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  • Finance 0

    Take The Week Off

    Some wild action this past week as we continue to base and may see some downside from some stocks as we see markets continue to build bases and consolidate. I don’t see this bull market as being over yet, with the real fun yet to come. Next week should be all but written off with Monday a half day and Tuesday markets are closed. All but the computers will most likely be taking the whole week off enjoying some time away. No need to try to trade and most likely get chopped up, so I’ll likely not do much in the week to come. SPY remains in the flat channel between 241 and 244. A couple or few weeks and we should break higher into a new range...
    On July 1, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Corus Entertainment: 8%+ Yield, Monthly Dividends

    There are certain sectors of the stock market that are well-known for having quality dividend stocks. Consumer staples, healthcare, and utilities all come to mind. Corus Entertainment (CJREF) is not a company that falls within any of these sectors, as it is one of Canada’s largest media companies. However, it has many appealing characteristics for dividend investors. What especially stands out about Corus Entertainment is the company’s 8.4% dividend yield, which includes it among the short list of stocks with 5%+ dividend yields. You can see the full list of all 416 stocks with 5%+ dividend yields here. In addition to Corus’ high di...
    On July 1, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Nowcast, GDPNow 2nd Quarter Forecasts Narrow Slightly: What’s Ahead?

    On Friday, both the Atlanta Fed and New York Fed updated their GDP 2nd quarter forecasts. The FRBNY Nowcast remained at 1.9% while GDPNow dipped to 2.7% narrowing a once gigantic spread to 0.8 percentage points. GDPNow Latest forecast: 2.7 percent — June 30, 2017 The GDPNow model forecast for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the second quarter of 2017 is 2.7 percent on June 30, down from 2.9 percent on June 26. The forecast of the contribution of net exports to second-quarter real GDP growth fell from –0.34 percentage points to –0.51 percentage points after Wednesday’s advance release on inventories and interna...
    On July 1, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Hedge Fund Traders Return To Banking As Trump Promises To ‘Make Prop Trading Great Again’

    The hedge fund industry is finding itself in increasingly dire straits as persistently weak returns and the advent of low-cost investing have forced more and more funds to shut down. So, it’s unsurprising that, amid this steadily worsening backdrop, more traders are heading for the exits. But where are the heading? Increasingly, more traders are moving back from where they came – i.e. the big banks, which expect to see a boost in trading revenue as President Donald Trump has vowed to dial back postcrisis regulations that forced banks to wind down their prop desks. In recent months, a number of high-profile hedge fund names have m...
    On July 1, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Housing Market Review – Pushing Against Interest Rate Headwinds

    The last Housing Market Review covered data reported in May, 2017 for April, 2017. At that time, the iShares US Home Construction (ITB) was testing support at its uptrending 50-day moving average (DMA) for the third time in May. ITB bounced nicely from there, but it just suffered its second largest one-day loss of the year. Only the 2.3% one-day loss on May 17, 2017 surpassed the 1.9% loss on June 29th. While iShares US Home Construction (ITB) is clearly still in an uptrend, the large one day sell-off may have signaled the end of new highs for a while. Source: FreeStockCharts.com The good news is that ITB recovered quickly from May’s los...
    On July 1, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Reflections On Q2

    Now that we’ve entered the second half of 2017, I wanted to take a look back at the quarter that just closed. On the whole, it was just another victory for the bulls, who have enjoyed over eight years of uninterrupted central-banking goodness. Indeed, looking at this chart of the Nasdaq Composite, it looks like totally smooth sailing ahead……. I would point out, however, that if you look closer, things are a lot rougher around the edges than you might think. The big red bar (which, ironically, almost marked the lifetime high) began the “tech wreck”, and since then, we can at least agree that the unrestrained momentum has been taken...
    On July 1, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    The Looming Energy Shock

    There will be an extremely painful oil supply shortfall sometime between 2018 and 2020. It will be highly disruptive to our over-leveraged global financial system, given how saddled it is with record debts and unfunded IOUs. Due to a massive reduction in capital spending in the global oil business over 2014-2016 and continuing into 2017, the world will soon find less oil coming out of the ground beginning somewhere between 2018-2020. Because oil is the lifeblood of today’s economy, if there’s less oil to go around, price shocks are inevitable. It’s very likely we’ll see prices climb back over $100 per barrel. Possibly wel...
    On July 1, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Central Bank’s Tightening Monetary Policy Talk Sends Global Markets Down

    Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank hinted at a change in the direction of monetary policy. This set a sell-off in most major global markets in anticipation of increase in interest rates. A sharp increase in crude oil prices also spooked financial markets. The decline in oil prices over the last three years has been one of the major drivers of global stock markets. Higher crude oil prices mean higher inflation for the US economy which approached 3% during the first part of 2017. US markets ended lower by 0.2% this week. Meanwhile, Brazilian markets rose higher this week as shares of state-controlled oil company Petroleo Brasi...
    On July 1, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    Gold Is Weak In Real Terms

    Intermarket analysis is a rather new field in technical analysis but one of my favorites because it is critical in understanding Gold. Asset classes like stocks and bonds are enormous and aren’t as influenced by as many factors as Gold. Trends in stocks, interest rates, commodities and currencies impact Gold in one way or another. We have written many articles over the years analyzing Gold with respect to its outlook and standing in real terms. Gold, when in a true bull market outperforms against all currencies and the global equity market. Unfortunately that is not the case at present. In real terms, Gold is weak, getting weaker and it cou...
    On July 1, 2017 / By
  • Finance 0

    S&P, Dow Finish Week Slightly Lower As Nasdaq Falls Sharply

    The major averages all declined on a weekly basis, though the loss for the Dow and S&P were fairly mild while the slide in the Nasdaq was more significant. Google (GOOGL) got called out by the EU, Amazon (AMZN) got called out by the President and biotech had a bad week, which all contributed to the Nasdaq’s struggles. MACRO NEWS: In the U.S., durable goods orders fell 1.1% overall during May, versus the expected decline of 0.6%. If transportation items are removed from the data, the core reading showed orders were up 0.1%, versus the expected increase of 0.4%. The Chicago Fed national activity index had a reading of -0.26, versus th...
    On July 1, 2017 / By