Central Perk

joi, 27 februarie 2014

Watch: The VP Comes Bearing Gifts

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Vice President Biden stopped by for the premiere episode of "Late Night with Seth Meyers" and had a couple of surprises for the new host and his first guest, Amy Poehler.

See what the Vice President brought to "Late Night."

3 Steps to Identify Blog Topics that are Relevant to Your Audience

Posted: 26 Feb 2014 03:16 PM PST

Posted by Aleyda

If you're reading this post right now, chances are that you have experienced this (or know someone who has): You have the deadline of a blog post coming, but you still don't know what to write about.

Sometimes you get away by writing about breaking news or a trend in your field, by doing a review of a new product or service, or by covering a recent conference or meetup that you have attended, but you can't do this all the time. You also want to write about something that is not only useful but also attractive, something that allows you to connect with your audience.

And you might be an experienced blogger, copywriter, or marketer. You might also know your audience pretty well; you have built your personas, completed and developed keyword research, and have already tried some techniques to get through the "writer's block." You have browsed through the content of prolific creators to get inspired and even tried Portent's content idea generator, but you still have a hard time finding a relevant and exciting blog post idea each time that your deadline approaches.

This likely happens because although you know where to find the dataâ€"and might even have it alreadyâ€"to get you inspired and identify ideas, the hardest part is to make it actionable, since it's so easy to get lost in such a vast amount of information.

What you need in order to identify blog post ideas that will allow you to connect with your audience is an actionable and simple process that is easily repeatable, applicable to any industry, and scalable:

Step 1: Gather the relevant data

How can we avoid getting lost when there's so much data available through so many sources? By focusing only on gathering the most important data that's relevant to your goal: Identifying a relevant and attractive blog post idea for your web audience.

Here's the data that you will need:

1. Your own most popular posts

You don't need to go through all of your previous posts, just select the most popular ones:

Most visited posts on your blog: Use Google Analytics to identify those blog posts that have had the highest amount of visits, the most valuable visits (those that generated the highest amount of conversions) and the most engaged visits (those that had the highest duration and generated more pageviews on the blog). Keep only the top 20% of them.
Most shared posts on social networks: Use SocialCrawlytics to crawl your blog and see which are the posts that have been shared the most by your visitors in their favorite social networks. Again, only keep the top 20% of them.

After gathering the data, consolidate these two "Top 20%" lists, eliminate the duplicates, and create a spreadsheet with the following information for each post:

Title
URL
Visits
Conversions
Visit duration
Shares in each social network (Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, etc.)

Now you know which of the posts has been, until now, your own most popular content. You know what has attracted better traffic and visibility in social networks, and the social networks that your audience prefers.

2. Your competitors' most popular posts

It's time to collect the most popular posts from your competitors, and although you don't likely have access to their full analytics, you can still identify some important statistics:

Most shared posts on social networks: Crawl their blogs with SocialCrawlytics as you did before.
Most externally linked posts: With Open Site Explorer, check to see which posts have earned the highest amount of links from other sites.

With this information you can consolidate these two lists into one and create a spreadsheet for the top 20% of posts by your competitors that includes the following data:

Title
URL
Shares in each social networks (Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, etc.)
External links
Linking domains

Here you have another very valuable and highly targeted source of information:
The most popular blog posts of your competitors!

3. Your community's and influencers' most shared content

Besides your own top content and that of your competitors, you can also identify which content is most liked in your own social communitiesâ€"the different groups that are connected to each other and form your audience.

For Twitter, you can get your communities and the influencers, topics, and locations per communities by using Tribalytics, just by adding your Twitter handle:

Once you identify your different communities, their most popular topics, and influencers, you can get even more specific by using Twtrland to obtain the most popular tweets for your influencers:

Create a list with the top content shared in your influencers' top tweets and segment it using the different topic areas identified for your communities. Complete it with social and search popularity-related data for each one of them:

Title
URL
Shares in each social networks (Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, etc.)
External links
Linking domains

Here's another very relevant input for your blog post ideas: The content that your influencers like to share and that has been popular in your own Twitter communities.

4. The hottest relevant content in social networks

After having identified the posts topics and pieces that have performed better for you, your competitors, and in your social communities in the past, you can identify which have been the overall most popular pieces of content in social networks about those same topics in the latest times.

