Archive - May 2010

As we were perusing the just declassified full 2004 FOMC transcripts, our attention was caught by two specific things in the December 14 uber-grouthink session. First, the original housing prophet is not Hoenig, not Lacker, and certainly no other Fed member: it is former Atlanta Fed president Jack Guynn, who prudently got out of dodge on October 1, 2006. Guynn was the first to point out, in the long ago days of 2004, that Fed policy could be leading to a massive housing bubble. Good thing the Maestro was more concerned about his misplaced dentures than to listen to voices of reason at the Eccles building. Yet speaking of the Maestro, we catch an amusing anecdote, in which it becomes obvious that none other than the Fed Chairman looks at the CFTC's Commitment of Traders reports to get an indication as to what may or may not happen to the relative strength of the dollar. When one considers this fact, and juxtaposes it with observation that the Fed runs the formerly free world, does it imminently follow that the people in charge are not brilliantly scheming and conspiratorial, but merely very, very, very dumb?

A few days after the economists have had some time to digest the latest GDP numbers, the results are coming in, and they aren't pretty... And to Obama's chagrin they aren't going to get any better. The end of the stimulus "sugar high" is approaching, and most likely will culminate with the mid-term elections: the attached piece by BofA only solidifies this observation. Bank of America, after Goldman, is now the latest major bailed out bank to join the bandwagon decrying US fiscal insanity (oddly enough, few have much to say about the lunatics in charge of monetary matters). And that's just for the medium-term. Speaking of lunatics, for those curious about the long-term, who can summarize it better than the Oracle of Constitution Avenue himself: "Unfortunately, we cannot grow our way out of this problem. No credible forecast suggests that future rates of growth of the US economy will be sufficient to close these deficits without significant changes to our fiscal policies." - none other than B.S. Bernanke. Furthermore, this is the real problem, forget all about G-Pap reelection chances (none to negative): Greece is just a pleasant distraction compared to what would happen if the US can't roll $700 billion in short-term debt each month.

Bloomberg reported that crude oil open interest was 1.41 million contracts, the highest since June 11, 2008. Some analysts think the high level of open interest raises concerns about whether the market is overvalued relative to fundamentals and whether the upward price trend can continue.

Soon appearing on the Bernie Madoff Book to the Month club.

Today is D-Day for Europe, and soon, the world. Shortly, the IMF will take its historic place as the cash cop of last resort, a post traditionally reserved for the Federal Reserve, which incidentally was rumored to have activated its FX currency swaps with European banks last week (whether or not that is true will be disclosed by next week's H.4.1). This action will open a floodgate of consequences, as every semi-bankrupt country forces itself into a spending frenzy to guarantee that it is truly bankruptcy, no ifs about it, and qualifies for IMF (and thus 20% US) aid. And at that point the politics of a US-funded world bailout really will come to the fore. Because while the Fed bailing out America is one thing due to the Fed's untouchable and unsupervisable status, the IMF, as a corporation, does not share the same "above the law" privileges. And in an election year, with Americans slowly realizing that the fate of the world is truly in their hands, and their tax money is being involuntarily taken away from them as we speak yet again, ahead of midterm elections, all bets are off. For those interested in the actual mechanics of the IMF rescue mechanisms available, as well as some of the political implications likely to follow, here is an overview via Bank Of Countrywide Lynch.

Last night just after 6 pm a home made car bomb, containing 3 propane tanks and 2 containers of gasoline, electrical wires, black powder and some sort of timing device, put in a green VIN-less Nissan Pathfinder, situated on the corner of 45th and Broadway, was prevented from killing numerous people in the heart of Times Square, on 45th and Broadway. According to a hotdog vendor eye witness account, quoted by CNN, the car had filled with smoke and actually exploded, however the explosion was subdued. At that point a bomb squad appeared and managed to diffuse the bomb. The car bore license plates registered to a Connecticut-based Ford F-150. Mayor Bloomberg rushed back to New York from Washington and was quoted as saying: "We are very lucky that we avoided what could have been a very deadly event. We have no idea who did this or why.” It is unclear whether the organizers of the terrorist attempt were foreign-based or domestic. Looks like Goldman Sachs and a bankrupt Greece are finally going to be dropped from the front page, for at least a few hours. And, as always, nothing like a "failed terror attempt" as a cohesive force to consolidate an increasingly polarized population.

Don't fall for 'ye ole divide-and-conquer strategy ...

