Archive - Jan 2012

The catalyst so many have been waiting for, and the nearly 30 million shorts dreading, has arrived. From Judge Eileen Bransten: "ORDERED that MBIA Insurance Corporation’s motion for partial summary judgment is granted to the extent that MBIA Insurance Corporation (“MBIA”) must establish for its claim of fraud that misrepresentations by the defendant(s) induced MBIA to issue insurance policies on terms to which it otherwise would not have agreed and that MBIA is not required to establish a direct causal link between defendant(s) misrepresentations and MBIA’s claims payments made pursuant to the insurance policies at issue; and it is further ordered that MBIA's motion for partial summary judgment is granted to the extent that MBIA must establish for its claim for breach of the Insurance Agreement against Countrywide Home Loans that CHL's breach of warranties in the issued insurance policies' transaction documents increased the risk profile of the issued insurance policies and MBIA is not required to establish a direct causal connection between proven warranty breaches by CHL and MBIA's claims payments made pursuant to the insurance policies at issue, and it is further Ordered that MBIA's motion for partial summary judgment is granted to the extent that MBIA may seek rescissory damages upon proving all elements of its claims for fraud and breach of representation and/or warranty." In short, this is core catalyst that Manal Mehta expected and which BTIG envisioned to justify its $22.50 price target. It is also the judgment that will make Bank of America's case law life a living nightmare going forward (naturally following repeated failed attempts at appealing). Lastly, any and all shorts in the name may have their work cut out for them.

As households are supposedly deleveraging and European nations face austerity, one might suspect that global debt levels were stabilizing or even dropping. Think again. It will likely come as no surprise when we point out that the G-7 nations alone face a massive $7.3 Trillion (with a T) of sovereign-only maturities (and a further $566 Billion in interest payments) in 2012 alone. This incomprehensible number is worsened only in historical comparison as it's current level is 125% higher than was 'expected' at the end of 2010 (and 238% higher than was expected for 2012 at the end of 2009). As Bloomberg points out, Japan tops the list with $3.05tn (equivalent) followed the US at $2.76tn for 2012 as the former peaks in March 2012 (with $678bn due in that month alone) and the latter peaks in this month with January 2012 seeing over $480bn due to mature (and be rolled). But it gets worse for supply - global corporations (dominated by Financials relative to non-Financials), as noted by S&P today, have used the low interest rate environment to modestly relever and face almost $1 Trillion (again with a T) of maturing debt that will need to be rolled in 2012 (with January and March also topping the list) and over $3.1Tn in the next four years. So in the next four years, amid a slowing demand picture thanks to European worries, global corporate debt combined with G-7 sovereign debt maturing is an incredible $18.48 Trillion that will need to be rolled, rehypothecated, and have capital allocated to it (or not).

Writing as someone who was strongly stock-oriented for most of a long investing career, I can assert that at today's low dividend yields, it is difficult to see stocks as strong trees on which to rely. The Smithers parameters provide cautionary evidence for the bulls who point to current "low" price-earnings ratios and "sunny skies almost forever" views of corporate profits and predict stock market returns well above bond yields for years to come.

The biggest FOMC news released today was not the December minutes - there was absolutely no surprise there. The biggest news, by far, is that as we wrote a few weeks ago, the composition of the FOMC voting members changes drastically as of January 1, with Hawks Fisher, Kocherlakota and Plosser now out of the voting rotation, and replacing them will be the gaggle of ferocious doves Pianalto, Lockhart and Williams. In fact the only hawk left in the Fed as of today through the end of the year is Richmond Fed's Jeffrey Lacker who has shown substantial dovishness in the past. In other words, from a rotation of 7 and 3, the Fed is now uber-dovish by a 9 to 1 majority. So does this mean that printing is imminent? Stay tuned and find out in 3 short weeks: the January FOMC statement comes out on January 25. The only good news: Charles "the fire hydrant" Evans is finally out.

The Inmates Are Running the Asylum

"They got lies so big... They don't make a noise... They tell 'em so well... Like a secret disease... That makes you go numb" --Frank Zappa

The bond market has always had clever names for bonds in specific markets.  Eurobonds, Yankee bonds, Samurai bonds, and now, Ponzi bonds.  I’m not sure what else to call these new bonds, but Ponzi bonds seems as good as anything. NBG issued these bonds to themselves, got a Greek government guarantee (how can a country that can’t borrow, provide a guarantee?) and took these bonds to the ECB to get some financing.  The ECB won’t buy National Bank of Greece bonds directly, they won’t buy Hellenic Republic bonds in the primary market, but they will take these ponzi bonds as collateral?  Greece, and Italy, is sacrificing the people and the country for the good of the bank. The market had made some attempt to charge banks with bad risk management, awful assets, and opaque books, more than they charged the country they were domiciled in.  But rather than let the market (and common sense) rule, a mechanism to let banks fund themselves cheaper than the countries they rely on, was created. Asides from giving Ponzi a bad name (at least until the ECB just admits that they are printing faster than even Big Ben) this is tying the banks and the countries ever closer.  A long, long, time ago (1 month) it was conceivable that a bank could fail and the sovereign survive.  That is becoming less clear.

