bluealberta said:
Way too long a post to respond to all
Sorry about that, I didn't even know it was submitted. It was sitting in the background, I get interrupted all the time, then when I have to wait for anything I go back to, well that post in this case, and other things have happened, more gets added but I should have moved it into a text editor because it was just a draft, but I must have hit something and it got submitted.
Now I'm waiting for a phone call, went back to see if anything in the post was even relevant, given than the vote was over and there's nothing for markets to react to now, but it was already submitted. And now it's been pulled out of context so I don't know what to do with it.
You managed to get past the economic report from 8 months ago that had/has nothing to do with politics: which was the point of posting it along with the dollar being at US$75.22 eight months ago, not US$62, which is quite a difference. But the 6 key is also right next to the 7 key and it could have been a typo. But you had a chance to state so and didn't. So right off the bat of your assumption, you proved that you don't know what you're talking about.
72 is close enough but 62?
So you found something in the Financial Post this afteroon and ignored everything else. And didn't even quote it.
Where is this article? How am I supposed to address something I can't even see that might (it's not an accusation, just a possibility) have pulled things out of context or missed the point of the article, as you did with my (draft unfortunately) post.
Did they deny that currency speculators pay attention to headlines from all over the world or that political instability/uncertainty is one of biggest indicators (aside from war or radical monetary policy changes, that they don't have time to sit around analyzing) and that if they're not on the ball, everyone is going to trade, over bad economic news (which political uncertainty is), for other currencies "before the other guy" before the value drops as the currency is traded for others, which raises the value of other currencies (possibly for a tenth of a second), but the value could drop so much that they end up stuck with the currency, because no one else is going to trade for it until better news comes out?
But regardless, the main cause of the rise of every curency in the world that trades openly, has been the fall of the USD over its massive trade and budget deficits and "soft economic patches", like in Feb 2003, the whole U.S. economy created 100 jobs: 2 per state.
Why has the Euro, you can check every currency in the world that trades openly, gone up in relation to the USD, other than the one everyone bitches about, particularly the U.S., the Chinese yuan, which doesn't trade openly on world markets and is pegged to the value of the USD.
So while even the most obscure currencies in the world were rising against the USD, the yuan wasn't (due to the possibility that Harper would become PM of the Canadas?), which contributed/contributes to the U.S. trade deficit, massively.
But you think it's because of Harper? And hang on a sec before you say, "No
you do!"
You made the assertion that the Canadian dollar was at 62 cents 8 monhs ago and has risen due to the possibility of "another government" (and your handle make the "other government" quite clear) would be running Canada.
So if that's true, in the context of this thread, why did the dollar go up when Stronach left the "conservative" reform-alliance party and joined the "liberals"?
The U.S. economy has picked up, and fallen and picked up and fallen, around the usual indicators and they've never all been down, but our currency value (in relation to USD, not the Euro) goes up and down with it. But the overall trend has been up, and it has nothing to do with politics in this country.
About six months ago when testimony came out of the Gomery inquiry that didn't look good at all for the government, the dollar started to fall: and who says it was due to the possibility of another political party taking over the government? If anything, if that's the theory, which is what I responded to, the dollar would have gone UP because the possibility of the "conservatives" taking over would have been good news. So why did the dollar fall instead?
Why did the dollar go up (in relation to the usual, the USD), which is the only context of this thread, when Stronach left the "conservative" reform-alliance party?
Why did the Canadian dollar drop when Parrish, who everyone knew was going to vote yea on C-78 yesterday, ended up in the hospital? Why did the dollar go back up when the news was released that she was released from the hospital and was going to be able to vote?
And why, as I stated yesterday, hasn't the Canadian dollar taken a hit today, over this "bad news" that the government didn't crash yesterday and the budget (that mattered) passed?
The markets are closed, and I just glanced at the board and the dollar is up at US$0.7898¢. Why isn't it down to 62 cents, as you claim it was 8 months ago, over this horrible news that the government didn't crash and the budget passed and the "conservatives" didn't get their way?
Now there's no possibility for an election until, as the majority of Canadians wanted, giving them 30 days to digest all the contradictory testimony of the Gomery report when it's tabled. So why didn't the Canadian dollar take a dive?
And whaddya know, I knew it was all sitting around somewhere, the values of the Canadian dollar, in Canadian dollars from our own central bank, not what someone else has to pay for it with whatever interest rate another country's central bank is charging on their currency, which the interest rate spread they have to deal with, not us:
March 27, 2004,
US$75.85¢
Gold, insurance, TSX market corrections. Just a bit of context from over a year ago.
August 14, 2004,
US$76.40¢
Why?
