Thursday, April 25, 2019
If This Pattern Holds True, the US Economy Could Face the Worst Stagnation in History / Economics / Great Depression II
By: John_Mauldin
I recently made a case that the Fed’s monetary policy is turning Japanese. Let’s examine how that worked for them.
From one perspective, it has done quite well. From another, they have paid a cost.
Is it worth it? I think many Japanese, likely a big majority, would say yes.
An Economic Miracle?
The Bank of Japan has more than 140% of Japanese GDP on its balance sheet.
Its laws let it buy equities not just in Japan but all over the world and it did. Yet the currency is roughly the same value as it was when the Bank of Japan got busy with that project.
Thursday, April 25, 2019
8 Reasons Why Investment in Education Always Pays Off / Personal_Finance / Student Finances
By: Submissions
University brings about so much imagination within us. Secondary school is over and we think of furthering our education and obtaining the great successes that await us. It seems anything can be possible as we transition into adulting. Picture having the help of an Oxbridge diploma with the highest accolades. Companies scrambling to offer the best career opportunities and suddenly the corporate ladder seems to be much shorter. But then we consider all the baggage that comes with uni. The need to find time for assignments, devoting 4+ years of life to courses, and the cost of a quality education in the UK is quite substantial. With skyrocketing tuition, many wonder if the financial investment for a degree makes sense. For those of you on the fence about higher education, let’s take a look at 8 reasons why an investment in education will always pay off.
“He who opens a school door, closes a prison.“ – Victor Hugo
Wednesday, April 24, 2019
Want To Earn A Safe 5% In Fixed Income? Buy Preferred Stocks / Companies / Dividends
By: Robert_Foss
Chances are you’re overlooking an entire class of safe, high-yield stocks…These stocks have dividend yields averaging 5.7%. Yet very few retail investors own them.
That’s a shame. It means you’re probably leaving a lot of (predictable) money on the table—a thought income investors should cringe at.
If you haven’t figured it out already, I’m talking about preferred stocks, the bond-like cousin of ordinary “common stocks.”
As I’ll explain, today’s interest rate environment makes now a great time to buy preferred stocks.
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Wednesday, April 24, 2019
Spring Has Arrived. Will Gold also Bloom? / Commodities / Gold & Silver 2019
By: Arkadiusz_Sieron
Recent positive news suggest the US economy spring revival. But what about gold? Will it blossom? Will the gold love trade take reins from gold as a safe haven play?
Retail Sales Surge
Last week, the government has released its latest report on the retail sector. The retail sales jumped 1.6 percent in March, the best results since September 2017, as one can see in the chart below. The change was above expectations (the economists polled by MarketWatch forecasted sales to climb 1.1 percent) and it was solid (0.9 percent) even if we set gas and autos aside.
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Wednesday, April 24, 2019
Can Saudi Arabia Still Sway The Oil Market? / Commodities / Crude Oil
By: OilPrice_Com
Saudi Arabia, the world’s top oil exporter and OPEC's largest producer, has influenced the oil market and oil flows since the middle of the 20th century.
Shortly after the 21st century began, one of Saudi Arabia's key customers made its first steps toward becoming one of the Kingdom's main competitors on the global oil market: the United States began fracking for oil in the mid-2000s. By the end of the 2010s, the U.S. is now the world's biggest crude oil producer, having surpassed Russia and Saudi Arabia to claim the crown.
Sure, Saudi Arabia is one of the most important factors in global crude trade and oil market participants are lapping up every word and hint from the top oil officials in the Kingdom.
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Wednesday, April 24, 2019
UK Home Owners Motivation to Remortgage Expected to Increase / Housing-Market / Mortgages
By: MoneyFacts
The latest research from Moneyfacts.co.uk shows that the motivation for existing borrowers to remortgage from a lender’s standard variable rate (SVR) is increasing and is expected to reach a peak in October 2019. Borrowers who opted for a two-year fixed rate at an average rate of 2.30% in May 2017 could see their interest rate more than double when moved onto the average SVR of 4.89%.
Further Moneyfacts.co.uk research shows that the average two-year fixed rate reached a record low of 2.20% in October 2017 and if the average SVR remains constant at 4.89%, the projected average difference in the revert rate will increase from 2.59% to 2.69% by October 2019, increasing the motivation to remortgage even further.
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Wednesday, April 24, 2019
Can Gold Price Rise Without a Rate Cut? / Commodities / Gold & Silver 2019
By: Jordan_Roy_Byrne
The downside potential in precious metals discussed last week is playing out as Gold and gold stocks have broken down technically.
The global economy appears to be firming and that is evidenced by a sustained rebound in global equity markets.
As a result, the potential for a rate cut which pushed precious metals higher is now unwinding. That has caused the breakdown in precious metals and there is more unwinding to go.
