Archive - May 31, 2013

While the dollar is pricing in the Taper, stocks are already looking beyond this transitory event, and in line with what happened after the end of QE1, QE2, Operation Twist, and QE3, has started pricing in the 'Untaper'. As an aside, we also we had a monster $5.016 billion POMO today... Though frankly, one glance at the charts below and it is pretty clear what is really driving today's action in stocks - cough JPY cough...

•     550,000 SPY shares
•     10,000 June 2013 eMini futures contracts
•     1,400 Nasdaq 100 futures contracts
•     800 Dow Jones futures contracts
•     350 Russell 2000 futures contracts
•     125 S&P 400 Midcap futures contracts
•     300 Crude Oil futures contracts
•     900 Dollar Index futures contracts
•     800 Gold futures contracts
•     10,000 10yr T-Note futures contracts
•     2,500 5yr T-Note futures contracts
•     3,500 T-Bond futures contracts
•     5,000 Eurodollar futures contracts
•     750 Japanese Yen futures contracts
•     600 Euro futures contracts

Just three weeks ago we noted Apollo Group's Leon Black's comment that his firm was "selling everything not nailed down," and that he sees "the market is pricey... in our view, priced for perfection." It seems he is not alone in the 'buy-low-sell-high' crowd. If wonderful times are ahead for U.S. financial markets, then why is so much of the smart money heading for the exits?  Does it make sense for insiders to be getting out of stocks and real estate if prices are just going to continue to go up?

It even has a little moon...

When two weeks ago we reported on the core retail sales "beat", we were surprised. Here's why: "Retail sales ex autos were in line with expectations at -0.1%, on expectations of a -0.2% print, but it was the sales number ex-autos and gas which surprised the most, rising 0.6% on expectations of a +0.3% increase, up from a -0.1% decline." We are no longer surprised. Reuters has the answer:

• US APRIL RETAIL SALES EX-AUTOS/GASOLINE REVISED TO +0.2 PCT (PREV +0.6 PCT)

And, as a reminder, the consensus was for a +0.3% print. So instead of a 100% beat relative to consensus, it was a 50% miss. Why did this happen: from the Census Bureau: "retail sales estimates were revised to reflect the introduction of a new sample, new seasonal factors, and results of the 2011 Annual Retail Trade Survey." Of course, the algos who bid stocks up on the flashing read headline of this now outdated and flawed "beat", will certainly go back and sell all the stocks they were otherwise going to buy, since it is now a "miss."

It doesn't get any better than this. For the fifth month in a row, UMich consumer confidence has beaten expectations and its final print at 84.5 for May is the highest in six years. This 'confidence' survey fits with the conference board's exuberance also. We can only assume that it is the one-year high mortgage rates and considerably lower-than-expected income and spending that is driving it? As a gentle reminder, the US consumer was this cock-a-hoop just before the market last topped in Q3 2007 - so we are not sure if it is 'useful' for anyone but a self-aggrandizing anchoring-biased asset-gatherer. Current economic conditions (at Oct 2007 highs) are surging (as are expectations) by their most since Sep 2009. Of course, in perfect 'correlation' with this 'confidence', these consumers decided that May was the first time in a year to cut spending...

Google has went on record hitting Apple where it hurts. Those who believe that Apple will be resurgent should look at the bigger picture.

So much for all the other diffusion indices, both around the world and in the US, telegraphing manufacturing contraction. Three minutes before its official release, the rumor was that the subscribers had seen a 58.7 print, on expectations of a 50.0 number, and up from 49.0 Sure enough, this is just what happened when the official number hit, leading the Chicago PMI to the highest print since March 2012: a 8 sigma beat to the consensus print and far higher than the biggest forecast. And while last time the plunge in the PMI was bullish for stocks as it meant no Tapering, today the beat is also bullish because it means QE is working, and as a result the stock market has wiped out all earlier losses. Looking at the report, backlogs, deliveries and employment all snapped out of sub 50 contraction, while production soared from 49.9 to a ridiculous 62.7. Even employment soared from 48.7 to 56.9. Amusingly, the only thing that dipped in April was Inventories, down from 40.6 to 40.4.