Organize the best-performing content that you have now into different topics categories or areas and use Buzzsumo to search for them.

Download the most shared content in social networks for each category. You will have a list with the following information:

Title
URL
Shares in each social networks (Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, etc.)
Content type

Consolidate the lists, segmenting again per category and organize it by prioritizing the overall best performing content for your topics in social networks.

5. Your relevant web industry questions

Another very relevant source of blog post ideas is the questions asked by your online community in social networks, such as Twitter, and on sites like Quora.

Go to your relevant topic's questions, and create a list with the highest-voted questions. Automate this process by creating an IFTTT recipe for their RSS feeds, by adding them directly into a Google Docs Spreadsheet.

You can complete the previous list of questions with the ones that users make directly in Google by using the SEOchat related keywords tool, a multi-level suggestion keyword finder that will give you the queries that your audience searches for in Google about your desired topics.

By doing this, you will learn which are the biggest questions that people ask on the web about your relevant topics. A direct source of ideas to create posts that answer them.

6. Your industry web content requests

Subscribe to HARO or ProfNet and get daily email alerts each time a media outlet asks for the input of a specialist about your selected categories of content. Create filters to apply a label to those emails that specifically include one of your relevant content topics:

By doing this you will learn how journalists are looking to cover these topics and the type of content they're writing about them already. This can serve as an ongoing reference for content ideas: See what important sites are writing about your relevant topics at the moment.

Step 2: Ask the relevant questions

Once you have gathered all the previous data you will have a very complete, but still manageable, prioritized and categorized source of potential blog post ideas from different type of sources:

Analyze and make this data actionable with the next steps:

Ask yourself which are the characteristics that differentiate this top content and questions? What do they all have in common? From the areas where they are focused to the style or format, identify the patterns that they follow and make a list of criteria with them.
Create a list of potentially attractive posts ideas by taking as an input the already existing popular content, questions and requests that you have identified before, applying the criteria that you have identified that they all share.
- Specifically ask the five Ws (who, what, when, where, why) and "how" for the potential topics, thinking on how these will target your audience needs and emotions.
- Classify each idea with a level of "interest" based on how relevant is for your audience and the amount of search volume that exists around each topic (you can validate the keyword planner information with those of SearchMetrics and SEMRush).
Search and identify which of these post ideas have been already covered, whether by you, your competitors, or any other site in the past. See which sites have published the posts and the degree of success they had with them. It's also important that you specify in which content format (text, infographic, video, checklist, slides, etc.) and type (guide, news, review, webinar, report, competition, etc.) they have been published, as well as when they were published (since it's not the same to have been covered five years ago than just a couple of months before).

By following these steps you will have a list of blog posts ideas with this information:

The blog post idea
Interest
- Search volume
- Relevance level
Coverage status
- Publication URL
- Content format
- Content type
- Publication date
- Shares in each social networks (Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, etc.)
- External links
- Linking domains

Prioritize those ideas that have the highest level of interest and that haven't been published yet.

Step 3: Identify your blog post opportunities

For each of the highly prioritized potential ideas for posts, ask the following questions to filter them further and validate your opportunities:

Is this topic related to your business's vision and goal?
Is this the type of post content that is really interesting and useful for your audience?
Is it clear how the post will help your audience solve an issue or improve what they have?
Will you be able to write the post to be easily consumed and understood by them?
Are the resources needed to write the post feasible for you?
Will it be profitable for you to rank with this post?

The winning idea will be those for which you answer yes to the questions.

In case that you have identified a topic that has been already covered in the past with a blog post, but it complies with the rest of the previous criteria so is still attractive to pursue, then think about how you can create a unique selling proposition that differentiates yours from what came before. Two common options are:

Do a follow-up post, completing or expanding the initial information.
Reformat the post to build a tool, create a checklist, a guide, a list or compilation of resources, an infographic, a presentation or a video that makes it easier and more attractive to consume, and then write a post to announce it.

Some examples; rinse and repeat.

I contribute my writing to Moz, State of Digital, and at WooRank and itÂ´s fundamental for me to have a process to follow to be able to come up each month with new blog posts ideas, so I've followed this process in the past to write these posts:

It has worked pretty well for me in the past and hopefully it does for you too!

