Wednesday, December 02, 2015
U.S. Treasury Secretary Makes Sad Admission about Coinage Devaluation / Currencies / Fiat Currency
Traders are bidding up the U.S. dollar and dumping metals as they become more convinced that the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates at its next meeting. Janet Yellen and company have been talking about raising rates for the better part of a year, though. All talk and no action so far.
Will they finally hike or keep crying wolf? We'll find out when the Fed meets on December 15-16.
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Wednesday, December 02, 2015
The Economic Costs of Terrorism Hit an All-Time Peak / Politics / War on Terror
The world can change quickly, and last week it did. The most immediate and heartbreaking impacts of the Paris attacks were suffered by the victims themselves and their families, but from there the ripples of terror spread outward around the world.
The Paris events didn’t happen in isolation. Recent bombings in Lebanon, Iraq, Mali, and Nigeria, plus the Russian airline disaster, showed us how far evil can reach.
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Wednesday, December 02, 2015
It Will Take Trillions of Euros to Save the European Union / Politics / European Union
The EU’s political leaders and other elites are committed to holding the European Union together. To them, united Europe is an article of faith. They hold the idea with as much ferocity and fervor as any religious belief. But while the European Union is a wonderful political idea, it’s economically terrible. And the EU nations will have to face up to bearing enormous costs to save the Europe we wished for.
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Wednesday, December 02, 2015
Gold COTs Most Bullish for 14 Years, Call for a Sizeable Tradable Rally Soon... / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
There is no need to mince words or beat around the bush with this update. The latest COTs for gold released yesterday showed another marked improvement so that they are now strongly and unequivocally bullish - in fact they are at their most positive since late 2001, that's 14 years.
We are not going to waste our time trying to figure out the reason or reasons for this, but possibly this situation suggests that the Fed is not going to raise rates this month as widely expected. If they don't, the dollar, which has wafted back to its highs on this expectation, will drop and the PM sector will rally.
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Wednesday, December 02, 2015
Merk Markets, US Dollar and Gold Outlook 2016 / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2016
Up! Buy the dips! What could possibly go wrong? A hell of a lot, actually, so investors might want to take precautions before, rather after, bad things happen to one's portfolio. We take a stab at where one may find opportunities in 2016.
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Wednesday, December 02, 2015
Gold Price is Nearing Record Low – When to Buy? / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
The price of gold has been under intense pressure over the last few weeks as expectations about the increase of the U.S. interest rates continue to rise. The Federal Reserve is expected to make an announcement soon with regard to this matter and several financial reviews believe that an uptick could come as early as this month.
This has helped to push the price of Gold close to its 5-year low of $1,056. However, in the last few days, the price of the yellow metal appears to have hit a turning point with some investors convinced that the expected interest rate hike has already been tacked into the bin.
Wednesday, December 02, 2015
Does the Financial Sector's Strength Drive the Gold Price? / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
The price of gold is determined mainly through changes in the general level of confidence in the Fed and the U.S. economy. This is why the U.S. dollar exchange rate (and the Forex market in general) has such strong influence on the yellow metal. As one can see in the chart below, gold is leveraged to the misfortune of major global fiat money. Each time confidence in the U.S. dollar increases, like in the 1980s and 1990s, the attractiveness of gold declines. Conversely, each time the U.S. economy and its currency prospects stumble, people are reminded of the extraordinary properties of gold.
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Wednesday, December 02, 2015
How Money Disappears in a Fractional-Reserve Money System / Currencies / Fiat Currency
Most experts are of the view that the massive monetary pumping by the US central bank during the 2008 financial crisis saved the US and the world from another Great Depression. On this the Federal Reserve Chairman at the time Ben Bernanke is considered the man that saved the world. Bernanke in turn attributes his actions to the writings of Professor Milton Friedman who blamed the Federal Reserve for causing the Great Depression of 1930s by allowing the money supply to plunge by over 30 percent.
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Wednesday, December 02, 2015
Putin’s Revenge? The Fight for Syria's Nothern Border / Politics / Syria
“We have received additional information confirming that the oil controlled by Islamic State militants (ISIS) enters Turkish territory on an industrial scale. We have every reason to believe that the decision to down our plane was guided by a desire to ensure the security of this oil’s delivery routes to ports where they are shipped in tankers.” –Russian President Vladimir Putin, Paris, 11-30-15
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Wednesday, December 02, 2015
Stock Market Blue Skies, Unicorns, and Santa Claus Rallies / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2015
"Unhappy events abroad have retaught us two simple truths about the liberty of a democratic people.
The first truth is that the liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is Fascism—ownership of Government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power.
