Archive - Jul 2011 - Story

Gold has fallen in most currencies today and is trading at USD 1,603, EUR 1,130, GBP 995 and CHF 1,315 per ounce. Gold is 0.3% higher in Swiss francs again today after the last two weeks of deepening turmoil saw gold rise in the Swiss franc. Many market participants are expecting a correction in gold at the psychological level of $1,600/oz. This is quite possible given corrections often take place after reaching record round number highs. Also, corrections tend to happen when there is a lot of noise in the press and media. Gold’s record high in all currencies is front page news in the Financial Times today which would make any contrarian nervous that the recent move is overdone. However, coverage remains very muted in much of the non specialist financial press – many of whom barely covered or did not even mention the new record gold highs. Gold at $1,603/oz is only 2.5% above the recent record nominal price seen on April 29th at $1,563.70/oz. Thus, gold has had a two month correction and consolidation prior to reaching the new nominal highs over $1,600/oz. Therefore, it is quite possible that gold targets the next psychological level of $1,700/oz, prior to any meaningful correction. Higher prices in euros and pounds are especially likely, prior to a correction. It is worth remembering that in the 1970’s gold bull market, gold had annual appreciation of some 30% per annum and had moves of over 73% in 1973 and 66% in 1974 (see table above). Gold only went parabolic in 1979 when it rose by over 140%.

Following last week's blatant secondary bond market intervention ahead of Italy's two auctions which even Willem Buiter predicted would need central bank intervention (ECB, but any would work), we were waiting to see if the ECB would announce an increase in its bond purchasing activity via the SMP for the week the passed. It did not. Which leaves just one culprit to explain the dramatic moves ahead of bond auctions (which naturally set the mood and allowed the primary issuance to proceed smoothly and not bring down the euro). China. And we venture to assume that it was China again who started buying bonds in the secondary market ahead of today's 4:30 am and 5:00 am issuance of €4.5 billion in 12 and 18 month bills and €1.25 billion in Greek 3 month bills, which resulted in the 10 year tightening -7bps to 1550; after it hit 1564bps earlier today, highest since at least 1998, while Italy's 10-yr yield over bunds tightened -22bps to 310bps vs yesterday’s 332bps, the highest since 1996. Yes this was before the auctions on no good news, and happened just as gold hit an all time high of just under $1610. Sure enough, following this sudden spike in buying interest, the auctions priced tremendously, and have resulted in a major shift in market sentiment in the past 3 hours, leading to a surge in Italian financial stocks, a jump in the EUR and thus a spike in futures.

A snapshot of the European Morning Briefing covering Stocks, Bonds, FX, etc.
Market Recaps to help improve your Trading and Global knowledge

Many associate exploding CDS as a feature of backward third world countries, or, as they are better known these days, PIIGS. It may thus come as a surprise to most that the default risk of not only the US, which we reported had recently hid a multi year high, but especially Germany and the UK have surged by well over 50% in the past month. In fact, Germany, by most objective evaluations, an economy that is far more resilient and productive than America's, has in the past 3 days seen its CDS surge to a level 10 basis points wide of the US. And if not the actual economy, what then? Why such monstrosities as Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank, which as reported previously have caused many to doubt are as viable as the stress tests represents, and whose combined asset bases are well over the total GDP of Germany. As the for the UK, after trading at around 55 bps for months, the spread has jumped to nearly 80 bps. So as Sigma X indicated earlier that it may now be time to shift attention to the UK, have the vigilantes already succeeded in penetrating all the way to the very core of the Eurozone? Or, courtesy of ISDA's criminal abdication of its responsibilities by pre-determining that no development in the future of Greece would be an event of default, perhaps the only natural response now is to buy protection on those names which have not blown out to ridiculous (read 600 bps or wider) spreads. Which, however, is very bad news for the Eurozone core, as going forward investors will simply hedge peripheral cash risk with core synthetic: a process which will result in the eventual wipe out of both instruments. But that's precisely what happens when the CDS administrator and "regulator" decides to play ball with the central planners instead of the siding with market participants: unintended escalating consequences galore.

In mainstream financial circles, the concept of a global currency is often spoken of only with an air of caution. It is approached always in hypothetical terms. It is whispered of as some far off dream; a socio-economic moon landing in the far reaches of fiscal space. Perhaps in 2015, or 2020, or maybe 2050, but certainly never just over the horizon, or right around the corner posing as an innocuous trade asset created over 40 years ago and used only on rare occasions. Unfortunately, the development of a centralized global security representing the creation of a supranational economic body is much closer than many would care to admit…

And another humiliating notch on Goldman's "client facing" FX team's bedpost... And another win for the firm's prop desk.

