All the best tips from the smartest financial, stock market and foreign exchange gurus.



Kathy Lien
Kathy Lien
I have received a number of requests for my Currency Checklist excel spreadsheet which I fill out every morning before I trade (admittedly some of them are linked to real time feeds and are automatically filled out) but here it is! This is the same Currency Pair Checklist shown in Chapter 8 of Day...

Kathy Lien | 8 Sep 2010 | 4:49 pm CDT

Kathy Lien
Kathy Lien
The European sovereign debt crisis has come back to haunt the euro. In the beginning of the year, European debt problems drove the EUR/USD from 1.45 down to 1.1877. When the fears receded, the euro climbed back above 1.33. However now that the fears that have gripped the currency for most of the ye...

Kathy Lien | 8 Sep 2010 | 4:32 pm CDT

The Big Picture
Barry Ritholtz
The Big Picture
I am off to rush-a-homa, but before I do, some links for your reading pleasure: • SEC Is Looking at ‘Quote Stuffing’   (WSJ) • Rogoff: Why America Isn’t Working  (Project Syndicate) • Sweep economists off their throne (FT.com) • Beware of Greeks Bearing Bonds   (Vanity...

The Big Picture | 8 Sep 2010 | 3:00 pm CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
Here's a good segment from CNBC: ...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 8 Sep 2010 | 2:07 pm CDT

The Big Picture
Barry Ritholtz
The Big Picture
Yesterday on XM Sirius, we discussed Infrastructure. One of the callers was a civil engineer who suggested we take a look at the US Infrastructure Report Card (infrastructurereportcard.org), which grade the US on a variety of factors. The 2009 Grades include: Aviation (D), Bridges (C), Dams (D), Dri...

The Big Picture | 8 Sep 2010 | 1:30 pm CDT

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT
Kathy Lien
Forex 360
With no U.S. economic data on the calendar, currencies and equities rebounded after successful European bond auctions helped to alleviate concerns about sovereign debt exposure. ...

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT | 8 Sep 2010 | 12:26 pm CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
For 78 straight sessions, the S&P 500 has closed between 1022 and 1128. It looks like today will be day #79. ...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 8 Sep 2010 | 11:47 am CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
From MarketWatch: By Tuesday's close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average had fallen 107 points, erasing nearly half of its big gain during the previous session. But are investors acting rationally when they dump stocks because of deflationary concerns? Though it would certainly appear that they ar...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 8 Sep 2010 | 11:10 am CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
Ok class, today’s lesson is on the pitfalls of similar stock performance. It’s tempting to think that all companies in a certain industry group behave the same way. The reason why is that in the short term, they often do. Once you start following a sector closely, you’ll see that, say, all t...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 8 Sep 2010 | 11:06 am CDT

The Big Picture
Barry Ritholtz
The Big Picture
Yesterday, Peter Boockvar referenced two WSJ articles on P/E:  The Decline of the P/E Ratio and Is It Time to Scrap the Fusty Old P/E Ratio? I believe these articles are asking the wrong question. Rather than wondering if the value of P/E ratio is fading, the better question is, “What does a ...

The Big Picture | 8 Sep 2010 | 10:30 am CDT

The Big Picture
Barry Ritholtz
The Big Picture
Today’s NYT has a column by David Leonhardt, titled The Bears and the State of Housing (I’m referenced but not quoted directly). Leonhardt offers a new(ish) framework to evaluate Housing, regardless of whether you “lean bearish or less bearish.” The column’s framework a...

The Big Picture | 8 Sep 2010 | 6:19 am CDT

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT
Kathy Lien
Forex 360
The Canadian dollar soared after the Bank of Canada raised interest rates by 25bp to 1 percent. This was the third consecutive rate hike from the BoC and has made them one of the most aggressive G20 central banks. ...

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT | 8 Sep 2010 | 4:35 am CDT

Commentary from Boris Schlossberg, Director of Research, GFT
Boris Schlossberg
Forex 360
After rebounding slightly during the Asian session the EUR/USD came under a fresh assault breaking below the 1.2700 barrier in early morning European trade as jitters over the financial state of the peripheral economies continued to pressure the pair. Greek government bonds weakened further tradin...

Commentary from Boris Schlossberg, Director of Research, GFT | 8 Sep 2010 | 12:20 am CDT

Commentary from Boris Schlossberg, Director of Research, GFT
Boris Schlossberg
Forex 360
German exports fell in July for only the second time this year suggesting that growth in EZ largest economy may be slowing into the second half of the year. The German Trade Balance declined to 13.5 Billion euros from 14.2 Billion euros the month prior and 14.3 Billion euros in July of 2009. The co...

