by Chris Becker Stock markets are renowned for pricing in promises but failing to deliver on accuracy. With US markets now at record highs, with the Dow Jones breaking through the 27000 point barrier last night as the S&P500 hovers at a near doubling of its GFC low, and a Federal Reserve hell bent
by Chris Becker While Bitcoin launches back over the $13000USD level in the Asian session today, a quick reply on the currency question from the ECB Twitter account smacked down the crypto bulls: Lane: No. Bitcoin is not a currency, it rather is an asset and it is very volatile #AskECB https://t.co/XQ9Mqdm5rU — European Central
by Chris Becker Following the jump in USD on the Friday night unemployment print, the PBOC has re-entered the easing game, resetting the Yuan fix to a much lower 6.8881 from Friday’s 6.8697. Offshore trading in Yuan (USDCNH) is already moving back above 6.89: This is part of Beijing’s ongoing manipulation of its currency as
by Chris Becker One of the struggles of successful investing is that a majority of your returns come by following along with the herd as prices rise, but to convert these ephemeral gains into actual returns almost always involves turning around and getting in the way of the crowd as they stampede to ever higher highs.
by Chris Becker The undollar crypto currency the mainstream economists love to hate – Bitcoin – has seen a meteoric rebirth since the start of March this year, tripling in “value”: Having reached nearly $USD14000 mid way through last week, Bitcoin also showed why for most investors/speculators, its something to avoid traversing in the short term,
by Chris Becker According to US President Donald Trump, there’s been “progress” made in the ongoing trade talks with China, enough to delay the tariff increase that was set to kick in on March 1st. In tweets (that look written by his staffers given the proper grammar and multi-syllabic words), he said: “I am pleased
by Chris Becker The Bitcoin boosters are back! HODL! Russia is still going to save the day and Bitcoin is going to $2 million! From Mickey: The economic analyst who claims Russia is about to buy more than $10 Billion worth of Bitcoin has responded to doubts about his credibility. Speaking exclusively to Micky News, Vladislav
by Chris Becker In short, not yet. The crypto lovers are going ga-ga over “news” that Russia, under “enormous pressure” by US sanctions after liquidating its very modest US Treasuries portfolio, will now diversify into Bitcoin. From ZH, where the cycle has hit the apex: According to Vladislav Ginko, an economist at the state-funded Russian
by Chris Becker Thar she blows – it didn’t take long for the crypto “currency” to fail again with price dropping over $400 last night to match its Christmas low at $3700USD: The technicals remain crystal clear – an inability to get positive momentum (green line below), unassailable resistance overhead at ca. $4000-4100 (red trailing
by Chris Becker It’s been nearly three weeks since Donald Trump shutdown the US Federal Government over his intransigence to fund a “wall”, even though one already exists across most of the US-Mexico border. Equity markets leading up to the shutdown were in a tailspin with the Dow down nearly 3000 points or a little over
by Chris Becker Predictions are hard to make, especially about the future and while trying to overlay charts from different periods can lead to the gambler’s fallacy, it’s when fundamentals collide with technicals that you should pay attention. For US stocks their are some alarming parallels with the end of the 2000 bubble today, according
by Chris Becker The reaction to the RBNZ’s extended hold at this morning’s interest rate meeting has been swift with everything crushes the Kiwi dollar – starting with the Yen: Aussie go smash: Euro smoosh: Meanwhile, the PBOC has kept the Yuan selloff contained by holding the reference rate tight again, today’s set at 6.8317
Fairfax has been running a series of articles (see here and here) on the collapse of Great Southern and the hardships it has caused, a timely reminder of the perils of mixing debt, investment and tax breaks. Almost every case consists of investors borrowing to invest on the advice of a “trusted professional”, large amounts
More crypto shenanigans, from Bloomberg: Bitcoin mining, the computing process that makes transactions with the cryptocurrency possible, is about to become more expensive for some after China ordered mining facilities to close. ViaBTC Technology Ltd., which runs the fourth-biggest bitcoin mining collective, is raising maintenance fees for some of its clients Friday to 50 percent