We have trumpeted the need (in precious metals) for a rate cut as a fundamental catalyst for the next bull market. But there is another scenario that plays well for Gold.
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Wednesday, April 24, 2019
Elliott Wave Analysis of SPDR S&P Semiconductor ETF (XSD) / Companies / Tech Stocks
By: WavePatternTraders
If you are an active trader, then you may well have been noticing the recent strength on the semiconductor stocks, particularly stocks like Broadcom (AVGO) Intel (INTC) and Microsoft (MSFT). Although there are a few more semiconductor stocks that have shown strength since the Dec 2018 low, based on the weighting, the stocks listed are the more important stocks to follow in my opinion.Taking a look at the ETF called XSD, it's pretty much the SOX in disguise, I favor the frenzy and euphoria that we are seeing now, is likely a 5th wave of a large impulse wave from the 2009 low. It's common to see Technology stocks being bid when traders and investors are chasing the market. We saw that into the Oct 2018 high as the FAANG stocks were being bid up. Today it's not so much the FAANG stocks, but the semiconductor stocks, which is very reminiscent to what was seen into the 2000 tech bubble top.
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Wednesday, April 24, 2019
Silver’s Next Big Move / Commodities / Gold & Silver 2019
By: Kelsey_Williams
Eight years ago this month, silver started its “next big move”. And that move continues today. It is awesome to behold. See the chart (ten-year history of silver prices) below…
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Wednesday, April 24, 2019
How Can a College Student Invest Wisely? / Personal_Finance / Student Finances
By: Submissions
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Tuesday, April 23, 2019
Prepare For Unknown Stock Market Price Action As New Highs Are Reached / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2019
By: Chris_Vermeulen
The ES and NQ are very close to breaking out to new all-time highs this week and possibly over the next few weeks. The NQ is very close to these new high levels already. Traders must not take this move for granted as increased volatility and a very real chance for a price correction become even greater once we break into “new high territory”.
This upside move has taken almost 5 months to climb back from the December 2018 lows. It has been a very dramatic rally to say the least. We’ve seen dozens of professional analysts suggest the markets would rotate lower all the way up this rally. It seems as though everyone wanted to be right that the market top in October 2018 was going to be the start of something big. We were one of the few analysts that called the market accurately. Our September 17, 2018 analysis called for almost every leg of this price swing over the past 7+ months. We stuck by our research while others were skeptical and doubting our research. We stuck to it because we believe in our work and modeling tools.
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Tuesday, April 23, 2019
Mueller Report - Cover-up for Real Crimes / Politics / US Politics
By: BATR
If one listens to the Democrats or the mainstream media, the impression that is being fed to the American public is that the Trump investigation will just intensify. The sacred Grand Inquisitor, Robert Mueller once the darling of the witch hunt, is now a spineless hangman who failed to topple the king. After this tortured process of the Deep State cover-up, the central concocted reason for finding collusion with some imaginary Russian plot to fix the 2016 presidential election never provided the evidence to prove this establishment narrative. Pray tell; no boot licking toady would ever admit that the U.S. imperial empire ever intervened or staged subversion into foreign elections or governmental overthrows.
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Tuesday, April 23, 2019
Silver Plays a Small but Vital Role in Every Portfolio / Commodities / Gold & Silver 2019
By: Jared_Dillian
Portfolio strategies like Modern Portfolio Theory and others tend to assume that market returns follow a normal distribution.
Not really.
Certain securities have high kurtosis. That is where out-of-the ordinary returns (larger or smaller) occur more frequently than the normal distribution predicts.
Of course, nobody who is stable and balanced puts 100% of their assets into something which has the possibility of extreme returns.
But risk 90 cents for the possibility of making 10 bucks? All day long.
Tuesday, April 23, 2019
Forecasting 2020s : Two Recessions, Higher Taxes, and Japan-Like Flat Markets / Economics / Recession 2020
By: John_Mauldin
I’m slowly losing confidence in the economy.
I still think the economy is okay for now. But I also see recession odds rising considerably in 2020. Maybe it will get pushed back another year or two, but at some point, this growth phase will end.
It will be either recession or an extended flat period (even flatter than the last decade, which says a lot). On top of that, we are headed toward a global credit crisis I’ve dubbed The Great Reset.
Let me give you the CliffsNotes version of how I think the next decade will play out.
Tuesday, April 23, 2019
Gold and Silver Give Traders Another Buying Opportunity / Commodities / Gold & Silver 2019
By: Chris_Vermeulen
We know many of you follow our research posts and have been waiting for the Gold/Silver setup we predicted would happen near April 21~24, 2019 back in January 2019. Well, it looks like our predictions were accurate and the current downward price rotation in Gold/Silver are the opportunities of a lifetime for precious metals traders.
