Market direction

When you look at all the news, corruption, revolutions, its pretty easy to point to the market and say it has to hit it. One thing that I have learned since 2008, is the market is not a pure report card of economic health. It is an almagum of politics, perception, and financial realities. So as I look at the market, I try to remove my predispotion to the view of problems with corruption, currency wars, problems with labor, and middle class crush. From purely a chart perspective, if the S&P500 traded between 1700 and 1500 for the year ahead, it would be a reasonbly decent outcome.

Aside from general market direction, we have my beaten friend, Gold miners ETF.

Best I can say for this thing is, what is down, probably may go up. Who knows, it can stagnate here or rebound. The spin seems to be the sector is beaten up, and time to buy. What I have, I'll keep, I really don't have the stomach to double down. This maybe a golden opportunity of a lifetime, if your not in, a little here is lower risk. Just take alook at the valuations, it hasn't been this bad since the economic implosion in 2008. Or wait for the red and blue trend lines to cross, that usually indicates its on the rise for a while. Then we have Gold (GLD), just plain ugly!

Best I can say here is, as long as it stays above the longer term trend line, still an upward moving asset. For the USD, it's demise is a tad bit overblown, its held up, although quite flacky in recent months.

So your guess is as good as mine. I do think there is ONE asset above all to watch, the cost of debt. I REALLY do think this is the entire story. Everything above is a sideshow. Why? Because in 2008 I warned (and many others) that the shift was from bank/private risk to government risk. The governments of the world have shouldered the burden of 'stimulous' for 4 year. Most governemnts have been burning the midnight oil on debt creation, and taking on risk assets. The US government buys 85 billion of the worst debt obligations from banks every month, taking them on. In effect, the problems are being buried in the good old faith and credit of currency system. So what we have here is a trend line of 30 year interest rates on the fall since 1981, and recently its been rising. If this trend ever breaks the downward two green lines, its pretty much over folks. I don't think the system can take rising debt costs.

So there you have it, market valuations high, Gold miners eating dirt, USD valuation holding, and US 30 year treasury rates, the foundation of cost of debt spiking in recent weeks. What is next? Tune in for second half of 2013 for the answer.