Happy Easter

After yesterday's huge rally on the Wells Fargo earnings surprise, the markets are closed today for Good Friday.

When working on Wall Street (metaphorically), I used to joke to friends that the markets were closed because Wall Street people were so religious. That usually got a laugh after the initial shock, when they realized I was being sardonic. Now, I suppose one would say that Wall Street is closed because they are worshippers of Satan so need to hide on that holy day. The truth is that Wall Street is closed nowadays simply due to two facts: (1) it always was a holiday for over a hundred years, and (2) European markets are closed as this is a big holiday for all in much of Europe.

New

The US trade deficit fell by a huge amount. Imports dropped big while exports held up. This has much more Global meaning than is generally recognized. Global is capitalized there for more literal and metaphorical reasons. Perhaps now I can write about a theory over which I've been noodling for a couple years.

Word of the Day

Conflate - verb [$10]
Conflate means to combine (two variant texts, for example) into one whole.
Sentence: Bunkerman intends to conflate notions of the US trade deficit and the dollar being the world reserve currency into a theory of the world money supply.

Le Mot du Jour

"Avoir l'intention" - compound verb expression
Avoir l'intention" means to intend; Avoir l'intention de faire quelque chose means to intent to do something.
La Phrase: L'homme du bunker a l'intention de étudier la langue allemande ce week-end.
Sentence: Bunkerman intends to study the German language this weekend.