Ukraine:  Winter & Sanctions Impact   The Ukraine-Russia Conflict began to settle into winter, with Russia targeting electrical infrastructure and Ukraine making headlines by inflicting damage on an important bridge linking Crimea to Russian conquered territories in south-east Ukraine.  Russia’s additional mobilization of 300,000 or so recruits will spend the…

During the month of October, the top sectors were crypto (+11.96%), indices (+8.45%), and energies (+4.13%). The bottom sectors were softs (-5.08%), metals (-2.09%) and interest rates (-2.07%). Equities roared back from bear-market lows, which were led by the Dow Jones posting its best month since 1976 (+13.80%). Softs (-5.08%),…

During the month of September, the only positive sector was: Metals (+2.17%), which was mostly contributed by Silver. The bottom 3 sectors were: Energies (-9.70%), Softs (-9.27%) and Grains (-9.35%). The sell off at the end of August continued across most all commodities into much of September. Equities had one…

OPEC Production Increased Strongly to 29.6 million barrels per day (mbpd) during August (Reuters), still much less than current quotas of 33.4 mbpd.  OPEC+ decreased allowances slightly at their early September meeting to signal limits on how far they would let prices fall.  Libya managed to hold full production of…