Archive - Nov 27, 2015 - Story

With the world closest to World War 3 since the cold war era and Russia about to unleash escalating sanctions of Turkey, it makes perfect sense that 'investors' would want to purge themselves of precious metals. Someone decided that Friday after Thanksgiving would be the perfect time to dump over 18,000 contracts (around $1.9 billion notional) sending the price of gold futures to their lowest since Oct 2010, below what Goldman called a "crucial level."

Having announced in two brief tweets on Thanksgiving - just as we warned was very possible - that he would pull his shares from being available-to-lend, Martin Shrekli has sent the meteoric Volkswagen-like trajectory of KaleBios vertical once again. With short-interest having surged to 49% (from 5.6%), the yanking of his loanable shares has sent KBIO up 65% in the pre-market, back above $45 (from just 45c 10 days ago).

From witch hunts to corporate defaults to abysmal data, Friday marked a rather unceremonious end to the week for China, as a veritable perfect storm of bad news sent the SHCOMP reeling. Unfortunately for China's day trading masses the plunge protection team was, like Guotai Junan International Holdings’ CEO Yim Fung, "missing" in action.

• Russia Takes Aim at Turkish Economy Amid Fighter-Jet Spat (WSJ)
• ‘Commercial scale’ oil smuggling into Turkey becomes priority target of anti-ISIS strikes (RT)
• Russia-Turkey Ties Are Headed Into a Deep Freeze (WSJ)
• France signals softer stance on Assad after Russia talks (FT)
• China Calm Shattered as Brokerage Probe Sparks Selloff in Stocks (BBG)
• China Stock Bulls Hit Breaking Point as State Dials Back Support (BBG)
• China's Bond Stresses Mount as Two More Companies Flag Concerns (BBG)

After several months of artificial, centrally-planned calm in Chinese markets, where "malicious sellers" found out the hard way the Politburo means business, overnight the relative quiet in Chinese stocks since August broke with a bang when the Shanghai Composite tumbled as much 6.1% before closing down 5.5%, the biggest drop in three months and the largest weekly loss since the depth of the Chinese rout in mid-August while a gauge of Chinese volatility surged from the lowest level since March.