Publications

Research Reports - Chronological

2008 Reports

Date Report Title
August 15, 2008 The InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
August 7, 2008 Investment Focus The Coming Shift in Consumer Stocks
The steadier, more defensive Consumer Staples stocks have vastly outperformed the highly-cyclical Consumer Discretionary stocks in the past year, as we predicted, but it isn’t likely to recur in the coming year.
July 31, 2008 The InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
July 23, 2008 Investment Focus The Real Story on Crude Oil: Not Mere Speculation
We believe it’s only commonsensical to expect oil’s “price” in U.S. dollars to mainly reflect changes in the value of the paper dollar, not any alleged geological shortage of oil (as “peak oil” proponents claim) and not “speculation” (as a new report now confirms).
July 16, 2008 Investor Alert Mid-Year Review: So Far, So Good
July 11, 2008 The Capitalist Advisor Roots of the Latest Banking Crisis
Understanding the causes of the on-going residential mortgage debacle.
June 27, 2008 The Capitalist Advisor From Flat World To Free World
The world is retreating behind nationalistic walls, because the expanding economic freedom of recent decades was a response to the bankruptcy of communism and socialism, not on acceptance of capitalism as an ideal. Without such acceptance, recent political advances – despite the economic success they generated – are vulnerable to the new wave of anti-capitalist measures.
June 23, 2008 The InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
June 13, 2008 Investor Alert History as a Guide to Rebounds in the Broker-Dealer Stocks
The stocks of U.S. brokerage firms have plunged 40% in the past year -- four times worse than the bearish performance of the S&P 500. Many observers, having failed to forecast this plunge in the first place, now insist that brokers can’t return any time soon to robust growth and profitability; some claim that whole lines of business – like credit securitization – are gone forever.
June 9, 2008 The Capitalist Advisor A Few More Policy Assaults
The poor performance of U.S. equities this decade can be attributed to punitive government policies – and poor performance over the past year has been no exception.
May 30, 2008 Investor Alert Consumer Confidence Plunges – and That's Bullish
The U.S. Consumer Confidence Index (CCI) reached a 16-year low this month -- soon after a similar indicator (of “consumer sentiment”) reached a 28-year low. In Figure One we plot the level of the CCI since its inception in late 1967 -- against seven shaded areas signifying U.S. recessions. Most economists, trained as “demand-side” Keynesians, believe “consumers” drive the economy. As such, the Keynesians tend to become bullish about forthcoming economic growth (and equities) when consumer confidence is inordinately high, and to become bearish about growth and stocks when (as today) confidence is abnormally low.
May 23, 2008 The InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
May 16, 2008 Investment Focus The Real Story on Crude Oil
The nominal oil price (in U.S. dollars) reached an all time record of $127/bbl earlier this week, up 31% so far in 2008 and 104% in the past year. Yesterday it closed near $125/barrel. Analysts at Goldman Sachs today reiterated their earlier view (with major qualifiers to their so-called “super-spike” theory) that oil could average $140/barrel in 2H2008 and as high as $200/barrel in the next two years (yet also fall to $60/barrel). As recently as January 2007, oil was just $50/barrel, and only a decade ago (December 1998) it was a mere $10/barrel.
May 7, 2008 Investment Focus Prospects for Equity Style Bets
Our model portfolio for U.S. equity style bets outperformed the passive benchmark by 1.69% points over the past year (see Table One), continuing a trend we’ve seen over the past five years.
