Archive - Jan 30, 2014

Hardly as memorable as yesterday's historic launch of Floating Rate Notes, today's 5 year auction in which the Treasury sold $35 billion in paper was a snoozer, and despite fears of a blow out following recent concerns about demand in the bucket following recent revulsion to 5 Years, priced at 1.572%, tailing the When Issued  1.57% modestly, however with a lower yield than last month's 1.6. The Bid to Cover also posted a modest increase from December's 2.42 up to 2.59, even if the general BTC trend continues to be one broadly lower. Within the internals the only notable item was the spike in Indirects, which took down 44.6% of the allocation, up from 24.8%, leaving 10.7% to the Directs and 44.7% to Dealers. Overall, nothing to write home about.

Now that Twitter is officially the second coming of Yahoo Finance message boards, the inundation with offers from clueless hacks who have nothing better to do than sell you $29.95 newsletters with guaranteed get rich quick schemes (one has to be so grateful for this boundless supply of noble humanitarians who would rather see you get rich than follow their own advice, and invest with their own capital...), even more guaranteed than Obama's MyRA ponzi scheme, has hit off the charts levels. However, there is some hope this is ending, and the regulators, as usual 3-5 years behind the curve - are finally be cracking down on these self-acclaimed financial Nostradami following an announcement today that the SEC "charged a New York-based money manager and his firm with making false claims through Twitter, newsletters, and other communications about the success of their investment advice and a mutual fund they manage."

The topic of home flipping is not new here ("Flip That House" In These Bubbling Cities, Housing Bubble 2.0 Edition: "25 Markets Where Flipping Homes Is Most Profitable", etc) - indeed that best-known flashback of the last housing bubble is easily one of the best indications just how fragile the current housing bubble truly is as investors gobble up real estate not with the intention of keeping it but merely to sell to the next greater fool, in the process setting marginal prices based purely on the availability of cheap money, money which has now been tapered by $20 billion in the past two months. However, to get the full picture on just how pervasive "house flipping" has become, we go to the source, RealtyTrac, which has just released its 2013 summary of this troubling trend.

Pending Home Sales collapsed 8.7% month-over-month - the worst since May 2010 - missing by the most in over 3 years. This is a 6.1% drop YoY. Sellside consensus (-0.3%) was unaware of the horrible weather in December until 13 minutes ago. Of course, analysts could never have guessed that weather could have an impact (and ths reduce their expectations) but NAR's Larry Yun notes "unusually disruptive weather" prevented buyers from looking. However, he goes on to add that "Home prices rising faster than income is also giving pause to some potential buyers." This unusually honest line from the realtor mouthpiece is notable.

Following yesterday's continued slide to record lows against the Central Bank's currency basket, the Russian Ruble is rallying this morning as Russian Central Bank chief Elvira Nebiullina jawboned the threat of renewed intervention to "smooth out" markets:

*NABIULLINA SAYS FX MKT INTERVENTIONS NEEDED FOR FIN. STABILITY; BANK ROSSII 'SMOOTHING OUT' SHARP RUBLE SWINGS

One can only hope that - despite the bank runs, a plan not to raise rates, and a canceled bond auction - Russia has more success that Turkey is "fixing" the problem of QEasy money flows. The Ruble "basket" has reverted back to pre-Turkey levels.

"BOTTOM LINE: Q4 GDP grew in line with expectations, although the composition was slightly softer than expected. We start our Q1 GDP tracking estimate three-tenths below our prior assumption at 2.7%." - Goldman

Hearing that some Zimbabwean retailers, cellphone airtime vendors & even newspaper hawkers are now refusing to take the South African #rand

— Susan Njanji (@SusanNjanji) January 30, 2014

"Not beating expectations" is the new "killing it" if today's markets are any judge. First, Facebook is up 19% ($150bn market cap). Gold and silver are being monkey-hammered in their new normal "I don't always sell gold, but when I do, I do it all at once in massive size) manner. Bond yields are pressing 3-4bps higher. The USD is surging (as JPY and EUR weakness trumps AUD strength) and that should provide the hint as to what is levitating stocks... JPY carry correlation remains extreme as the USDJPY bounce off 102 holds for now (and NKY is catching up).

Following discussions with Merkel, demands to de-escalate tensions from Barrose, and threats of sanctions from President Obama. Ukraine's President Yanukovych has gone on sick leave from "immense pshcological pressure." Despite his exclamations that he'll do everything for the sake of peace, he blames the opposition for "escalating the situation," which fits, rather ominously with warnings from former presdent Leonid Kravchuk. As The BBC reports, Ukraine's first post-independence president warned the country is on the "brink of civil war". While the Hyrvnia is not collapsing as much as it was (always the silver lining), money is running away from Ukraine stocks stuck at 5-year lows, bond term structure is inverted, and CDS are spiking back to recent highs over 1000bps.

After the blistering final Q3 GDP print of 4.1% (to be revised far lower eventually), the preliminary Q4 GDP number had only one way to go, down - and sure enough it dropped to the expected 3.2% (well below Joe LaVorgna's 4.0% forecast), capping 2013 GDPat 1.9%, down solidly from the 2.8% growth recorded in 2012. "Assume a recovery..."

The trend that was so many momentum-chasing bulls friend for so long has ended. The steady downward drift in jobless claims - all noise, debt-ceiling, winter storm, and software glitches aside - has ended. Initial claims rose 19k this week, missed expectations by the most in 6 weeks, and jumped to the same levels seen 6 months ago. The Labor Department says "nothing unusual" about this week's data but noted one state 'estimated' claims last week. Total benefit rolls dropped by 16k this week (back under 3 million) as emergency claimants remains "0". For those of the "seasonals are to blame" persuasion... this is the worst start to the year since the financial crisis...

Yesterday we reported that Goldman's attempt to buy an 18% stake in Dong Energy, the world's biggest operator of offshore wind farms, while largely preapproved by Danish politicians, had met with solid resistance by the broader population, which had started a petition to block the sale, signed by nearly 200,000 as of yesterday. Alas, despite the valiant effort by the population to keep the energy company - with 68% of the population polled as being against the deal - the country's politicians, certainly with no palms greased by the world's biggest depositor-insured hedge fund - just let Goldman have the DONG.  As Bloomberg reports, "a majority in Denmark’s parliament will let Goldman Sachs Group Inc. proceed with its purchase of a stake in state-owned utility Dong Energy A/S, according to a senior lawmaker in the ruling Social Democrat Party."

I predicted this clearly, with loads of evidence, last spring. I even tipped the SEC/UK authorities. Tthe chickens come home to roost. Let it be known, Wall Street's margin IS my business model!!!

We are sure it's just a storm in a teacup; just a brief interlude before the IMF's ever-changing forecast for global trade growth picks right back up again and demand to ship dry goods surges back to the inventory stuffed levels of Q4. But, for now, the Baltic Dry Index (admired when it's rising, ignored when it drops) has collapsed by over 50% from its December highs and is back to August lows.

"For the year ended Dec. 31, UPS generated $5.3 billion in free cash flow, producing a net income-to-cash conversion ratio of more than 120%. The company paid dividends of $2.3 billion, an increase of nearly 9% per share over the prior year, and repurchased more than 43 million shares for approximately $3.8 billion."