Archive - Apr 2015 - Story

"Amid the wave of bellicose rhetoric that has swelled in Moscow since the start of the conflict in Ukraine, officials as high up as President Vladimir Putin have been making open nuclear threats, a public saber-rattling with weapons of mass destruction largely unseen even in the days of the Cold War."

It might prove to be a one-off. But one group in the gold industry this week forged ahead with a unique strategy - which might just change the market. The group is India’s largest jewellery-maker, Rajesh Exports. Which said that it is taking an unusual step in securing gold supply for its operations. Buying gold mines.

Considering that Chinese equities are the best performing market in USD terms (second only, oddly enough, to Russia) in 2015, one can see why after a disappointing 2012 and 2013, and modest 2014, Hendry has hit 2015 out of the park with a bang, generating a 10.6% return in the first two monthes of the year. So is Hendry still bullish on China's stock market prospects?  Why yes, and then some. But is he is contrarian just for the sake of being contrarian? Does he see something in China that nobody else does? Or is he simply right... or wrong, as the case may be? We will let readers decide.

"Never, since 1900, have investors been this persistently bullish," warns Wells Fargo's Jim Paulsen. While the 13 previous cautionary signals since 1900 suggesting investor sentiment was too high have not been perfect, they have proved to be fairly good warning signs; and along with "massive overvaluation", and a dramatic "decoupling of markets from economic productivity" this extreme sentiment reading completes the trifecta of flashing red warning signs for US equity markets.

Having previously warned that "the eurozone chess game is entering its final stage," and exclaimed that "we are not at war with Russia or ISIS, we are at war with the Troika," Italy's erstwhile populist leader, Italy's Five Star Movement's Beppe Grillo unveils his Plan B by destroying seven unfounded myths with regard an exit from the euro...

Money doesn’t go “into” the stock market – it goes through it from a buyer to a seller. The resulting price changes are purely changes in the relative value that people place on these pieces of paper, and amount to changes the amount of “paper wealth” in the economy. These changes should emphatically be distinguished from the real wealth of the economy, and the underlying stream of cash flows that will be generated over time.

"For many Americans, the rise in food and housing prices is a tough squeeze. That’s because even in an era with low overall inflation low-income Americans spend a disproportionate share of their money on food and housing," WSJ notes, proving that once again, poor people aren't allocating their funds correctly.

What do people mean when they say the Stock Market is rigged? Nanex explains...

...but still a 'once in a lifetime' opportunity...

The great conundrum of the U.S. economy today is that we have record numbers of working age people out of the labor ‎force at the same time we have businesses desperately trying to find workers. So why aren’t workers filling these available jobs - or getting the skills necessary to fill them. We would posit five impediments to putting more Americans back to work - First, government discourages work...

The most 'liquid' FX cross in the world... just flash-crashed...

History is on the market’s side, says DoubleLine's Jeff Gundlach, noting the Fed’s forecast for how much benchmark rates will rise is still too high, even after central bankers lowered their estimates last month. BlackRock’s Jeffrey Rosenberg says the bond market’s too complacent and is poised for a correction, claiming The Fed has "a tremendous ability" to send bond yields higher. But as Bloomberg reports, "if the burden of proof is on anybody, it’s on the Fed," and for now, as Gundlach exclaims, The Fed has "been wrong for so long," that their forecasts have been literally of no value, "the market’s pricing has been closer."

Traditional banks were built to gather deposits. Their design and infrastructure is geared towards that; they are maladapted to today’s interest rate environment. P2P platforms and other non-bank lenders are eating their lunch. Absent some radical rethinking of their operations model, they are about to go the way of the dodo. Of course, markets are not efficient; it will take time for competitors to move in. Traditional banks, however, have few weapons to fend them off: their brands (much less valuable for loan-origination than for deposit-gather purposes) and their (hugely expensive) legacy infrastructure. It took almost a century for the dodo bird to become extinct.