David Rosenberg, chief economist for Gluskin-Sheff, is a contrarian with a superior intellect than our own. That’s why we hang on most every word he says.

China bulls beware… Chinese regulator warns of American-style housing bubble… Market rejoices over housing start rebound… should you be celebrating too? Dan Amoss on shorting the stock market’s recent strength… Sign of the times… Mexicans, Czechs no longer welcome in Canada… Plus, Byron King reveals an arresting historic gold chart…

It takes more than two to make a trend.  JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) yesterday (Thursday) became the second major U.S. investment bank – following Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE: GS) – to this week report windfall profits for the second-quarter. That’s helped fuel a four-day advance in U.S. stocks that’s seen the Dow Jones Industrial Average surge 7%.

Banks aren’t getting out of the TARP as easy as they got in. According to Bloomberg, the feds have demanded that banks “raise specific amounts of new capital before repaying taxpayer funds, applying a more stringent assessment than the stress tests in May.”

One of the problems with orthodox economics is it misses the point on human behavior. Orthodox economists build their models around the assumption of rational behavior of large groups of people. There is therefore always a gulf between this type of economic theory and the real world.

What comes after a trillion? Inflation…and lots of it. Just about one year ago, in the May 8, 2008 edition of the Rude Awakening, your editors asked, “What comes after a trillion?” Today we know the answer: two trillion…and then three…and then four.

The dogs in the street know Washington is going to have to come up with more cash to plug the gaping holes in banks’ balance sheets. Of course, our Orwellian government doesn’t want us to think that major banks such as Citigroup and Bank of America are insolvent.

Many investors want to get rid of mark-to-market accounting rules. Sure it will create a one-time trading opportunity. But in the end, it will only make things worse and could cost us all a lot of money.

Last weekend, Global Finance published its list of the World’s 50 Safest Banks – a list that the publication has run for 17 years.