Asia

If we’re going to discuss Asian equities in the context of “awesome”, we should begin with Tencent. Tencent, which has more than doubled this year, drove Asian stocks higher during Tuesday’s trading session. Trading on the main board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange hit a 28-month high of HK$157 billion with one fifth of it in only two stocks – Tencent (HK$21.7 billion) and Ping An Insurance (HK$9.4 billion). It was hardly surprising that shares in Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing also had a good day, rising 5.5%, the most in more than a year. Tencent’s 2.4% rise pushed it market cap.

S&P 500 futures are higher, continuing on yesterday's momentum, after European and Asian shares also rose alongside a rebound in oil, as the year-end performance chase appears to be accelerating. There were several different moving parts in a mixed European session, in which early Euro strength gave way to weakness...

... which in turn pushed the Stoxx 600 and US index futures higher, rising above yesterday's session high on negligible volumes. 

Authored by Mike Shedlock via themaven.net/mishtalk,

Who has a worse track record on the environment: President Trump or German Chancellor Angela Merkel?

Let's investigate. 

Trump Stance and Results

On September 19, amid chatter that Trump might reverse his climate stance, CNBC reported Trump is still pulling out of Paris Agreement.

One day ago the LA Times reported As Trump administration touts coal at U.N U.S. cities and states target climate change.

In recent years, there has been a major debate about the respective merits of gold versus Bitcoin, even though many, not all, gold bulls are also supporters of the latter. Gold advocates generally view favourably Bitcoin’s inherent characteristics of decentralisation, finite supply and ability to operate (so far) outside of the usual interference by western central banks.

Back in September, we reported on a major milestone in bitcoin’s evolution into a respectable medium of exchange for large purchases: A Dallas real estate agent had negotiated the first all-bitcoin purchase of a US home on record. Few details about the home or the identity of the buyers were released.