Is there a sense of panic amongst most fund managers across asset classes?
There is a lot of nervousness and there is no doubt that a lot of hedges are trading short in the market. There is no real value in any of the financials and there is nothing to go long on. The US dollar strengthened dramatically in the last six weeks. Oil is now at USD 98 per barrel or USD 98.50 per barrel. Gold rallied quite a bit today; it is up by about USD 20 per ounce. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a take off in the next week or over the next week due to what’s happening in the US. I don’t see the US dollar being able to stay at those levels and that will come under some pressure of sell off. There will be some push into precious metals and that’s become quite evident over the last couple of hours. Q: Do you think Merrill’s buyout might be taken positively by the US markets later in the evening or is there an overwhelming fear of more de-leveraging that will take money out of all asset classes? A: I think there will be further de-leveraging. It’s a very volatile time to be in th