Do you use a process to identify your blog posts ideas? I would love to hear about it.

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

The Future of Content: What To Do Now Guest-Posting Is Dead

Posted: 27 Feb 2014 02:41 AM PST

As every SEO is aware, Matt Cutts recently made a very strong statement against the use of guest-posting. The points he made were clear and (if we're honest) fair. Guest-posting has become more and more spammy over the past few years, and has been over-utilised by many in the SEO industry. However, this condemnation of guest posting means that many people working in content and/or outreach may now be at a loss as to what to do and how they can utilise their skills.

Luckily, this post is here to help, and will concentrate on ways you can improve your (and your client's) website and boost rankings without spammy link-building tactics.

Website Basics
First and foremost, now is the prime time to take a thorough look at the site you're working with. When was the last time you updated your meta data? Are you still using and tracking relevant keywords? Are your pages delivering good conversion rates?

If your answers to any of the above are less than certain, then it's time to put a plan together to thoroughly update your website.

Keywords – how can you possibly write effective meta data or even webpages without having focused, user-based keywords? Check what people are searching for and what they're clicking through on. Adjust your keyword selection appropriately.
Update your meta data – now you've got relevant keywords selected, it's time to update all your title tags and meta descriptions. Ensure you're up to speed with the latest guidelines for length and structure, and that you make them both keyword-rich and user-friendly (and never forgo the latter for the sake of the former).
Update your H1s – a logical step forward from checking your meta data. Ensure you're using the most search-friendly terms, and that everything is properly formatted. It's a great opportunity to check for issues such as multiple H1s or even pages that are missing them all together.
Do a content analysis – time to get down and dirty with your onsite content. Are all of your pages still working for you? Are the beneficial to your users? Are they helping to make conversions, or are they dead ends where people drop off your site? Do a thorough analysis of your website and trim the fat. If a page is no longer of any use, then get rid of it. If a page needs altering to make it more relevant to current user needs, then improve it! Make your onsite content work for you! There's no point ranking well if your site drives users right back to the SERPs.

Your Own Content
Ok, so those are all pretty basic (but vital) things. What next? Time to be clever and focus on your own (or your client's) area of expertise. What do you have specialist knowledge about? Do you have access to interesting statistics or useful information? Start planning out high-quality content for your own website. It's time to focus your effort on making your site stand out, and positioning yourself as an expert in your field. Yes, I know, this was one of the premises behind guest-posting. But now it's time to bring everything back onsite, and boost the quality of what you're producing while you're at it.

Start planning and creating useful, engaging pieces of content that will actively encourage people to visit your site. Ensure that they will actually be beneficial to your users, and take this opportunity to improve your brand's image within its industry. Doing this should help to improve your user engagement, boost brand visibility and reputation, and help drive new yet relevant users to your site. It could even lead to a few people naturally linking back to your site without resorting to any dodgy or spammy tactics at all!

To get you started on ideas for onsite content, check out one of our older blog posts on the subject.

Try Something New
Ok, so you've improved your website; it's up-to-date, fresh, and useful. But, as ever, the challenge is getting people to click on it in the SERPs, and then guide them through to convert. So what else can you do?

Rich snippets. You've (hopefully) made your all meta data enticing and keyword-rich by now, so the next step is to make your pages stand out even more. Rich snippets are the answer! Whether it's showing your average review rating in stars, an image, or even a video, rich snippets are a great way to grab people's attention and get clicks. So look through your pages and think what you could add to make them jump out.
Following on from this comes Authorship. Images of the wonderful people who are writing all your website's great content is another good way to capture people's attention in the SERPs.
Next up, time for something crucial – load speed. If people click on your page they expect it to load almost instantaneously, so don't keep them waiting. The longer it takes for your site to load, the more likely it is that people will leave it. Additionally, Google has admitted that load speed also has small effect on rankings. So what are you waiting for? See if there are any major issues with your site-load time and, if there are, get to work! Even if there aren't, it's still worth seeing if there are any small things you can alter that will help to improve it.

And Now For Something Completely Different…

Finally, it might be time to try something a little different. Obviously, guest-posting used to have an added benefit of pushing your brand out there and raising awareness in those who had never heard of you before. So what can you do to replicate this without annoying Google?

