Monthly Archive: April 2016

Gold And Negative Interest Rates

2016-04-30

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2016-04-30

Submitted by Dan Popescu via Acting-Man.com, The Inflation Illusion We hear more and more talk about the possibility of imposing negative interest rates in the US. In a recent article former Fed chairman Ben Bernanke asks what tools the Fed h...

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Weekly Speculative Postions: Euro and Yen Exposure Trimmed ahead of FOMC and BOJ

2016-04-30

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2016-04-30

Speculators in the futures market made mostly small position adjustments in the sessions leading up to the FOMC and BOJ meetings.   During the Commitment of Traders reporting week ending April 26, the largest adjustment of speculative position in the currency futures was the 12.5 k build of gross long Australian dollar contracts. The accumulation …

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Will the Dollar Bloom like May Flowers after April Showers?

2016-04-30

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2016-04-30

April was a cruel month for the US dollar.  It fell against all the major currencies; even those whose central banks have negative yields.  The greenback also fell against nearly all the emerging market currencies, but the Philippine peso and the Polish zloty. Through the first four months of the year, the dollar is lower …

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The ‘Strange’ Death of Mr. Abadi

2016-04-30

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2016-04-30

As expected, PM Abadi was always going to come off worse in his last ditch attempt to try and regain some kind of political initiative by appointing a new look ‘technocratic’ government in Baghdad. But the ailing Prime Minister has managed to back hi...

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Gold Stampede

2016-04-30

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2016-04-30

  Stampeding Animals The mass impulse of a cattle stampede can be triggered by something as innocuous as a blowing tumbleweed.  A sudden startle, or a perceived threat, is all it takes to it set off.  Once the herd collectively begins charging in one...

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With Fiat Money, Everything Is Relative

2016-04-30

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2016-04-30

  What Determines a Currency’s Value? At the end of March the price of the euro in terms of US dollars closed at 1.1378. This was an increase of 4.7 percent from February when it increased by 0.3 percent. The yearly growth rate of the price of the eu...

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Do You Believe Six Impossible Things before Breakfast?

2016-04-29

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2016-04-29

The White Queen in Alice in Wonderland (Through the Looking Glass) confesses that when she was younger, she could believe six impossible things before breakfast.  She encourages Alice to do the same.    It appears many in the market are taking ...

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Negative Rates: Jim Bianco Warns “The Risk Of An ‘Accident’ Is Very High”

2016-04-29

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2016-04-29

In an interesting interview with Finanz und Wirtschaft, Bianco Research president Jim Bianco discusses a variety of topics such as negative interest rates turning the entire credit process upside down, bank balance sheets being even more complex and ...

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FX Daily, April 29: Dollar Losses Extended Ahead of the Weekend

2016-04-29

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2016-04-29

There are two main forces in the foreign exchange market that are rippling through the capital markets.  The first is the continued weaker dollar tone.  The combination of what appears to be a stagnating US economy (0.5% annualized pace in Q1) and a market that does not believe the Federal Reserve will hike rates in … Continue reading...

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Gold and Negative Interest Rates

2016-04-28

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2016-04-28

  The Inflation Illusion We hear more and more talk about the possibility of imposing negative interest rates in the US. In a recent article former Fed chairman Ben Bernanke asks what tools the Fed has left to support the economy and inter alia discu...

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Gold, Bonds and Negative Interest Rates Give SNB a Q1 profit

2016-04-28

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2016-04-28

2016 Q1 Results Swiss National Bank
SNB Results Q1 2016: Two thirds of SNB profit comes from Gold. Deflation helps with higher bonds prices and profit on negative interest rates.

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Podcast Discussing Dollar, Fed, BOJ on Futures Radio Show

2016-04-28

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2016-04-28

I had the privilege of being interviewed by Anthony Crudele, who is trader at the CME, for the Futures Radio Show.   There was much to discuss.  The FOMC met yesterday.  The market, judging from the Fed funds futures see little chance of a Ju...

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FX Daily April 28: What is the Next Shoe to Drop?

2016-04-28

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2016-04-28

One can appreciate the frustration in Tokyo. The Bank of Japan surprised the world by adopting negative rates in January and the yen rallied. Today it disappointed many by not easing, and the yen rallied. The BOJ next meetings in mid-June and like this week, the outcome of its meeting will be announced the day … Continue reading »

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Central Banks Roil Markets

2016-04-28

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2016-04-28

The Bank of Japan defied expectations and its economic assessment to  leave policy unchanged.  The inaction spurred a 3% rally in the yen and an even larger slump in stocks.  The financial sector took its the hardest and dropped almost 6%.  The...

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Hillary Will be the Least of Your Worries – America has Economic Diarrhea

2016-04-28

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2016-04-28

According to the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), the official recession arbiter, the US economy is currently at its fourth longest expansion in history. By the sheer nature of a capitalistic society with its inherent cyclicality it is a ...

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FOMC Statement Demonstrates Firm Grasp of the Obvious

2016-04-27

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2016-04-27

The FOMC delivered a statement largely as expected.  It upgraded its assessment of the global economy by dropping the reference to risks.  It downgraded its assessment of the domestic economy by acknowledging that growth has slowed.   Otherwi...

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What is the BOJ Going to Do?

2016-04-27

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2016-04-27

Under Kuroda's leadership the BOJ has surprised the market a number of times, most recently with the move to negative rates at the end of January.   It is not that such a move, which has been tried by several European central banks, was without...

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With Tech Tanking, Can Anything Save The System?

2016-04-27

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2016-04-27

Submitted by John Rubino via DollarCollapse.com, First it was the banks reporting horrendous numbers — largely, we were told, because of their exposure to recently-cratered energy companies. Now it’s Big Tech, which is a much harder thing t...

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Peak Data: When Not Enough Is Already Too Much

2016-04-27

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2016-04-27

  The Wild 1990s Not so long ago, during 1990’s, the connecting world of the connected world we now know was literally and comprehensively in the development stage during those wild crazy go go years before the crash in technology stocks in 2000.   T...

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Futures Ignore Apple Plunge; Oil Rises Above $45 As Yellen Looms

2016-04-27

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2016-04-27

For those who thought that the world's biggest company losing over $40 billion in market cap in an instant on disappointing Apple earnings, would have been sufficient to put a dent in US equity futures, we have some disappointing news: with just over...

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