Archive - Feb 2013

There was some hope that Greece, which for the past few months was desperately trying to show it has a primary surplus when in fact it was merely shoving unpaid bills under the rug, was at least getting its runaway deficit situation under control. This, despite what many sensible people pointed out was the return of nearly daily strikes, which meant zero government revenue as zero taxes could be levied on zero wages. Turns out the sensible people were again right, and the Greek and European propaganda machine has failed once more as the Greek Finance Ministry just reported that despite big tax hikes demanded as part of austerity measures by international lenders, tax revenues fell precipitously in January, with the Greek Finance Ministry reporting a 16 percent decrease from a year earlier, and a loss of 775 million euros, or $1.05 billion in one month. It is all downhill from here as the feedback loop of more spending cuts is activated to offset declining revenues, leading to even less revenue, and culminating with the complete collapse of Greek society.

As expected by most, the ECB just announced its three key interest rates unchanged, meaning the surge in the trade- weighted EUR will continue to weigh on European exports.

• Bersani's lead over Berlusconi continues to erode, now just 3.6 Pts, or inside error margin, in Tecne Poll
• Spain gears up for U.S. debt investor meetings (Reuters)
• PBOC Set for Record Weekly Liquidity Injection (WSJ)
• RBS Trader Helped UBS’s Hayes With Libor Bribes, Regulators Say (BBG)
• ECB, Ireland reach bank debt deal (Reuters)
• AMR-US Airways Near Merger Agreement (WSJ)
• Monte Paschi says no more derivatives losses (Reuters) ... remember this
• Harvard’s Gopinath Helps France Beat Euro Straitjacket (BBG) - by sliding into recession?
• Obama Relents on Secret Drone Memo (WSJ)
• Brennan to face questions on interrogations, drones and leaks (Reuters)
• Wall Street Success With Germans Boomerangs (BBG)
• Khamenei rebuffs U.S. offer of direct talks (Reuters)
• Boeing Preps Redesign to Get 787 Flying  (WSJ)

It has been another quiet overnight session, with macro data decidedly mixed and "adjusted", because while the key German December Industrial Production number came in sequentially at 0.3% on expectations of a 0.2% rise, it fell more than expected on an unadjusted Y/Y basis, dropping 1.1%, on expectations of just a 0.5% drop. On the other hand, Spain's industrial output not unexpectedly stagnated for a 16th consecutive month, plunging by 6.9% in December in line with expectations, and sliding by a whopping 8.5% Y/Y. In bond auction news, Spain sold some €4.61 billion in 2015, 2018 and 2029 bonds, all pricing with yields substantially higher than recent January auctions, which in turn sent the Spanish 10 Year to 2 month highs of 5.52% after the auction, however it has since regained most of the losses.

When it comes to "get rich quick" housing schemes, one can be a bank prop trading desk or a hedge fund, with access to the Federal "REO-To-Rent" program which grants a costless purchase of distressed real estate with zero cash down, in order to facilitate the subsidized removal of housing inventory from the market, or, if one is not too big to fail, one can simply pull off an Andre Barbosa, the infamous Boca Raton squatter who used the "adverse possession" loophole to claim title to a multi-million mansion. Or, as it turns out now, one can take advantage of the latter and lever it up even more, by renting out other people's foreclosed property without ever being present, while claiming ownership rights through "adverse possession", keeping the inbound cash flow while having someone else on the hook should the cops come knocking.

Thursday’s ECB meeting is important in the context of recent market moves and statements regarding the level of the euro. Citi notes that the rise in short-dated vol indicates considerable investor focus on the meeting. Expectations have been building that ECB President Draghi may offer a more cautious tone to ‘talk down’ the moves seen in the short-term rates and FX. In light of President Hollande’s advocation of an exchange rate policy aimed at ‘safeguarding competitiveness’, Draghi will likely face further questioning on FX. However, Citi does not believe that he will reverse his position and explicitly talk the currency down. Goldman also notes that while 'Taylor-Rule' users might infer a 30-50bps lowering of rates (thanks to growth, FX, and inflation) the improvement in 'fiscal risk premium' balances that dovishness leaving Draghi likely on hold. However, he is unlikely to stand 'idly by' without some comment on the ensuing currency wars.

