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  • Finance 0

    Time Is On Your Side, Yes It Is

    Business Insider and Barry Ritholtz both had posts in the last few days contributing to the same big idea that time is a valuable asset not just in and of itself but also as part of a financial plan and an investment strategy. The graphic is obviously from Business Insider. The positive message here is that there is hope for people who take a while to start saving for their retirement. One issue with the table is that unfortunately it assumes 12% annualized returns. A 50 year old putting away $26,000 and annualizing at 6% (even that may require some luck) would have a little over $413,000 at 65. The income safely generated from that amount p...
    On August 17, 2015 / By
  • Finance 0

    MS Boosts TSLA Price Target To $465, Days After Underwriting Stock Offering; Sees Tesla Bigger Than Ford And GM

    The last time Morgan Stanley made a mockery of Reg-S, was in February 2014 when a day before Tesla announced a $1.6 billion convertible offering Morgan Stanley’s Adam Jonas raised his PT on TSLA from $153 to $320, sending the stock soaring and assuring far less convertible dilution on the day of pricing. Fast forward 1.5 years when Tesla, having burned through most of this cash (in fact it burned over $1 billion in just the first 6 months of the year), Tesla announced it would sell $500 million in a follow-on stock offering (subsequently upsized). We were modestly surprised that Adam Jonas did not upgrade the stock just before the eq...
    On August 17, 2015 / By
  • Finance 0

    After This, Higher Education Will Never Be The Same Again

    I’ve been a long-time financial supporter of my alma mater. Even though I philosophically disagree with some of the positions of the administration, there’s never been a doubt that I’m a Georgetown Hoya through-and-through. My education while on campus, both in and out of class, was top-notch. It gave me a base to build on in both my professional career and my life as a citizen. But several years ago the school reached a milestone that I could no longer stand with. It raised tuition to an astronomical amount: above $45,000 per year. Today, it stands at $48,000. Keep in mind, that’s just tuition. Including other costs, the total bill...
    On August 17, 2015 / By
  • Finance 0

    Turmoil In Emerging Markets: The Czech Republic

    Although the currency war has followed in depth the major players over the last few years, emerging markets are under substantial pressure to perform.  Loose monetary policies fed much of the gains witnessed in emerging markets as foreign direct investment dominated the investment scene, chasing after higher yields available in less developed markets.  However, now that the Federal Reserve has slowly backed away from further monetary stimulus and moreover is contemplating an interest rate hike, the acceleration in the pace of outflows from emerging markets might spell substantial more downside for emerging market currencies, notably the Cze...
    On August 17, 2015 / By
  • Finance 0

    Morning Call For August 17, 2015

    OVERNIGHT MARKETS AND NEWS September E-mini S&Ps (ESU15 -0.08%) are down -0.08% as weaker oil prices (CLU15 -1.53%) undercuts energy producers and leads the overall market lower with Chevron down -1.3% in pre-market trading. European stocks are up +0.42% after Chinese stocks closed higher and as Greek stocks rose after German Chancellor Merkel said she’s confident the IMF will join Greece’s third bailout if debt relief for Greece is included. Germany’s lower house votes on the bailout on Wednesday and Merkel said that IMF Managing Director Lagarde made it clear she will back the IMF’s participation in Greece’...
    On August 17, 2015 / By
  • Finance 0

    Futures Flat As Oil Drops To Fresh 6 Year Low; EM Currencies Crumble Under Continuing FX War

    It was a relatively quiet weekend out of China, where FX warfare has taken a back seat to evaluating the full damage from the Tianjin explosion which as we reported on Saturday has prompted the evacuation of a 3 km radius around the blast zone, and instead it was Japan that featured prominently in Sunday’s headlines after its Q2 GDP tumbled by 1.6% (a number which would have been far worse had Japan used a correct deflator), and is now halfway to its fifth recession in the past 6 year, underscoring Abenomics complete success in desrtoying Japan’s economy just to get a few rich people richer. Of course, economic disintegration is...
    On August 17, 2015 / By
  • Finance 0

    EUR/USD Slips During Friday Trading Session

    The EUR/USD pair initially tried to rally during the course of the day on Friday but found the 1.12 level be a bit too resistive. Because of this, it looks like we’re going to continue the overall consolidation that we have been in for some time. The 1.12 level is the top of a large area that we have been finding the market comparable in, with the 1.08 level below being the absolute bottom. With this, the 1.10 level is offering “fair value.” Ultimately, I feel that the market should continue to favor the 1.10 level and with that it’s only a matter of time before we start to break down a bit. I believe that the rallies will continue to...
    On August 17, 2015 / By
  • Finance 0

    Market Analysis & Trading Opportunities – August 17, 2015

    Video Length: 00:02:00 Markets in general on Monday should more than likely follow the patterns that we’ve seen for some time now. With that, we believe that we will simply continue to grind away in various ranges between now and the fall where liquidity returns. We only have a couple of weeks left in the holiday season, so fairly soon we should start to see stronger moves. However, in the meantime there are specific ranges that we are paying attention to. 1 – The most obvious one is the EUR/USD currency pair. We believe that the market continues to bang around between the 1.12 level and the 1.08 level. With this, we are getting a little...
    On August 17, 2015 / By
  • Finance 0

    EC Gold Stocks: A Playable Rally May Be Beginning As Junk Bonds Crater

    Gold Stocks Jump and Retrace 50% Last week we discussed the potential for a rally in the gold sector (see: “Gold Stocks at an Interesting Juncture” for details). Gold stocks jumped early in the week and then retraced almost precisely 50% of the initial move higher, in the process closing a gap that was left behind on Wednesday. Image credit: dreamstime.com Interestingly, for the first time in many months, there were three up days in a row prior to the retracement move: Click on picture to enlarge The HUI Index daily: a jump from 104.50 to 126.25, followed by a 50% retracement: ideally the advance should resume from here  On a 10 minute c...
    On August 17, 2015 / By
  • Finance 0

    EC U.S. REITs Trend Higher Despite Expectations For A Rate Hike

    US interest rates may be set to rise next month, at the Federal Reserve’s policy meeting, but the outlook for tighter monetary policy isn’t weighing on real estate investment trusts (REITs). Highly prized for relatively rich yields, REITs are said to be among the more interest-rate sensitive slices of the capital markets—not quite as vulnerable as bonds but considerably more so vs. stocks. But that theory looks a bit wobbly these days in the wake of a modest rally in securitized real estate securities. Indeed, last week’s top performer among the major asset classes: US REITs, based on the Vanguard REIT ETF (VNQ). Although there’s ...
    On August 17, 2015 / By