I’m still worried about Europe.
Everyone else seems to have forgotten, including the Europeans. The Stoxx EU 600 Index hit its highest point since September 2008 this morning as commodities continued to climb (another chance to short oil futures below the $89 line). The Stoxx 600 is up 6.5% for the month and up 9.9% for the year. We had talked about gold, oil and the S&P in my Weekend Post; all are up about 10% in the second half of the year as the dollar fell 3.5%. This morning, the dollar is hugging that 80.75 line, still 10% off it’s June high. If Europe really is “fixed” then the dollar is free to drop back to it’s lows, which could provide tremendous rally fuel for stocks and commodities.
Moody’s warned it may lower Spain’s rating, citing “substantial funding requirements” and France is on Credit Watch and Belgium faces a rate cut at Moody’s as well while Standard and Poor’s is reviewing its assessments of Ireland, Portugal and Greece. The credit default swaps tied to the French bonds imply a rating of Baa1, seven steps below its actual top ranking of Aaa at Moody’s but, if it doesn’t bother the Europeans – why should it bother us?
There is no (ZERO) logic to global markets racing back to all-time highs with the VIX running back to it’s lows as if there is not a care in the World and I don’t say that because I’m a bitter short – we had 16 bullish trade ideas last week and just 8 bearish ones as we simply threw up our hands and played the technicals in Member Chat as the Dow tested that magical 11,500 line. Europe reads the same news we do and markets over there are up 1% this morning despite a pretty poor performance turned in by China, where the Shanghai fell 1.4% (and that was AFTER a 50% recovery into the close) and the Hang Seng fell 0.3% (also big recovery into the close) and the Nikkei fell 0.85% (small afternoon recovery) and the BSE, our global leader into November, weakly flat-lined 5% off its highs.
We’re watching 11,500 on the Dow as well as the 1,225 line on the S&P, which is its “must hold” line that we’ve been tracking on the breakout. Will the Dow break higher or the S&P…
