The Economist – International trade: Boxed in Global trade has turned down sharply this year. The outlook is pretty bleak, too TRADE-WATCHERS often look to the oceans to gauge activity. Bustling docks and harbours mean importers and exporters are busy, and trade figures are likely to be strong. Empty quays are ominous. At the end… Continue reading International Trade
<Click on chart for larger image> Business Insider – Ray Dalio On The #1 Reason To Own Gold “Gold is primarily an alternative to fiat currency and a storehold of wealth. The main advantage that gold has over other currencies is that it can’t be printed. While we have just gone through a period in… Continue reading Why Own Gold?
Bloomberg.com – JPMorgan Said to Face Escalating Senate Probe of CIO Loss JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s (JPM) wrong-way bets on derivatives are the focus of an escalating investigation by a U.S. Senate panel led by Carl Levin that has grilled executives from banks including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and HSBC Holdings Plc, three people briefed… Continue reading JP Morgan’s Whale Trade Is Not Quite Over
Comment Ben Bernanke’s parents released a video of his early childhood in Dillon, South Carolina.
European Central Bank – Press Release, September 6, 2012 As announced on 2 August 2012, the Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) has today taken decisions on a number of technical features regarding the Eurosystem’s outright transactions in secondary sovereign bond markets that aim at safeguarding an appropriate monetary policy transmission and the… Continue reading Draghi Finally Speaks About Bond Buying, Is Anything New?
Slate.com – The European Central Bank’s Ongoing Power Grab Mario Draghi is out with a new European Central Bank plan that, on its face, doesn’t make sense. For the loose money crowd, he’s offering potentially “unlimited” ECB purchases of peripheral government bonds. But on the other hand, he’s promising that these purchases will be “sterilized”… Continue reading The ECB
Real Time Economics (WSJ Blog) – Obama’s Thursday Night Secret About Jobs When President Barack Obama takes the stage Thursday night at the Democratic convention, he’ll probably know a secret about the economy that you don’t: the contents of Friday’s employment report. But don’t expect easy clues in his big speech…Mr. Obama doesn’t have to… Continue reading Looking For Secrets On Tomorrow’s Jobs Report
<Click on chart for larger image> MarketBeat (WSJ Blog) – Is the Stock Market Voting for Obama? Mr. Market seems to be screaming “four more years.” According to a new report by Capital Economics, it appears investors would prefer President Obama to stay in office for another term as opposed to Mitt Romney getting elected.… Continue reading Politics & The Stock Market
<Click on chart for larger image> The Financial Times – Protect the virtue of exchange traded funds They are among the biggest and most useful innovations for the retail investor since the advent of mutual funds. But it is time for those investors to look a little more closely at exchange traded funds. The industry… Continue reading The ETF Industry
Pimco.com – Bill Gross: The Lending Lindy If the dancing has slowed down, then the reason is not just an overweight partner. It’s that the price of money (be it in the form of a real interest rate, a quality risk spread, or both) is too low. Our entire finance-based monetary system – led by… Continue reading The Growth Of The Credit Market
<Click on chart for larger image> The Telegraph (UK) – Ambrose Evans-Pritchard: Saudi oil well dries up If Citigroup is right, Saudi Arabia will cease to be an oil exporter by 2030, far sooner than previously thought. A 150-page report by Heidy Rehman on the Saudi petrochemical industry should be sober reading for those who… Continue reading Crude Oil Production
<Click on chart for larger image> The Wall Street Journal – More Gains, Even More Pain It was the rally that left many fund managers behind. Stocks jumped nearly 10% over the summer, defying the expectations of many hedge- and mutual-fund managers who had bet on a decline. They saw a multitude of headwinds from… Continue reading Hedge Fund Managers