From Nicholas Colas of Convergex
Today we continue our recent exploration of the ongoing low volatility in US equity markets, but with a novel twist. Instead of looking at the CBOE VIX Index, we look at the historical trends in actual S&P 500 price volatility. Not only is the dataset longer here (starting in the 1950s rather than 1990), but it is also “Stickier” than the twitchy VIX.
Three takeaways.
Authored by Jeff Thomas via InternationalMan.com,
Recently, I published the comment that, when the present debt bubble eventually pops, “governments will lose the economic power to continue their advance against economic freedom.”
The immediate reaction from one reader was, “What could we expect next?… The governments and Deep State aren’t going to ‘just go away.’”
An excellent question—one which deserves an answer.
Authored by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,
When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men in a society, over the course of time they create for themselves a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.
– Frédéric Bastiat
Excerpted from The Gloom, Boom & Doom Report, March 2017, authored by Mark Faber; via MauldinEconomics.com,
Writing for https://www.dailybeast.com (February 4, 2017), Joel Kotkin opines under the title “The High Cost of a Home Is Turning American Millennials Into the New Serfs” that
In a note from Goldman's cross-asset strategist Ian Wright, the bank points out something troubling: on one hand, over the past six months, or rather since the US elections, equity markets around the globe have soared, and returns across regions have been "strong" - S&P 500, Stoxx 600, Nikkei 225 and MSCI EM ($) have returned roughly 11%, 16%, 20% and 11% in local currency price terms, respectively, with MSCI World ($) up 12% over the same period. In other words, everything is up.