Category: Stockie Dokie

Matein KhalidGold is in its most spectacular bull run since 1976-1980, when prices rocketed from $91 to over $800 an ounce.The current cycle found its floor near $1,800 in late 2022, as the Powell Fed’s rate-hike campaign peaked and Washington froze $300 billion in Russian reserves in response to the invasion of Ukraine.“Dr Auric” now trades at just over $4,000 an ounce – a perfect vindication of my previously published $4,000 year-end strategic target.The weaponisation of the US dollar, the Swift banking system

Matein KhalidWill we still be dancing when the music stops as Citigroup and UBS were in the autumn of 2007. Even my friends dissed me when I predicted a global financial crash as early as January 2007, but I track credit cycles like a bloodhound and it flashed the mother of all distressed SOS’s as it does now. In 2007, the trillion dollar daisy chain of subprime mortgages blew up Wall Street, froze the offshore wholesale bank funding markets where

Matein KhalidThe old adage that stock markets swing between fear and greed has been borne out by the mixed performance of Saudi Arabia’s Tadawul All Share Index over the first nine months of 2025.A turning point came on Wednesday September 24 when the Tadawul staged its biggest single-day rally since 2020, after a Capital Market Authority board member signalled that the 49 percent foreign ownership cap on Saudi equities would be lifted.Dubbed “Green Wednesday”, the announcement triggered a 5.1 percent jump in the index,

Matein KhalidWall Street’s strong bid is skating on macro thin ice as a government shutdown that reflects the toxic polarization in Congress looms. The latest PCE data shows that Powell’s fear for a tariff related uptick in inflation was well founded and Fed funds futures have narrowed the odds of a December rate cut to only 60%, which is perfectly rational given that the US economy is in the clear twilight zone early stages of stagflation. The labour market would

Matein KhalidMauritius, an island archipelago state in the Indian ocean, has long maintained extensive economic and cultural ties with the GCC.Thanks to tax treaties with India, Mauritius is a favourite domicile for wealthy Indian expatriate residents of the UAE and Saudi Arabia.GCC citizens and residents are prominent investors in some of Africa’s most expensive luxury beach resorts located in the island nation, where property contributes 70 percent of foreign direct investment.Dubai and Abu Dhabi’s private banking and wealth management ecosystem

Matein KhalidI go into purdah for Wednesday's FOMC D-Day secure in the knowledge, based on CME futures probability that the most important central bank in the world will cut its overnight borrowing policy rate by at least 25 basis points on Wednesday. Yet there are also "known unknowns" with the Fed's decision that will haunt and reshape the financial markets as well as America's toxic politics for the next year.Will Stephen Miran's confirmation add a Trumpian poodle vote to the

Matein KhalidKlarna hits the IPO hit parade in New York on Wednesday and the grapevine suggests that the Swedish fintech IPO is oversubscribed by at least 10X. The investment bankers priced Klarna last night at $40, even above the 35-37 range where Sequoia capital, Silver Lake and lesser grandees on Sand Hill Road, Dai Nippon, Sing and Oz will now pocket a multi-billion dollar paydirt as they unload their VC shares to the public.Klarna is valued at a tad below

Matein KhalidMy readers and friends know that I have been a boring perma-bull on gold since early 2024, when it became obvious that the People's Bank of China was accumulating gold bullions as a hedge against an overvalued King Dollar and a capricious White House, which had just seized $300 billion in Russian central bank reserves to punish Putin's invasion of Ukraine. The bullish gold trade became even more compelling after Trump returned to the White House last January and

Matein KhalidGold's 38% surge in 2025 to as high as 3570 an ounce in the New York spot market is not just about central bank anti-dollar reserve accumulation, expectations of a Fed rate cut at the September FOMC or inflation/deficit angst but also a very rational response to President Trump's repeated assaults on the political independence of the Federal Reserve, which raises the likelihood of deliberate currency debasement at a time when the US Dollar Index has tanked 13% in

Matein KhalidIt is now all but certain that the Federal Reserve will cut the US overnight borrowing rate, currently 4.25 percent, by at least 25 basis points at its September 18 Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting. The labour market is losing momentum, while tariff-driven inflation has yet to show up in the Consumer Price Index.The Trump White House has ramped up pressure on Fed Chair Jerome Powell to deliver a fresh round of rate cuts. Treasury secretary Scott Bessent has

