Here’s how the usual reporting on low volatility goes… There’s Low Volatility because the VIX is low, and the VIX being low reflects investors paying less for future downside protection, and paying less for downside protection means investors are less concerned (or aware) of the possibility of downside… so low volatility means these investors are […]
Category: Markets
04
Jun
2014
02
Jun
2014
About that 2014 Commodity Breakout…
Amidst all of the talk of the death of volatility, we’ll excuse you if you didn’t notice some rather bizarre behavior in farmed commodity markets in May. The poster child was Wheat, which had a trend reversal on May 6th, and didn’t look back. But it wasn’t just Wheat – similar patterns were seen in Corn, Soybean Oil, Rice, Coffee, and Cotton:
12
May
2014
The Russell 2000: The Chicken or the Egg?
All eyes in our office tomorrow will be looking at Russell 2000 futures tomorrow after shooting right up to down trend line today. While some have been calling for the S&P and Dow to confirm the down move seen in the Russell, there now exists the very real possibility the Russell will rally to make new highs to match those two, instead of the other way around.
08
May
2014
About those Higher Interest Rates (Lower Bond Prices)
Nobody remembered to tell the bond market what it was supposed to do this year; and before you knew what was happening – the long end of the curve has rallied (prices up, rates down) with the yield on the 30 yr falling from 3.90% to 3.40% so far this year.
06
May
2014
Gundlach: Short Housing, AAPL, Gold, and Yen
Jeff Gundlach has become something of an investment guru over the past few years; first with the not so small feat of beating out the Bond King Gross rather consistently in building up DoubleLine from scratch to a firm managing $52 Billion in assets. Now, just when things were getting boring with new all time highs in the Dow last week, he’s back at it with a call to short the housing market.
01
May
2014
Sell in May, and Look Managed Futures Way?
Is it really that easy? Just sell in May? Does it matter if stocks have been going up leading into May, what about if they’re down? What if we’re in the 2nd year of a presidential cycle?
28
Apr
2014
Energy Markets vs. Energy Companies
Now, you could be forgiven for thinking that the energy sector has been going down for most of the past 5 years from looking at the charts above – but those charts depict relative performance. The energy sector (via the ETF $XLE) has actually done quite well since the 2009 lows, see here:
09
Apr
2014
Performance of 40 Futures Markets after Q1
Commodities continue to grab headlines this year, as stocks stumble thus far in April, forcing many to question whether 2014 is the year of “Commodity Sex Appeal?” We’re a little bit past the first quarter of the year, and there’s reason to believe in the appeal by the amount of green shimmering below.
08
Apr
2014
Floating Gold (Whale Poop) worth more than Commodity Gold?
Well, let’s see how much that Whale Poop is really worth. While there is not exchange rate for Whale Poop, the guy was handed 100,000 British Pounds (about $167,000 US Dollars) for 6 pounds of ambergris.
03
Apr
2014
Chart of the Week: The Incredibly Boring Crude Oil Market
Crude Oil has become…dare we say… boring. Just take a look a the incredible shrinking range of Crude over the past 3.5 years to see what we mean. Crude had over a $100 point range in 2008, a $60 range in 2009, and about $40 in 2011. But since then it’s been smaller and smaller daily, weekly, and annual ranges for the poster child of commodities. Just look at last year, where despite tensions tension’s in the Middle East last summer and train holding thousands of gallons of oil derailing, the volatility in crude oil decreased by -18%. But here’s the thing…
