Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Warnings We’ll Wish We’d Heeded — Plunging US Jobless Claims / Economics / Unemployment

By: John_Rubino

It’s the same story every time: Imbalances build up during a recovery but most investors ignore them because good times have become the new normal and the uptrend seems bullet-proof. Then things fall apart and everyone wishes they’d paid attention to history.

This series will cover a few of the more glaring examples of late-cycle myopia, beginning with jobless claims, i.e., the number of people joining the ranks of the unemployed.

Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Brace Yourself For Italy’s Bankruptcy / Interest-Rates / Eurozone Debt Crisis

By: John_Mauldin

When Charles Gave of Gavekal chooses to express displeasure over an economic trend, an asset class, or what have you, he does not mince words. Right now, Charles is exercised about Italy.

When Italy adopted the euro in 1999, Charles argued at the time that Italy would change from being an economy with a high probability of many currency devaluations to one with the certain probability of eventual bankruptcy. Now, he says, the fateful moment is not far off.

Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Trump’s FDA Chief May Implement Progressive Approval for Drugs / Companies / Healthcare Sector

By: John_Mauldin

BY PATRICK COX : President-elect Trump's cabinet appointments are generating a great deal of attention and controversy. After eight years of Democrat rule, it would be foolish to expect otherwise.

One appointment, though, will have a profound impact on your health… and the health of your loved ones.

Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Trump Appointees Could Make Up The Majority Of The Fed In Two Years / Interest-Rates / US Federal Reserve Bank

By: John_Mauldin

BY PATRICK WATSON : The Trump administration's economic team is beginning to take shape, but we still don’t have nominees for two Federal Reserve Board vacancies.

Whoever gets them will have a chance to truly disrupt the global economy. That’s a big deal—so why haven’t we heard more about Trump’s plans for the Fed?

Monday, December 19, 2016

Chinese Yuan's Day of Reckoning / Currencies / China Currency Yuan

By: Michael_Pento

China's economy and markets have been defying the laws of economics since 2009. Amid a worldwide financial crisis during that year, they managed to grow their economy by 8.7%. But that growth was fueled by a $586 billion dollar government stimulus package, which was followed by an additional $20 trillion dollars in new construction spending over the next seven years.

China's economy became the envy of the world as the economy expanded through the edict of government to build massive cities that were mostly vacant. In fact, estimates are that 52 million homes in China are currently vacant and 90% of those empty units were purchased for investment purposes.

Monday, December 19, 2016

A KEYNESIAN CHALLENGE: Prove Deflation is Bad For ME! / Economics / Deflation

By: Gordon_T_Long

'Mish' Shedlock and Gordon T Long discuss a number of outstanding issues in 2016 that will become Themes in 2017.

Economic Challenge to Keynesian's

Mish is quite emphatic that:

"Of all the widely believed but patently false economic beliefs is the absurd notion that falling consumer prices are bad for the economy and something must be done about them. The BIS did a study and found routine deflation was not any problem at all.

“Deflation may actually boost output. Lower prices increase real incomes and wealth. And they may also make export goods more competitive,” stated the BIS study.

Monday, December 19, 2016

After Aleppo: America Needs a New Syria Policy / Politics / Syria

By: Dr_Ron_Paul

Over the past week, eastern Aleppo was completely brought back under control of the Syrian government. The population began to return to its homes, many of which were abandoned when al-Qaeda-linked rebels took over in 2012. As far as I know, the western mainstream media did not have a single reporter on the ground in Aleppo, but relied on "activists" to inform us that the Syrian army was massacring the civilian population. It hardly makes sense for an army to fight and defeat armed rebels just so it can go in and murder unarmed civilians, but then again not much mainstream reporting on the tragedy in Syria has made sense.

Monday, December 19, 2016

SPX may be hit by a double whammy / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Anthony_Cherniawski

While the SPX Premarket is slightly positive it has a cluster of Primary Cycle turns starting last Friday and lasting through this week that suggest something remarkable may happen. Friday morning was the terminus of an irregular (truncated) Wave (c) correction. The decline afterwards wasn’t very deep, but enough to cross beneath the trading channel trendline and become trapped beneath it at the close,

Monday, December 19, 2016

On the 225th Anniversary of the United States’ Bill of Rights / Politics / US Politics

By: Antonius_Aquinas

This December, 2016, marks the 225^th anniversary of the ratification of the first ten amendments to the US Constitution which would become known as the “Bill of Rights.”  To secure passage of the Constitution, the framers of the document (the Federalists) had to agree that it would contain explicit language on individual rights.

Monday, December 19, 2016

Bail-Ins Coming To Italy? World's Oldest Bank "Survival Rests On Savers" / Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis Bailouts

By: GoldCore

The world’s oldest bank and Italy’s third biggest bank, Monte dei Paschi di Siena (MPS), is making a last-ditch emergency attempt as the year ends to convince tens of thousands of ordinary Italian savers to help it escape state hands.

MPS shares fell 8.5% in early trading this morning as the bank began its attempt to entice institutional and retail investors to snap up fresh shares. The bank wants 40,000 retail investors and savers to take part in a complex €5 billion (£4.18bn) bailout. The Tuscan lender said it is pressing ahead with a highly-ambitious plan to persuade private investors to convert their bonds into shares. This process must be completed in the next two weeks – by the end of the year.

Monday, December 19, 2016

Stock Market More Short-Term Fluctuations Along Record Highs - Which Direction Is Next? / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Paul_Rejczak

Briefly: In our opinion, speculative short positions are favored (with stop-loss at 2,330, and profit target at 2,150, S&P 500 index).

