Subscription Options:

Subscribe via RSS

February Is A Disastrous Month For US Economy – The Money Is Drying Up, Sales Are Tanking Everywhere, People Are Cutting Back To NOTHING As Gas Prices Near Tipping Point And Expected To Climb Until May. What Would Happen When Austerity Begins March 1st?

I’m telling you we’ll be lucky to make it through the end of the first quarter without a major MAJOR crash…

I’m getting reports in from many business owners experiencing the same thing..

Proof:
Wal-Mart Situation “Getting Worse” New Leaks Reveal

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-02-27/wal-mart-situation-getting-worse-new-leaks-reveal

JCPenney Reports Horrific Results, Stock Plunges
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-02-27/jcpenney-reports-horrific-results-stock-plunges

Retail Rally In Jeopardy as Gas Prices Climb Higher
Drivers aren’t the only group growing concerned as gas prices tick upwards. Most retailers and consumer discretionary businesses consider $4 [...]

Peter Schiff & James Rickards & Byron Wien: Economy ‘Stuck in Serious Recession’ And America Is On The Brink Of A Global “Financial War.” Major Sell-Off Coming

Peter Schiff: Economy ‘Stuck in Serious Recession’

Officially, the last recession ended in June 2009. But Peter Schiff, CEO of Euro Pacific Capital, doesn’t see it that way.

And he thinks Wednesday’s gross domestic product (GDP) report, which shows the economy contracted 0.1 percent in the fourth quarter, backs him up.

“The weaker-than-expected GDP report shows just how out of touch most professional economists remain with respect to the fundamental weakness of the [...]

Doug Kass & Byron Wien: Stocks Will Hit Their High For The Year By The End Of This Week. S&P 500 Earnings Are Going To Be Down Year Over Year. Too Many People Making Too Much Stuff Out There. … The World Competitive Environment Is Too Intense.

Legendary investor Doug Kass of Seabreeze Partners thinks that by the end of this week, investors will see the top in the S&P 500 for the rest of the year.

 

In his “15 Surprises for 2013,” published today on TheStreet.com, Kass writes:

Once again, the bullish consensus is tightly grouped with the expectation that the S&P 500 will close the year at 1550-1615 (up from 1425 at the close of 2012) and that the 10 year U.S. note [...]

2013 Predictions: S&P 500 Plunges, Gold Soars

NEW YORK (TheStreet) – Blackstone’s BX Byron Wien has never been one to shy away from predictions. The Vice Chairman of Blackstone Advisory Partners has produced his 2013 list, including predictions on gold, oil, and everyone’s favorite stock,Apple AAPL .

 

Among some of the more notable macro calls Wien makes are concerns over oil prices, as he believes the price of West Texas Intermediate could plunge on new rules out of Washington. Wien is [...]

Smart Money Is Extremely Worried About What Lies Ahead

KWN

With continued volatility in key markets, including currencies, today King World News interviewed acclaimed money manager Stephen Leeb, Chairman & Chief Investment Officer of Leeb Capital Management, to get his take on what is happening.  Leeb spoke with KWN about the level of fear and concern that is being expressed from older market veterans that are extremely well connected.  Here is what Leeb had to say about what is taking [...]

Byron Wien: I Spoke To The Smartest Man In Europe, And What He Had To Say Was Terrifying

Blackstone’s Byron Wien is up with a new blog post, wherein he relays a conversation he had with someone he only refers to as The Smartest Man In Europe.

 

Wien doesn’t say who The Smartest Man In Europe is, but describes him as basically an incredibly brilliant, wordly, rich businessman.

Many of you remember The Smartest Man from earlier essays; I have been writing about him annually for more than a decade.  He has [...]

BYRON WIEN: 2012 Will Be Great, But Then We’re In For A Prolonged Period Of Slow Growth

Blackstone heavyweight and noted lothario Byron Wien is out with his latest monthly Market Commentary, and it’s pretty bearish.

 

That’s in contrast to his recent call for the S&P 500, which he said should reach 1500.

While he maintains this bullish near-term call, for everything after 2012, Wien sees a mess:

“I have been forecasting higher rates for some time and been wrong.  I do believe that we have reached an inflection point and that 10-year Treasury rates will [...]

WARNING: U.S. stocks are at the start of a more meaningful correction and possibly even a bear market: Marc Faber

CNBC

U.S. stocks are at the start of a more meaningful correction and possibly even a bear market, Marc Faber, the editor and publisher of the Gloom, Boom and Doom report told CNBC in Singapore on Saturday, though he added that further money printing would likely limit the decline in the S&P 500.

“The technical underpinnings of the market have been a disaster in the last couple of weeks,” Faber said on [...]

Top strategist Wien updates his famous “10 Surprises” list – Includes his outlook on stocks, energy, the euro, and much more…

From Investment Postcards from Cape Town:

Byron Wien, Vice Chairman of Blackstone Advisory Partners, today issued his list of “The 10 Surprises for 2012.” This is the 27th year Byron has given his predictions of a number of economic, financial market, and political surprises for the coming year.

Byron defines a “surprise” as an event the average investor would only assign a one out of three chance of taking place, but which [...]

Top strategist Wien predicts another winning year for gold

From Bloomberg:

Gold futures jumped the most in 10 weeks on demand for a haven following a report that Iran produced its first nuclear-fuel rod. Silver surged the most in five months as the dollar’s decline spurred a commodity rally.

A domestically-made rod was inserted into the core of Tehran’s atomic-research reactor, the Iranian Students News Agency said yesterday. The dollar fell against a basket of currencies as global manufacturing expanded, spurring [...]

Jim Grant Explains Why QE3 Is Coming

Once again we are reminded why we like Jim Grant so much. From his latest Grant’s Interest Rate Observer (which, trust us, is worth the subscription): “Almost 30% of the respondents to a poll conducted by UBS a few weeks back said they anticipate a third round of so-called quantitative easing… We count ourselves among the expectant 30%. To its congressional directed dual mandate the Bernanke [...]

Gold Buying in China Climbs on Inflation Concern, UBS

By Kim Kyoungwha

March 2 (Bloomberg) — Gold purchases in China, the world’s largest producer, climbed to 200 metric tons in the first two months of 2011 as faster inflation boosted consumer demand, according to UBS AG, which said the price may gain to $1,500.

“China is the big buyer,” Peter Hickson, global commodities strategist at Switzerland’s largest bank, said by phone yesterday, without giving a comparable figure [...]

Blackstone’s Byron Wien: “The retirement benefits for state workers are very generous. Too generous. And it is very hard to change that…”

by Courtney Comstock

Retired government employees apparently still haven’t gotten over Blackstone’s Byron Wien’s comment about how retirement benefits are too high.

City pension fund managers had recently been considering investing in Blackstone, Steve Schwarzman’s shop. They even had a meeting scheduled with, among other fund-of-fund managers like Legg Mason’s, Blackstone President Tony James on January 7th, according to Bloomberg.

That is, until they remember the comment Byron Wien made [...]