Money Daily does not make many predictions, but last week it was postulated that both Friday and Monday would show gains on the major indices, due to window dressing (Friday) and start of quarter allocation euphoria.
Both of these predictions were proven correct by a market that is now so transparently manipulated that investing has become nothing more than understanding the general mood. That is not a healthy market and surely not a sustainable model, but it is what we have, thanks to lax regulatory bodies and almost omnipotent control by the banking and financial services industry.
Friday and Monday's dual melt-up (on abysmally low volume, as usual) makes a case for the decrepit condition of US (and to a large degree, global) markets. They are old-boy networks and the only traders are strictly Wall Street insiders. These tendencies reveal much of what the general public does not perceive: that the markets have been broken since the financial collapse of 2008 and the ephemeral "gains" are nothing but the product of excessively loose economic policy and a disastrous fiscal policy being fostered at the top of the federal system.
Additionally, to say that the system is corrupt would be giving it a good name. It has gone well beyond corruption; what we now have is a false oligopoly that is baseless and doomed to eventual failure.
A couple of key points were made from data today, which, in more normal times, would have resulted in some caution and probably a general decline, but today's market is a monstosity of central planning which has nothing to do with the mundane facts of economic reality.
The ISM Index - a national barometer - checked in at 53.4 for March, after a reading of 52.4 in February. The metrics used in the calculation of of the index are distorted beyond recognition, as are most "official" economic readings. Even still, taken at face value, the index is registering just bare expansion, and will likely be revised lower in an upcoming debacle of data massage.
More importantly, the February construction spending number came in at a disappointing -1.0%, following a -0.8% reading in January. This, in the midst of one of the warmest winters on record is a serious issue, and, discounting the veracity of such a statistic, the real number is probably more like -3.0%.
The markets and the computers that do the trading were obviously adjusted to ignore these numbers; thus, the inordinate rise in stocks on the day.
It's a very sad state of affairs on Wall Street. The desperation in the brokerages is palpable and apparent to anyone who watches these things with both eyes open. The eventual crash will be horrifying to anyone with trust in these hopelessly deranged markets.
Dow 13,264.49, +52.45 (0.40%)
NASDAQ 3,119.70, +28.13 (0.91%)
S&P 500 1,419.04, +10.57 (0.75%)
NYSE Composite 8,280.83, +73.90 (0.90%)
NASDAQ Volume 1,778,994,250
NYSE Volume 3,579,872,500
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ Advance - Decline: 4092-1538
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ New highs - New lows: 273-43
WTI crude oil: 105.23, +2.21
Gold: 1,679.70, +7.70
Silver: 33.10, +0.61
Monday, April 2, 2012
Friday, March 30, 2012
First Quarter window Dressing Complete
Little explanation needed for the results below. Pure window dressing on a day-long melt up by the fundies, loading up on first quarter top performers and blue chips like Apple, Chipolte Mexican Grill, Bank of America, IBM and other garbage momentum stocks, just so they can say, "see, we own that!"
Amusing that the Naz was down for the day. Somebody must have taken massive profits on Apple.
Nice to see gold and silver making a move, though they are both well off recent highs.
Dow 13,212.04, +66.22 (0.50%)
NASDAQ 3,091.57, -3.79 (0.12%)
S&P 500 1,408.47, +5.19 (0.37%)
NYSE Composite 8,206.93, +40.56 (0.50%)
NASDAQ Volume 1,831,280,750
NYSE Volume 3,598,988,250
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ Advance - Decline: 2972-2654
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ New highs - New lows: 212-
WTI crude oil: 103.02, +0.24
Gold: 1,669.30, +17.10
Silver: 32.48, 0.49
Amusing that the Naz was down for the day. Somebody must have taken massive profits on Apple.
Nice to see gold and silver making a move, though they are both well off recent highs.
Dow 13,212.04, +66.22 (0.50%)
NASDAQ 3,091.57, -3.79 (0.12%)
S&P 500 1,408.47, +5.19 (0.37%)
NYSE Composite 8,206.93, +40.56 (0.50%)
NASDAQ Volume 1,831,280,750
NYSE Volume 3,598,988,250
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ Advance - Decline: 2972-2654
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ New highs - New lows: 212-
WTI crude oil: 103.02, +0.24
Gold: 1,669.30, +17.10
Silver: 32.48, 0.49
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Thursday Turnaround Mostly Vapors and Short-Covering
Let's see if we can find the good news that took the Dow back from a morning loss of 94 points to a gain of nearly 20 points by day's end?
