJIA) was up 3.60%, the S&P 500 (SPX) up 2.86% while the S&P midcap was up 1.61% and the Russell 2000 (R2K) was up 2.53%. On Monday, new lows on both the NYSE and NASDAQ hit their highest levels since the day after the mid July price low. Both the NYSE and NASDAQ new low indicators are moving sharply upward so there should life left in this rally.
Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, August 10, 2008
The Stocks Relief Rally and Commodities Correction / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets
The Wall Street Journal: S&P email – “We should not be rating it” “Some of the most strongly worded emails from analysts questioning their own ratings came from S&P, according to a draft version of the 38-page report, which includes the firms and was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. The unit of McGraw-Hill is the largest bond-rating firm by revenue.
“In one email, an S&P analytical staffer emailed another that a mortgage or structured-finance deal was ‘ridiculous' and that ‘we should not be rating it'. The other S&P staffer replied that ‘we rate every deal', adding that ‘it could be structured by cows and we would rate it'.
Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, August 10, 2008
US Dollar and Stocks Olympics Rally Despite Recession / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets
The Olympic Games kicked off at 8:08:08 pm on Friday night, the eighth day of the eighth month of 2008. Coincidence? Not at all. The number eight is considered lucky by the Chinese, because in Cantonese (the language of South China) the word for prosperity is “fa”, which sounds like “ba” (eight).
Let the gains begin. Fortune also smiled upon stock markets, with the S&P 500 Index scoring its first back-to-back weekly gain since April as the US dollar rallied strongly and oil and commodities plummeted. The S&P 500's gain since the low of July 15 has been 6.7%, with the Financial SPDR up by 27.8%.
Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, August 10, 2008
An Interview With the Kress Stock Market Cycle Master / Stock-Markets / Cycles Analysis
I have long been an admirer of the stock market cycle analysis of one Samuel J. “Bud” Kress, proprietor of SJK Capital and publisher of the cycle-based SineScope advisory. Kress has been in the equity market business all his adult life, either on Wall Street or in more recent years as an independent analyst/trader. If the Kress name seems familiar to you it's probably because you remember the chain of S.H. Kress & Co. “five and dime” stores that once dotted the country. The store's founder, Samuel H. Kress, was Bud's grandfather.Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, August 09, 2008
Stocks and Commodities Bubbles, Parabolic Moves, and Resulting Collapses / Stock-Markets / Liquidity Bubble
In the chart below I have included a weekly chart of the Nasdaq 100. Beginning at the 4-year cycle low that occurred in October 1998, we can see that price rose sharply in February 1999. In fact, in that 4-month period this index moved from a low of 1,063.74 up to 2,150.83. This was a 102% advance in only 4 months. As we moved into October of 1999 this advance was much more orderly, but still managed to advance another 400 points during this time period and in doing so the Nasdaq 100 had advanced 143% in a mere 12 months. As this move received more and more attention more and more people jumped on the bandwagon with the hottest tech stock. As a result, a bubble began to form.Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, August 09, 2008
Stocks Soar as Crude Oil Slides / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets
Equities are on a roll. Looking at the Nasdaq through the daily chart of the Nasdaq 100 Trust Shares (QQQQ), we see that the Q's closed at 47.31, just above the declining 200 DMA at 47.25. This is a very positive sign that today's upmove SHOULD continue Š towards my next optimal target zone of 48.20/50.Read full article... Read full article...