Archive - Jul 2015 - Story

We always keep a weather eye on the state of retail investing in the U.S.  There is, of course, the old saw that this batch of buyers doesn’t get involved until the top; therefore, it makes sense to see if they are getting too “Bulled up”. Then there is the fact that retail “Cult” stocks can hold premium valuations far longer than those without such sponsorship.

"in the 1990s, subprime borrowers typically were offered four-year car loans... Now, the standard is six years, partly because wages haven’t kept up with vehicle prices... I think that’s a good thing,... Unfortunately it seems to be painted as something bad, and I’m not sure why.”

Apple is expected to be the largest contributor to earnings growth for the Information Technology sector for Q2 2015. The blended earnings growth rate (combines actual results for companies that have reported and estimated results for companies yet to report) for the Information Technology sector is 0.2%. Exclude Apple, and the sector would report a year-over-year decline in earnings of 6.0%.

Despite the absence of bad weather, good weather, port strikes, and snow, The National Retail Federation today slashed its retail sales forecast for 2015 from 4.1% growth to just 3.5%. Sales grew at a 2.9% pace in the first half of 2015 and hope remains that the next 5 months show growth of 3.7% (with same store sales growth revised lower). The excuse reason for this markdown..."spending has been hampered by lackluster growth in our economy. Much of that blame can be shifted to Washington where too much time has been spent crafting rules and regulations that almost guarantee negative consequences for consumers and American businesses alike."

The US Treasury sold $25 billion of one-year T-bills at an interest rate of 33bps yesterday, the highest since June 2010. It appears the short-end of the yield curve is increasingly pricing in 'liftoff' sooner rather than later (and the long-end is responding by rallying - lower in yield - as medium term growth expectations fade) but it raises significant questions about the economic trajectory after the hike (and the ebbing confidence in The Fed).

Here are just two anecdotes to confirm that not virtually nobody is left to trade bonds any more (as confirmed by the plunging FICC revenues reported by the big banks in Q2), but the reason for this is that there is no bond market liquidity left, a topic extensively covered here for the past 3 years.

This seemingly inexhaustible credit line is now drying up, with severely negative consequences for oil producers with debt that's coming due. The row of dominoes swaying unsteadily in these stiff winds won't take much to topple.

Once again, US equity markets are algorithmically surging as Treasury bonds are aggressively bid. It didn't end well yesterday, and we suspect won't today either...

Despite the imploring of Greek bankers for Greeks to "take your money out of your chests and houses – which are not safe in any case – and deposit at banks," it appears the Greek bank deposit run continues. As The ECB just announced another €900 million increase in Emergency Liquidity Assistance, strongly suggesting that in the 2 days since the last increase, banks are once again insolvent facing a liquidity crunch as the "banks are trustworthy" propaganda falls on very deaf Greek ears.

Following yesterdsy's API data, DOE has confirmed a 2.5 million barrel build in crude inventory - the highest stocks of crude at this time of year in at least 80 years. This was accompanied by a very small drop in production and has squeezed WTI back below $50 (although there was an algo flash-smash up to $50.50 right after the data).

Within 50 minutes of the US cash market open, the S&P 500 has been ridiculed all the way back to unchanged - erasing all the losses from tech titan turmoil overnight. The reason is simple! USDJPY was manhandled up to 124.00 just as we predicted... the question is - how much further will the BoJ push it?

Houses have become stocks... the higher the price, the more demand (especially as the government has your back with low down-payment loans and the re-emergence of IOs). With Existing Home Sales soaring to a SAAR of 5.49 million, the highest since early 2007, the fact that median home prices are at an all-time high appears to be any problem for the releveraging American (or Chinese) homebuyer.

GREECE TSIPRAS WANTS ELECTIONS AS SOON THIRD LOAN AGREED-SRC

GREECE PM MULLS SEP 13TH OR 20TH FOR POSSIBLE SNAP POLLS-SRC

With ugliness in AAPL and MSFT, Nasdaq has gapped almost 2% lower at the open - its biggest drop since January... So what else would one expect but an algo-driven buying panic at the cash open...

"The inherent contradiction of program implementation by a government from within which the bulk of opposition originates will have to be resolved. It is unlikely that uncertainty around the stability of the Greek economy and banking system recedes until this is the case."