Author: shyam

US: The intellectual collapse of left and right

America’s struggling workforce faces mass unemployment, low pay, inadequate benefits and highly regressive taxation. The centre-right’s ownership society and the centre-left’s knowledge economy are irrelevant to these problems. It is an insult to tell struggling health aides and store clerks to supplement their income by investing in stocks. It is a cruel joke to tell most of them that they should go to college, become entrepreneurs and found start-ups.

via The intellectual collapse of left and right – FT.com.

Emerging powerhouses can’t save the world

Charlie Yeung participated 2007 Taiwan Orbis &...

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As fears mount that the developed world is shifting from slow growth to no growth, emerging markets seem to many economists better placed to weather the storm than they were during the great financial crisis of 2008/2009.

However, Rob Subbaraman, chief Asian economist at Nomura in Hong Kong, said the region would run into headwinds from slower exports to the United States, Europe and Japan. This was the main factor behind a cut in Morgan Stanley’s projection of 2012 GDP growth in Latin America, announced on Thursday, to 3.6% from 4.6%.

A clear worry is that while the economic fundamentals look better in many emerging economies than they did in 2008, policy makers generally have less leeway. India is especially constrained: the general government deficit has more than doubled since 2007 and wholesale inflation exceeds 9%. The government and central bank, which has raised interest rates 11 times since March 2010, are still forecasting growth of at least 8%in the financial year that began in April.

“There is now less policy room to respond to a significant deterioration in domestic or external demand than in 2008, but adequate measures are still available,” according to Stephen Green, head of China research at Standard Chartered Bank in Shanghai.

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The Golden Cross and the Death Cross

The Golden Cross represents a major shift from the bears to the bulls. It triggers when the 50-day average breaks above the 200-day average. Conversely, the Death Cross restores bear power when the 50-day falls back beneath the 200-day. The 200-day average becomes major resistance after the 50-day average drops below it, and major support after breaking above it. When price gets trapped between the 50-day and 200-day averages, it can whipsaw repeatedly between their price extremes. This pinball action marks a zone of opportunity for swing trades.

Caveat: Moving averages emit false signals during the “negative feedback” of sideways markets. Keep in mind these common indicators measure directional momentum. They lose power in markets with little or no price change.

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Weekly Market Comment (US) – Hussman

Description: Newspaper clipping USA, Woodrow W...

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A must read: http://www.hussmanfunds.com/wmc/wmc110815.htm

Short-term measures of market action became extremely oversold mid-week, and investors took the Fed’s latest statement as an occasion to launch a fairly typical “fast, furious, prone-to-failure” rally to clear those conditions. How could an economy already plagued by “moral hazard” possibly benefit from the belief that the Fed had provided a “backstop” for speculative risk-taking?

It is only that demand that has allowed inflation to remain low despite the massive expansion of government liabilities far exceeding GDP growth, and of misallocated credit that has produced losses rather than surplus output.

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