Category Archive: Finance
How Do Enhanced Yield Fixed Income Indexes Stack Up Vs. Active?
The research team at AQR Capital Management recently published a piece1 that attempted to explain why actively managed fixed income funds were able to deliver higher information ratios against their benchmarks than U.S. large-cap equity managers. The conclusion? Active fixed income managers tended to be over-weight credit risk compared to their benchmarks. While hardly surprising, that is precisely the rationale we focused on more […]
Barclays CEO: If Something ‘Snaps’, The Return Of Vol. Is Going To Be ‘Quite Something To Behold’
Barclays CEO Jes Staley is up to no good in Davos, what with all this talk about 2005 and 2006 and warning about complacency and so on and so forth. That’s the kind of thing that will get you ostracized in a market where everyone has spent the last six months making their own list […]
German IFO Business Climate Beats With 117.6 – EUR/USD At 1.24
Generally stronger numbers from the IFO survey: the headline business climate reached 117.6 and the Current Assessment advanced to 127.7, both better than expected. However, the business expectations slipped to 108.4, slightly below predictions. EUR/USD is now stabilizing around 1.24, halting its previous slide.Here is how it looks on the 30-minute chart: Germany’s No. 1 […]
US Q4 GDP Growth Expected To Hold Steady Near 3%
Tomorrow’s preliminary GDP report for the fourth quarter is on track to post a growth rate at or near the roughly 3% pace that’s prevailed in the previous two quarters, according to several estimates. If the projection is accurate, the US economy will log another healthy gain in quarterly output, reaffirming recent evidence that the […]
Silver: A Boring Metal With Little Movements
Silver, often known as the poor man’s gold has become a boring metal with little movements. In the past five years, the price of an ounce of silver has ranged between a low of $13.73 and a high of $22. Its one-year chart shows a metal struggling to find direction and one that is hard […]
Sensex Finishes In The Red; Dr. Reddy’s Lab Falls On Weak Q3 Performance
Indian share markets finished in the red snapping a six-day record-setting rally on the last session of January expiry in the derivatives segment. At the closing bell, the BSE Sensex closed lower by 111 points and the NSE Nifty finished lower by 16 points. The S&P BSE Mid Cap finished down by 0.8% while S&P BSE Small Cap finished down by 0.7%. Losses were […]
EUR/USD Rate Rally Vulnerable To ECB Verbal Intervention
The European Central Bank’s (ECB) first interest rate decision for 2018 may spark a limited reaction as the Governing Council is expected to retain the zero-interest rate policy (ZIRP), but President Mario Draghi and Co. may attempt to talk down the Euro as the ongoing appreciation in the exchange rate impedes on the outlook for inflation. The […]
E At The Global Level, Fiscal Policy Is Stimulating Economic Growth
The structural budget balance represents what government revenues and expenditure would be if output were at its potential level. Changes in structural balances are an indicator of whether fiscal policy is expanding or shrinking economic activity. As the following chart for the OECD countries indicates, changes in the structural balance have become pro-cyclical (i.e. spurring […]
Top 5 Safest And Highest-Yielding Stocks
Yesterday marked the five-year anniversary of the Safety Net column. Since 2013, I’ve warned readers many times about companies whose dividends were not safe, only to be proven right a short time later when they cut their dividends. In 2017 alone, we predicted several dividend cuts, including those by General Electric (NYSE: GE), Plains All American Pipeline (NYSE: PAA) and Prospect […]
BTC/USD And BTC/JPY Forecast – Thursday, Jan. 25
BTC/USD Bitcoin had a slightly positive session during the day on Wednesday, as we continue to see support near the $10,000 level. What I find significant about this is that the $10,000 level also lines up quite nicely with the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement level, so therefore there are a couple of reasons to suspect there […]