What started off as a simple, if very much illegal, information gathering protocol (and yes, NOTW is most certainly not the only organization that hacked voice mails), and has since escalated to an epic shakedown of one of the world's most legendary media companies in which Murdoch himself now appears on the verge of leaving the company, appears set to ultimately result in a historic parliamentary collapse, with the Prime Minister of the UK David Cameron seen as the ultimate fallguy. As English booking agency reports, "David Cameron's odds of leaving the Cabinet have been slashed by Ladbrokes. The bookies have taken a steady stream of bets on the PM leaving office with the odds dropping from 100/1 to 20/1 and now 8/1 in a matter of hours." In other words anyone who bet that the shuttering of the NOTW was merely the first step in the News Corp. scandal and that it would reach as high as the pinnacle of UK leadership, has made a return well over 10 times in the past several days. And yet, as the Economist chimes in with a late night piece, the departure of Cameron at this point is far from certain. Which is arguably a far worse state of affairs: if there is anything the markets hate, it is uncertainty. If Cameron was sure to stay or go, it would have no impact on the UK's economy and financial markets. As it stands, and with Murdochgate getting worse by the minute, we would not be surprised to see UK CDS follow the US and Germany to multi-year highs, as the UK now openly becomes yet another target for the bond vigilantes who relish precisely this kind of uncertain inbetweenness.

In theory, stock prices react positively to inflation. You can explain that with the balance sheet effect: while debt remains same in nominal terms, assets gain in value (with the difference showing up in the equity position via net profit). Gold should also benefit from inflation as the supply of precious metals is limited – hence they will go up in price if money supply increases. Taken together we should assume that gold and stocks are positively correlated (if one moves up, the other one does the same)...

Remember when back in November the SEC banned stub quotes, which the worthless regulators from the SEC even had the gall to blame the flash crash on, yet whose elimination was supposed to return investor confidence in the stock market and practically ensure that there would be no future HFT-induced manipulation or mini (tall, or venti) flash crashes every agan? Well... it's baaaack.

During the just completed Wynn earnings calls we witnessed what is without doubt the most blistering and scathing critique of Obama's administration to date by anybody in the public domain. To wit:"I believe in Las Vegas, I think its best days are ahead of it, but I'm afraid to do anything in the current political environment in the United States...I'm saying it bluntly that this administration is the greatest wet blanket to business and progress and job creation in my lifetime... And those of us who have business opportunities and the capital to do it, are going to sit in fear of the President...The guy keeps making speeches about redistribution, and maybe's ought to do something to businesses that don't invest, they're holding too much money. You know, we haven't heard that kind of money except from pure socialists....And until he's gone, everybody is going to be sitting on their thumbs.

Some breaking news out of Bloomberg TV which has just announed that Rupert Murdoch may step down as CEO of News Corp. contingent on his perfomance before parliament tomorrow, and that News Corp COO Chase Carey is being considered as his replacement.

Moody's is out with a comprehensive chart of defense spending since 1946 which shows that while over the years the average yearly amount spent on defense by the US government has been around $400 billion, in the past decade this amount has surged to an all time high of just under $750 billion. And while one can debate the reasons for why America spends 20% of annual revenues on military (and debate even more why this number has continued to surge under a Nobel Peace Prize winning president), one thing is rather certain: this number will decline in the coming months and years as Washington has no choice but to cut the defense budget. And while this will likely be a multi-year process, it will have substantial implications for not only the defense companies identified, but for their respectively supply-chains, resulting in hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of layoffs over the next decade as government-sourced revenue plummets and yet another layer of overhead will have to be trimmed.

It was only a few short weeks ago that we reported that the hacker group LulzSec which among others hacked the FBI, Sony, and who knows how many other security agencies, has decided to shut down. That didn't last long. As of a few minutes ago, The Sun's front page redirects to a makeshift website called New-Times.co.uk which carries a headline story titled "Media Moguls Body Discovered" which reports that "Rupert Murdoch, the controversial media mogul, has reportedly been found dead in his garden, police announce." Readers can experience the hack for themselves by going to thesun.co.uk. Naturally, that this is like poking a stick in an already angry hornet's nest goes without mention. As for the masses, we expect the distraction should be quite welcome.

Traditionally we reserve the funny pages for Friday but for Dick Bove we will always make an exception. While his Buy call on Lehman days ahead of the firm's bankruptcy can never be toppled in the pantheon of financial humor, his recent Price Target track record vis-a-vis Bank of America stock is rapidly approaching Hall of Fame status. The chart below says it all. And for those confused, the "B" stands for Buy.

RANsquawk Market Wrap Up - Stocks, Bonds, FX etc. – 18/07/11