Business

Och-Ziff Capital Management put a five-year-long investigation by Department of Justice and Securities and Exchange Commission to rest last year when it agreed to pay a $412 million fine to settle allegations that its Africa unit violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act by paying more than $100 million in bribes to corrupt government officials. But even after slashing its management fee following a wave of customer redemptions, the publicly traded hedge fund is in rough shape. Its shares are languishing around $3, well below their peak of $26, and investors have pulled ne

Authored by PIMCO Global Strategist Gene Frieda via Project Syndicate,

Bond investors are from Mars, and central bankers are from Venus – or so suggests the bond market’s negative reaction to signals that the exceptional monetary-policy accommodation of the last decade is winding down. Risky asset markets, however, are ignoring the red flags that the bond markets are waving. Are they right?

It appears that Horseman Global's Russell Clark may have been spot on with his bearish assessment of the US shale sector.

As a reminder, in his latest letter to investors, Clark said that "the rising decline rates of major US shale basins, and the increasing incidents of frac hits (also a cause of rising decline rates) have convinced me that US shale producers are not only losing competitiveness against other oil drillers, but they will find it hard to make money."

You know it's bad when even the traditional 'pumpers' are getting anxious. While obviously counched in its own "well maybe that's not totally terrible" spin, reading the following from Charles Schwab suggests Liz Ann Sonders, Brad Sorensen, and Jeffrey Kleintop were all struggling to defend any bullish position and perhaps more desperate to CYA in case reality doesn't match their hard-sold perception...

Via Schwab.com,

How long?

Google, aka Alphabet, reported Q2 earnings that beat on the top and bottom line, reporting EPS of $5.01, above the estimate of $4.45, and earnings per share excluding the $2.7 billion European Commission fine of $8.90, also above the $8.25 expected. Total Q2 revenue of $26.01 billion rose 21% Y/Y, and also beat consensus of $25.64BN.