Investing

[Deleterious]

41 minutes ago, Screwball said:

Something happened around 8:20 this morning. Both gold and silver took a ****. Silver went from $121.785 to $106.61. It has now recovered some and its back to 112 ish. That was a big move in about an hour and 10 minutes.

In other news, MSFT is getting smoked to the tune of 12%. META is up around 7. 

Also of note, crude oil has been up the last three days and is now $65+ a barrel (WTI). It's been around 60 or lower for quite some time. Probably due to weakened dollar.

Odd about MS.  They beat earnings but it looks like people are concerned about how much they are spending on AI.  

[Deleterious]

 

[Deleterious]

Desperately looking for growth but doesn't realize how important stability is for growth.  

A Weaker Dollar Has Always Been Part of Trump’s Plan A lower exchange rate is one more lever for the U.S. to boost growth, but it chips away at America’s traditional role as a safe haven

Quote

In Trump’s view, a strong dollar, like higher interest rates, interferes with his priorities: faster growth, reshored manufacturing and a smaller trade deficit.

Historically, the dollar appreciated when the U.S. economy outperformed. That’s what happened in the decade before Trump’s election in 2024 and investors assumed that would continue under his policies. Even his tariffs were seen as positive for the dollar, since exchange rates tend to offset tariffs’ effects.

But in April, when Trump imposed steep tariffs on almost everyone, that traditional relationship broke down. Optimism about artificial intelligence has since delivered better-than-expected economic growth and one stock market record after another. Yet the dollar has ground lower and gold, a hedge against a falling dollar, has soared.

Trump’s trade wars and threat to annex Greenland, a semiautonomous territory of Denmark, a military ally, and his demands that the Fed bend to his political priorities have shaken confidence in international relations and U.S. institutions. Investors have responded by trying to reduce exposure to the dollar without reducing exposure to U.S. stocks, such as through hedging.

 

[gehringer_2]

4 hours ago, Screwball said:

MSFT is getting smoked to the tune of 12%

Still down 11% last in the session.

I have very mixed feelings about MSFT. They have been a terrible, terrible company through most of their history. They aren't as bad now, but are still a terrible SW house, so in a just world the market should have and should still be punishing them. The problem is that mostly via their past unscrupulous practices, we now are all pretty dependent on them sticking around to support the SW we've been forced to depend on.

[gehringer_2]

3 hours ago, Deleterious said:

Odd about MS.  They beat earnings but it looks like people are concerned about how much they are spending on AI.  

They've also had a real fiasco with recent Windows updates. Not an issue revenue wise but leaves a lot the public re-considering their incompetence.

Edited 16 hours ago by gehringer_2

[gehringer_2]

23 minutes ago, Deleterious said:

Desperately looking for growth but doesn't realize how important stability is for growth.  

A Weaker Dollar Has Always Been Part of Trump’s Plan A lower exchange rate is one more lever for the U.S. to boost growth, but it chips away at America’s traditional role as a safe haven

 

One place this shows up is that despite the 225 basis pt reductions the short term funds rate, 10yr Treasuries are virtually unmoved over the same period.

[Screwball]

3 hours ago, gehringer_2 said:

Still down 11% last in the session.

I have very mixed feelings about MSFT. They have been a terrible, terrible company through most of their history. They aren't as bad now, but are still a terrible SW house, so in a just world the market should have and should still be punishing them. The problem is that mostly via their past unscrupulous practices, we now are all pretty dependent on them sticking around to support the SW we've been forced to depend on.

I went through the digital transition from the beginning. At first, I thought, wow, this is pretty cool - tech guy an all. Then spent years in IT, or IT adjacent, and learned first hand how ugly it can get.

I tried to be the most safe, protected, unknown person in the digital world. I have now thrown in the towel. They know more about us than we do. Spit!

You can't beat it.

[Screwball]

3 hours ago, gehringer_2 said:

They've also had a real fiasco with recent Windows updates. Not an issue revenue wise but leaves a lot the public re-considering their incompetence.

Yes, there has been some updates that were not good. I redid a laptop to new drives and more memory recently and went to Win 11 at that time. Some of the updates killed settings I spent hours getting the way I wanted. Spit again!

[Screwball]

4 hours ago, Deleterious said:

Desperately looking for growth but doesn't realize how important stability is for growth.  

A Weaker Dollar Has Always Been Part of Trump’s Plan A lower exchange rate is one more lever for the U.S. to boost growth, but it chips away at America’s traditional role as a safe haven

 

  

4 hours ago, Deleterious said:

Desperately looking for growth but doesn't realize how important stability is for growth.  

A Weaker Dollar Has Always Been Part of Trump’s Plan A lower exchange rate is one more lever for the U.S. to boost growth, but it chips away at America’s traditional role as a safe haven

 

Disclosure; That article is behind a paywall for me.

This is a "market" thing. When the value of the dollar (against another currency) goes down, the "purchasing power" of our money is less. Market 101. The dollar index they are talking about is the value of the US dollar against a basket of other currencies so it is going down against many.

Depending on what flavor of economic/fiscal theory you buy into, this comes into play. In this case, a cheaper dollar is good for US exports. On the other hand, it is bad for "our" consumer because our money doesn't go as far. 

When TPTB decided globalization was a good thing and took advantage of environmental and wage arbitrage through slave labor and 3rd world countries to exploit and dump waste, our goose was cooked. We went though the industrialization era of mass produced automobiles and other products - the hey day of American workers - to shipping our jobs and production all over the world. The giant sucking sound as Ross Perot said. I lived it, I watched it. I even helped it happen, and I hate that. But I had to eat.

It's too late. All the jobs we lost are not coming back, and on top of that, any that can be replaced by a robot, will be. Even if they tried, it would take years. That's assuming the ****wads running this place actually give one good ****. But they don't.

I don't know if they are all actually this economically illiterate, or just play the role on TV.

 

[Deleterious]

Supposed to announce it this morning.

Don't know much about him.  I read the following and gave up.

Trump Expected to Pick Kevin Warsh as Fed Chair

Quote

This time, Warsh has aligned himself more closely with Trump’s views—embracing the president’s tariff policies after years as a free-trade advocate and calling last year for the Fed to cut interest rates faster.