Folks, today marks the end of several things—the month, the quarter and the half-year, which we discussed earlier this week. But it also marks the end of QE2— the Federal Reserve’s policy to stimulate the economy by buying treasury securities with money it created out of thin air. People will be arguing for years about [...]

Folks, back when I was trading on the floor of the CME, I was surrounded by some of the best traders in the world. One of those traders was a man named Bing Sung, a brilliant guy who went from being a Harvard academic to helping to run the Harvard Endowment Fund. He was a [...]

Folks, we talked a little yesterday about T+3—how it takes three days after a trade to settle on stocks. I bring it up again today because there’s a trade developing that’s related to this T+3 phenomenon. As you know, every now and then an index will change its composition—a stock will be added and one [...]

Folks, this is a big week. We’ve got the end of the quarter, the end of the half-year and the end of the month all coming in this week. This is when we see strategies get scrutinized. Be cognizant of that trade-plus-three (T+3), the delayed delivery date for stock and bond transactions as fund and [...]

Yesterday, the Obama administration decided to release 30 million barrels out of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Supposedly, they were making up for the shortfall in Libyan production. But why now?  Why not when oil was up at $115/barrel? Because the only strategy at play here is the political kind. My fellow Chicagoan saw the recent [...]

Folks, we talked a little yesterday about Growthflation—this once-in-a-lifetime global growth story that’s coupled with inflationary pressure on the demand side—and I wanted to pick up on that more today. I believe that if we tune out the day-to-day noise—Greece, the Fed press conference, the pullback in oil this morning—and take a macro view of [...]

Folks, my good friend, Jeff Carter, joined me on the broadcast today. Jeff is an independent trader who’s also a commentator for CNBC, Bloomberg and Fox. He writes the wonderful blog pointsandfigures.com, which I highly recommend. Years ago he and I sat on the board of the CME together, where we helped usher in the electronic [...]

I’ve been talking a lot lately about the digestible levels we’ve been seeing in the S&P 500, and how this prolonged correction in that 7% sweet spot has made the market very cheap in terms of valuation. So today I thought I’d pull some numbers. Let’s take a look at the S&P earnings for the [...]

Folks, I had the great honor and pleasure of having former house speaker and Republican candidate for president, Newt Gingrich, as a guest on my show this morning. Mr. Gingrich and I discussed his new book, “A Nation Like No Other: Why American Exceptionalism Matters” and his Five Habits of Liberty, which speak right to [...]