Interesting Links and Reads for Wednesday, 31 January 2017: 98% Savings On Heart Surgery, Harley Davidson Slows Down & More

Harley Davidson sales slowing in the USA, inventory builds

In Bangalore, India, heart surgeons perform daily state-of-the-art heart surgery on adults and children at an average cost of $1,800

Shaky Ground: Weekly Charts For Bitcoin Investment Trust (GBTC), Gold & Silver Before Markets Open @ 9:30 12/27/16

A prognostication of sorts:

Readers of the news stories I supply to this blog will know about the recent demonetization of India's largest currency notes by Prime Minister Modi and the effect it is having on the lowest caste of poor people, and now India's middle-class. India is a notoriously corrupt economy built on cash transactions and now with less than a week, and bank lines still circling entire blocks, tens of millions of India's poorest people will not be able to turn in older, higher denomination Rupees for the newer notes Modi has declared "legal". Meaning many a poor person with worthless Rupee denominations no longer legal will pick up the torches and weapons Come 2017. Hence,  I expect the protests and riots already taking place in India to take on a new fever pitch.

Reader of this blog's news stories would also know the shaky pilings the Chinese Yuan stands on at this moment as the Red Chinese Government continues to devalue it's currency to keep export pricing competitive, while "dark channel" money is being dumped on a runaway housing bubble like we here in the West went through in 2004-2006. Chinese authorities are running out of plays now, having their Central bank buy billions of shares of stocks on their biggest exchange to support it, devaluing the Yuan, building infrastructure projects with no tenants or cars using them, importing pollution of "dirty" industries from the West, instituting "corruption" campaigns which chase their wealthiest kleptocrats and Oligarchs to flee the country, etc. At the moment, millions of Chinese are fleeing major cities as air pollution has turned day into dusk. Hence, I expect something bad to happen to the Chinese economy in 2017 too.

In the interim, the US Dollar is at a 14 year high against world currencies. The dollar is king and our US Federal Reserve has already begun to raise rates, meaning the dollar will become even stronger against weaker currencies around the planet. Imports to America are about to climb in price. People shopping at Walmart will see that smiley face icon on "sales" signs soon change to an upside down frown.

Toss in the election of Donald Trump, and now the whole world is watching America's next move.

Meanwhile, in a flight to safety, Chinese, Indian, and even Russian Oligarchs and Kleptocrats have been fleeing Canadian and European real estate as "safe havens" and they are now investing in expensive American real estate and stocks.

Many a pundit predicted gold and silver would explode, and stocks would tank,  on election day if Trump was named winner. 

That never happened. Cash is king, the US dollar is supreme, and ill-gotten wealth from around the globe is now investing in our stock markets along with what Wall Street watchers expect will be tens of billions of repatriated dollars held by US based multi-national corporations in overseas banks.

And then there is Donald Trump™, former Populist on the campaign trail, who has pulled the biggest bait and switch operation on America's working class voters in my life time. 

Unlike Trump™'s low information voters, Wall Street is watching Trump™, not listening to him. The markets have kept on rising on what Wall Street perceives as a "Swamp Friendly" and "Business Friendly" administration where the banksters, oil men and the military industrial corporatists have met - and are hired - by the new boss who is more connected to Billionaires than any President in our history. If you don't believe me, just peruse the stocks for banks, defense contractors and oil/gas companies. All of them have been on a tear since Trump™ was elected.

That said,  the three charts here, one for a Bitcoin Investment Trust, one for gold, one for silver, all drawn in weekly Japanese Candlestick charts, are telling me that bitcoin, gold and silver are "basing" and possibly getting ready to break upward. (Let me clarify, Bitcoin has been on a steady upward trek for all of 2016, and may soon hit its 2016 high again.)

A breakout on any of these would mean the confidence in this "Trump Rally" is done.

