Baltic Dry Index. 1703 +27 Brent Crude 74.78
J. K. Galbraith.
We have reached month end and dress up
Tuesday. Can the stock perma bulls retake the markets from trade war, gun shy, scaling
back investors? Is it all over for the
rigged FANG leadership? Was late January the peak and it’s all downhill for
most stocks from here? Can Tesla
survive?
If dress up Tuesday becomes dress down Tuesday,
as money managers start adjusting to a second half getting off to a poor trade
war start, Trump’s “easy to win” trade war may have just killed off the stock
market’s FANG golden goose.
In any great organization it is far, far safer to be wrong with the majority than to be right alone.
John Kenneth Galbraith.
July 31, 2018 / 1:42 AM
Asian shares slip on tech rout, focus shifts to BOJ
SYDNEY
(Reuters) - Asian share markets weakened on Tuesday, taking cues from the rout
in global technology shares while the yen edged higher ahead of the Bank of
Japan’s rate review, at which it could flag a shift away from its massive
monetary stimulus.
Japan's
Nikkei .N225
fell 0.5 percent. South Korea's Kospi index KS11 dipped 0.1 percent despite
solid second-quarter results from Samsung Electronics (005930.KS) which posted a 5.7 percent rise
in profit.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan .MIAPJ0000PUS was mostly unchanged at 543.23 as were Australian shares .
Overnight in Wall Street, the Dow .DJI and the S&P 500 .SPX each lost 0.6 percent and the Nasdaq .IXIC skidded 1.4 percent.
The technology index .SPLRCT crumbled 1.8 percent overnight as disappointing results from Facebook (FB.O), Twitter (TWTR.N) and Netflix (NFLX.O) spurred concerns about future growth for a sector that has led U.S. equities to record highs.
----Elsewhere, most major currencies stuck to narrow trading ranges ahead of several central bank decisions. The U.S. Federal Reserve concludes its policy meeting on Wednesday and the Bank of England is seen raising interest rates on Thursday. Month-end macroeconomic data is also due from China on Wednesday.
The British pound GBP= held at $1.3132, drifting away from a more than 10-month trough of $1.2955 touched earlier in July.
The euro EUR=EBS was flat at $1.1707 after two consecutive sessions of gains. The dollar index .DXY, which measures the greenback against a basket of major currencies, was flat at 94.332.
In commodities, U.S. crude CLc1 eased 3 cents to $70.10 a barrel after a sharp rally overnight while Brent LCOc1 settled up 68 cents at $74.97.
Spot gold was a tad firmer at $1,223 an ounce.
More
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-global-markets/asian-shares-slip-on-tech-rout-focus-shifts-to-boj-idUKKBN1KL02R
Morgan Stanley Says Correction Worse Than February Is Building
By Dani BurgerDespite more than 85 percent of S&P 500 members beating analyst estimates, the type of pro-cyclical companies you’d expect to surge amid banner earnings have been falling behind. Not even the biggest winners of the year are posting reliable gains, as earnings misses from the likes of Netflix Inc. and Facebook Inc. hamper the momentum trade.
As such, risks to the July stock rally are building, and with peaking
growth rates and extended positioning, the three-day slide that started
Thursday will only get worse, Morgan Stanley analysts said.
“The selling has just begun and this correction will be the biggest
since the one we experienced in February,” Morgan Stanley equity strategists
led by Mike Wilson wrote in a note Monday. “It could very well have a greater
negative impact on the average portfolio if it’s centered on tech, consumer
discretionary and small caps, as we expect.”
The Nasdaq Composite Index fell 1.3 percent as of 2:48 p.m. in New York,
bringing its three-day slide to 3.7 percent. The measure sank almost 10 percent
from a January high through Feb. 8.
Some below-the-surface moves are setting the market up for a bigger
downturn. One of the more curious developments since the reporting season began
has been lagging value stocks -- those priced cheaply to their assets.
