Archive - May 13, 2015

Looking for signs that the country's largest asset management firms believe a market meltdown may be on the horizon? Look no further than Vanguard and several other large ETF providers who have set up billions in credit lines with banks to guard against the possibility that a wave of redemptions could wreak havoc on illiquid credit markets.

"Mark Dearlove, a Barclays Plc executive who was involved in the manipulation of the London interbank offered rate, was named as the U.K. lender’s head of markets for Asia-Pacific," Bloomberg reported earlier today, proving once again that not only do those involved in rigging, fixing, and otherwise manipulating every benchmark rate and market on the planet not go to prison, they in fact get promoted.

"when I say that, I’m not saying that because I dislike hedge fund managers, or I think they are evil, I’m saying that you’re paying a lower [tax] rate than a lot of folks who are making $300,000 a year... There’s a fairness issue involved here. And by the way, if we were able to close that loophole, I could now invest in early childhood education to make a difference. That’s where the rubber hits the road. That’s … where the question of compassion and ‘I’m my brother’s keeper’ comes into play. And if we can’t ask from society’s lottery winners to just make that modest investment, then really this conversation is for show."

Jim Leaviss, the head of retail fixed interest at M&G has an idea to end the boom and bust economic cycle - Make Cash Illegal: Forcing everyone to spend only by electronic means from an account held at a government-run bank would give the authorities far better tools to deal with recessions and economic booms. We think he is serious - you decide...

As 30Y yields push up to the highs of the day, steepning the yield curve across the entire complex, it has now retraced 50% of the yield collapse from the start of 2014 to early Feb 2015...

As Greek empty their bank accounts at a record pace, waiting for the capital-controlling, bank-holiday-based 'other shoe' to drop on Grexit, devaluation, and drachmatization; they are not stashing their cash in the proverbial mattress. Instead, as The Telegraph reports, there is a slightly surprising sign that Greece is in the classic throes of a bank run (as we saw in Russia last year): car sales jumped by 47% in April.

Real Estate is a highly “illiquid” asset class ‘most of the time’.  It always has been and always will be.  However, some times, such as now - and from 2003 to 2007 as a prime example - when liquidity is flowing like water, Real Estate’s illiquidity is masked.  Speculators can do no wrong.  Simply having access to short-term or mortgage capital to purchase Real Estate guaranties a double-digit return.  This continues until one day, suddenly, it doesn’t; and, the snap-back to the true, historical illiquid nature of the Real Estate sector happens suddenly and is amplified at first. This creates a snowball effect from which both house supply and illiquidity surge at the same time. Price then becomes the liquidity fulcrum and will drop, relentlessly ripping speculators faces off, until capital begins to view the asset class as a relative value once again.

If yesterday's strong 3 Year auction caught the hordes of shorts unaware, sending the repo rate plunging from a super special -1.7% to positive, today's just concluded 10 Year auction was nothing short of epic, in virtually every possible way.

Some folks have been dumpingglobal bonds again today (after disappointing retail sales in the US). But, can we just put the recent bump in interest rates into some perspective? Will the "bond bull" market eventually come to an end?  Yes, eventually. However, the catalysts needed to create the type of economic growth required to drive interest rates substantially higher, as we saw previous to the 1960-70's, are simply not available today. This will likely be the case for many years to come as the Fed, and the administration, come to the inevitable conclusion that we are now caught within a "liquidity trap" along with the bulk of developed countries.

While apparently the US does not have its hands full already with orchestrating (and profiting from) two proxy regional wars, one in Ukraine and one in the Middle East, and feels compelled (by shareholders of US "defense" companies) to prove to the world it has long since lost its globocop status when China roundly ignores American threats, China wasted no time to do just that and overnight Beijing strongly condemned a proposed U.S. military plan to send aircraft and Navy ships near disputed South China Sea islands to contest Chinese territorial claims over the area. It didn't end there and China escalated verbally to a near breaking point when Beijing urged “relevant countries to refrain from taking risky and provocative action.”

Not wittingly...

Zero Hedge first brought attention to the Atlanta Fed over two months ago, when the first massive divergence between bullish consensus and objective reality appeared. Since then it has been nothing but a downhill race for reality, with consensus scrambling to catch up. Moments ago, the Atlanta Fed just cut its Q2 GDP forecast once more, this time to 0.7% from 0.8%. This is on the back of a Q1 GDP which as of this moments is around -1.0%.

In short, the very project of counting “jobs” is essentially laughable in the context of the US economy as it is currently structured - for better or worse. But regardless of the equities and efficiencies of the current labor market, one thing is abundantly clear. The Payroll Friday report amounts to virtually meaningless noise. It is bad enough that the bubble vision Romper Room and the casino robo-traders are oblivious to this reality. What is scary is that the Eccles Building is just as clueless.

Having tested down to Payrolls levels once again, German Bund yields have spiked back quickly to the highs of the day (from under 60bps to 70bps). This has sparked selling across most asset classes with US and European stocks waning quickly. Trannies are in trouble have tumbled post-open and are now -1.7% from payrolls.