Investment/Trends

How to Profit From Stealth Inflation

"Decreasing quality, with rising prices. That’s stealth inflation. And no one — not even the great monetary wizard Ben Bernanke himself — can deny that stealth inflation’s a real problem. Take a look at Kimberly-Clark Corp., makers of Kleenex and other consumer products. A recent article in the Wall Street Journal points out that they’ve quietly… slowly… been 'de-sheeting.' What is de-sheeting? De-sheeting is the reduction in the number of sheets of toilet paper or tissues in each package while holding retail prices constant. The beauty of the de-sheeting process is that it is very hard for consumers to detect." Continue reading →

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China is Banking on a Detroit Comeback

"Detroit real estate agents have been swamped with requests for cheap properties by Chinese investors. One agency even sold 30 properties to a single buyer. Why all the interest from Chinese investors? Back in May, The New York Times reported that dozens of companies from China were putting down roots in Detroit in order to push their way into the American auto industry. Chinese businesses have tried to keep the movement of Chinese auto suppliers into Detroit as quiet as possible to avoid the public backlash experienced by Japanese automakers moving manufacturing to the U.S. in the 1980s. The Chinese know an opportunity when they see one." Continue reading →

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Who’s Hiring in the U.S. and What They Pay

"The segment of the economy that has added the most jobs since the recession ended in June 2009 is classified as 'professional and business services.' About 2.12 million jobs have been created for architects, engineers, scientists, managers, computer geeks, and yes, journalists. This is normally high-paying work with an average hourly wage of $28.41 an hour, which translates into $1,136 a week. Unfortunately, almost half of the new professional jobs since mid-2009 were created at temporary-hiring agencies. The work doesn’t always lead to a full-time job and these positions pay far less: $15.74 an hour." Continue reading →

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The Fed Doesn’t Control as Much as You Think It Does

"In actuality, the Fed has little control or influence over the things that really matter in the real economy. Innovation is often a meaningless buzzword (think 'financial innovation'), but it is also the key driver of wealth creation in the real economy. The Federal Reserve could be shut down and all its asset bubbles could pop, and innovations in energy, agriculture, transportation, education, media, medicine, etc. would continue to impact the availability and abundance of what really matters in the real world: energy, knowledge, water, food, and opportunity, to name a few off the top of a long list." Continue reading →

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As Keystone stalls, TransCanada OKs bigger East Coast pipeline

"TransCanada Corp gave the green light to building a $12 billion oil pipeline to ship Canada’s Western oil sands crude to refiners on its east coast and beyond, scaling up the project as its U.S.-bound Keystone XL line remains stalled in Washington. The company said it would move forward with building a 1.1 million barrel per day Energy East Pipeline after “strong market support.” That would be larger than the 850,000 bpd capacity it had mentioned in April, when it first began seeking customer commitments for the project. TransCanada is also likely to face stiff resistance from some groups over the construction of the line." Continue reading →

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Why Oil Could Move Higher–Much Higher

"A more intriguing dynamic has been presented by Financial Times reporter Izabella Kaminska over the past year: Financiers are buying oil as collateral for various speculations. Kaminska sees this financial hoarding of oil (i.e., reduction of supply) as inducing 'scarcity amidst plenty.' In broad terms, I would characterize this as one aspect of the financialization of commodities. The financialization of commodities is driven by several macro factors: 1. The scarcity of non-phantom, easily tradable collateral in a financial system that is increasingly dependent on phantom collateral. 2. A scarcity of sound investment opportunities." Continue reading →

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Instead Of Bonds, Buy This…

"Naturally, after this year’s 9% pullback in bonds, we’re going to see some air flow out of the bond bubble. That is, folks that were looking for safety in bonds were burned and are now looking for safety in other places – cash, equities, you name it. Remember back in 2008 we saw the same thing — the safety trade had everyone running to bonds. CEOs for Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs have both recently gone on record saying interest rates should, or need to, eventually rise. The market needs to 'normalize' they say. That said, plan on seeing a lot more money heading in to cash, equities or other investment classes." Continue reading →

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Save Thousands With 3-D Printing Technology

"The typical family can already save a great deal of money by making things with a 3-D printer, instead of buying them off the shelf. In the study, Pearce and his team chose 20 common household items listed on Thingiverse. Then they used Google Shopping to determine the maximum and minimum cost of buying those 20 items online, shipping charges not included. Next, they calculated the cost of making them with 3-D printers. The conclusion: It would cost the typical consumer from $312-1,944 to buy those 20 things, compared with $18 to make them in a weekend." Continue reading →

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American Automobile Glut? Unsold Cars Are Piling Up

"There are some signs automakers might be stepping on the gas a little too hard. Some 3.27 million new cars are now sitting on lots across the U.S., more than there have been in almost five years, according to Automotive News. That’s a lot of cars—just enough to equip every man, woman, and child in the state of Iowa with a new vehicle. A year ago at this time, by contrast, there were 2.7 million vehicles lying in wait across the country; summer 2011 saw an inventory of about 1 million fewer cars. Looking for a deal on a vehicle in the next month or two? Dealership lots that stock American automakers appear to be ripe for bargain seekers." Continue reading →

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What is the Money Supply?

"Money supply growth has been crashing. Near the start of the year, three month annualized money growth was around 11.2%. It is now at 2.2%. I use the Fed's money supply measure M2 (non-seasonally adjusted) to calculate the growth. If the slowdown in growth continues, it suggests that the Fed manipulated economy will slow once again and that the stock market is likely to once again crash." Continue reading →

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