Sunday, January 29, 2017

Sheffield Schools Crisis, Why 2017 Will be Worst Year Ever for School Place Admissions / Politics / Sheffield

By: N_Walayat

It will soon be crunch time for the parents of Sheffield's children starting secondary school this year as they will find out whether their child has obtained a place at their preferred / catchment area school or not. Or as has been increasingly the case during the past few years are going to be disappointed by the outcome as they contemplate the stressful process of appealing. A crisis due to a number of factors including that which prompted latest years BrExit vote. A Sheffield schools crisis that in large part has been the city councils own making, regardless of the party in power as the council has been determined in a continuation of the crisis that has no end in sight.

Saturday, January 28, 2017

Dow Busts Through 20k Triggering Speculative Short at Stock Market New All Time High / Stock-Markets / Stock Index Trading

By: Nadeem_Walayat

The Dow finally sprinted to above Dow 20k for the first time ever after having hugged just below 20k since first reaching the mega stock market milestone early December.

Saturday, January 28, 2017

Grow Your Own Tomatoes From Seed - Step by Step Easy Money Saving Guide / Personal_Finance / Gardening

By: Sami_Walayat

Now is the right time of year to get started growing your own vegetables of which given the high shop prices tomatoes should be at the top of ones list. In this comprehensive guide, 9 year old Sami shows literally how anyone, even a child can easily grow hundreds of tomatoes indoors in a small pot from seed germination, to planting, to hand pollination, to pruning and then enjoying the fruits for a whole years worth of money saving crops of healthy fresh organically home grown tomatoes, good for your financial and physical health as well as delivering a lot of self satisfaction.

Saturday, January 28, 2017

More Upside Ahead for S&P 500 After Pivot Off Support / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017

By: Mike_Paulenoff

In my January 13 Wrap, I included a chart on the Emini S&P 500 (ES) showing a bullish coil formation pointing to a target zone of 2300/10.

On Thursday of this week, the ES reached a new high of 2299.50 before pulling back.

Saturday, January 28, 2017

SPX Uptrend Extension May be Underway / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017

By: Tony_Caldaro

The market started this record week at SPX 2271. After a pullback to SPX 2257 on Monday the market rallied to all-time highs at SPX 2301 by Thursday morning. Then a pullback ended the week at SPX 2295. For the week the SPX/DOW gained 1.15%, and the NDX/NAZ gained 2.0%. On the economic front reports came in even. On the downtick: existing/new home sales, durable goods orders, Q4 GDP, plus weekly jobless claims rose. On the uptick: the FHFA, leading indicators, consumer sentiment, the WLEI, and the final Q4 GDP estimate. Next week is quite a busy one on the economic front, highlighted by the FOMC meeting, monthly payrolls and the PCE. Best to your weekend and week!

Saturday, January 28, 2017

Stock Market Long Awaited 4% Pullback May Be Close / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017

By: Brad_Gudgeon

Last time I wrote, I said that a 10-week bottom was close and could come as late January 31.  Venus square Saturn (today) has a variance of 2 TD’s, the ten-week low can come as late as January 31 and the 16 TD low can come as late as +4 or 20 TD’s (January 31).

The odds are high in my book for a big down draft on Monday into Tuesday next week. My target is 2205 on the S&P 500 (we’ll see) Tuesday. There are positive astros for a peak on Feb 10 with Mercury sextile Venus.  If we drop hard over the next 2 trading days, the pattern would suggest a strong rebound rally to new highs by then, likely somewhere in the 2310’s.

Saturday, January 28, 2017

Silver Lining of the 'Violent, Stunning, Historic Collapse of Palladium' and How to Profit from It / Commodities / Palladium

By: The_Gold_Report

Palladium took a dive this week, and Chen Lin, author of the popular newsletter What Is Chen Buying, What Is Chen Selling?, explains what happened and how investors can profit from the drop.

This is President Trump's first week in office and a huge week for the stock market. However, not many noticed the palladium futures market experienced the "violent, stunning, historic collapse," according to the well-known market commentator Dennis Gartman, the "commodity king." Let's drill down to exactly what happened.

Saturday, January 28, 2017

Modern Delusions, Japan Thinks It Can Balance Its Budget / Economics / Japan Economy

By: John_Rubino

A recurring problem for most developed-world governments is explaining why last year’s plan didn’t work while convincing voters that this year’s new and improved plan will do the trick. This is especially tough when the new plan is pretty much the same as the old one and therefore just as likely to fail.

Saturday, January 28, 2017

SPX Support May be Broken / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017

By: Anthony_Cherniawski

SPX appears to be testing its Orthodox Broadening top trendline at 2293.00. It is trading in a narrower and narrower band that is only two points wide in the past hour. I expect it to break soon. The break would be an aggressive sell signal, not confirmed by the VIX or the Hi-Lo.

The daily Cycle top support, which appears to be broken is at 2293.32.

Friday, January 27, 2017

Lala Land FX Assumptions / Currencies / US Dollar

By: Ashraf_Laidi

The notion that Trump's planned protectionist measures (tariffs and border adjustment tax) will be USD-positive is founded on an unrealistic world - where Mexico, China and other US trading partners would just sit back and watch without any retaliatory action. We're not in the 1980s or 1990s when US trading partners operated in a closed world, unaccountable to any world free trade bodies.

