THE WEEK THAT WAS

Election Day was Tuesday. Ken Cuccinelli of Virginia andColorado’s income tax were the losers, Chris Christie the winner. Despite winning the mayorship of New York City, Bill de Blasio’ssmackdown victory dance made him look like a loser.

Toronto mayor Rob Ford admitted that he smokes crack and gets drunk. He also confirmed our suspicions that that isn’t an innocent “maple leaf” on the Canadian flag, afterall. He also said that no matter how many illicit substances he ingests, he’d never behave as classlessly as de Blasio.

Obama sort of apologized to the millions of people he lied to about keeping their insurance plans under Obamacare. He said he was sorry “that they are finding themselves in this situation.” He’s just not sorry enough to do anything about it.

Richie Incognito, guard for the Miami Dolphins, made headlines this week for allegedly harassing a teammate. Apparently Incognito had been behaving questionably for some time, but it took the press a while to call him on the unsportsmanlike conduct because they couldn’t figure out who was behind it.

There is a “super typhoon” headed for the Philippines as of the writing of this. It is reportedly “one of the strongest storms ever recorded on the planet.” Please pray for these people.

Via: Human Events

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Dollar Falls Most Since 2011

The Dollar Index fell by the most since the first quarter of 2011 after the European Central Bankpledged to protect the euro from unraveling and the Federal Reserve committed to reduce unemployment via open-ended debt buying, which may debase the U.S. currency.

Since July 26, when ECB President Mario Draghi said he would do “whatever it takes” to save the euro, the 17-nation currency rose versus 15 of its 16 most-traded counterparts tracked by Bloomberg. Amid the Fed’s expansion of monetary stimulus, the Dollar Index lost 2.1 percent in the third quarter. The Bank of Japan, which followed the Fed and the ECB in expanding its balance sheet by 10 trillion yen ($130 billion), is scheduled to announce its next policy decision on Oct. 5.

“The ECB announcement to buy one- to three-year bonds in the periphery” shaped currency markets last quarter, George Davis, chief technical analyst for fixed income and currency strategy in Toronto at Royal Bank of Canada, said in an interview. “It was the opening of a new chapter.”

The dollar fell 1.5 percent during the past three months to $1.2866 in New York and touched $1.3172 on Sept. 17, the least since May. The common currency weakened 0.8 percent to 100.21 yen. The dollar lost 2.3 percent to 77.96 yen.

Big Winner

Sweden’s krona appreciated more than all of its major peers versus the dollar this quarter, gaining 5.4 percent. The South African rand had the biggest quarterly decline, slipping 1.8 percent versus the greenback

Brazil’s real has lost 7.9 percent versus the dollar in 2012, almost three times the decline of the rand, the second- biggest loser. The Mexican peso leads all 16 of the dollar’s biggest peers with a gain of 8.4 percent this year.

The New Zealand dollar led all major currencies this month against the greenback, appreciating 3.3 percent. The real increased the least out of 16 counterparts versus the dollar, gaining 0.2 percent.

The euro has fallen 0.7 percent during the past three months against a basket of nine other developed-market currencies, including the yen, pound and Australian dollar, according to Bloomberg Correlation-Weighted Indexes. Japan’s currency has declined 2.2 percent and the greenback has lost 4.3 percent, the most.

Via: Bloomberg

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