dinarpmkum

Stock markets rallied yesterday upon learning that US factory activity plunged to new lows.  The factory activity index reached a low of 49, where anything below 50 is considered a sign of economic contraction.  Three cheers!  Weak economic news means the Fed will continue its QE3 purchases of more than $ 80 billion of debt each month. Stock market mavens no longer hope for good economic news.  That seems an unlikely prospect.  Instead weakness suggests more aggressive Fed activity, so market prognosticators stay tuned in to see how bad it can get.  The more the economy worsens the better. Maybe the Obama Administration is long the stock market.  If so, that might explain policies that seem designed to prevent the economy from what should have been a strong economic recovery. So, instead of jobs and economic growth, we get higher stock prices.  At least for a while.

Following the success of the 1st and 2nd tranches of AmIncome Flexi, which were launched on Sept 18 and Dec 12 last year, with Rm100mil and Rm250mil in asset under management respectively, AmInvest once again would like to satisfy investors appetite. "Given ample liquidity from the various central bank easing measures, the bond market is expected to be well supported in 2013". The 3 year closed-ended fund, targeted at investors seeking regular income and potentially higher returns than fixed deposits but with lower risk than equities. How to do that? To achieve the investment objective, the fund intends to invest its NAV in a portfolio of domestic and/or foreign sovereign issued bonds and corporate bonds, with minimum 'A' credit rating. The manager will purchase bonds which will generally have shorter or same maturity to the fund's maturity. The fund employs a flexible investment strategy as follows:- Will not actively adopt a trading strategy unless there are d...

Readers of my blog will notice that I haven't been updating my blog lately ... usually I am pretty not that busy ... now I have to go to Singapore every week for a couple of days ... and then there are the many meetings that suddenly crop up and classes that I have to give for Murasaki ... blah blah ... I miss writing my blog, I love it because its like a diary of sorts, I cannot ignore my blog cause its now 6 years of my life. If anyone reads it carefully, they would know me very well cause I never write to create a false persona, if you think I am an asshole, you are probably right. I don't like to be busy, it makes time flies, and I don't get to sit and relax and enjoy. My Monday nights drinks sessions are sacred, those of you who are part of it knows too well. We all have to slow things down and take stock of what we are doing, whether they correlate to fulfillment of your goals in life, so I think its time to re-look my own aphorisms in life, making sure I stay centere...

Europe's unemployment rate increased once more -- now at 12.2 percent.  This is the highest level since data collection on European unemployment began in 1995.  Expect new records ahead. Too bad if you are young and live in Europe.  The unemployment rate is above 25 percent for those under age 25 almost everywhere in Europe and is well above 40 percent in places like Spain and Italy (lets not talk about Greece...their data, at this point, is probably suspect). Meanwhile, the IMF has noticed that taxpayer bailouts mainly enrich hedge funds.  Why?  Because after sovereign debt collapses in price, hedge funds come in and buy it for 20 cents on the dollar and then sit back to wait for the bailout.  So, who wins.  The average taxpayer simply transfers large amounts of private wealth into the coffers of rich hedge fund tycoons.  Great policy! It is now dawning on the IMF that restructuring sovereign debt (meaning a controlled bankruptcy) is a far better...

Chinese food giant Shuanhui  announced the purchase of Smithfield Foods this week.  This is a salient example of a process that has been underway for many years. If one country has a 40 percent savings rate and another country has a zero percent savings rate, the country with the larger savings rate will, in time, buy all of the assets of the country with a zero savings rate.  That process is underway. The US has had no net savings for several decades.  The reason for the absence of savings is twofold: 1) the private sector doesn't save because most Americans see no need; after all, the government guarantees income security and health care into old age (social security, medicare, medicaid); why bother to save (the Obama administration's recent suggestion to begin taxing IRA's provides some additional reasons for Americans to avoid saving); 2) the government sector is a big, big dissaver (that's what fiscal deficits are all about). But America has investment spending....

Would you cut loss? Would you cost averaging? Or, would you accumulate at current level? These are a few questions from Gold investors since March 2013. What a difficult questions to answer... Here is our view on gold prices currently: Our answer is to cost averaging or accumulate now, and hold it at least until September 2013. Why? Let's read on... Lately, there is some good signs which favors gold prices in the short term: Federal Reserve chairman signaled records stimulus will continue until economy improves. Physical gold demand has surged after mid-April drops, especially from Asian consumers and central banks. US debt ceiling issue will be discussed again in September 2013, in which congressman will most likely to increase again, thus, printing more money. If you're a technical guy, then let's look at the chart above. A ' Double Bottom ' pattern was formed and gold prices may rebound very soon. It will be a gain of almost 8% if it surges towards 1,500 level....

New SPACs - Terragali & Australaysia; Goldis-IGB; Excessive directors' compensation. http://www.bfm.my/sm-salvatore-dali-malaysiafinance-spacs-overpaid-directors.html http://www.bfm.my/snm-show.html