Quarter End Markup Begins in Earnst

Very predictable to see the "DaBoyz" use the light volume session today to mark everything up for Quarter End, re-substantiate Bernanke, Geithner, LLP as the leader of the "G-String" (aka G20) oligarchy, and blow up some GridBot and Forex Megadroid players at the same time.

Anyone see the Forex action last night?  Wild, unpredictable moves everywhere, like watching all the 300:1 leveraged FX gamers trying to hold on to a giant piece of vibrating sheet metal.

And the stock futures were weak with Asian trading, but "The Team" showed up at 5:00am with the obligatory Spoos Buying Spree, and as soon as the market opened, various financial stocks went vertical, like Hartford:

And the XLF, RKH, KRE, etc. were all jimmied up, since their survival is of critical importance to the survival of the quadrillion in derivatives bets being housed inside the JPM, BAC, and C towers.

And, of course, you had the normal and usual jam jobs in the junkers, like the mortgage insurers, as many are attempting to "make their year" in the last two days of trading.

And don't forget the bonds, which were also skied along with stocks, as another few billion of new debt to be floated will be coming up later this week.

Remember, the slightest hint of stock weakness, dollar strength, etc. will turn the wildebeest herd back into bonds to drive yields down even further to entice more people to buy a new "McBox" with a freshly printed 4.95% mortgage to be gobbled up on the Fed's balance sheet.

Its all part of the choreographed, seamlessly executed "Wash, Rinse, Repeat" cycle to grease the Perpetual Motion Machine...

Comments

[Anonymous]

Seems plausable as the equity markets have decided to ignore the $US strenght

[RobotTrader]

Even High Yield Junk was floated up today...

[Anonymous]

I'm short financials. When does this misery end?

[RobotTrader]

Trillions in deficits?

$200 billion per month of new debt to float each month?

Ahh, no problem!!!  Look at these rates!!

3-Month 0.000 12/24/2009 0.08
/
.09 -0.01 / -.010 15:30 6-Month 0.000 03/25/2010 0.17
/
.17 -0.015 / -.015 15:29 12-Month 0.000 09/23/2010 0.37
/
.38 -0.019 / -.019 15:24 2-Year 1.000 09/30/2011 100-01+
/
.97 0-01 / -.016 15:31 3-Year 1.375 09/15/2012 99-25½
/
1.45 0-02 / -.022 15:37 5-Year 2.375 09/30/2014 100-07
/
2.33 0-05½ / -.037 15:37 7-Year 3.000 09/30/2016 100-12
/
2.94 0-07½ / -.037 15:37 10-Year 3.625 08/15/2019 102-27+
/
3.28 0-10 / -.035 15:37 30-Year 4.500 08/15/2039 108-04½
/
4.03 1-04 / -.061 15:37

[Ruth]

Great, poker face

[Gordon_Gekko]

I bet that's what he actually looks like...when he removes his mask at the private FOMC meetings.

[Anonymous]

whoa...

the BEARD is WEIRD

[blackebitda]

ROFLMFAO

[Anonymous]

ok, from a clueless blue-collar russian guy trying to make out this market mess and hedge the risk of his own currency devaluation and saving his small pile in dollars - when should i sell them off? and what get instead?

[Gordon_Gekko]

Sell it ALL now, and buy Gold with it.

[Comrade de Chaos]

:)

"when should i sell them off?"

"when" is speculation (used to blow bubbles)

"if" is hedging (used to plan/match expenditures in near future)

just making sure you realize the difference between the two. And ether one implies significant risks.

[Anonymous]

not really. just trying to choose roubles or dollar to retain buying value in the long term.

[Comrade de Chaos]

the good answer is beyond one paragraph reply, will try to be short. It depends on where you live & when will you need the money.

If you live in CA (California LoL) and are paranoid about inflation while can not trust the US government, your best bet would be a bucket of TIPS and their European counterparts plus 10 -15% in the index of commodities. However you have to remember that potential deflation WILL reduce the principal value of your portfolio. So it's wise to keep in mind the approximate VaR (value at risk) of your total principle in order to make sure you'll have your future expense (or similar) covered.

Just trying to chose between dollars and rubles is not a good hedge against value loss.

Also, it makes sense to be patient because high inflation will no come overnight and will be visible in the producer/consumer price index reports and rising interest rates.

If you live in Russia, your choices might be limited to investing into the basket of various currencies, unless you are loaded. If you have plenty of capital, it might make sense to take a trip to Austria or similar country and move some of your money there (that's what a friend of mine did.) However I would never take an advice from a personal banker down there at the face value, because those could be sleazier than your average MER broker.

[Anonymous]

Russia has 13% flat tax, Iran, oil and gas, record trade surplus reserves and a world leading RTS market that
doubled this year.

30% of her reserves are in US Treasuries.