So I will update these three charts going forward for readers of the 360 Horizon blog because this will be a major "tell" on how the world's leaders and countries perceive Trump™, and these three charts, along with the Baltic Dry Charts, copper and few more indicators I watch might tip us off if a Global Recession is ready to bust a move.

One last thought:  as soon as Donald Trump™ takes the keys to the White House and tweets the first dangerously ill-informed Tweet at 4:00 AM in his first three months of "slumming" at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW in Washington DC, I am willing to bet bitcoins, gold and silver will quickly become the "safe haven" of choice around the planet and the next global Recession will be ignited.

I will update the following three charts on Fridays going forward.

Good day, good evening, whatever it may be wherever you are,

-  Rock

p.s. When I use a solid line for a trendline, that means the trendline has been set in place for a good while. 

Dashed trendlines signal trendlines which are in the process of being "confirmed" and are not as "probable" to trade off. 

For instance, if we end this week with a higher low and higher high for the gold weekly chart Japanese candlestick, that temporary trendline will now become "confirmed" and I will change it to a solid line end of business on Friday. 

If this does not make sense to you, leave questions here on the blog so that I might elucidate further.

(Click Bitcoin Investment Trust (GBTC) Weekly Chart Above To Enlarge)

(Click Gold Weekly Chart Above To Enlarge)

(Click Silver Weekly Chart Above)

Interesting Reads for Thursday, 22 December 2016: Sea Creatures, Millenials, Peak Cars & More

This Russian Deep Sea Fisherman Posts His Discoveries on Twitter and OH MY GOD KILL IT WITH FIRE (Gizmondo)

Peak Car Market: 32% of Trade-Ins On Car Lots Now Upside Down On Their Loans . . . Negative Balances on Trade-Ins Are Now An Average ($4,832) (The Detroit News)

Young Americans Living With Parents At 75 Year High (Wall Street Journal)

Is Age 30 The New 20? (Marketwatch)

How to Convince Someone When Facts Fail (Scientific American)

Smog refugees flee Chinese cities as "airpocalypse" blights half a billion people

(The Guardian)

China's Alibaba back on US counterfeits blacklist (BBC)

Trump Appoints "Death By China" Author Peter Navarro To Head Trade Office, Hints At Trade War With Beijing (Zero Hedge)

India’s Small Businesses Facing “Apocalypse” After Demonetisation Experiment KOs The Economy (The Guardian)

Strange Music, Owned By A Gangster Rapper, Enforces The Toughest "On The Road" Rules for Artists (Wall Street Journal)

Find the No. 1 Song on the day you were born (Playback.FM)

Complacency Screams "Get Out" Short Term

The Sure Fire Way To End Online Piracy

Mish on Newt Gingrich's Insane Approach To Economics, Intervention In Cuba, the Drug War and More

India Starts Paying for Iranian Oil With Gold Instead of US Dollars


Republican State Senator From Oklahoma Wants To Ban Human Fetuses In Food

Business/Economic/Housing/Layoffs News for August 16, 2010

Matt Taibbi: "Wall Street's Big Win"

The Biggest Lie About US Companies

Fleck: A Patently Obvious Way To Add Jobs

Massive Wealth Shift in Full Swing

Mish Says We Are Now In A Depression: Corporate bonds, Municipal Bonds, Treasuries at Record Low Yields; Is this a "Fool's Game"?

Mass Delusion American Style

Oil rises, dollar falls

Survey finds oil in Afghanistan

Gold Climbs a Third Day as Signs of Waning Recovery Fan Demand

Cotton Tests 1995 Peak as Supply Drops, Levi's Raises Prices

Jim Rogers Says Wheat, Agricultural Commodities Set for Steep Price Rises

Tastes Like Chicken: Hot New Plan For Conveying Taxpayer's Dollars To Wall Street Banks

Asian Stocks Fall to Three-Week Low as Yen Gains on Japan GDP

US 'Virtually Certain' to Fall Into A New Recession: Rosenberg

Infographics: How The Great Recession Has Changed Life In America

Signaling The Death of the American Dream

Another Threat To The Economy: Boomers Cutting Back

Recession-Worn Seniors Tap Social Security Early

The Reality Of The New Going Back To School List: Don't Forget The Janitorial & Bathroom Supplies

The Bears Have Seized Control Again

Is a Crash Coming? Ten Reasons to Be Cautious


Shadow Inventory Piles Up On Banks' Books

Your House Might Be "Under Water" For Years

When will the FHA blow up like Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae?

