TheStreet: Why China's Yuan Can't Take Down the Almighty Dollar

By SIMON CONSTABLE

Warnings that the Chinese yuan will oust the greenback as the world's primary reserve currency are premature at best. Absurdly premature, in fact. 

And that's a good thing for Americans. Having the dollar as king of currencies means borrowing costs from banks like JPMorgan Chase are lower than they would otherwise be. Likewise, imported goods in stores like Macy's, are cheaper. The good news is that situation isn't changing anytime soon.

It isn't so much that the dollar is a Goliath to the yuan as David as that the biblical fight between a giant and a young man looks fairly matched when you start comparing the two currencies. Read more here.

Photo by Sahand Hoseini on Unsplash

U.S. News: What Market Pros Will Be Watching in 2016

By SIMON CONSTABLE

If Mr. Market flummoxed you in 2015, don't worry. There's always tomorrow. 

Wall Street saw the eurozone narrowly avert disaster as Greece agreed to another bailout, China's stock market fall off a cliff and energy stocks suffer. Meanwhile, many health care companies and tech stocks continue to roll. 

What will the new year bring? To give you a little assistance in navigating the investment world, here's what some long-time market experts will be watching in 2016. 

Read more here.

TheStreet: Why Artificial Intelligence and Smart Machines Won't Destroy Us

By SIMON CONSTABLE

If you're worried that more intelligent machines will begin to make humans irrelevant in the work place, don't be. We've been down this road before, and it didn't turn out half as bad as many feared.

Yes, it's true that IBM's (IBM - Get Report) Watson computer has become a Jeopardy champion and that machines can learn. Apple's iPhone auto-correct seems to be improving, and Alphabet's Google search features do an increasingly good job of anticipating what you're really scouring the Web for.

Read more here.

Forbes: Schlonged -- Famous Quotes Using Trump's Latest Quip

By SIMON CONSTABLE

Entrepreneur and presidential candidate Donald Trump has done it again. He has captured the imagination of the press corps, this time by using the word “schlonged.” He meant “defeated,” he says.

Trump is not the first to use the word in that manner. Apparently, a host at National Public Radio described a 1984 political defeat using the term on-air in 2011, according to a report in the Washington Post. Another report by the Washington Post says he probably got the meaning wrong because he isn’t familiar with Yiddish, which maybe true.

Still, that’s where English is different from some other languages. It morphs over time. The way we use words changes and maybe Trump is an unlikely innovator in this field.

With that in mind I have amended some classic quotes to include this vernacular in the way Trump says he meant. No offense intended to anyone.

Read more here.

OZY: What More Cowbell Means For Europe's Economy

By SIMON CONSTABLE

A decade and a half ago, Saturday Night Live viewers first heard the phrase “More cowbell!” from actor Christopher Walken playing fictional music producer “the Bruce Dickinson.” Since then, the line has become an iconic quip — but one that’s not limited to pop culture. Across the pond, investors have been calling for more financial cowbell from the European Central Bank, and earlier this month, they got it. Sort of.

The head of the ECB, Mario Draghi, did deliver more cowbell in the form of some stimulus and lowered interest rates, but not as much as had been expected. “Ultimately, and profoundly, the ECB disappointed, and this has rarely been seen in Draghi’s tenure,” states a recent report from the bank Brown Brothers Harriman. Some small commotion followed in the financial markets. Still, the question remains: Will the policy move ultimately achieve the desired goals of lifting inflation and spurring growth? Read more here.

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U.S. News: 9 Things to Know About Investing in a Mutual Fund

By SIMON CONSTABLE

Once in a while, the markets deliver a timely reminder that not all investments are created equal. We just got one – and right in time for the holidays. 

Third Avenue Management's Focused Credit Fund recently announced it would stop investors from cashing in their holdings. The reason was to facilitate the orderly liquidation of the fund's holdings of speculative-grade fixed income securities, also known as junk bonds. To do otherwise would have meant a fire sale. 

Should investors have been surprised that they couldn't get their money when they wanted it? Maybe, maybe not. It is rather unusual for a mutual fund to do such a thing. That said, investors need to do their research before committing their hard-earned funds to any mutual fund. 

Read more here.

Barron's: Commodities’ Big Hurdle: The Strong Greenback

By SIMON CONSTABLE

The strength of the dollar will give no reprieve next year to already pummeled commodities markets.

Any rallies for crude oil, steel, coal, copper, and other base metals will be muted as the buck heads higher against most major currencies in 2016. It will do so because, while the U.S. economy isn’t exactly strong, it’s in a lot better shape than other key economies.

All major commodities are priced in greenbacks. So when the dollar strengthens, their prices fall if nothing else has changed. Put another way, if the dollar rallies 10%, then it buys 10% more materials than it did previously. As the U.S. dollar climbed 9.9% over the past year against a trade-weighted index of major currencies, prices of diesel fuel, natural gas, and U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate oil slid 40%, 39%, and 34%, respectively. Read more here.

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