Publications

Research Reports - Chronological

2012 Reports

Date Report Title
February 3, 2012   Track Record 2011
January 31, 2012 Capitalist Advisor Betting Odds Say Romney Will Be the Republican Nominee and GOP Will Regain the Senate – but Obama Will Remain President
January 25, 2012 Investor Alert The Fed's Extension of ZIRP to Late-2014 Justifies Bullish Stance on U.S. T-Bonds
January 11, 2012   Outlook 2012
January 5, 2012 Investment Focus The Worst of the Housing Debacle is Over

2011 Reports

Date Report Title
December 29, 2011 Investment Focus A Robust Economy Requires More
Investment, Not More Consumption
December 22, 2011 InterMarket Forecaster InterMarket Forecaster
December 19, 2011 Capitalist Advisor Obama's Policies Causing Dependency, Driving Would-Be Workers to the Couch
December 14, 2011 Capitalist Advisor Investment Implications of Fiscal Reform Plans in Europe
December 6, 2011 Investor Alert U.S. Banks Not Overly-Exposed to PIIGS Debt
November 28, 2011 InterMarket Forecaster InterMarket Forecaster
November 11, 2011 Capitalist Advisor Approval Ratings, Swing States & Obama's Re-Election
November 8, 2011 Capitalist Advisor The Jobless Rate, Stocks & Obama's Re-Election
November 4, 2011 Capitalist Advisor The U.S. Economic Recovery & Obama's Re-Election
A year from now American voters will decide whether to re-elect President Barack Obama or instead choose the GOP candidate. In our view Mr. Obama is unfit to be America's president and doesn't deserve re-election, yet strong evidence clearly suggests that he'll win re-election anyway.
October 25, 2011 InterMarket Forecaster InterMarket Forecaster
October 14, 2011 Capitalist Advisor Don't Trust the Stock Market to Forecast Recessions
Forecasters use many factors to anticipate the business cycle, but if forced to choose between the fixed-income market and the equity market, when forecasting U.S. recessions, they should...
October 6, 2011 Capitalist Advisor The TARP After Three Years: It Made Things Worse, Not Better
TARP didn't "prevent" the financial crisis of 2008 but contributed to it, as did the Fed's previous inversion of the Treasury yield curve and the subsequent insolvencies of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. U.S. bank stocks were recovering before TARP was adopted on October 2008, up 52% in the prior few months, but then plunged while TARP was being debated and by 72% in the five months after it was enacted.
September 30, 2011 Investor Alert The Fed's Old 'Twist' – and Shout-Out for Yet Another U.S. Recession
September 27, 2011 InterMarket Forecaster InterMarket Forecaster
September 16, 2011 Investor Alert  Impact of Greece and Other Would-Be Deadbeats
September 7, 2011Capitalist AdvisorObama’s Belabored, Beleaguered Economy
August 31, 2011Investment Focus
The Yield Curve as a Forecaster Amid the Fed’s ZIRP
August 25, 2011InterMarket ForecasterInterMarket Forecaster
August 18, 2011InterMarket ForecasterA Brief History of the U.S. Dollar and Its Debasement
August 11, 2011InterMarket ForecasterDespite U.S. Debt Trajectory, Fed’s Extended Zero-Rate Policy Ensures Low T-Bond Yield & Higher Gold Price
July 29, 2011 Investor Alert Revisiting the Bullish Case for Emerging Markets
July 26, 2011 InterMarket Forecaster InterMarket Forecaster
July 22, 2011 Capitalist Advisor Sovereign Debt Turmoil: Political Causes & Investment Consequences
Sovereign debt defaults are nothing new, historically--but what's new is that they're now becoming more typical of sovereigns in "developed" nations. The root problem is the welfare-warfare state, which is going bankrupt in slow motion. The U.S. is no exception. Although many people worry about sovereign debt defaults, few oppose its cause, the welfare-warfare state itself.
July 15, 2011 Investment Focus Corporate vs. Treasury Yields as Business Lending Revives
June 30, 2011 Investor Alert Revisiting the Bullish Case for Consumer Cyclicals
June 27, 2011 InterMarket Forecaster InterMarket Forecaster
June 14, 2011 Investor Alert Is Another Financial Crisis Imminent?
June 7, 2011 Investment Focus The Finance-Energy Gap as a Forecaster of Stocks
May 27, 2011 Capitalist Advisor A Brief History of the U.S. National Debt & Its Limit
May 25, 2011 Investment Focus The Myth That a Weak Dollar Boosts Equities
May 20, 2011 InterMarket Forecaster InterMarket Forecaster
May 11, 2011 Investor Alert The Commodity-Price Reversal: Don't Worry, Be Happy
April 25, 2011 Investor Alert Fed Money-Printing and the Rise in Global Bond Yields
April 25, 2011 Investor Alert Fed Money-Printing and the Rise in Global Bond Yields
April 18, 2011 Capitalist Advisor Economic Stagnation and Punitive Tax Burdens on the Rich
April 7, 2011 Investor Alert Does the Oil Price Spike Signal Another Recession?
March 31, 2011 Investor Alert The "Who" vs. "What" of Investing: The Irrelevance of PIMCO on T-Bond Returns
March 25, 2011 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
March 11, 2011 Investor Alert Bottoms Up: The Equity Rebound After Two Years
March 7, 2011 Investment Focus Oil's Jump: It's Bernanke, Not Gadhafi
February 28, 2011 Capitalist Advisor