April 30, 2008 Investor Alert Does the Fed's New Policy Stance Suggest a Bottom?
The Federal Reserve today once again cut its overnight, inter-bank rate, but at a regularly-scheduled meeting, and by just 25 basis points (to 2.00%); it also hinted that it might keep the rate steady for the foreseeable future.
April 25, 2008 The InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
April 18, 2008 Investor Alert In Search of a Bear Bottom
The U.S. stock market finally reached “bearish” territory a month ago, when the S&P 500 fell to an intra- day low of 1257 (on March 17th), or 20.2% below its intra-day high of 1576 about five months ago (on October 11th). Since then, over the past month, the S&P 500 has rebounded by 10% (to 1390), so many strategists and economists – especially those who didn’t predict the bear market in the first place – are now boldly prognosticating that a bottom was reached.
April 10, 2008 Investor Alert Profitable Mortgages Revisited
The low-quality sub-set of the U.S. residential mortgage market began to sour this time a year ago (spring 2007), even though broad stock-price indexes had yet to peak.
March 28, 2008 Investment Focus Technology Stocks are Not Immune
To the surprise of many, the worst performing sector in the U.S. S&P 500 so far this year has been Information Technology (-16%), not the headline-grabbing Financials sector (-14%).
March 24, 2008 The InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
March 12, 2008 Investor Alert The Fed’s Liquidity Schemes Boost Commodities, Not Equities
The Federal Reserve and top central banks abroad announced yet another scheme yesterday to inject “liquidity” into the world’s banking system, supposedly to cure the spreading credit crisis.
March 10, 2008 Investment Focus Asset Returns Amid Stagflation
Just as the U.S. is now suffering a recession, 1 it’s also suffering from ever higher rates of inflation – a combination known as “stagflation” – a vicious, policy induced phenomenon that was last seen during the recession of 1990-1991.
February 29, 2008 The InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
February 22, 2008 The Capitalist Advisor The Policy Mix Index: Washington Now Consumes $3 Trillion a Year
IFI’s Policy Mix Index (PMI) – a weighted grading system that assesses monetary policy, fiscal policy, trade policy, regulatory policy and foreign policy in the U.S. – is now less...
February 15, 2008 Investor Alert The Bond Insurance Bust
The top eight publicly-traded bond and mortgage insurers in the U.S. have lost 78% of their value – or $30 billion in market capitalization – over the past nine months....
January 31, 2008 The Capitalist Advisor The Stimulus Myth
In today's world Republicans and Democrats alike endorse big government, so whenever they agree whole-heartedly about some idea or policy – as they now do about an alleged “stimulus package” for the U.S. economy – investors should bet on near-term results being bearish.
January 28, 2008 Investment Focus Equity Bulls in Panic Mode
There have been plenty of forward-looking, market based warnings of this equity carnage, but as usual the equity bulls have blithely ignored or dismissed them. It was less than a year ago...
January  10, 2008 Investment Focus The Signaling Power of Stock Rallies Amid Early-Phase Yield-Curve Inversions
Historically, an inverted U.S. Treasury yield curve has signaled year-ahead trouble for U.S. stock prices and economic growth.
January  7, 2008 Investor Alert The Manufacturing and Profit Recessions
 Large sections of the U.S. economy have now fallen into recession – a result which our models first predicted about a year ago.
January 2008   Track Record 2007
January 2008   Outlook 2008

