Friday, June 26, 2015
Extreme Gold/Silver Shorting / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
Gold and silver are languishing near major lows, trudging through the barren sentiment wasteland of the summer doldrums. The major factor behind this weakness is extreme shorting by American futures speculators. But their heavily-bearish bets are actually very bullish for both precious metals. Not only do these traders as a herd always bet wrong at price extremes, their shorts are guaranteed near-future buying.
American futures speculators’ trading has utterly dominated gold and silver price action in recent years. This single group of traders doesn’t normally wield such outsized influence. But with Western investors largely missing in action since early 2013, futures speculators have gone unchallenged. Couple this with the extreme leverage inherent in futures trading, and its stranglehold on gold and silver prices is ironclad.
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Friday, June 26, 2015
Bitcoin Situation Getting Tenser / Currencies / Bitcoin
In short: no speculative positions.
Bitcoin is getting more and more attention from the banks and exchanges but it still remains relatively unknown to consumers, we read on CoinDesk:
A new survey published by Goldman Sachs has found that just over half of US millennials believe they will never use bitcoin.
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Friday, June 26, 2015
QM and XLE Energy Sector Charts Analysis / Commodities / Energy Resources
It’s starting to look more and more likely that the counter trend bounce in oil (and commodities) may be over. If so then my expectation is that oil will test $35 at some point before the 3 year cycle low is complete.
I was expecting a little more out of the bear market rally. Possibly a move to the mid 60’s before heading back down, but it’s looking more and more likely that oil is going to come up short of my original expectation and traders should probably now start looking for lower prices than hoping for one more pop higher.
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Friday, June 26, 2015
USD Daily, Weekly, Monthly & Conclusions / Currencies / US Dollar
USD has been in correction since the hysterical March top. The daily chart shows a series of lower highs and lower lows that was interrupted last week when USD failed to make a lower low, Hammered and bounced… right to the EMA and SMA 50’s.
So we remain on watch for a) a higher high or b) a lower low. It’s very simple. As it stands, the near-term is bearish until it proves bullish, not the other way around. That is because the existing trend is down (AROON, bottom Panel).
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Friday, June 26, 2015
Gold Price Target of USD 2,300 / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
- “Gold remains in secular bull market”
- System is addicted to unsustainable debt
- Persistent deflationary forces threaten system
- Monetary authorities to take increasingly risky measures to engender inflation
- Debt based monetary system is crux of problem
- “All available means” deployed to prevent global government bond bubble from bursting
- Aversion to owning any gold whatsoever displays “ignorance of monetary history”
- Gold’s qualities as store of value and medium of exchange to be “rediscovered”
- Have “gold price target of USD 2,300” in three years
Friday, June 26, 2015
Stock Market - Why I am Ultra Bearish over the Long Term / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2015
Some interesting developments are playing out in long term charts that make me feel comprehensively bearish over the long term:
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Friday, June 26, 2015
EU Migration Crisis Solution - Settle Migrants in Depopulated Eastern Europe, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia / Politics / European Union
Over 1 million people will succeed in their attempts to migrate to the European Union this year alone (2015), where whilst first port of call is Spain, Italy, France, and Greece, who soon funnel migrants northwards to the UK, Germany, Netherlands etc.
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Friday, June 26, 2015
Stocks and the Slippery Roads For the Rickshaw Economy / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2015
Stocks were weak Thursday on the 'better than expected' consumer spending number.
Jobs remain weak, despite the spin about The Recovery™.
There are jobs that will provide a poverty wage, and workers are increasingly insecure in an on-demand, rickshaw economy.
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Friday, June 26, 2015
Gold and Silver - Another Successful Option Expiration For the Insiders / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2015
The Bucket Shop managed to hold gold below the 1180 level, thereby allowing most of the calls for the option expiration to go out worthless. Oh well done.
There was intraday commentary about the Greek situation which may be actually coming to some sort of resolution over the next few weeks. You may read that here.
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Friday, June 26, 2015
Greece - The People Must Be Overthrown / Politics / Euro-Zone
Perhaps I should apologize for writing about Greece all the time. Thing is, not only have I just arrived in Athens last night (and been duly showered in ouzo), but Greece is the proverbial early harbinger of everything that’s wrong with the world (not to worry, I know that’s a hyperbole), and of everything that could be done about it.
That places a responsibility on the shoulders of Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras and his team that maybe they don’t want, and for all I know don’t deserve either. But they’re all we have, and besides, they’re all their own people have. In that sense, this is not about everything that’s wrong with the world, other than that’s the same as everything that’s wrong with Greece.
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Friday, June 26, 2015
Why Buffett Bet A Billion On Solar Energy / Commodities / Solar Energy
Miles Per Acre Per YearDuring the late innings of the ICE-age (as in the Internal Combustion Engine age) it has become clear that feeding gasoline and diesel to the next billion new cars is not going to be easy, or cheap. In China alone, 500 million new vehicles can be expected to jam the roads between now and 2030.
