Archive - Feb 5, 2013

From Whitney Tilson: "After a strong 12-year run, 2011 and 2012 were lost years. I feel very badly about this and apologize to you. But I know you don’t want an apology – you want performance! To that end, I’ve reflected on the mistakes I’ve made, learned from them, and taken significant steps to maximize our chances of success going forward: I’m now the sole portfolio manager and have dramatically simplified, focused, and de-risked the fund. I’m confident that my strategy is sound, I will execute it well going forward, and we will all profit."

Exactly ten years ago to the day, Simon Black was in the Kuwaiti desert waiting for George W. Bush to ‘make his decision’. He knew it was going to happen. At the time, he was a rising intelligence officer, his head still filled with ideals of national duty from my time at West Point. It all came crashing down ten years ago today. On February 5, 2003 Colin Powell, four-star general turned US Secretary of State, made a case to the United Nations that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Now, we won’t bother delving into the inaccuracies of the intelligence he presented. In Powell’s own words, making that presentation to the UN was “the lowest point in [his] life” and a “lasting blot on his record.”For Black, it was pivotal. At that instant, he knew without doubt that his government had reprehensibly lied through its teeth. And if they were lying about this... what else were they lying about? As destructive as these politicians are, though, they’re easy to defeat. Individuals who take action early have plenty of options to buy precious metals, move a portion of their savings abroad to a stable banking jurisdiction, and scout out locations overseas in case they ever need to get out of dodge.

We won't spend any time discussing the accuracy of the "impartial" Congressional Budget Office: we already did that in August 2011 when we showed that back in 2001 the CBO forecast total 2011 public debt would be negative $2.4 trillion; instead the real number was positive $10.4 trillion, a delta of only $12.8 trillion. We also won't spend much time on the just released CBO headline grabbing projection that the 2013 budget deficit will be under $1 trillion, or $845 billion to be precise. Instead we will show the progression of the CBO's baseline forecasts for the period 2012 and onward. We will also note that the now-forecast 2013 budget deficit of $845 billion was supposed to be a deficit of just $585 billion one short year ago, a token 40%+ error rate, but in the immortal words of Hillary Clinton: "who cares." Of course we should note that if we apply the same forecast error to the 2013 budget, it means the real final deficit print will be $1.2 trillion - just a tad more realistic. Finally, we will certainly note that while the CBO believes 2013 may see the first sub $1 trillion deficit in 4 years, a number which will decline modestly in the coming years, the deficit then proceeds to grow and grow and grow, until we reach 2024, at which point the US deficit returns to $1 trillion once again... and never gets smaller. And this is the optimistic version.

The Chairman of Goldman's Asset Management group, unwise supporter of Man Utd, promoter of 'decoupling' myths, and creator of the BRIC mnemonic has decided, with everything looking so tickety-boo, to retire. Whether his great Buy BRICS fail or his BoE leadership bid fail was the final straw is unclear, but for now, the erstwhile permabull (and mocker of market skeptics) leaves us on a bright note:

• *O'NEILL SAYS CLEAR EVIDENCE OF THINGS DOING BETTER ECONOMICALLY

20 years of 'broken record' survival and the Brit throws in his chips now - just as everything looks be taking off? Leave your farewell message below...

Sequester, Schmequester. It would seem Q4's initial warning from the DoD was enough to get the DC-ites scrambling. President Obama takes to the teleprompter to suggest (we assume) humbly that we swap today's sequester plans for tomorrow's 'balanced' slower rate of spending growth (oh and we are sure some new taxes). And yay verily, all will be well once again in the land of make-believe fiscal policy...

The raging second Egyptian Spring isn't quite the webcast ratings bonanza it was when it first struck in 2011, which makes sense as the current Muslim Brotherhood government has the full backing of the US and thus it is in "everyone's best interest" to not follow how close to a counterrevolution the nation once again is. And while for the time being the country's most valuable asset, the Egypt-controlled Suez Canal Authority is in "stable" hands, that does not mean that the government, which today announced its foreign reserves had dipped precariously to only $13.6 billion, can't enforce inflation where everyone else says deflation reigns. As a result, as of May 1, the tolls for any crude oil and other liquid tankers will rise by 5%, while tolls for other commodities will increase by 2-3%. Expect said additional infrastructure costs to be promptly passed on to end consumers around the globe.