Labor Unrest In China Results In Upswing Of Strikes For Better Wages

The Chronically Unemployed: They're known as 'the 99ers,' and their numbers are growing

Greater A&P Grocery Chain To Lay Off Over 2,000 Employees

Trenton, NJ Could Cut 400 Jobs This Week If State Aid Does Not Arrive

New Jersey's Non-Profit Legal Aid To Pink Slip 100 Workers

Gas, LNG & Oil Outlook

Shell/Qatar partnered LNG plant is delayed by another year

LONDON, Nov 23 (Reuters) - Royal Dutch Shell (RDSa.L) said it had delayed one of its largest schemes by around a year with start-up for the $8 billion Qatargas 4 liquefied natural gas project now planned for late 2010 and the first cargo possibly pushed into 2011.

The delay, which a Shell spokeswoman said was due to contractors struggling to keep up with the pace of developments in Qatar's gas industry, will make it harder for the Anglo-Dutch oil major to turn around a long run of falling production.

"We had been planning for a start-up in early 2010 but now we expect that to come in late 2010," the spokeswoman said on Monday, adding the slippage represented a delay of 10 months.

She declined to say when first cargoes would load but a statement from the company said ramp-up of the project could continue into 2011, raising the prospect the facility may not be in a position to load ships until then.

One dealer said they were not surprised by the delay, as Shell had flagged problems to analysts in recent weeks.

Further delays are possible, with industry analysts at Waterborne LNG saying they expect first cargoes in mid 2011.

The postponement could ease pressure on LNG prices which have come under pressure after the economic recession hit gas demand. Most economists expect the global economy, and energy demand, to be stronger in 2011 than 2010.

The Qatargas 4 project will produce 7.8 million tonnes of LNG annually, equivalent to 280,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day.

State-run Qatar Petroleum owns 70 percent of the project, while Shell owns the rest. Gas will be exported to China and Dubai under oil price-linked contracts which will make the project highly profitable, analysts said.

LNG is natural gas cooled to liquid so it can be exported in ships over distances too far for pipelines to be economic.

Shell has a target of 2 percent to 3 percent average annual growth between 2009 and 2012, despite output falling in recent years.

Qatargas was not immediately available for comment.

Europe's largest oil company by market value said its larger Pearl gas-to-liquids project in Qatar was scheduled to be completed by the end of 2010, with production ramp-up from late 2010 and into 2011.

In March, then-Chief Executive Jeroen van der Veer said Pearl would come onstream in late 2010 or early 2011.


As India's demand for energy grows, it seeks additional LNG (liquefied natural gas) from Qatar

China to divert more industrial natural gas to its people this coming December and January

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China has no plan to cut oil imports from Iran

It is reported that China has no plan to decrease its oil imports from Iran, the world fifth largest crude exporter.

Mr Wang Tianpu president of top refiner Sinopec Corp said China oil imports from Iran will remain at the current level of around 400,000 barrels per day.

The comment came as China announced that it will increase its oil imports from Saudi Arabia by about 12% from this year to top one million barrels a day.

Reuters quoted a Sinopec trader as saying that “We have to secure other supplies as the OPEC cuts may affect grades that our plants really need.”

Iran is the No 3 oil supplier of China, the world’s No 2 oil user.

Total Finds Oil In Vietnam

Are Higher Prices the 'New Normal' for Oil?