Archive - Apr 29, 2013

Ever since JCP entered the death watch with its absolutely abysmal 2012 year end results which saw the firm report something like negative $1.5 billion in Free Cash Flow (frankly we stopped counting there), and just ahead of the heavy inventory rebuild season so just as net working capital would demand another billion or so in cash, much has happened at the company.

We’ve seen this kind of divergence between stocks and the economy before in 2008. We all know how that ended.

This is a descriptive not a normative claim. My focus is on what people are actually doing, not what they might have done or what some think they should have done.

All of the EU “hails, welcomes and applauds” the new Italian government. Mr. Grillo thinks that the new government will last but a few scant months as Europe breathes a sigh of relief that the 5 Star Party is not in control. Far better to deal with the devils that you know rather than new ones that may be far worse. Beyond the politics of the moment Italy is besieged by a very serious crisis. As the various central banks dump money into the system the yields on Italian sovereign debt have gone down but this does not change the economic difficulties. Italy’s difficult position was enumerated in a Bank of Italy report to parliament last week which said the economy was going through its most acute crisis since World War II. Mr. Grillo’s response to the new government was amusing: “An orgy worthy of bunga bunga.”

Despite expectations that following several months of subpar income growth offset by rampaging spending and thus a plunging savings rate, March incomes would rise by 0.4%, while spending would be flat, this did not happen, and instead both spending and incomes rose by the same amount, or 0.2% in the past month. Worse, when adjusting for inflation, real disposable income rose just 1.1% compared to last March, and just barely above the 0% breakeven. On the other side, real spending was up 2.2% Y/Y just barely above the 2% recessionary threshold. And even that number is misleading as spending on Total Goods (including durable, already known as being quite abysmal, and non-durable), dropped by $32.8 billion in nominal dollars. What was the offset? Why a massive surge in consumption expenditures on services, which rose by $53.8 billion, which absent the spending aberation for September 11, 2001, which was reversed in the following month, was the biggest monthly increase on record! What drove this record services spending spree is anyone's guess. 

In 2007 a small number of French hedge funds imploded over sudden losses stemming from highly leveraged bets made on the unstoppable subprime mortgage market. At the time, a few saw the writing on the wall; but many simply wrote it off as just another over-levered hedge fund and the subprime mortgage market was 'fine'. Fast forward six years and as we have discussed numerous times (most recently here and here) there is a bubble, potentially far bigger than subprime, in student loan debt. As one of the last remaining outlets for state-sanction credit creation, this is a big deal; but, of course, the popping of the bubble (or even a slight leak) is eschewed since there is so much 'reach for yield' and the Fed's got your back. That is until this week. As WSJ reports, Sallie Mae (SLM), the nation's largest non-government student lender just cancelled a $225 million debt offering as investors  decided they simply were not getting paid enough for risk - amid rising student loan defaults. Simply put, there's a limit to what investors will tolerate.

Wait for it... Fauxterity Austerity's fault!

• Gold Bears Defy Rally as Goldman Closes Short Wager (BBG)
• Still stuck on central-bank life support (Reuters)
• Ebbing Inflation Means More Easy Money (BBG)
• So much for socialist wealth redistribution then? François Hollande to woo French business with tax cut (FT)
• Billionaires Flee Havens as Trillions Pursued Offshore (BBG)
• Companies Feel Pinch on Sales in Europe (WSJ)
• Brussels plan will ‘kill off’ money funds (FT)
• Danes as Most-Indebted in World Resist Credit (BBG)
• Syria says prime minister survives Damascus bomb attack (Reuters)
• Syria: Al-Qaeda's battle for control of Assad's chemical weapons plant (Telegraph)
• Nokia Betting on $20 Handset as It Loses Ground on IPhone (BBG)
• Rapid rise of chat apps slims texting cash cow for mobile groups (FT)
• Calgary bitcoin exchange fighting bank backlash in Canada (Calgary Herald)

The slight rebound in prices from multi-year lows has as of yet failed to dampen the global appetite for bullion, causing a shortage in the physical supply of gold coins and bars.

The week ahead will be driven by the heavy end-of-month data schedule. In addition to the usual key releases like ISM and payrolls and ECB meeting, this week we also get an FOMC meeting - though it will hardly see much more than a nod to the weaker activity data of late. For the ECB meeting a full refi but not a deposit rate cut are priced now.  Outside the FOMC and the ECB meeting there will be focus on the RBI meeting in India, with a 25bp cut priced in response to lower inflation numbers recently.

With China and Japan markets closed overnight, activity has been just above zero especially in the critical USDJPY carry, so it was up to Europe to provide this morning's opening salvo. Which naturally meant to ignore the traditionally ugly European economic news such as the April Eurozone Economic Confidence which tumbled from a revised 90.1 to 88.6, missing expectations of 89.3, coupled with a miss in the Business Climate Indicator (-0.93, vs Exp. -0.91), Industrial Confidence (-13.8, Exp. -13.5), and Services Confidence (-11.1, Exp. -7.1), or that the Euroarea household savings rates dropped to a record low 12.2%, as Europeans and Americans race who can be completely savings free first, and focus on what has already been largely priced in such as the new pseudo-technocrat coalition government led by Letta. The result of the latter was a €6 billion 5 and 10 year bond auction in Italy, pricing at 2.84% and 3.94% respectively, both coming in the lowest since October 2010. More frightening is that the Italian 10 year is now just 60 bps away from its all time lows as the ongoing central bank liquidity tsunami lifts all yielding pieces of paper, and the global carry trade goes more ballistic than ever.

Macro perspective of this week's events.  Hint:  the ECB meeting may be the most interesting.