Salient to Investors: Matt Maley at Miller Tabak said that when people sell liquid US equities stock market when they cannot sell their illiquid assets – the reason for last week’s sharp market sell-off. The IMF said the proportion of corporate-debt securities held by mutual funds has doubled since 2007 to
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Hedge funds cut bullish wagers on oil by the most in six weeks, while short positions rose to the highest level. John Kilduff at Again Capital said oil prices reflect speculation that further declines are more likely. IEA said US crude production will climb to the most since
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Fareed Zakaria said: Obama’s Syria policy is destined for failure and almost certain to produce chaos and unintended consequences. Joshua Landis at Syria Comment estimates that non-jihadi groups collectively control only about 5% of Syria. The underlying reason for the violence in Iraq and Syria is a Sunni
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Dominic Rossi at Fidelity Worldwide Investment said: He is looking to buy markets at these levels, particularly US stocks, amid a sell-off exaggerated and exacerbated by poor positioning from hedge funds. Long-only investors had largely maintained their asset allocations, but there has been a massive contraction of
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Steen Jakobsen at Saxo Bank said we have reached the part of the cycle where bad news is bad news – for years we have been trading on monetary policy and now we have to deal with real economic problems. James Bullard at FRB St. Louis said the Fed
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Harry Tchilinguirian at BNP Paribas estimates that Brent will be supported at $80 to $85 a barrel and could rebound to $95 by year-end because it is not in OPEC’s interest to see prices too low for too long. Analysts are split on whether OPEC will cut
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Ed Morse at Citigroup said the lowest oil price in 4 years will provide as much as $1.1 trillion of stimulus to global economies by lowering the cost of fuels and other commodities, which are energy intensive to one degree or another. Combined production from the US
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Eswar Prasad at Cornell and Brookings said: The US economic numbers looks good and the recovery is strengthening, but the rest of the world is weakening and there is a real fear Ebola could become something bigger. Policy-makers in the rest of the world have no room
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Computers are learning to pick investments, rebalance portfolios, adjust risk levels and minimize taxes more quickly, more reliably, at a quarter of the cost and with flashier graphics than financial advisors. Many new “robo-advisers” are relying on flesh-and-blood advisers becuase they find that a human with a
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Thomas Friedman writes: Is the US and Saudi Arabia engaged in another global war with Russia and Iran like when they pumped the former Soviet Union to death? Oil export revenues account for 60% of Iran’s government revenues and more than 50% of Russia’s. Oil producers Libya,
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