An interesting holiday trading season.
Last week, the Dow had the worst week for the whole year.
The broader indexes weren’t spared from the selling.
The trading was not done after the close Friday afternoon.
For all of those who are smarter than the rest and have moved their money into Crypto, Saturday was not a merry day.
Bitcoin fell down to $40,000 after trading near $70,000 a couple of weeks ago.
It recovered some and moved back to $49,000.
It just seems that sooner or later governments will take back the power they have through issuing currency.
China was one of the first. Countries ability to print money is their real power base.
These leaders will not cede the control they have, no matter how logical the instrument or how much more innovative.
Speaking of control, Chairman Powell speaking for the Federal Reserve testified last week that inflation is a factor and probably not transitory.
He may have delete that term permanently.
Such talk sent interest rates up along with the value of the dollar.
Crude prices though dropped all the way to $60 before coming back to $68 as concerns that the Omicron variant of Covid could slow the economy down.
The concerns over the impact of yet another strain on the economic recovery was the real con-
cern pushing the selling.
Make no mistake though that traders were taking profits while they still could.
Speaking of government control and power in China, the ride-sharing firm Didi is delisting in the U.S. and will trade in Hong Kong.
This is becoming a trend.
Part of the problem in listing in the U.S. is that the SEC has reporting requirements to protect the public.
As such, companies have to post audited financials.
That has been a problem for many considering whether to invest in Chinese companies.
Though it appears that Alibaba is China’s answer to Amazon, it is virtually impossible to determine what in fact they earn.
It has been a real problem, sending sellers in and pulling the stock price down.
You soon may have to trade on the Hong Kong exchange to invest in Chinese stocks.
The Chinese government has other issues to deal with, as Evergande the Chinese real estate company may default on its debt this week.
Just another example of how hard it is to manipulate the economy through the government control.
I am more of a fan of Milton Friedman’s theory on free enterprise and freedom of choice.
There is no perfect solution but it is hard to place trust in those who seek to control you on almost any level.