Typically, strong earnings reports spur investors to bid up underpriced stocks.
However, a market-neutral version of value has tumbled for the past three
weeks.
“Maybe this reflects a realization that while the results are great they
may also represent a peak,” Sanford C. Bernstein analysts, led by Inigo Fraser
Jenkins, wrote in a note Monday. “Analysts covering value stocks are already
‘maxed out’ in terms of their upgrading of earnings forecasts for such names;
we struggle to see how they can get even more positive.”
More
What to Watch in Commodities: Oil, El Nino, Arcelor, Trade, ADM
By Thomas Biesheuvel, Alex Longley, and Mario Parker
30 July 2018, 01:05 GMT+1 Updated
on 30 July 2018, 05:22 GMT+1
Commodity investors have a mass of information to deal with in the coming
week: earnings season is in full flow; the oil market is tracking OPEC’s
decision to add supplies; and there are likely to be developments on global
trade spats, especially on China. Raw materials are set to close out July with another loss after retreating in
June. Let’s see what August brings.Among the highlights, tanker-tracking figures will give the first full month of data since OPEC’s decision to add more barrels, and with weather woes dominating the news, there’s a key forecast on the outlook for an El Nino. Among top companies reporting, we’ve a focus on ArcelorMittal, as well as Archer-Daniels-Midland Co. and Bunge Ltd. Investors will also watch for earnings from BP Plc and Rio Tinto Group, Caterpillar Inc. and output data from Glencore Plc.
Troubled Waters
From ship tracking to geopolitics, there’s plenty to keep an eye on in the oil market this week. There’ll be the first full month of tanker tracking since the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies agreed to ramp up output in June. Bloomberg will also release its monthly output estimate for the group. OPEC’s biggest producer, Saudi Arabia, said that its July exports would be “roughly equal” to June, but expect to see some increases from its allies.
We’ll also be
watching developments in the Bab
el-Mandeb Strait after Saudi Arabia said that it was halting
shipments via that choke point after two tankers came under attack from Houthi
militia. Look for signals of whether flows from other nations will continue and
what the Saudis’ next moves will be.
The world’s weather has been pretty feisty
in recent weeks, with extreme
heat seen from Texas to Japan, and the blame being laid on a kink in
the jet stream. There may be more trouble ahead, with a possible El Nino
looming. Australia’s forecasters deliver their next update on the outlook on
Tuesday.
The pattern, driven by a warming of the
equatorial Pacific Ocean, can profoundly impact the planet, baking swathes of
Asia, making it wetter in California and risking drought in Brazil. Australia’s
Bureau of Meteorology has an
El Nino watch in place, and next up would be an alert should the outlook firm
up. The U.S. Climate Prediction Center has already put the chances of an El
Nino at 70
percent between December and February.
More
Crooks and Scoundrels Corner
The bent, the seriously bent, and the totally doubled over.
In trade war news, “so far so good,” as the man who fell off the Empire
State building said as fell past the 60th floor. It’s all about what
comes next.
If economists could
manage to get themselves thought of as humble, competent people on a level with
dentists, that would be splendid.
John Maynard Keynes.
July 31, 2018 / 2:59 AM
China's July manufacturing growth slows on trade dispute, softer domestic demand
BEIJING
(Reuters) - Growth in China’s manufacturing sector slowed more than expected in
July, as the worsening trade dispute with Washington, bad weather and weaker domestic
demand weighed on factory activity.
The official Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) released on Tuesday fell
to 51.2 in July, from 51.5 in June and below the 51.3 in a Reuters poll of
economists. It was also the lowest index reading since February but remained
above the 50-point mark that separates growth from contraction for a 24th
straight month.
Firms were hurt by trade frictions, rain and high temperatures in July,
which is also a cyclically slow season for some sectors, said statistics bureau
official Zhao Qinghe in a statement released with the data.
