Archive - Jun 2014

Whether or not Obama made a huge political gaffe by secretly arranging the Qatar-mediated exchange of Bowe Bergdahl, who some 16,000 Americans have petitioned should be court-martialed for walking away from his post in 2009, for 5 Taliban leaders remains to be seen. To be sure republicans have jumped on the blunder and especially the hawks within the GOP are now "tag-teaming" the issues of Benghazi and Bergdahl with the intent of painting will Obama "as an appeaser, and a negotiator-with-terrorists" as The Nation reports. In any case, if Obama was hoping to use the Bergdahl exchange as a marker of successful foreign policy, he is suddenly caught flat-footed. What won't help the president's case of promptly sweeping this latest scandal under the rug, is a clip such as this one, released earlier today by the Taliban showing the handover of the prisoner of war to US forces.

The problem in representative democracy is that every instance of waste, graft, fraud and monopolistic racket is somebody's fat paycheck or government contract. Promising good governance guarantees a losing campaign for public office. To avoid the political pain that would result from trimming waste/fraud/ rackets, the state prints money to keep the swag flowing. Since the state can't create real wealth, it prints claims on wealth and passes off the paper as "money." The only thing that is infinite about the state is the hubris of those at the controls and the narrow self-interest of those at its capacious feeding trough.

While the administration unabashedly argued that they would not hand out taxpayer cash subsidies to anyone who didn't verify income on... it seems once again, they lied. 9 months later and AP reports that 2 million of the Obamacare sign-ups have data discrepancies that could jeopardize coverage for some, a government document shows. Direct from the HHS itself, AP adds that several congressional committees are actively investigating the discrepancies, most of which involve important details on income, citizenship and immigration status. The farce is complete as no resolution looks likely anytime soon - "Current system access and functionality...limits the ability to resolve outstanding inconsistencies." Of course, this is the first that Obama would have heard about it (from AP) and a probe of this SNAFU will begin immediately...

The Beige Book was a slightly less boringly beige report than normal as all 12 regions say growth was "modest or moderate" - up from 8 of 12 in April...

• *FED SAYS NEW VEHICLE SALES `WERE GENERALLY DESCRIBED AS ROBUST'
• *FED SAYS `OVERALL LENDING ACTIVITY INCREASED THROUGHOUT' U.S.
• *FED SAYS `PRICE PRESSURES WERE SAID TO BE CONTAINED'

Weather remains an issue with 35 mentions (119 in Feb and 103 in April) but May was the month of exuberant car sales with 68 mentions of the growth and optimism.

While stocks make higher highs and investors shrug at recent housing data weakness (because, well it must be the weather, right?), it appears there is one rather important factor that every one missing... Unless houses are now being made of stock certificates, Lumber prices have fallen for the last 21 days and stand at 10-month lows... suggesting real demand for the most basic building material in America is non-existent.

Connecting the dots they don't want you to notice...

Why low inflation in Europe is not caused by too high of interest rates and why a 10-15 bp cut in rates will not succeed. 

God only knows how many billions of yuan’s worth of loans and financial instruments were using this imaginary stuff as collateral, but then again, God only knows a lot of things about China’s economic “miracle.

Orwell Much?

If the Fed is looking for definitive proof of bubble euphoria it should look no further than the CLO market: according to Bloomberg, so far in 2014, more than $46 billion of collateralized loan obligations have been raised, after $82 billion were sold in all of 2013. As a result of this epic dash for repackaged trash, JPMorgan boosted its annual forecast for CLO issuance from $70 billion to as much as $100 billion, which means 2014 may end up as the biggest year on record. We assume it is with great irony that Bloomberg summarizes: "The business of bundling junk-rated corporate loans into top-rated securities is booming like never before after the implementation of regulation aimed at making the financial system safer."

Month after month, they came up with new excuses. Now they’ve used up all the good ones, but sales are still tanking.

Crude oil prices dropped after earlier macro data but fell more aggressively around 1130ET. Desks are scrambling for reasons for the heavy volume selling pressure though some have noted that suggestions by Ukraine's newly elected president will meet with Putin were responsible for some 'war premium' being lifted. WTI and Brent both fell at the same time... The selling appears orderly - not machines-gone-wild...

While US equity implied volatility has been flat to slightly higher in the last week (as stocks have soared), FX volatility has remained near record lows... until today. Ahead of Draghi's big day tomorrow, EURUSD implied volatility has spiked from around 5 to over 17 - its highest since Dec 2011 - as investor anxiety over Draghi disappointing mixes with a record high short position in EUR FX Futures... it seems more than a few are concerned that Draghi's promise is more hope than reality.

It seems like it was only yesterday when the US, under the guise of a fabricated WMD threat, was invading Iraq to liberate its oil deposits. Fast forward to this week, when as Reuters reports, the US will deliver the first of 36 F-16 fighter jets to Iraq in what Baghdad's envoy to the United States called a "new chapter" in his country's ability to defend its vast borders with Iran and other neighbors. Which merely shows that since the US has "sanctioned" virtually every other potential customer of US weapons, it now has no choice but to invoice defense machinery deliveries (and boost factory orders and GDP) to former enemies. It also means that in several years, when Iraq reverts to a posture that is unfriendly to the US, and when the US shale boom is long gone and foreign sources of petroleum are once again all the rage, the US will have to fight its own fighter jets in the name of yet another war of democratic liberation and emancipation.

Bad news is absolutely great news this morning it would seem. Just as we noted (ironically) this morning, equity algos appeared set for new highs no matter how terrible (or good) data was... and sure enough, the S&P 500 is testing its record highs once again... With Q1 GDP expectations plunging and even the hopeful hockey-stick of Q2's resurgence are now being chipped away as one sell-side economist after another folds...