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Foreigners Turning on the US
Dow down, gold up. That’s two days in a row. We don’t know what to make of it! Actually, we’re not sure many people know what to make of the overnight action. Markets were all over the shop and the usual explanations for why things happen didn’t seem to stack up.
It just goes to show that market’s move to their own rhythm. It’s just that we demand a daily explanation for what happened and so the media throws one up, regardless of its veracity. It proves the old Wall Street adage, ‘Markets make opinions.’
That was certainly the case last night. Firstly, unemployment claims fell to a six year low. This is good news, but not in the market’s eyes because it increases the fear of ‘tapering’. Tapering means less liquidity, which is the lifeblood of Wall Street.
But employment data is a lagging indicator, so it’s not exactly telling you what’s happening right now. US claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 15,000 last week to 320,000, the lowest level since…October 2007. That was hardly an auspicious time to buy stocks, and there are some eerie peak market parallels with that period right now. We point some of those out in our latest presentation.
But if the market sold off on tapering concerns, then why was the US dollar under pressure? The theme lately has been for the dollar to strengthen as investors price in higher interest rates.
And the experts have told us for months now that tapering concerns are the reason why the gold price is under pressure. Yet gold spiked higher overnight, punching through an important level of resistance.
So just what is going on?
Read the rest of this article at The Daily Reckoning