Initial employment claims came in at 359K on expectations of 350K and the prior week was revised higher, from 348K originally reported to 364K. Well, that can't be it.
The third and final estimate for fourth quarter 2011 GDP remained steady at 3.0%. Maybe.
Moody's downgraded five Portugese banks. Nope.
Gas at the pump is still hovering around the $3.90/gallon range, on average, across the United States. Hmmm, probably not.
Those were the major headlines and issues on this Turnaround Thursday, as all the major averages fell out of bed, then through the magic of computer-programmatic algorithms, found a suitable bottom and rose through the afternoon and into the close.
In days past, chartists would say that the market put in another, higher bottom, but this intra-day bottom happened to be the low for the week. In other words, the monster rally from Monday was all eaten up by greedy, high-powered day-traders who more or less control this thinly-traded market.
Now, volume was a bit more perky today, but that would be due likely to short covering and the fact that it takes more trades to move all the indices from a cratered loss to near the break-even point. All of it is rather meaningless, since only the major banks, brokerages, fund managers and some moribund hedge funds have actually been engaging in this casino-style market since the middle of 2010, right after the flash crash scared out the last remaining individual investors.
As mentioned in yesterday's post, this is all leading up to a big rally coming either Friday (1st quarter window dressing) or Monday (first trading day of the quarter), or both. Not that the end of a quarter or the beginning of one has anything to do with fundamentals, they're just when the big boys open and close their books, so it gives them something upon which to hang their hats.
The bull market that began in March of 2009 has been one of the best in history, with the major indices all up close to or more than 100% from the bottom. Doubling your money in three years is a trick only the magicians of Wall Street can perform, though they got plenty of help from the taxpayers and rich Uncle Ben Bernanke at the Federal Reserve.
In fact, uncle Ben is still pumping out scads of greenbacks to keep the rally going, because in case anyone cares to look at the Fed's policies of the past three to four years, the stock market gains are about the only positive result among them.
Sure, sure, everyone pats Bernanke on the back for "saving" the economy, but what he really saved was the banks, which had fallen over a solvency cliff. The government has been running record deficits ever since the '08 crash, the value of the dollar is on a gentle glide-path to zero, just like Ben's interest rates, inflation continues to ravage household budgets, while low interest rates on savings are killing seniors. Housing is still declining, another credit bubble - in the form of student loans, auto leases and credit cards - is forming rapidly and small business is too busy keeping up with Washington's rule changes and mountains of regulations to actually hire anyone or expand. Entrepreneurs have been completely scared off and looking to foreign shores for opportunity.
So, really, what did Ben Bernanke save besides his banking buddies and his own job? Oh, that's right, Europe. But, but, but, that's not his job, is it?
Dow 13,145.82, +19.61 (0.15%)
NASDAQ 3,095.36, -9.60 (0.31%)
S&P 500 1,403.28, -2.26 (0.16%)
NYSE Composite 8,166.37, -21.98 (0.27%)
NASDAQ Volume 1,755,819,875
NYSE Volume 3,772,621,250
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ Advance - Decline: 2268-3291
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ New highs - New lows: 108-61
WTI crude oil: 102.78, -2.63
Gold: 1,652.20, -5.70
Silver: 31.99, +0.16
Initial employment claims came in at 359K on expectations of 350K and the prior week was revised higher, from 348K originally reported to 364K. Well, that can't be it.
The third and final estimate for fourth quarter 2011 GDP remained steady at 3.0%. Maybe.
Moody's downgraded five Portugese banks. Nope.
Gas at the pump is still hovering around the $3.90/gallon range, on average, across the United States. Hmmm, probably not.
Those were the major headlines and issues on this Turnaround Thursday, as all the major averages fell out of bed, then through the magic of computer-programmatic algorithms, found a suitable bottom and rose through the afternoon and into the close.
In days past, chartists would say that the market put in another, higher bottom, but this intra-day bottom happened to be the low for the week. In other words, the monster rally from Monday was all eaten up by greedy, high-powered day-traders who more or less control this thinly-traded market.
