Archive - Nov 18, 2015 - Story

“Do not involve Sales in anyway [sic] whatsoever.  In fact avoid mentioning the existence of the whole BATS Last Look functionality.  If you get enquiries just obfuscate and stonewall.... for the future, sales absolutely 100% do not know about the existence of last look and it shouldn’t be a concern for them...  IF any client does call up about a rejected trade . . . it is important that you state in any communication ‘THE TRADE WAS REJECTED BECAUSE OF LATENCY.’ . . . DO NOT talk about P&L on trades."

Charlie Sheen’s announcement that he is HIV positive has created a huge uproar as critics attack him from every direction, but the truth is that Charlie Sheen is simply a reflection of our society as a whole.  You see, the truth is that it isn’t just big Hollywood stars that are engaged in risky sexual behavior.  According to the CDC, there are 110 million cases of sexually-transmitted disease in America today, and another 20 million STD cases are added to that total every year.  The United States has the highest STD infection rate in the entire industrialized world, and more than half of all Americans will have a sexually-transmitted disease at some point during their lives..."the increases are quite alarming." 

Massive excess supply, storage filling rapidly, production near record levels all appear to be trumping any 'war' premium as WTI has now erased all of the post-Paris gains after DOE confirmed surging inventories continue...

With poll numbers plunging, it is hardly surprising that Chris Christie would come out swinging in the aftermath of the French attacks and while his comments this morning during a Fox News interview are rather astonishingly frank, they are not entirely without merit as the Obama administration appears to tumble from pillar to post with regard foreign policy and specifically ISIS. Remarking on John Kerry's comment that the terror attacks in Paris lacked the "rationale" of the assault earlier this year on the staff of 'Charlie Hebdo', Chistie exclaimed the Secretary of State should "get some sleep and shut up," adding that President Obama "was living in a fantasy land" and should focus on protecting the U.S., not helping Syrian refugees.

Overnight none other than the German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said that the "Syrian passport found next to a suicide bomber in the Paris terror attacks may have been planted." “There are indications that this was a planted lead, but it still can’t be ruled out that this was indeed an IS terrorist posing as a refugee,” he told reporters in Berlin on Tuesday, referring to Islamic State, which France blames for organizing the violence.

"I am now reasonably satisfied the market situation has settled down... So I am comfortable with moving off zero soon..."

Amid souring bets on Brazil and the general malaise across EM, PIMCO has been dethroned as the king of emerging market bonds. A fund run by Ireland-incorporated Stone Harbor has overtaken PIMCO's EM Local Bond Fund as the world's largest emerging market fixed income fund by AUM as rollercoaster bets on Brazil and the departure of both El-Erian and Gross weighs on investor sentiment.

You didn’t think the surveillance state would give up that easily did you? Of course not. Unsurprisingly, fresh off the heels of the Paris terror attacks, the usual authoritarian suspects in the U.S. government are running around exploiting the tragedy in a bid to further erode privacy and civil liberties.

The Fed's Bill Dudley confirmed this morning why The Fed is so keen to raise rates no matter what - "liftoff will signal The Fed's confidence in the US economy." In other words, the 'con' continues... We have two simple questions - 1) Given the chart below, which 'economy' is The Fed confident in? and 2) What is The Fed going to say when they reverse the rate hike (as we have seen with every nation who has tried to raise rates since 2010)?

Following last night's API-reported surprise inventory draw (but major Cushing build), DOE reports a modest (as expected) inventory build (of 252k barrels) - the 8th week in a row. Most crucially, given rising fears of the fullness of land storage capabilities, is DOE confirmed a significant 1.495mm barrel inventory build at Cushing. Total crude produiction fell a tiny amount (after 3 weeks of rising). WTI Crude oscillated a little before timbling back to a $40 handle once again - erasing the API kneejerk gains.

On Monday, nearly as soon as the markets opened, stocks for weapons manufacturers began to soar. In fact, it could be argued that the financial incentive created by both the weapons industry and the plunder of foreign resources, is what drives governments to war to begin with. In fact, a recent study proved that resource-rich nations are 100 times more likely to have a foreign power intervene in their internal conflicts.

Is the US about to go Icelandic (or Chinese) on Wall Street executives for their role in packaging bad mortgages in the lead up to the financial crisis? Probably not, but at least we can pretend...

Sure, the stock market had a great October with the Dow Jones Industrial Average jumping by 8.5%, but the disconnect between Wall Street and Main Street is too stark to ignore, and the Federal Reserve is about to pop the easy-money financial bubble.

BlackRock Inc., the world’s largest asset manager, is winding down a global macro hedge fund after losses and investor redemptions eroded assets. The reason for the liquidation: losses of 9.4% this year, cited by Bloomberg according to an October investor document, leading to the worst year for the asset manager since inception in 2003. The fund, which had $4.6 billion in assets just two years ago, has shrunk to less than $1 billion as of Nov. 1.

"... any time and every time we find ourselves philosophically dubious of what is going on and have attempted to take a bearish view our hands are slapped; our margins are depleted and our psyche struck down... We’ve no choice then but to see in the “reversals” that took place on Monday the propensity still for the markets to head higher. Indeed, they may go parabolically so as the shorts run for cover and as those left behind rush to be included."