2007 Reports
 

Date Report Title
December 24, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
December 17, 2007 Investor Alert The Coming Bottom in U.S. Interest Rates
Evidence mounts that the U.S. has already entered a recession – a result we first predicted about a year ago...
December 10, 2007 The Capitalist Advisor Price Controls on Mortgage Rates
The Bush-Paulson scheme will abrogate millions of contracts, induce lenders to reduce sub-prime mortgage lending, and raise default and foreclosure rates in the sub-prime market.
December 3, 2007 Investment Focus As Growth Slows, Will the Commodity-Price Boom Abate?
Do commodity prices reflect inflation, or do they primarily move in tandem with the business cycle?
November 30, 2007 Investor Alert The Myth of Bullish Rate-Cutting
Despite some bullish stock-price rallies this year, we’ve remained steadfast in our bearishness...
November 21, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
November  12, 2007 Investor Alert Junk Bonds and Real Yields Head South
 ...Recent trends give us no reason to alter these initial forecasts.
November  5, 2007 Investment Focus Gold and Equities
The gold price today surpassed $800/ounce for the first time in nearly 28 years...
October 29, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
October 22, 2007 Investor Alert From Bad to Worse on Profits and Equities
By our estimates the U.S. economy is now entering the early stages of recession...
October 10, 2007 The Capitalist Advisor The Greatest Story Ever Told
Rand was more than a superlative writer; she was also an illuminating philosopher and history’s greatest champion of laissez-- faire capitalism.
October 5, 2007 Investor Alert Rising Unemployment Isn't Bullish for Stocks
Employment in the U.S. tends to be a lagging indicator – useful for purposes of confirming where the economy has been – but it also provides hints of where the economy is going, because...
September 28, 2007 Investor Alert The Dollar in Debasement
Inflation is by no means a “thing of the past.”
September 24, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
September 18, 2007 Investor Alert When ‘Corrections” Degenerate Into “Bear Markets”
Before long, the partying bulls will be crying in their beer again.
September 7, 2007 Investor Alert The Race to Hoard T-Bills – and What It Means for Stocks
August 27, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
August 20, 2007 Investment Focus Can Corporate Junk Bonds Get . . . Junkier ?
Fed “liquidity injections” should not be construed as a reason to become bullish on junk bonds.
August 13, 2007 Investor Alert The Quiddity of Liquidity
A half-dozen of the world’s major central banks – including the U.S. Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank, the Bank of Canada, the Bank of Japan, and the Reserve Bank of Australia – injected $300 billion of “liquidity” into national banking systems last week, in a supposed “rescue” effort to prevent an impending “credit crisis.”
August 6, 2007 Investor Alert When the Financial Sector Falters
The Financials sector of the S&P 500 equity price index, which comprises 20% of the total market capitalization of S&P 500 firms, has plunged nearly 13% so far this year, compared to the S&P 500’s meager gain of 1%. The Financials sector now joins Consumer Discretionary as one of the two sectors that have declined, year-to-date, in absolute terms.
July 31, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
July 20, 2007 Investor Alert The Fed Downgrades Growth – Just Like the Last Recession
The Fed causes recessions - but never predicts them.
July 16, 2007 The Capitalist Advisor The Path to Censorship and Martial Law in America
As of May 9th, U.S. Presidents have the power to impose a dictatorship in America.
July 10, 2007 Investor Alert Inflated Profit Expectations
Of course, history teaches that stock investors tend to look forward, not backward; they anticipate earnings that will be generated about nine months in advance. Nevertheless...
June 30, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
June 22, 2007 Investor Alert When Energy Stocks Lead the Way
