gold outperformed s&p500 in 2011, and gold continues to outperform s&p500 ytd
one can of course choose other time periods but am not certain such would appropriate for investment-case tracking or more importantly, forward planning
in any case one should try to veer away from the same mistake as made by many other folks, insisting on comparing gold to a stock such as qcom or bac, or a stock index of any sort
because the correct read is to compare gold to any other currency.
below find just a pick from my e-mail tray, on running discourse with trader who sits on same investment committee as i, and i am trying best to save souls
From: J
Sent: Saturday, February 4, 2012 7:56 AM
Subject: Re: W cuts gold + Unemployment Drops to 8.3%; Payrolls in U.S. Jump 243,000
w/ re to bet of gold vs bac, i never took the bet because comparing a currency to a share is unbecoming
perhaps better to tee-up grek vs bac for laughes
and 50/50 fnv/slw vs bac for real
;0)
given overarching macro view per fiat money inflation scripture, all incoming watch n brief data must be filtered via critical analysis, and conclusions boxed as confirming details, counter-trend reactions, trend turn, or just noise.
should the incoming be found wanting, then must be faded as noise, and if opportune, raise high-conviction trades in alignment w/ high conviction
i am officially treating the jobs report as electioneering hopium to be faded as bls bs
qe3 has already been tee-ed up by europe and per swap, in league w/ america.
japan mumbling about the yen as the exports make more losses
china just got free-pass to tee-up something when ready and opportune
the fed and usa officialdom talking negative nominal rates, re-floating the housing titanic, as well as 'qe3' that would, in global sense, be qe4, qe5 or qe6, depending on japan / china timings
i am bullish, because gold, in comparison, is cheaper than it was when back at 254/oz
(i) re currencies
being fully faithful to the one true and elemental gold, as always in-place strategic response to need for true cash in view of too-many macro contingencies and enough officialdom imperatives; and besides, fed members seem to be okay w/ private pf holding of same gold. as a currency, gold is up in calibration w/ appointment w/ destiny
1999 Dec 31st USD 288/oz
2000 Dec 29th USD 274/oz -6%
2001 Dec 31st USD 279/oz +3%
2002 Dec 31st USD 348/oz +25%
2003 Dec 31st USD 416/oz +20%
2004 Dec 31st USD 438/oz +5%
2005 Dec 30th USD 519/oz +18%
2006 Dec 29th USD 638/oz +24%
2007 Dec 31st USD 833/oz +31%
2008 Dec 31st USD 889/oz +7%
2009 Dec 31st USD 1,095/oz +23%
2010 Dec 31st USD 1,421/oz +30%
2011 Dec 31st USD 1,567/oz +10%
2012 Feb 4th USD 1,726/oz +10% (plus cloud-atm dividends, seems good enough)
(ii) re shares
adding fnv and slw, along w/ cloud-atm on gdxj on pullbacks, all pullbacks, as answering call of duty of fiat money inflation and never-ending-n-always-the-same responses to diaper debt deflation
watching remx with interest, readying to short put / covered call to further build-up or be-torn-down position
have so far not pulled trigger on mcd covered calls, because more folks shall be eating big macs, before they get chain-dollar (substitution effect) adjusted by bls to ingest more chicken mcnuggets in lieu of burgers
(iii) re bonds
maintaining positioning in nly while watch n brief to see if negative interest rates reign supreme as further detailing of overarching macro and fundamental scripture; may short covered calls at opportune time in calibration w/ cloud-atm requirement
re jobs report,
am taking a/c of market-ticker.org
Employment Report: Blatant And Outrageous Lies
There are times when one questions a report as possibly being wrong or in error, and then there are times when one has to raise a flag and say "This is an intentionally false picture being presented by a government agency."
I'm in the latter camp with this one, and it is rare for me to brand something as not possibly wrong and in error, but intentionallyfraudulent.
Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 243,000 in January, and the unemployment rate decreased to 8.3 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Job growth was widespread in the private sector, with large employment gains in professional and business services, leisure and hospitality, and manufacturing. Government employment changed little over the month.
This looks really good; here's the chart that is on the front page:
I wish I could take this report, pick it apart at the household level, and find confirmation. Remember that last month the alleged 200,000 jobs that were gained were a phantom; when one looked inside the household data we found instead deterioration in both the employment participation rate and a decline in the absolute number of employed persons, while population rose.
That is, the actualcounts (as opposed to black-box statements) said that the labor picture deteriorated in December, contrary to the reported numbers.
This month it was worse. Far worse.
Let's start with the "base picture" that is causing the cheering:
That nice red line looks good, right? Well......
"Not in labor force" numbers leaped upward on an annualized basis (seasonally adjusted the "right way") and what's worse on a raw basis 1.572 million people exited the labor force last month.
This is reflected in the percentage of those not in the labor force as a percentage of the working-age population, which hit an all-time high going back to the initiation of the data series I've tracked since 1999:
That's 0.6% of the entire labor force that departed the working population in one month, three times the alleged drop in the unemployment rate. This means that internally, the numbers were even worse than they first appear!
Indeed, the total number of employed persons fell. A lot. To put a number on it, the total number of employed persons fell by 737,000 by actual count.
Now the cheerleaders will state that this is a common thing in January, and indeed it is. But the correct adjustment is to look at the population increase and subtract that back off as well. In other words, we take the loss of employment and add the population growth. When we do this we get a whopping 2.422 million in the wrong direction which was bested only by the -2.618 million in January of 2009 through the process of this downturn!
In fact other than January 2009 there has never been a single month in my table, which dates back to 1999, that put up a worse combined number. This "performance" rates a literal "second from utter despair and disaster", and the employment rate shows it:
This is not a strong report folks, and in fact documents an actual and ongoing collapse in the US labor force, despite the crooning on the mainstream media disinformation channels!