Now, volume was a bit more perky today, but that would be due likely to short covering and the fact that it takes more trades to move all the indices from a cratered loss to near the break-even point. All of it is rather meaningless, since only the major banks, brokerages, fund managers and some moribund hedge funds have actually been engaging in this casino-style market since the middle of 2010, right after the flash crash scared out the last remaining individual investors.
As mentioned in yesterday's post, this is all leading up to a big rally coming either Friday (1st quarter window dressing) or Monday (first trading day of the quarter), or both. Not that the end of a quarter or the beginning of one has anything to do with fundamentals, they're just when the big boys open and close their books, so it gives them something upon which to hang their hats.
The bull market that began in March of 2009 has been one of the best in history, with the major indices all up close to or more than 100% from the bottom. Doubling your money in three years is a trick only the magicians of Wall Street can perform, though they got plenty of help from the taxpayers and rich Uncle Ben Bernanke at the Federal Reserve.
In fact, uncle Ben is still pumping out scads of greenbacks to keep the rally going, because in case anyone cares to look at the Fed's policies of the past three to four years, the stock market gains are about the only positive result among them.
Sure, sure, everyone pats Bernanke on the back for "saving" the economy, but what he really saved was the banks, which had fallen over a solvency cliff. The government has been running record deficits ever since the '08 crash, the value of the dollar is on a gentle glide-path to zero, just like Ben's interest rates, inflation continues to ravage household budgets, while low interest rates on savings are killing seniors. Housing is still declining, another credit bubble - in the form of student loans, auto leases and credit cards - is forming rapidly and small business is too busy keeping up with Washington's rule changes and mountains of regulations to actually hire anyone or expand. Entrepreneurs have been completely scared off and looking to foreign shores for opportunity.
So, really, what did Ben Bernanke save besides his banking buddies and his own job? Oh, that's right, Europe. But, but, but, that's not his job, is it?
Dow 13,145.82, +19.61 (0.15%)
NASDAQ 3,095.36, -9.60 (0.31%)
S&P 500 1,403.28, -2.26 (0.16%)
NYSE Composite 8,166.37, -21.98 (0.27%)
NASDAQ Volume 1,755,819,875
NYSE Volume 3,772,621,250
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ Advance - Decline: 2268-3291
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ New highs - New lows: 108-61
WTI crude oil: 102.78, -2.63
Gold: 1,652.20, -5.70
Silver: 31.99, +0.16
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Are Americans Waking up to Gold?
It's a rare day indeed when Money Daily sources information from CNBC, because the on-air talent are generally stock-pumping cheerleaders for equities, but today's information presented by Steve Liesman, who offered up the results of CNBC's All-American Economic Survey in various spots on the network throughout the day, had heads spinning and eyes and ears popping when he revealed that of the 836 respondents in the survey, 37% found gold to be their preferred investment, followed by real estate at 24% and stocks a distant third, at 19%.
What this says about the stock market and American attitudes towards it partially explains the low volumes that have been a dominant feature for many months, implying (and there are numerous studies to back this up) that individual investors have nearly completely soured on stocks as stable investments due to a variety of factors, including, but surely not limited to, the financial collapse of 2008-09, the flash crash of May 6, 2010, a general distrust of Wall Street and the Federal Reserve and various other market events, such as the recent IPO failure of BATS.
What did not come out of the CNBC segment below, led off by Liesman's comment that he was "floored" by this finding, is that gold (and silver and platinum) are not only tradable investment vehicles that can be instantly redeemed for cash or bartered for other goods and services, but that the precious metals are tangible assets that not only appreciate, especially in light of dollar debasement, but are a store of value and wealth at a time in which there's an oversupply of skepticism pertaining to the management of currencies worldwide and yields on "safe" investments, such as money market funds or Treasuries are returning less than the rate of inflation.
(Note on this video: the first 6:15 covers the gold story; the remainder is on other topics.)
These stunning survey results are indicative of Americans' growing displeasure of a system which they rightly assume is unfairly slanted in favor of Wall Street fat cats and DC politicians, who engage in insider trading and other market-rigging activities with nearly universal disdain for the average American and small investor. It also destroys the notion that Americans are stupid when it comes to investing, as the "muppets," as some Goldman Sachs executives refer to their clients, appear to be more concerned about lasting value rather than quick, day-trading profits.
