Archive - Feb 2010 - Story

The latest out of the Richmond Fed is a joke of a paper that while analyzing the possibility that the entire stock market and dollar carry trade is one zero cost of capital-funded bubble, skips over this possibility and instead goes on to analyze the "factors that could contribute to a fundamentals-based explanation for the recent rally in certain risky asset markets." Spoiler alert: No bubble - it's all based in sound reality.

Now that every trigger happy, red-bull OD'ing HiFTer is keenly following every lockbox in possession of Greek bureaucrats to see how many billions more in debt will "suddenly" appear out of thin air, many have forgotten about that "other" sovereign bailout - Dubai. The reason: Dubai World, which was supposed to present a restructuring offer for $22 billion in debt in a meeting with lenders in December, never did. January wasn't any different. February, by the early looks of it, will also be a dud. So as the world grinds along and creditors have no clue what the hell is going on in Dubai, and increasingly so in Greece, everyone has their fingers crossed that not only will there be no default anywhere, but that anyone who dares to mention just what a great big castle in the air the entire sovereign debt arena has become, funded by overt and covert cash transfers by the Federal Reserve, will be (in)voluntarily swept under the rug.

It is no secret that SocGen's Dylan Grice has not been a big fan of the Japanese economy, or stock market for that matter. We have highlighted his perspectives on the island nation in the past, and his concerns about a likely demographic-induced funding crunch have been picked up by the likes of Hayman Capital's Kyle Bass. So when Grice comes out with constructive suggestions on how to play Japanese relative value, especially if it is based on liquidation value considerations, one would do well to listen.

It appears not even one day can pass without some new and improved indication of Greece's economic collapse. The latest comes from website Kathimerini.gr which discloses that the recently appointed "Committee on the Reliability Of Statistics" has uncovered $40 billion of previously hidden debt (one wonders when America will get a comparable commission: no question we are in dire need of one).

Watch Tim Geithner's testimony before the Senate Finance Committee on the President's amusing 2011 budget live and commercial free, here. It is time someone asks why the GSEs continue getting the Federal Budget exemption.

We hope, although it is very unlikely, Senator Bunning somehow makes a guest appearance with some very directed questions.

The January data for the Johnson Redbook retail index is out, missing the MNI consensus for both YoY change, which was at 1.0%, compared to a 1.2% consensus, while month over month Redbook was down 1.5% compared to december, on expectations of a 1.2% drop.

RANsquawk 2nd February US Morning Briefing - Stocks, Bonds, FX etc.

• Tom Hoenig for Treasury (Simon Johnson)
• Moral hazard prompts TCW and AllianceBernstein to buy bank sub debt (Bloomberg)
• The dollar-alternative trade continues: commodities rise as AUD drops on no OZ hike (Bloomberg)
• A scoop of double dip (Barrons)
• iTraxx Fin widest to iTraxx Europe since Lehman (Bloomberg)
• Philippine bond sale fails for second time this year (Bloomberg)

RANsquawk 2nd February US Morning Briefing - Stocks, Bonds, FX etc.

RANsquawk 2nd February US Morning Briefing - Stocks, Bonds, FX etc.

The Investment Team at Broyhill huddles up at 6.30AM every Monday Morning, to review market action, various measures of sentiment, and portfolio positioning, to name a few. For the two hours leading up to our Morning Macro Call, we scan dozens of charts, pour over piles of data and review all of the models critical to our investment strategy. Notes from our meetings are distributed internally and reviewed in aggregate at our Monthly Macro Meeting. We’ve noted a significant shift in the investment landscape over the course of the past few weeks, so we thought we’d share this morning’s Views from the Blue Ridge.

Today, to much fanfare, the administration released its ridiculous $3+ trillion budget (we say + because at that size the one thing certain is that the budget will certainly never hit the target and while we wish it would be lower, we are certain it will end up materially higher), which consists of a "short" 192-page summary section and a 1420 page appendix. We are confident that not one politician will read the whole thing from cover to cover. We won't either. Not because we don't care about what's in it, but because we are much more concerned with what is not included, namely $2.8 Trillion and $1.9 Trillion of MBS guaranteed portfolios at Fannie and Freddie, and an additional $782 billion and $809 billion in company debt outstanding for the two GSEs, respectively. This amounts to a total of $6.3 trillion in liabilities which should be counted toward the budget. And yet, oddly, the error-checker somehow made this rather justifiable omission: after all if we were to look at a number which written out looks as follows $6,264,000,000,000.00, we would also probably just avoid it - it is somewhat difficult to hide a number that big even in the 1,420 pages of the budget's appendix. That's ok, we are here to remind them about the omission, and also to remind Mr. Orszag, who himself, in that long ago 2008, espoused that these companies should be put on the Federal Budget. Isn't it strange what one and a half years worth of realizations just how broken beyond repair the system is, will do to one's convictions?

Everything that the government has done so far, with a few minor detours, has been almost exclusively focused on maintaining home prices high, by tweaking either the supply or the demand side of the housing equation. As the bulk of consumer net wealth is concentrated in the housing sector, and a wealthy and confident consumer, much more so than the banking system, is critical to the recovery of America's economy, the Administration will do everything in its power to achieve its goal of artificially manipulating the housing market, thereby not causing an incremental loss of wealth to those still stuck with overpriced houses, while the real intersection of actual supply and demand curves would indicate a materially lower equilibrium price. This is ironic, as proper price discovery is critical for a true recovery, since Americans realize all too well that buying a house at prevailing levels in advance of the second down-leg in housing is senseless, the continued pursuit of such flawed policies by the Fed and President Obama merely pulls the market ever further away from its equilibrium, thereby making the anticipated second dip so much more likely and not that far off in the distant future. Below are 5 simple charts the highlight just how precarious the housing situation in the U.S. is, and how likely the second, and probably much more fierce, leg down in the markets is going to be.

Spreads were tighter in the US as all the indices improved (albeit marginally). IG trades 3.9bps wide (cheap) to its 50d moving average, which is a Z-Score of 0.4s.d. (and HY has now traded wide of its 50-day for 2 days). At 95bps, IG has closed tighter on 36 days in the last 280 trading days (JAN09). The last five days have seen IG flat to its 50d moving average.

Pulling Volcker out of the closet following the Massachusetts debacle was a useful diversion: the whole prop trading ban seemed almost credible. And now that there are no immediate public votes in the future, it is safe to put Volcker back where he belongs, but quietly, lest the morts and general peasantry think that Obama is all bluster and no actions. Alas, if the latest development in the ongoing Wall Street "regulatory" saga, as reported by the FT is any indication, the prop trading plan, as proposed by Volcker, is now dead. This time, the last chance to put the financial system on some stable footing comes courtesy of Dick Shelby, Chris Dodd and Paul Kanjorski.