Discussion below (registration required to post)
From: W
Sent: Friday, February 3, 2012 11:21 PM
Subject: W cuts gold + Unemployment Drops to 8.3%; Payrolls in U.S. Jump 243,000
Lterm implications of this jobs data:
Fed may raise rates sooner than the late 2014 from earlier fomc announcement.
Gold will get hurt as qe3 is in doubt as well: gld -1.3%
usd rallying today
Tsys getting hurt
Fxi: +1.3pct
Xhb +3%
Bac +5.2%
I had made a gentlemen's bet of a beer w/ jay that bac out permforms gld in 2012.. I m more convicted
I cut out all gold in long posts, kept the sell puts
Added everyday this past week, bac, fxi, xhb, cha,ach
Bloomberg News, sent from my iPad.
Unemployment Drops to 8.3%; Payrolls in U.S. Jump 243,000
Employment climbed more than forecast in January and the U.S. jobless rate unexpectedly fell to the lowest in three years, casting doubt on the Federal Reserve’s pledge to keep interest rates low until late 2014.
The 243,000 increase in payrolls was the most since April and exceeded all forecasts in a Bloomberg News survey, Labor Department figures showed in Washington. The unemployment rate dropped to 8.3 percent, the lowest since February 2009.
Stocks and bond yields jumped as the report fueled optimism the economy is weathering the European debt crisis. The data may boost President Barack Obama’s re-election bid and come one week after Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said the economy wasn’t growing fast enough to push unemployment lower.
“Further Fed stimulus is probably limited at this point,” said John Silvia, chief economist at Wells Fargo Securities LLC in Charlotte, North Carolina. “The drop in the unemployment rate has to be very, very positive from the Fed’s point of view.”
The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rose 0.9 percent to 1,337.51 at 9:43 a.m. in New York. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note climbed to 1.91 percent from 1.82 percent late yesterday.
The median projection in the Bloomberg survey called for payrolls to rise by 140,000 after an initially reported 200,000 gain in December. Estimates of the 89 economists ranged from increases of 95,000 to 225,000. Revisions added a total of 60,000 jobs to payrolls in November and December. The Labor Department revised December’s gain to 203,000.
Broad-Based Gains
Gains in employment were broad-based, including manufacturing, construction, temporary help agencies, accounting firms, restaurants and retailers.
Employment, overtime and hours worked in factories increased as manufacturers, who have been leading the two-year recovery, ramped up production to rebuild inventories and meet global demand for their goods.
Assembly-line workers put in an average 41.9 hours of work each week, the most since January 1998, while overtime hours climbed to the highest since March 2007. Manufacturing payrolls increased by 50,000 in January, the most in a year.
Peoria, Illinois-based Caterpillar Inc. (CAT), the world’s biggest maker of earthmoving equipment, plans to hire more workers this year as it expands facilities, including in Victoria, Texas, and Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Chief Financial Officer Edward Rapp said yesterday.
“Those are the things that will lead to employment growth here,” Rapp said in an interview with Betty Liu on Bloomberg Television’s “In the Loop.”
Jobless Rate
The unemployment rate, derived from a separate survey of households, was forecast to hold at 8.5 percent, according to the survey median. The drop in the jobless rate reflected a 381,000 decrease in unemployment at the same time 250,000
Americans entered the labor force.
Private payrolls, which exclude government agencies, rose 257,000 in January after a revised gain of 220,000 the prior month, marking the biggest back-to-back gain since March-April. It was projected to climb by 160,000.
Employment at service-providers increased 162,000, the most in four months and reflecting faster job gains in retail, transportation and leisure and hospitality.
Tibco Software Inc. (TIBX) plans to hire 500 people in the U.S. this year as the economy improves and Europe works out its debt crisis, Vivek Ranadive, chief executive officer of the Palo Alto, California-based company said in an interview.
Hiring ‘Rapidly’
“We are hiring quite rapidly now, all in sales and service,” Ranadive said last week at the World Economic Forum’s annual conference in Davos, Switzerland. “It’s a good time to hire.”
Construction companies added 21,000 workers last month. Government payrolls decreased by 14,000 in January, reflecting cuts at the federal and local levels.
Average hourly earnings rose 0.2 percent to $23.29, today’s report showed. The average work week for all workers held at 34.5 hours.
The so-called underemployment rate -- which includes part- time workers who’d prefer a full-time position and people who want work but have given up looking -- decreased to 15.1 percent from 15.2 percent.
The Fed said on Jan. 25 after a two-day meeting that it would keep its benchmark lending rate low “at least” until late 2014 from a prior target of mid-2013.
‘On the Table’
Bernanke, speaking at a news conference after the statements, said that the option of a third round of large-scale bond purchases, known as quantitative easing, is still “on the table.”
“We still have a long way to go before the labor market can be said to be operating normally,” Bernanke told the House Budget Committee in Washington yesterday.
Today’s report may change the Fed’s thinking, said Michael Feroli, chief U.S. economist at JPMorgan Chase & Co. in New York. “The report definitely scales down the odds for QE3, particularly the drop in the unemployment rate,” Feroli said. “There is strength in the labor market.”
With today’s jobs report, the government issued its annual benchmark update, aligning the data with corporate tax records covering the period from April 2010 to March 2011. The Labor Department added 165,000 to the job count over the period.
The report also included methodology changes to the household survey, incorporating new population data from the decennial census, according to the Labor Department.
It also included changes to the figures used to adjust the data for seasonal swings affecting numbers back to January 2007.
To contact the reporter on this story: Bob Willis in Washington at bwillis@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Christopher Wellisz in Washington at cwellisz@bloomberg.net
Find out more about Bloomberg for iPad: m.bloomberg.com
Sent from my iPad |
