Archive - Feb 9, 2013
Is China Mobilizing For A War With Japan?
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/09/2013 23:17 -0500
We don't know if it merely a coincidence that a story has emerged discussing a Chinese mobilization in response to the ongoing territorial feud with Japan over the Diaoyu/Senkaku islands (and the proximal massive gas field) the very week that China celebrates its new year. We don't know how much of the story is based in reality, and how much may be propaganda or furthering someone's agenda. What we do know is that the source of the story: offshore-based, Falun Gong-affiliated NTDTV has historically been a credible source of information that the China communist party desperately tries to censor, such as breaking the news of the SARS epidemic in 2003 some three weeks before China publicly admitted it. Its motto is "to bring truthful and uncensored information into and out of China." If that is indeed the case, and its story of major troop movements and mobilization of various types of military vehicles and artillery into the Fujian and Zhejian provinces, bordering the East China Sea and closest to the Diaoyu islands, is accurate, then hostilities between China and Japan may be about to take a major turn for the worse.
Goodbye Fourth Amendment: Homeland Security Affirms "Suspicionless" Confiscation Of Devices Along Border
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/09/2013 21:20 -0500
Slowly but surely the administration is making sure that both the US constitution, and its various amendments, become a thing of the past. In the name of national security, of course. And while until now it was the First and Second amendments that were the target of the administration's ongoing efforts to eavesdrop on anyone, all the time, in order to decide who may be a domestic terrorist and thus fit for 'droning', coupled with an aggressive push to disarm and curtail the propagation of weapons in what some perceive is nothing more than an attempt to take away a population's one recourse to defend itself against a tyrannical government, the time may be coming to say goodbye to the Fourth amendment - the right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures - next. But only in close proximity to the border at first. According to Wired, "the Department of Homeland Security’s civil rights watchdog has concluded that travelers along the nation’s borders may have their electronics seized and the contents of those devices examined for any reason whatsoever — all in the name of national security."
How A Previously Secret Collateral Transformation With The Bank Of Italy Prevented Monte Paschi's Nationalization
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/09/2013 19:47 -0500
The endless Italian bailout story that keeps on giving, has just given some more. It turns out Italy's insolvent Banca dei Monte Paschi, which has been in the headlines for the past month due to its role as political leverage against the frontrunning Bersani bloc, and which has been bailed out openly so many times in the past 4 years we have lost track, and whose cesspool of a balance sheet disclose one after another previously secret derivative deal on an almost daily basis, can now add a previously unannounced bailout by the Bank of Italy to its list of recent historical escapades.
Guest Post: The U.S. Economy Is Now Dangerously Detached From Reality
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/09/2013 15:45 -0500
We now live in an entirely fabricated fiscal environment. Every aspect of it is filtered, muddled, molded, and manipulated before our eyes ever get to study the stats. The metaphor may be overused, but our economic system has become an absolute “matrix”. All that we see and hear has been homogenized and all truth has been sterilized away. There is nothing to investigate anymore. It is like awaking in the middle of a vast and hallucinatory live action theater production, complete with performers, props, and sound effects, all designed to confuse us and do us harm. In the end, trying to make sense of the illusion is a waste of time. All we can do is look for the exits…
The Fed's Bailout Of Europe Continues With Record $237 Billion Injected Into Foreign Banks In Past Month
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/09/2013 15:20 -0500
Last weekend Zero Hedge once again broke the news that just like back in June 2011, when as part of the launch of QE2 we demonstrated that all the incremental cash resulting form the $600 billion surge in the Fed's excess reserves, had gone not to domestically-chartered US banks, but to subsidiaries of foreign banks operating on US soil. To be sure, various other secondary outlets picked up on the story without proper attribution, most notably the WSJ, which cited a Stone McCarthy report adding the caveat that "interpreting the data released by the Federal Reserve is a bit challenging" and also adding the usual incorrect attempts at interpretation for why this is happening. To the contrary: interpreting the data is quite simple, which is why we made an explicit prediction: 'We urge readers to check the weekly status of the H.8 when it comes out every Friday night, and specifically line item 25 on page 18, as we have a sinking feeling that as the Fed creates $85 billion in reserves every month... it will do just one thing: hand the cash right over straight to still hopelessly insolvent European banks." So with Friday having come and gone, we did just the check we suggested. As the chart below shows, we were right.
