Asian equity market continued the rally overnight that the ECB had teed-up for them with all main indices returning around +1.75% on the day. Although Europe had the afternoon session yesterday to react to the ECB Q+A, the early momentum remained constructive regardless. Then the news that the Chinese (PBoC) had cut its one-year benchmark lending rate by 25bp to […]

The IMF has come out and warned that Saudi Arabia may go bankrupt within the next five years if the government maintains its current spending habits. Some emails are asking if the IMF is now copying our projections for they have the same timing. Who knows. I would assume the economic numbers are the numbers, but they […]

The Nikkei gave back some of yesterday’s rally as afternoon trading stocks turned negative to close down 118 points (0.65%). Shanghai rallied into the close, eventually gaining 1.5%, which made back some of yesterday’s losses. Europe spent most of the morning in no-mans land waiting for direction from the ECB. They did not have long to […]

Some people have wrongly expected a crash in the long bonds. What has actually happened is that China and others have sold into the high, liquidating their long bonds, and moving short-term. This is why rates are negative on the short-end. The CRASH comes in the opposite direction this time. Why? Because the central banks […]

Although the trade numbers from Japan were below forecasters’ projections, the street was abuzz with speculation of further BOJ intervention; so we saw the Nikkei close up 2% today. The same could not be said for Shanghai (closed down 3.5%) whilst the HSI was closed for a public holiday. European indices really could not decide on direction but after a […]

After a strong open the Nikkei spent the rest of the day clambering to remain in positive territory. Eventually closing +0.45% higher, the Nikkei inspired the Chinese (Shanghai) into a 38 point end of day rally to finish up at +1.1%. The HSI never managed to trade above Mondays close; it finished off the lows but still […]

The SVP won the elections in Switzerland, moving the nation a bit to the right and anti-immigration. This is becoming a global trend that we are monitoring in every country around the world. As the economy turns down, domestic populations ALWAYS turn against immigrants no matter what country it is. The Swiss are no different.

The economic data released from China earlier this morning has been the most talked about economic topic across almost every trading desk today. China’s Q3 GDP resulted in a small beat at 6.9% (expected 6.8%), and the September Retail Sales also slightly better at 10.9% (expected 10.8%) and then finally September Industrial Production released 5.7% against an estimated 6.0% expectation. All rather disappointing really – well, as […]

The debate for socialism is simply that they regard it as unfair when anyone has more than another does. The solution is always to rob someone else to improve your own life. If you take this philosophy as your own, then you rob others because they have more, which is no different than robbing someone […]

QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong; Thank you for coming to Paris. You said the civil unrest would rise in France going into 2018 and there was a risk of another French Revolution in 2020. You mentioned that when surrounded by many people on the Champs–Élysées. Since then  I have paid attention and there is a rising discussion […]