Archive - Dec 17, 2015

Sweden is in shambles (as we detailed here and here), but the latest escalation in terrorist-related threats to the refugee-protecting nation. As The Express reports, Sweden is now on lockdown after crazed Islamic State (ISIS) jihadis sent letters to European civilians ordering them to convert to Islam within three days or face being decapitated in their own homes. The chilling letters pledged to then "bomb your rotten corpses afterwards."

“He’s a really brilliant and talented person, without any doubt. It’s not our job to judge his qualities, that’s a job for American voters, but he’s the absolute leader in the presidential race.”

With another big-spending weekend ahead for the American consumer, President Obama is set to explain to an increasingly worried nation that despite the apparent very real threat of terrorism (and all the spending, surveillance, and loss of liberty that is required to maintain your freedom), they should go about their borrowing-and-spending consumption duties... or else the terrorists win. Having managed somehow to both increase gun sales and push a majority to oppose an assault weapon ban, Obama will today re-reassure his fellow Americans that he knows what's best for them.

The Fed hiked... and the Treasury market threw up all over it, flattening the curve over 10bps in the last 16 hours (to 9 month lows). The reaction screams "policy error" as rate cut odds for January remain above rate-hike odds. Financials - who will benefit greatly from this rate hike if all the talking heads are to be believed - appears not to have got the flattening curve joke yet.

"Once again I find myself shaking my head at the wasteful spending in DC and a flawed process that drops thousands of pages of text on us with 48 hours to “read” and understand... The fact that extremist environmental groups are pleased and that Obama hasn't threatened a veto tells you everything you need to know about this fundamentally-flawed bill."

Brazil's Supreme Court green lighted House Speaker Eduardo Cunha's Rousseff impeachment bid on Wednesday, even as the high court is also considering a request for his removal. Meanwhile, the economy continues to deteriorate as we just got the highest unemployment reading for the month of November in seven years."

It appears the "what the market missed" that we detailed earlier - This sets the Fed on a collision course with the market because "with the market pricing fewer hikes than the Fed suggests, someone is going to end up being wrong," - is starting to filter out to the mainstream. Despite exuberant buying in FANGs, the broad market indices have retraced the post-Yellen exuberance as bond yields fade, hinting at the market's growing realization that this could be a policy error.

It appears that a main preoccupation of economists – the self declared “behavioral economists” prominent among them – is to show how dumb people are as consumers and in assessing risks. Drawn to logical conclusion, this implies that economists, advising benevolent dictators are the solution. In ancient Greece people flocked to oracles and sought guidance.; today, Councils of Economic Advisers, IMF, OECD, Nobel prizes sustain perceptions that "macro- strology" and much else of what economists do is "science."

Despite spoiradic algo-crazed ramps, crude oil prices continue to slide back towards a $34 handle (in Jan '16 contract) this morning following a reiterated downbeat note from Goldman warning that storage levels are "too full for comfort," that positioning is not as stretched short as some believe, and confirming that this will not end until prices near cash costs to force production cuts, likely around $20/bbl.

Once again we ask The Fed, "why now?"

A different way of putting it is that the “rate hike” favors banks sitting on excess reserves over banks who are lending to businesses and consumers in their community. In other words, the rate hike just facilitates more looting by the One Percent.

Depsite the exuberant buying-panic of the first Fed rate-hike in 9 years lifting stocks to within spitting distance of record highs, under the surface, equities are roiling. In fact, the average stock's distance from its highs is now at 19%... just outside of bear market territory.

Following last month's bounce, driven by a surge in 'hope', The Philly Fed collapsed to -5.9 (dramaticlaly missing expectations of +1.0) and hitting its lowest levels since Feb 2013. With 'hope' plunging back to its lowest levels since Dec 2012, there was little to support the dream as Prices Paid and Received plunged, and New Orders cratered to 3 year lows. Future CapEx expectations crashed as did workweek and employment outlooks.

New President Mauricio Macri's move to unify the official and black market exchange rates for the peso in the face of depleted FX reserves and still sky high inflation has the currency plunging by nearly 30% on Thursday.

Manipulating the PR optics (i.e. perception management) as a substitute for an open market doesn't make you omnipotent, it makes you a hubris-soaked fool.