The mainstream media is overflowing with stories proclaiming the global economy is on the mend.  Really? Based on what engine of growth? If we cut through the Keynesian jargon of aggregate demand and other Cargo-Cult mumbo-jumbo, what we find is the Status Quo is hoping to boost its precious aggregate demand with the same bag of tricks that imploded so spectacularly in 2008: the wealth effect based on phantom collateral created by Centrally Planned asset bubbles. Though you will not find a Keynesian pundit or economist with the courage required to admit it, the same problem of phantom collateral applies to Federal and state debt: the consumption all that debt funded is soon forgotten, but the debt remains to be paid, essentially forever.

Worldwide, politicians are not exactly famous for honesty. However, Europe is a very special case… where just about everyone is lying on just about everything involving the economy and banking system.

Press conference from hell, slugfest about corruption, even in Germany

What I think of Eric Holder's carnival crusade against S&P...

While every central banker and policy-leech spews forth the government-supplied statistics on inflation - noting that all is well, carry on - we recently pointed out that Gas Prices are their highest ever for this time of year. Of course, the standard supply constraints (or technical) reasoning was applied to dismiss this as transitory (even though it has continued to rise since); but what is perhaps more worrisome is the broad-based nature of the real inflation that is leaking into our global supply chain. The 24-commodity heavy S&P GSCI index (widely recognized as a leading measure of general price movements and inflation in the world economy) has never been as high in early February as it is currently - ever. And with global growth stagnating at best, it seems a tough call to blame 'recovery' for this inflating (fastest pace in 8 years) raw material price leaking cost-push inflation (and margin-compression) into the real economy.

Work in the mortgage market?  Never read about Kamala Harris or the  CA "Home Owner Bill of Rights?"  Read on....

We urge readers to do a word search for "Moody's" in the official department of justice release below. Here are the highlights:

DOJ COMPLAINT ALLEGES S&P LIED ABOUT ITS OBJECTIVITY - when it downgraded the US?
HOLDER SAYS S&P'S ACTIONS CAUSED `BILLIONS' IN LOSSES - did Moody's actions, profiled previously here, which happens to be a major holding of one Warren Buffett, cause billions in profits?
HOLDER SAYS `NO CONNECTION' BETWEEN S&P SUIT, U.S. DOWNGRADE - just brilliant

Pure pathetic political posturing, because it was the rating agencies, whose complicity and conflicts of interest everyone knew about, who were responsible for the financial crisis. Not Alan Greenspan, not Ben Bernanke, and certainly not Wall Street which made tens of billions in profits selling CDOs to idiots in Europe and Asia. Of course, the US consumer who had a gun held against their head when they were buying McMansions with no money down and no future cash flow is not even mentioned.

Gold climbed $5.70 or 0.34% in New York yesterday and closed at $1,673.50/oz. Silver inched up to $31.86 in Asia, then it fell back to $31.38, and then rose to a high of $31.91, but eased off in afternoon trade and finished with a loss of 0.35%.

Gold rose to a new record nominal high on the TOCOM at 0.156 million yen per ounce. The resignation of Bank of Japan Governor, Shirakawa on March 19 is pressuring the yen as is increased tensions in the Pacific between China and Japan -  Japan accused China of targeting a Japanese naval vessel and helicopter.

Over the weekend we reported on the second Greek strike of the year, the first being that of subway workers which ended prematurely into its ninth day when the government threatened to arrest all strikers who had snarled traffic in Athens to a halt, this time involving Greek seamen who had left the Greek isles in geographic isolation for a week. Earlier today, the strike which had gone on for a week, was voted to be extended another 48 hours which mean ships would remain tied up in port until early Friday, while the seamen's union will meet anew to debate whether to further extend their walkout. Needless to say, the union is angry at pay arrears and government austerity policies. As of moments ago the union will be even angrier, as the government just announced it would order civil mobilization - or said otherwise, deploy the arrest threats - once again as a repeat desperate measure to halt this latest strike.