That may sound far-fetched but considering annual sales have already made it to 25 million units per year (vs. around 17 million in the U.S. – China became the top market in 2009), it only requires a 4 percent growth rate to reach that target in fifteen years.
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Friday, June 26, 2015
How Companies Are Using PIP To Humiliate and Get Rid of Workers / Politics / Employment
In my last two posts, I talked about why hiring now takes longer and how some companies use interview to score free consult from job applicants, today I'd like to discuss the increasing popularity of PIP. This is not your forex trading pip, PIP in the corporate lingo means Performance Improvement Plan.
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Thursday, June 25, 2015
Why Banks Rob Depositors: "Because That's Where the Money Is" / Politics / Banksters
One of America's most notorious bank robbers, Willie Sutton (1901-80), is said to have remarked that he robbed banks "because that's where the money is." In a strange twist, the banks themselves are now beginning literally to rob their own customers.
The theft occurs via the innovative practice of "paying" (i.e. "charging") negative interest rates on savings and checking account balances combined with account maintenance fees. Cash strapped Greece is looking to go even further – charging customers for daring to withdraw cash! So what gives here?
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Thursday, June 25, 2015
Chinese Stocks: "How to Think Like a Billionaire Investor" / Stock-Markets / Chinese Stock Market
What's next for the high-flying Shanghai Composite?
With China's main Shanghai Composite index up almost 40% this year, and the tech-heavy Shenzhen Composite index up more than 90% YTD, are Chinese stocks in a bubble?
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Thursday, June 25, 2015
Fed Taper Talk, And The $10 Bill / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
Since May 2013, Fed taper talk has fluctuated between hot and cold. When it’s hot, the markets anticipate a monetary tightening and prices become volatile.
Recently, speculation about just when the Fed will increase interest rates has reared its head, again. Since early 2013, I have said that the Fed would not act until late 2015. Well, it’s now approaching that date and I think the Fed will act, but later, rather than earlier.
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Thursday, June 25, 2015
When a Bond Is Not a Bond / Interest-Rates / International Bond Market
By Jared Dillian
I don’t know anything about Greece. I actually make it a point not to.
What I’ve found over the course of my career is that the closer people get to an issue, the worse their predictive power is. The forest-for-the-trees phenomenon. Like all the economists who do nothing but watch the Fed, every piece of data, every speech. Their track record in predicting interest rate moves is worse than everyone else’s!
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Thursday, June 25, 2015
Nature Rebounds - Trends in America Portend a Global Restoration of Nature / Politics / Environmental Issues
The common meme in today’s world is that we are slowly (or perhaps even rapidly in some instances) destroying our global environment. Not just by way of global warming, but pollution, over-farming, water usage, and increasing use of all sorts of resources taken from the ground. Post-apocalyptic movies and books are the rage, showing us living in a world where man has ravaged his environment and our lives have been degraded if not destroyed. Our failure to deal with global warming and the destruction of the environment are key components of the mantra repeated by the mainstream media, pundits, and politicians.
Technology is supposed to somehow save us from our dystopian future by creating new ways to clean the environment, feed us, and help us become more thrifty and less wasteful. But when? When will we see those breakthroughs, that light at the end of the tunnel?
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Thursday, June 25, 2015
Stocks That Profit... Even When You're Dead Wrong / Companies / Investing 2015
Porter Stansberry writes: Today, I'm going to cover a powerful investment secret that took me two decades of reading and thinking to figure out.
This investment secret will show you how to build a portfolio that I believe will make you money in almost any market condition. The ideas in today's essay will allow you to make money in the stock market even when you're bearish or afraid of stocks in general. And here's the best part: These ideas will also show you how to outperform in bull markets.
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Thursday, June 25, 2015
Dumping the Euro Isn’t a Cure-All: Easy Money Lets Governments Avoid Free-Market Reforms / Economics / Euro-Zone
The Greek drama continues to unfold with the risk of “grexit” becoming increasingly likely. Yet, a large majority of the Greek people want to keep the euro. This, however, would require the Greek government to live within its means — something it has not been able to do for decades. With anti-austerity parties gaining strength continent wide, Greece may be the first, but not the last, to leave.
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Thursday, June 25, 2015
When Will US Debt Hit the Wall? / Interest-Rates / US Debt
As I see it, the following are true:
- Debt is increasing far more rapidly than growth in the underlying economies that must support that debt. Although this is also true in Japan, the UK, and Europe, I’ll focus on the US.
- Revenue is increasing but less rapidly than debt. This is a problem.
- There will come a time when the interest payments on exponentially increasing government debt will exceed what the economy can support. Call that point “hitting the wall.”
- Higher interest rates will cause the US economy to “hit the wall” sooner. Lower interest rates merely delay the “day of reckoning.”