Michael Ashton

E-PIPHANY

Contributor since: 26 Feb 2010

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• Float On

  Published 02 May 2012 | viewed 0 times

  It is Golden Week in Asia, and the May Day holiday in Europe. In other words, it has been a slow couple of days in…

• ECI - Not As Benign As You Think

  Published 27 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  The Employment Cost Index just printed +0.4%, below expectations of +0.5%. The ECI consists of two parts: wages and benefits. The benefits component is very…

• Don't End the Fed...Just Ignore It

  Published 27 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  I'm not really sure what to make of the market action the last couple of days. I know Q1 earnings have looked good, but in…

• Taking the Market's Temperature

  Published 25 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  Forget for a moment, if you can, the European drama - the falling of the Dutch government, the possible imminent failure of the French one,…

• Stalling?

  Published 20 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  Be careful here. The most dangerous market climates occur when the news and/or the economy is in transition. When things are great, everyone knows they're…

• Ghost Rally

  Published 17 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  Equities launched aggressively higher on Tuesday, driven essentially by pique. The best that news hounds could do was to point to a good German confidence…

• Monetary Sedition

  Published 16 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  Is it really necessary to have a canary in the coal mine when the mine is belching clouds of noxious smoke? Today's Empire Manufacturing Report…

• The Problem With Small Surprises

  Published 16 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  The phrase "paradigm shift" is meant to sound dramatic. Like the sudden slipping of tectonic plates, a paradigm shift moves mountains (metaphorically). Deregulation of airlines…

• The Prius Economy

  Published 11 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  A bona fide growth scare is upon us. The first inklings of the scare may have come from China, a week or two ago, or…

• Keynes, Marx, and Bernanke

  Published 04 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  These days, the glimmerings of crisis are never far away, are they? Today, the sign was a very weak government bond auction in Spain, which…

• This Is Your Brain On Leverage

  Published 03 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  The event du jour on Tuesday was the release of the FOMC minutes from the March 13th meeting. There was almost nothing surprising in the…

• Copernican Economics

  Published 02 April 2012 | viewed 0 times

  I start the second quarter on the road in beautiful Cincinnati, but I have some time to pen a few thoughts tonight (aside: will our…

• Don't Surrender the CAPE

  Published 30 March 2012 | viewed 0 times

  The linear uptrend in stocks this quarter, which has only recently stuttered for a week or two around S&P 1400, has lifted that index at…

• Odds In The Skeptic's Favor

  Published 25 March 2012 | viewed 0 times

  Friday's shocking news was that new home sales are weak! I would say that sometimes I don't understand market reactions, but the fact is that…

• Son Of 'Risk Off'

  Published 22 March 2012 | viewed 0 times

  Son Of 'Risk Off' - Michael Ashton - March 22, 2012 Although the last few days' worth of trading is consistent with the type of…

• A Couple Quick Words About Commodities

  Published 21 March 2012 | viewed 0 times

  The market is back to casting about for the next source of fear. Today, it was China. Fears that the Chinese economy may be slowing…

• Has Inflation Turned, As The Fed Expected?

  Published 17 March 2012 | viewed 0 times

  If 15 months of rising core inflation did not a trend make, then surely one month of declining core inflation also does not. Nevertheless, with…

• The Downside Of Healthy Banks

  Published 16 March 2012 | viewed 0 times

  For the third day in a row, equity volume was passable, near 800mm shares. That's the best 3-day performance, volume-wise, since early February. What does…

• The Cool Kids Don't Like Bonds Any More

  Published 14 March 2012 | viewed 0 times

  Global stock markets were the boring markets for a change, as today global bond markets took a potentially meaningful step back. In the U.S., 10-year…

• My Two Cents On Nonsense

  Published 14 March 2012 | viewed 0 times

  I had not planned to write tonight, but there was too much that happened today, and too much that is likely to be misunderstood and…