[expat_panama]

So metals continuing gains yesterday are leading into more w/ today's futures traders, and what's interesting this time w/ stock indexes is yesterday's gains were in higher volume --but just the same we still got stock futures fairly negative anyway this morning.  Maybe it's all the reports coming out today--

 

Initial Claims
Continuing Claims
Housing Starts
Building Permits
Philadelphia Fed
Natural Gas Inventories
Mich Sentiment
Leading Indicators

 

--or the news:

• Parallels Between 1987 and Today - Should You Be Spooked? July 14, 2014 Chad Karnes. The latest pullback in the markets may have you a little spooked, especially if you own small cap stocks
• Uber v. Taxi Is Age-Old Battle Over Progress - Michael Rosen, The American
• Why Dems Can't Be Party of Business - Jonathan Chait, New York Magazine
• Do Not Short This Dull Stock Market - Lawrence McMillan, MarketWatch
• Here's Why Stocks Could Keep On Hitting New Highs - Patti Domm, CNBC
• What If Yellen's Wrong About the Economy? - Judy Shelton, New York Sun
• Gold Dreamers Are Living In Land of Fairy Tales - Noah Smith, Bloomberg

[Innovative]

Microsoft may announce its biggest layoffs ever on Thursday

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9249790/Microsoft_may_announce_its_biggest_layoffs_ever_on_Thursday

[Wyatt's Torch]

[Wyatt's Torch]

[Chgogal]

Fed Prez Richard Fisher's comments:
http://bizbeatblog.dallasnews.com/2014/07/dallas-fed-president-richard-fisher-is-increasingly-concerned-about-the-nations-monetary-policy-the-nation-must-dilute-the-punch.html/

[Chgogal]

Fed Prez, Richard Fisher's speech in L.A. July 16, 2014:
http://www.dallasfed.org/news/speeches/fisher/2014/fs140716.cfm

I spoke of this early in January, referencing various indicia of the effects on financial markets of “the intoxicating brew we (at the Fed) have been pouring.” In another speech, in March, I said that “market distortions and acting on bad incentives are becoming more pervasive” and noted that “we must monitor these indicators very carefully so as to ensure that the ghost of ‘irrational exuberance’ does not haunt us again.” Then again in April, in a speech in Hong Kong, I listed the following as possible signs of exuberance getting wilder still:

The price-to-earnings, or P/E, ratio for stocks was among the highest decile of reported values since 1881;

The market capitalization of U.S. stocks as a fraction of our economic output was at its highest since the record set in 2000;

Margin debt was setting historic highs;

Junk-bond yields were nearing record lows, and the spread between them and investment-grade yields, which were also near record low nominal levels, were ultra-narrow;

Covenant-lite lending was enjoying a dramatic renaissance;

The price of collectibles, always a sign of too much money chasing too few good investments, was arching skyward.

I concluded then that “the former funds manager in me sees these as yellow lights. The central banker in me is reminded of the mandate to safeguard financial stability.”