Thursday, December 24, 2015
Oil bear is dead?
After month long European vacation I am so tired of resting that I need some rest and not even going to post any charts. Take it or leave it. It is land of the free, right?
Saturday, December 05, 2015
Friday, December 04, 2015
Is it final shake off of the dollar tree before breakout?
It has been going on for almost a year – dollar has been trading in the range 95-100, I think since Euro, as well as EU, is doomed (never mind Thursday’s jump) – and world’s financial community expects rates to be finally raised in December therefore making sovereign debt repayments much more difficult and will promote inflows into US banks in search for higher than negative European return ….it is that wonderful time again for a new trade – I was on the sidelines since /ES short in September.
Saturday, November 14, 2015
‘The Fog of Fascism Is Descending Quickly Over Many American Universities’
“We are seeing a curtain of McCarthyism descend over many college campuses,” said Dershowitz. “I don't want to make analogies to the 1930s, but we have to remember it was the college students who first started burning books during the Nazi regime. And these students are book burners. They don’t want to hear diverse views on college campuses.”
“When I went to speak at Johns Hopkins University there were protests," he said. “It was said that because I won’t acknowledge that Israel commits crimes against the Palestinians, I am quote ‘harassing students’ and violating the ethical standards of Johns Hopkins University.”
“By expressing my opinion,” he continued, “I am ‘harassing students.’ This has become a very serious problem not only in American universities, but in universities around the world as well. And it is influencing and having a terrible impact on the education of students.”
“It is the worst kind of hypocrisy,” said Dershowitz.
Friday, November 13, 2015
Forget Paris…
I cannot help, but wonder if POS Charlie Hebdo will publish funny cartoon after today’s events in Paris as they did after Sinai Russian plane crash.
Monday, October 19, 2015
Gates of Hell of H-1B might open…even wider
The Obama administration is about to power up a massive new executive action on immigration and it’s far scarier than anyone could have imagined. Last November, when Homeland Security released its ten memos commandeering immigration policy from Congress, Secretary Johnson included a vague plan aimed at benefiting the tech industry, innocuously titled “Modernizing the Employment-Based Immigrant Visa System.” But a secret memo recently leaked on an immigration law blog now reveals that this ‘modernization’ plan will not only fast-track hundreds of thousands of work permits to employment visa-applicants in violation of longstanding U.S. worker protection laws, but will enable hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens to also receive work permits despite their unlawful status. As the full details leak out from the narrow clique of immigration lawyers and lobbyists advising the President, labor advocates are scrambling to warn the public.
Unlike the DACA executive amnesty program being challenged in the courts, USCIS is apparently opting to go through the normal regulatory process (although no details are up yet), complete with an opportunity for the public to submit comments. If enough patriotic American workers and their families flood the comment database, the agency may react like the ATF did when their proposed rule banning “green tipped” bullets was deluged with angry comments forcing them to rescind the proposal. If Americans care about their sovereignty like they do about their guns, Obama’s new immigration re-write won’t see the light of day.
Saturday, October 03, 2015
Sunday, September 27, 2015
Saturday, September 19, 2015
Locusts (אַרְבֶּה): Ex. 10:1–20
The Eight Plague: The Plague of Locusts, illustration from the 1890Holman Bible
“
This is what the LORD, the God of the Hebrews, says: 'How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go, so that they may worship me. If you refuse to let them go, I will bring locusts into your country tomorrow. They will cover the face of the ground so that it cannot be seen. They will devour what little you have left after the hail, including every tree that is growing in your fields. They will fill your houses and those of all your officials and all the Egyptians—something neither your fathers nor your forefathers have ever seen from the day they settled in this land till now.
”— Exodus 10:3–6
Just a random though of how things repeat in the different times, different countries, under different circumstances, but vicious circle of time will never be broken.
Friday, September 18, 2015
SHORT AWAY!
