Bloomberg.com – Complacency Breeds $2 Trillion of Junk as Sewage Funded Halfway through a sixth year of near-zero interest rates by the Federal Reserve and unprecedented central-bank stimulus from Brussels to Tokyo, almost any borrower is able to raise debt with few questions asked even as the World Bank cuts its outlook for global economic… Continue reading Junk Bonds
<Click on chart for larger image> Scott Skyrm (blog) – The Anxiety of Fails There’s a lot of discussion about fails in the Treasury market, including a variety of armageddon theories about why fails have increased, but rest assured, fails are a normal part of the market. That’s not to say I take the increased… Continue reading Treasury Fails In Perspective
<Click on graphic for larger image> Arbor Quantitative Analytics (AQA) – SPX Index – Days Without 1% Up or Down Move The S&P 500 has gone 56 consecutive days without seeing a gain or loss of 1% or more. The attached chart looks at previous streaks going back to 1950. The current streak is the… Continue reading Days Without A 1% Up Or Down Move
<Click on chart for larger image> Bloomberg.com – Crisis Haunting Spain as Loan Costs Threaten Growth Companies in Spain are having to pay three times more to borrow than their German peers, potentially stifling an economic recovery needed to provide jobs for the one in four people in the country looking for work. Adjusted for… Continue reading Spain
The Financial Times – Short selling drops to lowest level since Lehman Hedge funds have sharply scaled back their bearish bets that the value of stocks is about to fall, with the proportion of shares earmarked for short selling at its lowest level since before the financial crisis despite warnings of renewed market exuberance. The… Continue reading No One Is Short This Market
The Wall Street Journal – 125 Years On, Mr. Market Is Older. But He May Not Be Wiser In some basic ways, financial markets have changed remarkably little since The Wall Street Journal’s founding 125 years ago. Companies still issue stocks and bonds to finance business. Investors trade them. Stocks still average 6.7% long-term annual… Continue reading Price Swings In The S&P 500
The Financial Times – George Magnus: End to China’s property boom has barely begun Financial markets are having trouble pricing the implications The Chinese property sector is in a recession. Market optimists insist it is going through an “adjustment” similar to previous property downturns. A more sober view, however, is that because of unprecedented overbuilding,… Continue reading China’s Property Boom
The Financial Times – Bankers warn over rising US business lending US lending to businesses is reaching record levels but banks are privately warning that the activity should not be seen as evidence of an economic recovery. Much of the corporate lending is going to fund payouts to shareholders, finance acquisitions and fuel the domestic… Continue reading US Business Lending
None Today
Comment On July 10, 2014 at 9 AM CT (10:00 AM ET, 7:00 AM PT, and 15:00 BST), Bianco Research, in conjunction with Arbor Research & Trading, will be hosting a webcast/teleconference moderated by Jim Bianco. In recent months the economy and markets have been giving mixed signals. While GDP and earnings have been poor,… Continue reading Mixed Signals: The Economy And The Markets
Bloomberg.com – Complacency Breeds $2 Trillion of Junk as Sewage Funded Halfway through a sixth year of near-zero interest rates by the Federal Reserve and unprecedented central-bank stimulus from Brussels to Tokyo, almost any borrower is able to raise debt with few questions asked even as the World Bank cuts its outlook for global economic… Continue reading Booming Corporate Bond Market
The Financial Times – Puerto Rico casts shadow on muni market Asset class remains popular, providing strong returns Puerto Rico securities are widely held among pension and mutual funds, which have benefited from the bonds’ exemptions from municipal, state and federal taxes. Investors fear that should the change in Puerto Rican legislation ultimately lead to… Continue reading Munis