Archive - May 2014 - Story

Having noted America's surging government dependence before, the impact of almost 50 million people on food stamps is hard to imagine if you are not in retail food. The spike in business beginning on the 3rd of each month is truly astounding. By the 10th of the month the business begins to normalize and by the 22nd the ship is sinking. When you combine the number of people that receive their daily bread from taxpayer funds with the number of people who work for government we dare say it will be impossible to have an election that ever removes the corrupt from office. Who is going to vote against their pay-check or the food on their table? Sadly, it appears, the soup line is here to stay.

UPDATE: *NYSE REVIEWING TRADES FOR 'AOL,' 'NBR,' 'MPC,' 'LO,' 'CNQ' FROM 3:49:00PM-3:51:00PM ET

By now it is clear to everyone that the market is rigged, manipulated and broken. But this rigged, manipulated and broken? Honestly, we don't know, hence our question: is this now "normal" or are these just the death throes of a "market" busted beyond all repair?

The Dow had its narrowest range day of the year today and volume was dismal (as weak as yesterday's) but we made new record highs so USA USA USA. From the start of the day stocks were in a wild world of low volume levitation of their own as bonds made lower and lower yields and USDJPY was not supportive at all. Once Europe closed, the bid for US equities disappeared and Nasdaq and Russell tumbled, with the Dow and S&P catching down to unch. Bundesbank bullshit sent the EUR lower (cracking below 1.37 at 6 week lows) and thus the USD higher (+0.3% on the week). Treasury yields tumbled (and flattened) all day with 30Y -2bps on the week (and 7Y -6bps from today's highs). VIX had another seizure today (this time spiking up) and closed higher.

While we disapprove of much of the way the big pharma industry operates, we still think they should be free to conduct their business. Pfizer's interest in taking over (and reversing into) UK-based Astrazeneca would save shareholders billions (in taxes). Uncle Sam has a big problem with this. And Congress is jumping all over Pfizer to block the deal... even going so far as to propose retroactive legislation. In other words, they're willing to go back in time to kill the deal before it even gets started. Preventing Pfizer from leaving is a form of financial slavery. At a minimum, it's a form of financial repression and capital controls. And this is something that should concern everyone.

While many dismiss the impact of the "baby boomer" generation moving into retirement, the reality is likely to be far different. If the current survey is representative of that particular group, the drag on the financial markets and economy over the next decade could be quite substantial.

Just in case you were not convinced what a fragile fallacious lie the entire world's status quo has become, the Bank of Japan just provided one more straw on the camel's back of faith-based investing. As Bloomberg reports, BoJ officials are concerned that cooler-than-normal weather triggered by El Nino this summer will curb spending and weigh on an economic rebound. The Japan Meteorological Agency this week forecast a 70% chance El Nino will occur, the highest since its last occurrence in 2009, bringing lower temperatures that could continue through autumn - and, according to Dai-Ichi, could lower growth by as much as 0.9 percentage points. "We can't rule out the potential that the El Nino this summer causes unexpected damage to Japan’s economy," Nagahama said... the first pre-blamed weather forecast from a central bank we are aware of. Of course, given the dismal retail sales data this morning, we suspect a cooler-than-expected summer will be the scapegoat for a lack of economic escape velocity in the US also.

When good decisions are no longer possible, bad decisions are inevitable.

We have covered the topic of the student loan bubble extensively in the past so we won't waste more digital ink on where it comes from or what it means for the troubled US consumer, suffice to report that according to the Fed, in Q1 total Federal student loans rose by another $31 billion to a record $1.11 trillion, and up a whopping $125 billion, or 12% from this time last year.

Having questioned whether Tim Geithner leaked every Fed announcement to the banks during his tenure (but did not mention it in his memoirs) and shown that traders acted on information at faster than the speed of light (and thus were indeed aware of leaked decisions ahead of time), it should be no surprise that a new research paper has found “robust evidence” that some traders have been getting early news of U.S. Federal Reserve rate announcements and then trading on it during the Fed’s media lockup. The trading anomalies that Bernile and his colleagues spotted begin about 15 minutes before the news embargo is lifted and continue at a fairly even pace and are "statistically significant and in the direction of the subsequent policy surprise." So - are the markets rigged?

Headlines were made earlier today as Ireland’s ten year borrowing costs dropped below the UK’s for the first time in six years. Given that it only recently exited a bailout programme and not long ago was mired in the worst crisis in a generation, this is a pretty astonishing turnaround. Nor is Ireland alone. Spain and Italy can now borrow at similar rates to the USA on ten year debt. More broadly, in the past year peripheral countries borrowing costs have plummeted to levels seen before the crisis, or below, as countries begin exiting bailouts and returning to the markets. There are three key factors driving this 'bubble" and five major problems stemming from this seeming nirvana.

"New starts contracted 15% yoy (vs. -21.9% yoy in March); property sales fell 14.3% yoy (vs. -7.5% yoy); and land sales (by area) plunged 20.5% yoy (vs. -16.9% yoy previously). ... the housing market situation has undoubtedly turned quite gloomy. There has been a constant news stream of falling property prices everywhere, even in the 1-tier cities. A number of local governments, as we expected, have started to ease policy locally, especially relaxation of the home-purchase restrictions." - Soc Gen

As Europe closes with a record high DAX and a 15 year high for the FTSE-100, it seems the weakness implied by USDJPY and bonds has caught up (or down) to US equities. After bagging the 1,900 level, the S&P 500 is now down on the day and while Trannies hold green, the Russell 2000 is getting slammed (-0.8%)... but it's Tuesday!!!

Mr. Bowden, who heads the SEC’s examinations unit, speaking at a private equity conference, explained that “more than 50 percent of private equity firms it has audited have engaged in serious infractions of securities laws.” What is so incredible about the talk, is that while Bowden goes into details of shady practice after shady practice, he ultimately admits that the SEC isn’t being particularly aggressive with the private equity industry because “we believe that most people in the industry are trying to do the right thing, to help their clients, to grow their business, and to provide for their owners and employees.” What the SEC is basically admitting, is that private equity firms are also “too big to regulate” and, of course, “too big to jail.”