Blood Baht

Markets are in a heat process. All over the world, indexes are up. But we know, from statistics, that everything that goes up comes down!

Tonight, we had a small warning, from Thailand:

• Thai stocks suffered their biggest drop since Asia's 1997 financial crisis as foreign investors took fright at drastic measures to rein in the baht, prompting calls for a central bank U-turn.
• The currency dropped 2 percent from Monday's 9-1/2-year high after the central bank, worried strength in Asia's best-performing currency would hurt exporters, slapped controls on short-term speculative money inflows.
• The main stock index plunged more than 13 percent to a two-year low at one point, wiping more than $20 billion.

Be cautious. The overheat could hurt your holdings!

US: soft or hard landing?

The FED is praying for a soft landing. Bernanke is threatening with a new rate increase. Unemployment is at a good level: 4.5%.

Nevertheless, the currencies traders believe in a hard landing, because of this:

• They appear to be trading on the belief that, while US interest rates will fall in an effort to counter a slowdown, European rates will continue to rise – and, by implication, that Europe’s economic upswing has some way to go.

Pay attention, during next weeks.