Almost daily there's some article or another in the US financial press that is little more than marketing collateral for Wall Street.
Broken down, the message is always some version of: Now is a great time to buy stocks!
It's been especially severe — even laughable, for those of us looking to spot such shenanigans — of late. Bad news is good news; and good news is good news.
It's gotten to the absurd stage where everything justifies higher stock prices.
Today's 'best in show' effort comes to us courtesy of the front page of the WSJ:
Investors See Reasons to Jump Into U.S. Markets
A resurgent dollar is remaking the investment landscape as Federal Reserve stimulus ends, in a shift many fund managers expect will propel U.S. stocks to fresh gains and keep bonds buoyant.
The Fed in October is expected to conclude the bond purchases that are widely credited with helping fuel the run to records for the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
Some investors see the central-bank divergence behind a virtuous circle taking shape for U.S. markets and the economy, echoing the powerful U.S. expansions of the early 1980s and 1990s. The prospect of broad-based gains is shoving aside concerns some investors and analysts have held about the strength of the U.S. recovery and the high valuations for many companies' stocks, relative to their earnings.
As growing output and employment enable the Fed to gradually lift short-term rates, the dollar is likely to continue appreciating against the yen and euro, investors say.
An appreciating dollar could make U.S. stocks and bonds more attractive to overseas investors, who would pocket currency-translation gains. If inflation remains tame, as many investors expect, Treasury yields are likely to remain low and the prices of commodities such as fuel and metals are likely to fall, bolstering consumer spending, economic growth and many asset prices.
(Source)
OK… Let's take this apart piece by piece.
First up, even after Michael Lewis' book Flash Boys broke open awareness of high frequency trading (HFT) to a much wider audience, despite a few tepid inquires by the media that very real and very persisting scandal has all but been forgotten.
by kugscheese 
