A very welcomed rally in the US found the desired effect upon Asia initially but sadly failed to install confidence required to convince and resulting in a mixed session. The Nikkei saw a healthy opening but lost momentum midway through the session. Towards the close we did see some buying interest which managed to close […]

Asia started off where we left the US on Friday with the selling pressure still dominant. The Nikkei cash opened down over 1% lower and did not look likely to break that decline at any time during the trading session. Eventually closing 1.7% lower the JPY saw the safety rush but interestingly not as dramatic […]

With the ECB expanding its quantitative easing program to include corporate debt, European companies are now scrambling to issue as much debt as they can as cheap rates. These issue are selling BECAUSE it is assumed they have a guaranteed bidder being the ECB. At least this part of the QE is far better than […]

  QUESTION: Why are there so many Fed branches? It seems this is another way for government just to create jobs and pensions. ANSWER:I wrote several times that the original design of the Federal Reserve would have been a good, stabilizing entity for the economy had the politicians left it alone. At first, to ease […]

Asia was a mixed with a strong Hang Seng (+0.75%) an unchanged Nikkei and a slightly weaker Shanghai (-0.55%), which after yesterdays ECB Q+A session was actually very promising performance. However, it was not to last and as soon as Europe opened then the selling began. It started in the fixed-income markets but by afternoon […]

I have explained that watch the core regions in real estate and you will forecast the rest. Real estate booms and busts always begin in the core regions. As that property rises sharply, people begin to buy what is cheaper the next two over. This is the process of the economic wave in real estate […]

Secondary economic data in Japan coupled with slight dovish comments BOJ comments and the Nikkei started to drift lower. At worse the index was down around 1% but a lack of follow through volume saw a reasonable bounce into the close. Eventually, the Nikkei closed down 0.3% which, around mid afternoon looked very unlikely. The […]

After Fridays Payrolls release we saw Asian futures reflect a solid performance which was carried into the cash indices this morning. The Nikkei lost a little of the futures euphoria but still closed up 0.7% and the highest close in over 3 months, the JPY gained 0.55% rejecting the 104 handle and closing closer to 103 instead. […]

Thailand is looking to issue SIM cards to all tourists to protect national security. They say they will be able to respond to tourists in trouble, but they are really looking to track everyone because of the rising threat of Islamic extremism. Domestically, you are already being tracked. Google wants to “verify” who you are by using your […]

QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong, What comes first? The banking Crisis or the Sovereign Debt Crisis? Thank you for bringing our attention to these events OD ANSWER: The central banks are trapped. They can no longer even hope to sell the bonds they have bought in a vain attempt to stimulate the economy. So government can, in theory, keep their rates […]