The Energy sub-sector of the S&P 500 equity price index has boomed by 37% over the past year, outperforming the broader index by nearly 16% points...
June 15, 2007 Investment Focus Will the End of the Yield-Curve's Inversion Be Bullish for U.S. Stocks?
When this year began we were mildly bearish about U.S. equity performance in 2007, as our forecasting model projected that the...
June 8, 2007 Investor Alert The Implications of Rising Bond Yields
The 10-year U.S. T-Bond yield has risen by 53 basis points over the past three months, from 4.59% to 5.12%, while the 3-month T-Bill yield has declined by 33 basis points, from 5.10% to 4.77%. As a result, the U.S. yield-curve spread – the difference between the T-Bond yield and T-Bill yield – has shifted from being negative (-51 basis points) in early March to being positive (35 basis points), as shown in the nearby table. What caused this dramatic shift in yields and what are its implications?
May 27, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
May 16, 2007 The Capitalist Advisor Where the Money Is
When the famed U.S. bank robber Willie Sutton was asked why he robbed banks, his retort was both commonsensical and unvarnished: “That’s where the money is.” And that’s not a bad place to start for any investor who wants to understand why the powerful head of some U.S. Congressional Committee in Washington, D.C. has launched yet another investigation of the wealthy and big business.
May 9, 2007 Investment Focus Should Investors Be Encouraged by a Declining Trade Deficit?
We address this issue now because the U.S. trade deficit has, in fact...
May 2, 2007 Investment Focus Would Fed Rate Cuts Necessarily Boost Equities?
April 23, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
April 16, 2007 Investment Focus Which Type of Consumer Stock Will Outperform
April 9, 2007 Investment Focus Should Equity Investors Be Encouraged by a Low Jobless Rate?
April 2, 2007 Investor Alert The Market Impact of Appeasement
Some of the more short-sighted Wall Street strategists seem to prefer anything but war. For them “peace at any price” is the soothing balm markets require to perform well.
March 26, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
March 19, 2007 Investment Focus Will Mortgage Market Turmoil Hurt Mortgage-Backed Securities?
Even as U.S. “sub-prime” mortgage lenders suffer setbacks, fixed-income investors in the U.S. should take advantage of the growing hysteria over the debacle and buy mortgage-backed securities.
March 15, 2007 Investment Focus The Yen Carry Trade: Bearish for the Dollar?
Despite the dollar's recent dip in foreign exchange markets, we expect the greenback to resume its ascent against major currencies -- including the Japanese yen -- during the balance of 2007.
March 5, 2007 Investor Alert China's Alleged Influence on U.S. Equity Performance
As we’ve been expecting, U.S. stock prices are down for the year...
February  28, 2007 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
February  22, 2007 Investor Alert Prospects for U.S. Bond Yields
We expect a decline in interest rates along the entire maturity spectrum of the U.S. Treasury yield curve in 2007, with greater declines coming in the short-term end of the spectrum compared to the intermediate and longer-term portions of the curve.
February  15, 2007 Investor Alert Signs of Economic Weakness
Fed chairman Ben Bernanke testified before the U.S. Congress this week that he was more worried about inflation than economic weakness; therefore, he said, even though he and his colleagues would keep the Fed Funds rate unchanged for the foreseeable future, they’d continue to lean toward further rate hikes.
February  7, 2007 Investment Focus Inverted Yield Curves as Bull Market Killers – and Bear Market Predictors
Equity bull markets in the U.S. don't die of natural causes; they’re usually murdered by Fed officials.
January  31, 2007 The Capitalist Advisor The Policy Mix Index: The Bearish Tilt of Washington’s Surge and Splurge
Contributing most to the PMI's deterioration since last summer has been the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate hikes, even in the face of declines in long-term bond yields – to the point where...
January 2007   Track Record 2006
January 2007   Outlook 2007

