L'Information est d'Or

Excess leverage was at the root of the current economic crisis. This chart shows that debt is still increasing because of huge government spendings. We have a long way to go back to more sustainable levels... Source: John Mauldin's newsletter

The current rally is the biggest since World War II. A lot of good news are now priced in. Although the long-term outlook is still positive with the global economy getting out of recession, there is now significant risk of a short-term bear market. One could benefit from a pull-back by buying "short ETFs" like Lyxor Short CAC40 (code=SHC on Euronext Paris) or short commodities like ETFS Short Crude Oil (code=SOIL on LSE)

Today's chart presents the Dow divided by the price of one ounce of gold. This results in what is referred to as the Dow / gold ratio or the cost of the Dow in ounces of gold. For example, it currently takes 9.8 ounces of gold to "buy the Dow." This is considerably less that the 44.8 ounces it took back in 1999. When priced in gold, the US stock market has been in a bear market for the entire 21st century and is currently trading 78% off its 1999 highs. The recent five-month rally, however, has the Dow (priced in gold) putting in a significant test of resistance of an accelerated downtrend that began in mid-2007.

We already knew that bankers had been greedy and sometimes thieves. Well, we now learn through the expenses scandal uncovered by The Telegraph, that politicians have been as much greedy. Indeed, British members of parliaments have used expenses claims to make up huge salaries at the expense of the taxpayers. The difference between bankers and MPs is that bankers could blame an inadequate and inefficient regulation whereas MPs can't pass on the blame to anybody because they make up the rules that they live with. Shoking! An example of cover-up in video

Total has sacked several hundreds of employees (up to 900 according to some reports) for participating in a strike. This is outrageous behaviour on behalf of an international company. Let's boycott them! Link to the BBC news story

25 Billions dollars in cash and no dividend, why? http://www.istockanalyst.com/article/viewarticle/articleid/

http://m.ft.com/cms/s/0/71520770-4a2c-11de-8e7e-00144feabdc0.html?catid=2&SID=bf897f14bae9c5102c8ac3f2bf14958f Cyrille http://cyrilleuk.blogspot.com Sent from my iPhone