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Xinjiang

 

When we sanction products from Xinjiang, we would make many Xinjiang folks, particularly the Muslims out-of-jobs and lower their living standard. Since most of the masks from China are made with cotton from Xinjiang, will they be sanctioned too? So are the rare earth elements.

 

China has tightened the control of the dissidents there after the riots a few years ago. China did send extremist terrorists to re-education camps. It is better to send them to jail. Right? Since then, Xinjiang has returned to normal and tourists have returned. The following are the arguments that there is no genocide (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2tCuZu_U9rk) in Xinjiang, especially comparing how we treat our native Indians.

 

·         If there is one today, our satellites can spot them easily. We cannot depend on some dissidents with their own agenda. We have our share of dissidents in our country.

·         So are some U.S. politicians with their own agenda. They care about getting more votes. Demonizing Chinese gets their biggest bang for their efforts. It gives rise to the racial discrimination against the Chinese here.

·         Xinjiang’s population has been increasing rapidly. Partly it is due to China’s investments in exploring the resources and the “One Belt, One Road” projects.

·         The capital of Xinjiang has a brand-new subway system recently, which rivals the best in the U.S. Why does China invest so much money in an area they want to genocide?

·         China’s high-speed rail extends to Xinjiang. It will never be economical, but it should improve the living standard of the Xinjiang citizens. It is similar to the extension of the train system to Tibet.

·         China’s minorities did not have the one-child policy as the majority (the Hans) had.

·         The majority of cotton is harvested by machines (many made by John Deere), not by forced labor, which is NOT economically feasible.

·         Local language and culture are maintained in Xinjiang. I enjoyed many cultural shows in the western China. Many famous beauties are from Xinjiang.

·         The religion in Xinjiang has never been oppressed to my knowledge.

·         China’s minorities have given more priority to higher education than the Hans.

The alleviation program is not too extensive in Xinjiang due to a higher living standard. We have not done much to our native Americans.

Using a spreadsheet

 

Your statement from your broker provides all the information you need such as rate of return and your cost basis. However, it does not provide the performances of your strategies vs the market. We can use a spreadsheet such as Excel to calculate it as follows.

 

Return = (A-B)/B

 

Where A = the return of your strategy

             B = the return of SPY (an ETF simulating S&P 500 index)

 

It does not always work as illustrated next with all possible cases and many commit the same error.

 

Case	A	B	%	Work?
1	12	10	20%	Yes
2	-12	10	-220%	Yes
3	12	-10	-220%	No
4	-12	-10	20%	No

 

Now, we change the formula to Return = (A-B)/Abs(B) and it works for all four cases as illustrated below

 

Case	A	B	%	Work?
1	12	10	20%	Yes
2	-12	10	-220%	Yes
3	12	-10	220%	Yes
4	-12	-10	-20%	Yes

 

You should always check the results to ensure whether the formula works. For simplicity, the row numbers have not been added. If dividend return is important, you should add the dividend yields to A and B. The following suggests how to handle null value.

 

=if(A=””, “”, (A-B)/Abs(B))

 

Recent example of market timing

 

How to detect market plunges without charts (similar to Death Cross)

1.       Bring up Finviz.com.

2.       Enter SPY (or any ETF that simulates the market) or RSP for equally weighed SPY.

3.       If SMA-200% is positive, it indicates that the market plunge has not been detected and you can skip the following steps.

4.       The market is plunging if SMA-50% is more negative than SMA-200%. To illustrate this condition, SMA-200% is -2% and SMA-50% is -5%.

5.       Conservative investors should sell most stocks starting with the riskiest ones first such as the ones with negative earnings, high P/Es and/or high Debt/Equity. Obtain this info from Finviz.com by entering the symbol of the stock you own.

6.       Aggressive investors should sell all stocks. Extremely aggressive investors should sell all stocks, buy contra ETFs, and even short stocks. I do not recommend beginners to be aggressive.

 

As of 2/12/2022, the following are from Finviz.com.

 

ETF	SMA-200	SMA-50	SMA-20	Death Cross?
SPY	-0.8%	-4.2%	-1.7%	Yes (Step #4)
RSP	-0.5%	-1.9%	0.4%	Yes (Step #4)

 

Both ETFs indicate the market is a confirmed crash from my indications using a technique similar to Death Cross. However, they are quite close, and we should keep an eye on these numbers. In this case, SMA-20 has not been used. If it is a false alarm, golden cross would indicate it and you should return to equity; it could be quite common in volatile markets. The futures indicate that on Monday (2/14/22) the market would plunge further.

 

Another test is using SMA-350: When the current price is below SMA-300, it is a crash. SMA-20 has to be more negative than SMA-50 and it has not been used here.