Vitaliy Katsenelson's blog

Inflation is a possible but not a guaranteed outcome of what is taking place in the economy today. Deflation or a muddle-through economy with very low nominal growth are possible and probable outcomes.

Here are some arguments why one should think twice before jumping in bed with gold bugs, or at least remain sober while determining gold’s weight in the portfolio .

The thinking of the so-called gold bug often takes on a variation of this form: While in the bunker (or any other variance of the “world-falling-apart” scenario), you cannot pay for food with paper money or a stock or bond certificate.

This is the first in a series of what some may consider as “gold bashing” articles. I am not short gold in any shape or form. I am simply presenting the other side of the argument in response to what I deem to be dishonest, gold-pimping commercials that we are subjected to all day long on TV. I may be wrong, but I am honest.

Financial stocks had a huge run up from their bottom. Many have doubled and tripled, but are they still cheap?

Over a lifetime, active investors will make hundreds, often thousands of investment decisions. Not all of those decisions will work out for the better. Some will lose and some will make us money. As humans we tend to focus on the outcome of the decision rather than on the process.

After I looked at the data from 1900 to 2008, it is safe to conclude that September historically was the worst month for investors, period.

Electricity was not the only economic statistic not controlled / calculated by the Chinese government that showed that the 6% plus GDP growth in the first six months of 2009 (at a time when the global economy was sliding off the cliff) was an accounting miracle.

Six reasons why natural gas is better investment than oil

The Chinese ascent over last decade has lowered the degree of separation between China and the global economy: what happens in China doesn’t stay in China (not anymore), it spills over to the rest of the world.

China projects to the world a similar image as Japan did in the 1980s. Yet we know how that (Japanese) story played out: a bust of a major banking/real estate bubble, a contracting economy for almost two decades, accompanied by deflation, ballooning debt, etc.

For the next dozen years or so, the U.S. stock market will be a wild roller-coaster ride—setting all-time highs and multi-year lows in the process. While the twists and turns of this ride are still to be written by history, the long-term, sideways “range-bound” trajectory has already been set by the eighteen-year bull market that ended in 2000.

Here is my latest article explaining why the Chinese economy should not make us feel inadequate and explaining the consequences of what is taking place in China on the U.S. stocks.

Given my usual warning, I don't want to discuss politics in my writings for two reasons: it bores me to death and I'll upset 55% of my readers. But an investor cannot ignore politics especially today. What happens in Washington doesn't stay in Washington.

Financial commentators are obsessively debating whether the recent rise in the Chinese stock market means there’s a bubble — and if so, when it’s going to burst. My take? Who cares! What happens to the broader Chinese economy is what we should really be watching. It will have a far-reaching impact on the rest of the world — much more far-reaching than a decline in stocks.