Bloomberg.com – Sarkozy-Hollande Runoff Shaping Up in Fight on Finances French President Nicolas Sarkozy heads South and his Socialist challenger Francois Hollande goes East on the last day of campaigning before the first round of voting, courting supporters of other candidates whose backing they need in the runoff. Hollande and Sarkozy are almost certain to… Continue reading France Votes Sunday
<Click on chart for larger image> The New York Times – Fears Rise That Recovery May Falter in the Spring Some of the same spoilers that interrupted the recovery in 2010 and 2011 have emerged again, raising fears that the winter’s economic strength might dissipate in the spring. … Forecasters have said that the trends… Continue reading Is The Economy Slowing?
FT Alphaville (FT Blog) – This correlated world Two heat maps from HSBC. The first is a typical correlation matrix across a range of assets in the world before Lehman collapsed. The second is post-Lehman. Red indicates strong positive correlation and blue indicates strong negative correlation. Greens and yellows appear when correlations are close to… Continue reading An Alternate View Of The Risk On/Risk Off Trade
CNBC – In Financial Crisis, Hedgies Betting Morgan Stanley ‘First to Go’ If another financial crisis were to strike, like the one in 2008, Morgan Stanley will be the first to go –that’s the conventional wisdom on Wall Street. So says, Charlie Bobrinskoy, vice-chairman of Ariel Investments in an interview on CNBC’s Fast Money. “That’s… Continue reading Is Morgan Stanley First To Go In The Next Crisis?
The Economist – Nationalising YPF: Cristina scrapes the barrel Nobody will suffer from the nationalisation of Argentina’s oil giant more than Argentines themselves Perhaps Ms Fernández will enjoy a boost in popularity at home (see article). YPF is a symbol of national pride, and her cash-strapped government would welcome its revenues. Moreover, Argentina faces an… Continue reading YPF Nationalized, Argentina Loses
The Wall Street Journal – Ratings Firm Is in SEC Sights “The Securities and Exchange Commission voted Thursday in favor of bringing an administrative action against Egan-Jones, the firm said. In what would be an unprecedented move, the SEC could seek to punish the firm by stripping it of its ability to issue officially recognized… Continue reading Egan Jones vs. The SEC
Comment Jim Bianco was on Bloomberg TV yesterday discussing Spain. To view the interview click on the image above. To view any of our recent interviews click here. <Click on chart for larger image> The Wall Street Journal – Spanish Borrowing Costs Rise The Spanish government’s 10-year borrowing costs increased at its debt auction Thursday,… Continue reading Spain’s Problems Continue
<Click on chart for larger image> Bloomberg.com – CPI Conspiracy Theories Persist Even With Broad Checks Maggie Humphrey, a price collector for the Bureau of Labor Statistics, visits the same grocery store every month in the Chicago suburbs to punch the cost of a pound of bananas into her Lenovo tablet computer. “That price has… Continue reading Questioning The Measurement Of Inflation
Bloomberg.com – Caroline Baum: Geithner Takes Lead in ’Much Ado About Nothing’ What if the Bureau of Labor Statistics had reported a 220,000 increase in March nonfarm jobs two weeks ago instead of 120,000? Simple. We would have been spared a lot of market volatility, political grandstanding, I-told-you-sos and speculation that, like 2010 and 2011,… Continue reading Interpreting Payroll Reports
<Click on chart for larger image> Risk.net – Commodities correlation with equities, bonds – how long will it last? The correlation between energy commodities and non-energy commodities rose from a long-term average of around 0.1 in 2004 to as high as 0.7 in 2009, according to Xiong and Tang. They found that a key driver… Continue reading Correlation
MarketBeat (WSJ Blog) – Are Dividend Stocks Getting Too Expensive? Dividend-paying shares have been a hot sell for quite a while. So hot, in fact, that at least one analyst is wondering whether the “dividend trade” has gone too far, too fast. Investors often barrel into dividend-paying stocks when times are rough and volatility is… Continue reading Dividend Payers