Sell the Ruble, buy the dollar...

http://stockcharts.com/def/servlet/Favorites.CServlet?obj=ID3251493

[Comrade de Chaos]

NVAX

robo, i am pretty sure you were behind that one (classic rinse, wash, reload cycle)

AWSOMO is so happy today.

[RobotTrader]

Sorry...

I don't chase these biotech screamers.

It would be akin to me attempting to chase down an 18-year old Hollywood wanna-be actress running in between the rehab clinic in Malibu and the beach house of a leading film producer.

My odds of scoring that are slim to none....

I trade big cap S & P 500 stocks only.

[Anonymous]

If you're looking for a screamer you can have my wife.

[Pondmaster]

At least the Swine flu plays have fundamental panic backing them up , while the rest , well , fundamental manipulation - pick your  source of that . Just wacthing this market in amazement . An old sage once said "Don't analyze .. Utilize !" Applied to markets that would mean BE IN IT . Am fading that advice .

[Comrade de Chaos]

Chuck N doesn't chase returns, returns chase him.

(I don't trade much, thanks but no thanks; most of what I do is modern portfolio / strategic asset allocations; So naturally I am hibernating till the next spring. )

p.s. I am just passively following bio, have a positive bias toward those due to my past employment history; making a shopping list for the time when the current social experiment is over.... Cute, especially when you don't hear "I am like totally OMG."

[Anonymous]

another classic from RoboT! thanks.

[lizzy36]

mbia downgraded by s&p to junk.

should be up 40%-50% tomorrow.

[ghostfaceinvestah]

That whole sector is ridiculous.  PMI, the stock RT mentioned, is likely going to be forced to stop writing new business soon.  In my job I have to talk to my counterparts at Fannie and Freddie occassionally, and they expect one or more of the MI companies are going to go out of business before this is over, "unless things turn around quick", which they aren't in the housing market.

ABK has a market cap of a few hundred million, and they are involvent as well.

Things like that indicate to me this rally is just like fall 2001 - a rebound rally based on irrational optimism and previous-high anchoring.  Forget about "the market", look at the individual names.  Many of them are trading at insane equity valuations relative to business prospects.

AIG, FNM, FRE, C were 25% of NYSE volume in August.  'Nuff said.

[Anonymous]

.

Liz - you have the shortest posts -yet the most witty. The humor here is even better than rt's girly pics IMO.
(not that I don't enjoy them)

.

[Spartacus]

Lizzy remains the wittiest of them all. hers' is a class act. very impressed.

Cheers

[RobotTrader]

[Grog]

What I really like are the bills under 6 months.

10/29/09 were offered at 0.00 today.  Bid at 0.01. 

Nice work as always, Robo.

[gookempucky]

Missed the star trek show robo-must have been after 10 central as I needed to cut some zzzzzzzzzz----funny thing though the national debt clock was at 11 tril 842 billion ---at 6am this morn it had taken a 60 billion haircut and stood at 11 trill 782 billion---but wait the US trade deficit was at 348 billion last night and low and behold it now stands at 260 billion-----is it live or is it memorex ??? doesnt matter the burn rate is still 1.8 million a minute--warp factor 1 trillion Scotty.

I'll stand by my date of Nov 6 for the twelve Trillion dollar breach--wish me luck.

Everybody needs a Robo in the household......

[Anonymous]

OMFG. Please don't ever post a picture like that again without proper warning. Good thing there are no children on this site.

[London Banker]

I commented something very similar very early this morning on the USD Strength thread.  I suggested we were being set up for a replay of the September-October collapse last year - with a very strong dollar out the crash.

The power to call margin is the power to destroy.  In leveraged markets, the withdrawal of leverage necessitates collapse as forced selling wipes out value.  Those destroyed on the downswing lose all their assets as collateral to the creditor bank.  Those assets are held and then sold on the next rally.  Lather, rinse, repeat = perpetual motion profit machine for a more and more concentrated and powerful financial elite.

Virtually all margin under global standard derivatives, prime brokerage and securities lending agreements is in US dollar.  The result of a margin call by the prime brokers and major investment banks is therefore a sudden, sharp demand for US  dollars to prevent default. 

Foreign assets are sold and the proceeds swapped into dollars to meet the margin call.  Foreign assets and currencies crash, dollar strengthens.

Look at October 2008 for the template.  Prime brokers discreetly raised margin on PB clients from an average of 15 percent to an average 35 percent.  Because all PB is unreported bilateral business, there was no public announcement of this and no public record of this.  All the public saw was the crash of global asset markets and a rapidly strenghtening US dollar.

[Anonymous]

Robo,
Try DDRX the ultimate JohnnyWaddHolmes Boner Vehicle.
Look at it today. Always buy its selloffs and crashes is
a basic gaming strategy, then turn away, go to Church and
come back in 3 days. Then take proceeds to Vegas,Europe,Thailand or wherever. buddha