Archive - Dec 11, 2015

One of Donald Trump's recurring refrains ever since the San Bernardino shooting, ostensibly the one which prompted him to declare he would bar Muslims from entering the country, is that the "US is at war." Whether or not that is the case remains to be seen but what is certain is that Trump is merely proposing to do what Democrat Jimmy Carter did back on April 7, 1980, when he banned Iranians from the US and deported Iranian students during the Iran hostage crisis - a time when some could argue the US was likewise in war with the Iranian regime.

While the world patiently waits for Janet Yellen to raise interest rates this month, the markets have been unable to decide as of yet whether such an event is good or bad thing.

Amid the biggest weekly collapse in high-yield bonds since March 2009, Carl Icahn gently reminds investors that he saw this coming... and that it's only just getting started!

Presented with no comment...

You can't make this up...

"Presented with official employment figures that were literally incredible (impossible to believe), she took them at face value and trumpeted them in tweets and in a press conference as a triumph for her government. But it's not the real thing"

Here is the biggest difference: back then total debt/GDP was 61%. Now, it is 104%, with the total US debt just now shy of $19 trillion.

First it was Australia (closest to China), then Miami, then London, and now New York appears to have been hit by the sudden withdrawal of a bid-at-any-price, stash-my-cash, launder-my-money foreign flood of money to buy real estate. Manhattan apartment vacancies reached their highest level in more than nine years, according top broker Miller-Samuel, a sign that the post-recession run-up in rents may begin to cool. "We're reaching the point where things can't go up as much," Miller said in an interview. "The economics don't make much sense anymore." Did they ever?

Finland made the news recently by proposing a pilot program of guaranteed income for all, also known as Universal Basic Income: Desperate Finland Set To Unleash Helicopter Money Drop To All Citizens. Proponents claim Basic Income can be paid by redirecting existing welfare programs, but a quick review reveals this as nonsense.

The table below lists the bonds with the largest one-day volume among those that traded yesterday on TRACE at a spread of 1,000 basis points or more than their government benchmark.

Americans' belief that the country "will have good times for the next 12 months" has plunged. With the biggest YoY drop in 3 years, and despite stocks near record-highs and The Fed telling everyone how awesome everything is, the fewest people believe good time are ahead since September 2014.

Earlier this morning we got another glimpse of reality behind the smoke-and-mirrors, mainstream-media-sponsored last-pillar-standing lovefest that is US auto sales when the business sales data showed a disheartening tumble in sales in October. So where are all the sales going that automakers report? The answer is simple... (and painful).

Who could have known - the worst terror attack in a decade was "not" a buying opportunity after all...

While one could take their pick of bloodbathery today, Turkey seemed like an appropriate place to focus as its bond yields are exploding higher, currency collapsing, and stocks plunging to the lowest since March 2014. How long before Erdogan decrees all of this impossible and fires another 'dependent' central banker?