What a tumultuous year 2016 has been. Just around this time last year, we were looking back at 2015 and analyzing how 2016 would unfold. The August 24-25, 2015 “Flash Crash” was the talk of the day, where the S&P 500 faltered with an over 10% decline from its all-time highs. It was the first time in over 4 years that the noble index fell from grace so badly; and January and February 2016 brought more pain for the index.
Submitted by Lance Roberts via RealInvestmentAdvice.com,
There is little doubt currently that complacency reigns in the financial markets. Nowhere is that complacency more evident than in the Market Greed/Fear Index which combines the 4-measures of investor sentiment (AAII, INVI, MarketVane, & NAAIM) with the inverse Volatility Index.
Moments ago, during a hearing of Economic and Monetary Affairs of the European Parliament, in his prepared remarks Mario Draghi said that “support from our monetary policy measures is still needed if inflation rates are to converge toward our objective with sufficient confidence and in a sustained manner.” Confirming that no changes to the ECB's monetary policy are due in the near future, Draghi said that "underlying inflation pressures remain very subdued and are expected to pick up only gradually", adding that "risks to the euro area outlook remain tilted to the downside" but "relate mai
The last time we heard from Dennis Gartman, he has just turned bearish due to a peculiar "catalyst": he had just seen the infamous Barron's "Dow 30,000" cover (with a two day delay) which prompted him to say that "we would very much like to think that Dow 30,000 shall eventually be upon us, and we very, very much would like to believe that any further weakness in stocks is to be bought, but at the moment we have very serious doubts to that effect…. Very, very serious doubts." Shortly after, the Dow spiked above 20,000 again, and the S&P closed Friday just shy of all time highs.
Back in November, when describing the perverse global fund flows in which record money creation out of the BOJ and ECB amounting to roughly $200 billion per month was being used indirectly, via spread differentials, to create demand for US Treasuries by foreign official and private investors - an observation first made by Deutsche Bank - we dubbed it "global helicopter money", and were surprised that "nobody has noticed" what is going on.