Archive for the 'Economy' Category
GOLD COULD TEST ALL TIME HIGH TODAY
January 2nd, 2008It was a Guesses for 2008 post, not a Guesses for Later Today post! Sheesh! Congrats to all gold longs. Via: Reuters: Gold swept to a 28-year high on Wednesday driven by surging oil, a weaker dollar and simmering geopolitical tension, making a test of record highs at $850 an ounce a real possibility on […]
Ireland: Stock Market Crashed in 2007
January 2nd, 2008Via: Wall Street Journal: Ireland’s decade-long Celtic Tiger economy not only ran out of steam in 2007, it bled copiously, judging by the woeful performance of its stock market. After faring better than most major global indexes over several years, the benchmark ISEQ index was one of the worst-performing markets in the world this year, […]
Some Guesses About 2008
January 2nd, 2008WARNING: This is not a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any financial instrument. This took me a bit longer to write than I thought it would. Apologies. Here are some issue areas that I think will be interesting to watch in 2008. Economy I don’t see the U.S. Dollar catching much of a break […]
MERRILL LYNCH IN EMERGENCY WEEKEND TALKS WITH ASIAN AND MIDDLE EASTERN SOVEREIGN WEALTH FUNDS
December 31st, 2007“Why is this happening now? Here’s my theory: 31st December is a major day on the financial calendar. If you take a sample of bonds you’ll find that a disproportionate number of them are due for interest and/or redemption on 31st December. Redeeming bonds is very cash intensive, and cash is not freely available in […]
Realty Reality: Housing Prices Are Headed Way Down
December 29th, 2007Via: Los Angeles Times: In 2002, the median price of a single-family home in Los Angeles was $270,000 and the median homeowner’s income was $65,000. With a $50,000 down payment, the annual cost of that house (taxes, insurance and payment on a 30-year fixed-rate conventional mortgage) would add up to about 33% of the median […]
Make or Break: Gold Nears Two Critical Overhead Resistance Levels
December 29th, 2007WARNING: This is not a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any financial instrument. Thoughts for gold bugs going into the weekend and New Year’s period… Gold was at $822.60 when I put out my last long call a couple of days ago. Gold is around $840 now. Again, the next number to watch is […]
Britain in Secret Talks with the Taliban
December 28th, 2007What percentage of the world’s heroin results from Afghan opium production? 90% How many times does the article below mention opium? It doesn’t mention opium at all. So, in summary: The British Army provided security cordons around meetings between two senior British intelligence officers and leading members of the group responsible for producing the opium […]
Gold: Strong Rally
December 27th, 2007WARNING: This is not a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any financial instrument. We’ve got gold in strong rally right now. It’s still range bound, but keep $845 in mind. That’s the overhead resistance. The current move is happening on thin, holiday order flows. I find it interesting that some players see the need […]
Home Prices Post Record Annual Drop
December 27th, 2007Captain Obvious strikes again. Via: Reuters: Prices of existing U.S. single-family homes recorded their biggest annual drop in October, suggesting the housing slump is far from over, a national home price gauge released on Wednesday showed. The Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller year-over-year index of 10 metropolitan areas fell to 209.68 in October, down 6.7 percent from […]
New York Town Lets Poor Seniors Work to Pay Property Taxes
December 27th, 2007This is an unusually grim story, even by my standards. What’s the innovative solution for seniors who are lonely, broke and unable to pay their property taxes? Have them work for penury for the tax man! Of course, the ghastly Associated Press represents this as a human interest/happy ending story. The seniors get to hang […]
