Reader Mr. G had this to say about my post from last Tuesday:Ulli: Yesterday you wrote, “Other asset classes have rallied strongly above their respective trend lines issuing a buy of their own. Today, we added a small holding in Latin America and in an Intermediate-term bond ETF.” This seems in conflict with your advice to follow the TTIs before …
Educated Guesses
The Fed released it March 18 FOMC minutes, and it was revealed that many Fed officials were of the opinion that an economic contraction was “likely.” This is not earthshaking news especially in view of the fact that Fed Chairman Bernanke has since uttered the “R-Word.” The Fed is usually behind the curve with its facts and announcements as Calculated …
Housing Bubble Hangover
Bill Fleckenstein had some interesting thoughts in his piece titled “Our housing-bubble hangover.” Here are some highlights: The market has been bouncing around on misplaced hopes that the Federal Reserve will somehow save the day. Beyond the din, it’s important to focus on one overarching fact: The fundamental problem in our country is the aftermath of the housing bubble. We’ll …
Beware Of Junk
Income investors looking for a higher yield are having a tough time since high yield equals high risk. Bloomberg reports that “Junk Bond Losses Top $35 Billion.” Here are some highlights: High-yield, high-risk bonds are off to their worst start ever, and the biggest investors say there’s no recovery in sight. Junk bonds have fallen an average 3.9 percent this …
Sunday Musings: The Subprime Crisis Revisited
With almost daily news about banks having taken, or are about to, tens of billions of dollars in write-downs due to the real estate/credit bubble, you may be wondering how this whole mess got started. Sure, you’ve been catching news pieces here and there, but what caused this dilemma in the first place? How can Subprime mortgage investments have spread …
Avoiding Tragedies
Finally, I found a few paragraphs in the media that made some sense. MarketWatch featured a piece titled “Avoidable trillion-dollar tragedies.” While the story addresses several important issues, I want to focus on the portion about the misguided mutual fund management mess. Here is an excerpt along with my comments: If the next few years are as devastating as the …