Summary of the yawn-inducing minutes via Bloomberg:

• SEVERAL ON FOMC FAVORED CHANGE TO MID-2013 RATE VOW BEFORE LONG
• FOMC SAID GLOBAL FINANCIAL STRAINS POSE `SIGNIFICANT' RISK
• FED PLANS TO RELEASE OFFICIALS' FED FUNDS RATE FORECASTS (this is not news, and if the Fed is as accurate in "predicting" - note not setting - FF rates as it is in forecasting everything else, woe is us)
• FOMC MEMBERS SAW LONG-TERM INFLATION EXPECTATIONS AS STABLE
• FOMC MEMBERS SAW ECONOMY `EXPANDING AT A MODERATE RATE'
• FOMC MEMBERS SAID CONSUMER SPENDING `STRONGER THAN EXPECTED'
• MOST FOMC MEMBERS PREDICTED INFLATION WOULD `MODERATE'
• 'A NUMBER' OF FOMC MEMBERS SAW POSSIBLE NEED FOR MORE EASING

There are dim lights at the end of the seemingly darker and darker tunnel. The proposed sanctions legislation allows Obama to waive sanctions if they cause the price of oil to rise or threaten national security. Furthermore, there is the wild card of Iran’s oil customers, the most prominent of which is China, which would hardly be inclined to go along with increased sanctions. But one thing should be clear in Washington – however odious the U.S. government might find Iran’s mullahcracy, it is most unlikely to cave in to either economic or military intimidation that would threaten the nation’s existence, and if backed up against the wall with no way out, would just as likely go for broke and use every weapon at its disposal to defend itself. Given their evident cyber abilities in hacking the RQ-170 Sentinel drone and their announcement of an indigenous naval doctrine, a “cakewalk” victory with “mission accomplished” declared within a few short weeks seems anything but assured, particularly as it would extend the military arc of crisis from Iraq through Iran to Afghanistan, a potential shambolic military quagmire beyond Washington’s, NATO’s and Tel Aviv’s resources to quell. It is worth remembering that chess was played in Sassanid Iran 1,400 years ago, where it was known as “chatrang.” What is occurring now off the Persian Gulf is a diplomatic and military game of chess, with global implications.

The abysmal hit rate of Byron Wien's predictions over the past several years (ostensibly since the inception of this silly practice nearly three decades ago) has been the source of much laughter on the pages of Zero Hedge: see here and here. It has also been the source of much profit, due to the Blackstone Vice Chairman's uncanny ability to bat just over 0.000 with laser-guided precision and consistency. Below, as reported by Bloomberg, are the latest set of forecasts which are to be faded with impunity as soon as is possible.

The Status Quo's Ministry of Propaganda has a single political task for 2012: eliminate the sole threat to the Status Quo (Ron Paul) from the running, leaving voters with a "choice" of clueless stooges for the Power Elite. That roster includes President Obama and the daytime-TV/soap-opera field of Republicrat contenders. The Ministry of Propaganda has settled on a ludicrous strategy to eliminate Ron Paul: declare Paul "unelectable." As with all propaganda, the basic idea is that if it is repeated often enough on officially sanctioned stages, it will eventually be accepted as "true." Our Christmas-New Year's week of family visits took us to homes where the television is on all the time, and as a result I was exposed to the Ministry of Propaganda's preferred media, TV "news." Regardless of the channel or program, the message was the same: "The presidential race will between Obama and either Romney or Gingrich." Despite the polls that find Paul and Romney with equal levels of support in Iowa, Romney has been declared the front-runner and Paul written off as "unelectable." In other words, the voters don't even need to check in; the Ministry of Propaganda's army of toadies, lackeys and media apparatchiks have their marching orders: repeat that Ron Paul is unelectable at every opportunity, either explicitly or implicitly via leaving him off the list of "frontrunners."

History is full of other examples of once proud nations that, facing problems for decades (or even centuries), completely unwound in a matter of years. The Ottoman Empire. The  Ming Dynasty. Feudal France. The Soviet Union. Bottom line, when the real change comes, it comes very, very quickly. Think about the pace of change these days. It’s quickening. Europe is a great case study for this– when concerns about Greece first surfaced, European leaders were able to contain the damage. There was disquiet, but it soon dissipated. Fast forward to today. We can hardly go a single day without a major, market-rocking headline. And European politicians’ attempts to assuage the damage have a useful half life that can be measured in days… sometimes hours now. Like the Ottomans, the Soviets, the Romans before them, Western civilization is entering the phase where its rate of decline will start looking like that upside-down hockey stick.

European credit and equity markets rallied today but there was considerable relative underperformance by the former (especially in financials). Sovereign spreads leaked wider all day and started to lose it more rapidly into the close. It looks like Senior versus Subordinated decompression trades were placed in the European afternoon (a bearish trade ion financials) and even with the ECB in the market, BTPs closed above 500bps over Bunds (just shy of 7% all-in yields). Broad risk assets also lost ground as Europe's bid eased off as Oil eased back off its best levels and FX carry came off its highs of the day. US Treasuries are rallying after trying to converge earlier and 2s10s30s is also dragging risk lower for now.