Archive - Jan 29, 2013

Following his impromptu discussion early this morning with Mario Draghi, Italy's finance minister has proudly stepped before the cameras to discuss the farce that has become Monte Paschi. In a stream of seemingly incredulous hypocrisy, the minister explains that:

• *GRILLI SAYS MONTE PASCHI IS SOLID
• *MONTI BOND HELPED MONTE PASCHI MEET EBA RULES: GRILLI
• *GRILLI SAYS OVERSIGHT OF MONTE PASCHI WAS CONTINUOUS, THOROUGH
• *GRILLI SAYS GOVT AID TO PASCHI NOT TO HELP AN INSOLVENT BANK
• *GRILLI SAYS ITALY BANKING SYSTEM UNIQUE FOR NO BAILOUTS

Indeed, it seems that Juncker-ism has leaked across to all the ministers as a new realm of reality strikes the Italian banking system. So the 'bank is solid', 'aid is not a bailout', and 'water is not wet'.

In a shocking development, one which comes out of central planning left field, after eight years in his role as safe-guarder of the Shekel, the head of the Bank of Israel Stanley Fischer - Ben Bernanke's personal mentor, and famous underwater investor in AAPL - has announced his intention to step down. This resignation comes 10 months (and $100 less in AAPL) after the central bank's announcement to begin buying foreign stocks. Is this a harbinger of the change in the old brigade, and does it make Bernanke's departure one year from today virtually assured - we hope to find out, unless, of course, the most aggressive and ambitious central banking experiment in history to keep the global house of cards afloat fails in the meantime.

The one thing that all of us know, surely all of us must know at least this, is that markets do not go forever in one direction. I am not speaking here of the pecularities of a day or of trying to eke out some trade but of shifts in circumstances and sentiments that sets the direction upon a new course. We live in a world recently comprised of three basic tenets; postpone, make up facts to suit the goals of some nation or nations and throw money at anything that moves. This is an inherently unstable construct and yet that is what our brilliant leaders have embraced. I will tell you this; when chicanery is trotted out as truth, when liabilities are not counted, when losses are termed investments, when the only answer to anything is the printing of more small pieces of green and blue paper then trouble is approaching with a capital “T” and the future is a bleak cloud of foreboding.

A quick ranking of the world's most "miserable" countries, based on the conventional measure of the Misery Index which is simply the Unemployment Rate plus Inflation, shows just why most people in Spain are, well, less than happy (and Spain is damn lucky there is no subset of the Misery index for just those aged 25 and under as we would certainly need a bigger chart). As the chart below shows, the Spanish "misery" is now the greatest in the world, at some 30%, and is worse than South Africa, Greece, Venezuela, Argentina and Egypt.

Yesterday $42 billion tech behemoth VMWare stunned its investors when not only did it cut guidance, announcing that global demand is sliding, scaling back products but also disclosing a 7% workforce cut: hardly the stuff that global recoveries are made of. Sure enough, the stock is getting clobbered -17% lower this morning with the weakness likely to spread to the rest of the tech space. But just in case there was any confusion who was making money into last night's epic collapse, and was selling the stock to muppets who were told it was not only a Buy, but a "Conviction Buy", and to buy with both hands no questions asked, look no further than the usual suspect.

• U.S. Wants Criminal Charges for RBS (WSJ)
• Bernanke Seen Buying $1.14 Trillion in Assets in 2014 (BBG)
• Irish banks at mercy of international paymasters (Reuters)
• Do badly, and we will let you do even worse: Rehn Signals EU May Ease Spain Budget Goal in Austerity Retreat (BBG)
• Too Soon to Celebrate for Europe's Banks (WSJ)
• Army says political strife taking Egypt to brink (Reuters)
• Media Firms Probed on Data Release (WSJ) - No Criminal Charges Seen
• Japan’s Government Proposes First Spending Cut in 7 Years (BBG)
• Nazi Goebbels’ Step-Grandchildren Are Hidden Billionaires (BBG)
• Goldman seeks to reduce China exposure (FT)
• More than 70% of Chinese airports generate losses (People's Daily)

Following yet another quiet overnight session, futures have surprised many walking into work today as the traditional overnight levitation is strangely missing. The reason for that may be the lack of the traditional for 2013 lift in various funding currency pairs, with both the USDJPY and the EURUSD lower. While there was no major macro news, the former may have been dragged lower by various comments from the German BDI industry federation chief who said he is worried about the devaluation race stemming from Japan's central bank policy echoing Merkel's comparable sentiment and revealing that the EURUSD may have topped out, while the latter was pushed lower following today's 7 day ECB MRO, which saw some €124.1 billion allotted at a 0.75% yield. This was largely in line with expectations, with Barclays seeing some €135.4 billion maturing, while BNP had expected modestly more, or some €150 billion. The MRO is the first such operation, with tomorrow's 3 month refinancing operation likely to give a better glimpse of the bank's post-LTRO repayment funding needs. Whether it is this, or the market finally demanding some action out of central banks which, except for the Fed, have been in constant promise mode, or just a random walk, is unknown, but for now the carry funded nominal devaluation of risk may have topped out.