Archive - Jan 28, 2015 - Story

The Board of Directors of McDonald's Corporation today announced that Don Thompson will retire as President and Chief Executive Officer and as a member of the Board of Directors after nearly 25 years of service to the company, effective March 1. The Board has elected Steve Easterbrook to replace Thompson as President and CEO. Easterbrook was also elected to the Board of Directors, filling the vacancy created by Thompson.

A "Robbing" hood...

Facebook reported $1,133 billion in GAAP earnings: exactly the same as a year ago. What happened to non-GAAP income from operations during the same period? It rose from $1.5 billion to $2.2 billion. Again: this is in a period in which GAAP income remained unchanged!

It didn't take long for Syriza to start making changes in Greece. While these may be minor at the margin compared to the debt "issues", as KeepTalkingGreece reports, Alexis Tsipras and his junior coalition partner Panos Kammenos pushed the Fast Forward button to restore a series of so-called “reforms”, that is austerity measures imposed by the country’s lenders, the Troika - among the left-wing reforms are: scrapping planned privatizations, scrapping fees in public hospitals and prescriptions, restore “the 13th pension” for low-pensioners and other actions that SYRIZA had promised before the elections. And the iron barricades in front of Parliament have been removed.

"Eighty people hold the same amount of wealth as the world’s 3.6 billion poorest people, according to an analysis just released from Oxfam. The report from the global anti-poverty organization finds that since 2009, the wealth of those 80 richest has doubled in nominal terms — while the wealth of the poorest 50 percent of the world’s population has fallen." There you have it. The reason the wealth of the richest has doubled since 2009, is because “it’s not a recession, it’s a robbery.” Central bank and government policy has done this, it is no accident.

While the Fed is clearly hinting that lower crude inflation doesn't bother it because "recent declines in energy prices have boosted household purchasing power" and is generally more hawkish on the economy and the labor force, the clearest message from the Fed is simple: or so it would like to convey. At 569 this was the shortest FOMC statement since November 2012! Which can only mean one thing: an attempt at renormalization, if only for now.

One way or another this is going to get wild... As Nanex exposes, liquidity in the S&P 500 e-mini futures contract (the most liquid equity trading vehicle) is the lowest it has ever been on an FOMC Day...

The 4 key phrases from today's FOMC Statement are:

"Strong Jobs Gains" instead of "Solid Job Gains", and "Considerable time" sentence dropped entirely
"Solid Pace" instead of "Moderate Pace" For Economy, and added "Inflation is anticipated to decline further in the near term" as new language

And voila, a hawkish policy statement... sending stocks, crude, and bond yields plunging on the news.

With all eyes firmly focused on the words "patient" on rate hikes, "considerable" period of lower rates, and "transitory" oil-driven deflation, The FOMC did not disappoint

• *FED REPEATS IT CAN BE PATIENT IN STARTING TO RAISE RATES, ECONOMY HAS BEEN  `EXPANDING AT A SOLID PACE'
• *FED CITES `STRONG JOB GAINS' AND LOWER UNEMPLOYMENT RATE
  
• *FED SAYS INFLATION EXPECTED TO DECLINE FURTHER IN NEAR TERM

So shrugging off the global tumult, The Fed appears set to raise rates no matter what to remove themselves from the corner they are stuck in, wary of what they can do when the next 'event' hits home.

Pre-FOMC: S&P Futs 2024.50, Gold $1286, 10Y 1.778%, EURUSD 1.1339, Dec15 ED 99.285. Full redline below.

In what appears perfect timing, US inflation expectations (as measure by the market) have plunged to post-Lehman plunge lows - falling further even after The ECB unleashed Q€ last week... we are sure The Fed will be 'patient' and dismiss this as a good dis-inflationary trend that is merely 'transitory' but isn't it ironic...

2014 was "relatively easier," as the pre-determined pace of tapering had The Fed on auto-pilot last year. However, as WSJ's Jon Hilsenrath warns, Janet Yellen ’s job is about to get harder. Hinting that The FOMC is likely to remain "patient" in deciding when to start raising short-term interest rates later this year (and markets have started to price in lower for longer-er following recent macro weakness domestically and abroad). Juxtaposed against a mixed picture of the economy is concerns of being boxed in at ZIRP should another economic downturn arrive. However, as III Associates notes, it is the communications challenge for The Fed that is most problematic, "it has been nine years since the last rate hike, and I’d estimate about a third of those working on trading floors have never witnessed one."

If anyone is seeing a rate hike announcement on the imminent horizon, it sure isn't the exuberant buyers of today's 2 Year auction.

To say that Zimbabwe has not had much luck in its recent, post Robert Mugabe-goes-berserk, history with fiat money is putting it lightly. But did you know that with gold trading at prevailing depressed prices, driven over the past several years not by physical demand but by paper supply, Zimbabwe is about to have another "money" moment, only this time not with fiat but with real money. The reason: the same one why every so often we show the gold cost curve: because some miners simply can not continue operating if the "market" price of gold, with or without central bank and BIS intervention, is below their blended cost. Unfortunately for the south African country, the cost curve of the entire Zimbabwe gold mining industry is on the wrong side of the gold price line.

Which is better: a stronger dollar or a weaker dollar? You decide...

"When it gets serious, you have to lie," were the infamous words of one J-C Juncker and today - following the 40-50% collapse in Greek Bank equity capital this week,ECB's Bank Supervision boss Nouy has come out to calm everything down:

*NOUY SAYS GREEK BANKS ARE 'PRETTY STRONG',  HAVE STRENGTHENED THEIR BALANCE SHEETS
*ECB'S NOUY SAYS GREEK BANKS WILL SURVIVE CURRENT CRISIS

Which, translated for the elites means, "sell-sell-sell." And then - just to add even more pressure, S&P puts Greece on Watch Negative.