We will have an update Wednesday for our Peoplenomics.com subscribers on how our latest market observations are working out. Follow-up to last weekend’s discussion about Global Market Entrainment and Historical Resonance.
In the meantime, though, everything – and I do mean everything – hinges on the global markets ability to make an upside breakout.
As I showed recently, the old high in the global index we construct was 24,315 and that was the all time high in 2015.
Since then, we have seen a decent pullback, but as of this morning’s check of things, the global market was sitting at 34,245.
This means we are close (like 70 points in our odd approach to things) BUT we are not there yet in terms of a breakout.
To give you an idea of how slow and sticky this overhead resistance level is (which is what old highs are – they take some work to bust through) the UK stock market was only a point and a half from where it closed last Friday. The German market has moved about 32 points.
In asia, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng is up but the Japanese market is down.
And our own index? Down about 13.5 points which considering the raw index n umber is over 34,000 it pencils out to a move of 3.933420937363119e-4. Go ahead, slide the decimal point left 4 digits and it will all make sense…engineering notation for breakfast is a good thing.
The good news, such as it is, features the S&P looking like it will go up 5 around the opening. Should theS&P climb and close there, then we would be through the old top but by only 0.14 of a point and let’s face it – dead-banding and noise are real problems in this kind of modeling.
Remember, the only time we REALLY have confidence is when “hot money” has come off the table for the weekend and that means waiting until the Friday close.
Historical rhymes say that Trump should get his tax break and bond money should come in, especially if we get good quarterly inflows but that could be another two weeks getting here.
In the meantime, though, it is a terrible grind to watch since the market needs some decidedly good news and the Trump administration on all fronts looks to have its hands full.
And hour before the open, the Dow was up a bit but the S&P looks like it might not press our Global Index past overhead resistance. Yet.
Comey and the Big Picture
Did the Russians attempt to influence the U.S. election?
Allow me to step back and think about this logically for a moment: Yes, the Russians would likely have some interest in seeing Donald Trump win, as opposed to Hillary Clinton.
But what no one seems to be wondering is “Why? What would Putin see in Trump?”
If anything, Putin would have loved Hillary Clinton. Have you forgotten “Clinton accused of aiding Moscow ops with push for ‘Russian Silicon Valley’?”
I think the answer as to why there was no action on that one is simple: You-know-who wouldn’t drain the swamp.
Frankly, it’s a stumper until you remember that Russia used to be communist/socialist and effectively went capitalist. At the same time, however, the Obama administration – and no doubt a Clinton II administration, would have gone even more socialist in America.
When you read the news closely, in fact, you can see the U.S. is setting up for the same kind of governmental collapse that Reagan presided over as Russia fell. And now that the shoe is on the other food, maybe Putin is looking for payback.
Since Reagan, the U.S. has embarked on a huge budget deficit – and there are no plans to end it. In addition, the U.S. has become socialist even more so through expanded entitlements, more social spending, and importing as many foreigners as we can get our hands on – and prior to Trump, a good many without thorough vetting.
You can bet that if Comey and the FBI had found something, they would have tabled a case by now…but they haven’t. Instead, Comey looks to me like some of the corporate suck-ups that I had to tolerate in my management days: By “keeping the cloud” around Trump, Comey essentially makes himself fireproof.
That’s because if Trump fires Comey, the Left will scream cover-up. Already, we see tweets from the lakes of former senator Barbara Boxer who said “Glad the FBI is taking Russian interference in our elections, and Trump’s connection to the Russians, seriously.”
Trump’s “connections to the Russians?” Pray tell, what are they? And what about Clinton’s?
Where is the charge? Whny all the BS and headlines? Where is there evidence that this a) it is true, b) that it directly involved Trump, and c) was not a false flag?
Did we ever get to that point withg the Clinton deal? No sir. We did not. And why is that, Director Comey?
I’m trying to keep an open mind here, but the anti-Trump side is piling on because (and lest we forget) they have a Swamp to save.
Like most stories, this one can be written either way: Giving Trump the benefit of the doubt. Or, it can be reported giving credibility to the rumor-mill.
Even though there may have been Russian involvement, remember that Wikileaks Vault 7 revealed that the U.S./West really has the technology to make it appear as though Russia is to blame in cyber warfare, so even if the FBI were to find a smoking gun, where would the proof be that it was genuinely Russian and not a U.S. shadow government covert psy-op?
As you’d expect, the NY Times coverage plays up the currently investigating angle. And since accusation are the new national pastime, it will be instructive to see what – if anything comes of it all.
The report from the McClatchy DC Bureau that the “FBI’s Russian-influence probe includes a look at far-right news sites” simply gets us back to the “How do we know which bots were really Russian and which were false flags?”