Dollar lifts off record trade data Surplus contrasts with
big U.S. deficit. Dollar gains 1.21 cents on greenback (from the previous week; these are all Saturdays when the economists, analysts, speculators are out playing golf or having lunch in the French Riviera. Well, the big CEO's anyway; not they're taking the day off, they're swinging deals over cocktails at the Golf & Country Clubs or wherever the hobnobbing is going on).
September 4, 2004,
US$76.93¢ (8 months ago)
Why? Aside from the U.S. election coming up and there being almost 1 million fewer jobs in the U.S. since Bush became president (so why isn't Kerry pushing that and doing better, nailing Bush's Achilles heel, the horrible economic performance -- which really isn't up to any government but they like to pretend and people believe them; other than around budget deficits like in the U.S., but investment/business takes place on the business level
not the political level), the Hollinger crap was going on, Black had a possible legal loophole, Martin should ignore pressure to cozy up to Bush (according to the U.K.) and even the 'conservative'
Financial Times, crude prices were down, Intel shares took took a big hit (down $20.05 U.S. from July; ouch), technology stocks lower on Bay St., well up, but only by 0.12% on the week) and NY blue chips drifted lower.
No mention of Harper. And that was sort of 8 months ago, whatever you think happened 8 months ago, to drive the Canadian dollar up from 62 cents, steadily, which the numbers below will not show.
September 18, 2004,
US$77.07¢ (8 months ago almost exactly from the date of your post -- and on a Saturday, all around the world, when no major trading is going on)
Why? "
Loonie dives as rate of inflation slows". Hmm. Nothing mentioned about Harper at all. Down 0.43¢ from the previous week. That's almost half a cent, which is a fairly big dive. But not from the US$76.93¢ two weeks prior.
And now things start getting interesting.
October 30, 2004,
US$82.10¢
Why? "
Ford agrees to employment guarantees". And America's flu crisis over outsourcing vaccinations to Britain that got spoiled leaving them short and Conrad Black offered to resign as CEO of Hollinger, and a government report on economic growth that buoyed Toronto stocks, putting the TSX's key index to the highest level in three weeks. Wall St. posted a mixed finish; end of the month. No mention of Harper.
Here's the kicker I was looking for.
November 27, 2004,
US$85.04¢
The Canadian dollar broke past 84 cents U.S. to 85 cents. But then...
January 1, 2005
US$83.19¢.
Why? What did Harper do from the end of November to January to cause the dollar to drop by almost 2 cents U.S.? Isn't it supposed to be a steady rise from the "62 cents" 8 months ago, due to the possibility of another government taking over, to the Canadian dollar being 6 cents lower than it was 6 months ago, today? But still up today and with interest rates holding steady, which the Bank of Canada would not have done had something as major as what the "conservative" reform-alliance planned for "Canada" yesterday, happened.
Annual % changes from Jan 1, 2004 to Dec 31, 2004:
TSX up
12.84%
S&P 500 up 8.99%
Nasdaq up 8.59%
London [FTSE] up 7.45%
DOW [Jones Industrial] up 3.15%
Tokyo [NIKKEI] up 7.61%
Hong Kong [Hang Seng] up
13.15%
No mention of Harper or anything political. The market had some good legs. But the question for "Canadian investors" (which doesn't mean Canadian citizens) was ... how much further would (or could, beating every other market in the world other than the Hang Seng) rise in the immediate future?
And the Canadian dollar closed 2004 at a three-week high against the U.S. currency, and was expected push higher next (this) year, due to Stephen Harper.
I mean, nagging concerns over
U.S. deficits, as the whole world knows and it's main reason every currency that trades openly has gained on the USD over the last three years or more.
It was the Canadian dollar's
third conseceutive year of gains, adding another (or in reality, subtracting from the value of the USD; combined with the Canadian economic growth in 2004) adding another
7.5 "per cent" (cents, in USD) in 2004 after a rise from 2003's
21 "per cent" gain.
I'm sorry it's so long (again, and edited) but the main spike of getting over 85 cents U.S. with some context, had to be shown. The Canadian dollar was not at 62 cents U.S. 8 months ago and it has not risen steadily over anything to do with Harper. It took little hits that no one will even care about (now), every time something negative for the "liberals" was released and every time anything positive for the "conservatives" was released, but only since the revised budget/confidence vote have the "conservatives" been publicly determined to shut down parliament and try to crash the government.
And at crunch time, within the last week, they not only didn't change their position but lost their star MP for the entire Ontario section of the Windsor-Quebec City Corridor -- and the dollar went UP over it, not down.
But it's a trick to just play the same game you are, which is why I posted some economic news as to why the dollar was really up or down, because it has a lot more to do with real economics (and world economics, not just here; particularly in the U.S.), not currency speculators, and business news doesn't cut it either. Economic reports for the month or better, quarter, are needed to make any real sense out of what matters: long term investments, even when they're short term, looking at them over some meaningful period of time, like per quarter and per year, not per day or week or even month.
