<Click on chart for larger image> Business Insider – Share Buybacks Have Been Playing A Huge Role In The Market Rally Recent market discussion has centered on volatility, or a lack thereof. Amid this calm, however, stocks have pushed back to record highs. But there is a market force at play that we’ve talked about… Continue reading Stock Buybacks
<Click on chart for larger image> Bloomberg.com – World Bank Cuts Global Growth Forecast After ‘Bumpy’ 2014 Start The World Bank cut its global growth forecast amid weaker outlooks for the U.S., Russia and China, while calling on emerging markets to strengthen their economies before the Federal Reserve raises interest rates. The Washington-based lender predicts… Continue reading The World Bank Cuts Its Global Growth Forecast
<Click on chart for larger image> Bloomberg.com – Fed Prepares to Keep Record Balance Sheet for Years to Come Federal Reserve officials, concerned that selling bonds from their $4.3 trillion portfolio could crush the U.S. recovery, are preparing to keep their balance sheet close to record levels for years. Central bankers are stepping back from… Continue reading The Federal Reserve’s Balance Sheet
The Financial Times – Abe’s third arrow on economy quivers Mr Abe has placed many of his most measurable targets years down the road – objectives for everything from raising average personal incomes to improving the global rankings of Japanese universities have dates of 2020 or beyond. Still, Mr Mizobata and other analysts say the… Continue reading Japan
The Financial Times – Crazy equities should be boring as bonds Investors’ short-termism feeds excessive equity market volatility Is the equity market a sober reflection of companies’ future profitability, or is it crazy? It is crazy. Today, the S&P 500 is more than 50 per cent above its average level in 2011. In what sense… Continue reading Why Stocks Are “Fun” and Bonds Are “Boring”
Zero Hedge – The Simple Reason Treasury Yields Are Going Lower: Half A Trillion More Demand Than Supply Back in April 2013, when looking at the dynamics of global treasury supply and demand (and just before the TBAC started complaining loudly about a wholesale shortage of quality collateral), we made the simple observation that between… Continue reading Why Yields Are Falling
MarketWatch.com – Fed needs to start raising rates, top forecaster says The Federal Reserve needs to start raising interest rates pretty soon or find itself staring at another financial crisis, said Joseph LaVorgna, chief U.S. economist for Deutsche Bank and the winner of the MarketWatch Forecaster of the Month award for May. The economy is… Continue reading Should The Federal Reserve Be Raising Rates Now?
The Wall Street Journal – Job Openings Return to Prerecession Levels The number of job openings in the U.S. economy climbed to the highest level in seven years, becoming the latest labor-market gauge to recover ground lost during the recession. Job openings rose to 4.5 million in April, according to the Labor Department’s job-openings and… Continue reading Number Of Job Openings Rise
The Wall Street Journal – Volatility Traders Have More to Fear than Fear Itself The latest big worry to hit markets is an unusual one: calm. With stock prices high and various gauges of risk low, investors appear to have thrown caution to the wind. That isn’t entirely true, though. Exchange-traded notes that profit handsomely… Continue reading Trading Volatility
Financial Sense – The Truth About the Jobs Report and the Economy The economy may be recovering from its winter slowdown. But the jobs report that 217,000 new jobs were created in May is clearly not evidence of that, if we look beneath the headlines…Friday’s jobs report of 217,000 new jobs in May is being… Continue reading The Jobs Market
Real Time Economics (WSJ Blog) – Jon Hilsenrath: Why Are Stocks Rising If There’s Secular Stagnation? Investors have been puzzling a great deal this year about whether the long-term growth prospects for the U.S. economy were diminished by the 2008 financial crisis, placing the nation in a state of “secular stagnation,” as economist Lawrence Summers… Continue reading Hilsenrath Questions The Stock Market Rally Of Late