Archive - Oct 2015 - Story

"The system failed in 2008/09 and rather than allow a proper creative destruction cleansing, policy makers have been aggressively propping it up ever since.  We think the end game is that when the next global recession hits, then QE/zero rate world will be re-appraised."

"It's living in hell in Syria. They are living in hell," according to Donald Trump, blaming President Obama's failed policies. However, in a reversal of policy - earlier this month he told Fox News the US should take in more refugees - Trump told a New Hampshire rally: "If I win, they're going back."

Every year ending in a '5' has posted a positive return since 1875. In other words, the last 13 '5' years have left stock investors "high-fiveing" each other. However, the number of times the S&P 500 has finished the year positive - after being down 6% at end of Q3 - is ONE!

Always the silver lining... refugee housing crisis "solved"

Two years after the controversial appointment of Saudi Arabia to the U.N. Human Rights Council, leaked diplomatic cables have revealed the U.K. was a key player in the election of the Gulf State - despite the Saudis’ appalling human rights record. What is surprising is the next chapter in the farcical saga...

As Bloomberg reports, "German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government signaled it will step up expulsions of economic migrants after the influx of asylum seekers reached a record in September."

Those paying close attention to the geopolitical chess game unfolding in the Middle East might have noticed a rather amusing contradiction in Riyadh’s foreign policy stance of late...

But the question remains whether financial condition concern should manifest itself through unemployment and inflation dual mandate forecasts or be a separate consideration all together? To me, the danger in the latter is it turns central bankers into traders and market timers and that is something they are unlikely to have trained for

"Under U.S. law - the law that, not coincidentally, governs most of the world’s largest online platforms - intermediaries such as Twitter and Facebook generally can’t be held responsible for what people do on them. But the United Nations proposes both that social networks proactively police every profile and post, and that government agencies only “license” those who agree to do so." Interestingly, it appears Apple and Facebook want to get ahead of the curve and begin censoring news the U.S. government might find embarrassing right away.

Ever since The Fed began to taper QE, global manufacturing growth (as ascribed by JPMorgan's global PMI) has been falling almost incessantly. August's 50.6 print is the weakest 'expansion' since June 2013 as output fell to its lowest since April 2013 with New Orders falling.

It was all looking so good...(thanks to Dennis)

Yesterday, when the Atlanta Fed boosted its Q3 GDP tracker from 1.4% to 1.8%, the permabulls were crowing how the global recession has been called off. We are confident they will be mysteriously mute, however, following today's dramatic revision lower which cut the number for the current quarter by half to just 0.9% as a result of the previously reported tumble in the advance report on U.S. international trade which slashed the Atlanta Fed's model contribution of net exports to third-quarter real GDP growth by 0.7 percentage points to -0.9%.

In August, hedge funds blamed risk-parity funds for their dramatic underperformance. In September, the underperformance continued however this time, with risk-parity funds supposedly buying stocks, one can't blame them. To be sure, some such as Ackman whose 20 million shares of Valeant are hurting badly, will blame the Martin Shkrelis of the world for the biggest biotech tumble in years, but others may have to bite the bullet and admit it is their own lack of ability to come up with alpha in a centrally-planned "market" that is the reason.