I had a chat with Bill Gates, Sr. recently, co-chairman of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the world?s largest private philanthropic organization. There, a staff of 800 helps him manage $30 billion.
The foundation will give away $3.1 billion this year, a 10% increase over last year. Some $1.5 billion will go to emerging nation health care, and another $750 million to enhance American education.
The foundation?s spending in Africa has been so massive, that it is starting to have a major impact on conditions, and is part of the bull case for investing.
The fund happens to be one of the best managed institutions out there, having sold the bulk of its Microsoft (MSFT) stock just before the dotcom bust and moving the money into Treasury bonds.
Mr. Gates? pet peeve is the precarious state of the US K-12 public education system, where teaching is not as good as it could be, expectations are low, and financial incentives and national standards are needed.
When asked about retirement, he says ?having a son with a billion dollars puts a whole new spin on things.?? Now razor sharp at 87, his favorite treat is the free NetJet miles he gets from his son Bill every year. In his memoir Showing up for Life, he says a major influence on his life was his Scoutmaster 70 years ago.
Being an Eagle Scout myself, I quickly drilled him on some complex knots, and he whipped right through all of them.
The world needs more Bill Gates Srs.
https://www.madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Bill-Gates-Jr-Sr.jpg348463Mad Hedge Fund Traderhttps://madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/cropped-mad-hedge-logo-transparent-192x192_f9578834168ba24df3eb53916a12c882.pngMad Hedge Fund Trader2013-09-18 09:08:592013-09-18 09:08:59An Evening With Bill Gates, Sr.
Global Market Comments September 17, 2013 Fiat Lux
Featured Trade: (JOIN THE INVEST LIKE A MONSTER SAN FRANCISCO TRADING CONFERENCE), (IT?S ALL ABOUT LARRY), (SPY), (TLT), (FXY), (YCS), (FXA), (MSFT), (LUNCH WITH ROBERT REICH)
SPDR S&P 500 (SPY)
iShares Barclays 20+ Year Treas Bond (TLT)
CurrencyShares Japanese Yen Trust (FXY)
ProShares UltraShort Yen (YCS)
CurrencyShares Australian Dollar Trust (FXA)
Microsoft Corporation (MSFT)
https://madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/cropped-mad-hedge-logo-transparent-192x192_f9578834168ba24df3eb53916a12c882.png00Mad Hedge Fund Traderhttps://madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/cropped-mad-hedge-logo-transparent-192x192_f9578834168ba24df3eb53916a12c882.pngMad Hedge Fund Trader2013-09-17 01:06:452013-09-17 01:06:45September 17, 2013
I am pleased to announce that I will be participating in the Invest Like a Monster Trading Conference in San Francisco during October 25-26. The two-day event brings together experts from across the financial landscape who will improve your understanding of markets by a quantum leap and measurably boost your own personal trading performance.
Tickets are available for a bargain $399. If you buy the premium $499 package you will be invited to the Friday 6:00 pm VIP cocktail reception, where you will meet luminaries from the trading world, such as Trademonster?s Jon and Pete Najarian, Guy Adami, Jeff Mackey, and of course, myself, John Thomas, the Mad Hedge Fund Trader. All in all, it is great value for the money, and I?ll personally throw in a ride on the City by the Bay?s storied cable cars for free.
Jon Najarian is the founder of OptionMonster, which offers clients a series of custom crafted computer algorithms that give a crucial edge when trading the market. Called Heat Seeker ?, it monitors no less than 180,000 trades a second to give an early warning of large trades that are about to hit the stock, options, and futures markets.
To give you an idea of how much data this is, think of downloading the entire contents of the Library of Congress, about 20 terabytes of data, every 30 minutes. His firm maintains a 10 gigabyte per second conduit that transfers data at 6,000 times the speed of a T-1 line, the fastest such pipe in the civilian world. Jon?s team then distills this ocean of data on his website into the top movers of the day. ?As with the NFL,? says Jon, ?you can?t defend against speed.?
The system catches big hedge funds, pension funds, and mutual funds shifting large positions, giving subscribers a peek at the bullish or bearish tilt of the market. It also offers accurate predictions of imminent moves in single stock and index volatility.
