Archive - Jul 2014 - Story

For once the ADP was actually spot on: in June the US economy added 288K nonfarm payrolls, far above the 215K expected, and above the upward revised 224K from June. Further, May jobs were revised from 282K to 204K. This was the fifth consecutive month of job gains over 200K. The unemployment rate tumbled to 6.1%, well below the 6.3% expected. The brth/death adjustment added 121K jobs, compared to 205K previously, and a total of 452K so far in 2014.

No change... no change. Draghi's back and, just like RBA's Stevens last night, is ready to talk (but not jawbone) his currency down; explaining that any day now we might - just might - unleash a treaty-busting monetization of more debt that won't actually reach the real economy but will provide more ammo for carry-traders to leverage longs in peripheral nations sovereign debt. Since the last ECB NIRP unleashing, things have got worse for Europe... but it will take time we are sure... just wait until H2 2014...

While up until now the virtual war between Saudi Arabia, openly calling for the ouster of Iraq's Maliki (whose words in retaliation were just as harsh) was primarily of words, things appear to be escalating on that front too following an overnight report that Saudi Arabia has deployed 30,000 soldiers to its border with Iraq after Iraqi soldiers withdrew from the area, Saudi-owned al-Arabiya television reported Thursday. The world's top oil exporter shares an 500-mile border with Iraq, where Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) insurgents and other Sunni Muslim militant groups seized towns and cities in a lightning advance last month. King Abdullah has ordered all necessary measures to protect the kingdom against potential "terrorist threats," state news agency SPA reported on Thursday.

• Citigroup 190K
• HSBC 200K
• Goldman Sachs 210K
• UBS 215K
• JP Morgan 220K
• Deutsche Bank 225K
• Bank of America 225K
• Barclays 250K

Unlike a month ago, this time there are no NIRP announcement fireworks from the ECB which just announced it kept all rates unchanged, with the main refinancing operation rate flat at 0.15%, while the deposit facility continues its existence in NIRP purgatory at negative 0.1%.

• Obama Decries Big Bonuses at Bank Trading Desks as Risky  (BBG)
• India central bank seeks to swap gold to improve reserves quality (Reuters)
• There goes Q3 GDP: Arthur Strengthens to Become First Atlantic Hurricane (BBG)
• Airports Serving U.S. Tighten Checks on Stealth-Bomb Threat (BBG)
• Fear, cash shortages hinder fight against Ebola outbreak (Reuters)
• Brent Declines as Libya Rebels Say Ports Are Open (BBG)
• Shiites Train for Battle in Iraqi Holy City (WSJ)
• Dimon’s Cancer Has 90% Cure Rate With Demanding Therapy (BBG)
• Goldman says client data leaked, wants Google to delete email (Reuters)
• ECB Watchers in the Dark Look to Draghi for Illumination (BBG)

There is far less on the ECB table today compared to a month ago when expectations were massive and Draghi didn't fail to satisfy (with the usual set of half-baked, non-existant programs a la the OMT which still doesn't technically exist, 2 years after it was first revealed) and nobody expects any major announcements out of Mario Draghi. If anything, the market hopes the ECB head will use the press conference today to elaborate on the missing technicalities of the TLTRO. With inflation printing at 0.5% again, concerns of deflation will likely be mentioned once again. When it comes to the EUR reaction, the most bearish case would be for Draghi to discuss QE, and providing details of how a bond monetization operation would look like. More than the EURUSD, a bigger risk lies for peripheral bonds which are at risk if Draghi unveils details of TLTRO today that could hurt the periphery carry trade.

Once again, US equity futures are roughly unchanged (while Treasurys have seen a surprising overnight bid coming out of Asia) ahead of an avalanche of macroeconomic news both in Europe, where the ECB will deliver its monthly message, and in the US where we will shortly get jobless claims, ISM non-manufacturing, trade balance, nonfarm payrolls, unemployment, average earnings, Markit U.S. composite PMI, Markit U.S. services PMI due later. Of course the most important number is the June NFP payrolls and to a lesser extent the unemployment rate, which consensus expects at 215K and 6.3%, although the whisper number is about 30K higher following yesterday's massive ADP outlier. Nonetheless, keep in mind that a) ADP is a horrible predictor of NFP, with a 40K average absolute error rate and b) in December the initial ADP print was 151K higher than the nonfarms. Those watching inflation will be far more focused on hourly earnings, expected to rise 0.2% M/M and 1.9% Y/Y. Should wages continue to stagnate and decline on a real basis, expect to hear the "stagflation" word much more often in the coming weeks.

