Despite Fed minutes that left the door open to a December taper contingent on better economic stats, the markets are taking the relatively upbeat data over the last two days in stride....
Copper has rather quietly displayed a good amount of weakness over the last few weeks and is down another 2.2% today. We highlight this because copper, having so many industrial and construction related uses, tends to be a good thermometer by which to measure the...
The spread between junk bond yields and the yield on the 10 year treasury bond hit a new cycle low yesterday, confirming the strength we’ve seen in the equity markets....
Multiples continued to expand in October as the Shiller PE hit a five year high of 24.4. Based on about 120 years of data, this implies a prospective 10 year nominal annualized return for stocks of something close to 0%....
Banks, and financials in general, play an important role in the performance of stock indices. Many bull markets are characterized by the outperformance of banks relative to the overall market. The latest rally in the S&P has not been confirmed by the relative outperformance of...
The taper trade appears to be back on this week. Some of the basic symptoms of this trade are: 1) higher interest rates, 2) higher US dollar, 3) lower gold and 4) weakening stocks. Charts below showing the last 10 days of activity reveal this...
We use a very basic fundamental indicator to capture movements in the economy and compare them to stock prices. The fundamental indicator has two, equally weighted, pieces: 1) the CRB Raw Industrial index divided by unemployment claims, and 2) Consumer Comfort index....
So far the contraction in commercial paper has not had a negative impact on stocks, but history would suggest that this is a red flag....
10 year treasury yields finished 9bps lower on the day today hitting the lowest level since mid-July while gold, silver, copper and the euro all caught a decent bid. The divergence between S&P 500 futures and the 10 year note is now at the most...
QuestionWhat are speculators long right now? Answer1) Stocks – from the E-mini S&P500, to the E-mini NASDAQ, to the E-mini Dow, to the E-mini Russell 2000 QuestionWhat are speculators short right now?...
New monetary policies like QE have muddied the water somewhat when looking at monetary aggregates like M2. We have a simple adjustment we make to M2 to improve the optics on bank credit....
For the last 20 years, valuations on the S&P 500 have correlated pretty well with the 25-54 year old male participation rate in the US. The now 13-year old structural bear market in the US is easy to see. The recent turn down in this...
S&P 500 futures fall to 10 day lows this morning. The VIX is close to breaking out above 20....
