A feature this first week of the trading year is the re-emergence of the inflation trade. Many commodity futures markets are in bull runs, led by crude oil. The U.S. Treasury markets are seeing rising yields, with the benchmark 10-year note yield now fetching 1.10%, after trading below the 1.0% level since late last winter. Meantime, the U.S. dollar index this week hit a 2.5-year low as the greenback continues to depreciate on the foreign exchange market. To anyone who has studied economics, it seems nearly unfathomable that the massive injections of liquidity into global financial systems over the past months (read that central banks printing money) cannot produce problematic inflation down the road. Rising commodity prices are a harbinger of that problematic inflation scenario. Stay tuned!– Jim