"If you had read “This Time is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly” by Reinhart & Rogoff,
none of the current alarm over Greece’s debt situation would come as any surprise. Indeed the book
shows that Greece has been in default roughly one out of every two years since it first gained
independence in the nineteenth century. However, it is never knowable
in advance at what exact moment the tipping point is reached. Today, the government of Greece is burdened with approximately €275 billion of debt, equating to
115% of GDP, are running a nearly 14% budget deficit for
2009, [Eurostat, April 2010] and S&P has downgraded
their debt to BB+/B - junk status! Up until March, the
world bond markets had taken a remarkably sanguine
view of this situation. In January, the Greeks sold €8
billion worth of bonds at a rather high (historically)
6.25%, while there was demand for €25 billion. But
shortly afterward, the situation deteriorated rapidly." Oisin Zimmermann

No photos or videos of Greek street riots, or burning Athens policemen here. With all the serious discourse over Greek bankruptcy and what not, the general public sometimes ignores the levity of the broader comedy that has brought us here in the first place, i.e. that the Greek government simply sucks at collecting taxes. And no matter how many decrees from above come, this will not change. Case in point: the Guardian reports about the latest tax collection, and immediate ensuing tax avoidance scheme implemented by the Greek government and the Greek wealthy, essentially includes the usage of Google Earth to track those who have swimming pools, cross indexing it with tax collections by address, and catching perpetrators. The loophole - green tarps to fool Google. In other words, good luck IMF.

I'm tired of arguing about Goldman so here's something to amuse you.

EuroWeek magazine reports that Greece has hired Lazard in an advisory capacity: it is not a stretch to assume that this is in connection with a potential, and some say inevitable, bankruptcy... unless the country is really serious about procuring a stalking horse distressed M&A bidder for Santorini. We also note that DebtWire has yet to report on this development: looks like the FT is really starting to slip. It would not be a stretch to see why Greece and Lazard are on good terms: after Greece basically put all banks on the kleptocrata non grata list, the pseudo-French company seems like a legitimated candidate (not to mention that France will fail first should Greece default). Additionally, in March 2009 the firm advised the Hellenic Government on the sale of various Olympic Airlines assets to Marfin. Lazard is also no stranger to sovereign reorg, having worked with Nicaragua, Ecuador and Cote d'Ivoire on various restructuring assignments. However, while those deals were a walk in the park, Jim Millstein and and new (and critical) addition Felix Rohatyn will find Greece, where 80% of the population does not want a bailout and in fact is rooting for a default, a much tougher nut to crack.

The boom and bust cycles of the new normal (as it wishes to be called) can be characterized.  This characterization provides clues about the nature of its endgame and progress toward that end. 

• Economic growth fueled by easy monetary policy leads to excessive investment in specific assets (bubbles), resulting in more extreme boom and bust cycles. 
• Government policies to regulate the cycles lead to further crises that impact higher levels of capital structure.
• In particular, very steep yield curves result in a generalized carry trade. 
• Equity valuations always get smashed in a crash.  However, in the new normal the top of the corporate capital structure is not as immunized as it has been. 
• The next to get smashed?  Sovereign credit.
• The Endgame?  The United States lives within their means, or U.S. t-bills get hammered.

Riots erupting in Greece during May Day mayhem, and they will only get worse. It's time for Greece to explore all options and avoid the IMF's road to ruin.

Just because Goldman refuses to get it, and wishes to inflict even more pain on itself with more and more public appearances, here is Lloyd on Charlie Rose last night. More of the same: "We did well because we had the disciplined hedging [on housing]."Paraphrase: "Thank you Paulson for letting us steal your idea and have our prop book go $10 billion short two months before HSBC and New Century went tits up. Also thank you for reminding us to short hundreds of millions worth of Bear stock." Also, the amount of money put into Goldman by the government was not important for us. Ok Lloyd, please refund all the $2 billion in CDS profits you made by shorting AIG immediately. And again Lloyd blatantly misrepresents the truth, by saying that doing away with prop trading would only cost the firm 10% of the firm's revenue (so why the massive fight against the Volcker rule?). Forget all this market maker, liquidity provider generic fallback bs and mumbo jumbo. How about some disclosure on just how you classify prop trading Lloyd? Because something tells us that at least 50% of your flow and correlation desk is purely Prop (and certainly serves to bolster prop profits instead of putting clients "first" as we have disclosed about 10 times in the past week alone), as the 901 pages in Goldman discovery make only all too obvious (we will post on that soon). Hey Lloyd, here's an idea - how about instituting P&L stop limits on all your OTC FICC prop trades just like RBS? Oh yes, we'll go there... and in much more detail. Soon.

Eric King reports the breaking news that in a letter obtained by Ted Butler, the DOJ's Antitrust department is considering launching an investigation into silver market manipulation by JP Morgan. Should an announcement of a full formal probe of manipulation by JPM follow, it would be tantamount to a confirmation of what numerous individuals have been claiming over the years, that JP Morgan, the LBMA, the CFTC, various banks, and even that kindly old grandpa who was so much against derivatives except when he was about to lose money as a result of regulation that he is spending the whole weekend telling his investors in Omaha to run, not walk, to Borsheim's, and buy all their massively overpriced trinkets (you can't be a quadrillionaire without first being a trillionaire), are nothing but a borderline criminal cabal that traffics in wealth extraction courtesy of a few monopolist players. As Eric King discloses in its letter the Anti-Trust division announces that "it will carefully consider the issue of silver market manipulation by JP Morgan and other traders. Generally the CFTC investigates these types of market manipulations. However, the suggestion that JPMorgan Chase may be signaling other traders, warrants further analysis. The DOJ will carefully consider the issue you raise, and you can be assured that if we conclude that silver traders have engaged in anti-competitive conduct, we will take appropriate enforcement action."