"The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +0.74% gained 211.81 points, or 0.7%, to close at 28,956.90, while the S&P 500 index SPX, +0.67% rose 21.65 points, or 0.7%, to 3,274.70. The Nasdaq Composite Index SPX, +0.67% added 74.18 points to finish at 9,203.43, a gain of 0.8%. All three benchmarks set new intraday and closing highs, with the Dow nearing the psychologically important 29,000 threshold."
~ Marketwatch, January 9, 2020
By Catherine Austin Fitts
This week is the 2019 Annual Wrap Up Equity Overview with the quarterly blockbuster from Rambus Chartology. Check out the web presentation here for the quarterly financial charts and Rambus Chartology when posted on Thursday.
The U.S. equity market continues to outperform global equity markets. Here is a comparison of the NASDAQ and S&P with European and Chinese equity ETFs since 2009.
The Trump administration considers the U.S. stock market an essential performance indicator. The administration's target appears to be a Dow above 30,000. Given the monetary and fiscal largesse underway in the Trump administration and the fact that it is a U.S. presidential election year, politics argues for rising corporate profits and a continued climb in the equity markets.
That said, the storm clouds are gathering across the globe as the failure of the unipolar model and the transition to a multipolar model raise profound questions regarding the preservation and performance of current global financial market trends—whether for currencies, stocks, or bonds. Do financial markets still offer opportunities to retail investors? Or have they become simply a way to channel monetary inflation into ever larger bubbles that are causing devastating non-economic allocations of capital? Are sovereign bond markets being squeezed dry to return us to an East and West Indies model—when corporations ruled the world and fielded mercenary armies? Or is a fundmental shift underway between global liquidity from West to East?
We will also look at how the "climate change op" fits in—and whether a new raid on the G7 pension funds is underway.
If you have not listened to my review of trends, top stories, and unanswered questions with Dr. Farrell in our first two parts of this 2019 Annual Wrap Up, I strongly recommend them to you as important background for the discussion this week regarding what is happening in the financial markets. You can access Part I here and Part II here.
Please e-mail your questions for Ask Catherine or post them at the Money & Markets commentary here.
