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Strategies & Market Trends : Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Tommaso who wrote (24109)	2/22/2005 3:39:52 PM
From: mishedlo	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116555

I expect American agricultural exports to increase and food prices to remain firm and rise somewhat. Grains will depend on weather here and Brazil. Unless there is bad weather or bean rust, not sure much of anything happens. We are in a short covering rally right now, but a big one. I do not really know what gold and silver will do. For that matter I am not sure what oil does. I would expect industrial metals like copper and steel, especially the latter to take a big hit. Probably aluminum too. Mish

To: Tommaso who wrote (24109)	2/22/2005 3:40:34 PM
From: mishedlo	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 116555

Bush selects John Dugan for comptroller of the currency [I never heard of this position] Tuesday, February 22, 2005 7:59:12 PM afxpress.com WASHINGTON (AFX) -- President Bush intends to nominate John C. Dugan, a Washington-based lawyer specializing in banking and financial institution regulation, to be comptroller of the currency, the White House announced Tuesday. Dugan served as assistant secretary of the Treasury for domestic finance during the administration of President George H.W. Bush. Before that, he was Republican general counsel to the Senate Banking Committee. The comptroller of the currency is a Treasury Department official who is one of several federal banking regulators

To: Tommaso who wrote (24109)	2/22/2005 4:08:03 PM
From: mishedlo	Respond to of 116555

The bullish case for Euroland bonds It’s difficult to find someone bullish on the Euroland bond market these days. The German magazine Finanzen, in its January edition, reported that among a large group of financial institutions they polled, the lowest forecast for the 10 year German yield at the end of the year is 4.10%. That is more than 50 basis points above the current level (3.57% at the time of writing) and 32 basis points above the market discounted rate (3.78%). Institutional investors themselves seem quite negative as well and surveys still show an average short position in bonds relative to investors’ benchmarks. Question 1: who wants to be long in bonds? Not many... Question 2: who needs to be more invested in bonds? And here lies the crux: everybody. Question 3: does it make sense to invest at the current levels? My answer is yes. European bonds are attractive even at current levels. Not only on a global relative value basis, but also simply because European bonds are likely to perform better than their natural alternative: cash. Various factors will continue to support European bonds in 2005 - fundamental factors as well as technical ones. The conclusion of this piece is that low yields are here to stay. And that means getting used to yields of 4% and less on 10 year bonds and expecting a flatter yield curve going forward! Let me walk through the rationale, starting with the fundamentals. .... pimco.com