Bank Profits vs. Fed Profits
There's been a significant revival in the profitability of U.S. commercial banks (and the financial sector generally) over the past year, although the level of profits has yet to revisit the record level registered before the recession of 2007-2009 (see Figure One), due to a below-par rebound in lending – the most profitable activity. Tragically, the Federal Reserve is now...
February 24, 2011 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
February 9, 2011 Investor Alert The Corporate Bond Winning Streak
The same Fed policy that boosts corporate bonds, with a lag – a steeply-sloped yield curve and inflation – doesn't necessarily help nominal Treasury bonds.
February 1, 2011 Investor Alert Egypt, Crude Oil and Emerging-Market Equities
January 25, 2011 - Outlook 2011
January 17, 2011 Capitalist Advisor U.S. Public Profligacy on the Cheap: How Long Can It Last?
January 7, 2011 Investor Alert U.S. Equity Performance When the GOP Controls Congress vs. a Democratic President

 

2010 Reports

Date Report Title
December 29, 2010 Investor Alert The Revival of Corporate Profits – Revisited
December 23, 2010 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
December 16, 2010 Investor Alert The Continuing Case for TIPS - Revisited
December 6, 2010 Capitalist Advisor

The Widely-Ignored U.S. Fiscal Turnaround
Amid the just-released report on the U.S. federal deficit by an Obama-appointed commission, it's an appropriate time to review the state of federal finances since the U.S. recession ended in June 2009, and to note how the fiscal situation turned for the better last February and has since undeniably improved, despite every effort by Keynesian policymakers to spend the nation into oblivion and insolvency.
November 30, 2010  

