ALWAYS CONSULT YOUR INVESTMENT PROFESSIONAL BEFORE MAKING ANY INVESTMENT DECISION
April 26, 2024 | How Far Can The Yen Fall Before Japan Goes Bankrupt? We may be about to find out
Japan’s ongoing march to national bankruptcy has been a recurring theme here. See: Japan Is In That Box Japan Takes Another Step Towards the Cliff How a Country Goes Bankrupt, In 10 Steps Now the death spiral has entered a new phase, with the yen/dollar exchange rate heading straight down: To restate the “Japan collapse” […]
April 26, 2024 | Tesla Reports Poor Results and The Share Price Spikes Higher
Tesla, Inc. had a closely watched first quarter report, outlining poor results this week. But the markets’ initial reaction was positive, even if the financial results were underwhelming. Why would the market push the stock 10 percent higher after disappointing results? Tesla reported a 9 percent decline in revenue after a previously reported decline in […]
April 26, 2024 | Private Equity More Boondoggle Than Brilliance
I’ve frequently spoken and written about leverage-on-leverage contagion risks from the private equity and credit markets with feedback loops to real estate. Some of the articles are here. As interest rates slumped in the decade leading up to 2022, this space increasingly attracted yield-starved capital from institutions and individuals alike. Our capital management firm was inundated […]
April 26, 2024 | US GDP & Recession into 2028
QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong, Socrates correctly picked March as the Directional Change, and it looks like there will be a sharp decline into June. Are you expecting a serious recession with the May 7th turning point on your Economic Confidence Model? SH PS It seems like Jamie Diamond uses Socrates since he has just said what you […]
April 26, 2024 | What’s Behind: “Sell in May and Go Away”
There is considerable history behind the gem of stock market lore to “Sell in May”. The real explanation is readily provided by the record of Great Bubbles as they occurred in the London financial markets. There were five to the 1929 example. Four climaxed in May. And one, the infamous 1720 South Sea Bubble climaxed […]
April 26, 2024 | The Nice Part about Getting Old
The nice part about getting old (I’ll be 77 in one week) is that you’ve experienced more than most people – and that includes real estate cycles. U.S. housing prices may be at record highs today – but as I continue to illustrate in my Timing Letters, a massive mean reversion is likely […]
April 25, 2024 | Plastic Recycling is a Myth: Here’s How We Fix That
Understanding the truth about plastic is key to finding solutions. Globally, only 9% of plastic is ever recycled, and even that tiny amount requires some virgin plastic to maintain quality. But scientists have discovered a new way to address this issue: “plastivores”, organisms that have evolved to eat plastic using enzymes in their bodies. Can […]
April 25, 2024 | Democrats Praying for a Trump Assassination?
COMMENT: I have been a Democrat all my life, and I am 72. I suppose I was a Democrat because my father was. Like you, after watching what they have been doing to Trump and the flood of illegal aliens that have resulted in my own neighborhood becoming no longer safe, I will […]
April 24, 2024 | Rates Weighing on Too-High Home Prices
First quarter new condo sales in the Toronto region dropped to their lowest level since the 2009 financial crisis, with investors balking at lofty purchase prices and higher borrowing costs. See New condo sales in the Greater Toronto Area hit 15-year low: “It is dead. I would never use words like this, but I am because […]
April 24, 2024 | Global Taxation – Proposal to Fight Climate Change and Poverty
Finance ministers from France and Brazil are urging the G20 to implement a minimum 2% tax on billionaires in an effort to fight climate change and poverty. Everyone cheers when the suggestion is to tax someone else, but feigns shock when the rules expand and everyone experiences rising taxation. Global collaborative efforts such as […]
April 23, 2024 | Banks Wage War on Gun Ownership
The government has successfully weaponized the banks against the people. Major banks are voluntarily sharing customers’ private transactions with the federal government “as part of a wildly overbroad financial surveillance scheme intended to identify domestic terrorists,” a group of attorneys general wrote in a letter to Bank of America in regards to discrimination against […]
April 23, 2024 | Mortgage Pain Has Not Peaked Yet
Despite spring market optimism, US Home sales in March posted their most significant decline in more than a year (-4.3% month-over-month–largest monthly decline since November 2022) as 30-year fixed mortgage rates moved back above 7% from just over 6% in early February. See Housing Market Slumps as Mortgage Rates Top 7%. Also, see, This could be the year […]
April 22, 2024 | Is The AI Bubble Bursting? Wolf Richter’s WTF Charts
