Archive - Jul 1, 2014

BTFATH! That was the motto overnight, when despite a plethora of mixed final manufacturing data across the globe (weaker Japan, Europe; stronger China, UK) the USDJPY carry-trade has been a one-way street up and to the right, and saw its first overnight buying scramble in weeks (as opposed to the US daytime trading session, when the JPY is sold off to push carry-driven stocks higher). Low volumes have only facilitated the now usual buying at the all time highs: The last trading day of 1H14 failed to bring with it any volatility associated with month-end and half-end portfolio rebalancing - yesterday’s S&P 500 volumes were about half that compared to the last trading day of 1H13.

For a while now it has been well proven beyond a shadow of a doubt by scientific research (Cornell and California Universities) that there is a phenomenon called ‘emotional contagion’, meaning that it is possible to induce a state of either happiness or sadness in someone, by inducing that feeling and emotion without their knowledge or awareness.