First, you can try to start a company newsletter. Make it weekly, monthly, quarterly – as frequently as you like. Just ensure that you make it very easy for people to sign up, and encourage them to do so. It's a good way to push your brand out to people who may have been on your site but haven't yet converted. It's also a good way to bolster fresh onsite content.

Secondly, leverage the connections you do have. If people have reviewed you or your services, ask them for a link back. Alternatively, encourage satisfied customers to recommend you to others – you can simply ask, or provide incentives for them to do so, depending on budgetary restraints. Utilise those skills you developed outreaching all those spammy guest-posts and hone them into doing something much more beneficial (and debatably easier) – getting people who like you to talk about you online.
So there you are – a whole host of things that content and outreach specialists can do to improve your website and rankings in the post guest-blogging era. Have you got any other ideas for how to boost rankings without guest-posting? Or are you going to continue with blogging despite the warnings? Tell us what you think in the comments below!

The post The Future of Content: What To Do Now Guest-Posting Is Dead appeared first on White Noise.

Seth's Blog : Most of all, money is a story

Most of all, money is a story

Money's pretty new. Before that, we traded. My corn for your milk. The trade enriches both of us, and it's simple.

Money, of course, makes a whole bunch of other transactions possible. Maybe I don't need your milk, but I can take your money and use it to buy something I do need, from someone else. Very efficient, but also very abstract.

As we ceased to trade, we moved all of our transactions to the abstract world of money. And the thing about an abstract trade is that it happens over time, not all at once. So I trade you this tuition money today in exchange for degree in four years which might get me a better job in nine years. Not only is there risk involved, but who knows what the value of anything nine years from now is?

Because of the abstraction and time shift, we're constantly re-evaluating what money is worth. Five dollars to buy a snack box on an airplane is worth something very different than five dollars to buy a cup of coffee after a fancy meal, which is worth something different than five dollars in the grocery store. That's because we get to pretend that the five dollars in each situation is worth a different amount--because it's been shifted.

Most of the time, when we're buying non-commodity items, we're asking ourselves questions like:

How much pain am I in right now?
Do I deserve this?
What will happen to the price in an hour or a week? If it changes, will I feel smart or dumb?
What will my neighbors think?
Does it feel fair?
and, What sort of risks (positive and negative) are involved? (This is why eBay auctions don't work for the masses).

Pricing based on cost, then, makes no sense whatsoever. Cost isn't abstract, but value is.

• Email to a friend •

miercuri, 26 februarie 2014

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Job Creation and Destruction: Do Small, Medium, or Large Corporations Account for Job Growth?
Ukraine Hryvnia Down 17% in Two Weeks as Run on Banks Intensifies; 7% of Bank Deposits Withdrawn in 3 Days
Saxo Bank's Steen Jakobsen Warns of Global Economic Vacuum, China Slowdown, Germany Growth Negative, 30% S&P Correction

Job Creation and Destruction: Do Small, Medium, or Large Corporations Account for Job Growth?

Posted: 26 Feb 2014 07:43 PM PST

The hunt for jobs is on. But where is the job growth? Is job growth in small, medium, or large corporations?

Unfortunately, that question is insufficient to answer the question. One must also factor in job destruction and the closing of businesses.

With that in mind, please consider the Wall Street Journal report: Say It Together: Young Businesses, Not Small Ones, Drive Job Growth

It's not size that matters — at least when it comes to job creation. The age of the company is a bigger factor.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago's Jason Faberman on Monday became the latest in a long line of economists to unpack the misconception – promoted frequently by elected officials — that small businesses are the key to creating new jobs in the U.S.

It's a subset of small firms—young, innovative companies—that lead in job creation. "It's the new guys, not necessarily the small guys, that generate growth," he said at the National Association for Business Economics policy conference in Arlington, Va. "The focus for policymakers shouldn't be on small business job growth, but on new business formation."

Nearly 90% of U.S. firms employ 19 or fewer workers. Those smaller firms create jobs at nearly twice the rate of larger companies. Controlling for the age of the firm, Mr. Faberman found the strongest job growth came from firms that were less than four years old.

Small or Large vs. New

The above article says job growth is not small vs. large, but rather old vs. new.

But what about job destruction?