We would assume that tomorrow's ECB meeting will be the usual smug gloating by Draghi of how the market has turned around so exuberantly and implicitly that means all is well. While Willem Buiter just took that complacent perspective to task, we thought the following six simple charts of Good (well not terrible), Bad, and Ugly macro-economic data would simplify reality...

There have been several articles as of late discussing that the next great secular bull market has arrived. However, the reality is that this cycle is currently unlike anything that we have potentially witnessed in the past.  With massive central bank interventions, artificially suppressed interest rates, sub-par economic growth, high unemployment and elevated stock market prices it is likely that the current secular bear market may be longer than the historical average. No matter how you slice the data - the simple fact is that we are still years away from the end of the current secular bear market. The mistake that analysts, economists and the media continue to make is that the current ebbs and flows of the economy are part of a natural, and organic, economic cycle. If this was the case then there would be no need for continued injections of liquidity into the system in an ongoing attempt to artificially suppress interest rates, boost housing or inflate asset markets. From market-to-GDP ratios, cyclical P/Es, misconstrued earnings yields, and the analogs to previous Fed-blow bubbles, we appear near levels more consistent with cyclical bull market peaks rather than where secular bear markets have ended.

Thus, we find that Europe’s primary political market props (EU leaders including ECB head Mario Draghi) are coming unraveled at the precise time that EU banks are showing warning signs and the most important EU economies are heading sharply south.

Citi's Willem Buiter sums it all up: "...the improvement in sentiment appears to have long overshot its fundamental basis and was driven in part by unrealistic policy and growth expectations, an abundance of liquidity and an increasingly frantic search for yield. The key word in the recovery globally, and in particular in Europe, growth is fragile. To us the key word about the post summer 2012 Euro Area (EA) asset boom is that most of it is a bubble, and one which will burst at a time of its own choosing, even though we concede that ample liquidity can often keep bubbles afloat for a long time." His conclusion is self-evident, "markets materially underestimate these risks," as the EA sovereign debt and banking crisis is far from over. If anything, recent developments, notably policy complacency bred by market complacency, combined with higher political risks in a number of EA countries highlight the risks of sovereign debt restructuring and bank debt restructuring in the EA down the line.

Just as markets can stay irrational longer than traders can stay solvent, so Byron Wien warns all the market-watching self-confirming bulls that "markets slough off bad news until they don't." Blackstone's top-man fears the "oblivious markets" are missing the point that nothing has been solved and that a "big battle between entitlement cuts and raising the debt ceiling" is coming. Shrugging off the anchor's insistence that earnings have been 'pretty good', Wien states reality as expectations are rolling over and performance following. With people complacent and investors euphoric (ignoring European risk re-emergence and depression and Middle East tensions), Wien's brief clip concludes with his expectation of a 200 point correction in the S&P 500 in H1 2013.

While Japan's recent attempt to massively reflate and break out of its "liquidity trap" - an artificial construct to explain what happens when an artificial model, created by a flawed and artificial economic theory explodes in a singularity of Econ PhD idiocy leaving billions of impoverished people in its wake, is nothing new, there are those who are rather skeptical this latest attempt to achieve what Japan has not been able to do in over 30 years will work. And while one can come up with complicated, expansive, verbose theories based on Keynesian DSGE models and other such gibberish, why this time will be different for Japan, there is a very quick and simple argument why it won't.

The official lie is most effective when we want to believe the lie more than we wish to know the truth.

Compared to previous V-shaped recoveries, this one is not looking too rosy. From consumption to GDP, and from retail sales to consumer sentiment, the following charts show how we are doing in context. So, the next time someone on TV tells you how great we are doing, perhaps a glance at these charts will flush some of the recency bias away. There is one bright shining 'better than any other recovery' segment though... one that is dominated by record levels of stuffed channels - can you guess?