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By:  Peter SchiffTuesday, March 10, 2015I have always argued that quantitative easing and zero percent interest rates were misguided policies to combat economic weakness. But as the years went on, misguided turned into irresponsible, which led to ridiculous, and then turned into dangerous. But lately, the only word that comes to mind is "surreal." How should we react when central bankers begin to speak…

In a surprising development the American Petroleum Institute (API) reported an inventory draw of 400,000 barrels of crude oil last week. It was expected that there would be another large build of over 4 million barrels. Tomorrow we have the 'official' government report from the EIA and the expectations are for a build of 4.4 million barrels. Could this be the…

Earlier today Escalera Resources (ticker:ESCR) announced a suspension of dividends on their Series A preferred shares (ticker:ESCRP) and we have had notes from Fred and Vern on the issue.As you recall we chickened out of this issue a few months ago and sold our holdings (at around $12 or so for a loss). After we sold the shares rebounded to…

Well it looks like a tough day coming up for the MLPs. Pre-market shows issues down 3% to as much as 10%--of course the worst of the hits are being taken by the upstream players as it is becoming clearer that credit lines are going to be cut relatively soon. We would expect that both utilities and REITs are going…

We constantly receive questions about what affect interest rates have on preferred stock prices. In a general sense we can address this question for perpetual preferreds.  Even though we have read investor speculation that interest rates do not effect fixed income type securities there should be no question that there is a very pronounced relationship and for those that doubt that is the case…