Job Creation and Destruction by Firm Age and Size

To help answer the question, please consider the following interactive map from Tableau Software.

Tableau Chart of Job Creation vs. Destruction

The above Tableau interactive map is from The Pattern of Job Creation and Destruction by Firm Age and Size by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.

Here is a snip.

Colors represent age categories, and the sizes of the dot represent size categories. So, for example, the biggest blue dot in the far northeast quadrant shows the average rate of job creation and destruction for firms that are very young and very large. The tiny blue dot in the far east region of the chart represents the average rate of job creation and destruction for firms that are very young and very small. If an age-size dot is above the 45-degree line, then average net job creation of that firm size-age combination is positive—that is, more jobs are created than destroyed at those firms. (Note that the chart excludes firms less than one year old because, by definition in the data, they can have only job creation.)

The chart shows two things. First, the rate of job creation and destruction tends to decline with firm age. Younger firms of all sizes tend to have higher job-creation (and job-destruction) rates than their older counterparts. That is, the blue dots tend to lie above the green dots, and the green dots tend to be above the orange dots.

The second feature is that the rate of job creation at larger firms of all ages tends to exceed the rate of job destruction, whereas small firms tend to destroy more jobs than they create, on net. That is, the larger dots tend to lie above the 45-degree line, but the smaller dots are below the 45-degree line.

Apart from new firms, it seems that the combination of youth (between one and ten years old) and size (more than 250 employees) has tended to yield the highest rate of net job creation.

Appearances vs. Reality

It's not small vs. large but rather old vs. new in conjunction with small vs. large.

But what about the influence of regulations, of unions, of Fed policies, of local taxes, federal taxes, and currency manipulations everywhere one looks?

Since regulations and tax laws overwhelmingly favor large corporations over small corporations (thanks to huge campaign contributions from the former vs. latter), I ask a simple question: Are the Wall Street Journal and Fed reports totally worthless?

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Ukraine Hryvnia Down 17% in Two Weeks as Run on Banks Intensifies; 7% of Bank Deposits Withdrawn in 3 Days

Posted: 26 Feb 2014 10:36 AM PST

Ukraine's currency, the Hryvnia, has fallen nearly every day for two weeks straight.

US$ vs. Hryvnia

On February 13 the Hryvnia went for 8.41 to the US dollar. Today it sells for 10.15 to the US dollar. That is a decline of 17.14% in two weeks.

Ukraine Seeks Help From IMF

Reuters reports Ukraine Asks IMF for Help on New Financial Aid Program

Ukraine has asked the International Monetary Fund to help prepare a new financial aid program, its central bank chairman said on Wednesday, adding that the new government would soon have its own anti-crisis program ready.

Stepan Kubiv [Ukraine's new central bank head] told reporters the bank was taking measures to stop capital flight from Ukraine, which has spiraled since protesters took to the streets in November against President Viktor Yanukovich's rejection of an EU trade deal.

7% of Bank Deposits Withdrawn in 3 Days

CNBC reports Risk of a Bank Run Heightens in Ukraine

Fears of a bank run in Ukraine are rising, as central bank reserves sink and some 7 percent of bank deposits were lost in just 3 days.

Yuriy Dyachyshyn AFP Getty Images

Ukraine's reserves currently sit at $15 billion, according to the country's newly appointed central bank governor, Stepan Kubiv. Kubiv said 7 percent of deposits, or 30 billion hryvnias ($3.3 billion), were lost between February 18-20, when the violence in the country reached its zenith and snipers opened fire on protesters.

Goldman Sachs has estimated the country's foreign currency reserves have declined to $12 - $14 billion.

The slump also hit the Russian rouble, which hit a fresh five-year low versus the dollar.

The lead sentence in the above article is a bit curious. A run on Ukrainian banks has clearly started. The fear is not that a run starts, but rather that it does not soon stop.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Saxo Bank's Steen Jakobsen Warns of Global Economic Vacuum, China Slowdown, Germany Growth Negative, 30% S&P Correction

Posted: 26 Feb 2014 12:45 AM PST

Steen Jakobsen, chief economist at Saxo Bank in Denmark, sent an interesting email yesterday regarding China, Germany, the European debt crisis, and equity prices.

Steen is one of the speakers at Wine Country Conference II, May 1-2 in Sonoma, California.

