Saturday, April 30, 2016

US Economic Statistics LIES, LIES AND OMG, MORE LIES / Economics / Economic Statistics

By: James_Quinn

It’s that time of year again. It’s open enrollment for health plans at my employer. They are biggest employer in Philly and have the most leverage possible with the insurance companies. They have such good leverage that my premiums are going up “only” 9.8% this year for a basic HMO plan. Based on what I hear from others, I should be thankful for just a 9.8% increase.

This isn’t a new development. Since I’ve been tracking all my expenditures using Quicken since 1991, I know exactly what my annual health insurance costs have been every year. Obamacare was passed in 2009 and began to be implemented in 2010. Obama declared that families could expect $2,500 of savings per year. I know for a fact my annual medical expenses were $2,000 higher in 2015 than they were in 2010.

Friday, April 29, 2016

Gold Stocks: Extended but More Upside Potential / Commodities / Gold and Silver Stocks 2016

By: Jordan_Roy_Byrne

What a move in the gold stocks! The sector has refused to correct for more than a few days at a time. All weakness has been bought as a wall of worry has been built and the sector emerges from a historic low that could be on par with the 1942 low in the stock market. I thought the Federal Reserve statement or reaction to it (along with the market’s overbought condition) might cause the sector to correct this week. Instead, GDX and GDXJ powered higher and have gained roughly 13% for the week.

Friday, April 29, 2016

Did Shanghai Just Blow a Hole in the Old Gold Market? / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2016

By: Michael_J_Kosares

I did not want the day to pass without posting a few words on gold’s significant push to the upside, now trading just shy of the $1300 mark. To be sure, the dual positions with respect to rates on the part of the Bank of Japan (to stand pat) and the Federal Reserve (to remain ultra-dovish) played a role in the dollar’s recent weakness and gold’s strength. Those determinants though, in my view, are only part of the story, and the few percentage point drop in the dollar against the yen over the past week is really not enough to justify a nearly $60 rise in the price of gold over the past five trading sessions.  The bigger determinant has been China’s underpinning of the gold price on two different occasions over the past week after it had taken a major turn to the downside in New York trading.

Friday, April 29, 2016

Stock Market Strong Elliott Wave Relationship is Developing / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Anthony_Cherniawski

So far, sub-Minute Wave (iii) is more than 3.38 times the size of sub-Minute Wave (i). This suggests a strong Fibonacci relationship in this decline. This is the Wave relationship we are looking for in this decline. I am still looking for Minute Wave [i] to reach the 50-day Moving Average, or possibly exceed it.

At this rate, Minute Wave [i] may be complete today with a bounce on Monday morning. But things may also speed up at any time.

Friday, April 29, 2016

Fed's Kaplan: Brexit to Factor in US June Interest Rate Decision / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates

By: Bloomberg

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas President Robert Kaplan spoke with Bloomberg Television's Betty Liu, Mark Barton, and Michael McKee today. He discussed his expectations for a consumer rebound, his support of a rate hike if GDP and jobs data come together, and how the U.K. Brexit debate will factor into the Fed's next interest rate decision.

On how much Brexit will influence the Fed, Kaplan said: "It'll be a factor...Our meeting is the 15th and 8 days later is the vote. I'm going to have to make an assessment on June 15 what the likelihood is, and right now, it's a little bit unclear -- or it's unclear. Forget a little bit, it's unclear. And if it's still unclear on June 15, that's going to be a factor."

Friday, April 29, 2016

Silver Miners Strong in Grim Q4 / Commodities / Gold and Silver Stocks 2016

By: Zeal_LLC

The silver miners showed impressive fundamental strength during 2015’s grim fourth quarter.  That was the worst silver suffered in many years, a perfect-storm trough with major secular lows fueling extreme bearish sentiment.  Traders feared this entire industry faced an existential threat, so they fled in terror from silver stocks.  But silver miners’ strong operational performances aced that severe trial with flying colors.

Q4’15 may seem like ancient history now, but it was exceedingly important for the entire precious-metals realm.  Gold slumped to a miserable 6.1-year secular low in mid-December, on the day after the Fed hiked rates for the first time in 9.5 years.  That was wildly irrational based on market history, which has proven gold thrives during Fed-rate-hike cycles with big average gains.  Gold hadn’t seen lower prices since Q4’09.

Friday, April 29, 2016

Is Silver a better bet than Gold in the Near Future? / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2016

By: Chris_Vermeulen

Last week, the beginning of April 18^th, 2016, silver was on fire, rising sharply and forcing ‘Wall Street’ to take note of its move, though, many investors believe that gold and silver are one and the same, one can hold either in your portfolio and earn the same returns? the truth is far from that!

In reality, though both silver and gold are considered precious metals and over the long-term, they have a high degree of ‘correlation’ in their movements, but in the short-term, for the active investor, both offer opportunities at different times.

Friday, April 29, 2016

Stock Market Decline Continues / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Anthony_Cherniawski

SPX may be in for a short-term bounce as it approaches the 2-hour mid-Cycle support at 2062.81. If so, it may not last. The more important support and potential target for this decline appears to be the 50-day Moving Average at 2028.50.

Friday, April 29, 2016

What's Going on with Gold? - Video / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2016

By: Gary_Savage

Gold is in the final phase of the baby bull rally. This is the stage that causes maximum pain for shorts that were unable to recognize that the bear market is over, or tried to sell short (I warned and warned traders not to short a baby bull).

This is also the stage that causes maximum anxiety for longs who aren’t in the market. This is the time when the bull tries to get as many traders as possible to panic in at the top so as to catch them in the first reaction.

