Investors rushed into bonds in 2012 pushing the yield on the 10-year US Treasury bonds to under 2%, their lowest level since George Washington was president. Click to enlarge Source: Desperately Seeking Safety, Seth J. Masters, Alliance Bernstein From the research report by Seth: These extraordinarily low yields primarily reflect the Federal Reserve’s concerted efforts in recent …
I recently came across an article on frontier markets in which Franklin Templeton’s Carlos von Hardenberg, the deputy manager of the $1.2bn Templeton Frontier Markets fund stated that for sky-high returns investors should consider frontier markets. According to him, investors focusing on just the emerging markets for growth are missing the opportunities in frontier markets. However this trend seems to …
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Japan has the highest debt to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the developed world. Late last year, Japan’s sovereign debt exceeded over 200% of the GDP. At that time, the OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurria commented that Japan’s debt load was in “Uncharted Territory”. However unlike most countries in the developed world, 90% of Japanese government debt …
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According to an article in The Wall Street Journal recently, U.S, exports of coal continues to soar. Last year 120 million tons of black gold was exported compared to about half of that amount in 2009. The following chart shows the gradual increase in coal exports: Click to enlarge Two interesting facts from the article: Contrary …
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The U.S. railroad industry is one of the key pillars of the economy. Railroads are highly efficient and help move goods from one point to another cheaply and efficiently. Joining tracks of Central Pacific Railroad and Union Pacific Railroad to complete the transcontinental railroad at Promontory, Utah May 10, 1869 Some of the reasons to invest …