Bloomberg.com – The Big Short Was Only One Reason 2015 Was The Year of the Bears The year is ending up much rosier for shorts than how it started. After a couple of rough years during the U.S. bull market, the first half was looking similarly bad — mergers boomed and credit was cheap, while… Continue reading Why 2015 Is The Worst Year Ever, A Reverse David Tepper?
<Click on chart for larger image> Business Insider – There has been a ‘sea-change’ in commodities, and hedge funds have lost $40 billion Commodities trading company Trafigura says there’s been a “sea-change” in investor attitudes in the commodities sector. In other words, investors are feeling negative and many are fleeing commodity-focused hedge funds. A number of hedge funds that specialize… Continue reading Hedge Funds Continue To Lose Money
Barron’s – The Global Recession of 2016 Forecaster David Levy sees a spreading global recession intensifying and ultimately engulfing the world’s economies. Although the U.S. economy is in pretty good shape, it doesn’t have enough strength to fend off weakening fundamentals elsewhere, particularly in the emerging markets. That’s the view of David Levy, the 60-year-old… Continue reading Calls For A Global Recession In 2016
<Click on graphic for larger image> Comment The chart above shows the yearly change in the Dow Jones Transportation Index (TRAN). The shaded areas are recessions. Year-to-date (through December 18), TRAN is down over 20%. As the chart shows, this is the worst non-recession year since 1917! Charles Dow, the founder of the Dow Jones… Continue reading Some Perspective On The Fall In The Transportation Index
<Click on chart for larger image> The Financial Times – Renminbi poised for record weakening run If the People’s Bank of China sets a softer dollar rate for the renminbi today it will mark a record run of weakening and be a further sign that Beijing is increasingly measuring its currency’s performance not against the… Continue reading The Renminbi
<Click on chart for larger image> The Wall Street Journal – Gas Windfall Fails to Stoke Consumers When gas prices began plummeting last fall—they were above $3.50 a gallon as recently as August 2014—many economists predicted the savings would act as a giant tax cut by jolting long-weary consumers into stronger spending and pushing up… Continue reading Gas Savings Not Spurring Spending
<Click on chart for larger image> The Wall Street Journal – Wall Street’s Biggest Junk Bond Dealer Weighs In on the Rout J.P. Morgan’s global head of debt capital markets says there is still good money in high yield The executive overseeing Wall Street’s top high-yield bond desk says the market for such debt isn’t… Continue reading Junk Bonds
Reuters – Fed’s Lacker says four rate hikes in 2016 would be “gradual” Federal Reserve forecasts pointing to four interest rate hikes in 2016 show what the U.S. central bank means when it says it anticipates raising rates at a “gradual pace,” Richmond Fed President Jeffrey Lacker said on Friday. “That’s half the rate at… Continue reading How The Fed Defines Gradual
<Click on chart for larger image> MoneyBeat (WSJ Blog) – Volatility Returns to Stocks as Fed Raises Rates As the past week demonstrated, stock-market volatility is back, and many money managers expect it to keep worsening in 2016. A simple way to measure volatility is to count the days indexes rise or fall by 1%… Continue reading Volatility
<Click on chart for larger image> The Wall Street Journal – The Bank of Japan Lays an Egg Japan’s central bank loses credibility as it tries to create inflation The Bank of Japan announced Friday a change in its asset-buying program to include new exchange-traded funds, longer-dated bonds and more risky assets. But if Governor… Continue reading The Bank Of Japan’s Quest For Inflation
<Click on graphic for larger image> Reuters – Global corporate profit is under serious threat Quarterly capitalists should gird themselves for disappointment. With post-tax earnings running around 10 percent of national income, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. companies are close to the peak of profitability not seen since at least the late… Continue reading Corporate Profits Pressured?
CNBC – Men still worse at investing than women Men didn’t get any better at investing in 2015, at least compared to their female counterparts. The median male investor lost 1.8 percent over the last 12 months, including fees and dividends, while women squandered only 1.4 percent, according to a review of 360,000 investors using… Continue reading Gender Wars