As the Aussie dollar makes new highs, going through 79 cents against USD, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have sold off once again. It doesn’t take much for the volatility to spike with news – rumors actually – that the South Korean Government is flagging a potential a ban on cryptocurrency trading, sending bitcoin prices down over 20%
Here’s the latest from bond guru Bill Gross the Janus Henderson:Bonds, like men, are in a bear market. For both, it’s hard to say when it all began. There was no Helen Reddy “I Am Woman” moment back in June 2012, and then again in July 2016 when the 10 year Treasury double-bottomed at 1.45%, but
Bitcoin mania has similar parallels with the epic silver bubble of the 1970s: Silver went through a huge bubble, moving from $6 to nearly $50USD per ounce in just over a year due to the Hunt brother’s cornering of the market. At the peak they owned one third of the world’s supply. Sound familiar? The
Wall Street Journal on a theme dear to our hearts – Chinese growth slowing: The Business Cycle Is Different This Time—Thank China Diverging Chinese and U.S. growth are behind the confusion in global markets right now Commodities and stocks have started 2018 with a bang. U.S. oil is trading over $60 a barrel for the
Bill Gross says so: The 10-year U.S. Treasury yield climbed to the highest level in more than nine months, leading Bill Gross at Janus Henderson Group to declare a bond bear market just ahead of a deluge of sovereign debt sales. The benchmark U.S. yield rose as much as six basis points to 2.54 percent, a
I wanted to follow up on Jeremy Grantham’s comments from yesterday and run through some of GMO’s asset allocation views from the perspective of an Australian investor. Jeremy Grantham & Co. at GMO have put out two thoughtful (as always) pieces in the last 3 weeks. I rate the team there highly and so when
The RBA has released its latest monthly Chart Pack. Here are some interesting visuals to consider going into next month’s meeting: First up, looking abroad where the G-3 economies continue to have flat wage growth but modest unemployment figures since the GFC: Headline inflation is also still flat below 2%, but rising from the 2015
Everything is at record or multi year highs it seems; US stocks, Japanese stocks and even the ASX200. Usually at these peaks, the howls from the bears would start to be heard in equal measure with the ebullient crowd of bulls, as the latter group look around nervously for more buyers. But not this time, with
Richard Bookstaber recently put out an interesting post on sectors that he thought had problems on a 30-40 year view. Richard is the author of a number of good finance books – I liked A Demon of Our Own Design: Markets, Hedge Funds, and the Perils of Financial Innovation and I have his new one The End
A few companies have come out recently talking about the effect of Trump tax cuts and flagging large losses/write-downs. From the FT: in the short term, the cut in corporation tax to 21 per cent will lead to a revaluation of all BP’s US deferred tax assets and liabilities. On current estimates, the impact
Not having a good start to 2018 (I prefer 12018, let’s get the Holocene going!) for Bitcoin, with prices down more than 6% on the first day of trading. Having nearly reached $20,000 in mid-December, its now at $13,814 after almost cracking $13,000… Chart from coinmarketcap.com: Here’s Bloombergs take on first day of year trading,
US markets continued grinding higher overnight, most of the news was about the tax cuts. Ray Dalio (who runs Bridgewater, one of the world’s largest macro funds) posted his thoughts on the tax cuts – largely echoing my thoughts from yesterday: When we look at the tax plan holistically, it looks to me like it’s
Both branches have now approved the Trump tax cut bill, which is now just waiting on Trump’s signature. His signature didn’t come immediately, with the suggestion that Trump may be holding off to delay some of the spending cuts until 2019. My view continues to be that the tax cuts are a short-term sugar hit for the
Buy the rumour, sell the fact is a well-worn truism. The question is whether the Trump tax cuts will fall into this pattern (i.e. the stock market increases while the potential of tax cuts exist, only to fall once the legislation is actually passed) is a good one and there are many arguments for and
With Trump looking increasingly likely to leave tax cuts under the Christmas tree for all the good boys and girls (i.e. anyone who is rich), and lumps of coal for anyone concerned about climate change, the US market powered on again overnight: The US dollar took a breather: Oil was largely flat overnight, but two
