Archive - Feb 2013

• Tunisian opposition politician shot dead, protests erupt (Reuters)
• China says extremely concerned after latest North Korea threats (Reuters)
• Postal Service to cut Saturday mail to trim costs (AP)
• Debt Rise Colors Budget Talks (WSJ)
• Obama proposes short-term budget fix, Republicans swiftly object (Reuters)
• S&P Analyst Joked of Bringing Down the House Before Crash (BBG)
• Dell’s Bigger Challenge Ahead in Turnaround After Buyout (BBG)
• Some of the Mark Carney Gloss Is Coming Off (WSJ)
• Japan Official Says BOJ Tools Sufficient as Shake-Up Looms (BBG)
• S&P Lawsuit Undermined by SEC Rules That Impede Competition (BBG)
• Heavy Clashes Erupt in Syrian Capital (WSJ)

Perhaps the biggest news of the night was the resurgence of Silvio Berlusconi, who managed to close the lead to the Democratic Party leader Bersani, embroiled in the fallout from the Monte Paschi scandal, to just 3.7 points, or within the 4 point margin of error, before the February 25th elections. According to a SkyTG24 poll, support for Bersani’s bloc dropped 0.2 point to 33.1% from yesterday while support for Berlusconi’s bloc rose 0.1 point to 29.4%. This is certainly the most catalytically destabilizing event on the horizon for Italy, and Europe, as should Silvio win the Italian elections, an outcome unthinkable as recently as a month ago, all bets about Europe's technocratic/Goldman-forced "recovery" in which only the banks are recovering, if not the people, are off.

Two examples today of the strange way things work here in the Netherlands regarding conflicts of interest. Of course we know that things are getting increasingly blurry whereever you are between government, regulators and corporations. I'll be interested to hear what you think about the whole issue.

The first example is for a business that tests LED lamps and publishes the results on the internet. The people that run the tests both work full time at Philips. Maybe not on the lamps themselves.

Bush and Obama Have Set Us Back 800 Years

"Retrophrenology says why not change a man's personality by hitting him on the head with a hammer, till you raise the right bumps in the right places."--Simon Green

As was reported on Monday, among the numerous files hacked and leaked in the past week by the Hacker group Anonymous was a database of some 4606 regional bankers together with copious amounts of confidential information, which according to Anonymous' twitter account was sourced at the very Federal Reserve, which in turn would imply that the Fed itself had been hacked.

How does the saying go: it is better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a clueless Keynesian muppet than to open it and remove all doubt? Sure enough, if there was any confusion as to the level of economic comprehension (or lack thereof) of Japan's chosen savior du jour, one who is hell bent on destroying its currency and sending energy costs into the stratosphere (but don't worry - as Rajoy would say, inflation is plunging, except for the things that are soaring) the following two snippets should clear up the situation once and for all.

Following today's sequester-delay-seeking, tax-hiking, close-the-loophole speech by the President, it would appear that fiscal policy debates will be balanced a little more to raising effective rates on corporates (as opposed to the 'statutory' rate so many discuss). The US has the second highest global 'statutory' tax rate but less than 10% of S&P 500 firms have paid this rate over the last decade. Somewhat shockingly, since 1975, taxes have had the largest cumulative positive impact on S&P 500 ROE as effective rates fell from 44% to 30%. They estimate each percentage point rise in effective tax rate would lower S&P 500 ROE by 22 bp and EPS by $1.50, all else equal. Closing all the loopholes would smash year-end 2013 expectations from Goldman's 1575 to around 1300 with Staples and Tech the hardest hit. With the 'market' the only policy tool left, it would seem not even the Fed could monetarily save us from this fiscally fubar action.

Profits and leverage are locked in a deadly embrace. There is a time-honoured tradition in statistics: whipping the data until they confess. Bullish and bearish equity analysts are equally guilty of this practice. It would seem that statistical conclusions are merely an ex-post justification of a long-held prior belief about equity markets being cheap or overpriced. Clearly, consensus, notably among sellside analysts, is bullish. GLG's CIO Jamil Baz presents the bullish view before discussing the bearish counterpoint - consensus disregards leverage. In the short term, it is clear that central banks need to entertain the illusion of viable stock market valuations by pulling rabbits from a hat. But as high-powered money reaches ever higher levels, the probability of accidents looms large.

This simple piece of legislation proves that you can make a difference at the local level - Councilmember Dede Smith, who voted in favor of the bill, says that drones are “pretty clearly a threat to our constitutional right to privacy.”  We need a lot more of this type of thing all over these United States.  As I have said many times, it’s not that I am against drones in all capacities; however, we must be vigilant about how these things are used and must have serious safeguards in place to protect civil liberties.

"I went through the January data one last time with a fine tooth comb. I fail to see what got everyone so excited, beyond the upward revisions to the back data. That only proves that productivity has been weaker than initially thought. And the income from those upward job revisions has probably already been spent. But as I highlighted yesterday, the broad-term trends are slowing down and doing so discernibly."

Much has been made of Europe's impressive market performance last year (and ongoing this year) with its strength yet another confirmation-bias proving indication that every US stock dip should be bought. In recent days a few cracks in the armor of European invincibility have begun to show as political and banking system fraud comes back top haunt along with rising concerns and jawboning about the strength (or lack thereof) of the Euro. With a somewhat split view of Thursday's ECB meeting (will Draghi cut to hold EUR down for exports or hold to maintain the optics of a strong EURUSD meaning a strong Europe), it is perhaps notable that the outlook for 2013's GDP growth continues to sink. However, as the chart below so obviously highlights, expectations for earnings growth in Europe have massively disconnected from macro fundamentals (just as in the US) as nominal stock indices is all that matters anymore.

The Egyptian government is facing potential collapse and a re-run of a revolution that has never really ended. The economy is facing total collapse, and Qatari aid efforts will only go so far. The first half of 2013 will produce only worse economic indicators and the market will feed off of this. The regulatory environment in the meantime remains uncertain at best, and much will depend on which group (or combination of groups) comes out on top after the dust settles and if April elections indeed proceed. If this turns out to be a successful power grab by radical Salafi forces, it will not proceed without a great deal of bloodshed, and it will destroy Egypt’s investment climate.

Back in 2007, at the peak of the credit and housing bubble, Wall Street knew very well the securitization (and every other) party was ending, which is why the internal names used for most of the Collateralized Debt Obligations - securitized products designed to provide a last dash trace of yield in a market in which all the upside had already been taken out - sold to less sophisticated, primarily European, investors were as follows: "Subprime Meltdown," "Hitman," "Nuclear Holocaust," "Mike Tyson's Punchout," and, naturally, "Shitbag." Yet even in the last days of the bubble, Wall Street had a certain integrity - it sold securitized products collateralized by houses, which as S&P, and certainly Moody's, will attest were expected to never drop in price again. But one thing that was hardly ever sold even in the peak days of the 2007 credit bubble were securitizations based on personal-loans, the reason being even back then everyone's memory was still fresh with the recollection that it was precisely personal-loan securitization that was at the core of the previous, and in some ways worse, credit bubble - that of the late 1990s, which resulted with the bankruptcy of Conseco Finance. Well, in a few short days, those stalwarts of suicidal financial innovation Fortress and AIG, are about to unleash on the market (or at least those who invest other people's money in the absolutely worst possible trash to preserve their Wall Street careers while chasing a few basis points of yield) the second coming of the very worst of the last two credit bubbles.