| Tempted to add a bucket of chicken to your portfolio? Our newly released Magic Markets Premium research report and podcast is on Yum! Brands, owner of KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut. If you've ever wanted to understand the franchise business model, this is your chance. Subscribe here>>> Gold is just too hardI've basically given up on the yellow metal. With so many good reasons why it should've done well in recent times, all I've experienced is that inflationary pressures end up hurting the miners an d not doing enough good for the gold price. Perhaps things will change, but for now I took profits after the recent rallies. A flurry of earnings updates seems to support what I did, as gold miners really aren't shooting the lights out and the gold price has come under recent pressure again. DRDGOLD only grew its earnings because it is holding on to cash and earned a better interest rate than in the prior year. Gold Fields saved its earnings result by earning a break fee from the Yamana deal. As for actual mining? Yeah, that's not great. Positive updates yesterday came from Emira Property Fund (including some interesting commentary on the office sector), Glencore (signing off on a spectacular year) and Life Healthcare which seems to be attracting unsolicited bidders for its European assets. In a bumper edition of Ghost Bites, there was also news from AngloGold, Cashbuild, Gemfields, Jubilee and Murray & Roberts. I spent an inordinate amount of time yesterday working through SENS so that you don't have to. Get the important stuff in Ghost Bites here>>> And remember, the Ghost Wrap podcast (brought to you by Mazars) is a fantastic way to catch up on the prior week. With news on 9 companies in just over 7 minutes, give it a whirl here>>> Dollar strength continuesWith a US Retail Sales print for January that was higher than expected, the market stayed bullish on the dollar. The rand closed the day above the R18.00 handle. Despite the US strength and our local issues, TreasuryONE believes that the rand feels overwhelmingly overstretched at current levels. Palladium lost a massive 3.5% on the day, under pressure from a slowdown in demand and news of the European Parliament banning new non-electric vehicles from 2035. Gold and platinum also fell. Podcasts to improve your dayGet those earphones out. Here are two great podcasts for you to learn from: Siyabulela Nomoyi of Satrix joined me on Ghost Stories to talk about China and its importance to the South African economy and market.Justine Brophy of AnBro Capital Investments was our guest on Magic Markets to discuss artificial intelligence and how to cut through the hype.I hope you have enough energy left for Ghost Bites. Trust me, you're going to need it when you see how busy the JSE was yesterday! Good luck out there. | 