The Eurozone leaders have a long way to go before they get past this debt crisis… And along the way there will be some potholes big enough to swallow a Mac-Truck. But knowing what I know about the resiliency of the region, they will pull themselves out of the pothole, and attempt to move further along the way toward solving the crisis.
[Read more...]The Shifting Focus of US Consumer Spending
October 10, 2011 By Leave a Comment
The feds released a jobs report on Friday. It said that things weren’t as bad as everyone thought. The US economy actually added 103,000 new jobs in September.
But wait. That is not a lot of jobs. There are about 150 million people who make up the labor force. This number increases — by immigration and population growth — by about 1.2 million per year. So, 100,000 new jobs doesn’t do much to restore full employment.
[Read more...]US Dollar Reverses Losses After Jobs Report
July 11, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Well… Friday was quite interesting with the Jobs Jamboree falling flat on its face, and watching the dollar get sold…and then bought again as the day went on… The dollar holds the hammer again this morning, as now the media and market observers are going after Italy… So the offset to the dollar, the euro (EUR), is slip-sliding away… Slip-sliding away, the nearer your destination, the more you’re slip-sliding away…
[Read more...]“Risk Off” Currencies Rally on Greek Credit Downgrade
May 10, 2011 By Leave a Comment
We had a busy but manageable day on the trading desk yesterday, which was all we could ask for with both Chuck and Aaron traveling to Las Vegas and with me tied up in meetings all day. The newest member of our WorldMarkets family, Antione, spent his first full day on the phones, and did quite well according to the rest of the gang.
[Read more...]How Will Census Workers Affect the Jobs Report?
September 3, 2010 By Leave a Comment
It was a ping-pong day for the currencies, back and forth over the net… The net being the “level of the day?… For instance, the Aussie dollar (AUD) played over the 91-cent net all day, and the euro played over the 1.2820 level all day.
[Read more...]The Two Divergent Views of Currency Market Investors
August 6, 2010 By Leave a Comment
The weekly jobs numbers released yesterday morning showed 25K more people signed up for unemployment last week than the week prior. The number of continuing claims declined slightly, but remains above 4.5 million. The data confirms what everyone outside of CNBC has been saying for quite a while; this is a ‘jobless recovery' (if you can even call it a recovery!) What growth we have had has been spurred by government spending, the private sector just isn't expanding, and won't probably expand for some time.
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Euro Reverses Slide in Short Squeeze
The Jobs Jamboree on Friday proved to be a real boost for the economy and the dollar, which rallied on a “strong jobs number” for the first time in a month of Sundays. I highlight “strong jobs number” because, this is what this has come to… 200,000 jobs were created, so says the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), in December, which is the strongest number of jobs created in another month of Sundays… The jobs reports have been so weak for so long now, that the media, and markets are all lathered up and calling this a “strong jobs number”… It’s stronger than previous ones, yes…
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