 

Date Report Title
December 29, 2006 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
December 22, 2006 Investment Focus

How Valuation Can Mitigate Otherwise Warranted Bearishness
Historically, an inverted Treasury yield curve (which we’ve had since last July) has spelled trouble for the year-ahead performance of U.S. equities and the U.S. economic growth rate. But while we now expect...
December 15, 2006 Investment Focus

Is the Housing Sector Predictive?
As we expected, the U.S. residential housing sector performed badly this year. Whether we consult the data on new home construction permits, housing starts, old and new home sales, median house prices, real residential investment spending or the performance of homebuilder stocks relative to the S&P 500, we find that the news this year has been uniformly grim. But does the housing sector’s performance over the past year have any predictive value?
December 7, 2006 Investor Alert

The Recession of 2007
The last U.S. recession occurred in 2001, after Fed rate hikes inverted the Treasury yield curve...
November 22, 2006 Investment Focus Does 'Sideline Cash' Predict U.S. Equities?
Today's equity bulls, no doubt heartened by the recent rally in stock prices, continue to offer various theories in support of a bullish stance. One is the so-called “sideline cash” theory...
November 8, 2006 Investor Alert How Punitive Fed Policy Can Trump the Benefits of Divided Government
Many people (usually the advocates of government activism) decry “gridlock,” but all else equal, over the past fifty years, divided government in Washington has been a positive thing for investors.
October 29, 2006 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
October 16, 2006 The Capitalist Advisor Betting Markets Say GOP Will Lose the House
As we’ve seen in past U.S. elections, betting markets – where people put there own money on the line – tend to be much more accurate than opinion polls when it comes to forecasting results
October 11, 2006 Investor Alert North Korea's Nukes and the Market’s Rally
The Bush Administration this week lost any remaining credibility in foreign policy.
September 29, 2006 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
September 21, 2006 Investor Alert The Policy Mix Index: Yield-Curve Inversion Signals Trouble
IFI’s Policy Mix Index (PMI) – a weighted grading system assessing monetary policy, fiscal policy, trade policy, regulatory policy and foreign policy – has declined to -15.0 (Table One, page 2), versus readings of ...
September 11, 2006 The Capitalist Advisor

Why America Can't Win Wars Anymore
Over the past five years we’ve observed something even more horrific than what we witnessed five years ago today, when Islamic terrorists sponsored by Islamic regimes in the Middle East murdered 3,000 innocents by using three commercial airplanes to destroy the World Trade Center and part of the Pentagon. Why more horrific?
August 31, 2006 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
August 21, 2006 Investor Alert

Rationalizing Recession
Few analysts at the time saw recession as likely in the foreseeable future and none would dare say (publicly) that the Fed might deliberately trash the economy, since most believe the Fed always knows (and does) best.
August 14, 2006 Investor Alert

Two Cease-Fires -- Neither of Which is Bullish
In the past week investors have had to assess the likely market impact of two “cease-fires.”
August 7, 2006 Investment Focus

Predicting U.S. Equities: Interest Rates Matter More than Earnings
When it comes to forecasting U.S. equity performance, most analysts, strategists and economists focus on two key variables: earnings and interest rates...
July 28, 2006 The Capitalist Advisor

Reflections on a Quarter-Century in Business
I walked forty blocks south, from my tiny apartment on Manhattan’s upper east side to my first professional job as a management trainee for Manufacturers Hanover Trust Company at 350 Park Avenue.
July 14, 2006 The Capitalist Advisor

