Tuesday, May 16, 2017
German - US Bond Market Spreads and Sentiment / Interest-Rates / Germany
Putting aside hard and soft data, yield differentials continue to command FX markets as the German-US 10 year yield spread breaks above its 200-day MA for the 1st time since August to hit -1.90%. The story, however, is not only in the break of the average, but also in the fact that the formation of the spread consists of higher lows and higher highs since the December bottom, which is the same formation for EURUSD, gold and most "anti-USD" instruments.
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
Will the SPX Stock Market Final Surge Fail to Appear? / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
The Wave structure on the left is a likely scenario on how the SPX may play out. This morning’s decline appears to be Wave c of (iv). Wave (v) may now be underway. As far as Wave relationships go, Wave [c] equals Wave [a] at 2405.86, while Wave (v) equals Wave (i) at 2410.24. Wave 5 equals Wave 1 at 2415.05. Cycle Top resistance on the hourly chart is at 2413.67. That gives us a range in which SPX may reverse course.
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
Bitcoin Price Corrects from Top / Currencies / Bitcoin
In short: no speculative positions.
A hacker attack has swept across the globe encrypting user files and crashing corporate services. In an article on CoinDesk, we read:
Extortionist hackers who may be using leaked computer exploits from the U.S. National Security Agency infiltrated computers in dozens of countries in a fast-spreading attack that forced British hospitals to turn away patients and breached systems at Spain’s Telefonica SA and organizations from Russia to Taiwan.
Tuesday, May 16, 2017
The Final Probe in SPX May be Underway / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
SPX futures are higher, suggesting the final probe to the top may be underway. At the moment, 2415.05 appears to be a reasonable target. Although May 26-29 appears to be the time target for the Master Cycle low, another important Cyclical anniversary is coming up. June 6, 2017 (2017.43) happens to be exactly 17.2 years from the March 24, 2000 (2000.230) high of 1553.11. Cycles are not always exact. For example, 8.6 years from the March 24, 2000 high was October 29, 2008. The 2008 low occurred on November 21, exactly 17 market days later. We are within 15 market days of the June 6 anniversary, so the top may happen at any time. Can it stretch to June 6? Possibly, yes. However, SPX is very late in the current Master Cycle.
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
Cyber Wars Could Crash Markets and Threat To Humanity – Buffett and Rickards / Stock-Markets / Cyber War
Cyber wars are a bigger threat to humanity than nuclear weapons, the world’s richest and most famous investor Warren Buffett, presciently warned a few days ago.
“I do think that’s the number one problem with mankind,” Warren Buffett warned during Berkshire Hathaway’s annual shareholder meeting on May 6th.
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
How Silver Price Could Rally Significantly Over The Coming Months / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017
The silver price and the US Dollar/South African Rand exchange rate (USD/ZAR) have a very interesting relationship that goes back a long way.
In the long run, the two move in opposite directions. When the USD/ZAR rate is moving up, the silver price is moving down, and vice versa. Furthermore, when the USD/ZAR rate is making a top, then a bottom in silver is normally very close (before or after the USD/ZAR peak).
Tuesday, May 16, 2017
Who Are ASEAN’s Biggest Military Spenders, Really? / Politics / Asian Economies
The conventional military narratives highlight aggregate expenditures and downplay per capita spending. Realities are more nuanced, both globally and in Southeast Asia.The conventional narrative is that China has become assertive, while the West is ignoring its defense needs. According to SIPRI research, in the past decade military spending in China and Russia increased 118% and 87%, respectively, while US spending plunged almost 5%.
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
How the China Belt and Road Could Change the 21st Century / Economics / China Economy
Until recently, globalization was led by the West and benefited only a few advanced economies. After China’s three decades of rapid growth, the Belt and Road initiatives hold potential for more inclusive globalization.During the weekend, the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation flooded Beijing with almost 30 heads of state and government leaders, 1,500 delegates from over 130 nations, and over 70 international organizations.
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
Silver: Don't Miss the Opportunity of a Lifetime - AGAIN! / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017
Peter Ginelli writes: Silver is and has always been one of the most essential metals on the planet, and yet it has never received the respect it deserves as does gold.
If tomorrow morning we wake up and discover there is no gold on the planet, only three groups of people would miss it: banks which use it as partial reserve, private investors who use it as a hedge and the general consumers who buy it in the form of jewelry.
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
GOP Establishment Elite Plots Trump Removal / Politics / US Politics
Russia, Russia and all things Russia!
