Archive - Nov 11, 2014 - Story

When you absolutely, completely, undoubtedly need the Dow and S&P 500 to close green at new record closing highs... unleash the last second VIX smasher algo...

As one would expect with half the market away, US equity volumes were terrible (but fiunnily enough not much worse than yesterday) with most major indices trading in a very tight range around unchanged. Overnight strength in stocks on the back of USDJPY's momo ignition after Reuters headlines on Japan tax delays. Trannies, however, surged out of the gate, stalled into the European close, tumbled on oil weakness, then rallied back in the last hour - amid now news. Treasury futures were very quiet and went nowhere. The real story of the day was in the FX markets, which saw notable USD weakness led by EUR and AUD strength, and a late day rally in JPY (USDJPY tagged 116.00 stops then faded... that's 8 handles in 9 days). The USD weakness - which started around the European close - sparked a rally in copper, gold, and silver (and gold miners surged). Oil prices tested cycle lows before also bouncing back in a v-shaped recovery to close higher. Despite early intraday record highs in Dow and S&P futures, they ended practically unchanged as VIX was notably divergent. Late-day panic-buying lifted the Dow (+0.007%), S&P, and Russell 2000 green.

Game over, man: the Fed won.

"Overseas views on the BOJ’s surprise easing announcement can be broken down into two camps: the reflationists, who commend the BOJ for its bold actions, and those critical of the policy, who say it is a symptom of the final stages of Japan’s economic decline. The critics can further be divided into two groups: those who believe that continuing the current policy of “Banzainomics” will lead to a collapse of the Japanese economy and government finance triggered by a crash in the JGB market, and those who worry that the ongoing devaluation of the yen under this policy will hurt their own countries’ industries.... The first group’s scenario, in which the BOJ’s reckless attempts to achieve a 2% inflation target trigger a bond market crash and an eventual collapse of the Japanese economy, is of greater concern. After all, it is the same scenario the world’s QE pioneers—the US and the UK—are desperately trying to avert at this very moment."

At the end of the day, it is overwhelming clear that the headline jobs number is thoroughly and dangerously misleading because there has been a systematic and relentless deterioration in the quality and value added of the jobs mix beneath the headline. It has no value whatsoever as an index of labor market conditions, labor market slack or even implied GDP growth. The truth is, in an open global economy the quantity of labor utilized by the US economy is a function of its price - not the level of interest rates or the S&P 500. Currently, wage rates on the margin are too high, but the Fed’s ZIRP and money printing campaigns only compound the problem. They permit the government to fund with ultra low-cost bonds and notes a massive transfer payment system that keeps potential productive labor out of the economy, and thereby props up bloated wages rates; and it enables households to carry more debt than would be feasible with honest interest rates and competitively priced wage rates, thereby further inhibiting the labor market adjustments that would be required to actually achieve full employment and sustainable growth.

While we understand the Fed's desire to pass the monetization baton seamlessly from the end of QE3 in the US, to the expansion of QE in Japan first, and then the launch of public QE by the ECB, things may not be quite as smooth as desired . Because a quick glance at the latest Fed H.4.1 statement reveals something unexpected: in the past 4 weeks, the level of total reserves with Fed banks (i.e., excess reserves created by QE), have seen their biggest plunge since the launch of QE in March of 2009. As of November 5, the total amount of outstanding reserves tumbled to $2.561 trillion, down a whopping $188 billion in the past 4 week, well below the $2.8 trillion recorded in August, and at a level last seen in February 2014.

While no US Federal Agency sees fit to monitor ocean radioactivity in coastal waters, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI) has taken on the task of keeping the information flowing in a world of 'promises' that everything will be ok. As WHOI reports this week, scientists have detected the presence of small amounts of radioactivity from the 2011 Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant accident 100 miles (150 km) due west of Eureka, California.

Gold and crude oil have been in a slow motion free fall of late, even as U.S. equities rally but ConvergEx's Nick Colas looks at the value of each asset class relative to the other two and assess their historical relationship.  For example, you currently need 1.72 ounces of gold at $1178 to “Buy” one S&P 500 index at 2032.  That is cheap to the 30-year average of a 1.86x ratio, putting fair value on U.S. stocks 8% higher. Separately, it currently takes 25.1 barrels of crude to buy the S&P 500, versus the 30-year average of 27.8, making stocks look cheap by 11%.  Closing out this analytical triangle: you need 14.5 barrels of oil to buy an ounce of gold, but the 30-year average is 16.6.  Bottom line using these long-term ranges: U.S. stocks look mildly cheap to oil and gold, but drops in those commodities would erase the difference just as easily as a further rally in stocks.  Gold looks cheap relative to oil and should be $170 higher, or oil should trade closer to $71.

As US equity markets push to higher and higher highs, the underlying substance of the exuberance is becoming not just more and more defensive but more and more concentrated in fewer and fewer names... now where have we seen this before?

While Putin was busy laying the groundwork for another major commodity gas pipeline expansion project, one that would make China the largest natural gas client of Gazprom, surpassing Europe and fully concluding Russia's pivot from west to east, US president Obama had slightly less lofty ambitions out of the annual APEC summit in Beijing: coordinating with China's leader Xi Jinping on how to best avoid war, or as the WSJ phrased it "military confrontations." So in order to prevent military conflict in the coming years, China and the US have penned two deals. “It’s incredibly important that we avoid inadvertent escalation and that we don’t find ourselves again having an accidental circumstance lead into something that could precipitate a conflict” said a White House official.

Just 24 hours before "the most important watch in the world" goes up for auction in Geneva today, the owner - 48-year-old Sheikh Saud bin Mohammed Al-Thani of Qatar has died suddenly; somewhat ironically confirming that "you never actually own a Patek Philippe, you merely look after it for the next generation." Though, it appears, in this case, as Hodinkee reports, the sale of Henry Graves Jr. Patek Philippe Supercomplication - which is expected to sell for in excess of $15 million today - was due to the Sheikh running into financial difficulties. So is this Peak Patek, when even the oil-money is forced to sell assets?

Europe is closing... the American stock trader is on his own now with no bond market police to manage the mania...

As everyone knows in today's new normal world of investing, "good news is bad news" and indeed it seems a record "Singles' Day" sales record of around $9.3 billion (up 59% YoY) was enough of 'good news' trigger to spark the worst day in BABA since the IPO. Today's 4% drop of course is nothing compared to the 45%-plus gains off the Bullard lows, and we suspect the BoJ or GPIF will be back in action soon to BTFD. Profit-taking? Sell the news? Or perhaps it was Jack Ma's Elon-Musk-esque comments on how his high stock price is based on very high expectations and he is feeling the pressure.

The responsibility for starting and ending wars, the way wars are fought and the losses we suffer all rest with our elected civilian leadership.

It appears the terrorist organization known as Islamic State has been watching the fiasco of fiat money and reading Alan Greenspan and Ron Paul. As The Daily Mail reports, ISIS wants to introduce its own currency and plans to bring back solid gold and silver dinar coins in an attempt to solidify its makeshift caliphate. Around 1500 years after the Dinar was first introduced - made from pure gold and silver - ISIS plans to implement the change within a few weeks, changing changing from regular dinars and Lira to golden dinars and silver dirhams.