The gauge of factory activity is the first major reading of the world’s
second largest economy since the second quarter of this year, when China logged
a modest slowdown in growth, weighed by government efforts to tackle debt risks
and escalating U.S. trade tensions.
ANZ Senior China Economist Betty Wang said while trade tensions were a
factor in the moderation in growth, the ongoing deleveraging campaign and
unfavourable weather were bigger drivers behind the slowdown.
The PMI’s July new export orders index remained in contraction in July,
but did not change from the previous month’s reading of 49.8, a sign trade
conditions have not worsened significantly.
However,
the sub-index on imports, viewed as a proxy for domestic demand, dipped into
contraction in July and was the lowest since February.
Earlier this month, the United States imposed tariffs on $34 billion of
Chinese imports. China promptly responded by levying taxes on the same value of
U.S. products, leading U.S. President Donald Trump to threaten tariffs on $500
billion of Chinese goods.
China’s June exports growth cooled slightly from the previous month but
remained solid, as exporters rushed to move shipments before tariffs went into
effect on July 6.
More
Every
generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before
it, and wiser than the one that comes after it.
George
Orwell.
Technology Update.
With events happening fast in the
development of solar power and graphene, I’ve added this section. Updates as
they get reported. Is converting sunlight to usable cheap AC or DC energy
mankind’s future from the 21st century onwards?
Technique to easily fabricate ceramic films used as OPV inter-layers developed
Researchers develop coating technique to create ceramic ultra-thin films using solution
Date:
July 26, 2018
Source:
Osaka University
Summary:
Researchers developed a technique for coating Zinc related oxide (ZnOx, ZnOHx)
simply by depositing the films in a solution process using the Metal Organic
Decomposition method at ambient temperature and pressure without heating. They
also demonstrated that their thin films produced by this technique were useful
as buffer layers for OPV cells and that the films achieved a power conversion
efficiency equivalent to that of ZnO thin films produced by conventional
methods involving sintering.
As environmental and energy issues have become increasingly aggravated
in recent years, photovoltaic (PV) cells are drawing attention as a new energy
source. However, since the cost of silicon PV cells is still high, it's
important to reduce the cost of PV cells. On the other hand, organic photovoltaic
(OPV) cells using organic compounds have several advantages: they are
lightweight, flexible, and sophisticated, and their production cost is low. For
these reasons, they are anticipated as next-generation PV cells.
As for the development of OPV cells, in addition to organic
semiconductors that absorb light, (1) materials for buffer layers in OPV cells
(buffer layers, or OPV inter-layers, that efficiently separate electrons and
holes produced from light energy and transport electrons and holes to each electrode
and (2) the design of OPV devices are actively being studied. In these
circumstances, one of the techniques that grabs the most attention is a spin
coating technique to create Zinc related oxide (ZnOx, ZnOHx) ultra-thin films
(ceramic films) using a solution.
OPV cells using ZnO thin films as buffer layers are actively being
studied. In conventional production processes of ZnO thin films, a sintering
process by high temperature heating or alternative energy irradiation was
necessary.
A joint group of researchers from Osaka University and Kanazawa
University developed a technique for coating Zinc related oxide (ZnOx, ZnOHx)
simply by depositing the films in a solution process using the Metal Organic
Decomposition (MOD) method at ambient temperature and pressure without a
heating process. They also demonstrated that their thin films produced by this
technique were useful as buffer layers for OPV cells and that the films
achieved a power conversion efficiency (PCE) equivalent to that of ZnO thin
films produced by conventional methods involving sintering. Their research
results were published in Scientific Reports.
One of the authors Tohru Sugahara says, "We succeeded in forming
nano-sized oxide ultra-thin films by our blended solution coating method
without heating."
More
The monthly Coppock Indicators finished June.
DJIA: 24,271 +221 Down. NASDAQ:
7,510 +267 Down. SP500: 2,718 +169 Down.
All three slow indicators moved down in March
and have continued down in April. May and June. For some a new bear signal, for
others a take profits and get back to cash
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