Moreover, questioning whether a media organization too any actions to “assist” Russian operatives, to me reads like a ‘soft smear” of alt-news. Well, gee, color me surprised by that.
What is more telling is that outside of the Washington/New York corridor, life seems to have gone on.
In Philly today, a local political story leads.
Even more interesting (and telling, but you might not read about it in New York) is how the Chicago Trib this morning leads with how “Emails to (Rahm) Emanuel raise questions about dozens of possibly lobbying violations.”
Is Comey going to send FBI in to look into that?
I’m not holding my breath. Or, being fireproof for now, is conduct of Obama’s former chief of staff something the FBI doesn’t need to get involved in? I mean, it’s only Chicago, after all.
I’m still at a loss to understand why the FBI didn’t jump in last summer when the Wall St. Journal reported “The Clinton Foundation, State and Kremlin Connections
Why did Hillary’s State Department urge U.S. investors to fund Russian research for military uses?”
Damn fine questions there…I don’t recall it getting answered (I am an old man, though) but why no FBI grilling on that story? And the conduct of a certain foundation? Poof!
I must be a dim-witted farmer, not to understand this…I guess it’s why we live out inn the woods.
Meantime, though, we do note the Washington Post report that “Andrew Napolitano reportedly pulled from Fox News over debunked wiretapping claims.”
Debunked? Well, not quite. The reason the US has communications platforms in such scenic places as Alice Springs Australia and Menwith Hill, England is so that foreign persons can monitor U.S. persons without violating U.S. law.
That there is a “workaround” for U.S. law is obvious. But unless Napolitano can produce more detail, and prove his assertions, his assertions may have torpedoed the Trump presidency.
As a legal analyst should know, there is a difference between an assertion and a proof. And when the proof ain’t talking…
Back to the Data
Press release du jour is from the Bureau of Economic Analysis:
“The U.S. current-account deficit decreased to $112.4 billion (preliminary) in the fourth quarter of 2016 from $116.0 billion (revised) in the third quarter of 2016, according to statistics released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA).
The deficit decreased to 2.4 percent of current-dollar gross domestic product (GDP) from 2.5 percent in the third quarter. The $3.6 billion decrease in the current-account deficit mostly reflected a $19.9 billion increase in the surplus on primary income that was largely offset by a $17.5 billion increase in the deficit on goods. The changes in the surplus on services and the deficit on secondary income were relatively small.
And no, it didn’t seem to move futures prices.
Hell George you know as well as I do that the whole system is corrupt right down to the local level this morning I see the lawmakers downstate N.Y want to make not voting a fineable offence.’
And this mess up in Washington make me think something else is going on behind the curtain, and I’m not sure but Trump isn’t one of the main players for he’s one hell of a distraction with his millionaire/billionaire club he’s picked to run the country.Now he’s added another $56 billion not counting the billions to each of the armed forces except the Coast Guard which he cut, he’s going to cut corporate taxes again, when he should be raising them and repealing the Bush tax cuts on the top percentage and closing the off-shore loopholes created for them by the IRS,he’s sending more troops abroad, a few thousand to Kuwait more to Syria and a thousand or more to Africa it seems the more things change the more they remain the same, change we can believe in except we are running out of change”..
You cannot expect an alligator to not eat a struggling duck.
You cannot expect a billionaire to really understand or empathize with ‘commoners’ – he’s just a showman after all and always was.
He promised change yet does not bring in any new ideas or people. The primary difference between POTUS and ex-POTUS are minimal – one required teleprompter, this one doesn’t; one was black and this one is white; one was a democrat and this one republican.
The country is heading for division, where the “not rich” want to separate due to unfair treatment while the “quite rich” will not “get it” because they are in a whole other economic world. Just happens that the rich all reside in metropolitan areas, which happen to be east and west, leaving the middle as a kind of “lost continent” they have no idea how to navigate.
Just watch the news – the talking heads cannot even fathom why the country half even thinks. They don’t even know how to address the group that elected Trump. much less those of us to violently ill to pull either voting lever.
Given the way you beat the drum on Obama’s broken promise to close Gitmo, usually without admitting what stopped him from keeping the promise, I will share a list you can print out and keep on your computer to complain about over the next few years:
Trump promised Americans he’d replace the Affordable Care Act with a system that would cover “everybody.”
He promised to unveil a new, secret plan to destroy ISIS.
He promised to pursue budget policies that would benefit working families.
He promised to eliminate the national debt.
He promised to combat the opioid epidemic.
He promised to stand up to Wall Street and banking giants like Goldman Sachs.
He promised to “drain the swamp” and weaken lobbyists’ influence.
