Archive - Jul 2012

Both earnings and revenues for 2012 have been cut dramatically in the last three months, rejuvenating a sliding consensus trend for 2012 that began in the middle of last year, and now Q3 expectations are negative YoY for the first time since Q3 2009. However, as we are told again and again, the economy must be doing fine because the market is up so much in that period. In fact, what is even more fun to hear is that the market is cheap (never mind the incredulous hockey-stick expectations for Q4 this year). In fact, the market is not cheap at all. The correlation between the S&P 500 in the last two years and the P/E multiple shows that performance has been driven almost entirely by multiple-expansion alone. Forward P/E is now getting close to recent peaks suggesting the market is far from cheap and on a longer-term view (based on both an as-reported and operating basis), the S&P 500 appears expensive - and perhaps these charts will re-anchor whatever cognitive bias that seems to pervade the long-only manager's herding mentality.

Amazon's AH stock price may be up or down, or sideways, but here are the three charts that make us scratch our heads as we valiantly try to explain how a company which just said it will have 'Operating income (loss) inbetween $(350) million and $(50) million" and currently has a 263x P/E, is worth anywhere close to where it is trading.

UPDATE: FB -17%, AMZN -0.5%, SBUX -5.3%

A quick run-down of this evening's catastrophe among the sweetheart hope stocks. From Facebook, Amazon, and Starbucks - not pretty. Top line misses, earnings misses, and outlook guides down... FB -13%, AMZN -2% (was -6%), SBUX (-6%). Via Bloomberg...

• *FACEBOOK 2Q COSTS/EXPENSES $1.93B MOSTLY ON SHR BASED COMP
• *FACEBOOK 2Q ADJ. EPS 12C, GAAP LOSS 8C-SHR
• *AMAZON.COM 2Q EPS 1C, EST. 3C
• *AMAZON.COM 2Q SALES $12.83B, EST. $12.90B 
• *AMZN SEES 3Q NET SALES $12.9B-$14.3B, EST. $14.11B
• *STARBUCKS 3Q EPS 43C, EST. 45C; FORECAST CUT, SHARES FALL
• *STARBUCKS TARGETS FY13 EPS $2.04-$2.14, EST. $2.28 
• *STARBUCKS SEES 4Q EPS 44C-45C, SAW 46C-48C, EST. 48C

But have no fear - Draghi and Bernanke have our backs... so why are all the CEOs cutting outlooks? Don't they 'believe'?

CRAAPL taketh and Draghi giveth it all back. The question remains - given all the front-running anticipatory moves on the back of jawbone after jawbone, will ECB/Fed action have anything but a brief romance with higher prices when/if it occurs? The S&P 500 pushed up to fill its Monday opening gap-down on a reasonable volume day (heading into T-3 from month-end shenanigans) but the participation is absolutely not what one would expect if this was belief with S&P 500 e-mini futures seeing their lowest average trade size of the year. Gold was a winner again as the USD was sold against everything. Treasuries gave back some of their gains - yields leaking higher by around 3-5bps at the mid- to long-end. Credit and equity stayed largely in sync but the former was quiet and likely being reracked more than traded as it gapped at the open and stayed there. Stocks took off from their broad-risk-asset peers from the day-session open, retested VWAP, then pushed back to highs into the close - ending well above risk-assets' view of the world as correlations fell modestly. VIX ended the day down 2 vols at 17.5% but was unable to close the gap to Friday's close like stocks - which closed (rather coincidentally, given month-end, at June's closing price)

Another epic retail disappointment:

• AMAZON.COM 2Q EPS 1C, EST. 3C
• AMAZON.COM 2Q SALES $12.83B, EST. $12.90B

And the kicker, proving that the company has finally gone "inverese" profit:

• AMZN SEES 3Q OPER LOSS $50M-$350M, EST. PROFIT $119.6M - yes, negative
  
• AMZN SEES 3Q NET SALES $12.9B-$14.3B, EST. $14.11

Mario Draghi promises that whatever AMZN loses in profit, it will make up in volume: "beleeeeve me." In other news, the US consumer is fine.