Jon started his career as a linebacker for the Chicago Bears, and I can personally attest that he still has a handshake that?s like a steel vice grip. Maybe it was his brute strength that enabled him to work as a pit trader on the Chicago Board of Options Exchange for 22 years, where he was known by his floor call letters of ?DRJ.? He formed Mercury Trading in 1989 and then sold it to the mega hedge fund, Citadel, in 2004.
Jon developed his patented algorithms for Heat Seeker? with his brother Pete, another NFL player (Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Minnesota Vikings), who like Jon, is a regular face in the financial media.
In order to register for the conference, please click here. There you will find the conference agenda, bios of the speakers, and a picture of my own ugly mug. I look forward to seeing you there.
Cling! Cling!
Jon Najarian
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When I first heard about Larry Summers decision to withdraw his name from consideration as the next Chairman of the Federal Reserve, I thought ?Whoa! ?RISK ON, here we come.? I knew immediately that global stock (SPY), bond (TLT), and commodity markets would rocket and the dollar would crash (FXA), except against the Japanese yen (FXY), (YCS). That?s what we got in spades at the Monday morning opening.
This has to be one of the greatest left-handed compliments of all time. Who knew Summers choice to remain in the private sector would add 20 points to the S&P 500 and slash 10 basis points off ten year Treasury yields? The markets are saying ?Thank you for staying away,? in the loudest possible voice. It reminds me of the huge pop in Microsoft (MSFT) stock we saw in the wake of CEO Steve Ballmer?s retirement announcement. Is Summers really that bad?
You have to wonder if the guy who got fired as the president of Harvard University for his cantankerousness was the ideal pick to build a consensus among the sitting Fed governors, a group already known for outsized egos. The financial markets were afraid that he would deep six Ben Bernanke?s quantitative easing policy because it might reignite the inflationary fires far down the road.
After all, it wasn?t his idea, and his public comments about the hyper expansionary monetary policy were neutral at best. ?Not invented here? would have been a great reason to end the stimulus once the new governor takes up his post in January. This is why I have been predicting that a Summers pick by Obama would have chopped 10% off the Dow in a matter of days.
My long time friend, Federal Reserve co-chairperson, Janet Yellen, is now the no brainer winner here. For a start, her co-chair position makes it an easy transition to the top job that will be welcomed by the markets. She is widely loved and respected at the UC Berkeley Haas School of Business, where she taught for many years, and where I also have been known to address the occasional class.
She is already viewed as an ultra dove who will keep QE initiative alive and well. Fed governors tend to be more representative of their local economy than national trends. Texas governors reflect what is happening in the oil industry. As the most populous state in the nation, California governors are a mirror image of what is going on in the housing market, the Golden State?s largest industry. Education and technology are not far behind.
That is great news for the rest of us. A housing priority means keeping interest rates lower for longer. It will not only help the real estate market, but all ?RISK ON? assets as well. It makes our jobs as traders easy. You just close your eyes and BUY. That?s why stocks are inches short of all time highs as I write this.
I have been ramping up risk in my model-trading portfolio all month, as have most other hedge fund managers. But I was doing so for different reasons. I did not believe Bernanke would taper this month, as the economic data are lukewarm, at best. I thought a taper no show would send markets soaring, and was positioned accordingly. It turns out that a Summers no show has the same effect. It?s all a classic example of ?The harder I work, the luckier I get.?
Which begs us to ask the question, ?Is Yellen really that good?? the permabulls shouldn?t get too deep over their heads here. The things that Janet looks at to track the health of business activity are starting to light up. Housing in San Francisco is up a blistering 32% YOY. And Silicon Valley is probably the only part of the country that is seeing real wage inflation. There are rampant bidding wars here for competent computer programmers and engineers. Soaring asset and wage prices are the traditional reason for the Fed to throttle back and raise interest rates. Therefore, the ultra easy monetary policy the markets expect from Yellen may, like Larry Summers, be dead on arrival.
Obama also has an opportunity here to address a frequent complaint from his base, that he hasn?t been appointing enough women in senior positions in his administration. Here is a great one all tied up with a bow and ready to go.
Janet Yellen grew up in the Bay Ridge section of Brooklyn, New York, from which the Italian branch of my OWN family originates. She graduated summa cum laude from Brown University (I thought they didn?t give grades?), and went on to get a PhD from Yale, where she rubbed shoulders with Hillary Clinton.
