Archive - Oct 7, 2014 - Story

Under the title (only-a-PR-person-could-make-up) "Providing Quality Benefits for Our Associates," Walmart - who employs 1.3 million people in America, has changed its eligibility standards for healthcare benefits. "Like every company," they explain "Walmart faces rising healthcare costs," and so are ending benefits for associates who work less than 30 hours a week. We suspect the refrain from the American taxpayer will go something like "thanks Obamacare, you're welcome Walmart."

While according to the BLS survey employers have almost never had more open positions, they have also decided to put an abrupt stop to hiring, something which certainly points to a major disconnect in the US labor market. In fact, according to the JOLTS report, its far less tracked "Hirings" number plunged from 4,934K to just 4,640K. This was the lowest number of monthly hiring since January's "Polar Vortex" ground the economy to a halt. What's worse, the 294K plunge in monthly hiring was the biggest monthly drop since June 2010, and was the third biggest monthly plunge in hiring since Lehman!

Almost everyone is expecting much higher yields in the near term, but a 30-year drop in yield toward 2.5% should be considered as a possibility for these 8 reasons...

Because the IMF's sheer and gross incompetence never gets old.

But it was "good" news, right?

Did the IMF just upset the bulls?

The always "nailing it" IMF has downgraded global growth expectations...

*IMF SEES WORLD ECONOMY GROWING 3.8% NEXT YEAR VS 4% JULY EST.

Citing geopolitical risk (among other things). The only problem - the IMF's estimate is still 30% better growth than the consensus expects for 2015...

If you want to understand why our economy is stagnating and wealth inequality is rising, look at the rise of rentier skims and the resulting decline in wealth creation.  To understand why the real economy is stagnating, we have to understand the critical difference between rentier wealth and wealth creation. Rentier wealth is skimmed by fees that provide little to no value to the to the person paying the fee. The classic example is a fee collected to pass from one fiefdom's border to the next: no value is provided to the person paying the border fee; it is a rentier skim that transfers wealth from serfs to the fiefdom's landowning nobility. In the modern economy, rentier skims take a variety of forms. The government is adept at levying rentier skims. Harsh penalty fees piled on top of minor traffic violations are one example; another is extra fees to "expedite" services government is supposed to provide in a timely manner.

In the new normal, companies can one second trade with a market cap of hundreds of millions (or over a billion in the case of negative cash flow GTAT) and the next unexpectedly report they are bankrupt, or, as SODA just did, report guidance that is just about as bad.: "We are very disappointed in our recent performance," said Daniel Birnbaum, Chief Executive Officer of SodaStream. "Our U.S. business underperformed due to lower than expected demand for our soda makers and flavors which was the primary driver of the overall shortfall in the third quarter. While we were successful over the last few years in establishing a solid base of repeat users in the U.S., we have not succeeded in attracting new consumers to our home carbonation system at the rate we believe should be achieved.  The third quarter results are a clear indication that we must alter our course and improve our execution across the board."

• Liberian Rubber Farm Becomes Sanctuary Against Ebola (WSJ)
• The World’s Most Powerful Central Banker: Janet Who? (BBG)
• Islamic State moves into south west of Syrian Kurdish town (Reuters)
• Waldorf to Be Biggest Chinese Property Purchase in U.S. (BBG)
• Spain Seeks People in Contact With Ebola-Infected Nurse (BBG)
• Hong Kong protests at crossroads as traffic, frustration pile up (Reuters)
• Immigration: Grim Caseload at the Border (WSJ)
• China Cuts Thousands of ‘Phantom’ Workers From State Payroll (BBG)
• U.S., U.K. Regulators Push to Settle Deutsche Bank Libor Case This Year (WSJ)
• Wall Street Moles Go to NY’s Top Cop, Spurning SEC Cash (BBG)
• Pimco's outflow headaches only just beginning (Reuters)
• Japan Lawmakers Flag Need for Exit Strategy as Yen Falls (BBG)

While the economic data, especially out of Europe, just keeps getting worse by the day, with the latest confirmation that Europe is now officially in a triple-dip recession coming out of Germany and the previously observed collapse in Industrial Production which tumbled the most since February 2009, it was once again the Dollar and especially the New Normal favorite currency, the Yen, that was in everyone's sights overnight, when it first jumped to 109.20 only to slide shortly after midnight eastern, when Abe repeated once again that a plunging Yen is hurting small companies and consumers - and to think it only took him 2 years to read what we said would happen in late 2012 - but also the BOJ minutes which did not reveal any addition easing, which apparently disappointed algos and triggered USDJPY slel programs, pushing the USDJPY 80 pips lower to 108.40.

A few hours ago we finally got undeniable confirmation that Europe is once again in recession, its third since Lehman, only this one is worse: it is led by the "core" countries, with Germany in the forefront, a Germany which just reported industrial output which suffered its biggest monthly decline in more than five years in August. Specifically, German IP tumbled 4%, led by capital goods which crashed 8.8%; consumer goods sliding 0.4%, and basic goods dropping 1.9%, with the headline plunge far below the consensus of -1.5%, and below even the worst forecast of -3.0%, the biggest drop since February 2009, a result which according to the FT rose "fears that Europe’s biggest economy might be heading for recession and prompting renewed concern about the economic health of the eurozone."