The big news revolved around gold -- black gold, to be specific. OPEC announced a 1.2 million barrel reduction of daily supplies; shortly thereafter, Russia announced its own 300,000 barrel reduction. If followed, these supply decreases should exert upward pressure on crude oil prices, and as a result, the energy complex soared.

By Jon S. Strebler

In the financial planning field, we tell people that going into debt is by itself neither good nor bad. There are a number of criteria that make borrowing money either wise or unwise; perhaps the most important of those is the purpose of the loan. From a strictly logical, monetary point of view, borrowing to pay monthly bills, go on a vacation, buy a new bass boat or jewelry for your spouse is probably not well-advised. On the other hand, borrowing to expand a profitable business, to purchase a residence or certain other solid, physical assets may well be a very good idea.

By Matthew Kerkhoff

Part of the essence of Dow Theory has to do with confirmations, which at their root level look for congruencies in the marketplace. With many indicators frequently moving in different directions, alignments across key market barometers can substantiate the existence of an underlying trend.

Price action over the past few weeks has led to an abundance of confirmations, in addition to Dow Theory recently turning bullish. Let’s examine a few of these moves to understand what lies ahead.

Richard's Comments

Few investment legends have weathered more than Richard Russell.  Born in the Great Depression, Russell knew what it was like to live in hard times.  And his survival tips are essentially timeless.

Today was a bit calmer than yesterday around the world, as stock markets were generally mixed.  In the US, more good economic news helped the Dow Industrials move higher, though the S&P 500 and especially the NASDAQ have been reluctant to follow it.  

by Jon S. Strebler

Now that the Presidential election is over, a top concern is “the ins”: in-terest rates and in-flation rates. Inflation is defined as an ongoing rise in the average price of goods and services. There are two types of inflation. One is cost-push inflation, also known as stagflation. It most notably occurred in the late-1970s and early-1980s when the cost of inputs (raw materials, labor, capital) climbed, thus increasing the cost of making things while at the same time reducing the aggregate (or total) supply of goods and services. It looks like this, with AS representing the total supply of stuff and AD representing the total demand for stuff: