Morning Call For May 19, 2015
OVERNIGHT MARKETS AND NEWS June E-mini S&Ps (ESM15 +0.24%) this morning are up +5.50 points (+0.26%) on carry-over optimism from European stocks. The Euro Stoxx 50 index this morning is sharply higher by +1.7% after an ECB official said that the ECB will increase its QE buying in May and June ahead of lower liquidity […]
Apple Inc. IPhone Sales Still Growing; FBR Capital And Bernstein Still Bullish
Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) fans have been engrossed with the new Apple Watch, but Apple investors are still excited by iPhone 6 sales growth, specifically in China. Looking back at the first quarter of 2015, Apple CFO confirmed that Apple sold more iPhones in China than in the U.S for the first time, partially thanks to the […]
EUR/USD Struggles At The 1.14 Level
The EUR/USD pair had a fairly negative session on Monday as traders came back from the weekend. It seems that we continue to struggle out the 1.14 level, which of course is a not a huge surprise to me, because we are testing the last vestiges of true resistance. I believe that this resistance and […]
U.S. Stocks Are Back In The Lead – ETF Performance Review: Major Asset Classes
The US stock market has regained the pole position for the trailing one-year return (250 trading days) among the major asset classes via our standard set of ETF proxies. Vanguard Total Stock Market (VTI) is ahead by 16% on a total-return basis for the past year through yesterday (May 18). The rebound to the top spot comes […]
This Is What A $240/Share AAPL Would Look Like In Context
If Carl Icahn, whose $6.8 billion in AAPL holdings makes him nearly a 6x bigger holder of the stock than the Swiss National Bank, is correct and AAPL is truly worth $240/share today, or about $1.4 trillion, roughly equivalent to 9% of U.S. GDP, then this is how AAPL would rank if it were a sovereign nation (and yes, […]
CFDs Vs Forex – What’s The Difference?
Have you ever wondered what the difference is between CFDs and Forex? Did you know there was a difference?Do you know what they both are? First things first then. What is a CFD CFD stands for Contract for Difference and it’s essentially a financial (derivative) product that allows you to buy and sell a market with leverage […]
Downtown Revitalization – The Role Of A Billionaire
In downtown Las Vegas Nevada recently I visited a small business that is the opposite of everything we normally associate with Sin City. The small business made me think about the role of both visionary billionaires and geography to city revitalization. The small, serious, bookstore The Writer’s Block opened last year as part of The Downtown Project, entrepreneur Tony Hsieh’s […]
Why Bonds Are No Longer A “Safe Haven”
Bonds: A Crowded Trade In the financial markets, we have been waiting for a crash of U.S. stock prices. And waiting. And waiting. It still hasn’t come. Last week the spectacular bull market in U.S. stocks that began in March 2009 continued with even more gains. On Friday, the S&P 500 hit another all-time high. […]
JP Morgan Horizontal Range Imminent
JPMorgan (JPM:NYSE) is a global diversified bank holding company engaged in retail, commercial, and investment banking giant. With a market capitalization just shy of $245 billion, it ranks among the biggest financial institutions on the globe. Its status of “too big to fail” has been modestly contained by increasingly draconian regulatory measures enacted over the […]
Dollar Lifted By ECB Front Loading QE And UK Slipping Into Deflation
The US dollar is broadly higher as yesterday’s gains are extended. The driving force is not so much a shift in perceptions of the US economy, though the San Francisco Fed that claimed seasonal adjustment quirks are behind the repeated weakness in Q1 GDP helped market sentiment yesterday in North America. Rather the euro has […]
