Archive - May 29, 2014 - Story

While the "use of armed [unmanned aircraft systems] is not authorized," The Washington Times uncovering of a 2010 Pentagon directive on military support to civilian authorities details what critics say is a troubling policy that envisions the Obama administration’s potential use of military force against Americans. As one defense official proclaimed, "this appears to be the latest step in the administration’s decision to use force within the United States against its citizens." Meet Directive 3025.18 and all its "quelling civil disturbances" totalitarianism...

When the weather channel of USA today discusses economics it may be time to officially replace Joe LaVorgna with groundhog Phil...

Following last night's record plunge in Japanese retail sales, tonight was another slew of crushingly bad data for Abe and his motley crew of money printers to reflect on. First Household Spending cratered 4.6% YoY - its biggest drop since the Tsunami (and markedly worse than expectations which were bad enough due to the tax hike repurcussions). Then, Industrial Production tumbled 2.5% MoM - its biggest drop since the Tsunami (considerably worse than the 2.0% drop expected and the slowest YoY growth in 8 months). While this would typically be the kind of bad news that is great news for QQE-hopers, it was disastrously capped by a surge in Japanese CPI (well above BoJ target 2% levels) crushing moar-easing hopes as Barclays see no further easing in 2014 (and even Goldman pushes any hope off til October at the earliest).

Having gone from the sublime (zero-money-down mortgages for Chinese homes) to the ridiculous (when China's largst property developer says "the period in which everybody makes money out of property is gone,") the latest desperate act of a dying Chinese property bubble is stunning. As WSJ reports, Season Joy City (a remote suburb of Beijing) offers not only a party bag of bonuses to lure potential buyers; but the development's big selling point is "buy one floor, get one free." The government's reluctance to bail the nation out may soon be tested as Barclays notes "this downturn is more serious than in 2008."

With leverage rapidly rising while credit spreads approach record lows, high-yield bond markets have long since lost any sense of sanity with regard to forward-discounting... but that hasn't stopped the world's biggest bond managers (and now Japan's pension fund GPIF because as they say "now they have a chance to chase higher returns without taking on much risk") from diving in while the water is warm. With the smell of risk essentially removed from any and every market, why not pile into the riskiest credits, gain some extra yield (for free) - what could go wrong?

First it was Italy which, as we reported last week, had decided to "boost" its GDP by adding the estimated impact of cocaine and hookers. And now, riding on the coattails of this economics gimmick designed solely to make the economy appear more solvent, it is Britain's turn, whose Office for National Statistics will also add add up the "contribution" made by prostitutes and drug dealers. According to the Guardian "for the first time official statisticians are measuring the value to the UK economy of sex work and drug dealing – and they have discovered these unsavoury hidden-economy trades make roughly the same contribution as farming – and only slightly less than book and newspaper publishers added together."

Wondering why the extreme left (we are not happy and need moar bailouts) and extreme right (this European 'union' thing is not working out so well for us) have become so euro-skeptic? Perhaps the following chart from Bloomberg Brief's Niraj Shah will clear up any questions. The ratio of people at risk of poverty or social exclusion in the EU increased by 0.5 percentage points in 2012 to 24.8% or 124.2 million people, according to figures updated this week. The risk increased most in bailed-out nations Greece and Cyprus, where the rate rose by 3.6 and 2.5 percentage points, respectively. The Netherlands had the lowest risk at 15%.

Treasuries continue to do nothing wrong.  Bullish views on bonds over the past several months have been met with stern opposition; however, several are now beginning to question their defiance.  With such in mind, it is worth reviewing once again some possible explanations behind the bid.  There are many reasons to expect their strong performance to continue (particularly over the next week).

Former MSFT CEO, Steve Ballmer, who earlier was said to have put in a $1.8 billion bid for the LA Clippers, is reported to have won the bidding war for the troubled sports team, and will shelve out a massive $2 billion: a record price for any NBA team, and four times the $550 million that was paid earlier this month for the Milwaukee Bucks. It is also the second highest price ever paid for any US sports team, only behind the $2.1 billion paid for the Dodgers in 2012.

In the middle of the last great financial crisis, the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) proclaimed that Q1 2008 was the US economy grow at a modest 0.6%. This was met with hockey-stick prognosticators looking to the heavens for the next few quarters and bleeting about transitory factors affecting the economy. However, as the following chart shows, five years later (and after numerous adjustments) the +0.6% growth for Q1 2008 had somehow morphed into a clench-worthy 2.7% collapse in the economy...

The temptations of extrapolation are hard to resist. The trend exerts a powerful influence on markets, policymakers, households, and businesses. But discerning observers understand the limits of linear thinking, because they know that lines bend, or sometimes even break. That is the case today in assessing two key factors shaping the global economy: the risks associated with America’s policy gambit and the state of the Chinese economy. It is often said that a crisis should never be wasted: Politicians, policymakers, and regulators should embrace the moment of deep distress and take on the heavy burden of structural repair. China seems to be doing that; America is not. Codependency points to an unavoidable conclusion: The US is about to become trapped in the perils of linear thinking.

While dealers are telling their clients to dump the long end due to everyone mispricing economic growth and inflation prospects, and to expect the long awaited curve steepening any minute now, what are they doing? They are the flattest they have been in two and a half years! In other words, buying.

Bad breadth, flaccid flow, and bonds bid - what could possibly go wrong?

Prof. Ken Rogoff’s book ‘This Time is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly'; is one of the best researched public works on the subject of sovereign debt. And Rogoff’s conclusions (though hotly contested due to an ‘Excel error’) were that, sensibly, governments which accumulate too much debt get into serious trouble. Duh. Not exactly a radical idea. But in an article published yesterday afternoon on the Financial Times website (based on a recently published academic paper), Rogoff did propose a new idea that is radical: ban cash. All of it.

One supremely smart CNBC talking head summed it all up, "today's negative GDP number was excellent news," and sure enough, thanks to someone's multi-billion-dollar bid at the all-time-highs mid-afternoon, we went to the moon, Alice. Trannies are on target for their best month since October (+5.7%). The dash-for-trash has a new life as "most shorted" have now risen 6 days in a row - the biggest squeeze in over 3 months. This all happened as bonds rallied (though yields rose modestly on the day), VIX rose, USDJPY would not play along and aside from the spike in volume, on a total lack of liquidity. Gold and silver were monkey-hammered early on but limped back off their lows as WTI crude rallied from the GDP print on. The S&P 500 is now only 30 points short of Goldman Sachs June 2015 target.