Until evidence proves otherwise, my thesis remains that cost of servicing the current level of the national debt and budget deficit is simply too high to allow any meaningful pick up in long term secular economic growth. As you know, my thesis is that ending QE will have little impact on the US economy but cause pain for the Markets whenever and however it unwinds. ] given the fact that the Markets were the prime beneficiaries of QE, they will be the ones that take the pain of its demise. I take issue with that assumption, based not only on the falloff in global activity but also the lack of consistency in our own data and the never ending expansion of debt. Since its approval earlier in 2016, it has been greatly influencing large and small companies to consider data security with high importance. Nonetheless, my bottom line is that I, perhaps foolishly, remain hopeful that the Donald’s current negotiating strategy will pay off; however, the risks and rewards associated with failure and success are very high.

So bottom line is that I am confused. Bottom line: on a secular basis, the US is growing at an historically below average secular rate although I assume decreased regulation will improve that rate somewhat. Bottom line: the indices remain technically strong. So I wouldn’t characterize them as compelling evidence that quantitative tightening will continue irrespective of future developments. Finally, the emerging markets continue to experience dollar funding issues—clear evidence that global money supply is shrinking and interest rates are rising. The other development was the raising of target interest rates by the Banks of Hong Kong, India and the Philippines, all fighting the ongoing dollar funding problem. Also, lest we forget, the growth rate in rest of the global economy has slowed and will not be helped by the decelerating effects of the dollar funding problems in the emerging market. But it is a pure play on CLO equity, and will likely perform better in a rising rate environment than the mortgage REITs.

The original tax cut, increased deficit spending, a potentially big infrastructure bill and funding the bureaucracy of a new arm of military (space force) will push the deficit/debt higher, negatively impacting economic growth and inflation, in my opinion. ] the cost of servicing that debt offsets any benefits to growth that might come from tax cuts/infrastructure spending. However, your doors might be giving you signs that you are probably ignoring. ] equities prices might be stretched. Well how does this affect the stock market and stock prices? Some of the world stock markets entered “bear territory “ of -20% correction from the peak. The stock with the second highest score in our model is Becton Dickinson (BDX). The dollar was up, ending above the upper boundary of its very short term downtrend for a second day, negating that trend. Nevertheless, that is a single stat and in no way implies a trend. In addition, if Trump is successful in revising the post WWII political/trade regime, it would almost certainly be an additional plus. If Trump is able to create a fairer political/trade regime, it would almost certainly be a plus for secular earnings growth. Plus I remain somewhat confused by this given that the dollar and gold seemed to interpret the Fed chairman Powell’s statement following the FOMC meeting as somewhat hawkish.

Plus Trump is insisting on a changes in the terms of our trade agreements with Japan and Europe. ], I am not going to change a forecast, beyond what I have already done, based on the dataflow to date or the promise of some grand reorientation of trade. I guess it’s not easy partly bcos have a strict margin of safety rule forces you to pass on many investment ideas even if they are quite good. If you’re feeling uncertain about a particular investment opportunity, seek the help of a financial advisor. For this you can seek some legal advice from the professionals. However, I can try to show why his argument, if blindly applied across the board, fails. However, film investment is thought to be one of the most secure and reliable type of investment a person can choose considering a correlation of definite profit vs risk. Just because it’s not going to make you a profit doesn’t mean you can’t still enjoy it.