Investment Watch Blog

Borrowers in the U.S. are defaulting on subprime auto loans at a higher rate than during the financial crisis, according to Fitch Ratings. Lenders are responding by pulling back on financing to applicants with shaky credit histories and requiring higher standards for loans that they bundle and sell on to investors. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-14/consumers-skip-more-high-rate-auto-payments-than-during-crisis and real inflation … Read more

by Geoffrey Grider GOOGLE SHOCKED THE WORLD THIS WEEK WHEN IT SHOWED OFF GOOGLE DUPLEX, ITS NEW TECHNOLOGY TO HANDLE TASKS OVER THE PHONE. SINCE ITS REVEAL ON STAGE AT THE GOOGLE I/O CONFERENCE, THERE HAS BEEN SOME NEW INFO REGARDING THE A.I. THAT WILL MAKE PHONE CALLS — HAIR APPOINTMENTS OR DINNER RESERVATIONS — IN … Read more

IF YOU’VE EVER HAD THE CHANCE TO HEAR THIS INCREDIBLE MAN SPEAK, YOU KNOW HE CHEWED WHOOPI UP AND SPIT HER OUT… Dr. Mitchell was the architect of “enhanced interrogation” aka waterboarding. The man is a hero. Dr. James Mitchell returned fire at “The View” host Whoopi Goldberg for suggesting that President Donald Trump ought … Read more

by sundance I have a sneaking suspicion the Machiavellian connections between the U.S. intelligence apparatus and multiple foreign agents/actors, including the work of Stefan Halper in the 2016 presidential election, are only a few days from fully surfacing.  There could be enough sunlight on U.K/U.S. political and intelligence officers to launch multiple investigations. There was always something … Read more

via Zerohedge: Long gone are the days when the CDS market was naively seen as merely a simple hedge to long cash bond positions for vanilla investors (negative basis), or more conspiratorially, a means to naked short the bonds of distressed companies (as many alleged happened during the financial crisis) without being subject to squeezes, … Read more

Via Marketwatch Millions of Americans who lost manufacturing jobs during the 2000s have long ”known” China was to blame, not robots. And many helped elect Donald Trump as president because of his insistence that China was at fault. Evidently many academics who’ve studied the issue are finally drawing the same conclusion. For years economists have … Read more

by Adam Hamilton of Zeal LLC The mega-cap stocks that dominate the US markets are just wrapping up a truly-extraordinary earnings season.  Naturally this first quarter under Republicans’ new corporate tax cuts fueled surging profits.  But sales were up big too, which is no mean feat for massive companies.  With sustained growth at this torrid pace impossible, peak-earnings fears are mounting.  And … Read more

https://grrrgraphics.com/a-house-divided/ Its real

via Danielle Park Nomi Prins, author of “Collusion: How Central Bankers Rigged the World,” discusses how easy monetary policy has affected the global economy.  Here is a direct video link. David Rosenberg’s recent corporate debt to GDP cycle chart goes well with this discussion, shown here since 1986.

via ZeroHedge Frequent readers will recall that it was Andrew Lapthorne’s revelation back in late 2015, which was behind the following chart, indicating that virtually all net debt issued this century has gone for one thing: to fund buybacks, i.e. wealth transfers from bondholders to shareholders. Now, in a follow up note as the increasingly politically-charged … Read more

by stockboardasset Over the last two years, academic researchers have identified various methods that they can transmit hidden commands that are undetectable by the human ear to Apple’s Siri, Amazon’s Alexa, and Google’s Assistant. According to a new report from The New York Times, scientific researchers have been able “to secretly activate the artificial intelligence systems on … Read more

by DCG Well, this is disappointing. Gov. Fallin’s term ends in 2019. From Fox News: Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin on Friday vetoed the “Constitutional Carry” bill that, if passed, would have enabled handgun owners in the state to carry without first obtaining a permit. The NRA had supported the bill’s passage and had urged Fallin to sign it. … Read more

by Dr. Eowyn The New York Daily News reports that on April 18, 2018, New York governor Andrew Cuomo warned banks and insurers to stay away from the National Rifle Association (NRA) and the gun industry because of the “reputational risk” they will incur if they do business with either. NY Department of Financial Services Superintendent Maria Vullo issued … Read more

by Simon Black On October 22, 1981, the national debt in the United States crossed the $1 trillion threshold for the first time in history. It took nearly two centuries to reach that unfortunate milestone. And over that time the country had been through a revolution, civil war, two world wars, the Great Depression, the nuclear … Read more

Source: Michael J. Ballanger for Streetwise Reports Precious metals expert Michael Ballanger discusses movements in the U.S. dollar. There was an article written a few days back where the author vehemently denied that the U.S. dollar could go any lower and where the phrases “face-ripping,” “face ripper,” and “rip your face off” (as well as derivatives thereof) … Read more

by stockboardasset Lorenza Martinez, director of the Payment System of the Bank of Mexico, informed Reuters in a telephone interview last week that more than five Mexican financial institutions have recently observed “unauthorized transfers,” resulting in hundreds of millions of pesos stolen. Cybercriminals siphoned 400 million of pesos ($20.4 million) out of Mexican banks, including the second largest … Read more