Another month

World markets have brought up gold and oil, as well as equity futures. There’s still another day of trading before the US cash markets open, but, so far so good.

It looks like geo-political news will catch the spotlight before bailouts and euros do. Sure it’s all related, but you may want to keep an eye on commodities this week, especially gold and oil. A couple notes on what’s cooking out there on the war front: Deaths as Israeli forces storm Gaza aid ship, Koreas Ease Tensions With Small Gestures, China Balks at Criticism of North Korea, and Israel braces for Turkish, Hizballah, Hamas reprisals. Greece halts joint drill. We live in interesting times.

Coming this week on Friday, we have the monthly US Jobs report, which should show the much awaited pop created by census worker hiring. This should be psychologically motivating if we see over 300K jobs created. On the other hand we may also see a pop in layoffs in a couple of months as the government will not need all these census workers anymore. It’s like getting drunk….we have fun and feel good for a little while, but we’ll feel the hurt later.

If all the euro-country lending/bailout stuff has got you confused, then this video, Lending merry-go-round, should straighten it all out for you.

Hope everyone had a great long weekend. Thanks to the family and friends of our military might…past, present and future….without whose dedication and sacrifices we could not do all the things we take for granted. Thank you!