Financial sanity and stability may not return, but we can protect our assets and learn from the discussion. The Dow, S&P 500, Nasdaq and other markets sell at all-time highs. However, many imbalances exist within our financial world. This is not new – things have been crazy before, are now, and will be again. But to regain financial sanity we need: From “Doug Casey on the New Fed Chair” “In an ideal world, there would be some radical changes. The best thing for the US in the (famous) long run is to go “cold turkey.” To abolish the Federal Reserve, fire its thousands of employees with their worthless PhDs. Return to 100% rese...
Gold prices rose $9.84 on Tuesday as the dollar continued to fall on the first trading day of the new year. XAU/USD traded as high as $1321.34 an ounce, the highest level in 16 weeks, in early Asian session today. The slumping dollar is a bullish underlying element, but it seems that the market is stalling near the $1321 level. The dollar has already significantly weakened recently, so we can see some profit taking in the short term. XAU/USD is trading above the Ichimoku clouds on almost all time frames, suggesting that the market is likely to continue to benefit from the bullish long-term outlook. We have positively aligned Tenkan-sen (nine-...
FRBNY’s December 2017 Primary Dealer survey results aren’t yet published, so we will have to wait a few days for the collection of those banks’ economists to tell us what they think their own traders likely won’t do. It’s a mess in that situation, but one as old as the crisis. Nevertheless, Economists for some reason still occupy prime slots in mainstream commentary opining about a great many things often year after year (after year). One such is Blackstone Group’s Byron Wien. Mr. Wien is well-known throughout Wall Street and not just as the firm’s current Vice Chairman. He has a long and storied career in high NYC finance, havi...
EUR/USD 4 hour The EUR/USD uptrend broke above the 1.20 round level resistance which now could become used as a potential support zone (green lines). There are also two support trend lines that could keep price from falling. The bearish wave count from yesterday has been invalidated and a bullish wave 3 (pink) is becoming more likely, but a break above the previous top is still needed (red). 1 hour The EUR/USD stopped at the previous top (red) and is building a correction. The sideways movement could be part of a wave 4 (blue) which typically retraces to a shallower Fibonacci level. GBP/USD 4 hour The GBP/USD bullish momentum keeps pushing hi...
Central banks are now trapped. In a nutshell, central banks are promising to “normalize” their monetary policy extremes in 2018. Nice, but there’s a problem: you can’t “normalize” markets that are now entirely dependent on extremes of monetary stimulus. Attempts to “normalize” will break the markets and the financial system. Let’s start with the core dynamic of the global economy and nosebleed-valuation markets: credit. Modern finance has many complex moving parts, and this complexity masks its inner simplicity. Let’s break down the core dynamics of the current financial system. The Cor...
Central banks are now trapped. In a nutshell, central banks are promising to “normalize” their monetary policy extremes in 2018. Nice, but there’s a problem: you can’t “normalize” markets that are now entirely dependent on extremes of monetary stimulus. Attempts to “normalize” will break the markets and the financial system. Let’s start with the core dynamic of the global economy and nosebleed-valuation markets: credit. Modern finance has many complex moving parts, and this complexity masks its inner simplicity. Let’s break down the core dynamics of the current financial system. The Cor...
USD/CAD stays below a bearish trend line on the 4-hour chart and remains in downtrend from 1.2920. As long as the trend line resistance holds, the downtrend could be expected to continue and next target would be at 1.2400 area. Near term resistance is at the trend line and the key resistance is at 1.2600, only break above this level could signal completion of the downtrend....
The last six months have seen an almost unprecedented surge in world macroeconomic data upside-beats as the so-called ‘global coordinated growth’ narrative surprised more dismal economists. Until recently, The Baltic Dry shipping index had confirmed that narrative… But The Baltic Dry Index has dropped for 8 straight days, tumbling over 21% – the biggest drop since Jan 2015… While there is seasonality in the index, this is a notable decoupling… (as Bloomberg notes, peak season typically boosts trade volume and pricing, benefiting liners. The industry’s slack capacity remains a drag on rate increase...
It’s time again for our weekly gasoline update based on data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA). The price of Regular and Premium were up a nickel each from last week. According to GasBuddy.com, Hawaii has the highest average price for Regular at $3.23 and San Francisco, CA is the most expensive city, averaging $3.21. Oklahoma has the cheapest at $2.17. The WTIC end of day spot price closed at 60.37, a 0.7% increase from this time last week and its highest in 18 months. How far are we from the interim high prices of 2011 and the all-time highs of 2008? Here’s a visual answer. The next chart is a monthly chart ove...
Wednesday’s stock picks Take a look at three trading ideas to prep you for the next trading session. Long International Paper (IP) Long Forum Energy Technologies (FET) Short Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL)...