It is a quiet start to the week: in the US we have the Chicago Fed’s National Activity index (CFNAI) numbers for February (0.25 expected; 0.28 prior) which missed badly as noted earlier, printing negative after a sharp upward revision to the January number, as well as the latest existing home sales data (5.31mn expected) momentarily.
After last week's ridiculous FOMC announcement which forced even such "party line" commentators as Steve Liesman to ask Yellen if the Fed has lost all credibility after its dots tumbled despite surging core inflation and a mandate low unemployment rate, one can be forgiven if all they laugh at the latest Fed "forecast."
Billionaire philanthropist and media tycoon Haim Saban has said that a United States led by Hillary Clinton would be “great” for Israel. American – Israeli Saban who is also one of Clinton’s top donors, made his remarks during an exclusive interview with The Jerusalem Post. They write: Saban declined to provide specifics on Clinton’s diplomatic policy for the region but said, “We have yet to see all of Hillary’s detailed positions, and I will not give anything away.
One month ago, as we pounded the table on the biggest threat to the fundamental case for oil, namely that even a modest rebound in oil prices could unleash another round of production by the "marginal", US shale oil producers, we warned that a rebound in the price of oil as modest as $40 per barrel, could be sufficient to get drillers to resume production.
Last June, China’s stock market miracle ended in tears.
The SHCOMP’s inexorable, parabolic ascent was to a large degree facilitated by an explosion of margin debt, the likes of which could not be found in any other major market across the globe. For instance, by the end of June, the outstanding balance of margin transactions as a percentage of the SHCOMP’s free float market cap was nearly 14% compared to just 5.5% for the S&P and less than 1% for the TOPIX.