He promised to label China a currency manipulator on his first day in office.
He promised he wouldn’t go golfing.
And he’s been in office for 60 days – what’s your point.
Print them out and keep them. Each time he keeps a promise, put a line through it. See if you get to mark them as promises kept, or if you find yourself as happy as a Trump University “student”.
Putin hates Hillary because she spoke against him running for a third term as Russian president. In 2011 Clinton was promoting democracy while Trump was still only concerned with lining his own pockets.
“She set the tone for certain actors inside the country; she gave the signal,” Putin said of Clinton at the time, accusing her of ordering the opposition movement into action like some kind of revolutionary sleeper cell. “They heard this signal and, with the support of the U.S. State Department, started actively doing their work.”
http://time.com/4422723/putin-russia-hillary-clinton/
Excellent critical thinking on Comey and the Big Picture!
Mr. Ure,
I am a Peoplenomics subscriber and I follow most of what you say. You recently have suggested that the ATH may be pushed out a year although you had said it could be in mid-March. Today it seems mid-March could well have been right.
Yah – Europe has pulled back a bit, but let’s see how the3 global index plays in the morning
If central banks can just buy stocks & sell then to each other at higher prices, why would the party ever have to end? Buy the dip I say. I am waiting to go all in short but I just can’t see any good reason for it just yet.
Everybody is ‘corruptible’ to a degree, that’s why we survived as a species. You want to live and reproduce, or? However, there are boundaries that thinking people recognize. (What’s presently argued about is plain silly, because it clouds ‘real issues’ we’re desperately trying to avoid).
On another issue: I think GU overemphasizes this breakout, IMHO! I’ve seen many breakouts that have failed, leading investors into a trap. That’s just my opinion. Sure, we have too much money, but also too much debt!
SPARE ME THE Reagan line for much of the ills today can be traced right back to his sell out to big business,his destruction of a health care system that had worked very well since the end of WW2, a not for profit system but he muttered in his cups that everything ought to make a profit so now we have Obama care.
His failure to not heed his budget directors advice on Freddy and Fannie to remove them from a GSP and force them to go to the street, which later on would create the housing crash,his famed STAR Wars which plunged the country butt deep in debt,his two cuts on the top percentage and added to the bottom leveling the playing field so he mumbled, his scam of outsourcing and off-shore accounts and no Bush was no better with his NAFTA which ushered in low wages as the flood from south of the border came.No spare me the Reagan/Bush policies for once was more than enough..
“Listen readers, I want what right for this country. A financially conservative government that has a socially conscious bent to it.”
Would not that have been accomplished by declaring martial law at the beginning, cleaning the so-called swamp first, and then re-establishing the US of A like our founding fathers intended it to be? That’s what I’d hoped. Present way it’s “all as usual,” with the same old silly arguments about really NOTHING.
Reset has happened while you sleep ,all debts released ,with a fresh start , that’s why the markets haven’t dropped and that is what the world wide fuss is about, some are hoping it’s not true because of the huge loss they will have accrued,it has happenned over night but to many are holding on to the old world idea, the new is you can’t reach the stars and hold the concept of debt. You arent a debt slave anymore.
If you believe that, maybe I can tell you another one,haha
You have just entered into a new timeline. ,,,,look it up , yep google it
As I watched the News leading up to our Presidential Inauguration, I was angered by the
childish behavior of the Left. Yes, there are those who do not honor and care about our
Nation’s Election Laws and Processes! The Left are not American, no matter what they say.
Yes, there are people who don’t want the rule of law, and who will do what they can to derail
it for their own intent. I say the Left, because certainly most Democrats do want the rule of law,
but they have in their Party, a group of people who will be dishonest, violent, and treasonous
if it suits their purpose. And what is that purpose?
History shows quite plainly that the Left is single minded in their purpose, which is to take
over a group of people, deprive them of their rights, confiscate their wealth, and then
purge those who disagree, murder them. This is the Left, from the beheadings
after the French Revolution, to Marx, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Castro, Che, etc.
The Left accuse the Right of taking our liberty, being violent, and against humanity. Things history
shows that in almost every instance come from the Left, not the Right. Sadly, what too many of
we Americans have forgotten today is that the Left in many countries around the world are
responsible for murdering well over 100 million people in the last century or so. That’s right,
over 100 million, it isn’t a mistake. The Left are evil, and once they become plentiful, and
powerful enough, will do the same here, if they can. Thank God our Founders provided for
our defense though the 2nd Amendment. The Left will find this Nation a bitter pill because
of that Amendment.
