There isn’t single commodity that could touch the volatility of oil through 2009. Going into the year oil was coming off summer highs of $147 a barrel and had dipped as low as $37 as the global recession reached its peak. With 2010 on the horizion, it looks like we could have a repeat of 2008. Read more…
Quantitative easing is such a beautiful word for such an ugly subject: inflation. With record amounts of Treasuries up for maturity in 2010 and huge amounts of new issuance, the Fed will be forced to again ease the fixed income markets. Read more…
With the Great Recession still in effect and consumers still cutting back, 2010 could be the year of death for credit card profit margins. A battered consumer, a fear of debt and new legislation regarding credit card interest rates could create a death spiral for plastic. Read more…
Exchange-traded funds are loved by investors for their tax advantages, especially when it comes to capital gains. Because most funds are indexes that track the returns of a subset of stocks/bonds/commodities and rarely buy or sell holdings, capital gains are almost never incurred on the operating end. Usually, a trader will only have to pay taxes when a capital gain is generated on his/her side after the position is sold. Unfortunately, this isn’t exactly true for bond funds, which had to move funds around in a very volatile 2009. Read more…
Small provisions in humungous bills often realign whole industries. One case, a new tax on indoor tanning products, will increase the price consumers pay for tanning services by 10% to pay for a new healthcare system. Read more…
Despite criticism from both the left and the right of the political spectrum, Bernanke was reappointed by the Senate as the Chairman of the Federal Reserve. The vote, which was closer than most, came in at 16-7. Read more…
Sony, the company that pioneered the VCR and later propelled DVD into the forefront of home entertainment, has seen lackluster results for its BluRay high definition discs and players. Though Sony hit everything out of the ballpark with its newest disc format, timing proved to be poor. Read more…
One of the few bright spots in any US based recession is that exports typically strengthen as the US dollar weakens. This recession has been no different. For the sixth straight month, the US trade deficit has shrunk as Americans export more and import less. Read more…
It looks like a second stimulus package could be in the works. This time, the stimulus will come in at $100-150 billion, roughly 1/5 the cost of the first stimulus effort. Read more…
After shedding only 11,000 jobs in November and a multi-month trend of upward revisions, analysts are predicting that November could have actually added more jobs than were lost, pointing towards a recovery. Read more…
After November’s employment report, gold dove nearly 5% on better than expected employment numbers. With only 11,000 jobs lost and the unemployment rate dipping from 10.2% to 10%, investors figured that an improving economy would force the Federal Reserve to increase interest rates, fighting off inflation. Read more…
The Federal Reserve is probably one of the most criticized (semi-)Federal institutions right now. From the constant grilling of Ben Bernanke as he testifies before the House Financial Services Subcommittee to the bill, HR 1207, that would audit the Fed, the Fed is certainly in the middle of all kinds of macroeconomic discussion. Read more…