Our intraday outlook remains bearish, and our short-term outlook is bearish. Our medium-term outlook remains neutral, following S&P 500 index breakout above last year's all-time high:

Intraday outlook (next 24 hours): bearish
Short-term outlook (next 1-2 weeks): bearish
Medium-term outlook (next 1-3 months): neutral
Long-term outlook (next year): neutral

Monday, December 19, 2016

UK Savings Trends Treasury Report 2016 - A Year of Misery / Personal_Finance / Savings Accounts

By: MoneyFacts

Moneyfacts UK Savings Trends Treasury Report data, yet to be published, highlights that all of the banking groups have cut rates in 2016’s race to the bottom.

Monday, December 19, 2016

What Washington's Rivals Stand to Gain From Hacking the Presidential Campaign / Politics / US Presidential Election 2016

By: STRATFOR

Earlier this month, U.S. President Barack Obama ordered the intelligence community to conduct a full review of the 2016 presidential election before Donald Trump is inaugurated on Jan. 20, 2017. The move came amid growing suspicions that Russian intelligence agencies were behind the recent hacking of email accounts belonging to members of the Democratic National Committee and presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton's campaign manager, John Podesta. Though many people's computers have been compromised before, the fact that the attack targeted prominent political figures during a presidential race — and that tens of thousands of emails gained in the process were then posted to WikiLeaks, an organization with clear connections to Russian intelligence — has caused an uproar.

Monday, December 19, 2016

UK Christmas Sales 2016 High Street and Online Start Dates Full List / Personal_Finance / Shopping

By: Nadeem_Walayat

Britain is enjoying a post BrExit consumer boom courtesy of the Government and Bank of England hitting the panic button following the BrExit vote, injecting an extra £150 billion into the UK economy. So Britain's shoppers with more cash in their wallets look set to go on a debt fuelled spending binge at the cathedrals of modern Britain, and so consumers infected with sales fever will be out hunting for bargains as Christmas has long since morphed into a month long relentless advertising campaign to keep consumers spending all the way into January.

Monday, December 19, 2016

Federal Reserve and Stronger Real Rates Cause Breakdown in Gold / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2016

By: Jordan_Roy_Byrne

Gold and gold mining stocks were setting up for a rebound until the market suddenly priced in tighter policy from the Federal Reserve. Both nominal and real yields surged and that pushed an already oversold sector below key support. Gold lost support in the mid $1100s while gold stocks (GDX) lost a critical support level. While the sector is oversold and likely to rebound as 2017 begins, the primary trend remains lower.

Monday, December 19, 2016

While dismantling Obamacare, U.S. Congress aims for Social Security reform / Politics / Social Issues

By: Michael_T_Bucci

Humans are woefully unprepared to deal with a surprise asteroid or comet, said NASA researcher Dr Joseph Nuth at the annual meeting of American Geophysical Union this month. Woefully, Americans are as unprepared to deal with the most ideologically driven reactionary Congress in this nation’s history that will convene on January 3 and decide the future of Obamacare, safety net programs, housing, EPA, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, among others.

In the elections of Nov. 8, Americans gave Republicans unified control of government. The policy and budget priorities of Congress promise to reflect a center-right conservative ideology for years to come.

Monday, December 19, 2016

Gold and Silver New Bull or Bear Market Rally ? / Commodities / Gold and Silver 2017

By: Rambus_Chartology

Buckle Up ,Pour yourself your favorite beverage , and take some time . This Report will be an in depth Chartology analysis of the current situation in this ever interesting and often exasperating market we are participating in. Oh and don’t forget to open your mind. Lets begin.

I would like to start the Weekend Report by looking at a combo chart which has the US dollar on top and gold on the bottom, which shows you a better version of the positive divergence the US dollar had vs gold in 2011. First note the red arrows on the US dollar and gold back in 2008 when gold was making a high, and the US dollar was making a low, which is what you would expect. Now look at the two red arrows in 2011 whch shows the all time high for gold and a higher low for the US dollar vs the 2008 low. Gold rallied almost 1200 points to its 2011 bull market high, but the US dollar made a higher low. If they were on an equal footing the US dollar should have traded much lower when gold was making its all time high. That’s how I viewed the positive divergence for the US dollar vs gold.

Sunday, December 18, 2016

Freedom in America Disappearing in Plain Sight / Politics / US Politics

By: Stephen_Lendman

The republic was founded “in strict secrecy,” Benjamin Franklin explained. When asked “what have we got, a republic or a monarchy,” he responded “(a) republic, if you can keep it.”

Today he’d say a coup to destroy it is underway in plain sight, the last vestiges of freedom fading with it - a fascist dictatorship emerging, far more ruthless and dangerous than others in world history.

Sunday, December 18, 2016

Stock Market Consolidation? / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Andre_Gratian

Current Position of the Market

SPX Long-term trend: If the market strength persists, the long-term trend may need to be re-evaluated.

SPX Intermediate trend: SPX intermediate P&F count to 2270 has now been met, but there are higher counts that could still be filled before a serious reversal take place.

Analysis of the short-term trend is done on a daily-basis with the help of hourly charts. It is an important adjunct to the analysis of daily and weekly charts which discuss longer market trends.

Sunday, December 18, 2016

Santa Claus to Extend Trump Stock Market Rally? / Stock-Markets / Stock Markets 2016

By: Brad_Gudgeon

In this article, I’m going to point to reasons why I believe this rally has some more juice left in it.  I also want to warn that early next year, what I thought would happen in November 2016 should happen in March/April 2017, and that is a 14+% drop.

The Trump phenomenon seems to have caused the normal cycles to misbehave and extend. After further examination into Primary Wave 4, I have come to the conclusion that I need to revise the timing of the final Millennial Wave top out to a possible 3 years (that IF is Intermediate Wave Z of Primary Wave 4 extends out to the end of 2018 instead of year end 2017).