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  • Finance 0

    Perspective On The Gold / Oil Ratio, Macro Fundamentals And A Gold Sector Bottom

    With all due caveats about the non-stellar gold CoT data, I wanted to note a constructive situation in gold vs. oil, which is a key sector fundamental consideration. Now, there is still a constructive situation in play for nominal crude oil, so take this post for perspective more than anything. Au/WTI bottomed in December of 2016 as the sector bottomed that same month. The first positive signal was a rise above the daily EMA 10. That is what Au/WTI did this week (until today, as it pulls back below the EMA 10, in-day). Pullbacks will happen even if this is a successful bottoming process. The relative downside volume into an oversold RSI (14) ...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Some Strange Trends Among 2017 Hedge Fund Returns

    From one perspective, there is an odd disparity in the force. Hedge fund returns in certain categories are experiencing fat tail correlation and return extremes when compared to players inside a particular category as well as compared to the category average itself. No better can this be seen than in the most formulaic of all hedge fund strategies, managed futures. Meanwhile, in the Long / Short category, a familiar name continues to have a strong year.   Cantab’s multi-strategy approach is finding the market environment conducive to outsized returns During a year when the HSBC Hedge Weekly performance ranking shows the Managed F...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Financial Times: Sell Bitcoin Because The Market Is About To Become “Civilized”

    On 31 October 2017, we discussed the announcement that the CME Group was responding to client interest and launching a Bitcoin Futures contract before the end of this year. CME stated that the contract would be cash settled based on the CME CF Bitcoin Reference rate, a once-a-day reference rate of the US dollar Bitcoin price at 4:00 pm London time. In the run-up to the launch of the futures contract, the Financial Times has written a piece on the likely impact of futures trading on the Bitcoin price. The title of the piece makes the FT’s view clear, “Prepare to bet against bitcoin as it becomes civilized”. We disagree with using th...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Time To Take A Gamble On These 5 Gaming Stocks

    The casino gaming market has seen steady growth since the June 2016 quarter and there’s nothing to suggest that there will be a reversal in this growth trend. On the other hand, there are good reasons why growth should continue over the next few years. A Little Government Support The most important if unlikely of these is government support. The prospect of taxes (as high as 25%) on earnings is attractive and can be used by any welfare state to build schools, infrastructure and so forth. Besides, the industry employs a large number of people and therefore has an impact on the jobs market. So governments cross the world are moving to reduce ...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    D R Horton – Chart Of The Day

    The Chart of the Day belongs to D R Horton (DHI). I found the home builder stock by using Barchart to sort today’s 52 Week High list first by the most frequent number of new highs in the last month, then used the Flipchart feature to review the charts for consistent price appreciation.Since the Trend Spotter signaled a buy on 9/12 the stock gained 27.53%. D.R. Horton, Inc., one of the largest homebuilders in the United States, builds high quality, single-family homes designed principally for the entry-level and move-up markets. Founded in 1978, the company builds and sells homes with a geographic presence in the Midwest, Mid-Atlan...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Chart Of The Week; Deconstructing And Applying BRL

    Last week’s Chart of the Week kicks off this week’s, though it will have to wait for a series of explanations to get us from that one to this. A week ago, we noted the growing divergence between leveraged loan prices and WTI, two risk indicators that used to be pretty well correlated for obvious reasons. The S&P/LSTA Leveraged Loan 100 Index did not have a good week this week, while oil was down only somewhat until trading today. In broader terms, it’s an indication of latent risk being traded in systemic fashion. This extends, of course, beyond US junk credit and oil into currencies like CNY, HKD, RUB, and BRL; i.e., the eurod...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    What Can We Learn From Asset Class Behavior?

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    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Standby For The Coming Golden Age Of Investment

    I believe that the global economy is setting up for a new Golden Age reminiscent of the one the United States enjoyed during the 1950’s, and which I still remember fondly. This is not some pie in the sky prediction. It simply assumes a continuation of existing trends in demographics, technology, politics, and economics. The implications for your investment portfolio will be huge. What I call “intergenerational arbitrage” will be the principal impetus. The main reason that we are now enduring two “lost decades” of economic growth is that 80 million baby boomers are retiring to be followed by only 65 million “Gen Xer’s”. When ...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Here We Go Again: No Down Payment, No Problem!

      Flagstar Bank in Michigan will “gift” down payments to low-income borrowers to buy a house. What can possibly go wrong? Housing Wire reports Flagstar rolls out zero-down mortgage with closing cost aid for low-income borrowers. Flagstar Bank is targeting low- to moderate-income borrowers with a mortgage offer that’s seemingly too good to be true. The program, which Flagstar introduced earlier this week, requires no down payment from the borrower and also provides the borrower with closing cost assistance. Under the program, Flagstar will gift the required 3% down payment to the borrower, plus up to $3,500 to be used for closi...
    On November 17, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    EC Introduction To Candlestick Charts

    What do modern stock market analysts and 17th century Japanese rice traders have in common? A little more than you may think. In fact, both have been known to be fond of a very particular charting technique to describe trading sessions. Today, we call this style of stock chart a candlestick chart, and it is regularly used by investors and technical traders to gauge the momentum of securities. CANDLESTICK CHARTS Today’s infographic comes to us from Hantec Markets, and it provides an introduction to how candlestick charts work. Further, it explains some common patterns, and how they are generally interpreted by investors. Candlestick charts ...
    On November 17, 2017 / By