Israel Fights Back, But the U.S. Keeps Appeasing
 No investor can afford to ignore geo-political trends, especially those that destroy portfolios.
July 7, 2006 Investment Focus Forecasting Shifts in U.S. Corporate Profit Margins
As we enter the latest U.S. “earnings season” (with corporate reports of second-quarter results, through June 30th) and see new estimates of year-ahead profit performance, investors should be aware that
June 30, 2006 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
June 21, 2006 The Capitalist Advisor Bill Gates: Triumph and Tragedy
Microsoft’s co-founder and chairman Bill Gates announced last week that as of July 2008 he’ll no longer work full-time at the firm; thereafter he’ll devote most of his time (and wealth) to a philanthropic foundation he established in 2000. As he’s been doing in recent years, Gates will shift further away from creating wealth toward giving it away.
June 13, 2006 Investor Alert Technical Fouls – by Bulls in Denial
Stock bulls are in denial about the Fed’s blatant sabotage.
June 7, 2006 Investment Focus Forecasting Commodities
How can investors best forecast and profit from forthcoming changes in commodity prices?
May 31, 2006 The Capitalist Advisor Paulson and the Dollar
Earlier this month we showed why a potential cessation of further Fed rate hiking later this year won’t necessarily be...
May 25, 2006 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
May 15, 2006 Investor Alert The Beginning of the End
The bull market in U.S. equities was nice while it lasted – but our market-based signals indicate that it’s coming to an end – if, indeed, it hasn’t ended already.
April 28, 2006 Investment Focus Anticipating Shifts in T-Bill Rates, T-Bond Yields and the Yield-Curve Spread
This study shows how a set of forward-looking market prices forecasts (one-year ahead) T-Bill rates, T-Bond yields and the Treasury yield-curve spread (defined as the difference between T-Bond yields and T-Bill rates, as reflected in the shape of the yield curve, whether it be steep, flat or inverted).
April 25, 2006 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
April 14, 2006 Investment Focus Forecasting Fed Rate Moves
This study illustrates how a set of important, forward-looking market prices reliably forecasts (one-year ahead) Federal Reserve policy -- which basically entails shifts in the overnight Fed Funds rate.
April 7, 2006 Investment Focus Predicting U.S. Sector Performance
This report shows how a set of five important, forward-looking market prices forecast absolute and relative stock performance by the ten main U.S. sectors.
March 31, 2006 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
March 28, 2006 Investor Alert The Long and Short of U.S. Interest-Rate Shifts
Today’s rate hike by the Fed -- it's fifteenth since June 2004 and one that brings the overnight Fed Funds rate up to 4.75% -- has now definitively inverted the U.S. Treasury yield curve. Below we remind investors that a yield curve inversion presents a...
March 18, 2006 Investor Alert The Bank of Japan's Pending Rate Hikes
The Bank of Japan (BOJ) announced last week that over the coming months it will cease its five-year policy (begun in March 2001) of a zero short-term (overnight) interest rate and “quantitative easing.”
March 9, 2006 The Capitalist Advisor The Year of Living Dangerously
Investors confused about the seemingly awkward performance of markets year-to-date should consider the many ways Washington has injected dangerous elements into the nation’s political economy.
February 27, 2006 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
February 24, 2006 Investment Focus Global Yield Curves and Economic Growth
The currently-inverted U.S. yield curve signals a ...
February 17, 2006 Investment Focus Global Yield Curves and Equity Performance
There's no better leading indicator of yearahead equity performance and economic growth than the local government yield curve – especially when measured as the spread between the 10-year bond yield and 3-month bill rate.
February 10, 2006 The Capitalist Advisor The Next Fed Head: Part 2
It doesn't take long for markets to gauge the likely impact of newly-installed central planners.
January 31, 2006 The Capitalist Advisor Greenspan's Record: Better Than Predecessors, Not As Good as Gold
Since today is Alan Greenspan’s last day as Federal Reserve chairman, it’s an appropriate time to assess his 18½-year track record – and what it has meant for investors. Our review can also serve as a guide to those trying to assess the likely impact of the next Fed head.1 Contrary to popular assessments, we find that Greenspan’s track record falls well short of what it should have been.
January  2006   Outlook 2006
January  2006   Track Record 2005
January 6, 2006 Investor Alert The Fed Wants a Recession
One need only be a fact-oriented realist to know that Fed officials invariably hike short-term rates until they inflict widespread pain, whether in the form of stock and bond price crashes, corporate bankruptcies, house-price plunges or recessions. But as before, today few people can make themselves believe it.