Don’t be fooled, the people who want to take your rights, subjugate you, tell you what you may
say, tell you what you may think, and confiscate your land and wealth are not only found in
North Korea! Does any of that last sentence sound familiar? Look around, they are among
us today, working actively to undermine our Institutions, our rights, and our way of life.
Look no further than the headlines from the past several years. The Left, working tirelessly
to gain power over our Nation, and your person, stated publicly their intent to disrupt our
Peaceful Transition of Power, as dictated by our laws. Part of their philosophy after all, is
that they do know what is best for the rest of we citizens. It seems like only yesterday that
our News was filled with names like the Weather Underground, and Symbionese Liberation
Army. Just to name two, there were others, they were violent, and they too were the Left.
The transition of power was completed, not without incident, but it is done. Lest we forget,
over 1 million men died for our Nation and way of life, millions more were wounded.
Now a new tally is being kept, about 200 of my Sisters have died, while serving in Iraq and
Afghanistan. A part of their sacrifice was to insure our Nation continues to be a place of freedom,
and a self governing people. The Left do not share that sentiment, they feel that only they are
smart enough to fairly govern our Nation. After all, it is much more important that anyone can
use the public restroom of their choice no matter their gender, more important that College
students are protected from alternate viewpoints which might scar them for life, than it is to
solve the real problems of our Nation. While it may sound insane, these things are the Left,
working continually to gain control of your life, what you may say, what you may think,
and what you may do. May God Bless the incoming President. I feel that God has blessed
America, but evidently there are some who aren’t paying attention, or as the Left normally
states, there is no God, just before they make it a crime to worship Him
ESHALON! Look it up. I scream it. The U.S. National Security Agency has been openly sharing collected, raw intelligence data with the U.K. for well over a decade.
The U.S., per the Posse Comitatus law, cannot spy on her own citizens. ESHALON is the sending of U.S. collected Intel data directly to Great Britain. They, in turn, sift thru that data. If info pertaining to U.S. citizens just happens to be uncovered, by treaty, the U.K. can legally send that data back to the U.S. That data can then be used in a court of law.
I’m not claiming that this has happened against Trump or his minions, I’m just flatly saying “it happens.” And neither the President nor Congress can stop it until a law specifically excluding the aforementioned activity is passed by Congress and signed into law by the President.
Eschaln provides
Correctly spelt Echelon
ECHELON, originally a secret government code name, is a surveillance program (signals intelligence/SIGINT collection and analysis network) operated on behalf of the five signatory nations to the UKUSA Security Agreement[1]—Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States, also known as the Five Eyes.[2][3][4]
The ECHELON program was created in the late 1960s to monitor the military and diplomatic communications of the Soviet Union and its Eastern Bloc allies during the Cold War, and was formally established in 1971.[5][6]
By the end of the 20th century, the system referred to as “ECHELON” had allegedly evolved beyond its military and diplomatic origins, to also become “…a global system for the interception of private and commercial communications.”[7]
Wiki at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON
Trump (and anyone else who uses a phone) would be subject accidentally or otherwise when calling to certain sensitive countries. Hell, I thought I told you ALL about this…OMG how can people NOT know it?
Why every time you talk about Trump getting wiretap you don’t say this? If you are talking with risky people you got wiretap. Trump seems to me like the person that farts and then ask everybody Who fart it??
ESHALON! Look it up. I scream it. The U.S. National Security Agency has been openly sharing collected, raw intelligence data with the U.K. for well over a decade.
The U.S., per the Posse Comitatus law, cannot spy on her own citizens. ESHALON is the sending of U.S. collected Intel data directly to Great Britain. They, in turn, sift thru that data. If info pertaining to U.S. citizens just happens to be uncovered, by treaty, the U.K. can legally send that data back to the U.S. That data can then be used in a court of law.
I’m not claiming that this has happened against Trump or his minions, I’m just flatly saying “it happens.” And neither the President nor Congress can stop it until a law specifically excluding the aforementioned activity is passed by Congress and signed into law by the President.
Trump is a politcal door; opened by the people as a warning to the “swamp.” He clearly was not the most eloquent choice as a leader. But as a warning, the choice could not have been better. We will survive his bumblings. Perhaps bruised, perhaps knocked down, But, we as a people, will never be out. In that event, we will rebuild and be stronger, if not as is usually the historic case, wiser.
As for him being a Russian agent … LOL!!! Take that tinfoil hat off bubba. Let some light shine into that head of yours.
Banking agent more like. I like that he has the Left’s knickers in a twist but he’s more of the same… blue team read team…. Goldman Sachs Team.
Weren’t you gonna arr-you-enn-enn-oh-eff-tee a while back LJ? Guess you missed us.
where is Obama and why can’t FBI question him
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUSFPZ0qqAU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUSFPZ0qqAU