Archive - Aug 2015

Premiums on silver coins have risen again - from 22% on Friday to 28% today.

While we have all seen how equity markets had decoupled from the 'reality' occurring in commodities, FX, and credit markets (as well as macro fundamentals), trading desks are anxiously eying the following 'decoupling' as this week's "pair trade."

A glitch in the Matrix (if you will) that affected pricing for 1,200 mutual funds and ETFs still wasn't wholly resolved as of Sunday evening after executives worked through the weekend in a frantic attempt to resolve the issue ahead of Monday's open. Remember, if anyone asks, none of this has anything to do with flash-crashing, broken markets.

After last week's epic squeeze in crude, overnight weakness has accelerated dragging WTI back to a $43 handle. This comes after EIA (based on improved reporting) reduced the H1 2015 production data by 130,000 barrels per day.

"I'm confused, but still buying stocks. I trade only from my own account, I'm slightly long - a little discouraged when I see the action we've seen overnight in China. But, I think I'll stay that way and my propensity shall be to a quiet modest buyer of more on today's weakness.

The market has already delivered its verdict swiftly in the face of the global equity market correction– reducing substantially the probability of a rate hike in September, and pricing in a full rate hike only by March next year. We assign a higher probability than the market for a lift off in September but acknowledge that the risk has shifted towards later, a slower pace and a lower terminal rate. For now, we hold on to the put on EDU5 that we initiated two weeks ago. "Data dependency” over the next couple of weeks might really mean “equity market dependency”. If the equity market drops 10%, the Fed will most likely not hike, no matter what the payrolls data is.

China's Ministry of Public Security says the accused are very, very sorry for their actions, in which they "misled society and the public, generated and spread fearful sentiment, and even used the opportunity to maliciously concoct rumors to attack [Communist] Party and national leaders."

• Hilsenrath: Fed Appears to Hold Line on Rate Plan (WSJ)
• Europe, Asia stocks set for worst monthly drop in three years on China, Fed (Reuters)
• Beijing abandons large-scale share purchases (FT), if only for a few hours
• China’s Next Problem: Paying for Its Stock-Market Bailout (WSJ)
• Crises Put First Dents in Xi Jinping’s Power (WSJ)
• Man Group’s China Chief Said to Assist Police in Probe (BBG)

· The final US Nonfarm payrolls report before the September FOMC rate decision takes centre stage this week after developments in China last week dampened expectations for a Fed rate lift off

· The ECB rate decision and press conference is this week’s main event in Europe, with some analysts forecasting an extension to QE by the end of the year

Sometimes you have to work really hard for those "soft dollars."

Yesterday, the FT triumphantly proclaimed: "Beijing abandons large-scale share purchases", and that instead of manipulating stocks directly as China did last week on Thursday and Friday, China would instead focus on punishing sellers, shorters, and various other entities. We snickered, especially after the Shanghai Composite opened down 2% and dropped as low as 4% overnight. Just a few hours later we found out that our cynical skepticism was again spot on: the moment the afternoon trading session opened, the "National Team's" favorite plunge protection trade, the SSE 50 index of biggest companies, went super-bid and ramped from a low of 2071 to close 140 points higher, ending trading with a last minute government-facilitated surge, and pushing the Composite just 0.8% lower after trading down as much as -4.0%.

News That Matters

Businesses get “crunched” in the Oil Patch, consumers lose it, indexes hit Financial Crisis levels. 

Following Monday’s historic stock market downturn, many politicians and so-called economic experts rushed to the microphones to explain why the market crashed and to propose "solutions” to our economic woes. Not surprisingly, most of those commenting not only failed to give the right answers, they failed to ask the right questions.

With 30% of Venzuelans eating two or fewer meals per day, social unrest is mounting rapidly in President Nicolas Maduro's socialist utopia. As WSJ reports, soldiers have now been deployed to stem rampant food smuggling and price speculation, which Maduro blames for triple-digit inflation and scarcity. "Due to the shortage of food... the desperation is enormous," local opposition politician Andres Camejo said, and nowhere is that more evident than the trampling death of an 80-year-old woman outside a state-subsidized supermarket.