Top News Headlines Obama sticks a fork in Keystone after company withdraws request. Valeant troubles continue; CEO sells stock after margin call. Bill Ackman having a very bad month. DOJ ratchets up scrutiny of drug pricing. Seeking information from MRK, LLY and, of course, VRX. Berkshire Hathaway's profit more than doubles; other earnings news last week was pretty poor. Economic [...]
Economic Reports Scorecard – 8/31/15 to 9/11/15 The majority of the reports from the last two weeks were worse than expected but the overall view of the economy hasn't changed much. Manufacturing, with the exception of autos, continues to struggle and the majority of the pain is centered in the oil patch as evidenced by the awful Dallas Fed report. [...]
Economic Reports Scorecard – 8/17/15 to 8/28/15 The economic data since my last update hasn't changed much. I know that is getting boring to hear but it does have the advantage of being the truth. Manufacturing continues to struggle, housing is doing relatively better, inflation is dead and the consumer is struggling - although apparently confidently so. The jobs market [...]
The ECB and Mario Draghi made some fairly dramatic moves in European monetary policy last week. They weren't entirely unexpected but the market response indicates some disappointment that they didn't do the full monty and initiate outright QE. Draghi has spoken recently about his desire to see a lower Euro and the last couple of weeks things have been going [...]
The US Dollar index exhibits the classic characteristics of a downtrending asset: Declining 50 and 200 day moving averages with the 50 solidly below the 200. Momentum indicators (MACD, PMO) both on sell signals. A longer term view shows the index on the edge of support: A break of the 78-79 support level would open the way to a return [...]
The market is a very confusing place right now and there are a lot of cross currents to decipher. I spent the afternoon perusing a lot of charts in the hopes of finding some clarity. I do this about once a week - I look at charts everyday but once a week I sit down for several hours and review [...]
Over the last couple of months I've dedicated a good portion of these weekly commentaries to the various headwinds I see facing the global economy and markets. Everyone, it seems, knows what the risks are and I'm beginning to wonder if, being so well known, the actual events may prove less jarring to sentiment than I've been expecting. There is, [...]
The markets were once again higher this week, as the Dow Industrials hit the 13,000 level and the Nasdaq Composite hit 3000, levels not seen in years. The S&P 500 also hit multi-year highs, on its way to the best 2-month start to any year. This might all change soon with Bernanke's announcement on inflation and monetary easing. The VIX [...]
More of the same this week. Markets inching higher on low volume. Crude oil spiking. Tensions in the Middle East. The Bank of Japan trying to do too much. The markets do seem overbought right now, but have been for weeks now. Will this correction ever come? The Nasdaq Composite is holding its trend line. The index is overbought, and [...]
The S&P 500 continues to creep up on no news from Europe and further monetary easing here in the US. While the move up has been nothing to write home about, the markets do find themselves overbought, and sentiment is quite positive, which may signal at least a short term top. The VIX index hit levels not seen since July [...]
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