2005
December 31, 2005 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
December 23, 2005 Investment Focus Dubious Dow Theory
Dow Theory suggests a bullish stance on U.S. stocks for 2006. But the evidence supports a precisely opposite stance.
December 16, 2005 Investor Alert What Gold Portends
Last week we examined the likely future direction of the gold price – one of the most important leading indicators (besides the Treasury yield curve) in our market- based forecasting system...
December 9, 2005 Investment Focus The Meaning of Gold at $500
 The purchasing power of gold – what an ounce of it buys in terms of tangible goods – has been relatively stable for over three centuries.1 That’s why, throughout human history, civilized nations converged on gold (and gold-convertible instruments like currency and checks) as money, for gold has always served as a stable and reliable yardstick. Gold’s relative stability also explains why England and America – the two nations most associated with the Industrial Revolution – were on the gold standard for most of their history.
November 22, 2005 Investment Focus The Business Cycle, Inflation and U.S. Sector Performance
 Two market-price signals provide reliable forecasts of the U.S. business cycle and inflation climate...
November 15, 2005 Investor Alert The Outlook for U.S. Sector Profits
 The 'consensus' outlook of analysts and strategists on Wall Street is for a rise of 12% in S&P 500 profits over the coming year.
November 7, 2005 The Capitalist Advisor The Next Fed Head – Part 1
Two weeks have passed since President Bush nominated Ben Bernanke to replace Alan Greenspan as chairman of the dozen-or-so central planners ruling Washington’s central bank – i.e., the money monopolist known affectionately as the Federal Reserve.
October 31, 2005 InterMarket Forecaster The "Peak Oil" Thesis: Supply or Price?
As Yogi Berra once said, “it's deja vu all over again." As in the late 1970s, when the oil price nearly tripled in four years (from $11/barrel at the end of 1975 to $32/barrel at the end of 1979), the near-tripling of the oil price during the past four years (from $21/barrel at the end of 2001 to $61/ barrel more recently) has led to a growing gang of doomsayers claiming the world is “running out of oil.” In the 1970s it was called “limits to growth.” Now it’s called “peak oil theory.”
October 21, 2005 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
October 14, 2005 Investment Focus The Japan That Few Predicted
 Few economists or strategists predicted the strong economic growth or robust equity gains witnessed in Japan in recent years; fewer still projected that Japan might outperform other major economies and stock markets – as it certainly has.
October 7, 2005 The Capitalist Advisor The Policy Mix Index: Government Burdens Mount
IFI's Policy Mix Index (PMI) – a weighted grading system assessing monetary policy, fiscal policy, trade policy, regulatory policy and foreign policy – has declined to 13.0 (Table One, page 2), versus readings of 30.5 (February 2005) and 47.0 (June 2003).
September 30 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
September 23 Investment Focus Fed Policy and Equity Valuation: The Joint Impact on Future Returns
With persistent attention focused on yet more hurricanes in the U.S. gulf coast, there’s little recognition of the fact that man-made disasters can inflict far more harm on the economy, wealth creation and portfolio performance. The best current example of this is the Federal Reserve’s interest- rate policy, which continues moving on a bearish path.
September 9 The Capitalist Advisor Unionization's Shift to Government
Not capitalist 'injustice' but Marxist dogma has been the main fuel for labor unionism for most of the past century, especially in Europe but also to some extent in the U.S.
September 2 Investor Alert Disasters: Natural and Man-Made
Insurers currently estimate that Hurricane Katrina – which swept through the U.S. Gulf Coast this week and submerged 80% New Orleans under water -- will cost as much as $75 billion. If so, it will be the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history (using inflation adjusted numbers). As we’ll see, the ten largest hurricanes in U.S. history (since 1900) were followed by an average decline of 3.1% in U.S. equity prices one year later (Table Three, page 3); but the bulk of that decline is explained not by the hurricanes per se but by Fed policy – i.e., a man-made disaster.
August 26 Investment Focus The Impact on Stocks When the Fed "Chases" Oil-Price Spikes
Taking all episodes (since 1967) together we find – contrary to conventional wisdom – that a rising oil price alone has not been bearish for U.S. equities.
August 19 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
August 15 Investment Focus Interest-Rate Shifts Prior to Recessions
The U.S. has suffered eight recessions in the past fifty years, each of which was signaled by an inverted Treasury yield curve – by the rare condition of bond yields being below bill yields.
August 4 Investor Alert The Return of (and On) the 30-Year T-Bond
