Wednesday, January 16, 2019
It’s Not Polite, but I’m Pretty Pissed at the Fed / Interest-Rates / US Federal Reserve Bank
By: John_Mauldin
This essay is going to insult a bunch of smart, maybe even brilliant, people. It is not polite nor is it politically correct. I will try to be better. But right now, I am pretty pissed.
Here’s the thing.
No serious scientist would run a two-variable experiment. By that I mean, you run an experiment with one variable to see what happens.
If you have two variables and something happens—either good or bad—you don’t know which variable caused it.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, January 16, 2019
Gold Holds Steady Over £1,000 – Increased Likelihood Of A Disorderly Brexit / Commodities / Gold & Silver 2019
By: GoldCore
– Gold supported near $1,300/oz ahead of important British Brexit no-confidence vote
– Gold is consolidating in range between $1,280 and $1,300/oz (over £1,000/oz and €1,100/oz) – A break of resistance at $1,300 will likely see gold rise rapidly in all currencies
– Physical demand for gold coins and bars has picked up in the UK and Ireland, aided by Brexit uncertainty
Wednesday, January 16, 2019
One-year Savings Bond Rates Soar, While Five-year Deals Rise Modestly / Personal_Finance / Saving Bonds
By: MoneyFacts
Starting a new year can be a great time to review the top savings rates, and reassuringly, average rates on one-year fixed bonds have hit a four-year high, according to the latest research by Moneyfacts.co.uk. However, this encouraging start to 2019 has not been seen in the five-year fixed bond market, with rates (although rising) not rising at the same pace.
Statistics released today show the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) fell to 2.1% during December, meaning 94 fixed rate bonds and 6 fixed rate ISAs (based on a £10,000 deposit) can now match or beat inflation*. Within that, 82 fixed bonds and 4 fixed ISAs beat 2.1%, still a small share of the standard savings market.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, January 16, 2019
Gold Price – US$700 Or US$7000? / Commodities / Gold & Silver 2019
By: Kelsey_Williams
Does either of the above preclude the other? In other words, if we expect gold to reach $7000.00 per ounce, and we are correct, does that mean that we can’t reasonably expect gold to go as low as $700.00 per ounce? Conversely, if we are predicting or expecting gold to decline from its current level and even breach $1000.00 per ounce on the downside, can $7000.00 per ounce, or anything even remotely close to that number, be a reasonable possibility?
I do not think either one precludes the other. In fact, I think it is entirely possible that we can see bothfigures. And not necessarily spread over an inordinately long period of time, either.
Here is a possible scenario that would allow that to happen.
As the U.S dollar strengthens, the U.S. dollar price of gold declines. This is clearly evident in the price action of gold since its high point of approximately $1900.00 per ounce in 2011. There is no way to know for certain how long relative dollar strength will last. And it is reasonable that if ongoing dollar strength takes gold below $1000, it might come to rest somewhere between $860 – 890.00 per ounce. In January 1980, gold peaked at $850.00. Revisiting that number is plausible, and well within the realm of realistic speculation. And, yes, there are technical indicators that point to a gold price of as low as $700.00 per ounce.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, January 16, 2019
Rare earths deja vu: Chinese crackdown = higher prices / Commodities / Rare Earths
By: Richard_Mills
In a scene awfully familiar to those who follow the rare earths market, China is once again threatening to hatchet production of the valuable minerals used in high-tech, renewable energy and military applications.
Last week it was reported that the Chinese government published new guidelines designed to eliminate illegal mining and encourage more high-end processing. Those sterile words are code for “less polluting”.
Shutting down illegal rare earth mines is nothing new to the Chinese, who have found that the process of extracting rare earth oxides from ore and refining them into useable products has come at a high price to the environment.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, January 16, 2019
Commodities Are the Right Story for 2019 / Commodities / Commodities Trading
By: Richard_Mills
The markets are up and down like a bride's nightgown, as my dad used to say, bitcoin is in the toilet, and tech stocks, once as steady as the banks, are as unreliable as an old Apple computer. If you’re reluctant to dip your toe back into the stock market, you’re not alone.
‘The Hunt for Red October’ was a great movie but nobody thought ‘Red October’ would actually happen. In October it did. Anyone that was invested saw their equities turn as red as a Russian submarine commander. The S&P 500 churned. When the calendar mercifully turned to November, the benchmark US stock index had fallen 8.5%, the worst month since February 2009 and the ugliest October since the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008. The Dow and the Nasdaq were equally pummeled.
