- S&P and the NASDAQ made new record highs
- Stock market continues to ignore all the bad news about the economy
- Bad news is not being ignored in the foreign exchange markets
- Negative economic news is buoying the stock market because it removes fear of interest rate hikes
- Weak economy means more cheap money which means higher stock prices
- Oil prices hitting highest prices of the year
- Gold is back above the 1200 level
- April PMI Manufacturing Flash Index at 54.2 biggest miss ever
- New Home Sales tumbled by 11.1% – biggest drop since July of 2013
- March Durable Goods slight bump based on military aircraft, but less transportation, the index unexpectedly declined .2%
- Durable good orders, less defense and transportation dropped for the 7th consecutive month
- April Service Sector PMI missed lowest expectations at 57.8 – the biggest miss ever
- Dallas Fed Manufacturing Survey – recorded significant drop at -16; biggest losing streak ever
- There will be a delayed reaction from the market to first quarter’s bad economic news on top of this quarter’s economic news
- A Boston Fed official is considering retaining “balance sheet tools”, i.e. QE
- In other words, the Fed is considering not having an exit strategy – because it can’t exit
- We have done all sorts of crazy things that we never would have done but for zero percent interest rates and QE
- A market that was built for 0% interest rates can’t handle 2% interest rates
- The product of all this stimulus will be big increases in prices, and the Central Banks are setting the stage for higher inflation
- Declining Swiss consumer prices are described as “dangerous”
- Currently, the Swiss consumers are enjoying lower prices and do not need a government “cure”
- The law of supply and demand is so simple that only an economist would fail to understand it
- Keynesians will spin ever-conflicting news to support their theory
- Fitch has downgraded Japanese government debt to A- because or the Japan’s deteriorating fiscal condition
- Based on that logic, why is the U.S. AAA?
- There is a general fear of downgrading U.S. debt, based on fines levied against the S&P
- The real problem will be the collapse of the dollar, which means the debt will be repaid in dollars without purchasing power
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