Archive - Sep 2013

Gallup, which every week polls thousands of adults to get an unadjusted, snapshot picture of who has a job, who has a part-time job and who has no job has released its latest weekly results which have some good and some bad news. Good for those who fear that the NFP print on Friday will be so bad Bernanke will have no choice to delay (or reduce) the taper; bad for the economy. Because at 8.5%, unemployment for the week ended September 1 is now near the highest levels it has been in one year, following a spike in mid-August that sent it all the way to 8.8%.

With the value of the rupee plunging to new lows, the current account deficit at an all-time high and inflation running at nearly a ten-percent annual clip, India is in serious economic trouble. Indeed many are beginning to wonder whether the country is edging toward a replay of the events in the summer of 1991. Back then, an acute balance of payments crisis forced New Delhi into the indignity of pawning its gold reserves in order to secure desperately needed international financing. At a small public event the other week, Duvvuri Subbarao, the outgoing head of the central bank conceded that policymakers rarely learn from their mistakes: "...in matters of economics and finance, history repeats itself, not because it is an inherent trait of history, but because we don’t learn from history and let the repeat occur."

The newspapers of the mainstream media across the Western world are jumping on the same bandwagon and making sure that the most used word this week is Syria followed closely by ‘bomb the b’stards’.

The stock market is on the line for the whole QE forever rally.

1:1 In the beginning, Ben Bernanke hath said, let there be liquidity.

...

1:6 And so each among them sayeth the following benediction: “May the Fed bless you and keep you; may the Fed extend its balance sheet to shine upon you; and may the Fed lift up asset prices and protect you from harm”

As usual, Gloom, Boom, and Doom's Marc Faber pulls no punches in this brief interview on CNBC's Futures Now. When asked what is the catalyst for the crash he expects in US equity markets (following crashes in various markets around the world), he shocks a stunned anchor looking at equity markets near all-time highs with some ugly truths - "interest rates are no longer a tail-wind, earnings growth is not there, and emerging economies are collapsing (so no global growth)." However, with asset allocators "swimming in the pool of liquidity" it is hard to say 'when' it will occur especially as money floods out of EM markets. Critically though, it is Syria (and the spillover) that has Faber most concerned; as he concludes that Western governments "meddling" is "going to be a disaster."

Fusion nuclear energy has been described as both the ‘Hail Mary pass’ and ‘Holy Grail’ of renewable energy sources. Fusion, the process that powers the sun by fusing together light atoms at extremely high temperatures, offers almost unlimited potential. The fuel is practically inexhaustible, the production process emits no greenhouse gasses and it is inherently safe from many of the safety concerns that have tarnished the reputation of fission nuclear energy. Finally, unlike most renewable energy sources under development, fusion nuclear energy could serve as a base load power source, providing huge amounts of energy around the clock relatively efficiently. ITER portends to be the next step on the path to scaling up the process to commercial proportions. However, the ambitious project may be critically handicapped by its European-politicis-inspired organizational structure. The most apt metaphor may be a fumbled Hail Mary pass.

If the direct result of today's surprising and unannounced Israeli missile test was to provoke a response by Russia, the Allies have succeeded. ITAR TASS reports that Russia’s Black and Baltic Sea Fleets’ Ropucha-class landing ships Novocherkassk (150 marines on board) and Minsk (225 marines) have sailed off for the Mediterranean Sea. What was not reported is that the destination of the two marine carrying ships is the sensitive area around Syria already staked out by the US navy. It is implied.

Markets started the day in exuberant mood. Investors were greatly rotating away from bonds into stocks, "war-off" premia were holding up and oil prices were not shooting higher. Then the macro data hit - better-than-expected - and things got a little anxious in equity land (and bond yields pushed higher in Taper-on mode). Then Boehner et al. showed their support for Obama and stocks started to crumble. Commodities had already risen back above Friday's close (dismissing any de-escalation) and while stocks stalled on their collapse lower at Sunday's futures open, they inevitably dumped back to unchanged from Friday. VIX jumped back above 17.25% and the curve flattened and bonds (slow to start) saw yields dump back lower. A late-day pure algo run to VWAP saved the day and closed us green in stocks buy Trannies are not happy as WTI closes back above $108.50.

Syrian Government tells French Parliament in letter that "we can work together to reach a diplomatic solution"

— Sky News Newsdesk (@SkyNewsBreak) September 3, 2013

Now that the All Time High (ATH) in the S&P is a distant memory (at least until the Syrian war becomes a widespread conflict involving all global powers and the US suddenly has to issue, and monetize, a few extra trillion) there are those momentum chasers who have an itch to BTFATH. To all of them we have a message: don't despair, and merely set your sights a little lower, on the globe that is, to Venezuela where the local stock market keeps crushing every upside resistance level and hitting new all time highs day after day after day, resulting in a YTD return of nearly 200%!

The petrodollar regime - that oil is bought and sold globally in U.S. dollars - is easy to understand. It boils down to these two principles: 1. Petroleum is the lifeblood of the global economy; and 2. Any nation that can print its own currency and trade the conjured money for oil has an extraordinary advantage over nations that cannot trade freshly created money for oil. This is why many analysts trace much of America's foreign policy back to defending the petrodollar regime. America's energy boom is creating consequences for the value of the dollar.

"The Big Three" will take the stage in front of the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations to make the case for "the authorization of the use of force in Syria." Given the volume of 'supportive' leadership comments this morning already, it seems that John Kerry (Secretary of State), Chuck Hagel (Secretary of Defense), and General Martin Dempsey (Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) will not get too much push-back though earlier comments that the scope of the strike "was too narrow" may become a sticking point.

Spot gold prices have surged over $40 from Sunday's knee-jerk lows as once again lower prices have encouraged demand. Gold had shfted back to unchanged from Friday's close before Boehner spoke but since then has accelerated over $20 higher. Gold shorts in the futures and options markets have dropped for 6 of the last 7 weeks. The 60% drop in the non-commercial short position represents a massive 81,700 contracts (8,170,000 ounces or ~$10.6 billion worth of notional 'paper' gold). Gold's 21% rise from the lows in the last 2 months is among the fastest rises since 1999; and GLD holdings have risen for the last 6 days in a row.

It seems that the reason why Obama has been such a staunch supporter of a Syrian campaign without a land component, is because US-armed and trained Qatari mercenaries, also known elsewhere in the media as "rebels", are about to take to the battlefield (ignoring for a moment prior reports that American, Israeli and other troops have already long operated on Syrian territory). The Telegraph reports that "the first cell of Syrian rebels trained and armed by the CIA is making its way to the battlefield, President Barack Obama has reportedly told senators. During a meeting at the White House, the president assured Senator John McCain that after months of delay the US was meeting its commitment to back moderate elements of the opposition. Mr Obama said that a 50-man cell, believed to have been trained by US special forces in Jordan."