Yes, by all means flatten the yield curve. Should do wonders for the economy. The only idiots here are the ones at the Fed - a bunch of Phds who think they can sit in a room and run an economy (don't you realize, they understand duration, let's all shut up and let them run things). The same sort of central planning (also done by phds) that drove the Soviet Union into the ground. Bill Gross, bearish on the 10 year at 3.5%, has turned bull at 2%. Classic capitulation. I would use any rally on a Fed announcement to go short long bonds. Don't know whether to actually short the futures, buy puts on the futures, or buy calls on TBT, or buy puts on TLT ... will study. I bought puts on Treasury futures after QE2 began last year and made 10X my money, but I'm still not sure that was the best vehicle.
I hadn't realized it was this bad ... http://www.google.com//finance?chdn...to=INDEXSP:.INX&cmptdms=0&q=NYSE:BRK.A&ntsp=0 No wonder the old rent seeker was on the phone with the President arranging his sweetheart deal for BAC last week.
Couldn't help myself - just shorted AUD at $1.0712. End of the month bs rally, expectations for more from the Fed (which the stock rally eliminates by the moment, remember your soros), now the Bammer is ratcheting up expectations by requesting a joint session of congress for the latest imbecilic stimulus program - so I think risk is due for a sell-off Couple that with Aussie real estate really starting to take a tumble as well as some other weak data, and I think the Aussie is due to return back to a $1.05 handle.
Barrons says buy bank preferred stocks http://online.barrons.com/article/SB50001424052702304539504576532340245942076.html?mod=BOL_twm_fs One reason I don't like this is because I'm a non-US investor. I get taxed by the IRS 30% of the dividend income right off the bat
The nytimes article saying 'This could be 2008' marked the 'effective' bottom for the Aug collapse http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/11/b...comparison-to-2008-crisis.html?pagewanted=all The close that day was only slightly higher then the actual bottom. I accumulated some losses leading up to those days by buying the decline too early. I thought the panic was ridiculous and kept buying, I recoup the losses I end up having a smaller loss of 1.5% Its funny how this is not 2008 anymore. Bottom line here is this, the actual news(fundamentals) are almost irrelevant in a short-term basis, what matters is how the emotions are playing out. Yet I see it over and over again people saying 'This decline will only stop once politicians do the right thing', this MIGHT be true on a long-term basis(we could see further 10-15% collapses in the future because politicians are screwing up) but in a short-term basis it doesn't mean shit
This suggests poor stock returns from here http://www.zerohedge.com/news/sorry-qe-momentum-chasers-economy-still-matters-lot Interesting data
For reference - my post about the July 2011 Aussie housing data: http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=3286854#post3286854
IMO, AUD against CAD is a better proposition than that against NZD, because in my experience (no hard numbers behind this); AUD and NZD react more closely to China data than AUD and CAD. Also, CAD is a good proxy for US growth, whereas a lot of 'current' action in NZD is very news/sector specific - 1. rebuild post the earthquake and 2. its dairy industry. I do like to play AUDNZD but mostly using a mean reversion/continuation methodology.