Artificial intelligence, which a few years ago existed only in science fiction (check out William Gibson’s Neuromancer), has morphed into an epic stock bubble. Nvidia, maker of the leading AI microchips, saw its market cap surge from $200 billion in 2019 to $2 trillion in 2023. I haven’t actually checked, but that might be the fastest […]
April 22, 2024 | China Exporting Deflation (encore)
China’s epic property bust has left it with a glut of materials and products that it is now exporting globally. This will help ease inflationary pressures and threaten the viability of competitors. As construction at home has dried up, Chinese steel exports have risen 33% year over year, and the excess supply goes far beyond steel to […]
April 22, 2024 | Two Big Lies
Happy Monday Morning! We typically try to steer clear of politics in these weekly musings. However, there were two big lies told by the Trudeau government this past week, both of which relate back to housing, the key focus of my work. The federal budget announced this past week brought no reduction in spending, shocking […]
April 22, 2024 | Canadian Govt Offers Vaccine Victim Suicide as Compensation for Paralysis
Kayla Pollock, 37, was a healthy woman from Ontario with no medical issues. Everything changed with Kayla took the Moderna mRNA experimental vaccine on January 11, 2022. Four days later, she collapsed and could lost feeling in her legs. Her doctor suggested she see a neurologist. Kayla woke up one morning in February and […]
April 21, 2024 | What Drives AI Market Dynamics? Insights from ASML and TSM
In market analysis, closely monitoring industry leaders is vital, particularly in flourishing sectors like Artificial Intelligence (AI). As AI continues its rapid evolution, drawing parallels to the internet’s growth becomes increasingly evident. Just as the internet’s development unfolded in stages—from the establishment of hardware infrastructure such as modems, personal computers, and fiber optic cables, to […]
April 21, 2024 | Predictive Programming from 30 Years Ago
When they tell us things such as, “You will own nothing,” we scoff and dismiss them. They are always placing the truth in plain sight. Did they have this technology all along? A reader sent me the image above of an advertisement published in a magazine over 30 years ago. A basic EV […]
April 21, 2024 | Prepare to Sell in May and Go Away
The portfolio managers who rig the markets appear to be losing their touch. Usually, they are able to short-squeeze stocks in the ‘lunatic sector’ — our label for the egregiously mis-named ‘Magnificent Seven’ — when earnings are announced after the close. This quasi-criminal manipulation can add hundreds of billions of dollars to the world’s ‘wealth […]
April 21, 2024 | There Is No Alternative
Today, we look at the world of “alternative investing.” I put it in quotes because this was originally a somewhat pejorative term. Back in the 1960s (and maybe before?), brokers sold you stocks and bonds, saying that was how smart people invested. Of course, by pure coincidence, they sold these securities at markups and commissions […]
April 20, 2024 | Russia Tests an Undetectable Supersonic ICBM
Russia tested a new missile last week that has many concerned that this is a new supersonic version of a nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) on April 12th, 2024, that is capable of attacking NATO and the USA undetected. The Russian Ministry of Defence only claimed this was part of “state testing of prospective missile systems, […]
April 20, 2024 | Trading Desk Notes For April 20, 2024
Nasdaq had a lousy week and closed on its lows Benchmark global stock indices had their best-ever monthly close in March, but they all turned lower in April, with some of the former high-fliers getting hit the hardest. Nasdaq closed Friday at a 2-month low, down ~8.5% from March highs. MSFT had its lowest close […]
April 20, 2024 | Tech Talk for Saturday April 20th 2024
The Bottom Line Short term technical action by world markets remains focused on the Israel/Iran conflict. Growing uncertainties had a negative impact on equity markets and a positive impact on commodity prices last week. First quarter earnings report season ramps up this week. Responses to results released to date have been mixed. Focuses this week […]
April 19, 2024 | Does China Control America’s Strategic Petroleum Reserves?
Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo. Reminded the US Energy Secretary, Jennifer Granholm, “We are not governed by a world government – yet!” The Biden Administration consulted with China before selling off America’s strategic petroleum reserves. In 2021, Granholm admitted that she spoke with the Chinese Communist Party about coordinating how America would handle its nation’s highly sensitive […]
April 19, 2024 | The Canadian Government Makes Impressive Attempt to Solve Housing Unaffordability
The budget this week contains an impressive number of substantial measures designed to improve housing unaffordability. Will these measures make housing affordable again? Housing in Canada has been more expensive than the average family can “afford” for a long time. The old benchmark from the 1990s was a home should be no more than three […]