What follows is from Steen, I dispense with my usual blockquote style for ease in reading.

Economic Vacuum

China's flag is waving strongly these days, the direction of the economic- and political winds have changed but the present multitude of macro changes is yet to be recognized by consensus and the market.

My conclusion is this:

China will slow-down to 5% growth over next two-three years.
China will start devaluing their currency in response to Abenomics and weaker terms of trade
China will no longer be the world's biggest investor and importer of investment goods.

The changes will during 2014 mean that:

Germany growth will go negative quarter-over-quarter in Q4 (from Q3)
World growth will come down from the recent 3.7% to less than 3.0%
The recovery will once again be postponed and the synchronic monetary policy of the major central banks will be questioned, leading to all time new lows in interest rates
Deflation will take hold in Europe and become a major risk in the US
This final third crisis in this cycle will mean equity needs to be sold off. This comes after commodities sold off in the US banking- and housing crisis, followed by fixed income during the late stage European debt crisis now I see a 30% correction in H2 of 2014 after a high is registered between 1840/1890 in the SPX.

I simply believe that China leads the world. They took the burden of world growth in their hands during the peak of the crisis in 2008/09 through the biggest fiscal expansion ever seen (550 billion US Dollars), then they increased their investment to GDP ratios securing export orders for major European and US exporters until late 2013, but since the Third Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee in November 2013 the main objectives for the political elite in China have changed from growth and export to rebalancing, fighting graft, reducing pollution and betting a small crisis now is better than a big one later.

I have already spent considerable amount of ink explaining why China is proactively seeking a small crisis rather than a big one and how China can no longer afford to keep its investment to GDP levels excessive but now China seems to have engaged in a fundamental change to its FX rates – attempting to weaken the CNY [Yuan].

China is a long term critic of Abenomics and the ensuing devaluations as Japan and Korea remains its key competitors in the export market, but until last week China held their FX tight and tightening but now things have changed:

Source: Bloomberg LLP & Saxo Bank

With the present geopolitical tension between China and Japan this chart is cause for concern for all of us: China no longer will play 'nice', they are this time ignoring "best practice" of playing paying lips service to the US-Sino relationship. Clearly Obama once again receiving the Dalai Lama in the White House is not helping the situation. That the rally in USD-CNY happened almost to the day Obama hosted the Dalai Lama is of course a pure coincidence! (They met Friday February 20th!)

China is not happy these days: The domestic economy needs rebalancing with the risk for upsetting the population and the bureaucrats. Overseas, Japan's Abe is insisting on a stronger Japan, the US is clearly ignoring China advice on the Dala Lamai and overall the G-20 meeting had the developed world blaming the recent slow-down on the EM.

Not a good month for monetary coordination and friendly summits. The political crisis is biting ironically at a time where stock markets across the world is reaching 5, 7, and in the case of the UK 14 year highs! My old economic theory: The Bermuda Triangle of Economics is still in place: Slow growth, high unemployment and high stock market valuations kept in place by a policy where the 20% of the economy which is the listed companies and banks gets 95% of all credit and access to subsidies while the 80%, which creates 100% of all jobs, the SME's [Small and Medium Enterprises] get less than 5% of credit and less than 1% of the political capital.

Markets and monetary policy

It's the weather! The reason for the disappointing start to 2014 is all to do with the big cold in the US – well partly, I think most investors/pundits forgets that data coming in for December, January really was "born" 3,6, and 9 month before due to that specific times change in outlook, interest rates and the overall cycle. The slow-down in housing was "expected" in our models as I have constantly conveyed it to you through my economic co-op on econo-physics it has to do with spike in rates in mortgage rates between May and August 2013.

The US Consumer must have known the weather would be bad already last summer looking at this chart of Retails Sales:

The US consumer remains 2/3 of the economy but he is still conservative: Spending rose 2.0% in 2013 after 2.2% and 3.4% in 2012 and 2011. This is mainly due to low wage growth. Since 2010 the Average after tax income adjusted for inflation have only been 1.6%.

To reach the magic 3% growth we will need wages to grow 3% on their own! Not likely to happen in world of excess capacity, but never the less the pundits started the year with a 2.9% average expected growth for 2014. One month into the year, revisions came pouring in as Q1 is already reduced from 2.3% to 2.0%. The blockbuster Q4 growth of 3.2% is now expected to come in at 2.4% only!