Post mortem …err… post FED admittance that everything is awesome…er and they failed plus caved to the world begging not to destroy what is left from fragile financial system (additionally strained by “migrant border jumpers”) went short /ES at 2000.
Would be interesting to see if the “real” correction to 1700 area is upon us.
Sunday, September 13, 2015
You can not make this up…or the story about “good father”
The father of drowned Syrian toddler Aylan Kurdi was working with smugglers and driving the flimsy boat that capsized trying to reach Greece, other passengers on board said, in an account that disputes the version he gave last week.
Ahmed Hadi Jawwad and his wife, Iraqis who lost their 11-year-old daughter and 9-year-old son in the crossing, told Reuters that Abdullah Kurdi panicked and accelerated when a wave hit the boat, raising questions about his claim that somebody else was driving the boat.
Friday, September 11, 2015
In Observance of 9/11
To all my friends who meaninglessly lost their lives in the flames of WTC - you are remembered, you are forever in my heart...
Monday, September 07, 2015
698K Native-Born Americans Lost Their Job In August: Why This Suddenly Is The Most Important Jobs Chart
After the Fed admitted over a year ago that the US unemployment rate (which in 2012 was supposed to be a rate hike "threshold" once it hit 6.5% and is now at 5.1%) has become irrelevant in a country where a record 94 million people have left the labor force, and with the Fed poised to hike rates even though US hourly wages have not only not increased for the past 7 years, but for the vast majority of the labor force continue to decline, some have asked - is there any labor-related chart that matters any more?
The answer: a resounding yes, only it is none of the conventional charts that algos and sometimes humans look at.
The one chart that matters more than ever,has little to nothing to do with the Fed's monetary policy, but everything to do with the November 2016 presidential elections in which the topic of immigration, both legal and illegal, is shaping up to be the most rancorous, contentious and divisive.
The chart is the following, showing the cumulative addition of foreign-born and native-born workers added to US payrolls according to the BLS since December 2007, i.e., since the start of the recession/Second Great Depression.
Friday, September 04, 2015
Saudi King Arrives In DC
I wonder if there is any place in Andrews Base for planes to land left after all those limousines arrived and if any rooms in DC’s hotels will be available.
Why would not Saudi take some Middle East refugees in is beyond my understanding
Wednesday, September 02, 2015
Saturday, August 29, 2015
This is how they dealt with outsourcing back then
“In order to protect American Labor…” That sounds like science fiction to Americans today
Posted on Market Ticker
Monday, August 24, 2015
Friday, August 21, 2015
Thursday, August 20, 2015
Sunday, July 05, 2015
Greek “NO” Monday
“You can have your democracy for as long as people have no right to voice their opinion.”
[Real Owners of countries]
It seams that Greeks decided that definition is wrong – my hat off to them.
This is the start of the end game for lawyers who define economic policies – house of cards is starting to fall apart.
Friday, July 03, 2015
Your money is safe in the banks…NOT
FT reports, Greek banks are considering a depositor bail-in that could see deposits above €8,000 haircut by "at least" 30%.
Via FT:
Greek banks are preparing contingency plans for a possible “bail-in” of depositors amid fears
The plans, which call for a “haircut” of at least 30 per cent on deposits above €8,000, sketch out an increasingly likely scenario for at least one bank, the sources said.
A Greek bail-in could resemble the rescue plan agreed by Cyprus in 2013, when customers’ funds were seized to shore up the banks, with a haircut imposed on uninsured deposits over €100,000.
It would be implemented as part of a recapitalisation of Greek banks that would be agreed with the country’s creditors — the European Commission, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank.
“It [the haircut] would take place in the context of an overall restructuring of the bank sector once Greece is back in a bailout programme,” said one person following the issue. “This is not something that is going to happen immediately.”
Greek deposits are guaranteed up to €100,000, in line with EU banking directives, but the country’s deposit insurance fund amounts to only €3bn, which would not be enough to cover demand in case of a bank collapse.
