Archive - Nov 14, 2013

• Yellen to defend Fed's ultra-easy monetary policy (Reuters)
• Japan growth slows on global weakness (WSJ)
• Eurozone third-quarter growth falters (FT)
• Fed Debates Its Low-Rate Peg (Hilsenrath)
• Yellen: Economy Still Needs Fed Aid (WSJ)
• ‘Obamacare’ launch fiasco rouses sceptics (FT)
• DoubleLine's Gundlach says U.S. equities 'only game in town' (Reuters)
• Indian Inflation Exceeding Estimates Adds Rate-Rise Pressure (BBG)
• HUD Said to Fail in Bid to Sell $450 Million of Mortgages (BBG)
• Boeing machinists reject labor deal on 777X by 67 percent (Reuters)

Japan growth cut in half, Europe growth cut by more than half, but none of that matters: today it will be all about the coronation of QEeen Yellen, who testifies before the Senate Banking Committee at 10am. Not even Japanese finance minister Aso's return to outright currency intervention warnings (in addition to the BOJ's QE monetary base dilution), when he said that Japan must always be ready to send signal to markets to curb excessive and one sided FX moves and it is important that Japan has intervention as FX policy option, which sent the USDJPY back up to 100 for the first time since September 11 made much of an impact on futures trading which after surging early in the session following the release of Yellen's prepared remarks, have now "tapered" virtually all gains. Certainly, the follow up from Europe doing the same and also warning it too may engage in QE, has been lost. Which is odd considering the entire developed world is now on the verge of engaging in the most furious open monetization of virtually everything in history.

Following the second quarter 0.3% rise in Eurozone GDP, which ended a multi year European recession (and who can possibly forget all those "strong" PMI numbers that helped launch a thousand clickbait slideshows), the proclamations for an imminent European golden age came hot and heavy. This was before the imploding European inflation print was announced and certainly before the ECB had no choice but to cut rates and even hint at QE, shattering all hopes of European growth. And just over an hour ago, the latest validation that just as we expected Europe is on the verge of a triple dip recession, came out of Eurostat (which may or may not get back to the issue of Spanish data integrity eventually), which reported that just like in Japan, the sequential growth rate in Europe is once again not only stalling but was dangerously close to once again contracting in the third quarter when it printed by the smallest possible positive quantum of 0.1%.