Covid and Trump and the US Presidential Election

The news has been totally dominated by these events. Real market forces seem not to matter.

I listened to Kuppy on The Market Huddle. He was waxing lyrical about $JOE (St. Joe Company). This is a small cap stock that has done …

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Another Covid story

Given that the media have been obsessed with the presidential election, and with covid, it’s not surprising that a story which combines the two is popular.

Wrap

Equities: generally down, except Mexico & the UK. It’s not often that those two markets move together against the …

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HK real estate looking shaky

Goldin Financial Holdings experiences creditors seizing assets. This huge chunk of real estate is on sale at a 34% discount to book value (as of nine months ago). Can this be the top of HK real estate? The coup by China, the deteriorating state of …

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Utilities need EVs to make their business model work

This article explains why without all that spare capacity running (mainly) overnight to charge battery electric vehicles (BEVs), electric utilites are going to really struggle. The article is about California, but it seems to me that where California is now, the …

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Wrap

I didn’t pay any attention to the markets today. Generally, it was slightly risk off. Soft commodities up a bit. Most indexes down. Some of the tech megastocks up. $XOM down 3%, all the oil majors down heavily. $SLB down 5.2%!

Maybe something more exciting will happen …

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Presidential Campaign

The first presidential campaign TV debate is today. The mafia boss vs an aging political hack with dementia. It is going to be gripping, but for all the wrong reasons. At 2am local time, it’s a miss for me, although I might listen to highlights in my …

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Wrap

S&P down 0.6% this week (up 2.1% y-t-d). Ten year Treasury yields fell four bp on the week (down 12bps ytd). Most international equities were down, apart from inflation-prone places like Mexico and Turkey. I feel that the weakness of currency is the biggest weakness of …

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Gold and real rates

I just saw this plot posted by David Finch. It’s very clear cut.

Energy

I just feel that Covid has not changed the world so much that it no longer needs energy. I recognize that more electricity generation is going to come from wind and …

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China to be carbon-neutral by 2060

Xi Jin Ping promised this, and promised that Chinese emissions would start to decline by 2030. It’s a big ambition. It will be interesting if it can be delivered without huge hardship for the greying population of this country.

Markets this morning

The …

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Wrap

Today was definitely risk off. Everything down again, including commodities (except NG which has a life of its own: up 18%, on weather in the gulf, apparently). Developed Europe looking weak. Emerging markets all very weak. Japan an exception, not sure why. Maybe the BoJ started buying ETFs more …

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