When Your Entire System is Backed Only By Credibility, Corruption Scandals Can Bring the Whole System Down
Submitted by Phoenix Capital Research on 02/09/2013 13:21 -0500
Corruption only works as long as the benefits of being “on the take” outweigh the consequences of getting caught. As soon as the consequences become real (namely someone gets in major trouble), then everyone starts to talk. This process has now begun in Spain.
Paul Krugman: "We Should Kick The Can Down The Road. It’s The Responsible Thing To Do"
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/09/2013 13:17 -0500
The below article, recreated in its grotesque entirety, is a real, serious Op-Ed written by a supposedly real, non page-view trolling, Nobel-prize winning economist, in a serious paper, the New York Times. It can be classified with one word: jaw-dropping:"We’re not going to resolve our long-run fiscal issues any time soon, which is O.K. — not ideal, but nothing terrible will happen if we don’t fix everything this year. Meanwhile, we face the imminent threat of severe economic damage from short-term spending cuts. So we should avoid that damage by kicking the can down the road. It’s the responsible thing to do."
2013 Earnings Are Now Forecast To Be Less Then 2009 Earnings Were Projected To Be In 2007
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/09/2013 12:51 -0500
Over the past few weeks, virtually all of the empty chatterboxes on financial comedy TV have been repeating ad infinitum just how much cheaper the market now is compared to its prior peak in 2007 because, get this, it trades at "only" a 15x multiple compared to the 18x or so reached at its peak in 2007. By doing so these same hollow pundits simply confirm just how painfully clueless their cheerleading is, as the market, or what's left of it in the "new Bernanke centrally-planned abnormal", never trades on current earnings but always future discounted EPS, or in other words, forward P/E, or any other valuation, multiples. And it is when one looks at the future on an apples to apples basis, that the market now is more expensive than it was back in 2007!
French Socialist Nightmare: 'The State Cannot Do Everything'
Submitted by testosteronepit on 02/09/2013 12:37 -0500The fight over plant closures, layoffs, and bailouts in the collapsing auto sector
Days After Freezing Prices, Argentina Bans All Advertising
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 02/09/2013 11:17 -0500"We are from the government and we are here to help you"
- Anonymous government worker
A week after Argentina resorted to every failing authoritarian government's last ditch measure to (briefly) control inflation before runaway prices flood the nation and result in political and social upheaval, namely freezing retail prices - a decision which never has a happy ending, the country is pressing on through the rabbit hole and in the latest stunner of a government decree (which like Venezuela yesterday is merely a harbinger of what is coming everywhere else), has banned advertising in the Argentina's newspapers in an attempt to weaken what's left of a private, independent media, and to punish those who don't comply with the government's propaganda.
No Love for the Coffee Market?
Submitted by EconMatters on 02/09/2013 10:19 -0500Coffee is just that kind of market great for traders and well worth putting on your trading radar screens.
Currency Positioning and Technical Outlook: Correction or Reversal?
Submitted by Marc To Market on 02/09/2013 09:07 -0500Here is a review of the technical condition of the major currencies. In my professional experience, I know few purist fundamental traders in the foreign exchange market. Even for those, like myself, who study the macro economic and political fundamentals, technical analysis allows us to quantify the risk. Those who make money in the markets, do not do so because they are right more often, but rather they are disciplined risk managers. Technical analysis provides a way to manage the risk by helping to identify where we are wrong. It is offered here not as a substitute for fundamental analysis, but as a complement.







