If building large amounts of wealth was easy, then almost anyone could do it. However, we know that only 6.4% of American adult population are millionaires, and the reality is that not all of those are self-made. What habits and practices helped this elite group in accumulating large amounts of wealth, and how can we apply these to our own careers to become more financially independent? COPYING THE HABITS OF MILLIONAIRES Today’s infographic from StocksToTrade.com skips the silver bullets and “get rich quick” tricks to show the real habits of millionaires that have led to wealth accumulation over time. Many of these habits are not part...
Confirming the expectations of all 41 economists, The Bank of Japan changed absolutely nothing about its monetary policy tonight following The Fed’s 3rd rate hike in 11 years. The BOJ said in a statement that it would keep the two key rates at current levels, maintain the pace of its asset purchases, and did not change its economic outlook. The BOJ maintained its short-term policy rate on some bank reserves at -0.1 percent and… left its target for 10-year government bond yields at around 0 percent. It kept the pace of its asset purchases unchanged at about 80 trillion yen ($700 billion) annually. As Bloomberg reports, with the e...
The Fed pushed the dollar lower and the Dutch elections provided another boost to EUR/USD. What’s next? Here is their view, courtesy of eFXnews: The overall message from the meeting was that the Fed is on track and delivered one of the three hikes it projected back in December 2016 -the Fed has not become more hawkish, notes Danske Markets Research. “We expect the Fed to hike twice more this year (July and December) and three-four times next year. We expect the Fed to begin the reduction of its balance sheet in Q1 18,” Danske projects. On the FX front, as EUR/USD bounced on the Fed announcement, Danske notes that technically short-te...
Tiffany & Co. (TIF – Free Report) , which designs, manufactures and retails jewelry and other items globally, is slated to report fourth-quarter fiscal 2016 results on Mar 17. Barring the first quarter, the company has outpaced the Zacks Consensus Estimate in the second and third quarters by 18.3% and 13.4%, respectively. In the first quarter, the company posted negative earnings surprise of 5.9%. Let’s see how things are shaping up for this announcement. What to Expect? The question lingering in investors’ minds now is, whether Tiffany will be able to post positive earnings surprise in the quarter to be reported. In the trai...
EUR/USD 4 hour Investors and traders were looking for a direction from the Federal Reserve (Fed) yesterday regarding the potential path of interest rate hikes during 2017. The Fed indicated that it expects 3 rate hikes during 2017, which seems to match expectations of the market. Despite the interest rate increase from 0.75% to 1%, the US Dollar declined against other major currencies. The rate increase seemed to have already been priced. Another contributing factor was the lack of an even stronger hawkish tone (more rate hikes) in the meeting minutes from the Fed. 1 hour The EUR/USD found support after the Fed news event, which has been labe...
The U.S. Federal Reserve hiked interest rates by 25 basis points at its meeting yesterday as widely expected. This was the second rate hike in less than three months and the third increase since the central bank started its monetary policy tightening cycle in December 2015. The U.S. short-term interest rates are now at 0.75% – 1.00%. The vote to hike rates was not unanimous, however, as Neel Kashkari, Minneapolis Fed President voted “no.” He was the sole dissenter at yesterday’s rate hike meeting. The central bank, however, noted that core inflation which strips the volatile food and energy prices were still running below 2% and noted...
There is no change to the risk budget this month. For the moderate risk investor, the allocation between risk assets and bonds is unchanged at 50/50. The Fed spent the last month forward guiding the market to the rate hike they implemented today. Interest rates, real and nominal, moved up in anticipation of a more aggressive Fed rate hiking cycle. Post meeting, a lot of the rise came out of the market. Nominal and real 10 year Treasury rates dropped by an identical 11 basis points on the day. Rates fell at the short end too as the yield curve shifted lower but didn’t flatten significantly. The market was looking for a big change in the F...
I could see this coming a mile away… Snapchat is already catching flak. Its parent company, SNAP, IPO’d less than a week ago. Founded in 2011, Snapchat is the photo-disappearing social media company with 158 million users who are typically between the ages of 18 and 24. Its IPO was the biggest tech IPO since Alibaba’s (BABA) in 2014 and the biggest American tech IPO since Facebook’s (FB) in 2012. Not one broker among the eight following the company has a buy. Most have sells… Snap’s Disappointing Ratings Based on ratings as of March 6, five out of seven firms say Snap is a “Sell.” The first day, its shares rose by more than 51...
Markets moved sharply as the U.S. Fed announced the 25 basis points interest rate increase. Markets were volatile, but which market was the real winner? The answer will be surprising to most. First and foremost, when markets react in a volatile way on financial news, it is wise to wait a couple of days before coming to conclusions. Although most moves were clearly in certain directions today, there was also an inconsistency. For instance, we observed a strong increase in bond prices while stocks rallied simultaneously. That is not really making sense, as stocks are ‘risk on‘ assets but bonds ‘risk off’. In other words, we recommend n...
The cost of living in India is rising – or so says the inflation data. Recent data showed India’s wholesale price index (WPI) inflation rose to its highest in more than three years. WPI rose an annual 6.55% in February, rising from previous month’s 5.25% increase. The surge was seen on the back of higher fuel, power, and food prices. Fuel and power inflation rose 21.02% in February from 18.14% last month. Food inflation firmed up to 2.69% in February from a 0.56% fall in January. And if that wasn’t enough, the month of February also saw a surge in retail inflation. Retail inflation, as measured by the consumer price i...