The drum beat never ceases. Only the most dense and easily manipulated buy into the bogus narrative that Trump is a Russian asset subject to blackmail. After all these pathetic months of disinformation from the Beltway District of Criminals, the absence of factual reality has become the most rare commodity in the public arena. The establishment panic over the enactment of a robust America First policy administration has the bi-partisan ranks of dedicated Statists scheming to remove President Trump from office by any means necessary. It should be obvious that marginalizing his presidency started the day of his election. Now the ground work is being set to trump up some phony story, absent of any definitive proof, that will entice the GOP never Trumpers, to join in with the deranged Democrats to remove their most threatening nemesis.
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
Tax Reform and the ‘Repatriation’ Trade / Politics / Taxes
Since the Trump victory we have heard all about the coming fiscal policies that would replace the non-stop and brilliantly evil* monetary policies employed by the Fed since the 2008 market crash. These fiscal policies range from the hair-brained (rust belt factory job repatriation) to the silly (building a border wall in lieu of modernizing security-focused information and surveillance technologies) to the arduous (fixing the Healthcare system) to the sound (well-targeted tax cuts). We’ll get tax cuts, but how well targeted they’ll turn out to be will be debated endlessly and I for one don’t think the trend of the rich getting hyper richer and the poor getting poorer is going to reverse any time soon. For reference, see this post at Biiwii.
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
Ransomware Attack, Debt - You’d Think We’d Be A Little More Worried… / Interest-Rates / Global Debt Crisis 2017
By now everyone with an Internet connection is aware of the “ransomware” attack that shut down hundreds of thousands of computers over the weekend.
The fact that the onslaught is just beginning — as the military-grade hacking tools developed by the NSA and recently leaked are weaponized by hackers and released into the wild — should, you’d think, be worrisome.
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Tuesday, May 16, 2017
Walkers Crisps Pay Packet Cheats, Shoplifters and Staff Conning Customers / ConsumerWatch / Freebies and Comps
Unfortunately the Walkers Crisps Instant Cash Win Pay Packet £2 million promotion is bringing out the worst in people who would normally be law abiding. It looks like the temptation to cheat, steal and con ordinary shoppers is proving too great. From shoplifters ripping open multi-packs in stores to super market staff rather than working spending their time feeling packets for the fiver sachets, which amounts to conning customers into buying packs of crisps that have already been processed of winning fivers by members of staff!
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Monday, May 15, 2017
SPX is higher, but the VIX is not beaten / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
A new high has been made. My best analysis suggests that it is a Wave [c] that is not yet finished. Wave Equality calculations at the minute [] level suggest it may end at 2415.05. At the Minor level, Wave equality may reach as high as 2437.41. The 2-hour Cycle Top is currently at 2412.07, suggesting the lower level may suffice.
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Monday, May 15, 2017
Crude Oil Price Correction / Commodities / Crude Oil
Crude gained $1.62/bbl. last week and closed at 47.84 but still below the 200-dma. BWI (bandwidth indicator) fell in non-confirmation of the rally.
Support is at 45.25. I suspect we will see a run to the 200-dma at 49.00 prior to new lows in crude however, the detrended oscillator is overbought warning of a pullback early this week.
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Monday, May 15, 2017
Bernanke’s Confetti Courage / Interest-Rates / US Federal Reserve Bank
Former Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke’s book titled “The Courage to Act” is now available in paperback. This isn’t a surprise because, after all, his proclivity to print paper encompasses the totality of what his courage to act was all about. The errors in logic made in his book are too numerous to tackle in this commentary; so I’ll just debunk a few of the worst.
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Monday, May 15, 2017
Cyber Attacks Show Vulnerability of Digital Systems and Digital Currencies / Currencies / BlockChain
– Cyberattacks expected to spread today in “second phase”
– UK intelligence says scale of threat significant
– Microsoft slams NSA for letting hacking tools cause global malware epidemic
– Ransomware attack already crippled more than 200,000 computers in 150 countries
Monday, May 15, 2017
Wealth Protection: Two Cautionary Tales from France and the American South / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017
On May 7, Marine Le Pen's defeat in France's presidential election secured an integrated EU and had many investors breathing a sigh of relief.
Had the election gone her way, French workers could have seen the devaluation of their euro-denominated pensions if Le Pen had made good on plans to quit the currency in favor of returning to the franc.
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Monday, May 15, 2017
Gold and Sillver Markets - Silver Price Sharp Selloff / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017
Technical analyst Jack Chan charts the latest moves in the precious metal markets, noting the impacts of a sharp selloff in silver.
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