International Forecaster Weekly

Market bull Phil Orlando believes the Fed will raise interest rates six times over the next two years to reign in significant ongoing consumer price increases.

Last week he said, “…we will see two quarter-point rate hikes…in the second half of [2022], and perhaps another four quarter-point rate hikes over the course of [2023].”

In other words, Orlando and his firm, Fidelity Hermes, see the Fed Funds rate rising from its current 0% to 0.25% range to 1.75% to 2.0% two years from now.

One measure of that is the latest JOLTS ratio, showing that for every job opening in September, there was significantly less than one person actually seeking a job.

The 0.7 job seekers available per job is an all-time low, with the exception of one month — April 2019 — when the stat hit 0.69. That’s according to the government’s Job Openings and Labor Turnover report, released last Friday.

Inflation came in like a hot potato last month.

At 6.2% for all items, virtually no economist wants to touch it, politicians just want to play the blame game, and few everyday Americans see a silver lining.

There are always a ton of ways to slice and dice inflation, including what it actually is and the best way to measure it. 

Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping have nothing over Xi Jinping. 

Mao and Deng are the only two Chinese Communist Party Leaders to pen a so-called “historical resolution”…that is, until now.

Last Friday, the DJIA, S&P 500 and NASDAQ all closed up. But too big to fail banks lost billions of dollars in market cap. 

Among the biggest losers were Citigroup — closing down 1.7%, Credit Suisse — down 1.6%, and Deutsche Bank — down 1.3%. 

In the second tier, JPMorgan Chase, Barclays and Goldman Sachs closed down between 0.1% and 0.4%.

Their problem appeared to be the flattening of the Treasury yield curve.

Corporate America is shelling out higher wages to employees, and business executives expect to continue doing so.

According to its new quarterly survey released today by the National Association of Business Economists, a record high 58% say they increased pay at their companies during the 3rd quarter.

            Just about the same number expects that trend to continue in the months ahead.

So, what do you do after you buy 100 gold or 1,000 silver coins? More to the point, where do you store them?

This latter question is perhaps the most important you can ask — whether you’re a new precious metal investor or a seasoned veteran. 

Why? Because your investment’s long-term security — and growth — depends on storing it in a safe place and being able to access it when you want to “cash” it in.

Yes, it seems so elementary, doesn’t it, dear Watson? 

But what good is your nest egg if it’s not there when it hatches, i.e., when you want or need to cash some of it in?

And the winner is…

Mega money beast Goldman Sachs took back the crown for the top equity trading desk on Wall Street.

Revenue at the too big to fail bank edged out that of competitor Morgan Stanley, which is usually Number One.

Yesterday, the Federal Reserve announced changes to its rules regulating its officials' personal investment practices.

The changes come after recent scandals over some members' trading practices raised eyebrows and produced a firestorm of criticism.

Everyone — from Vegas casinos to online startups DraftKings and PredictIt — is accepting bets for who will be the Fed’s next chair.

Wednesday’s article listed a handful of reasons why the coming months could be opportunistic for gold. Add one more to that list… 

Investors are beginning to worry about stagflation — a combination of lower growth and higher inflation — which hasn't been a thing since the early 1980s.

But too big to fail Goldman Sachs reported today that "stagflation" was the most common word in client conversations last week as equity market volatility remains elevated.

This week, their clients are focused on the risks posed to growth by supply chain challenges and rising energy costs.

Don’t look now, but the economic recovery, rebound or whatever you want to call it has stalled.

It’s not exactly drowning in quicksand (at least not yet), but it’s definitely mired in pools of thickening sludge.

The U.S. reported disappointing job growth for the second straight month and for the third time in six months.

Just 194,000 nonfarm jobs were added to what has got to be characterized as an restless economy in September — a significantly slower pace than the 366,000 number a month earlier. 

Economists had been expecting to reach at least 500,000 this time around.

Congress managed to avert a recurring crisis last Thursday, as it passed a short-term appropriations bill that will keep the lights on in the hallowed halls of Washington through December 3rd. 

That leaves members with the rest of what Hayes Brown calls “the to-do list from hell” — at the top of which is what to do about the debt ceiling.

Buy your holiday gifts now.

That’s the message from retail executives, who are warning that both shoppers and investors should brace for a challenging holiday season.

As Big Business continues raking in record profits so far this year, two things are popping out:

Businesses have been investing more on improvements than any point before the pandemic, according to Oxford Economics.

Yet, the Delta variant is keeping more companies cautious about how to invest the huge wad of cash they have at their disposal. 

And that’s led to corporate spending on stock buybacks outpacing capital expenditures in 2021.