Category Archive: Finance
April Retail Sales: The Spring Rebound Goes Missing
The Advance Retail Sales Report released this morning shows that sales in April came in flat month-over-month, a situation that was enabled by an upward March revision from 0.9% to 1.1%. Core Retail Sales (ex Autos) came in at a disappointing 0.1%, with the March number tweaked upward from 0.4% to 0.7%. Today’s numbers came in below […]
Negative Duration Bond ETFs – Right Time To Bet?
With increasing energy prices, growing inflationary expectations and an improving job market, the Treasury yields have been on the rise yet again in recent weeks. Yields on 10-year Treasury notes (TNX) saw a sudden and sharp jump from $1.890 on April 16 to near $2.35 as of today – the highest level in more than […]
Yearning For Yen
Feel like a really contrarian play? How about going long the Japanese Yen? Yes, the idea of buying the rapidly-expanding currency of a country already one quadrillion yen in debt seems lunatic, but relative to the US dollar, I think the Yen might be in for a surprising rally. The FXY is one way I know of owning the currency. Looking at the […]
Return Of Bond Market Stability Pushes Equity Futures Higher
Following yesterday’s turbulent bond trading session, where the volatility after the worst Bid to Cover in a Japanese bond auction since 2009 spread to Europe and sent Bund yields soaring again, in the process “turmoiling” equities, today’s session has been a peaceful slumber barely interrupted by a “better than expected” Italian and German Bund auction, […]
Morning Call For May 13, 2015
OVERNIGHT MARKETS AND NEWS June E-mini S&Ps (ESM15 +0.25%) this morning are up +0.27% and European stocks are up +0.85% after global bond markets rallied and after Eurozone Q1 GDP expanded as expected. The British pound fell back from a 4-3/4 month high against the dollar after the BOE cut its 2015 UK GDP forecast […]
Wednesday Pre-Market Insights: GEVO, WPZ, HDP, PTIE
Gevo, Inc. (NASDAQ:GEVO) shares are up more than 21% in pre-market trading to $5.68 after the renewable chemicals and advanced biofuels company reported 1Q15 results. Gevo posted quarterly revenue of $5.9 million, a significant increase from $0.9 million in the same quarter of last year. The report also highlighted a recent renewable jet fuel agreement […]
Inside New Leveraged REIT ETN Issued By UBS
ETRACS, the fund brand of UBS, has already made a name for itself in rolling out high yield leveraged products. To carry on its success story, the issuer recently launched a new leveraged ETF targeting the U.S. REIT sector. The fund trades in the name of ETRACS Monthly Pay 2xLeveraged MSCI US REIT Index ETN (LRET – ETF report). […]
First-Quarter REIT Underdog Update
In January I wrote an article on CorEnergy (NYSE:CORR) and I described the company as my “2015 REIT Underdog”. Earlier this week the company announced its first-quarter results, so I decided that I would provide an update on the Energy Infrastructure REIT. Before beginning, I will remind you that CORR generates revenue by leasing infrastructure assets, or offering loans […]
Continued Weak Consumer Spending “Puzzles” BofA
BofAML’s Michelle Meyer is “puzzled” at why the U.S. consumer is not the spendaholic her textbooks said they should be by now… A setback after the bounce in March Based on BAC (BAC) internal data, which tracks spending on credit and debit cards, consumer spending slowed in April. Retail sales ex-autos declined 0.1% mom seasonally adjusted […]
Real Estate ETF Momentum Has Shifted Overseas
The proliferation of publicly traded real estate investment trusts (or REITs) has created access to a global menu of high dividend paying securities. REITs function by generating income from rents and property development that is ultimately passed on to shareholders in the form of dividends. This creates a highly coveted asset class for income oriented […]
