commodities

I have been pretty sanguine about the markets and the US economy. Yes, the commodities complex is worsening, but that doesn't mean this feeds through enough into other sectors to force the market down. And the real economy isn't at stall…

My argument has been that the US economy is not yet at stall speed and that recession is not on the horizon. However, I believe the US is slowing, and that, in conjunction with a strong dollar and the ongoing global growth slowdown, this…

I don’t believe the jobs report today is indicative of an improving US economy. I believe it is a one-off that is so strong that it will be difficult for the Fed to overlook it. And this makes the likelihood of rate hikes that much greater,…

The first time I wrote about shale oil resource misallocation in the wake of lower oil prices was back in October 2014, exactly a year ago. A lot has happened in that year, so I want to look back at the oil-related posts I have written in…

The equity markets that have fallen the least so far are the U.S. and the Japanese markets. If my prediction that we are looking into a more difficult period in the U.S. (and the euro zone), U.S. equities look particularly vulnerable, so…

Yesterday I retweeted an interesting tweet by Business Insider’s Henry Blodget which references an article on data compiled by Barclays on profit mean reversion and recession. The gist of the article is that a profits recession generally…

Today, we got a pretty shaky US jobs report. Non-Farm Payrolls were up only 142,000, well below the 190-203,000 range of median expectations I have seen quoted. But the previous month was also revised down to 136,000 from 173,000 and July…

I have been meaning to write this post for a few days. And as the information comes in from Brazil, from China, from equity markets, it seems all the more compelling that this is indeed an important period in market and economic history. I…

Many markets have now recovered from the initial wave of selling associated with the Chinese mini-devaluation catalyst. This should be expected. Some of these markets will surely continue higher. Nevertheless, the Chinese devaluation still…

The macro environment right now is disinflationary as many countries struggle with product and labour ‘overcapacity’. The missing element is demand to meet supply. I want to talk about Fed monetary policy and the new Chinese currency regime…