While numerous massively indebted administrations around the world hope to divert the attention of what's left of their struggling middle class away from its daily impoverished existence and distract it with flashing lights and glitzy animations showing another all time market high on a daily basis, a significantly more important shift taking place behind the scenes is appreciated by very few: the ongoing de-dollarization of the world. For the latest example of how increasingly more countries are setting the stage for the final currency war, we go again to Russia where VOR's  Valentin Mândr??escu explains that slowly but surely the BRICS - that proud Goldman acronym which was conceived to perpetuate the great American way of life by releasing trillions in US-denominated debt in heretofore untapped markets - are morphing into an anti-dollar alliance.

In a QE dominated world - in the Golden Age of the Central Banker - renminbi strengthening has been an unmitigated disaster. Chinese political stability depends on the actual production of actual things by actual people working in actual factories, and the prospects for that real economic growth are made significantly worse the longer the West persists in favoring financial asset inflation and the ossification of a low-growth status quo. While the West may be able to accept, even celebrate, unlimited private wealth – China cannot. Not if it wants to remain a politically unified Great Power. We think this is just the start of a multi-year weakening of the renminbi, a sea change in Chinese monetary policy that will inevitably create broad political tensions with the US and make Japan’s devaluation/inflation course infinitely more difficult to achieve.

All around Asia, PMIs are tumbling. The last few days saw a number of nations' manufacturing PMIs drop with the notable miraculous surge in China (at 2014 highs). Tonight saw the Services PMI side also tumbling with Australia first (at 2014 lows) and Japan fade back to 49 for its 3rd month in contraction. But (unlike the manufacturing side) China 'official' Services PMI faded from its rebound (55 vs 55.5). The drop in Services PMI makes some sense given the 8-month lows in employment indices within the manufacturing PMIs... But then the baffle 'em with total bullshit brigade arrived as Markit/HSBC unveiled their version of Services PMI which jumped to 53.1 - its biggest MoM on record - makes perfect sense.

"Wasn't me..."

Just when you thought things could not get any worse for Abe and his experimentation in monetary policy alchemy... it does. Between surging inflation and stagnant wage growth, real wages for the Japanese fell by their most since the collapse of Lehman. Even the break of a 23-month streak of base wage drops was dismissed by the government as "expected to be revised lower." As Goldman warns, downside economic risks remain high, the J-curve is 'delayed', and with tumbling cabinet approval ratings and soaring personal disapproval ratings, Abe has a major problem on his hands...

It appears it's one of those nights. In a fit of confusion, Australia's Central Bank head Glenn Stevens declared "investors are under-estimating the chance of an AUD decline" only to follow that 'jawboning' up with an explanation that he is trying "to avoid shifting language or jawboning." But then he broke the cardinal rule of central-banking - he told the truth:

*STEVENS: PEOPLE SHOULDN'T ASSUME HOUSE PRICES ALWAYS RISE

But.. but.. but... Ben Bernanke said... The AUD plunged over 50 pips on the news (but like any good central bank non-jawbone is suffering from a short half-life).

Over the past decade, the long-term trends that are destroying jobs in America have accelerated. We have seen countless numbers of jobs shipped overseas, we have seen countless numbers of jobs replaced by technology, we have seen countless numbers of jobs taken by immigrants and we have seen countless numbers of jobs lost to the overall decline of the once great U.S. economy. Unfortunately, even though we can all see this happening, our “leaders” have failed to come up with any solutions. Needless to say, all of this is absolutely eviscerating the middle class. The following are 17 facts that prove that the quality of jobs in America is going down the drain...