Here we are… The last couple of days of January… So the first month of 2012 is just about over, and already, we’ve heard the Fed push their rate forecast for near zero rates out further, and the Fed laying the groundwork for another round of QE… But… When we began the month/year, everyone was pounding their chests, and talking about what a great year 2012 would be (economic-wise)… Talk about deflating the balloon in the first month of the year!
[Read more...]Commodities Take Off!
January 27, 2012 By Leave a Comment
The Greek talks returned to the headlines this morning. I know I said this last Friday, and I was a little too optimistic and turned out to be wrong! But… I do expect this agreement on a private-sector involvement in Greek debt to get hammered out this weekend… It seems that the opposition from eurozone policymakers is backing off, and that has me optimistic once again.
[Read more...]Existing Home Sales: Up or Down?
December 22, 2011 By Leave a Comment
The markets will be getting thin today, and will be super light tomorrow as most of the traders take some time off for the holidays. These thin markets can be volatile, as any moves are exaggerated by the lack of volume in the markets. We have lots of data hitting the markets today, which could be the spark for some real action, so it may get interesting.
[Read more...]Weekly Jobs Data is Positive, Pushing the Dollar Lower
December 16, 2011 By Leave a Comment
As mentioned in yesterday’s Pfennig, we had a long list of data released yesterday, and most of the numbers indicated that the US economy may be picking up a bit of steam. Producer prices came in right where they were expected, increasing 0.3% MOM and 5.7% YOY. The ‘core’ figure, (ex food and energy) is the one the Feds monitor and both showed modest increases over last month. The biggest surprise came in the form of the Empire Manufacturing number which came in at 9.53 on December versus 3.00 last month. This number reflects manufacturing activity in the NY region, but has a history of being very volatile and therefore an unreliable indicator of future manufacturing growth.
[Read more...]Brazil Quietly Scraps its Tax on Foreign Investment
December 7, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Today is our country’s first day of infamy… Pearl Harbor Day… I hope to visit Pearl Harbor some day, and pay my respects to those American soldiers and sailors who were attacked when we weren’t even at war with the Japanese… A day for us all to stop and think about what happened that day.
[Read more...]Rate Cut Week Next Week?
December 2, 2011 By Leave a Comment
OK… It’s a Jobs Jamboree Friday… (Doesn’t it seem like we just did this?) The experts are looking for the economy to have created 125,000 jobs in November… Hmmm… While that would be nice to see, I doubt it has legs to stand on… IF, we really count the jobs created correctly… Remember that in October the BLS (Bureau of Labor Statistics) told us the total jobs created for the month was 80,000? And then I told you that 102,000 jobs were added from the Birth/Death Model… Or as I like to call them…“ghost jobs”… So, that’s what I’m talking about when I say “count jobs created correctly.”
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Jobs Data Sends Currencies and Gold Lower
Good day… And a Marvelous Monday to you! Congrats to the fans of the Big Blue, NY Giants, who are the Super Bowl Champions, after a very entertaining game. It’s very foggy out this morning here in St. Louis, reminds me of the time my beautiful bride and yours truly were driving home from Des Moines to St. Louis and a very dense fog was everywhere… Not wanting to stop, I cracked the car door open and kept an eye on the white line, which would keep me on the road… Thinking back now, that probably wasn’t a very safe thing to do, eh?
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