And then it kept going. December was the worst month since the Great Depression. The financial talking heads couldn’t decide what was going on. The trade war with China, speculation that the Federal Reserve would raise interest rates in December (it did) and slowing global growth, were all trotted out as culprits. Algorithmic trading and end-of-the-year tax selling also played a role, as did good old profit-taking by retail investors, who figured it was as good a time as any to exit a nine-year bull market.
Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, January 16, 2019
Look Inside Letoonia Club Hotel Resort Bungalow Rooms - Turkey Holidays 2019 / Personal_Finance / Holidays
By: Anika_Walayat
Planning a trip to the Dalaman / Fethiye area of Turkey during 2019? Well here's what a look inside the Bungalow rooms at the popular Letoonia Club Hotel Resort, situated about 40 miles south of Dalaman and across the bay from the city of Fethiye. As we check out what several rooms are like in terms of space, facities and of course beds.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
Bitcoin Price Wavers / Currencies / Bitcoin
By: Mike_McAra
If Bitcoin bulls got excited about the recent move up, Thursday’s action extinguished some of this excitement. But it doesn’t come as a surprise to our readers. This one day of strong depreciation can be seen as an indication of things to come. But are these things bearish?
Bitcoin remains on the fringe of the financial system. The Bank of International Settlements (BIS) has recently issued a warning on Bitcoin. In an article on the Forbes website, we read:
In another blow to bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, BIS warned investors and traders that they could lose money on privately minted cryptocurrencies like bitcoin.
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
History Shows That “Disruptor Stocks” Will Make You the Most Money in a Bear Market / Companies / Tech Stocks
By: Stephen_McBride
“Sell everything, I can’t take anymore!”My stockbroker friend got a phone call from a hysterical client on Christmas Eve.
She was panicking over all the money she had lost in the market—and demanded to sell her whole stock portfolio.
As you know, December was horrendous for US markets. The S&P fell 10%. It was its worst December since 1931 during the Great Depression. In fact, it was the S&P’s worst month overall since February 2009.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
US Border Barrier Solution / Politics / US Politics
By: BATR
Rational discourse has been the overriding casualty of the border war. The break down in language is more than semantics. It has elevated into a divergence of culture that no longer shares a common value system or a cherished dream. The camps of discontent reside in separate and distinct jurisdictions. Government has failed at every level. People have become so polarized that trust in a community of citizens has been discarded for the purity of totalitarian globalism. The continued controversy over a border barrier differentiates more than a line between two countries.
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
What Will the Stock Market Do Around Earnings Season / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2019
By: Troy_Bombardia
The U.S. stock market has done well throughout the first half of January 2019. With earnings season just ahead and the stock market under its 200 day moving average, the high probability of a pullback/retest remains.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
2018-2019 Pop Goes The Debt Bubble / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2019
By: Darryl_R_Schoon
Fiat paper money: Once gold and silver derivatives
Today, instruments of debt issued by central banks
After the 2008 financial crisis, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke invoked Milton Friedman’s theory that a helicopter drop of money could prevent a collapsing credit bubble from becoming a Great Depression.
When credit bubbles burst, defaulting debt and disappearing demand cause the velocity of money to plunge; and, in 2008, Bernanke resorted to Friedman’s untested theory hoping to prevent the US economy from collapsing as it did in the 1930s.
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
Are Global Stock Markets About To Rally 10 Percent? / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2019
By: Chris_Vermeulen
Technical Traders Ltd. is issuing new analysis which indicates the US and global markets may be poised for a dramatic upside price swing over the next couple. Recent events have driven asset class values to new valuations that may change the dynamics of markets for a few months. Prior to August/September 2018, many traders were fearful of the expectations of the US Federal Reserve, Global Trade Issues and the US Elections. Combine this with the end of the year liquidity issues and the threat of a US government shutdown over the wall funding and we have almost a perfect storm brewing for uncertainty and fear.
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
Here's something to make you money in 2019 / InvestorEducation / Learn to Trade
By: Submission
Want to make a extra income in 2019
There’s a chance you may have missed the message we just sent you!
Don’t worry if you haven’t had a look at it yet – I’ve attached a small snippet of what you’ll find inside below:
Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
Theresa May to Lose by Over 200 Votes as Remain MP's Plot Subverting Brexit / Politics / BrExit
By: Nadeem_Walayat
Parliament looks set to deliver Theresa May an humiliating defeat in today's vote in the House of Commons on her dogs dinner "EU Withdrawal Act" at around 6pm. Theresa May requires 320 MP's to vote for her deal to get it through the House of Commons, with the mainstream media consensus pointing towards Theresa May only being able to secure support from between 190 to 200 MP's.
