Monthly Archives: August 2015

The Real Message Of Plunging Commodities

The Chinese stock market recently saw its biggest selloff in 8 years as the dramatic 8.5% fall in Shanghai. “A” shares also rattled markets around the world. For the past few weeks China has been balancing its desire to keep the equity market from a complete meltdown, while still courting the international investment community with…

Exxon Oil Disappoints

Exxon Mobil continues to slide on the back of slumping oil prices. The company’s Q2 2015 earnings weren’t exactly what investors were looking for. Revenue came in at $74.1 billion, a big beat on the Wall Street consensus by $1.62 billion, but it’s still down 33.4% year over year. The big whiff was its miss on earnings….

Top 6 Myths Driving Oil Prices Down

“Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech.” Benjamin Franklin, Silence Dogood, The Busy-Body, and Early Writings I start with that quote because once the media, as well as politicians for that matter, have no accountability for actions or words then liberty will dissolve. Over the last…

Light Vehicle Sales Per Capita: A New Look At The Long-Term Trend

For the past few years we’ve been following a couple of transportation metrics: Vehicle Miles Traveled and Gasoline Volume Sales. For both series we focus on the population adjusted data. Let’s now do something similar with the Light Vehicle Sales report from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. This data series stretches back to January 1976. Since that first data…

China Stocks Open Marginally Higher As Regulators Unleash More &#

Chinese stocks are opening flat to marginally higher – still lower from Friday’s close – despite the government unleashing yet more ‘measures’ in the name of stability. Having banned 5 accounts – reportedly including Fed-favorite Citadel – China is blaming excess market volatility on short-term short-sellers and has put in place curbs on short-selling that…