Matein KhalidTwo fallen angel megacaps in a rich market now that July CPI proved a non-event, I see a beautiful opportunity to scale up my long Palo Alto Networks (PANW) and Eli Lilly (ELY) to former darlings of Mr. Market who have been sandbagged by adverse events in the last two weeks. My rationale?Palo Alto Networks (PANW) was slammed down to 165 after its $25 billion acquisition deal was dissed by Mr. Market. This is an insane overreaction. I just

Matein KhalidThere are two gems in global finance that I believe can make serious money if purchased at the right price this autumn. Their high beta means a 16% hit if the S&P has the 10% index correction that Morgan Stanley projects.The best thing at TPG for me is CEO Jon Winkelried, who I first met in Goldman Sachs' cathedral of money at Peterborough Court in 1990's London. He ran FX and commodities then but was later elected partner and

Matein KhalidWhile Marjan Island day trips with Amore mio Donna Farah hardly makes me nostalgic for my singleton era visits to Vegas and college boy trips to the odious Trump Plaza/Taj Mahal casinos in Atlantic City, I have no problem taking a flutter on Wynn when it traded at 12X earnings since the free cash flow yield is a more reliable proxy for a money making trade than the capricious whims of Lady Luck. This is why the casino action

Matein KhalidMorgan Stanley has evolved into one of the world's preeminent wealth management franchises and dramatically reduced its exposure to volatile securities trading in a major strategy shift under its former CEO James Gorman. His acquisitions of E-Trade, Eaton Vance and the Smith Barney brokerage platform from Citigroup have enabled its client assets to grow to a colossal $6.5 trillion and provide the anchor for secular EPS growth in the next decade. Despite the trade war and hyper volatile markets

Matein KhalidI had flagged Nvidia in this platform as a must own chip stock on the eve of the AI revolution just before its historic Q2 earnings call in May 2023. Fast forward two years and Nvidia earnings are up 10X while its share price is up 8X since my post as it flirts with a $4 trillion market cap that awaits if the shares trade at 163 (they will, Sugar Daddy Jensen and Masa-san willing LOL).Taco Tuesday actually boosted demand

Matein KhalidSri Lanka is one of the most fascinating and drop-dead gorgeous countries I have ever visited, the island once known as Serendip by ancient Umayyad Arab sailors/ruby merchants and Ceylon by the colonial Dutch and British who once ruled the island, an emerald tear drop in the Indian Ocean. I have a special bond with Sri Lanka because my late mother, an artist, used to spend her summers painting in the exquisite resort of Nuwara Eliya when I was

Matein KhalidBoth Israel and the US were careful not to target Iran's oil export terminal at Kharg Island, a major reason why Brent crude trades at 68 and not 100. It is ironic that Iran's oil output is now 5.1-MBD (this figure includes condensates and gas to liquids), its exact amount in 1978, the last year the Shah ruled from his Peacock Throne. There is no danger of an oil price spiral triggering an inflation shock in the US as

Matein KhalidMy generation were teenagers in the late 1970's and thus passionate fans of Sweden since Abba dominated the Top of the Pops (God, how I hated the ghastly Dancing Queen since every girl in high school thought this syrupy pop tune was written specifically for her!) and Björn Borg dominated Centre Court at Wimbledon as the Men's Champion until the trophy was wrested from him in 1981 in a five set marathon by the awful but brilliant American John

Matein KhalidThe past decade dramatically illustrates the peril of trusting paper money as a store of value in a political system designed to pivot recklessly towards deficit financing and deliberate debasement of the world's reserve currency. The US national debt is now $37 trillion and the annual budget deficit is now $2 trillion or 125% of GDP. Add political gridlock in Washington, violent migrant riots in Los Angeles and even ghastly political assassinations in Minnesota and I see echoes of

Matein KhalidIt is ironic that Brent crude collapsed from its $78 high on the New York Merc to as low as 66.80 in early Singapore trading even though Iran's Revolutionary Guards launched a missile strike on America's largest military base in the Gulf in Qatar. This retaliatory strike was polite, measured and apologetic with advance notice given to Centcom to avoid any US military casualties. Trump literally thanked Iran for the great degree of consideration shown for the sanctity of

Matein KhalidOperation Midnight Hammer was a spectacular military success though it will take 60 years more for the top secret CIA files on Trump's rendezvous with history at Fordo to be declassified even though I hope Centcom and the Pentagon generals will release their BDA (Battle Damage Assessments) in the next two weeks to reinforce their claim that the Islamic Republic's nuclear assets beneath the mountain in Fordo have been "totally obliterated".125 American military aircraft in the skies above the