Latest European Debt "Crisis" Still Overblown
Six months ago, when the first wave of what we characterized as over-wrought fears of European sovereign debt troubles swept through financial journalism and market commentary, we downplayed the materiality of the risks Europe faced and reiterated our bullish case for continental stocks.1 Fears last spring mostly surrounded Greece, Spain and Italy, but now mainly surround Ireland. In both cases, we contend that the sensationalist and pessimistic accounts largely obscure many positive facts.
November 24, 2010 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
November 16, 2010 Investor Alert California's Greek Tragedy
November 5, 2010 Investor Alert QE2 and the Iceberg
October 31, 2010 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
October 20, 2010 Investor Alert The Currency Warriors – and Their Collateral Damage
Both the U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve want a weaker dollar, one that declines steadily in value—and they're getting it (just watch gold). Policymakers falsely claim that a weaker dollar will boost U.S. growth, by curbing imports. This is currency protectionism—and utter nonsense—but it inflicts collateral damage, by repelling incoming foreign capital, which the U.S. sorely needs.
October 18, 2010 Capitalist Advisor Don't Expect Miracles After Election Day
October 11, 2010 Capitalist Advisor The Burden of the TARP Trap
Contrary to the opinion of most investors, we contend that TARP has been a disaster – one of the top ten policy blunders of the past decade – because it's been an unjust grand larceny inflicted on innocent taxpayers and a burdensome, costly snare imposed on over 700 banks and institutions, most of which were compelled to take government loot. [...]
September 25, 2010 Investment Focus What About "Gold for the Long Run?"
The decade-long decline and stagnation in U.S. equities is worrisome to those who welcome moneymaking and prosperity. Yet despite the depth and duration of these results, many Wall Street professionals still favor stocks, while de-emphasizing (or often ridiculing) holdings in commodities like gold. Even those economists who foresee only doom for U.S. equities repeatedly deride gold as likely to under-perform all other asset classes – even silly pork derivatives like Spam.1 In sum, most investment professionals have an unshakeable faith in Jeremy Siegel's dictum about the supposedly inevitable benefit of holding "stocks for the long run," even though gold has surpassed U.S. stocks and bonds for more than a decade, and [...]
September 20, 2010 Investor Alert The Meaning of Negative Real Yields
September 9, 2010 Investment Focus Fears of Deflation are Ridiculous
There's no deflation in the U.S. today, there hasn't been deflation for more than 50 years, and market signals say none is forthcoming. Even if we were to get deflation, it wouldn't hurt equities, profits or economic growth.
August 30, 2010 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
August 26, 2010 Investor Alert Revisiting a Bullish Stance on Emerging Markets
August 20, 2010 Investment Focus Fed Policy Mirrors the Bank of Japan – and Thus Depresses T-Bond Yields
Tragically, the Fed and U.S. Treasury are copying the futile and failed policies of the Bank of Japan and Tokyo's Ministry of Finance from the 2000s. It's this policy – not the risk of a "double-dip" recession or "deflation" – that's lowering T-Bond yields.
August 15, 2010 Investor Alert Uneven Recoveries (Like the Current One) are Normal
Every economic recovery in modern history seems riddled with complaints about how tentative and prolonged it is, and with so little job creation — even though that's the norm.
August 6, 2010 Capitalist Advisor Frank-n-Dodd and the Financials - Part I
July 31, 2010 Investment Focus Be It Inflation or Deflation, Gold Performs Very Well
July 26, 2010 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
July 16, 2010 Capitalist Advisor The Paradox of Profligacy
Typically, a more leveraged and less creditworthy borrower must pay a higher interest rate than does a less leveraged, more creditworthy borrower (collateral aside) and the principle holds true regardless of the phase of the business cycle we're in, whether recession, recovery or expansion. Rational markets require that a riskier borrower pay more than a safer one – that the profligate pay more than the frugal – whether as an individual or a business. Unfortunately, this same, prudent principle doesn't always hold true for government borrowers. [...]
July 9, 2010 Capitalist Advisor The Macro-Climate Trumps All Else
Whenever I re-read the book Security Analysis, the investment bible of Graham and Dodd, I'm transported to a past era when investment life was much simpler and easier. I could [...]
June 30, 2010 Capitalist Advisor America's Longest War: Why Failure is Washington's Preferred Option
The so-called "war" in Afghanistan, begun in October 2001, soon after the 9/11 Muslim terror attacks on New York City and Washington, is now the longest on record in U.S. history. This prolonged, tortuous quagmire is wholly unnecessary – and thus a profound tragedy. The Bush Administration is largely to blame. But now consider [...]
June 23, 2010 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
June 11, 2010 Investor Alert The Continuing Case for TIPS
June 4, 2010 Investor Alert The Real Story on Currencies and Stocks
Perhaps the most relevant financial story of the year so far has been the appreciation of the U.S. dollar and pronounced weakening of the euro, a trend attributed, by most observers, to over-leverage (and resulting debt woes) in the so-called "PIGS" of Southern Europe (Portugal, Italy, Greece, Spain).1 While there's some truth to this insight, it's important for investors to recognize that [...]
May 28, 2010 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
May 21, 2010 Investor Alert Latest "Crisis" is Much Ado About (Almost) Nothing
"Crisis" is an over-used word in tumultuous times. The media use it to lure a shrinking pool of viewers. Politicians use it to justify their wealth-smashing interventions (and power). As H.L. Mencken once observed, "The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed – and hence clamorous to be led to safety – by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." While the recent month swoon in stock prices (-8%) isn't wholly imaginary – nor inexplicable – it's also best interpreted as a healthy pullback. In our view, [...]
May 10, 2010 Capitalist Advisor How Fed Policy Busts Washington's Budget
Qhen Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke testifies before Congress, he typically warns members against profligate deficit spending. But Bernanke's own policies – like Alan Greenspan's before him – have been a major cause of Washington's widening budget deficit. Since most Congressmen don't know this, they accept the criticism and even praise Bernanke for his wonderful policymaking skills and conscientious fiscal advice. It would all be a huge charade – if it weren't so reckless. Figure One nearby is a reminder [...]
May 5, 2010 Investment Focus Corporate vs. Treasury Yields as Relative Holdings Shift
Even though U.S. T-Bond yields skyrocketed by 175-225 basis points, trough (December 2008) to peak (April 2010), their subsequent-month drop of 35-45 basis points has led analysts and bond managers to doubt the bearish case on T-Bonds.1 Yet our models, ...
April 30, 2010 Capitalist Advisor Representation Without Taxation
The America of the past century has been the near opposite of that of the 1700s. Instead of a populace demanding a limited and laissez-faire government, its a populace which wants (as evidenced by election results) bigger and ever-more invasive government. Instead of fair taxation with representation, the America of recent decades has endorsed an increasing degree of representation without taxation. [...]
April 26, 2010 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
April 15, 2010 Investor Alert Yes, the Recession Ended Last Summer -- and Don't Expect a 'Double Dip'
April 7, 2010 Investor Alert Greece Government Debt and all That
March 31, 2010 Capitalist Advisor Ominous Trends in the Burden of the Jobless on Taxpayers
March 25, 2010 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
March 16, 2010 Investment Focus Profligate Public Finance: US versus Japan
March 9, 2010 Investor Alert The Year Since The Bottom: What's Next?
February 28, 2010 Capitalist Advisor Doctor Doom Revisited
February 19, 2010 InterMarket Forecaster The InterMarket Forecaster
February 12, 2010 Special Report Track Record 2009
January 25, 2010 Special Report Outlook 2010
January 13, 2010 Investment Focus Equity Volatility Revisited
Indeed, volatility has plummeted over the past year, as stock prices soared. But what's the year-ahead signal for volatility? Is volatility likely to decline again (or by as much) in 2010 as it did in 2009?
January 13, 2010 Investor Alert Prospects for Investment Returns in the Coming Decade
What can an investor reasonably expect to gain in the coming decade?

 

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