morgan stanley2

Reasons for the weakness at the open: Morgan Stanley takes estimates from global GDP growth from 4.2% to 3.8% for 2011. Scary front page of the WSJ: “Fed Eyes European Banks” which is what they should be doing but it is still scary as presented. NTAP cut guidance last night and the stock is off…

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nyc sunrise

While many pundits are talking about recessionary conditions – we would like to point out that the actual environment is much better than this, and in many regards, running at about the same pace now as Q1. We acknowledge that GDP growth has disappointed this year, and come in lower than bullish forecasts from Wall…

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german fashion

The German economy has detached from other developed markets over the past year. Real GDP growth in Germany grew at 3.6% in 2010, and accelerated to 5.5% growth in the first quarter of this year. This morning, we learn that the initial estimate of Q2 GDP growth has fallen sharply to 0.5%. This is the…

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french model

Rumors are swirling that France is about to be downgraded by Standard & Poor’s. We do not believe France should be downgraded, unless every nation that is rated “AAA” changed to “AA” on Standard & Poor’s definition of “AA”. No country should have a higher sovereign credit rating than the US. No other nation has the world’s…

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recession special

Well, the market clearly isn’t looking for the light at the end of the tunnel. Italian 10-YR bonds have surged, rallying 80 basis points (from a 6.09% yield on Friday to 5.29% yield today). Spanish 10-YR bonds have also surged, rallying 88 basis points (from a 6.03% yield on Friday to a 5.14% yield today).…

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light at end of tunnel

Fears of a Crisis Grow Interesting market reactions this morning. While many market participants are clearly being terrorized by a crisis of confidence (and this is always a risk) there look to be some genuinely better pieces of information. Markets are selling off based on rhetoric from the ECB. As we discussed yesterday, the ECB…

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rome

Click Here for Formatted Europe PDF “I think we need a bigger boat!” The words of Martin Brody, played by the late Roy Scheider, ring true today with regard to Europe’s spluttering attempt to avoid a sovereign debt crisis. Now that the side-show spectacle regarding raising the US debt ceiling (i.e., whether the US would…

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Crackerjack Finance holds the view that superior investment results come from three areas: knowledge, perspective, and disciplined research. After growing weary of financial websites and blogs that either a) regurgitate headlines or b) scratch the surface with quick-and-easy investment recommendations, Crackerjack was conceptualized in order to provide deeper investment analysis with regard to the broad…

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