She started work as an economist at the Federal Reserve in 1977. Her first political appointment came in 1997 when Bill Clinton named her to the Council of Economic Advisors. From 2004-2010 she was president of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, where she was a voting member of the Federal Open Market Committee. In 2010, Obama made her vice chairperson of the Federal Reserve.
Oh, and for good measure, her husband, George Akerlof, has a Nobel Prize in economics. The kitchen talk must be fascinating.
A woman in charge of the national purse strings? Yikes! There goes my bowling allowance!
Next Up for Bernanke?s Job
https://www.madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Janet-Yellen.jpg315473Mad Hedge Fund Traderhttps://madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/cropped-mad-hedge-logo-transparent-192x192_f9578834168ba24df3eb53916a12c882.pngMad Hedge Fund Trader2013-09-17 01:04:032013-09-17 01:04:03It?s All About Larry
Global Market Comments September 16, 2013 Fiat Lux
Featured Trade: (NOVEMBER 1 SAN FRANCISCO STRATEGY LUNCHEON), (CATCHING UP WITH ECONOMIST DAVID HALE), (EEM), (GREK), (IWW), (EWJ), (NGE), (EWJ), (FXY), (YCS) (TESTIMONIAL)
iShares MSCI Emerging Markets (EEM)
Global X FTSE Greece 20 ETF (GREK)
iShares Russell 3000 Value Index (IWW)
iShares MSCI Japan Index (EWJ)
Global X Nigeria Index ETF (NGE)
iShares MSCI Japan Index (EWJ)
CurrencyShares Japanese Yen Trust (FXY)
ProShares UltraShort Yen (YCS)
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Come join me for lunch at the Mad Hedge Fund Trader?s Global Strategy Update, which I will be conducting in San Francisco on Friday, November 1, 2013. An excellent meal will be followed by a wide-ranging discussion and an extended question and answer period.
I?ll be giving you my up to date view on stocks, bonds, currencies, commodities, precious metals, and real estate. And to keep you in suspense, I?ll be throwing a few surprises out there too. Tickets are available for $191.
I?ll be arriving at 11:00 and leaving late in case anyone wants to have a one on one discussion, or just sit around and chew the fat about the financial markets.
The lunch will be held at a private club in downtown San Francisco near Union Square that will be emailed with your purchase confirmation.
I look forward to meeting you, and thank you for supporting my research. To purchase tickets for the luncheons, please go to my online store.
https://www.madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/San-Francisco-e1410363065903.jpg238359Mad Hedge Fund Traderhttps://madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/cropped-mad-hedge-logo-transparent-192x192_f9578834168ba24df3eb53916a12c882.pngMad Hedge Fund Trader2013-09-16 01:05:152013-09-16 01:05:15November 1 San Francisco Strategy Luncheon
I have been relying on David Hale as my de facto global macro economist for decades, and I never miss an opportunity to get his updated views. The challenge is in writing down David?s eye popping, out of consensus ideas fast enough, because he spits them out in such rapid-fire succession.
Since David is an independent economic advisor to many of the world?s governments, largest banks, and investment firms, I thought his views would be of riveting interest to you.
I met him this time at the posh Ozumo restaurant on San Francisco?s waterfront, near the Ferry Building. A favorite of Silicon Valley?s tech titans, I bumped into Marc Andreessen on the way in, nearly impaling myself on his pointed head. I settled for a delicate vegetable tempura and eel sushi, while David, being from the Midwest, dug into an excellent Wagyu beefsteak. We washed it all down with liberal doses of Kirin beer and Takagi Shuzo designer sake.
David is an unmitigated bull on the economy, predicting that growth will leap from this year?s 2.5% to 3% next year. Fading away of the fiscal drag created by a gridlocked congress will be the main reason. This year, we were hobbled by the maximum Federal income tax rising from 35% to 39.5% for income over $400,000. Capital gains rose from 15% to 20% as well. These combined to subtract 1% off US GDP growth in 2013. There are no such tax hikes planned for 2014.
The economy continues to power along, supported by three legs: housing, the energy boom, and a reviving auto industry. Detroit is expected to pump out over 16 million vehicles this year, a figure only dreamed about five years ago when it hit a rock bottom 9 million unit annual rate.
The real surprise this year was how hot the second quarter came in, with corporate profits soaring by 17% YOY. Q3 should fall back to a more sustainable 5% rate. Managements have a death grip on controlling costs, which is why they aren?t hiring, and explains the feeble employment statistics. This has enabled profit margins to surge to all time highs. Expect more of the same.
