Salient to Investors: Kevin Cummins at UBS Securities said we are moving in the right direction, and the data is consistent with an improvement in the labor market and income. The median selling price increased 14.9 percent in April from a year ago to a record $271,600, reflecting increases in sales of homes
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: John Williams at FRB of San Francisco said: Any move to reduce the pace of the Fed’s bond buying could be followed by an increase should the economy weaken again – this is uncharted territory. The Fed could begin slowing its purchases as early as this summer and end the program late
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Miller Samuel and Douglas Elliman Real Estate say Manhattan apartment rents are within 2 percent of their all-time highs set in 2006, up 6.5 percent in April from a year earlier. Real Capital Analytics said investors are clamoring to capture the rising rates, more than doubling the volume of multifamily
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Nobel Laureate Edmund Phelps warned against the dangers of EU membership saying we are still learning about the European experiment and to what extent it is going to succeed or fail. Phelps cited huge blanks and huge gaps in the euro area – each country is subject
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Barry Knapp at Barclays predicts the Fed will maintain its current rate of asset purchases into 2014, as the labor market is again the Fed’s focus. Knapp said an improving labor market rather than accelerating inflation made the Fed end its last 3 easings – May 1983, February 1994, Feb-to-August, 2004. In
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Craig Erlam at Alpari says if the markets believes Bernanke indication the Fed will scale back in three months then we could see a bigger sell-off, but if they believe this is just a threat with no follow through expected for six months then this is a buying
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: The unemployment rate for veterans fell to a 4-yr low of 6.2 percent in April versus 6.9 percent for adult non-veterans. More than a million Americans are projected by the White House to transition out of the military through 2015. The Intl Franchise Assn said veteran-owned franchise
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Jim O’Neill writes: The rising success of German soccer clubs seems to say something about backbone and deep strength. Germany’s economic resilience owes much to the diffusion of its strength across a strikingly diverse range of big cities, uncommon in the rest of Europe. German soccer clubs have
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Zillow says: 22 million homeowners lack enough home equity to move, keeping property listings tight and limiting sales as the housing market recovers. Values have to climb further to ease the shortage. Over 13 million homeowners were underwater in Q1, or 25.4 percent of those with a mortgage.
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Goldman Sachs study says: Bond investors do not perceive the 6 biggest US banks as too big to fail, including itself. The 6 banks have had an average funding-cost advantage over smaller competitors of 0.31 percent since 1999 – widest in the financial crisis and now an average 0.10
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