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.
Monday, January 30, 2017
Manganese Is Energy Critical / Commodities / Metals & Mining
In 1917 the War Industries Board (WIB) noted that the United States was deficient in certain minerals of great importance to war making and self defense. A pre-World War II list of materials contained a total of 29 materials: 14 were strategic materials that ‘must be based entirely or in substantial part on sources outside the United States.' There were 15 critical materials that would be easier to source, perhaps even domestically, than the strategic materials.
The 1939 Strategic Materials Act authorized US$100 million to purchase strategic raw materials for a stockpile of 42 strategic and critical materials needed for wartime production.
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Monday, January 30, 2017
Trump's Trade Policy to Drive Price Inflation and Gold Buying / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017
Donald Trump's trade policy is likely to spark higher consumer price inflation, and that has ramifications for gold and silver prices. Regardless of where investors stand regarding the president's plan to make Mexico "pay" for the border wall, if he is successful in getting Congress to impose a hefty tax on imports it will mean higher prices for things. A tax on goods from China could be even more inflationary.
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Monday, January 30, 2017
US Dollar Chartathon / Currencies / US Dollar
In this Weekend Report I'm going to show you some updated charts on the US dollar which has been in a bull market since the low in 2011. It's hard for a lot of investors to admit, but until the charts change the bull market continues. A bull market is characterized by a series of consolidation patterns forming one top of the next, until the last pattern is a reversal pattern which reverses the bull trend. The old expression, the trend is your friend, also applies to the US dollar as well. Until the US dollar negates the series of higher highs and higher lows on an intermediate term basis, we have to assume the bull market is in tact.
Lets start by looking at a daily line chart for the US dollar which shows the horizontal trading range beginning back in March of 2015. The breakout topside of the horizontal trading range took place a little over 2 months ago in November of last year. After the initial breakout there was the initial backtest which could have been the beginning of the next impulse move up, but the US dollar stalled out a month later and is currently backtesting the top rail around the 100 area again.
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Monday, January 30, 2017
The No.1 Mining Stock For 2017 / Commodities / Metals & Mining
On January 4, 2017, the biggest manufacturing development since Henry Ford’s Model T assembly line was powered on...
And investors should pay careful attention...
Because, with this quiet flip of a switch, the energy markets have now been transformed.
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Monday, January 30, 2017
Don't Count on the Great Stock Market Rotation 2017 / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
After many false promises and one false start, it is becoming evident that 2017 will be the year the Federal Reserve finally begins down the road towards interest rate normalization. Therefore, it is likely that Ms. Yellen will cause bond yields to rise this year on the short-end of the yield curve. In addition, soaring debt and deficits, along with the lack of central bank bond-buying, should send long-term rates much higher as well.
Wall Street soothsayers, who viewed every Fed rate cut as a buying opportunity for stocks, are now busily assuring investors that the potential dramatic and protracted move higher in bond yields will be bullish for stocks as well.
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Monday, January 30, 2017
Aggressive Stock Market Sell Signals / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
SPX made an 8.68 point gap down this morning and continued its decline to challenge Short-term support and the 2-hoour mid-Cycle support at 2268.22. Those that “took a chance” of that happening by going short last week may breathe a sigh of relief.
SPX has an aggressive sell signal that is not yet verified by the VIX. However, the decline is sharp and steady. Additional confirmation comes beneath the mid-cycle support.
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Monday, January 30, 2017
SPX Futures Down, TNX down, USD up / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
Good Morning!
SPX futures are down beneath the Cycle Top support and Trendline support this morning. SPX is on a countdown for a potential low on Wednesday. An extension of the decline may come, depending on the actions of the FOMC.
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Monday, January 30, 2017
Is the Gold Market Finally Ready to Breakout? / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017
If pleasures are greatest in anticipation, just remember that this is also true of trouble. - Elbert HubbardThroughout 2016, we stated we did not expect much from Gold, and we stuck to this forecast, even though many experts went out of their way to report that Gold was ready to soar to the Moon or even to the next Galaxy. In fact, since 2011, we have continuously said that until the Trend turns positive, it would be best to play other lucrative markets, such as the general equities market, the US dollar, etc. During this time several experts stated that Gold was ready to surge and some issued insane targets ranging from $20,000-$50,000. Under no circumstance can we ever see Gold going to $20,000 or $50,000 and even if drank a whole bottle of scotch or any other toxic compound it would still be very hard to visualise such a target. Issuing such targets is perfect for fear mongering, and we find that tactic to be unpleasant and distasteful.
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Monday, January 30, 2017
Brace Yourself For The Battle Of the Senate Republicans / Politics / US Politics
BY GEORGE FRIEDMAN : On Jan. 20, Donald Trump became the 45th president of the United States. For Trump (as with every president before him), all that he said up until that point consisted of promises.
But now, the focus must shift... from what he will do, to what he is doing. (Subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, This Week in Geopolitics, and stay informed on the most important geopolitical developments)
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Monday, January 30, 2017
10 Things I learned From Meetings With Trump’s Transition Team / Politics / US Politics
I was in Washington, DC, on Inauguration Day.
That gave me the opportunity to set up a few meetings with members from Trump’s transition team (many of whom read my free weekly letter, Thoughts from the Frontline).
During those talks, I gained some insight into what the first 100 days, the first six months, and the first year of the Trump administration might look like.
Here’s a summary of my impressions.
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Monday, January 30, 2017
Stock Market Negative Expectations Following Last Week's Rally / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017
Briefly: In our opinion, speculative short positions are favored (with stop-loss at 2,330, and profit target at 2,150, S&P 500 index).
Our intraday outlook remains bearish, and our short-term outlook is bearish. Our medium-term outlook remains neutral, following S&P 500 index breakout above last year's all-time high:
Intraday outlook (next 24 hours): bearish
Short-term outlook (next 1-2 weeks): bearish
Medium-term outlook (next 1-3 months): neutral
Long-term outlook (next year): neutral
Monday, January 30, 2017
UK Mortgage Cashback for first-time Home Buyers Decreasing / Housing-Market / Mortgages
Cash rebates are seen as a great sweetener for cash-strapped first-time buyers, with the providers that offer this type of incentive really standing out from the crowd. However, research by Moneyfacts.co.uk shows that the average cashback for those with a modest deposit (90 and 95% loan-to-value) has fallen by £59 in just two years.
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Monday, January 30, 2017
Gold Mining Stocks Could Halve In 2017 / Commodities / Gold and Silver Stocks 2017
Fed Hikes and Their Impact on Gold
When the first hike was delivered, along with the intention to deliver 3-4 more, gold prices were hovering above $1000. Gold now sits over $100 higher than it was at the time of the first hike, having rallied to $1375 when hikes were taken off the table. In our view one hike will see gold test $1000, two will see $1000 break, and three hikes would see $720 tested.
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