SeekingTruth

EFA: Diversify Your Portfolio Outside the U.S.

A few international mutual funds outperformed EFA over the past five years, like Harbor Intl. for one.
However, the MF's do not offer the intra day trading opportunities, or the tax advantages that EFA offers.
Also . the "EFU" ETF (short) allows the investor to short against the box when things get shaky, or if the investor feels the need to be market neutral for some time period.
Of course , EFU can be employed to hedge against a held Intl. MF as well, among other strategies.
Thanks for the refreshing update on EFA.

Nouriel Roubini Agrees with Jeff Gundlach

This is all like watching three movies at the same time:
One movie is a documentary narrated by Nouriel Roubini, and the other two "The Wizard of OZ", and "Alice in Wonderland", are produced and narrated by the The US Government, and Wall Street respectively.
So one is for probabilities based on facts, and the other two are for short term entertainment, and they enjoy the larger audience, but I suspect we all will not be amused or laughing for a great deal longer.

Forex Markets: The Dollar/Oil/Inflation Revolving Door

The prior comments do not do this article justice. The notion that the dollar may virtually be on the "oil" standard is an interesting one , and may be one of the reasons I have intuitively preferred oil over gold , ( but also gold ,silver,etc. secondarily) as an inflation hedge in the past, which I will continue at least for now. No doubt deflation is the current monster du jour, but it will not last with the demonstrated Fed/Treas./Congression... proclivities. Thanks for the Bretton Woods synopsis also. An excellent series of articles well worth reading and considering.