Matein KhalidThe India-Pakistan war in May and the Iran-Iraq war that rages as I write only reinforces my conviction that wars will be won or lost via a access to the latest missile air defense, stealth fighter jet platforms, ballistic hypersonic missile, power projection capabilities and state of the art ISR (intelligence surveillance reconnaissance) defense technologies. A nation without these capabilities is akin to a Stone Age tribe whose only weapons are bows and arrows and whose existence can be

Matein KhalidThe deployment of 30 US air-fueling tankers to the Middle East strongly suggests that Trump has decided to escalate the war with Iran with an American led strike on the underground nuclear site at Fordo. Since the B-2 Spirit super bombers would need tankers to refuel their fighter escort.Ali Khamenei's tweet threatening America was precisely the wrong message to send to Trump at a time when the IDF's initial airstrikes have killed almost every general in the Pasdaran, Basij,

Matein KhalidThere is precious little good news to emerge from the Middle East since the IDF launched its spectacular blitzkrieg and leadership decapitation strike against Iran's nuclear asset and military/intelligence elite last Friday. This weekend was grim with Iran's ballistic missile strike on Haifa and Tel Aviv with even a real miss on the IDF command and control complex in Kirya. Netanyahu's boast that he would order IDF warplanes to destroy 100 buildings in Iran for every building destroyed by

Matein KhalidI had analyzed SpaceX as a potential 10X winner in the Dubai media circa late 2020 when it traded at a mere $46 billion in the private market and even invited a number of close friends in an investor syndicate after sourcing shares from the Founders Fund in San Fran via the secondary market.Shakespear's Henry V praised the English longbow archers who won him the battle of Agincourt and thus the crown of France as "we few, we happy

Maein KhalidSince the pandemic, IPO activity across GCC capital markets has surged – offering a sharp contrast to the stop-start pace on New York’s Nasdaq and the near standstill on London’s LSE.Nearly 300 IPOs have raised around $50 billion across the Gulf since 2021.Below I outline six key macro themes shaping this post-Covid IPO boom in the GCC.First, contrary to expectations, the number, size and aftermarket performance of IPOs in the GCC have shown little correlation with oil prices.Since 2021

Matein KhalidI have had a neurological soft corner for Wall Street's alternative asset manager stocks ever since I resisted the come hither importunings of multiple Morgan Stanley (MS) managing directors before the firm sold its private wealth division in the DIFC to Credit Suisse. Everyone of these MS honchos wanted me to subscribe to the Blackstone IPO in the summer of 2007 at $32. They assured me that the biggest institutional investors in the UAE had all subscribed to the

Matein KhalidDr. Copper supposedly boasts a doctorate in economic forecasting because its price predicts inflection points in the global industrial cycle and Freeport-McMoRan (FCX) is the largest listed copper miner on earth, with gold and oil drilling businesses as ancillary SBUs. Dr. Copper is not exactly my fav prognosticator of the economic cycle but I do notice a mini price breakout of the red metal on the LME, where 3-month futures now trade at $9600 a metric ton. A month

Matein KhalidMy macro crystal ball begins to vibrate ominously whenever a perma-bull talking head joins the Squawk Box on CNBC, my spiritual, philosophical and financial lodestar in life and La Dolce Vita of the mercati monetari globali. After all, our beautiful business began as a money lender's bench in Renaissance Florence 600 years ago and if we ever ran out of cash, they ruptured our banco - i.e bankrupted us. The biggest money lenders in Europe were the Medici, whose

Matein KhalidWhile I never ​ever found diamonds in any coal mine, the truth is​ I never looked since I never really believed that De Beers/James Bond propaganda that diamonds are forever. In fact, my ​i​ndustry sixth sense​ tells me that diamonds are forever - worthless. I guess, my only investment in diamonds was a romantic one when I proposed to my then GF and now proud mother of my twins​. Unlike J Lo, she never raps to me​: "look at

Matein KhalidWhile I was not surprised by Moody's decision to cut the sovereign credit rating of the US from Aaa to Aa1 since I have done my best to warn my friends in this post about the King Dollar's vulnerable underbelly on debt/deficits, I am surprised that the credit rating agencies is willing to risk the wrath of Trump White House with this move. After all, Trump could well invoke the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to handcuff Moody's entire

Matein KhalidThe US Treasury bond market is unnerved by Powell's reluctance to cut rates at the May FOMC and increasing short bets on long duration Uncle Sam IOUs by the world's biggest hedge funds. This is the reason the 2-year Treasury note yield, the single security most sensitive to changes in expectation of US central bank monetary policy, has risen 15 basis points this week to 4.06% despite Bessent's hyped success with the Chinese Vice Premier on trade talks in