With few deposits over €100,000 left in the banks after six months of capital flight, “it makes sense for the banks to consider imposing a haircut on small depositors as part of a recapitalisation. . . It could even be flagged as a one-off tax,” said one analyst.
Thursday, July 02, 2015
Robot kills worker at Volkswagen plant in Germany
Contractor was setting up the stationary robot when it grabbed and crushed him against a metal plate at the plant in Baunatal
An investigation is under way into whether human error was to blame for the death of a contractor at the hands of a robot at a Volkswagen production plant. Photograph: Joerg Sarbach/AP
Associated Press in Berlin
Wednesday 1 July 2015 21.48 EDTLast modified on Thursday 2 July 201504.22 EDT
A robot has killed a contractor at one of Volkswagen’s production plants in Germany, the automaker has said.
The man died on Monday at the plant in Baunatal, about 100km (62 miles) north of Frankfurt, VW spokesman Heiko Hillwig said.
The 22-year-old was part of a team that was setting up the stationary robot when it grabbed and crushed him against a metal plate, Hillwig said.
He said initial conclusions indicate that human error was to blame, rather than a problem with the robot, which can be programmed to perform various tasks in the assembly process. He said it normally operates within a confined area at the plant, grabbing auto parts and manipulating them.
Another contractor was present when the incident occurred, but was not harmed, Hillwig said. He declined to give any more details about the case, citing an ongoing investigation.
German news agency DPA reported that prosecutors were considering whether to bring charges, and if so, against whom.
The answer I’d like to know – was it outsourcing company that took care of programming?
Monday, June 29, 2015
Thursday, June 25, 2015
Monday, June 22, 2015
Wednesday, June 17, 2015
Sunday, June 14, 2015
Sunday, May 03, 2015
A restructuring and H-1B use affect the Magic Kingdom’s IT operations
[THAT IS WHAT WE, AMERICANS, LET TO HAPPEN]
Fury rises at Disney over use of foreign workers
At the end of October, IT employees at Walt Disney Parks and Resorts were called, one-by-one, into conference rooms to receive notice of their layoffs. Multiple conference rooms had been set aside for this purpose, and in each room an executive read from a script informing the worker that their last day would be Jan. 30, 2015.
Some workers left the rooms crying; others appeared shocked. This went on all day. As each employee received a call to go to a conference room, others in the office looked up sometimes with pained expressions. One IT worker recalls a co-worker mouthing "no" as he walked by on the way to a conference room.
What follows is a story of competing narratives about the restructuring of Disney's global IT operations of its parks and resorts division. But the focus is on the role of H-1B workers. Use of visa workers in a layoff is a public policy issue, particularly for Disney.
Disney CEO Bob Iger is one of eight co-chairs of the Partnership for a New American Economy, a leading group advocating for an increase in the H-1B visa cap. Last Friday, this partnership was a sponsor of an H-1B briefing at the U.S. Capitol for congressional staffers. The briefing was closed to the press.
Wednesday, April 01, 2015
market to correct?
Watching /es 2015 level, 100 ema was being pocked one too many times, setting tight stops for my long index positions
Monday, February 23, 2015
The cleanest dirty shirt…or long $ no more
Is not is quite amusing how long term charts keep making money when you filter out noise, turn off TeeVee and stop having “opinion”?
Took profits on long term short crude oil position
If anyone wants to listen to experts that oil will be going down more because of ….blah blah blah – good luck with that. I am happy with my Great yellow Line target on downside.
Saturday, February 21, 2015
Gold update
Setting tight stop on my short position ( tight stops on long mentioned on Jan 21st post worked out nicely for 100 points move) and might (OR NOT) switch long again with stops/reversals under recent lows. This time directional move might be quite illusive and position will be very small if any at all. DO I think move down is over? Good grace – of course NOT – gold has way more to go down.
Sunday, January 25, 2015
The question is not “If”, but “When”
As immortal George Carlin said: They are coming after your retirement money
as well as “It is a big club and we aint in it”