Tag Archives: newsletter

  European Stocks Look Really Bad… Late last week stock markets around the world weakened and it seemed as though recent “Brexit” polls showing that the “leave” campaign has obtained a slight lead provided the trigger. The idea was supported by a notable surge in the British pound’s volatility. Battening down the hatches… Euro-Stoxx 50 Index On the other hand, if one looks at European stocks, one could just as well...

  Hero or Traitor? And it’s one, two, three, What are we fighting for? Don’t ask me, I don’t give a damn, Next stop is Vietnam; And it’s five, six, seven, Open up the pearly gates, Well there ain’t no time to wonder why, Whoopee! We’re all gonna die. Country Joe McDonald Robert McNamara, next to a map of Vietnam…in 1964 he participated in propagating the “Tonkin incident” lie, a false flag incident which drew the US...

Silver gets the Saruman question…(see further below) Photo credit: New Line Cinema Precious Metals Surge The price of gold bumped up thirty bucks, and that of silver about one buck. Is this liftoff — when the dollar falls sharply, and the price of each metal in dollar terms skyrockets? Is this the denoument when the gold bug does not get rich, because although his net worth measured in dollar is massively up, the...

  Battle of Wits  BALTIMORE – On Wednesday, the Dow rose over 18,000, for the first time since April. Hillary is riding high, too. She is a pro. She has the entire Deep State behind her – including almost every crony and zombie in the country – and a political machine that can turn out more claptrap than any in history. While her opponent rambles incoherently and mindlessly, every phrase from Hillary’s mouth is a...

A chart-up from China and Japan. Growth of Chinese industrial production, retail sales, fixed asset investment is at lows not seen since the Asian financial crisis. The Yuan is falling. Economic data from Japan is not a lot better. Economic Data from China Then Chinese data largely disappointed. A “meet” in Industrial Production – hovering at multi-year lows… *CHINA MAY INDUSTRIAL OUTPUT RISES 6.0% FROM YEAR EARLIER...

Within the world of central bank and government gold reserves, there is often an assumption that these gold holdings consist entirely of gold bullion bars. While this is true in some cases, it is not the fully story because many central banks and governments, such as the US, France, Italy, Switzerland, the UK and Venezuela, all hold an element of gold bullion coins as part of their official monetary gold reserves. These...

EM ended last week under pressure.  With two potentially disruptive events (FOMC meeting and Brexit vote) still in play, we think that EM softness should carry over into this week.   Markets remain jittery about the June 23 Brexit vote, as a vote to leave would be very negative for risk assets such as EM.  No action is expected at the FOMC meeting Wednesday.  However, we think July remains very much in play and the FOMC...

A couple of weeks ago, the four central banks that meet in the coming days were thought to be a big deal. Numerous Federal Reserve officials were preparing the market for a summer hike. Risks of a new downturn in Japan spurred speculation that BOJ would ease policy. On the other hand, the neither the Bank of England nor the Swiss National Bank were expected to move ahead of the UK referendum on June 23. Besides...

EUR/CHF The SNB has about 280 billion CHF in euro. Hence the loss of 2% in the EUR/CHF rate will cost the SNB around 14 billion Swiss francs.We explained that the main reason for the stronger CHF was the bad Non Farm Payrolls Report in the United States. FX Rates June 06 to June 10, 2016 click to enlarge USD/CHF As Marc explains, the dollar recovered a bit in the second part of the week. Still enough so that the...

On the Swiss Franc: Price action shows a increase of the Swiss franc after the bad US payrolls report. Commitments of traders, however, indicate a move to a short CHF position of 9600 x 100k contracts against the dollar. Chandler: “Although Swiss franc speculative position adjustment was not large, it was counterintuitive.  The market has been rife with talk of Swiss franc buying, and the euro-franc cross has fallen...