While Dos Equis has its most-interesting-man, we think we have found the 'most hypocritical'. Until today we thought Sandy Weill was the undisputed champion in this category, but after seeing this clip we think he has strong competition. At around 40 seconds into this lengthy diatribe, everyone's favorite Libertarian Las Vegan utters the most two-faced hypocritical words that he could possible have uttered: "I think we should audit the Federal Reserve". Between Harry Reid's recent vehement anti-Paul behavior and the whip-order that Democrats received on Ron Paul's bill yesterday, this is stunning. While the sell-out nature of this kind of politician does not surprise us, we thought it prudent for all US citizens to understand the true nature of the political class that decides an increasing amount of our day to day lives.

The 200 Pip move was purely based on speculation or a hope that Draghi’s statement would render the same affect as the Calvary riding in to save the day. That’s just not how these things work. Draghi will have to put his money where his mouth is in order to see a move like this sustain itself in the long-term.

Load your EURO Bullshit...

On one hand we have Mario Draghi promising he has a magic wand (not a printer - remember the keys to that are now held by Angela Merkel who is on vacation) and to "believe him" that the EUR will survive. On the other we have Greece which is a poster child of everything that is wrong in Europe. And that we summarize as follows: i) an epic and now relentless deposit outflow from Greek banks which continues as all trust in the local banking system is now gone, as €7 billion in deposits or the second biggest amount ever, is pulled and 20% of the entire corporate and household deposit base has vaporized in the past year, and ii) an economy in which it is every man for himself and where nobody pays any taxes any more, period. Good luck Super Mario.

Not seeing many fiscal developments that would prompt significant bullish action...

There is no point in recapping the ongoing vendetta between former SIGTARP Neil Barofsky and former head of the NY Fed, and current Treasury secretary and resident TurboTax expert Tim Geithner. One need but follow the former on Twitter for a quick and concise sampling of the sentiments harbored vis-a-vis the latter. However, in the following interview Barfosky does touch on some points which in the context of the recent Liborgate, should be brought front and center, especially since the increasingly apathetic US audience seems to not care about one bit (as opposed to their distant cousins across the Atlantic for whom Lieborgate has become a daily distraction). Namely, what Barofsky says is that Geithner and other regulators who allowed Lieborgate to proceed should not only lose their job but we should "see [Geithner] in handcuffs."  Sadly that will never happen as it would actually be a deterrent to future crime among the highest echelons of America: something which is just not allowed to happen in a system whose very survival is increasingly reliant on rampant criminality.

Every day we are told how this recovery is the slowest since WWII and that nothing is working. Well, we think we can trump that for dysphoria. Not only is this the slowest recovery since WWII, it is even slower than the average 'stagnation'. Based on Goldman's analysis of 93 stagnations the US GDP per capita is growing even more stagnantly than ever (and dramatically worse than during Japan's 'lost decade').

Given the anticipation that is now built-in for next week's ECB meeting, we hope that Draghi has a little more up his sleeve than reviving the Treaty-testing, bondholder-subordinating SMP. Presented with little comment is the market's reaction during the last two periods of buying as it seems that Italian and Spanish bondholders are more than happy to know that there will always be a buyer no matter how much they keep selling their exposure down.

Did you know that Chinese government officials are all corrupt? Did you know that many of Chinese statistics look either weird or totally unreliable to a point that even the Vice Premier can’t help admitting it? People outside of China have never really trusted the Chinese Communist Party as far as politics are concerned, and probably never will. However, the seemingly unstoppable growth engine of China has produced a remarkable level of complacency among investors that China is going to do well. While recent economic data from China are mixed at best, the market consensus is unanimously biased towards believing that the second quarter is the bottom. We do not understand the reasons behind the faith in the Chinese leadership as far as running the economy is concerned.  Here are a few reasons why you should just stop believing in the Chinese leadership when it comes to running the economy.