The Most Over/Under-Valued Housing Markets In The World

House prices – with respect to both levels and changes – differ widely across OECD countries. As a simple measure of relative rich or cheapness, the OECD calculates if the price-to-rent ratio (a measure of the profitability of owning a house) and the price-to-income ratio (a measure of affordability) are above their long-term averages, house prices are said to be overvalued, and vice-versa. There are clearly some nations that are extremely over-valued and others that are cheap but as SocGen’s Albert Edwards notes, it is the UK that stands out as authorities have gone out of their way to prop up house prices - still extremely over-valued (20-30%) – despite being at the epicenter of the global credit bust. Summing up the central bankers anthem, Edwards exclaims: “what makes me genuinely really angry is that burdening our children with more debt to buy ridiculously expensive houses is seen as a solution to the problem of excessively expensive housing.”

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It’s Official, the US is Back in Recession

As warned previously on these pages, the US is in a recession… again.
The latest ISM reading came in at 49. Any reading below 50 is considered recessionary. And an ISM of 49 is the worst in four years.
The Fed, as usual, is oblivious to this. Bernanke claims we’re going to see a 3% GDP growth in 2014. We haven’t seen annual GDP growth of 3% since Bernanke took office. And he and the Fed have been claiming that a recovery was just around the corner for five years now… that’s HALF a business cycle.
At this point we should ALREADY be in a massive economic expansion, not waiting on a recovery. And we certainly shouldn’t be seeing weak growth and higher costs, which is the worst possible combination: stagflation.
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Bill Murphy – Breaking News: Comex Admits Its Reports Are For Informational Purposes Only

from Financial Survival Network
Breaking news from Bill Murphy of Gata.org and LeMetropoleCafe.com. While reviewing the Comex Gold Inventory Warehouse Report, he came across a newly minted disclaimer. Basically they are telling you that the numbers are for informational purposes only and they effectively are making no warranties or representations as to their accuracy or truth. Bill’s been saying this about every Comex issued report for years, from the Commitment of Traders Report, to the Inventory Report to the Open Interest Report. Bills believes this sham is getting close to the end game and perhaps this latest legal step is an indication.
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Bazaarvoice Inc (NASDAQ: BV)

Bazaarvoice, Inc. provides various social commerce solutions in the United States and internationally. The company offers its solutions through Bazaarvoice conversations platform, a software-as-a-service platform that enable clients to capture, display, and analyze online word of mouth, including consumer-generated ratings and reviews, questions and answers, stories, recommendations, photographs, videos, and other content about clients brands, products, or services. It also provides Bazaarvoice connections solutions, such as BrandVoice, which enables brands to enter into distribution relationships allowing them to display review content on retail Websites within the network; and BrandAnswers that allows brands to interact directly with consumers on retail Websites within the network to answer questions and provide suggestions on alternative products. In addition, the company offers Bazaarvoice analytics solutions, including Intelligence solution that allows clients to derive market, consumer, and product insights from the underlying data collected on their behalf through Bazaarvoice conversations platform; and Workbench Analytics solution, which allows to generate reports highlighting simple rating trends, text analysis, and product and service issue identification, as well as perform self-service administration. Further, it provides Bazaarvoice media solution that creates connections between consumers by inserting their authentic opinions into advertising campaigns, and creating relevant and targeted ads.
To review Bizaarvoice's stock, please take a look at the 1-year chart of BV (Bazaarvoice, Inc.) below with my added notations:
BV had been selling off consistently since hitting it's top of $20 back in June. Over the last (5) months though, the stock has moved into a common pattern known as a rectangle. Rectangle patterns form when a stock gets stuck bouncing between a horizontal support and resistance. A minimum of (2) successful tests of the support and (2) successful tests of the resistance will give you the pattern. BV's rectangle pattern has formed an $8 resistance (blue) and a $6.50 support (red).
The Tale of the Tape: BV has formed a rectangle pattern. The possible long positions on the stock would be either on a pullback to $6.50, or on a breakout above $8. The ideal short opportunity would be on a break below $6.50, or on a test of $8 again.
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Richard Russell – Silver, Gold & A Coming Stock Market Crash

from KingWorldNews:
I’ve been wrestling with a moral question. Would it have been better to allow the bear market of 2008-09 to continue down to its ultimate and natural conclusion — or would it have been preferable to “step in” (as the Bernanke Fed did) and attempt to halt the bear market in its tracks? Of course, we know that Ben Bernanke chose the latter course, which meant attempting to halt the bear market.
Personally, I’ve voted against the Bernanke way. The reason is that I never thought it was possible to halt and then reverse the primary trend of the stock market or the economy — any more than I think we can halt the dawn and thus hold back the night.
Richard Russell continues @ KingWorldNews.com

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Stock Market Foreshadows Another Rally

SP500 Index Trading Daily Chart - SPY Exchange Traded Fund

The SP500 index continues to hold up within its rising trend channel and the recent pullback is bullish. Remember the trend is your friend and it can continue for very long periods of times ranging from days, weeks, and even months...

The US Stock Market MUSCLE Indexes

The charts below show and explain my thinking... But in short we need these two indexes to be strong if we want to see another major leg higher in the SPY, or to at least test the recent highs.
Today the market opened slightly higher and push up in the first 30 minutes with strong volume. Overall the market looks as though it needs a day pause/pullback before taking another run higher.

Small cap stocks are the ULTIMATE Risk On play and generate ridiculous gains in very short periods of time. I focus on these with my trading partner exclusively at ActiveTradingPartners.com where we have been making a killing on trades like: NUGT up 21% in 1 day and IOC up 11% in 2 days

Bullish Index Price, Volume & Candles

The SP500 has been very predictable the past couple weeks for both intraday trading during key reversal times in the market when price has pullback to a support zone, and also for swing trading. Last week we myself and followers bought SSO ETF when the market pulled back and we exited the next day for a 3.5% profit.
Yesterday was a perfect intraday example with the SP500 bottoming out at my 11:30am morning reversal time zone with price trading at support. Price then rallied into the close posting a 12 point gain on the SP500 futures for a simple momentum play pocketing $600.

US Stock Market Mid-Week Conclusion:

In short, I still like stocks as the place to be and will not get bearish until proven wrong. Once price reverses and the technical clearly paint a bearish picture with price, volume, momentum, cycles and sentiment will I start shorting the bounces.
This week is a pivotal one for the stock market so expect increased volatility and possibly lower lows still until the counter-trend flushes the weak position out before moving higher.
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Jonathan Burton – Individual Investors Flocking Back To Stocks

from Financial Survival Network
We caught up with Jonathan Burton today.The Dow is up over 2,000 points since the beginning of the year. What’s going on here? We’ve gone over 5 months without a correction, which may be cause for concern. If you’re going back into the market, you’ll probably want to spread your investment out over a period of time to avoid a major corrections. In addition, the market leaders will probably rotate from high dividend yielding stocks back into cyclicals. GM once again rejoined the major markets indexes which could well be an indication of this trend. Be careful!
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