At Last: Rally for Good?

Two-hundred points up, straight ahead.

The big driver this morning could be damn near anything you want it to be:

Oil is back up to almost $31-bucks.

German and Kneeler markets are clawing toward 2 1/2% gains and the French CAC-40 was up almost 3 1/2%.

Even more promising was Asia:  Japan screamed ahead almost 6% (!!!) and the Hang Seng was up almost 3%..  Even the Shanghai market put on some beans.

The major problems have been pushed out to next week, or the week after.  If we rally back to our long term trend line levels, that have been developing since the bottom of the Housing Collapse in 2009, there will be a critical path choice made.

If the market can power-through the overhead trend line (and stay there) then we will take our long-awaited 5th massive wave to the upside as arriving.

But, if the market only rallies to the trend line, and then turns down again…well, we call that a “kiss of death” and the only place to be in that case is hiding under the bed because it will mean seven-years of recovery is toast.

Off in the background, two major pieces are moving around.

For one, there’s the presidential politics.  It’s hard to get excited about an election where the choice could be something as far-fetched as Yet Another Bush against Yet Another Clinton, yet there’s enough “thumbs on the scales” trying to hold to the Old Way in Washington (the seat of the Checkbook Republic) that it could happen.

Still, we won’t get pessimistic about “the fix being in” until we see if the FBI Director still has a job after the Hil investigation is done, and whether the Traitorcans will broker the GOP convention to an insider.

The rally I’m expecting really hinges in many ways on this notion of legitimate change.

One of my daughters called last night to proudly say she was pleased that Bernie Sanders is coming on strong.  But dear-old-dad reminded her that he’s been around Washington a long while – long enough to be part of the problem, as I see it.  Still, she’s hoping and planning on a Sanders sticker.  I went to be praying that it wouldn’t be a Sanders-Clinton ticket…

Still, based on pole data, that could be Trumped with Cruz, but there is too much potential for real change for that to ever occur.  The repeating nightmare was that Washington would embrace a socialist in lieu of even more remote outsiders.

Things are nevertheless entertaining.  The WaPo story about the Trumpster and National Review going at it is good.  And there’s a good bit of waffle/position drift apparent as we catch the daily Limburger.  Seems it’s the conservation “I’m holier than thou” contest.

The other Big Screen event to watch, and it could overshadow the farcical politics   would be a War Distraction.  A note from our defense expert warhammer explains:

Israel Warms to Sunni Powers…

Happy Friday, George!

As Winter Storm Jonas finishes its assault in the southern U.S. and churns up toward the northeastern seaboard, some surprising news is swirling out of the Middle East indicating Israel is cozying up to several Sunni Islam states in response to Iranian sanctions being lifted:

<http://www.foxnews.com/world/2016/01/21/israel-warms-to-sunni-powers-questions-us-palestinian-focus.html?intcmp=hpbt1>

Such news may be surprising to some, but not to those who’ve tracked the Jewish state’s recent open dialog with rational Muslim rulers. As the Arab saying goes, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend!” Iran is everyone but Syria and Russia’s enemy. For the past 4-5 years ‘ears to the ground’ Intel has revealed the existence of open channels between members of the Saudi royalty and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his cabinet. Solid rumors even mention preliminary military cooperation plans in the event of overt Iranian aggression in the region.

Out of the darkness appears a ray of light. A Sunni/Jewish alliance, loose as it may be, could lead to something far more promising, much like how modern democracy and formerly fascist Germany fully and peacefully integrated into European military and financial affairs. This same Germany, which during WWII practiced Jewish genocide as state policy, now also routinely provides military and economic aid to Israel. Is such an alliance possible, even imminent between the Saudis and Israel?

Optimism aside, there is danger ahead on the hazardous road to peace. An alliance between the House of Saud and the House of David acts much like a weather barometer indicating a calm before the approaching winter storm. The extremist Iranian religious and military elites believe, as Hitler and his SS lapdogs did, that prophecy and destiny are on their side as they pursue regional dominance. It is not a matter of if, but when Iran strikes out to smite their Jewish nemesis. The strange, budding alliance between Saudi Arabia and Israel is as much one of deterrence as it is a strong signal for an inevitable conflict, very possibly armed conflict, with the Shi’ite Persian state.

There’s a storm a comin’, and it’s not just Winter Storm Jonas. But as with blizzards, one should be well prepared for what will almost certainly follow these surprising Middle East indicators.

Cheers,

And that may be, in part, why the markets are up.  Oil is up, copper is up, and it could be there will be some kind of change of sea-state in the global expectation set that will give rise to some optimism which I keep looking at as ending in 2017.

The stock market correction/decline might be over, but it’s still too early to tell.  False Springs are not uncommon in nature, politics, and human affairs.

This weekend, Peoplenomics will feature an “Analysis of the Threat Board.” 

Is “Jonas” a Whale?

We don’t know for sure – and won’t until we get through the weekend and compare the snowfall levels with the 10-worst storms in East Coast history.

We have to sit back in amazement at the reports of people ransacking stores in order to get last minute supplies.

Have people been living under rocks and completely missed the prepping movement, or what?

Or, are people generally a lot dumber than we give them credit for?

Normally, I’d go into a long harangue about all the hype and BS the MSM is going through.  But this has the feel of something really big when I look at the maps with my “junior forecaster” badge on the line.

This one might make it into “the books.”

On the other hand, from essentially zero entries back when Google started up years back, to present day, we notice the word frequency for “snowmageddon” is now over half a million uses.   It is perhaps more tasteful than “shitstorm” which has 2.88 million hits, making it the much more common storm descriptor.

Another Day, Another Fed (jr.) Report

This one from Chicago: ChiFed National Activity Index (*CFNAI):

“The Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI) moved up to –0.22 in December from –0.36 in November. Two of the four broad categories of indicators that make up the index increased from November, but three of the four categories made negative contributions to the index in December.

The index’s three-month moving average, CFNAI-MA3, decreased to –0.24 in December from –0.19 in November. December’s CFNAI-MA3 suggests that growth in national economic activity was somewhat below its historical trend. The economic growth reflected in this level of the CFNAI-MA3 suggests subdued inflationary pressure from economic activity over the
coming year.”

Reading reports like this one bring on a sudden urge to create new words.  “Disconclusive” seems to be missing from the language and we really ought to fix that.

I did mention Dow +200 on the futures and oil over $31, right?  Off to work on a longish Peoplenomics report…have a fine weekend.  We expect another flurry of words Monday.  Enjoy the Global Warming.