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Wednesday, December 02, 2015
Stock Market Correction Nearing Its End... / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2015
What appears to be a final fifth wave has appeared, morphing the former double zigzag into an a-b-c Wave 2…
…that is, if it reverses very soon. You see, Wave (iii), which is 18.39 points long, cannot be the smallest wave in the series. That may happen if the SPX peaks above 2105.16. So the issue remains unresolved until morning.
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Wednesday, December 02, 2015
Renewable Green Energy Bankruptcies / Politics / Renewable Energy
With the approach of the much ballyhooed Paris Climate Summit, the world is being conditioned to accept the spread of the renewable energy gospel. As shams go this one is a doozy. Absent from the filtered media coverage is the actual record of failure and fraud that produces more bankruptcies than usable energy. Hold onto your socks, the waste of public money is about to accelerate. All these projects will enrich the few, while soaking the multitude. Aye, global warming is such a blessing . . .
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Tuesday, December 01, 2015
Financial Markets are a Psychological Phenomenon - Video / InvestorEducation / Trader Psychology
Interview with Robert Prechter
Watch this 2-minute video where Robert Prechter talks about his developing theory on finance with Douglass Lodmell for The Mind Of Money series.
Since then, Bob has been hard at work on his new book about his now fully developed theory on finance (scheduled for completion in 2016).
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Tuesday, December 01, 2015
Fed's Yellen Running Out of Makeup - Video / Interest-Rates / US Federal Reserve Bank
It's Tuesday before non-farm payroll which is coming out on Friday but it's been an interesting day in the markets we've had some interesting data in the us- the manufacturing I assume PM. number came out of 48 points, was forecast to come out and it dropped from 50 the previous month so that's quite a big drop in its below 50 which means a contraction so if you look at the headlines on Zero Hedge for example today we've had some interesting headlines about the US economy one of them says Atlanta Federal Reserve slashes fourth-quarter GDP forecast from 2.3 to 1.4.
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Tuesday, December 01, 2015
U.S. Dollar Remains the reserve currency of the world for a good reason / Currencies / US Dollar
U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew spoke with Brendan Greeley on Bloomberg TV's new flagship morning program, Bloomberg <GO>. Lew discussed how government can address the lack of access to banking in the United States, financial services' rules and regulations and the benefits of Dodd-Frank.
On the IMF elevated the Chinese yuan, Lew said: "The U.S. dollar remains the reserve currency of the world for a good reason." He added: "We've also had long, ongoing discussions with China about their currency practices. They have made commitments to us that will not intervene in ways that are unfair. And those are important commitments. And they know that we're going to hold them to those commitments."
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Tuesday, December 01, 2015
SPX Does a Double Zigzag Correction / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2015
SPX appears to have formed a double zigzag correction, usually rare for a Wave 2. Crossing the hourly mid-Cycle support at 2078.65 may confirm that observation.
This may be an ideal aggressive short entry if you have any dry powder or if you have been stopped out. Otherwise we wait for the confirmations at lower levels.
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Tuesday, December 01, 2015
The Demographic Nightmare Caused by Gender Selection / Politics / Demographics
I took a year off after college. I don’t remember it having a cool name like “gap year” back then. Most people considered it goofing off. I spent the summer and fall on the coast in Florida waiting tables, then moved out west to Jackson Hole, WY for the ski season. I worked at a hotel at night and skied during the day. It was a modest existence, no doubt, but it was also just as awesome as it sounds.Back then Jackson Hole was still a hole. The airport had not been expanded, so there was no large jet service. However, changes were already happening. It was clear the place was about to explode. The owner of the hotel at which I worked called me into his office at the end of season. He offered me a job as a real estate agent, working with him selling vacation properties to tourists.
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Tuesday, December 01, 2015
Why We Won’t See Gold $5,000 / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
I have so many bets on the go with gold bugs like Porter Stansberry (Stansberry Research) and Jeff Clark at Casey Research… and I just keep winning ‘em.That’s something to be happy about, right?
But I’m more pained than happy about it because, when I debate these guys (including Peter Schiff), we all agree that we’re in an unprecedented debt and financial bubble with QE adding kerosene to the fire. We all agree that things are about to end very badly.
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Tuesday, December 01, 2015
U.S. Mint Gold Eagles See Sales Surge, Silver at Record / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
“The U.S. Mint’s sales of American Eagle coins surged in November, with gold nearly tripling month-over-month and silver already reaching a new annual record as bullion prices fell to multi-year lows” reported Reuters.
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Tuesday, December 01, 2015
Gold Price and Stocks Divergence / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
This appears to be the only time in this bear market that miners are diverging form the price of gold as it moves down into the intermediate cycle low.
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