It was truly a pleasure to watch and listen to the various and mostly wrong CNBC commentators as they scrambled for explanations to somehow blunt the contrarian thrust of the message. Americans are not stupid and they don't like being cheated; there are two good reasons right there why more and more Americans are keeping a safe distance from stocks and Wall Street and putting their investment dollars into tangible assets, like gold.
As for the markets, todays was definitely a "risk off" event, with stocks and commodities both feeling the heat. Of course, in a yo-yo economy such as we have, one day does not make anything even closely resembling a trend, though the losses today and on Tuesday took a lot of the punch out of Monday's rally.
With just two more trading days left in the month and the first quarter, some shaving of profits should be expected prior to what are traditionally strong market up-moving days: the end of quarter "window dressing" by te fund managers expected on Friday and the first trading day of the new quarter, come Monday, April 2nd.
Dow 13,126.21, -71.52 (0.54%)
NASDAQ 3,104.96, -15.39 (0.49%)
S&P 500 1,405.54, -6.98 (0.49%)
NYSE Composite 8,188.34, -51.03 (0.62%)
NASDAQ Volume 1,764,716,250
NYSE Volume 3,854,093,750
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ Advance - Decline: 2033-3584
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ New highs - New lows: 144-46
WTI crude oil: 105.41, -1.92
Gold: 1,657.90, -27.00
Silver: 31.83, -0.78
What this says about the stock market and American attitudes towards it partially explains the low volumes that have been a dominant feature for many months, implying (and there are numerous studies to back this up) that individual investors have nearly completely soured on stocks as stable investments due to a variety of factors, including, but surely not limited to, the financial collapse of 2008-09, the flash crash of May 6, 2010, a general distrust of Wall Street and the Federal Reserve and various other market events, such as the recent IPO failure of BATS.
What did not come out of the CNBC segment below, led off by Liesman's comment that he was "floored" by this finding, is that gold (and silver and platinum) are not only tradable investment vehicles that can be instantly redeemed for cash or bartered for other goods and services, but that the precious metals are tangible assets that not only appreciate, especially in light of dollar debasement, but are a store of value and wealth at a time in which there's an oversupply of skepticism pertaining to the management of currencies worldwide and yields on "safe" investments, such as money market funds or Treasuries are returning less than the rate of inflation.
(Note on this video: the first 6:15 covers the gold story; the remainder is on other topics.)
These stunning survey results are indicative of Americans' growing displeasure of a system which they rightly assume is unfairly slanted in favor of Wall Street fat cats and DC politicians, who engage in insider trading and other market-rigging activities with nearly universal disdain for the average American and small investor. It also destroys the notion that Americans are stupid when it comes to investing, as the "muppets," as some Goldman Sachs executives refer to their clients, appear to be more concerned about lasting value rather than quick, day-trading profits.
It was truly a pleasure to watch and listen to the various and mostly wrong CNBC commentators as they scrambled for explanations to somehow blunt the contrarian thrust of the message. Americans are not stupid and they don't like being cheated; there are two good reasons right there why more and more Americans are keeping a safe distance from stocks and Wall Street and putting their investment dollars into tangible assets, like gold.
As for the markets, todays was definitely a "risk off" event, with stocks and commodities both feeling the heat. Of course, in a yo-yo economy such as we have, one day does not make anything even closely resembling a trend, though the losses today and on Tuesday took a lot of the punch out of Monday's rally.
With just two more trading days left in the month and the first quarter, some shaving of profits should be expected prior to what are traditionally strong market up-moving days: the end of quarter "window dressing" by te fund managers expected on Friday and the first trading day of the new quarter, come Monday, April 2nd.
Dow 13,126.21, -71.52 (0.54%)
NASDAQ 3,104.96, -15.39 (0.49%)
S&P 500 1,405.54, -6.98 (0.49%)
NYSE Composite 8,188.34, -51.03 (0.62%)
NASDAQ Volume 1,764,716,250
NYSE Volume 3,854,093,750
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ Advance - Decline: 2033-3584
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ New highs - New lows: 144-46
WTI crude oil: 105.41, -1.92
Gold: 1,657.90, -27.00
Silver: 31.83, -0.78
College Financial Aid Information
This infographic brought to you by Southern New Hampshire University
Brought to You by SNHU.EDU Online College Programs
Brought to You by SNHU.EDU Online College Programs
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