Friday, April 29, 2016

US Dollar Meltdown Underway as Fed Credibility Evaporates - Video / Currencies / US Dollar

By: Mario_Innecco

Transcript Excerpt: It's Friday April 29 2016 early here in london it's nine o'clock in the
morning so 4 a.m. New York time while in the us- and I'm making this video just
to talk about the dollar but the galleries crashing you most people and
even I have focused on the dollar yen on the yen been strong but you know we've
broken through the lows of the year and we had the lowest level since October
2014 that the dollars at 107 12 right now against the yen we had a key support
which was to prove you know earlier this month the low one of seven sixty and we
went down way to 10 689 and you know there's talk about that the Bank of Japan

Friday, April 29, 2016

How to Use the CoT Report in Gold Investing? / Commodities / Gold and Silver Stocks 2016

By: Arkadiusz_Sieron

The CoT report enables investors to peek behind the scenes of the gold futures market and to better understand the psychology of the marketplace and, thus, get a better idea of futures moves on the market. This is because the COT report shows the net long or short positions of different types of traders. The knowledge of how traders are positioned is useful, but what really matters are changes in their positions. Knowing that, for example, non-commercials have 175,000 contracts long is meaningless without the supplementary information whether they are accumulating more or starting to unload contracts over time.

Friday, April 29, 2016

Sri Lanka is Intriguing: Areas to Consider for Value Investing / Economics / Asian Economies

By: Dylan_Waller

The stock market discount and comparatively stronger trends of growth present in frontier Asia is intriguing, and a buy frontier, sell emerging approach is one of the most clear cut ways to prosper when investing in Asia. These trends, coupled with noteworthy political improvements, can be combined to create a strong value investing case. Sri Lanka is a strong frontier market in Asia that meets all of these requirements, yet is being relegated by many foreign investors. Sri Lanka has been benefiting from the end of the country’s 26 year civil war that ended in 2009, which has resulted in an improved political landscape.   This improvement has been coupled with Sri Lanka’s new government, which was elected in January 2015.

Friday, April 29, 2016

Gold “Chart of The Decade” – Maths Suggest $10,000 Per Ounce Says Rickards / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2016

By: GoldCore

James Rickards, economic and monetary expert, joined Bloomberg’s Francine Lacqua on Tuesday to discuss the gold “chart of the decade”, his new book “The New Case for Gold,” why gold is money and why gold is going to $10,000/oz in the coming years.

Friday, April 29, 2016

Ugly Day for Wall Street / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Harry_Boxer

The stock market indices had a very rough day today. The day started out with a nice rally in the morning, they rolled over just after the lunch hour, and got hammered hard into the close, finishing as one of the worst days of the year.

Net on the day, the Dow was down 210.79 at 17,830.76, more than 200 points off the high. The S&P 500 was 19.34 at 2075.81, 24 points off its high. The Nasdaq 100 was down 52.64 at 4363.99, 93 points off the high.

Friday, April 29, 2016

Are We or Are We Not in a New Gold Bull Market? / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2016

By: The_Gold_Report

Technical analyst Jack Chan has examined the charts and says that if we are in a new bull market, prices in both gold and gold equities should begin to pull back and consolidate soon.

Thursday, April 28, 2016

Cruz-Fiorina Alliance Shows Desperation / ElectionOracle / US Presidential Election 2016

By: Stephen_Lendman

A days earlier announced Cruz-Kasich alliance to stay out of each other’s way in upcoming primaries as a way of challenging Trump faltered straightaway - Kasich urging supporters to stick with him.

Trump called their gambit “pathetic,” a desperation move. In response to Cruz naming Carly Fiorina his running mate, he posted an earlier TV clip on his Twitter page of her calling Cruz a politician who “says whatever he needs to say to get elected.”

Thursday, April 28, 2016

The Sad Truth About the State of the Financial System Today / Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2016

By: Graham_Summers

For seven years, the world has operated under a complete delusion that Central Banks somehow fixed the 2008 Crisis.

All of the arguments claiming this defied common sense. A 5th grader would tell you that you cannot solve a debt problem by issuing more debt. If the below chart was a problem BEFORE 2008… there is no way that things are better now. After all, we’ve just added another $20 trillion in debt to the US system.

Thursday, April 28, 2016

Will Stock Market Crash 24% in the Next Three Months? / Stock-Markets / Financial Crash

By: Graham_Summers

Will stocks collapse 24% (a Crash) in the next three months?

For the first time since the 2009 bottom, Earnings Per Share (EPS) have diverged sharply to the downside from stocks.

Thursday, April 28, 2016

The Next Battleground for Gold Will Be At 1550 If the Cup and Handle Formation Completes / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2016

By: Jesse

If and when gold breaks out of this cup and handle formation, which is a matter of probability and not certainty, the next real battleground in a new bull market will be around $1550. One of the more interesting variables will be the manner of any breakout, and the 'time' it takes to reach a minimum measuring objective.

This is quite appropriate as 1550 marks the major support level for the channel in which gold had been moving prior to the recent bear market.

Thursday, April 28, 2016

The Central Banking Prisoner’s Dilemma: Fed Freezes, BoJ Stammers, Dollar Drops 2% Overnight / Politics / Central Banks

By: Jeff_Berwick

In today’s communist-style, centrally planned world, when big central bankers meet and make decisions, no matter how small, markets quake and currencies shake. And that’s what just happened.

Bankers at both the Federal Reserve and the Bank of Japan met in the last 12 hours to decide where they would take monetary policy next. But when they sat down to make decisions, they were faced with a classic prisoner’s dilemma: Options were precluded. There was a lot they wanted to do but little they could do.