However, don't be under any illusion that May's deal is anything other than complete GARBAGE, which gives the EU £39 billion for NOTHING In return! And then there is the 'backstop' or more accurately the 'backstab', a means to ensure that the UK can NEVER LEAVE the EU without the EU's permission! And where Northern Ireland is concerned it's simple, the EU gives the NI £380mln per year, whilst the UK government gives Northern Ireland a £11 billion block grant per year, so it does not take a genius to figure out on which side the bread is buttered!
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, January 14, 2019
Europe is Burning / Politics / European Union
By: Raul_I_Meijer
There will be elections for the European Parliament on May 23-26 2019. They will likely change the face of Europe more than anything has done since the EU was founded. That is not some wild prediction. Many European countries have held elections since the last European elections in 2014, and just about all had outcomes that shook up domestic political ratios.
In most cases, countries went from traditional parties to newly founded ones. France erased the Socialists and center-right in 2017, and the final round of the presidential elections was between Marine Le Pen’s Front National and Emmanuel Macron’s brand-new En Marche. Macron won sort of by default, because France as a country would never have voted for Le Pen.
In Italy, M5S and Lega have taken over. In Germany, Merkel’s CDU/CSU coalition lost bigly though it remained the biggest party, but Angela lost her ‘socialist’ SPD partner which gave up so much it didn’t want to be in government anymore. In Spain, Mariano Rajoy’s center right lost enough to cede power to the Socialists who came up tops because they played a smart game, not because the Spanish wanted it to rule.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, January 14, 2019
Has the Fed Already Gone Too Far? / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
By: Michael_Pento
It is crucial for investors to understand that the Federal Reserve has not yet turned dovish and the Fed “Put” it not yet in place. Wall Street sometimes hears what it desperately needs, but that does not make it fact. While Jerome Powell has moved incrementally towards the dovish side of the ledger in the past few weeks, the Fed is still firmly in hawkish territory. If, however, Mr. Powell was actively reducing the Fed Funds Rate (FFR) and expanding the balance sheet, then we would have a dovish Fed. However, by just indicating that the FOMC might be close to finishing its rate hiking campaign, while still selling nearly $50 billion of bonds every month from its balance sheet, the Fed is still tightening monetary policy--and in a big way.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, January 14, 2019
New Shortfall in Production Capacity for Fabricated Silver and Gold / Commodities / Gold & Silver 2019
By: MoneyMetals
The two largest private producers of bullion bars and rounds in the U.S. have gone defunct over the past two years. Premiums for silver bars and rounds are already on the rise as markets adjust to the lack of supply.At present, demand for these products is manageable. A surge in buying activity, however, could lead to serious difficulty finding low-premium products.
Monday, January 14, 2019
S&P 500 Bounces Off 2,600, Downward Reversal? / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2019
By: Arkadiusz_Sieron
Stocks were little changed on Friday, as investors hesitated following the recent rally. The broad stock market has retraced its recent decline following the S&P 500's breakdown below 2,600. Will the short-term uptrend continue? Or is this still just an upward correction before another leg lower?
The U.S. stock market indexes were mixed between -0.2% and 0.0% on Friday, as investors hesitated following the recent advance. The broad stock market has retraced its recent decline following the S&P 500's breakdown below 2,600. It continued its recent rebound off the December the 26th medium-term low of 2,346.58 recently. The index traded 20.2% below September the 21st record high of 2,940.91 on that day. Then the market rallied and retraced some of the downtrend. It got very close to 2,600 mark again. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was unchanged and the Nasdaq Composite lost 0.2% on Friday.
Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, January 14, 2019
Gold A Rally or a Bull Market? / Commodities / Gold & Silver 2019
By: Jordan_Roy_Byrne
Although the financial media conflates the two, there is a difference between a rally and a bull market.
A rally implies a rebound after or a reprieve from weakness. A bull market is higher highs and higher lows for a period of at least a few years.
Gold’s strength in the 2000s was not a rally, as many have deemed it, but a bull market. Gold’s rebound in 2016 was a rally.
Nevermind the Gold pundits who insist Gold is in an invisible or stealth bull market or even a correction. A market that pops for seven months then doesn’t make a new high for almost two and a half years is not a bull market.
Read full article... Read full article...