Commentary from Boris Schlossberg, Director of Research, GFT | 7 Sep 2010 | 9:36 pm CDT

The Big Picture
Barry Ritholtz
The Big Picture
In this morning’s NYT column — Lehman’s Last Hours — Andrew Ross Sorkin wrote: “But what is clear is that the politics of the moment played a factor — or at least was discussed among senior and junior staff — in the decision not to lend to Lehman Brothers, perhaps the g...

The Big Picture | 7 Sep 2010 | 4:30 pm CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
CNBC: First in business worldwide. (Via: Bess) ...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 7 Sep 2010 | 3:51 pm CDT

The Big Picture
Barry Ritholtz
The Big Picture
For those of you who have XM Satellite radio, I will be discussing the new proposed spending programs from 5:00 to 6:00 pm today on POTUS with Pete Dominick: > ...

The Big Picture | 7 Sep 2010 | 3:15 pm CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
At the end of last year, I was invited to participate in Bespoke’s Roundtable Q&A to discuss investing in 2010. For the question of what the major themes I saw, I said that investors would return to dividends. Not a major theme, but I expect a new-found love for dividends. A company like GE coul...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 7 Sep 2010 | 1:42 pm CDT

The Big Picture
Barry Ritholtz
The Big Picture
Dhaval Joshi is clearly in the deflation camp. Bloomberg’s Chart of the Day references his recent RAB Capital sovereign debt commentary as suggesting bond yields are set to “massively collapse.” Here’s an excerpt: “Yields on U.S. and U.K. government bonds have room to ...

The Big Picture | 7 Sep 2010 | 1:30 pm CDT

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT
Kathy Lien
Forex 360
The nice breeze in New York City today reminds us that summer is officially over. Trading desks are once again fully staffed and the countdown to the end of the year begins. Volume ...

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT | 7 Sep 2010 | 12:21 pm CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
Reuters reports: The disparity in the numbers could either mean the market is due for a correction or the recent stock rally will keep going, analysts say. I particularly like the "analysts say" part. ...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 7 Sep 2010 | 11:18 am CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
This is from the Guardian's profile of Bob Diamond, the new head of Barclays: When not at work, Diamond is a fanatical sports fan, supporting Chelsea (football), the Chicago Red Sox (baseball) and the New England Patriots (American football). I'm guessing they're inbox is filling up. But who's m...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 7 Sep 2010 | 10:31 am CDT

The Big Picture
Barry Ritholtz
The Big Picture
Today’s chart porn is a quick look at major world indices since January 2000, via the always excellent D-Short. > click for ginormous chart > Hat tip Grant Williams...

The Big Picture | 7 Sep 2010 | 10:30 am CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
Oracle (ORCL) announced that it's hiring Mark Hurd, formerly of Hewlett-Packard (HPQ). First, I'm glad to see wealthy and powerful people finally land on their feet after a few weeks of unemployment. But an interesting question is, how much does a CEO really add to a company's business? When you g...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 7 Sep 2010 | 10:02 am CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
Can anyone imagine Tim Geithner saying this? Speaking as the Russian government announces plan to raise duty on alcohol and cigarettes, Alexei Kudrin said that by smoking a pack, “you are giving more to help solve social problems such as boosting demographics, developing other social services and...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 7 Sep 2010 | 9:40 am CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
I hope everyone had a great long three-day weekend. The weather was perfect here in DC, lots of sun and not too hot. On Saturday, I was walking through DuPont Circle and I came across one of the most bizarre protests I’ve ever seen. Living in DC, you get used to seeing people protest some off-bea...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 7 Sep 2010 | 9:30 am CDT

The Big Picture
Barry Ritholtz
The Big Picture
Amongst the items coming out of the FCIC hearings last week were new docs that revealed exactly how over-reliant LEH was on daily, short term funding to cover their longer terms costs. It was a recipe for disaster, a trailer park in search of a tornado. Here is the WSJ: “In looking last week a...

The Big Picture | 7 Sep 2010 | 8:25 am CDT

The Big Picture
Barry Ritholtz
The Big Picture
Earlier this month, Jeff Miller posted an interesting discussion about The Fly on the Wall litigation (lower court decision here; coverage of appellate arguments here). For those of you unfamiliar with The Fly, it is an online service that reproduced a headline feed of Wall Street Research coverage:...

