BKT News and Press, BlackRock Income Trust Inc. From 05/12/19

We didn't know what we thought we knew. As far as market participants understood it, a Sino-US trade pact was a done deal. Last year's escalations gave way to a steady stream of recycled headlines about "progress" in 2019. Talks are always "constructive", according to Steve Mnuchin. China i...

This article has an ambitious purpose, namely, to show investors how interconnected different financial sectors are and how they influence other sectors. The stock markets, the Fed, the debt and the dollar are not independent entities that go their own way. They influence each other. The US do...

The disruption this week is connected with the US-China trade talks that is scaring financial markets throughout the world. The yield on the 10-year US Treasury note dropped to 2.45 percent as money poured into the bond market, down from the 2.50 percent close yesterday. This rush to ris...

A few months ago, I wrote part III to this series outlining why interest rates would continue to remain low and most likely continue to fall on the long-end of the curve, confounding consensus opinion as to why interest rates should rise. The consensus opinion on long-term interest rates, ...

Three pieces of recent good news for Federal Reserve officials. First, the rate of growth of the US economy rose or remained constant for the twelfth consecutive month , coming in for the first quarter of 2019 at 3.2 percent. Second, the growth rate of labor force productivity came in at...

The BCI at 258.6 is above last week's 257.9, and formed a new high for this business cycle indicated by the BCIp of 100. Also, the 6-month smoothed annualized growth BCIg at 13.7 is above last week’s 12.9. Both BCIp and BCIg are not signaling a recession. (BCIp needs to drop below 25, o...

Why Did Rates Fall On The "Strong" GDP Print? On Friday, the BEA released the Q1 GDP figures which widely beat consensus expectations, rising 3.2% quarter over quarter (QoQ). Under the headline number revealed much weaker results than the top-line "beat" suggested which is why nominal int...

At the end of the second quarter of 2019, the US economy will have completed ten years of growth, the longest period of economic expansion since the end of the Second World War. It appears as if the annual compound rate of growth will come out around 2.3 percent. As post-World War II busines...

While the housing market has historically been the catalyst for many U.S. recessions, Hedgeye Housing analyst Josh Steiner explains in the video below why it’s unlikely to be the cause of the next economic downturn. “Housing is normally the cause of recessions – with...

Understanding The Economy: Where Are We Headed? In a recent research note, published about two months ago, I outlined why recession risk was low despite a decelerating economic environment. I made this assessment based on my four-factor coincident index which was constructed based o...