Author Archive: Jeremy Parkinson
Even The “Experts” Get It Wrong Occasionally
A friend was lamenting about the difficulty he was having getting “look through” information on closed end funds and ETFs, specifically bond funds, and calling into his online brokerage firm for help didn’t yield much better results. Closed end funds not necessarily being transparent isn’t news and while I am surprised he had the same […]
Pitchforks Coming For Central Bankers
As central banks have pumped trillions of QE liquidity into the financial system since 2008, money supply (green) increased along with household debt (in red), but economic output (green) has maintained its downward trend along with wages and salaries (black). This is a big problem, because credit bubbles have always burst–every one (see chart below)–evaporating […]
Rail Week Ending 08 July 2017: Slowing Continues
Week 27 of 2017 shows same week total rail traffic (from same week one year ago) improved according to the Association of American Railroads (AAR) traffic data. The economically intuitive sectors slowing continues. Analyst Opinion of the Rail Data We review this data set to understand the economy. If coal and grain are removed from the analysis, rail over […]
Barclays Says Sell Seagate With Cost Cutting Near Conclusion
Barclays downgraded Seagate (STX) to Underweight, its equivalent of a sell rating, from Equal Weight. The company’s cost cutting initiatives have largely come to an end, while it is losing share to its rival, Western Digital (WDC), in the high margin hard disk drive market, Barclays believes. Furthermore, Western Digital looks increasingly like it could […]
Better Dividend Aristocrat: Johnson & Johnson Or Medtronic?
For investors looking for high-quality dividend stocks, the Dividend Aristocrats is a great place to begin your research. The Dividend Aristocrats Excel spreadsheet has 51 stocks with 25+ consecutive years of dividend increases. Health care giants Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) and Medtronic (MDT) are both on the list. J&J is a member of an even more exclusive […]
Regrettable Eateries
Although I cover my retail stocks early this morning (M, JWN, DDS) I am still cheerfully short a different kind of “retail”, which are casual dining establishments (AKA places I would never, ever want to eat). Here they are……….Fiesta Restaurant Group: Brinker International………. And, home of the Grand Slam, Denny’s………..
The Logic Of A Modern Gold Standard
In last week’s Insight, I analyzed the current geopolitical situation and concluded that it was now in the interest of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation to break from the US dollar completely, by establishing a new monetary and banking system. By linking the yuan and rouble to gold, the SCO’s principal currencies would be insulated from manipulation […]
Despite Yellen’s “Uncertainty”, VIX Crushed Back To A 9 Handle
US equity markets are ramping higher (aside from Small Caps) this morning as it appears the word “uncertain” – uttered ubiquitously by Fed Chair Yellen in the last two days – has a different meaning in stock-land… VIX hammered to a 9-handle, sending stocks soaring… Oh, and decliners are outpacing advancers… Headlines: Everything is […]
USD/JPY Rally Vulnerable Ahead Of U.S. CPI/Retail Sales
USD/JPY Daily Technical Outlook: USD/JPY responded to a key resistance range this week at 114.37/60. The pair is loaded with technical considerations into the 115-handle which include the 100% extension of the April rally, the 61.8% retracement of the 2017 range and the May high. The pullback is in focus with the broader outlook weighted to the […]
PPI Shows No Price Traction: Dear Econoday Parrot
The Producer Price Index (PPI) was up 0.1% month over month and 2.0% year over year, the latter down from 2.4%. The Econoday parrot was not happy. Inflation data, wherever one looks, are weak. Producer prices edged only 0.1 percent higher in June as did the less food & energy reading with year-on-year rates moving down noticeably, to […]
