Archive - Apr 2015

"The EU and US need to hear the pleas coming from the southern European countries, as well as those of the refugees. The humanitarian catastrophe has reached large scale, with profound and irreversible consequences. Greece is paying a disproportionately high price, although Greece played no role in triggering this catastrophe. The EU and the US have the moral obligation, which is also consistent with their long-term interests, to take the necessary steps to put an end to the suffering of those in war zones, while at the same time preventing Greece’s collapse under the mounting pressure of refugees."

Amid the 'glorious' earnings last night, Nasdaq is on its own today, surging to higher highs as The Dow and S&P are unch to down. As this exuberance exudes, gold and silver are being smashed lower... which is odd given The ECB's threat to pull Greek financing. Crude prices are also tumbling post-Durable Goods.

Show me the money!

The recent unprecedented surge in oil imports has again prompted a review of things here. In a prior story, we wrote that the lack of capacity to process light sweet crude at refineries produced via shale plays could be playing a role in the stock build. As mentioned previously, refineries over the next 24 months are expected to add 700,000 B/D in capacity to handle this type of crude. In the meantime, we have noticed an unusual amount of crude being imported, possibly as a result of this imbalance in refinery capacity. Or could it be that a more sinister plot is afoot?

All the comparisons to 2000 seemed a little far-fetched.........until today.

Be careful of blowback as Troika said they are "turning hostile" in Greece today...

Having missed expectations for 5 of the last 7 months, Durable Goods New Orders jumped 4% MoM in March - the biggest jump since the July Boeing aberration (all driven by a 112% surge in defense Aircraft new orders). Durable Goods New Orders (ex-Transports) fell 0.2% MoM (missing expectations of a 0.3% rise) for the biggest YoY drop since 2012, and under the covers it is ugly - Capital Goods New Orders non-defense, ex-aircraft have now fallen for 7 straight months, missing expectatons dramatically (-0.5% vs +0.3% exp.). These numbers have never fallen for this long a period without a recession.

UK debt has continued to rise throughout the recovery and has soared to an eye-watering £1.48 trillion. In recent days, a slew of foreign exchange analysts have warned that the pound is vulnerable to falling in value. The incumbent government have not reined in public and trade deficits and have been accused of juicing the property market and the economy to postpone a crisis until after the election. 

"One day while Sarao is busy trying to trick the U.S. stock market into falling, the market collapses, more sensationally than it has ever collapsed. And instead of digging some hole in Hounslow in which he might hide for a decade or so, or fleeing to Anguilla, where he has squirreled away his profits, he stays in his parents’ home and keeps right on spoofing the U.S. stock market -- and then is shocked when people turn up to accuse him of wrongdoing. He’s not some kind of exception to the standard operating procedure in finance. He’s a parody of it."

• Obama’s Drone-Strike Rules to Be Reviewed (WSJ)
• Hostage locations difficult to track - and may be getting harder (Reuters)
• Varoufakis Said to Take Hammering From Riled EU Ministers (BBG)
• EU Frustration Mounts as Greeks Try to Bypass Aid Process (BBG)
• Kleiner Perkins seeks almost $1 million in costs in Pao case (Reuters)
• Google Misses, Caps Costs as Growth Slows (WSJ)... stock surges 
• Oil prices trade near 2015 highs on Yemen worries (Reuters)
• Pentagon Announces New Strategy for Cyberwarfare (NYT)
• Bloomberg Oil at $65 Seen Freeing 500,000 Barrels From Shale Fracklog (BBG)
• ‘Flash Crash’ Trader Navinder Sarao: It Was Wits, Not Bits (WSJ)

Even though no rational person expected that the Greek situation would be resolved at today's talks in Riga, Latvia, apparently the algos were so caught up in spoofing each other to new record highs that futures, after surging once more overnight following the latest Google miss which sent the company and the Nasdaq soaring, actually dipped modestly into the red following headlines that the latest Greek talks have broken down after a "hostile" Troika "hammered" the Greek finmin, who was accused by European finmins of "being a time-waster, a gambler and an amateur."

They’ve become sitting ducks, in a market that is "in extreme overvaluation."

The war on cash is escalating. Just a week ago, the infamous Willem Buiter, along with Ken Rogoff, voiced their support for a restriction (or ban altogether) on the use of cash (something that was already been implemented in Louisiana in 2011 for used goods). Today, as Mises' Jo Salerno reports, the war has acquired a powerful new ally in Chase, the largest bank in the U.S., which has enacted a policy restricting the use of cash in selected markets; bans cash payments for credit cards, mortgages, and auto loans; and disallows the storage of "any cash or coins" in safe deposit boxes.

We've all seen Chinese stocks explode in the last year; we've all seen margin lending soar to fund this exuberance; we've all read the dominant buyer in this trading frenzy is high-school-educated housewives; and we've all seen the analogs to the 2000 dotcom bubble. But, we guarentee you have never - ever - seen anything like this...