While we have previously observed the massive glut of oil product in the US, which has led to such arcane developments as a "parking lot" of oil tankers outside of Galveston, TX...
... or ships loaded to the brim with crude making U-turns in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, taking advantage of the supercontango while unable to find buyers...
Authored by Stephen Roach, originally posted at Project Syndicate,
Three weeks ago, when observing the ongoing lunacy in the Vancouver housing market, we mentioned the case of Canadian Bill Ring, head of operations for a property management company who, as Bloomberg quotes, said "I don’t want to invest in stocks because they’re crazy and real estate is a solid, safe investment."
Much to our chagrin we mocked Bill's zest, adding that "if the housing market in Canada were overheating, you wouldn't be able to get "bargains" like the listing shown below from Vancouver."
Gold is many things to many people. A perennial battleground subject, gold remains arguably one of the most debated asset classes across global financial markets, but as Goldman's precious metals equity analyst notes, from a fundamental perspective, the risk/reward looks more balanced than that of its bulk and base metal peers, especially in terms of the supply/demand dynamics.
Americans are in debt. And massively so.
In fact, the US is laboring under $1.1 trillion in auto loan debt and $1.3 trillion in student loan obligations.
This massive burden may well be holding back the beleaguered consumer in the US, a country which depends on consumer spending for three quarters of economic growth.