Stock Preacher

A key factor is preventing huge panic selling of shares and augurs for an equities rebound is the piecemeal nature of government attempts to rescue banks and the economy, according to analyst , Sitaraman Shankar. “We need to see an index falling 7 or 8 percent intraday in high volumes and then ending up nearly flat on the day as the buyers come back in,” said Philippe Gijsels, strategist at Fortis in Brussels. “What we’re getting instead is Chinese water torture, and no massive cleanout. Governments and central banks are tending to watch stock markets and giving investors small glimmers of hope, not enough to take markets higher, but enough to prevent a sell-off.” So for capitulation to happen, markets will have to be hit by a big, negative news event, and for the rebound to be sustainable, the overall environment would have to improve. “We need to see an event that would shock everybody, a big US bank failure, or a country in Europe going broke,” said Mark Bon, fund manager at Canada Life. Bon said positive factors that would need to be in place for any strong rebound included an improvement in consumer or business confidence indicators, some merger and acquisition activity, successful rights issues and a belief among investors that company profits had bottomed out. “We would have a sharp sell-off triggered by an event, and then a turnaround as people reversed their short positions and bought into a rally,” he said. The MSCI world index .MIWD00000PUS hit its lowest point since April 2003 last week. The index fell more than 43% last year, punctured by a credit market crisis with its origins in collapsed subprime U.S. mortgages, and is already down 16%this year. Between November 2008 and January 2009, there was a 27% rally driven by investor relief that governments were acting firmly to deal with the crisis. Since January 2009 global equities have slipped steadily as it became clear that the government moves were not enough to stave off a sharp recession in top economies. NO CAPITULATION = SMALLER FALLS, WEAKER RALLIES

Popularity: 6% [?]

World trade flows are falling fast as the credit crisis bites and Crude Oil prices slide, with official figures showing export and import declines in the US, China, UK and Canada. The banking crisis hit consumer and business confidence last fall, leading to higher levels of unsold inventory, some problems in securing trade credit insurance and falling investment across advanced economies, all of which reduced the demand for imports and the level of exports.

Popularity: 7% [?]

According to a recently released Global Competitiveness report from the World Economic Forum, Canada has the “soundest” banking system in the world. In 2nd place: Sweden, Luxembourg, Australia, Denmark, Netherlands, and coming in 3rd: Belgium, New Zealand, Ireland, Malta, and the United States, well the US was ranked 40th.

Popularity: 13% [?]

The price of a detached house in West Vancouver fell 22% in October from a year earlier, draging down the average residential price in Canada down by 10%, the biggest decline in 26 years, according to the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver and the Canadian Real Estate Association.The speed and magnitude of the price declines in parts of metropolitan Vancouver and across the country are startling some Canadians, who haven’t seen a recession since 1992, said Ken Peacock, director of economic research at the Business Council of British Columbia. Many homeowners felt Canada, the world’s eighth-largest economy, would escape the U.S. credit crisis.

Popularity: 2% [?]