Europe should grow by 1% in 2014 after delivering a near zero rate this year. It will take years for them to return to any kind of normalized growth rate. That said, continental stock markets could well outperform those in the US in the near term.
David spends much of his time traveling, doing a major intercontinental trip almost every month. The coming calendar includes Japan, Australia, and Europe by yearend. To have his frequent flier points!
A year ago, David was banging his drum about an imminent recovery in Japan (EWJ) and a collapse in the yen (FXY), (YCS). He was ignored by virtually all, except by me. As you may recall, I started laying on major short positions in the yen last November at David?s behest, which proved wildly successful. The proof is in the constant testimonials that I regularly publish in my letter. I don?t make these up.
David believes that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is doing all the right things, so the recovery is real, sustainable, and will play out over several more years. However, he would be wise to spread out the coming VAT tax rise planned for April, from 5% to 8%, over five years instead of bunching it all up in one. He also should spend less time focusing on domestic nationalistic issues, which have the undesirable effect in that it focuses China on Japan?s regrettable past, not its bright future.
He is also quite an authority on emerging markets (EEM), which account for 40% of global GDP, and sees the recent collapse as presenting a once in a generation buying opportunity. His favorite is Mexico (EWW), which will benefit hugely from the first new round of political and economic reforms in 20 years. The new oil and gas fracking technology has also arrived just in the nick of time, as its existing conventional fields are approaching exhaustion.
David thinks Greece (GREK) has more to run, although not at the heady pace of the past year. Nigeria (NGE) is another outstanding opportunity, where he recently visited. A privatization wave there could boost GDP growth from 7% to 10%.
To show you how wide David casts his net, he had lunch with none other than Syria?s Bashar al-Assad a decade ago. The country was then enacting a series of ground-breaking liberalizations by privatizing banks, and was viewed as the hot frontier market of the day. How things change! This is why investors expect outsized returns from these countries. Less, and the risk is not worth it. They?re called ?frontier? for a reason.
What could bring the cheering bull parade to a grinding halt? The debt ceiling crisis, which could start generating headlines in a few weeks. If the government really does shut down in mid October, as Treasury Secretary, Jack Lew, told me a few weeks ago (click here for ?Riding With the Treasury Secretary Jack Lew?) no one will care if it reopens the next day, or the next week. Longer than that and it could be a real problem not just for the US, but for the global economy as well. A similar shut down during the 1990?s lasted only a day, but cost the Republicans dearly in the next election.
David has in the past made some far out predictions that were real zingers. Population growth is grinding to a halt throughout Asia. It is already well below the replacement rate in Japan and South Korea, which will soon be joined by China. This will eventually lead to labor shortages in Asia, and bring to an end the cheap labor regime, which has driven their economies for the past 100 years. The Chinese work force will shrink from five times ours to only three times.
Their cost advantage then goes out the window. The upshot for us is that perhaps half of the 6 million jobs that America lost to China over the last 20 years will come back. Many items can now be bought cheaper in Chicago than they can in Shanghai. This explains why ?onshoring? is accelerating with a turbocharger (click here for ?The American Onshoring Trend is Accelerating?).
China will still become far and away the world?s largest economy in our lifetimes. In 1700, Asia accounted for 58% of world GDP. Some 250 years of wars pulled that figure down to 15% by 1950. It is on track to recover to 50% by 2050.
To learn more about David Hale and the extensive list of services he offers, please visit the website of David Hale Global Economics at http://www.davidhaleweb.com.
https://www.madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/David-Hale.jpg353305Mad Hedge Fund Traderhttps://madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/cropped-mad-hedge-logo-transparent-192x192_f9578834168ba24df3eb53916a12c882.pngMad Hedge Fund Trader2013-09-16 01:04:592013-09-16 01:04:59Catching up with Economist David Hale
Global Market Comments September 13, 2013 Fiat Lux
Featured Trade: (MAD HEDGE FUND TRADER HITS ANOTHER NEW ALL TIME HIGH), (FXY), (YCS), (FCX), (AAPL), (FXA), (LOADING UP ON AUSTRALIA), (FXA), (EWA), ($SSEC), ($BDI), (UPDATE ON FREEPORT MCMORAN) (FCX)
CurrencyShares Japanese Yen Trust (FXY)
ProShares UltraShort Yen (YCS)
Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc. (FCX)
Apple Inc. (AAPL)
CurrencyShares Australian Dollar Trust (FXA)
iShares MSCI Australia Index (EWA)
Shanghai Stock Exchange Composite Index ($SSEC)
Baltic Dry Index ($BDI)
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It looks like I?m Waltzing Matilda again. I am going to use the two-cent drop last night to scale into a long position in the Australian dollar. This is a dip in the (FXA) that gives up one quarter of the four-cent move off of the August 88 cent bottom.
