Charts of the Week Topics Covered This Week Include: The Size Into Open-Ended Mutual Funds The Flows Into Open-Ended Mutual Funds Major Fixed Income Mutual Fund Sector Flows Don’t Expect Mutual Fund Inflows Anytime Soon Corporate And Muni Detail The Size and Flows Into ETFs ETF Holdings Of Platinum, Gold, Platinum, Palladium and Silver Municipal… Continue reading Untitled
<Click on chart for larger image> The Wall Street Journal – China Sold Treasurys in November China, the largest foreign creditor to the U.S., was a net seller of Treasurys in November.In contrast, Japan boosted its overall holdings of Treasurys, narrowing its gap with China which remains the biggest foreign owner of Treasurys. The drop… Continue reading China, Japan And U.S. Debt
<Click on chart for larger image> Blooomberg.com – Mortgage-Bond Spreads Tumble From 15-Month High: Credit Markets Relative yields on government-backed mortgage bonds that guide U.S. home buyers’ borrowing costs fell from a 15-month high as interest rates become less volatile. Fannie Mae’s current-coupon 30-year fixed-rate mortgage securities yielded 0.79 percentage point more than 10-year Treasuries… Continue reading Mortgage Bonds
Bloomberg Businessweek – U.S. Stocks Near ‘Significant’ Top, Tom DeMark Says U.S. stocks are within a week of “a significant market top” that is likely to precede a drop of at least 11 percent in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index, said Tom DeMark, creator of a set of market-timing indicators. DeMark’s Sequential and Combo… Continue reading Are Stocks Near The Top?
Bloomberg Businessweek – Best Muni-Bond Manager Says Whitney Call on Defaults Overblown Lyle Fitterer, the top manager of U.S. municipal-bond funds in the past decade, sides with Bill Gross and against Meredith Whitney in his view that fiscally strained states and cities will avoid widespread defaults. “The baby has been thrown out with the bathwater,”… Continue reading The Muni Default Debate Continues …
Reuters.com – James Saft: Fed hits its 3rd mandate: rising shares While we have known for months that the Fed was targeting asset prices with QE, it really is shocking to hear it enunciated so clearly. As money manager John Mauldin mused in a letter to clients, would the Fed be setting targets for shares?… Continue reading QE2
<Click on chart for larger image> Bloomberg.com – Euro’s Spanish Battle Needs Some Shock and Awe The major battle in the fight for the survival of the euro will be fought on Spanish soil. Greece, Ireland and soon Portugal should be regarded as skirmishes. But Spain is different, in terms of scale and solvency. If… Continue reading The Euro And Spanish Debt
The Financial Times – Was it all just a bad dream? Was it all just a bad dream? Strip out the banks, and share prices suggest the past three years never happened. On Tuesday, the FTSE 250 index of midsized British companies reached its highest since July 2007, just before the credit crunch hit. Its… Continue reading Small Caps Are Reaching Their Pre-Credit Crunch Highs
Bloomberg.com – Amity Shlaes: Taylor Rule II Shows Which Fed Moves Work Best The reason Hu Jintao decided to visit the U.S. this month is that the Chinese leader wants to know when the U.S. economy and its currency will be stable and strong again. It’s good the Chinese are known for patience because Hu… Continue reading Taylor Rule II
Bloomberg.com – Pimco’s Kashkari Warns U.S. May Face Debt Crisis Without Reduced Spending “Our debt is now starting to get away from us,” Kashkari, a managing director at Pacific Investment Management Co., said in an interview on Bloomberg Television’s “InBusiness” with Margaret Brennan. “Indicators in the Treasury market are flashing caution.” The difference in yields… Continue reading Will The U.S Face A Debt Crisis?
The Wall Street Journal – Fed Labors to Get Its Message Out Federal Reserve officials, who meet next week to ponder monetary policy, have signaled they aim to stick with Chairman Ben Bernanke’s plan to buy $600 billion in long-term U.S. Treasury bonds. But they are struggling to find a coherent way to explain that—and… Continue reading The Federal Reserve