As expected, the U.S. Treasury Department announced yesterday that it would again issue 30-year bonds, after having suspended new issues in October 2001...
July 29 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
July 25 Investor Alert The Market Impact of Currency Manipulations in China and Malaysia
Consider what just happened (last week) with the currencies issued by the governments in China and Malaysia
July 15 The Capitalist Advisor The Mythical "Savings Glut" -- and the Likely Policy Response
Equity investors can benefit by understanding why the real bond yield is low, whether it’s likely to remain low or whether it might rise again.
July 8 Investor Alert Market Messages Amid Terrorism in London
World-wide market reaction to yesterday's terrorism in London wasn’t nearly as negative as many analysts expected it might be. What then might be gleaned from these market messages?
June 30 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
June 24 The Capitalist Advisor Another Nail in the Coffin for Property Rights
The U.S. Supreme Court yesterday ruled that it's perfectly legitimate for a local government to seize private property, pay a below-market price and hand it over to another private citizen or company that claims it can do more with the property -- i.e., better develop it and pay more taxes to the local government.
June 17 Investor Alert Will the Yield Curve Invert? Sir Alan's Attempt at a Parting Blow
President Bush says he’d like to break the rules and extend Sir Alan’s expiration date; isn’t it nice to see Mr. Bush working so hard to make the world safe for monetary monarchy?
June 10 The Capitalist Advisor The SEC: Consequential and Destructive: Can Christopher Cox Make It Less So?
An "excessive accumulation of complicated laws" surely characterizes the U.S. in recent years, especially laws violating the freedom of corporate executives, investment bankers and CPAs. The regulatory-litigation craze of recent years has sought to criminalize business mistakes and create scapegoats to deflect public anger and criticism away from the government policy-makers who actually caused the bear market of 2000-2002.
May 27 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
May 23 Investment Focus Whither Commodity Prices?
Historically, commodities have outperformed more-traditional asset classes (stocks, bonds and bills) -- and usually in consecutive- year periods -- far more frequently than most people realize.
May 16 Investor Alert Can the Dollar's Rally Persist?
Since the year began the U.S. dollar has appreciated between 2% and 5% against major currencies and by roughly 9% against gold. Can this rally persist?
May 6 Investment Focus Is That It For Corporate Bonds?
After underperforming U.S. Treasury bonds materially for roughly six years (1997-2002, inclusive), corporate bonds in the U.S. -- whether one considers investment-grade, high yield or convertible bonds -- have outperformed T-Bonds significantly since the end of 2002...
April 28 Investment Focus The Bearish Inflation Premium
History makes clear that inflation is bearish for stocks. Yet many economists and strategists have difficulty even defining inflation, let alone measuring or forecasting it.
April 25 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
April 8 Investor Alert CAPEX and Sector Performance Re-Visited
 The rate of growth in capital expenditures (CAPEX) by U.S. businesses will likely decelerate by half over the coming year -– and as we explain below, this deceleration will likely influence the relative performance of S&P 500 sectors.
March 31 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
March 21 Investor Alert Are There Parallels to the 1930s?
In re-visiting the ten-year periods following these two prior episodes we'll try to ascertain whether the S&P 500, over the coming five years, might share their fate -- that is, might suffer a weak and halting recovery followed by still further declines.
March 14 Investor Alert Is That It For Small-Cap Stocks?
 Is this the year the small-cap winning streak comes to an end?
March 7 Investor Alert Stability, 'Excess' and Conundrums
We will see yet another yield-curve inversion before Greenspan finally leaves the Fed next January?
February 25 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
February 16 Investor Alert The 'Mythical Housing Bubble' Re-Visited
Thirty months ago we told investors to ignore widespread claims about a U.S. 'housing bubble.'
February 9 The Capitalist Advisor The Policy Mix Index: The Fed Slowly Adds Its Poison
IFI's Policy Mix Index (PMI) -- a weighted grading system assessing monetary policy, fiscal policy, trade policy, regulatory policy and foreign policy-- has declined to 30.5 compared to a prior reading of 47.0.
February 2 The Capitalist Advisor Capitalism's Greatest Champion
Today marks the centennial of the birth of Ayn Rand -- capitalism's greatest intellectual champion.
January 31 Investor Alert Does January Predict the Markets Full-Year Performance?
The S&P 500 fell 2.53% this month. Therefore, says a popular investment newsletter, be afraid be very afraid because 2005 necessarily will be a bear market