Free Republic

Monday’s trading will be the first opportunity stock investors in the U.S. will have to act on a major technical violation that occurred at Friday’s close: The breaking of the 200-day moving average. This could result in an avalanche of sell signals hitting the market at Monday’s open, since many technical analysts use the 200-day moving average as the dividing line between bull and bear markets. They consider the primary trend to be up so long as the market is trading above its 200-day moving average, and that this trend turns to bearish whenever the market closes below this average—and...

Stocks have continued to come under pressure after large falls on Wednesday and Thursday, with banks and oil stocks hit hardest. Financial markets are jittery about the eurozone debt crisis. European finance ministers are meeting this afternoon in Brussels to try to boost faith in the euro. David Jones, chief market strategist at IG Index, told Sky News that the markets were waiting to see what EU ministers plan to do to restore confidence. "The hope is we will get a bit more clarity about what is being done." he said A slew of bad economic data from Germany and...

LONDON – A strong set of U.S. jobs data Friday failed to shore up confidence in world markets as stocks plunged again amid mounting fears that Europe's debt crisis could spread and derail the global economic recovery. In Britain, where investors were grappling with uncertain general election results, the FTSE 100 index slid 209.98 points, or 4 percent, at 5,051.01, while the pound oscillated wildly. Germany's DAX slid 226.05 points, or 3.8 percent, to 5,682.21 while the CAC-40 in France was 112.56 points, or 3.2 percent, lower at 3,443.55. And on Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average plunged 210.09...

Bankruptcy fears in Dubai and Greece roiled world credit markets in recent months as investors braced for the possibility of default. But United States governments have their own share of woes. The city of Vallejo, Calif., located just north of San Francisco, filed for bankruptcy in 2008. Jefferson County, Ala., is on the brink of what would be the largest government bankruptcy in the history of the U.S.--surpassing the 1994 filing by Southern California's Orange County. At least 39 states expect a budget shortfall in 2011 with the tab estimated at more than $180 billion. Free-spending America isn't quite a...

Scary. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/financialcrisis/3182806/Financial-crisis-Government-to-take-majority-stake-in-RBS.html IMF warns: The developments emerged as the International Monetary Fund warned global equities could plunge by a further 20 per cent in the coming days unless governments deliver concrete action to address the crisis. The world financial system was standing on the “brink of systemic meltdown”, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the IMF managing director, said. “Intensifying solvency concerns about a number of the largest US-based and European financial institutions have pushed the global financial system to the brink of systemic meltdown.” The warning came as Chancellor Alistair Darling told his fellow finance ministers that they “must get on with” dramatic...

The Encouraging hopeful Part of this "Black Monday": All Eyes to US!   January 21, 2008   True, the total losses of the world's major markets are immense & painful.   Not to be belittling the tragedy at all, yet, you can't help but not overlook a sweet lightening surprise among the bitter rubble.   If we were told time and time again that America's future is a vague one, that tomorrow's economy is in  an Euro capital or in Beijing, or as America's feverish enemies shout out in ecstasy: "it's going down", this day came and abolished all those thesis, if you read the...

One day the public is going to wake up and realize that when analysts are telling them to buy things at all-time highs, it might be time to sell. The day after a government report showed that crude oil inventories have risen to their highest levels since July 2002, the esteemed Wall Street brokerage firm, Goldman Sachs, released an analysis forecasting a continued increase in energy prices that could result in oil hitting $105 per barrel. As reported by Reuters: "We believe oil markets may have entered the early stages of what we have referred to as a ‘super spike’...

Since 9/11, much of the political and media debate on terrorism-prevention policies has focused on the notion that poverty creates terrorism. The presumption of a strong link between poverty and terrorism wasn't totally unjustified. After all, economists and political scientists have documented a consistent link between adverse economic shocks and the outbreak of civil war. And since terrorism is another manifestation of political conflict, many reasoned that poverty and adverse economic conditions could help to explain terrorism's rise.... It turns out, that all things equal, there was no evidence that poor countries generate more terrorism. Then, last year, the World...

US stocks rose as a report that two sons of Osama bin Laden had been captured triggered a rebound from initial losses. Share prices fell after the economy unexpectedly lost jobs last month and Intel Corp said first-quarter sales wouldn't meet its highest forecast. They moved higher even though the White House said it couldn't confirm the Associated Press report on the al-Qaeda leader's sons. "Everything is hinged on anything related to terrorism, bin laden, or Iraq," said Michael O'Hare, head of listed trading at Lehman Brothers Inc, the world's fourth-biggest securities firm. "Any positive piece of news and the...