Post Tagged with: "outlook"
Conservatorship of GSEs is bad for the dollar and inflation
I might have egg all over my face quicker than quick about my $150 oil call. It seems the Fannie-Freddie bailout chatter is spooking stock markets, currency markets and the oil market. This is going to be a volatile day. The dollar dropped to a one-week low against the euro and headed for a weekly
Oil down below $138
Yesterday, oil fell the most in one day since the start of the Gulf War in January 1991 to close at $136.03 in New York trading. Now is the time to evaluate whether we have seen the top in oil prices? On Thursday in my post “Oil close to $146” I said, The price action
Bullish?
One cannot expect double digit returns from the U.S. market over the medium term as there are significant headwinds impeding that from high P/E ratios, reversion to the mean, consumer price inflation, credit deflation, high debt, to a housing bust. That said, I am not particularly bearish over the short-term. We have had a huge
$1.6 trillion: new estimate on writedowns
$1.6 trillion! This is the figure that a Bridgewater Associates study has come up with. I caught this article when I was looking for the original German-language version of a story that MarketWatch exposed regarding the Swiss banks’ need for more capital. (see MarketWatch here and my analysis here).
Oil close to $146
Oil tightened its squeeze on world economies today soaring to a new high of over $145 a barrel. Eurozone growth is also expected to take a further hit at lunchtime when the European Central Bank is expected to raise rates to curb inflation. In London, the continuing threat of an attack on Iran, the world’s
Outlook for Spain: Recession
The well-deserved euphoria over the European Championship in football has brought welcome relief to Spanish consumers, weighed down by a slow economy. However, global economies have not decoupled from the U.S. slowdown. European economies are suffering, Denmark having already declared recession. In this piece I am going to take a look at the Spanish economy
Marc Faber: Investment strategies for June 2008
I have uploaded the associated PDF for this teleconference. Click here for PDF. U.S. Global Investors Exclusive Webcast: Where is the Boom and the Doom? SAN ANTONIO–(BUSINESS WIRE)–U.S. Global Investors (NASDAQ:GROW), a boutique investment adviser specializing in natural resources and emerging markets, will host a webcast titled, “Where is the Boom and the Doom?” on
Alt-A: defaults lie ahead of us, not behind us
I am pretty well satisfied that the subprime mess has reached its pinnacle. While there may yet be many more defaults, much of the disaster in subprime is baked into the cake. It’s time to move on. But, move on to what? Most analysts say recovery, I say Alt-A. With nearly $400 billion in writedowns
Marc Faber: Obama’s not going to be good for the market
I was reading Barron’s 2008 Midyear 2008 Roundtable just yesterday when a comment by Marc Faber struck me. He said that Obama is “not going to be good for the market.” He expects Barack Obama to win in November and for the investment markets to suffer as a result. Although I support Obama, I have
Commercial poperty ‘im Visier’
Deutsche Bank has sold three New York skyscrapers back to the Macklowe group at a discount of 20-30% reports the Wall Street Journal. This could be a watershed moment in the U.S. commercial real estate (CRE)sector. CRE is a sector that is poised for a fall due to a slowing real economy. “Deutsche Bank is
Bank failures to surge in coming years
My blog title comes from the title of an article, "Bank failures to surge in coming years" by MarketWatch on 23 May 2008. I highly recommend reading the full article. It mentions that only 3 banks have actually failed so far in 2008. But that number will go much higher as distress from the credit
Which homebuilder will go bankrupt next?
When was the last time you heard of a major U.S. home builder going bankrupt? It’s been quite a while. Even though my focus right now is firmly fixed on financial institutions and mortgage lenders, I have a watchful eye on home builders. After all, I believe that the next leg down in the housing