Bond

News That Matters

Despite The Fed's best efforts to crush the business cycle, the crucial credit-cycle has reared its ugly head as releveraging firms (gotta fund those buybacks) and deflationary pressures (liabilities fixed, assets tumble) have led to a soaring market cost of capital and surge in downgrades. In fact, in the latest quarter, the ratio of upgrades-to-downgrades is its weakest since the peak of the financial crisis in 2009. “We’re seeing more widespread weakness across more industry sectors in the U.S... It’s become broader than just the commodity story.”

As Allianz latest survey notes, 61% of all middle-class Americans, across all income levels included in the survey, admit "they are not sacrificing 'a lot' to save for retirement," which is a major problem as, assuming 2% inflation (the Fed's current target) when millennials enter retirement, they will need to withdraw about $270,000 per year from their retirement plans.

We think the market may have gotten ahead of itself, accepting the narrative that the Fed will raise rates as many other countries ease. We believe the market is gradually realizing that the Fed is far less flexible than it hoped it would be, thus causing a re-pricing of expectations. We don't think this will necessarily change the Fed's "desire" to pursue an exit. This re-pricing of expectations may have profound implications for the U.S. dollar, and with it, the price of gold.

Some things you CAN see coming, in life and certainly in finance. Quite a few things, actually. Once you understand we’re on a long term downward path, also both in life and in finance, and you’re not exclusively looking at short term gains, it all sort of falls into place. Of course, the entire global economy has been hanging together with strands of duct tape for decades now, but hey, it looks good as long as you don’t take a peek behind the facade, right?

In medicine, they have something called the Hippocratic Oath. It requires physicians to swear to uphold certain ethical standards. In modern fund management, there is no Hippocratic Oath. Whereas doctors are expected to “First, do no harm”, in modern fund management, iatrogenic illnesses hold sway. An iatrogenic illness is one that is caused by the physician himself. Fund management doctors seem to be doing the best they can to kill their own patients. Science has a word for this, too. It’s called parasite. There is a solution to all this insanity.

• Playboy to Drop Nudity as Internet Fills Demand (NYT)
• Stock futures fall on weak China trade data (Reuters)
• Any Hall is down 20% YTD (WSJ)
• Global Stocks Slide With Metals After Chinese Imports Tumble (BBG)
• Clinton's tack to the left to be on display in Democratic debate (Reuters)
• Switzerland Said to Impose 5% Leverage Ratio on Big Banks (BBG)
• AB InBev, SABMiller brew up $100 billion deal (Reuters)

With JNJ about to announce - what are almost certain to be very bad - earnings in just over an hour, the company decided it was prudent to set the mood by preannouncing, less than an hour before earnings, good days are back again and that the company will do all in its power to not only increase the buyback pardon equity-linked compensation of CEO Alex Gorsky, but to reward shareholders for sticking with a company that hasn't announced a major buyback plan in recent months.

For the past two weeks, the thinking probably went that if only the biggest short squeeze in history and the most "whiplashy" move since 2009 sends stocks high enough, the global economy will forget it is grinding toward recession with each passing day (and that the Fed are just looking for a 2-handle on the S&P and a 1-handle on the VIX before resuming with the rate hike rhetoric). Unfortunately, that's not how it worked out, and overnight we got abysmal economic data first from China, whose imports imploded, then the UK, which posted its first deflation CPI print since April, and finally from Germany, where the ZEW expectation surve tumbled from 12.1 to barely positive, printing at just 1.9 far below the 6.5 expected.

"I heard time and again this week from governors of emerging-market central banks that it’s not the hike itself that worries them. It’s how much and when it occurs." "Delaying an increase in rates only increases volatility and uncertainty in emerging markets."

News That Matters

"It's really beginning to 'feel' close. The first major event could happen anytime now." The coming storm promises to be the largest of our lifetime. We shall all be affected by it. A few will profit from it. Some will be mildly negatively impacted; most will be hit hard, due to being unprepared.

If we don't prepare for the coming high tide, we may all drift out to sea.