Sadly, that "something" has nothing to do with the real economy, but it has everything to do with the stock market which is all that matters to the Fed. Presenting the Adjusted Reserves held by Fed banks: it is, logically, at a fresh all time high. This is the low-powered money that due to capital allocation preferences continues to go, every day for the past 4 years, not into the broader economy (blame it on the 2s10s, or the disastrous state of the US consumer who has no desire for loans, or what have you) but straight into the S&P500. Since the full blown launch of QE3 excess bank reserves have grown by $500 billion, or roughly a 30% increase in six months. Which is also the reason why the S&P has correlated not with any actual fundamental data, but only this chart for the past 6 or so months.

Ireland has seen its youth unemployment rate drop for 10 of the last 11 months and has dropped to a 'mere' 26.6% - the lowest since July 2010 - in what is truly the only possible silver lining in today's absolutely dreadful data release. All four of the other PIIGS nations now have broken the dismal Maginot Line of 40% youth unemployment with Italy finally joining the club (Italy 40.5%, Portugal 42.5%, Spain 58.2%, and Greece 62.5%). What is even more concerning is that not only are these rates extremely high but they are accelerating with all four of these dark nations seeing their rates rising faster than in recent months (this was the 2nd fastest rise in Greek youth unemployment ever). Overall, Europe's youth unemployment rate continues to march higher (to 24.4%) having not fallen for 24 months, but it is Spain that is the 'winner' with 41 consecutive months without a drop in youth unemployment. With welfare benefits running dry, and Sweden and Switzerland already running hot, we fear this summer may bring the much-feared unrest so many have been concerned about.

In yet another confirmation that the US consumer continues to get slammed, and is respectively slamming the GDP by spending less, today's April personal spending and personal income both missed expectations, printing flat and declining -0.2% from the March numbers, much as expected following the Q1 spending spree, which means that economic growth in Q2 and onward as a function of consumer spending will only "taper" going forward especially with the delayed impacts of the payroll tax negative effect on spending finally starting to trickle down. What's worse, is that since incomes did not improve in April, the savings rate remained flat at a minuscule 2.5%, or just off the lowest its has been since the start of the Second Great Fed-propped Depression.

Weakness in gold and silver is leading to robust demand internationally as store of value buyers accumulate gold and silver on this dip. This is particularly the case in Asia where premiums remain robust and supply demand imbalances remain. The persistent strong demand of this week began on the price falls in April. This demand is clearly seen in the London gold and silver trading data released by the London Bullion Market Association (LBMA) yesterday. London gold trading jumped to a 20 month high in April and silver volumes surged 25% after the price falls led to an increase in physical buying, the LBMA said in a report. Trading in gold averaged 24.1 million ounces a day in the London market, the most for any month since gold reached record nominal highs in August 2011, the LBMA said in a statement yesterday as reported by Bloomberg.  The 24.1 million ounces was a 10% increase on March when 21.8 million ounces a day were traded. Silver volume surged nearly 25% to 165.2 million ounces a day, up from 132.5 million ounces in March. There were 5,395 gold transactions on average per day, the highest on record, while silver transfers at 1,007 a day were the second-highest ever, according to the report.

The European Union is leading the nations of Europe nowhere. They have sat there and languished in their own self-adoration, propped up their egos on self-congratulation and flounced recitals of praise fluffed and huffed by one politician and told to another. They have a central bank promising what cannot be delivered and they have used up all of their capital to buy the debt they have created to support the artifice. Then having mutilated the pension funds of their citizens and having pressured every money manager on the Continent they congratulate themselves on their lower yields. They see a road without end; we can see the end. They congratulate themselves; we yawn as the mumbo jumbo continues.

If the scramble to hit 100% unemployment was a race, then Europe is about to leap the rest of the world.

• Record unemployment, low inflation underline Europe's pain (Reuters)
• The ponzi gets bigger and bigger: Spanish banks up sovereign bond holdings by more than 10% (FT)
• California Lawmakers Turn Down Moratorium on Fracking (BBG)
• China’s Growing Ranks of Elderly Beset by Depression, Study Says (BBG)
• Tokyo Prepares for a Once-in-200-Year Flood to Top Sandy (BBG)
• Morgan Stanley Cutting Correlation Unit Added $50 Billion (BBG)
• IMF warns over yen weakness (FT)
• Rising radioactive spills leave Fukushima fishermen floundering (Reuters)
• India records slowest growth in a decade (FT)