Market Drivers – U. S. Session – 12-11-2121

Mohamed Abdelhamid 13 November, 2021 3:03 am Commodities, Cryptocurrency, Forex Market, Market Update

The “Big Short” movie star Michael Burry returned to Twitter Friday. After earlier remarks about inflation, SEC and Fed policies, the movie star who is also CEO of Scion Asset Management says that Elon Musk has wrong calculations and had it not quite right with his Rivian comments.

Earlier in the week, Burry commented on the CEO of Tesla’s twitter poll saying that Elon Musk’s personal loans were probably the real reason why he needed to sell stocks.

While crude prices have been relatively range-bound recently, hovering within the $80-85 per barrel range, they are expected to suffer their third weekly decline in a row. Yet, beyond the retreats in the futures markets, several trends point towards a further weakening in crude.

Public criticism of U. S. Fed’s policies and response against inflation has leaped to several news headlines nationwide, particularly since the Consumer Price Index gained 0.9% in month-over-month in October according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Wednesday, far higher than economists’ expectation of 0.6%.

Economic Data:
U.S. consumer sentiment fell in early November to the lowest level in 10 years as surging inflation cut into households’ living standards, with few believing policymakers are taking sufficient steps to mitigate the accelerating inflation.

The University of Michigan’s Consumer Sentiment Index dropped to 66.8 in its preliminary November reading, released Friday, versus October’s final reading of 71.7.

The reading is as well the lowest since November 2011, below the Dow Jones estimate of 72.5 and far short of the median estimate among economists of 72.4 in a Reuters’ poll, representing a drop of 6.8%.

The survey showed consumers expecting still higher inflation, with the 12 month forecast nudging up to 4.9%.

Baker Hughes on Friday reported that the number of active U.S. rigs drilling for oil rose by four to 454 this week.

That followed increases in each of the previous two weeks, including a climb of six oil rigs last week, Baker Hughes data show.

The total active U.S. rig count, which includes those drilling for natural gas, climbed by six to stand at 556, according to Baker Hughes.

Other Developments:
Taproot is the next upgrade of bitcoin, and even bitcoin’s first major upgrade since 2017, and it will impact the blockchain in several aspects. It is expected to go into effect in the coming days at block 709,632. It will go live as soon as Saturday.

Taproot will introduce investors to Schnorr signatures, which will help bitcoin transactions become more private, efficient, less expensive and most importantly, the upgrade will better enable bitcoin to execute smart contracts on the blockchain.
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What Investors Need To Know About Bitcoin’s Taproot