As investments go, India has really great long-term prospects. No doubt about it.
Indeed, India has enjoyed very decent growth rates for the last decade, pulling many of its people out of poverty in the process.
But investing in India can be tricky.
Allow me to show you why.
For our forecast for the India stock market, please read on...
Brazil and China have had their differences, but the two emerging market leaders are putting those qualms aside for the betterment of both their growth.
The latest China-Brazil trade deal, which was announced Tuesday and is worth up to $1.5 billion, is the latest proof of that.
In fact, as the two countries entered into their third annual BRIC summit with their Indian and Russian counterparts, Brazil made it clear that it sees China as a model for its own industrial development.
Brazil and China have entered into an increasing number of trade agreements as the Red Dragon has sought to shore up supplies of raw materials to fuel its growth. Brazil, among other things, is the world's largest producer of iron ore and often a counterpoint in negotiations between China and Australian miners.
By Lee Adler
Weak corporate tax collections in the first quarter and through April 11 could mean that many quarterly earnings reports may surprise the market by failing to meet analysts' inflated expectations. Either corporate profits are falling sharply or else corporations have suddenly become much savvier about offshoring income and avoiding taxes. While they may be getting better at avoiding taxes, it seems unlikely that they've suddenly all become such geniuses at it simultaneously. My bet would be that when everybody has reported, aggregate earnings will fall short of consensus estimates.
The Treasury Department publishes daily data on tax collections. As of 5 PM each weekday it releases the Daily Treasury Statement for the previous day. That's as close as we can get to a real time economic barometer short of being at the cash register. It's definitely useful in gauging whether subsequent corporate earnings reports will meet, beat, or miss expectations. Corporate tax collections and subsequent reported aggregate earnings have correlated well historically, not just in terms of the trend, but even to the extent that the peaks and valleys in tax collections are echoed at lower amplitude in the earnings line.
Proposals for how to fix the U.S. government's spiraling federal budget deficit have led to little more than political gridlock and public frustration.
But House Republicans aimed to make progress last week. They released an ambitious 2012 budget plan on April 5, setting the stage for heated debate with Democrats over the best way to pull America out of its debt hole.
House Budget Committee Chairman Rep. Paul D. Ryan, R-WI, said the GOP's main goal is to avoid the national debt crisis America is headed toward.
Turn on the television or flip through the pages of any major newspaper, and the top stories will be either the stock market's unrelenting rise in recent days or gold's climb to yet another record high.
Without question, both are worthy of note – but the real star over the past eight months has been silver.
Stocks, gold and silver all hit cyclical lows during the final week of August 2010. The Dow Jones Industrial Average bottomed on Aug. 26, closing at 9,985.81, while June Comex gold futures closed at $1,223.30 an ounce on Aug. 24, and July Comex silver contracts settled at $18.121 per ounce on Aug. 23.
Silver rose as high as $41.98 an ounce this week – a 31-year high – and has remained above the $40-an-ounce level. That means that the "other" precious metal is up about 32% so far this year – and has more than doubled since Money Morning recommended it to readers in early September.
But where does it go from here? And how should investors position themselves? To answer those questions – and others – Money Morning brought its top "gurus" together for a roundtable discussion.
For this discussion, Money Morning Executive Editor William Patalon III and Associate Editor Kerri Shannon sat down with Money Morning Chief Investment Strategist Keith Fitz-Gerald, contributing editors Shah Gilani, Martin Hutchinson and Peter Krauth, and Contributing Writer Jack Barnes, the author of our popular weekly "Buy, Sell or Hold" feature.
The consensus: The long-term outlook for silver remains bullish, and a projected near-term pullback might even be healthy. But certain stocks and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) will likely be winners, and certain metals dealers are more reputable than others.
What follows is a transcript of that silver investing strategies roundtable discussion:
For our forecast for silver prices – and our top profit plays – please read on…
Investors have been flocking to precious metals to protect from looming inflation and a weak outlook for the U.S. dollar. The trend has turned investments related to gold, silver and other precious metals into some of the hottest plays of the past year.
The demand for "safe-haven" metals investments continues pushing prices to new highs:
Oil prices are on the rise for a bevy of reasons – soaring demand in emerging markets, the weak dollar, and a strengthening U.S. recovery, to name a few.
However, supply disruptions and civil unrest in the Middle East-North Africa (MENA) region in recent months have had the biggest impact on oil prices. Egypt, Libya and Yemen have all played a part in driving up oil prices, and now they're about to be joined by another volatile oil producer.
I'm talking about Nigeria.
When a March 25 "no-confidence" vote toppled the government of Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, it also set the stage for a new general election.
This May 2 election will be Canada's third in five years and fourth in seven years. In light of the civil unrest in the Middle East/North Africa (MENA) region – not to mention the financial problems that continue to plague Europe – it would be understandable if global investors added Canada to the "do not invest" list.
But don't make that mistake: Our neighbor to the north remains one of the most stable big-market profit plays on the planet today.
Some investors even refer to it as the "world's safest economy." And with good reason.
For four ways to profit from the world's "safest economy," please read on...
