Yesterday it was the French, with record high unemployment and record low bond yields. Today, it is the turn of the Italians as the unemployment rate rose to 13.2% – the highest since records began – as bond yields continue to plumb new “lower rates will spur lending which will spur economic growth which will create jobs”…
The correlation between gold and the national debt was clear for 13 years. It made perfect sense in a free market. You can’t print more gold. It is a relatively scarce metal that has represented wealth for centuries. Fiat currency can be printed at will by corrupt bankers and politicians. Every paper currency ever created eventually reached…
A quick “glance under the hood” shows us which sectors have been hot in 2014, which have not and which could be leaders for 2015. The nine SPDR Sector ETFs have been telling us about the advances and declines of the various sectors throughout the year. While many of us had our own expectations about…
The world is awash in oil, I’m hearing. The problem is, it’s fairly expensive oil. Take for example Canada. The country has managed to increase its production of oil by a million barrels a day over the last decade. But almost all of that increase has come from oil sands. If you consider only conventional…
There was much hope for America’s struggling brick-and-mortar retail outlets that was aided by plunging gasoline prices, Americans would come out in droves to chase Black Friday (and increasingly Thanksgiving) blockbuster deals on the ground across America’s increasingly troubled shopping malls and retail outlets. And while there was the usual hysteria on select occasions (see this…
With nearly nearly 33% of exhibitors coming from France in the CES Eureka Park, the EU member state will be sending over 100 startups to the event while the U.S. will be sitting at around 20. With the advent of Connected Hardware & Internet of Things, the once-passée CES has seen a revival in the last 3…
Colgate-Palmolive (CL) is one of the largest publicly traded personal products companies. The company has a market cap of $63 billion which is large for the personal products industry; larger than Kleenex maker Kimberly-Clark’s (KMB) $43 billion market cap, but significantly smaller than Procter & Gamble’s (PG) $244 billion market cap. Colgate-Palmolive has an extremely long dividend history. The…
Throughout the last few months, we have identified three forces that are shaping the investment climate: the economic and monetary divergence that favors the U.S., the decline in commodity prices, and a slowing of China. These forces remain very much intact, and if anything, have strengthened and reinforcing each other. The unexpected upward revision…
Seoul, with its rapidly growing startup ecosystem is gaining precedence as one of the most promising entrepreneurial hubs in the world. Home to two of the most influential global tech leaders, Samsung and LG, the perception of Seoul has traditionally been of a corporate hub. But this is now rapidly changing, as a new breed…
Small businesses often capitalize on their less formal, more personal, approach to their customers and clients. While there is nothing wrong with this approach in general, it should not extend to business agreements and legal matters. On the contrary, a small business should insist on reducing all agreements to writing just like their larger counterparts…