The Big Picture | 7 Sep 2010 | 6:00 am CDT

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT
Kathy Lien
Forex 360
With no U.S. economic data on the calendar today, investors would normally expect quiet trading. However, this week is not about the U.S., but about the rest of the world as elections, central bank rate decisions and employment reports for other countries dominate the calendar. ...

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT | 7 Sep 2010 | 4:21 am CDT

Commentary from Boris Schlossberg, Director of Research, GFT
Boris Schlossberg
Forex 360
The euro was massacred on the second trading day of the week falling more than 150 points in overnight trade after a Wall Street Journal article suggested that this summer’s bank stress tests were insufficient raising fresh concerns in the FX market regarding the quality of sovereign debt in the ...

Commentary from Boris Schlossberg, Director of Research, GFT | 7 Sep 2010 | 12:07 am CDT

Commentary from Boris Schlossberg, Director of Research, GFT
Boris Schlossberg
Forex 360
The Aussie dollar fell towards the .9100 cent mark after the Reserve Bank of Australia kept rates unchanged and the Labor party finally won enough independent votes to form a minority coalition government. ...

Commentary from Boris Schlossberg, Director of Research, GFT | 6 Sep 2010 | 9:40 pm CDT

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT
Kathy Lien
Forex 360
U.S. markets are closed on this quiet Labor Day Monday and so we want to take this opportunity to talk about some interesting characteristics about how currencies behave in the month of September. We are big subscribers to the idea of seasonality, which are regular and predictable patterns that occ...

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT | 6 Sep 2010 | 4:52 am CDT

Commentary from Boris Schlossberg, Director of Research, GFT
Boris Schlossberg
Forex 360
With US on holiday until tomorrow, currency markets remained predictably quiet with cable providing the only volatility of the night as the unit slipped below 1.5400 on continued EUR/GBP strength. The euro held its gains in post NFP trade but could not break through the 1.2900 level as markets remai...

Commentary from Boris Schlossberg, Director of Research, GFT | 6 Sep 2010 | 1:02 am CDT

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT
Kathy Lien
Forex 360
Who wants to buy dollars? Based upon today’s price action, no one does. The non-farm payrolls report was not as weak as the market had feared and in fact was pretty good when taking into consideration prior revisions. ...

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT | 3 Sep 2010 | 12:47 pm CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
Congratulations to McDonald's (MCD). The stock just made a new all-time high today of $75.35. That's not just a 52-week high, or a post-crash high; that's an all-time high. Forty years ago you could have picked up the shares for just 29 cents a piece. That's adjusted for nine stock splits; four 2-f...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 3 Sep 2010 | 11:25 am CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
Thanks to this morning's push, the Crossing Wall Street Buy List has crept back into the black for the year. Through yesterday's close, we were down -0.79% for the year compared with -2.24% for the S&P 500. That doesn't include dividends. Here's a look at the chart: By early April, we ran to a...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 3 Sep 2010 | 10:44 am CDT

CrossingWallStreet.com
Eddie Elfenbein
Crossing Wall Street
Today’s jobs report is being celebrated as “better-than-expected” which probably comes as a surprise to most non-Wall Streeters. After all, the unemployment rate ticked up from 9.5% in July to 9.6% for August, and there are now close to 15 million unemployed people in the country. That also do...

CrossingWallStreet.com | 3 Sep 2010 | 9:46 am CDT

Kathy Lien
Kathy Lien
If you have read the international papers, you may know that there are two political developments that is worth paying attention to. On August 21st, Australia held general elections for Prime Minister and if you recall, the votes were so tight that nearly 2 weeks later, there is still no clear wi...

Kathy Lien | 3 Sep 2010 | 9:22 am CDT

Kathy Lien
Kathy Lien
I published this report on FX360.com this morning (if you haven’t read it already) The U.S. dollar skyrocketed after the stronger than expected non-farm payrolls report. Not only did the headline number surprise to the upside, but private sector job growth beat expectations with the July fig...

Kathy Lien | 3 Sep 2010 | 8:41 am CDT

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT
Kathy Lien
Forex 360
The U.S. dollar skyrocketed after the stronger than expected non-farm payrolls report. Not only did the headline number surprise to the upside, but private sector job growth beat expectations with the July figures also revised sharply higher. ...

Commentary from Kathy Lien, Director of Research, GFT | 3 Sep 2010 | 3:50 am CDT