Archive - Sep 25, 2009 - Story

"When I heard Alan Grayson was running for Congress, I remember thinking to myself, That Alan Grayson? The lunatic? It can’t be, I thought. I kept imagining trails of half-eaten sheep leading to his campaign appearances. But it turned out to be true. And when I checked, his platform turned out to be quite sane and even kind of interesting." - Matt Taibbi

Radio Zero Again. GSE pay limits? Talk to the hand- I've got Radio Zero in my acoustically isolating earbuds.

Meanwhile, chat up the DJ (send your .mp3 files) here: radiozh or EFNet #radiozh (where the cool kids hang out and get the inside scoop on Studio Zero antics in real time).

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Live program starts at 9:30(ish) ET.

Even as market optimism rages unabated despite the occasional dip in the market (where everyone on the sidelines is buying, buying, buying GE stock), the economic fundamentals continue souring. The latest casualty - legendary movie studio, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc. Well, not so legendary these days, with the only consistently profitable venture to come from the studio being the James Bond series, and alas that's the problem. According to Bloomberg, MGM has informed creditors it will skip a $12 million coupon payment (the technical term here is waived, but good luck if you expect to see one penny of that amount). Moelis & Co., whose restructuring division is comprised of the ex-Jefferies Derrough-Carlston dynamic duo (and henchmen), is advising the firm on what will likely end up being a $3.7 billion debt for equity swap.

Spreads pushed wider today with HY actually starting to shiver a little after holding its gains in the face of equity and IG weakness so far this week, as high beta names finally underperformed low beta. IG12 modestly underperformed IG13 once again as the tail names underperformed and HY underperformed IG. Breadth was more negative today in CDS land with wideners outpacing tighteners by around 7-to-1 and a noticeable flattening in the IG12 curve.

The JPY has been considered the weak currency amongst the majors pretty much universally for most of the last decade. The interesting thing is that frankly one cannot really look at the monthly chart and really say the USD has been stronger. There have been spikes of relative USD including lately from 2004 to 2007, but really overall the two currencies have been trading water against one another, and if anything it's the JPY winning.

A look at the SPY VWAP since the FOMC announcement. Just a slightly abnormal distribution.

In the continuing absence of WalStreetPro2, we present something comparable in the spirit and body of Michael Moore. Additionally, for the sequel to Capitalism, Mr. Moore may consider grabbing a baseball bat and commencing a tour de force of the United States, side by side everyone's favorite protagonist.

Bank of America, suddenly left out in the cold, without the gentle hand of the SEC to part an angry sea of taxpayers, has filed its first response to the SEC since it found itself at odds with the regulator, courtesy of Judge Rakoff. Well, a response is a loose definition for 8 pages filled with "No responses."

According to the WSJ, Reza Saleh, whom the SEC identified as the individual behind the Perot option insider trading scheme, is an actual hero: "Unsolicited and with no promise of reward, this guy put his life on the line and didn't flinch."

Say you are a hedge fund and you have been unlucky enough to have bought GGP bonds or other GUCs in the biggest clusterfuck of a CRE bankruptcy in history: how will you know what the hell is going on in the deal that has more moving parts it would make Level 99 of The Incredible Machine look tame in contrast? The easiest way is by getting access to disseminated inside information. But how will you "ascertain" that your traders will not take advantage of this material, insider information, a process that would immediately hold them liable for civil and criminal charges? By erecting internal "screening walls" of course, that are so completely impenetrable, that you traders will never be able to have drinks with you and where, just after your 8th Jager bomb, you will never disclose just which maturity it is that traders needs to nudge or which GUC they need to "start opportunistically unwinding if you know what i mean, wink, wink."

Optimism is a good thing: just ask an unstimulated Larry Kudlow. Yet when optimism is the only thing, you have problems. These tend to materialize whenever any event occurs that shows just how disjointed reality and hope are in actuality. Of course, the greater the divergence, the greater the downside shock. And if the Conference Board's numbers are any good, we are set for a recordly harsh reintroduction with reality.

Yet another ignorant swab who does not believe in the Mobile Internet Tsunami or buying on the dips.

Alan Grayson doing his immaculate Jaws impression here. And the man is definitely smelling a wounded and bleeding Fed. Must watch clip.

Grayson to Fed General Counsel Scott Alvarez: "Do you mind if we have a GAO audit to see if there has been front-running or insider trading by [Fed Primary Dealer JP Morgan]? Do you mind? Is that ok with you?"

The dollar pain continues as the dollar drops below the 90 Yen support level. Surprisingly despite the dollar weakness, there is no capital flow into domestic risky assets (10 Years are well bid). In fact, the bid in HY, the latest risk casualty of bubble psychology, is weakening. Is the carry trade now financing safer/foreign assets? If so, is yield chasing finally over?

"If we want to have a chance to remain the masters of gold an international agreement on the rules of the game as outlined above seems to be a matter of urgency. We would fool ourselves in thinking that we have time enough to wait and see how the S.D.R.'s will develop. In fact, the challenge really seems to be to achieve by international agreement within a very short period of time what otherwise could only have been the outcome of a gradual development of many years."

- U.S. Department of State, March 1968