Throughout the years, I've extolled the KISS principle, an abbreviation of Keep it Simple, Stupid. Over complicating matters rarely generates benefits greater than the drawbacks associated with all the complication. GE stumbled on the same idea when it combined three digital businesses into a single Digital Solutions unit a few years ago. The business was having trouble generating new business because it took potential clients months to parse through GE's reams of contract language. To speed up business and boost revenue, GE focused on creating a single plain language contract to replace its … [Read more...]
Archives for March 2017
Should I be Frightened or Happy about Driverless Trucking?
I don’t know if I should be frightened or enthusiastic about this news. The Wall Street Journal reports that driverless trucks may be on the horizon. With the trucking industry struggling to find drivers, regulations on labor squeezing profits, some artificial-intelligence experts see an opportunity to automate big rigs. I don’t know about you, but it is going to take some getting used to a massive big-rig hauling down the highway at 70 MPH without a driver. but should it happen, you are talking about a profound change. The opportunity not only for truckers, but for businesses would be … [Read more...]
IRS Fraud Getting Better, but Risks Remain
Since peaking in 2014 at 766,000, the number of reports of tax-ID theft involving federal returns has dropped dramatically. But risks remain to tax filers who don't protect themselves. Thieves are using new methods to get access to tax filers' information in order to file false claims in their names, and then pocketing fraudulent refunds before anyone knows what's happening. Laura Saunders writes in The Wall Street Journal: And thieves are constantly trying to defeat new detection efforts. In some recent schemes, phishers pretend to be high-level executives requesting W-2 information for many … [Read more...]
New American Oil Production to be the Backbone of Success for Exxon
In 2017 Exxon will spend a fourth of its budget on drilling in Texas, new Mexico and North Dakota shale plays according to Bradley Olson at The Wall Street Journal. The U.S. increasingly appears at the center of a burgeoning global revival after prices rebounded modestly and companies such as Exxon have improved in their ability to profit due to lower costs and feats of engineering. Yet unlike some peers that plan to keep investment roughly flat in future years, Exxon plans to increase spending to an average of $26 billion a year from 2018 to 2020. The company plans $22 billion in … [Read more...]
Is 30,000 the next stop for the Dow?
That's the opinion of at least one analyst who points out that if stocks reach the same valuation level they reached during the two greatest stock market bubbles in U.S. history, the Dow could hit 30,000. I don't know if that should make one optimistic or frightened. MarketWatch has the story. In a note to clients, McMillan asks the obvious: Where does the Dow go from here, after cracking that 21,000 ceiling? Given stocks are in uncharted waters, he looks for a steer in the Shiller’s CAPE ratio, which compares equity prices with earnings over the past 10 years to gauge frothiness in the … [Read more...]
Exciting New Additive Manufacturing Tech Could Improve the World
In Pittsburgh, America's historic center of manufacturing prowess, GE is improving a technique called additive manufacturing which could change the world by making processes more efficient and reliable. GE Reports writes: Few technologies have spread as rapidly as additive manufacturing, and few show as much promise. As recently as the early 1990s, 3D printing prototypes were a rarity found at only a handful of research labs scattered across the globe. Today, GE is printing fuel nozzles and other components for jet engines that already are powering planes with paying passengers on board. CATA … [Read more...]
Epic Rally Squeezed Short Money Until it Really Hurt
The shorts got squeezed after Trump’s speech. The fast money didn’t look very smart here. Stock market gurus are out in full force explaining the reasons for the rally. But I have not heard the real reason from a single person. To get to the answer, let’s start by reviewing an annotated chart of DJIA futures. Please click here for the annotated chart. To find out what happened today, we’d have to know how large players were positioned going into Trump's speech, which took place after the close of the stock market. (Positioning, in this context, means aggressive short selling or buying … [Read more...]
The Fed Signals a Rate Hike for the First Time in 2017
Fed officials are attempting to prepare the market for a rate hike in March as best they can. They proclaimed loudly on Tuesday that March is the right time. The market is listening. On February 22nd traders pegged the chances of a March rate hike at 35%, by Tuesday night odds had risen to an 82% chance. Early morning trading on Wednesday appears to show even more confidence in a March hike. Also illustrating the market's confidence in a March hike is the movement in the 12 month Treasury bill, which is typically sensitive to expectations of Fed funds rate moves. You can see in my chart … [Read more...]
Japan Stuck in Unparalleled Years Long Low Rate Trap
The Federal Reserve and other global central banks should pay close attention to the low rate trap Japan has created for itself. John Lyons and Miho Inada write for The Wall Street Journal: The U.S. appears to be leading other parts of the globe out of an extended era where central banks relied heavily on low and negative interest rates and stimulus to jump-start growth and keep prices from falling. The Federal Reserve has raised U.S. interest rates, and the European Central Bank is considering easing its stimulus. Japan remains definitively stuck, despite a long and aggressive experiment … [Read more...]
This is What Happens When Companies are Threatened with Tariffs
LG Electronics has announced a new washing machine factory in Tennessee, its first major US. facility. LG isn't the first Asian company to bypass domestic production in its home country to instead produce appliances in the U.S. Haier, a Chinese conglomerate, purchased GE's appliance unit in June of 2016 for $5.4 billion. But The Wall Street Journal's Andrew Tangel writes that the plant could help LG avoid U.S. tariffs. LG’s decision to locate production in the U.S. could aid its push into the American home-appliance market, where it has gained share in recent years competing against rivals … [Read more...]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 5
- 6
- 7