We put in a good citizen call to the SEC yesterday. "There's a massive scheme to manipulate stock prices," we told the friendly agent. "I have to tell you that your call is being monitored so that we can better serve the public," he replied. "Oh, don't worry about that. The NSA is tapping our call anyway." "Are you...
US stocks fell about 1% yesterday (give or take). Let's see, the total value of the stocks trading on the NYSE is about $17 trillion. So, yesterday erased about $170 billion worth of 'wealth.' By our reckoning, there's about $7 trillion left to go. It's too early to call a top... but we wouldn't want to be sitting on...
The unemployment numbers came out on Friday. They were worse than expected. Only 74,000 jobs added – about one-third of the consensus estimate. Meanwhile, the labor force participation rate – the amount of people either employed or actively seeking work – went from 66% to 62%. That's a loss of about 5 million from the available workforce... or about...
The US Senate has confirmed Janet Yellen for the top post at the Fed. Your editor has given up hope. We had thrown our hat in the ring, hoping to at least get a free chauffeur service as the new Fed chief. But our hat was not even noticed. Our phone never rang. And the person not calling was...
Somehow, like it or not, the world turns. Today's hegemon becomes tomorrow's also-ran. Today's reserve currency becomes tomorrow's wallpaper. Today's cock o' the walk becomes tomorrow's dinner. Hey, we didn't create this system. We don't even especially like it. But that's just the way it is. We'll come back to this in a minute. First, let's just note that...
The Dow rose 105 points yesterday. Gold fell $8 an ounce. Nothing proven one way or another. We don't know what will happen this year. Nor does anyone else. Meanwhile, the newspapers are reporting the rise of the Chinese currency, the renminbi. It is already the Avis of world currencies: No. 2 in terms of trade. And it's gaining...
How's our "Trade of the Decade" doing? Great! It outperformed almost everything in 2013. To refresh your memory... Our Trade of the Decade is based on a few simple ideas. 1. You don't make money by trading in and out of assets. You do better by taking a good position, at the right price, and sitting tight. 2. One...