The decline was triggered by dismal employment data showing that 10,200 jobs were lost in August. Many analysts had been expecting job gains. To give you some perspective, this is equivalent to the US getting a nonfarm payroll of (minus) -150,000 out of the blue when everyone had been expecting an improvement of a similar amount. Yikes!
The problem with this analysis is that employment data is a lagging indicator, sometimes a deep one. A few things have happened since these numbers were collated. The China hard landing has been taken off the table, emerging markets (EEM) have been screaming, and there have been massive short covering rallies across the entire hard asset space. Looking at just this single data point is the equivalent to driving ninety miles an hour and only looking at the rear view mirror.
You wanted a dip to buy? This is a dip.
The steadily improving China data puts not just the Aussie in a fresh new light, but all Australian assets. If it is sustainable, then Australian stocks also look great down here as well. The Australia iShares ETF (EWA) has told you as much, rocketing some 16% off the August lows, triple the gains seen here in the US. Australian bonds are the only security you want to walk away from, which are likely to see further losses matching those in the US.
You?ve gotta love Australia. It is the low cost producer of a whole range of economically sensitive commodities, including iron ore, copper, natural gas, coal, tin, gold, wool, wheat, beef, and others. Get it right and you make a fortune. It is the leveraged play on an improving global economy. Call it a call option on the world. If you have any doubts about the attractions of the Land Down Under, just spend a free summer afternoon strolling Sydney?s Bondi Beach.
If you want some independently confirming data on the likelihood of this turnaround, look at the chart below of the Baltic Dry Index, which reflects the cost of chartering dry bulk ships to carry stuff like iron ore and coal. It has been absolutely on fire, blasting up by 100% in the past four weeks.
This morning?s unbelievable 31,000 drop in weekly jobless claims to 292,000, a new five year low, reaches the same conclusion. It is a far more contemporaneous data set, and reflects a return to a normal economy. The Australian jobs data is so old it has hair growing in it.
The unfortunate aspect of this Trade Alert is that (FXA) options are fairly illiquid, and trade at double the normal spread found in the foreign exchange options market, so execution here is crucial. Put in a limit order for the spread that works for you. If you don?t get done, just walk away and wait for the next Trade Alert, of which there will be many.
Or you can just buy the (FXA) outright, given that the August low on the charts is looking pretty solid. Buy some Australian shares (EWA) too, while you?re at it, and throw a couple more steaks on the barbie!
Suddenly, Australia is Looking Very Attractive
https://www.madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Map-Australien-Energie.jpg428624Mad Hedge Fund Traderhttps://madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/cropped-mad-hedge-logo-transparent-192x192_f9578834168ba24df3eb53916a12c882.pngMad Hedge Fund Trader2013-09-13 01:04:242013-09-13 01:04:24Loading Up on Australia
Those who bought my Trade Alert on the Freeport McMoRan (FCX) October $28-$30 bull call spread at $1.68 or besttwo days ago will be thrilled to see the charts below. They were prepared by my friends at Stockcharts.com, who offer a very reasonable subscription technical analysis product (click here for their site http://stockcharts.com ).
After testing $26 three times over the past two years, the stock has forged a major long term bottom that appears unassailable. This almost perfectly matches the chart for the Chinese stock market, which is demonstrating almost identical strength. Conclusion: higher prices for copper and the rest of the commodity space.
Just thought you?d like to know.
https://www.madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Pennies.jpg296523Mad Hedge Fund Traderhttps://madhedgefundtrader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/cropped-mad-hedge-logo-transparent-192x192_f9578834168ba24df3eb53916a12c882.pngMad Hedge Fund Trader2013-09-13 01:03:072013-09-13 01:03:07Update on Freeport McMoRan (FCX)
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