Business

In what may have been a watershed moment in monetary policy - which awkwardly was missed by almost everyone as a result of the concurrent launch of the latest North Korean ballistic missile which immediately drowned out all other newsflow - late on Thursday, the Bank of Canada held a conference on inflation targeting and monetary policy titled "Bank of Canada Workshop “Monetary Policy Framework Issues: Toward the 2021 Inflation-Target Renewal"  in which, in a stunning shift of monetary orthodoxy, BoC Senior Deputy Governor Carolyn A.

Authored by Sara Potter via FactSet,

Last week, I detailed the various factors leading up to the stock market crash of October 19, 1987. As we approach the 30-year anniversary of Black Monday, are there signs that the bull market of 2017 could end in the same way? Let’s compare the financial, economic, and political factors now and then to paint a better picture.

One week ago, in his weekly "flow report", BofA's Michael Hartnett looked at the "Disconnect Myth" between rising stocks and sliding yields and succinctly said that there is "no disconnect between stocks & bonds."

Why? The reason for low yields and high stocks was simple: trillions in central bank intervention. The result is an era of lower yields & higher stocks, or as the chart above shows, an era in which the alligator jaws of death are just waiting for their moment to shine. Here are the three phases:

As Texas slowly normalizes from Hurricane Harvey's impact, production has rebounded but the rig count continues to tumble (down 7 to 749 this week). This is the biggest weekly drop in oil rigs since Jan 2017 and June 2016. WTI Crude futures have once again tested $50 (and failed) this morning.

This is the 5th week in a row with no increases in oil rig counts.

Authored by Cyril Widdershoven via OilPrice.com,

The long-awaited Saudi Aramco IPO, scheduled for mid-2018, could be delayed to 2019.

International news reports have stated that the Saudi government is currently putting together contingency plans for a possible delay to the biggest IPO ever. The listing of 5 percent of Saudi Arabia’s crown jewel, the world’s largest oil company Saudi Aramco, could bring in around $300-$400 billion, based on a valuation of Aramco at between $1.5-2 trillion.