A definite Christmas theme today with most markets meandering into the festive season. Japan was closed for annual holiday (Emperor’s Birthday) and many markets were on half-day (Hong Kong, Singapore, Philippines and Australia). The PBOC set mid-point for the Yuan at 6.4731 but saw the market push it to 6.478 (don’t forget the range can […]

Asia returned a quiet lacklustre day’s trading on Tuesday with Toshiba alone being the reason the whole market had edged lower. The stock sank an additional 12.3%, extending Monday’s 9.8% decline having stated it is expected to post a 550B loss in yen ($4.54Bln) for the fiscal year. In Shanghai and Hong Kong, we saw marginal […]

QUESTION:  Hi Mr. Armstrong! Thank you for all that you do in keeping me sane by making sense of certain things that I can not seem to comprehend. Here’s one matter that still boggles my mind and heart. I am from the Adriatic coast of Montenegro and have a passion for everything associated with olives. […]

In Asia, the Nikkei opened heavy on the back of a weak U.S. closing on Friday. The continued sell-off in oil prices also gave up ground after Toshiba’s stock declined 9.8%. Meanwhile in China, reports were running around the street that additional stimulus were soon to be announced and encouraged a firmer Shanghai Exchange (+1.7%). […]

Something very interesting is unfolding. Included in the new year-end spending bill was a waiver of the Foreign Investment in Real Property Tax Act (FIRPTA), which had been implemented during the late 1980s when the Japanese were buying everything. They claimed to have focused on buying U.S. farmland, but it also applied to buying trophy […]

  QUESTION: Marty, Regarding the brief clip of Larry Summer’s opining on why economic declines are hard to predict, I was struck by the 2nd part of his explanation, which seemed to me to indicate that economists would not want to forecast a decline (even if they could) because it would set expectations of a decline […]

COMMENT:  MA,  OH things are bad out West.. the commodity downturn – oil and gas, basic metals – Iron ore Copper etc…and the housing market is the worst there OF all the Australian states :arrears and non performing past 90days is around 4% on owner occupied residential …El’nineo has screwed the current (and looking like […]

COMMENT: Dear Mr. Armstrong, Dear Mr. Armstrong, What you wrote concerning the possible repeated start of the banks collapse from Austria, once again, is right. The biggest lenders in Romania are some Austrian banks, among some Greek ones which are already in a coma. A new law has been passed and violent attack started from […]

QUESTION: Marty, at the Berlin cocktail party you said we may yet see gold sales from oil producing countries if oil breaks your yearly number of $35 for year end and gold closes below 1044 or so I think. You said gold could then reach that $——- level you mentioned in the conference. It looks […]

It was not just the large/last option expiry, but also the Friday before Christmas (the biggest party night of the year) when the Bank of Japan supplied an early headache to the markets as they announced additional QE — despite leaving rates unchanged. We heard of two major announcements this morning, one being an extension […]