On Tuesday, during the peak of the Harvey-related flooding, we reported that the hurricane may leave a greater trail of automobile destruction than even Katrina, the most expensive natural disaster in US history. In August 2005, Katrina wiped out some 500,000-600,000 vehicles but William Armstrong of CL King warned that Houston has about 5x more people than New Orleans did at the time.
One look at the last few days in stocks and all we can say is...
Gold and The Long Bond were the best performers in August with stocks and the dollar unchanged-ish
Amid chaotic swings in the dollar, and flash-crashes in precious metals, it seems anxious global investors have pushed into cryptocurrencies as a safe-haven overnight with the top 5 virtual currencies all soaring.
Bitcoin has reached a new record high at $4740...
Pushing its total market cap near that of Morgan Stanley.
Bitcoin is now bigger than 425 of the S&P's 500 members.
The 'resilience' of stock markets is proclaimed as self-reflectingly positive, as they surge higher, enthusiastically embracing debt ceiling anxiety, nuclear armageddon, and biblical floods. However, below the surface all is very much not rosy...
As Bloomberg reports, this is a warning for stock traders entranced by a market that remains resilient to surprises. Even though the S&P 500 is less than 1 percent away from a record set this month, the best move is to wait out more selling, according to Strategas Research Partners.
With just one month left until the "X Date", better known as the first day on which Treasury has exhausted its borrowing authority and no longer has sufficient funds to pay all of its bills in full and on time, and also known as the date the US is technically in default on its debt obligations and would be forced to prioritize debt payments according to that infamous 2011 Fed transcript...