Archive - Jul 24, 2015

As President Obama completes the re-fueling ahead of the second leg aboard Air Force One on his way to Kenya to visit extended family (and we are sure to do some America-related business), concerns over security have been dismissed after the President's schedule was leaked this week by a Kenyan airline. However, as China Daily reports, Susan Rice, the National Security Adviser said that Obama will not visit his family's ancestral village of Kogelo due to "time and logistical reasons."

Starring Linda Green

Because of their credit issues, these bonds often trade more closely with equities than they do with base interest rates. Occasionally, however, junk bonds and stocks will diverge with one another. Such a divergence is occurring at the moment. It is often suggested that when the bond and stock markets diverge, the bonds typically prove to be correct, i.e., the stock market usually ends up going the way of the bonds. Is there evidence to back that up? According to our research there is, and with junk bond yields at s-x month highs while the S&P is within 1% of record highs, for stock bulls, that isn’t necessarily good news.

Investors are dumping billions of dollars worth of gold, commodities and emerging market assets in a wave of "capitulation" selling, Bank of America Merrill Lynch said today as reported by Reuters.

"Defendants used electronic chatrooms, instant messaging, and other electronic and telephonic methods to exchange confidential customer information, coordinate trading strategies. Traders at some of these primary dealers talked with counterparts at other banks via online chatrooms and swapped gossip."

• Gunman kills two, wounds seven in Louisiana theater before killing himself (Reuters)
• Health insurer Anthem to buy Cigna in $54.2 billion deal (Reuters)
• Murder, Poisoning, Raids: It’s Election Season in Russia (BBG)
• Lagarde Push for Greece Debt Relief Challenges Merkel (Bloomberg)
• Fund Boss’s Gamble on Health Law Pays Off Big (WSJ)
• Wall Street Cranks Up Its Outlook for Amazon After It Delivers Monster Earnings Report (BBG)
• China's Richest Man Marks Push Into Hollywood With Jake Gyllenhaal Movie (BBG)
• West Africa's alarming growth industry - meth (Reuters)

On Monday, the 46th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, the Smithsonian launched its first crowdfunding campaign they’re calling “Reboot the Suit” to conserve, digitize, and display Neil Armstrong’s spacesuit that he wore on the moon. The museum has raised over 86 percent of its $500,000 goal since the launch of the campaign. 

After yesterday's latest drop in stocks driven by "old economy" companies such as CAT, which sent the Dow Jones back to red for the year and the S&P fractionally unchanged, today has been a glaring example of the "new" vs "old" economy contrast, with futures propped up thanks to strong tech company earnings after the close, chief among which Amazon, which gained $40 billion in after hours trading and has now surpassed Walmart as the largest US retailer. As a result Brent crude is little changed near 2-wk low after disappointing Chinese manufacturing data fueled demand concerns, adding to bearish sentiment in an oversupplied mkt. WTI up ~26c, trimming losses after yday falling to lowest since March 31 to close in bear mkt. Both Brent and WTI are set for 4th consecutive week of declines; this is the longest losing streak for Brent since Jan., for WTI since March.