2014 Recap --Looking Back; Investment & Finance Thread - Dec. 14
Posted on 12/21/2014 8:49:52 AM PST by expat_panama
2014 Recap --Looking Back; Investment & Finance Thread - Dec. 14
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Merry Christmas!
We get to open some goodies a few days early here, first with the list of this past year's thread links (left) for a nostalgic walk down Memory Lane while we go over this past market strategies.
Then we can number-plot check out how general markets fared.
Stocks: Looking over the past year (as of Dec. 19) we're seeing the S&P 500 up 12.0% and the NASDAQ up 14.1% --above average! OK we've done better but I personally can live w/ this.
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However, maybe this is just me but something unusual this past year is that it's been unusually hard to gage. Too many times it's seemed we were definately going one way and POW, we'd do the opposite.
No problem. What's good is we see what's happening, that the signs are dodgy, so we move forward knowing we got things not being what they seem.
Good enough.
Metals had a rough year but not as badly as many feared. Sure, silver lost 20% but gold's actually about where it was a year ago.
IMHO Barchart's got a great longer term overview for precious metals at Gold And Silver - Nothing Is Ever As It Seems And No Respite For PMs.
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All of this begs the biggest, most often asked, and most useless market trend question: WHY? OK, here are the top headlines for 2014 and the stories we can blame:
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This is the thread where folks swap ideas on savings and investment --here's a list of popular investing links that freepers have posted here and tomorrow morning we'll go on with our--
Open invitation continues always for idea-input for the thread, this being a joint effort works well. Keywords: financial, WallStreet, stockmarket, economy. |
Every year, it seems, we’re bombarded with stories about the “poor retailer” and how end of year sales are gonna be down, Black Friday ain’t what it used to be - blah, blah, blah.
And every year, somehow, someway, sales increase. Check out the chart at the link.
Good morning! So far it's light trade w/o big price swings --perfect for vacation time and it's true for both metals (hanging on) and stocks ("flat in half session"). We even got "crude prices steady above $60 in thin Christmas trading"! This morning we're wrapping up our 'part-time' week as futures peg stock indexes up +0.16% and metals down -0.45%.
Other active econ threads:
Dang --subscribers only! Tell me what's plotted & I can get out the original numbers.
-- and a top of the bright & early new day to you!
"Money's a bitch that never sleeps."
--and money comes out of no where --just numbers made up at banks. That's ok, last night I was watching an excellent documentary "The Secrets of Quantum Physics" - BBC, and it turns out that just about everything is not really there either. For me the hard part is I still got to deal w/ all this stuff that's not there. Wait, where's my coffee? Ah, at least my coffee's really here...
Merry Christmas to you. Hope you’re well and thanks for all you do.
As a point of order, shouldn’t we, when discussing oil prices and the topic of Libya comes up, remind everyone that the blood, rape, mayhem and chaos in Libya is a direct result of Democrat meddling - thanks Hillary and Barak (blood on their hands).
Well, not exactly. The Italians had a big though not noted by am Americentric press hand in the events in Libya.
Sure we can add Libya, but this list is getting awfully long though..
Lot of markets closed for Boxing day. This is the day we pay homage to Joe Louis, Cassius Clay, Max Schmeling and the rest.
Job Engine Running Low on Gas
Sharp Drop in Energy Prices Pinches Employers in the Oil Patch, Spurring Layoffs
By Jeffrey Sparshott
Dec. 26, 2014 1:43 p.m. ET
U.S. oil and gas companies have been an engine of economic growth through much of an otherwise lackluster economic expansion, providing steady employment, solid wages and fierce competition for workers across the country.
Now, after a roughly 50% plunge in oil prices, exploration and production companies are cutting capital budgets, service companies are weighing layoffs and nonenergy firms that popped up to support the industry are bracing for a slowdown.
Houston-based Hercules Offshore Inc. is laying off 324 employees, roughly 15% of its workforce, because oil companies aren’t renewing contracts for its offshore drilling rigs in the Gulf of Mexico while crude prices are depressed.
“It’s been breathtaking,” said Jim Noe, executive vice president of Hercules. “We’ve never seen this glut of supply and dislocation in oil markets. So we’re not surprised to see a significant decline in demand for our services.”
It is a possible early sign of what’s to come for the broader industry as the sharp drop in oil prices is set to dim what had been one of the brightest patches of the labor market.
Within the narrow set of sectors most closely related to oil and gas extraction, including oil-field services and equipment manufacturing, employment jumped by 56% to almost 758,000 jobs from the start of 2010 through October, compared with a nationwide gain of only 10%.
Wages in such industries also saw a marked increase, the data showed. Average earnings for workers in oil and gas extraction, for example, climbed 21% to more than $1,700 a week over that period, not adjusting for inflation. That compares with an 11% increase to $848 for all workers.
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In Oil States, Bracing for a Price Bust’s Ripple Through the Economy
By MANNY FERNANDEZ and JEREMY ALFORDDEC. 26, 2014
HOUSTON — States dependent on oil and gas revenue are bracing for layoffs, slashing agency budgets and growing increasingly anxious about the ripple effect that falling oil prices may have on their local economies.
The concerns are cutting across traditional oil states like Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Alaska as well as those like North Dakota that are benefiting from the nation’s latest energy boom.
Here in Houston, which proudly bills itself as the energy capital of the world, Hercules Offshore announced it would lay off about 324 employees who work on the company’s rigs in the Gulf of Mexico at the end of the month. Texas already lost 2,300 oil and gas jobs from October to November, according to preliminary, seasonally adjusted data released last week by the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. On the same day, Fitch Ratings warned that home prices in Texas “may be unsustainable” as the price of oil continues to plummet.
In Louisiana, the drop in oil prices had a hand in increasing the state’s 2015-2016 budget shortfall to $1.4 billion and prompting cuts that eliminated 162 vacant positions in state government, reduced contracts across the state and froze expenses for items like travel and supplies at all state agencies. Another round of reductions is expected as soon as January.
And in Alaska — where about 90 percent of state government is funded by oil, allowing residents to pay no state sales or income taxes — the drop in oil prices has worsened the budget deficit and could force a 50 percent cut in capital spending for bridges and roads. Moody’s, the credit rating service, recently lowered Alaska’s credit outlook from stable to negative.
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What was the Italian “job” in Libya?
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