One has to laugh at how imprecise these measures are – we watch them, take decisions on them but ultimately their reliability is really only valid six months past the first announcement. Talk about reverse engineering!

Strategy

Fixed income: Still see new lows in 2014 – mainly in Q4- into Q1-2015. ETF flow into fixed income has been +16 billion US Dollars year to date, could be largest inflow since 2002!

I mainly like US and Core Europe although Italy and BTP's have done well with the power change from Letta to Renzi. The bet on rates down goes back all the way to last year.

[Expected] Dividend yield @ 1.89% vs. [current] 2.72% still attracts my money.

Equity: We have had a call for peak in Q1 – admittedly I did not expect 1840 to be broken, but my partner in Economo-physics still see chance of 1870/90 before top is in place.

I submit our updated November 2013 forecast which slightly corrected still stands – The risk reward is now wrong: Upside is 50 S&P points vs. 500 points down-side. Remember a 20/30% correction happens every 4-5 years – a 10% correction twice on average in 'normal year'.

FX:

Overall the US Dollar should soon find support. The best long term gauge of the US dollar is World Growth minus US Growth. Why? Because US dollar is the reserve currency and often the currency of choice in trade. When the world growth is slowing (now…) then the US and the US Dollar needs to pull ahead to fill the gap. This is one of the catalysts we need to monitor over the next week or two as the US Dollar Index is right on its support line:

Conclusion:

The world economic flags is still almost in vacuum but some countries are now changing the position of the flag pole to get better wind conditions.

Safe travels,

Steen

Thanks Steen!

Wine Country Conference II

Want to hear a live discussion of what Steen Jakobsen thinks about Europe and China?

Then come to the second annual Wine Country Conference which will be held May 1st & 2nd, 2014.

We have an exciting lineup of speakers for this year's conference.

John Hussman: Founder of Hussman Funds, Director of the John P. Hussman Foundation which is dedicated to providing life-changing assistance through medical research
Steen Jakobsen: Chief Economist of Saxo Bank
Stephanie Pomboy: Founder of MacroMavens macroeconomic research
David Stockman: Ronald Reagan's budget director, best-selling author, former Managing Director of The Blackstone Group
Mebane Faber: Co-founder and the Chief Investment Officer of Cambria Investment Management
Jim Bruce: Producer, Director, and Writer of Money For Nothing: Inside the Federal Reserve
Chris Martenson: Reknown speaker and founder of Peak Prosperity
Mike "Mish" Shedlock: Investment advisor for Sitka Pacific and Founder of Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

In addition, we expect confirmation from a number of other highly respected fund managers and speakers. This year's event is two days and will include additional "break-out" groups.

For speaker bios, please check out Wine Country Conference Speakers.

This Year's Cause: Autism

$100,000 of the money raised last year came from a generous matching grant from the John P. Hussman Foundation.

Some of us in the industry who have done well are making an effort to help others. John Hussman is at the very top of that list.

One of John's kids has severe autism. This year, all net proceeds will go to support autism programs.

Conference Details

For further details about the 2014 conference, please see Wine Country Conference May 1st & 2nd, 2014

Nothing Like It!

This event is not just another "come and hear someone talk" kind of thing. Attendees and their significant others can expect an educational, fun, and relaxed time.

Last conference, we arranged wine tours. They were a big hit. We will do so again. One of the wine estates we visited had a Bocce Ball court. On a couple of miracle shots, I won both games I played.

Stay an extra day and golf or travel. I did. The conference hotel is a fun place in and of itself.

Unlike many other conferences, you will have easy access to speakers.

Want to chat with me, Steen, John, or anyone else at the conference? You will have an easy chance.

Not only do we have an excellent lineup of speakers, you will have an opportunity to meet with them, have intimate discussions on important investment topics, with a lot of fun on the side, including wine tours and great wine.

There's nothing like it in the investment business. And your money goes to a great cause! What can be better?

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

joi, 27 februarie 2014

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2. Your competitors' most popular posts

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5. Your relevant web industry questions

6. Your industry web content requests

Step 2: Ask the relevant questions

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Some examples; rinse and repeat.

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