Archive - Aug 23, 2012

I have to admit, I am pretty sick of writing about Europe, particularly since nothing has changed over there in the last month.

Instead what’s happened is that Mario Draghi issued a borderline ridiculous statement that he somehow will be able to fix the EU’s solvency Crisis.

The actual speech started with a philosophical inquiry comparing the Euro to a bumblebee. I kid you not:

One (and by one, we mean the incumbent presidential candidate) can only hope that consumer comfort tracked by Bloomberg is not a leading market indicator... Of course, with Wall Street now solidly on the side of Mitt Romney, and well aware it needs to crash the S&P ahead of November if Romney is to have a running chance, this may well be the case.

If there was ever a sign that our economy, from the bottom-up, is running on fumes, it was Big Lots' dismal earnings and even more dismal outlook. The discounter is now down 21% back to 12 month lows...

Looking at the headline number in the just released New Home Sales data one would be left with the impression that the tepid "recovery" in housing may be chugging along: after all with a seasonally adjusted annualized 372,000 new homes sold in July, this was an improvement to the revised 359K in June (ignoring that the US housing market at best continues to drag along the bottom). This impression, however, promptly changes when one looks at the underlying data. The reality: the actual number of new homes sold in July was 34,000, the same as in June, and the lowest since March. Of this, a massive 3,000 (yes, three thousand) homes were sold in the Northeast in the entire month. Where things get worse is when one looks at the number of new homes for sale. At 142,000 (of which just 38,000 actually completed), this was the lowest number. EVER. And finally, to ruin all hopes that the housing bottom may mean an actual pricing bottom, the median new home price slid to $224,200, down from $229,100 in June, and the lowest since January, while the average home price declined from $266,900 to $263,200. This was the lowest average price posted so far in 2012.

I am reminded that this is the 5-year anniversary of the emergency Fed Discount Rate cut in response to the collapse of Countrywide Financial (CFC) earlier that week.  

A year ago the mere mention of Greece selling its real estate, let along its prized islands, was enough to fill Syntagma square with tear gas, laser light pointers and the occasional riot dog. Now - nobody cares, which is why the statement by Greek PM Samaras that he is ready to start selling Greek islands was largely met with a yawn across the investing world.

The last few months have seen a rapid deterioration in economic newsflow. SocGen's newsflow indicators, which capture sentiment regarding trends in the underlying economy (based on the balance of economic strength and weakness in newswire and newspaper articles) typically leads the economy by around three months. Currently, this intriguing indicator suggests a notable drop off in global industrial production - and furthermore, while Fed/ECB anticipation has dragged market-implied inflation expectations up, newsflow has biased towards deflation rather notably in the last few months. It seems that rather than being the chess pieces of global central planners, we really do have minds of our own and act in our own best interest.

Here come the facts!!! Warning, if you get your feelings hurt over hearing the truth, simply move on. You may have a couple of quarters lefft.

Industrial unrest hobbling the South African platinum industry deepened yesterday, prompting fears of a broader mining crisis in one of the main platinum and gold producing countries. Platinum and gold prices continued to soar partly due to real concerns of supply disruptions after 44 people died during strikes at a pit owned by  Lonmin. About a fifth of global platinum production capacity is idled in South Africa today as the nation holds a day of mourning for 44 miners and policemen killed in the deadliest police violence since apartheid ended (see Newswire). Massive discontent has spread to two other important platinum mines. Amplats, the world’s largest platinum producer that is 80% owned by Anglo American, disclosed it had received demands for pay rises at its Thembelani mine. Meanwhile, another miner, Royal Bafokeng, said about 500 people were protesting outside its Rasimone mine, and preventing others from going to work. It seems likely that the protests will spread from the platinum sector, to other sectors, including the gold mining sector.

One month of positive economic surprises since the last FOMC may be all we get, now that a "majority" of FOMC members suddenly need a rapid deterioration in economic data to usher in the NEWER, MORE OPEN-ENDED QE. Initial claims was happy to comply: after posting several weeks in a row of "beats", claims has finally resumed "missing", as well as rising, posting an increase from last week's upward revised 368K print to 372K this week, worse than the expected improvement to 365K, and to a one month high. And with continuing claims missing too, the real story continues to be the steep fall off in those on extended benefits and EUC, which declined by a total of 48K in the past week, and down by about half a million in the last few months, and lower by 1.3 million in the past year. This is 1.3 million fewer consumers who can recycle Uncle Sam's dole back into the economy and iGadgets. The question is whether this minimal miss is enough to justify the FOMC doves' fears the much more QE is needed. Judging by the futures reaction to Bullard and claims, the answer is so far no, and in fact points to something very ominous: the closer the Fed (and ECB) come to actually doing something instead of talking about it, the more negative the market reaction seems to be. Woe to Bernanke or Draghi the second they finally have to do something instead of telling listeners to "believe them."

With only days until the great unveiling and back-slapping that is the GOP's 'convention without walls', we humbly suggest they erect some - and buy some umbrellas. In NOAA's most recent update, Hurricane Isaac is forecast to pass right down the middle of main street Tampa amid Romney-and-Ryan's great moment so far. Of course, TOTUS will be riley smiling, noting that God didn't build this storm, his government did. Somewhat ironically, Tampa mayor Bob Buckhorn added, for once, "Safety is going to trump politics" - perhaps he should tell Bernanke.

Reports that the ECB is discussing a new variation for sovereign bond purchases involving secret caps for interest rates failed to support  peripheral EU bonds and instead provided market participants with an opportunity to book profits following recent strong gains. As a result, 10y peripheral bonds with respect to the benchmark German Bund are wider by around 12bps, with the shorter dated 2y bonds wider by around  15bps. This underperformance by peripheral EU assets is also evident in the stock market, where the IBEX and the Italian FTSE-MIB failed to match performance of the core indices today. The latest PMI data from the Eurozone, as well as China overnight underpinned the need for more simulative measures either from respective central banks or the government. While the PBOC continues to refrain from more easing, the release of the FOMC minutes last night revealed the members favoured easing soon if no growth doesn’t pick up.

Following yesterday's FOMC minutes we suggested that the minutes are, all facts considered, extremely stale, especially when one actually observes the surge in all economic indicators (or should we say seasonal adjustments) since the last FOMC meeting. Moments ago, on CNBC, non-voting St Louis Fed president confirmed just that.

• St. Louis Fed President Bullard says FOMC minutes “are a bit stale”.
• Says some data stronger since FOMC minutes
• Doesn’t know where FOMC will come out on easing
• Says “different constellation” of data vs 2011
• Says “not sure” data warrant big FOMC action
• Says U.S. unemployment “very high”
• Says “we’re not going to react” directly to stock market

In other words, the FOMC minutes do not reflect the economy, but the Fed does not care about the market which just happens to be at 2012 highs, as it does not reflect the economy either, but instead reflects merely what the FOMC thinks, which in turn reacts solely to the market.

The conditions are dramatically different from the first two QE initiatives in regards to Pre-Conditions or available flexibility to undertake an asset raising initiative.