Friday, January 27, 2017

Going Long The Euro Could Be The Trade Of 2017 / Currencies / Euro

By: John_Mauldin

BY JARED DILLIAN : For a long time now I've held the theory that you have to be completely insane to be a successful investor. Like, right out of your tree.

Let me put it this way: Just a few weeks ago we were all sure, 100% positive that the US dollar would continue to appreciate against the euro, because the Fed was more hawkish, and the ECB was going to have negative rates and QE forever.

Friday, January 27, 2017

The Recession-Proof Industry That Few Investors Know / Companies / Sector Analysis

By: John_Mauldin

BY PATRICK WATSON : Americans are pet crazy. Recent surveys show that more than two out of three Americans own some kind of pet. According to the ASPCA, almost half of American households own a dog and around a third are cat owners.

Demographics are also likely to boost pet ownership, as people who don’t have children are more likely to have pets. Therefore, the continued greying of baby boomers and the low birth rate among millennials means that growth in pets in the US is set to continue.

Friday, January 27, 2017

4 Investing Legends Predict Change In 2017 / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2017

By: John_Mauldin

Forecasting the New Year is a curious tradition. Much evidence suggests that no one does it both accurately and consistently, yet everyone keeps trying. Just as no war plan survives contact with the enemy, no investment plan survives contact with February.

But the real value of an annual forecast is strategic. It helps you set priorities, define important issues, and think about what you should anticipate and what you can safely ignore. That’s a good exercise to go through periodically, and January is as good a time as any.

Friday, January 27, 2017

Silver Stocks’ New Upleg / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017

By: Zeal_LLC

The silver miners’ stocks have surged higher in this young new year, putting the Trumphoria general-stock rally to shame.  Following its fourth-quarter drubbing, this tiny contrarian sector is embarking on a major new upleg as traders return.  Silver-stock uplegs tend to grow to massive proportions, and silver-mining fundamentals remain strong today.  So odds are the silver stocks are going to power far higher in 2017.

Because silver stocks aren’t widely followed, most investors and speculators are unaware of this sector’s stellar upside potential.  Silver mining is a challenging business both geologically and economically, so there aren’t many primary silver miners out there.  And their stocks’ collective market capitalization is small, a rounding error compared to the broader stock markets.  That doesn’t leave much room for funds to buy.

Friday, January 27, 2017

Bitcoin Price Above Resistance / Currencies / Bitcoin

By: Mike_McAra

In short: no speculative positions.
The recent drop in Bitcoin volatility is widely attributed to developments in China. On Bloomberg, we read:

Bitcoin's volatility has plunged since China banned leveraged trading and forced exchanges to charge fees.

Perhaps more meaningfully, trading volume has plunged 98 percent compared with the first days of 2017, according to data from bitcoinity.org. On Jan. 1, when bitcoin traded at $1,012.3, 4.8 million coins exchanged hands. On Wednesday, only 80,092 did. Sure, many Chinese investors, who still represent the lion's share of trading, are away from their desks because of the Lunar New Year. Still, the speed and pattern of the decline make it hard not to draw a line to the regulatory action.

Friday, January 27, 2017

BEA Estimates US 4th Quarter 2016 GDP at 1.87% / Economics / US Economy

By: CMI

In their first (preliminary) estimate of the US GDP for the fourth quarter of 2016, the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) reported that the US economic growth rate was +1.87%, down by nearly half (-1.66%) from the prior quarter.

The quarter to quarter decline in the headline growth rate came from a number of sources: the growth of consumer spending on services was more than halved (down -0.68%), exports went into contraction (off a dramatic -1.69%) and imports were down yet another -0.86%. Partially offsetting those declines were upticks in consumer spending on goods (up +0.34%), and increases in the growth rate for commercial fixed investment (+0.65%) and inventories (+0.51%).

Friday, January 27, 2017

The Single Biggest Threat to Investing Success… and How to Manage It / Stock-Markets / Investing 2017

By: David_Galland

Dear Parader,

Have you ever encountered a rotten egg?

Remarkably, as someone who enjoys eggs with breakfast almost every day, I hadn’t.

At least until earlier this week when I came across my first, honest-to-goodness rotten egg. Or, should I say, it came across me—spraying out of the shell in all its rotten glory.

Friday, January 27, 2017

USD rebound cut short. SPX Flat / Stock-Markets / Stock Market 2017

By: Anthony_Cherniawski

Good Morning!

The overnight bounce in USD futures was stymied by the Durable Goods hard data that crushed the hopes of a rebound. A Wave [iii] may have begun.

Friday, January 27, 2017

Dow 20K, US Debt $20 Trillion, Trump and Gold / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017

By: GoldCore

by Jan Skoyles, Editor Mark O’Byrne

In case you’ve been hiding under a rock, the Dow Jones Industrial Average reached 20,000 earlier this week for the first time in its 132 year history to much media fanfare.

Friday, January 27, 2017

Basic Materials Stocks Sector Investing: Real Stuff Prices Are Rising / Commodities / Resources Investing

By: Rambus_Chartology

Tonight I would like to update the Basic Materials sector as this area now looks like it's ready to resume its bull market. Also with the stock markets breaking out today, especially the INDU, this adds another layer of confirmation that the breakout is the real deal. As we've discussed previously there are many big cap Dow stocks that make up the XLB, Basic Materials fund, and with the INDU making a new all time high today there will be some individual components making new all time highs as well.