Our original research regarding the predicted Gold price rotation and breakout initially posted in October 2018 and was updated in January 2019. You can read our updated post here.
This research suggested, back in October 2018, that gold would rally above $1300, then stall and setup a momentum base near April 21~24, 2019. Currently, we are actively seeking entry positions in Gold, Silver and many other stock market sectors related to the metals and miners.
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Monday, April 22, 2019
Cannabis Stocks: Don't Let Your Opportunity Go Up in Smoke / Commodities / Cannabis
By: EWI
Here's when society expresses greater acceptance toward marijuanaIn the 1973 song "The Joker," the Steve Miller Band sang:
"I'm a joker. I'm a smoker. I'm a midnight toker."
Of course, "midnight toker" referred to pot smoking. Back then, there were plenty of midnight tokers, but most of them feared getting "busted."
Thirty years later, in 2003, the Elliott Wave Theorist predicted:
"Eventually, possession and sale of recreational drugs will be decriminalized."
Then, in July 2009, The Socionomist (the monthly publication of the Socionomics Institute, a sister organization of Elliott Wave International) published a study titled "The Coming Collapse of Modern Prohibition," which reviewed the repeal of Prohibition during the bear market psychology of the early 1930s.
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Monday, April 22, 2019
Global Bond Market Bubble’s Ultimate Culmination / Interest-Rates / International Bond Market
By: Michael_Pento
Historically speaking, a normal Fed tightening cycles consist of raising the Fed Funds Rate (FFR) by 350-425bps. It is at that point that the yield curve usually inverts--thus, disincentivizing future lending and closing down the credit conduit. At that point the Fed backs off from future rate hikes. Then, about a year later, a stock market meltdown begins; and six months after that a recession ensues. During this current cycle, the Fed Open Market Committee (FOMC) has raised rates by just 250bps before turning dovish. Therefore, Wall Street takes solace in the view that this time around the Fed stopped in time before it killed the business cycle.
However, that 250bps of hiking is before you factor in the end of Quantitative Easing (QE) and the current Quantitative Tightening Program (QT), which is still an ongoing process and won't end until September. When you factor in the tightening that occurred when the Fed ended QE in October of 2014, which amounted to $85b per month of newly printed money at its peak and added a total of $3.7 trillion to the Fed’s balance sheet, the actual amount of tightening from ending QE is probably close to 300bps. And, the QT from the Fed will end up draining nearly $1 trillion from its balance sheet and reached $40-$50 billion per month at its peak. A reduction in the Fed’s balance sheet of anything close to $1 trillion is completely unprecedented and amounted to a tremendous drain on liquidity. Nobody knows exactly the amount of rate hikes this equates to, but it most likely added another 75bps of monetary tightening.
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Sunday, April 21, 2019
Stock Market Pause Should Extend / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2019
By: Andre_Gratian
Current Position of the Market
SPX: Long-term trend – Final long-term phase on the way? How much longer is the question.
Intermediate trend – The trend which started at 2346 is ready for another pull-back which should be followed by a final high before a significant correction begins.
Analysis of the short-term trend is done on a daily basis with the help of hourly charts. It is an important adjunct to the analysis of daily and weekly charts which discusses the course of longer market trends.
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Sunday, April 21, 2019
Why Gold Has Been the Second Best Asset Class for the Last 20 Years / Commodities / Gold & Silver 2019
By: The_Gold_Report
Frank Holmes, CEO and chief investment officer of U.S. Global Investors, speaks to Streetwise Reports about the fundamentals for gold, his company's funds and a handful of companies on his radar screen. Streetwise Reports: Since the beginning of the year, gold has been trading fairly narrowly in the $1,300 range. What are some of the macro factors working behind this and how do you believe they'll affect the price moving forward?
Frank Holmes: When we look at macro factors at U.S. Global—and we write about them every month, in particular the Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI)—we try to take this complexity and simplify it by dividing it into big chunks.
The first is commodities; 50% of all commodity demand is China, so China is very, very important. When you add the populations of China and India—"Chindia"—you get 40% of the world's population. That's a lot of food. That's a lot of clothes. That's a lot of airplanes they'll be buying for India.
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Sunday, April 21, 2019
Could Taxing the Rich Solve Income Inequality? / Politics / Taxes
By: Harry_Dent
Tax Day Monday. Have you filed yet?A tax professional friend of mine told me recently that he’s surprised every year to see how many people leave their tax filing to the last minute.
Maybe they’re too busy. Maybe they live under a rock…
Regardless, they can’t escape it. As U.S. citizens, we wear the IRS ankle brace wherever we go.
So, when I moved to Puerto Rico in May 2016, the tax implications didn’t cross my mind. I packed up and shipped out to be closer to my vacation home on Culebra, not only to expedite its completion, but to enjoy it more freely. In hindsight, the move brought with it some much welcomed tax benefits…
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