Federal Reserve

Importantly, while the "bias" of the market is to the upside, primarily due to the psychological momentum that "stocks are the only game in town," the mounting risks are clearly evident. From economic to earnings-related weakness, the "bullish underpinnings" are slowly being chipped away.

The sums in play are so staggering (an estimated $11 trillion in emerging market debts denominated in other currencies) that even the Fed won't be able to stop the meltdown.

Janet Yellen’s astonishing letter to the Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, is a sign that the central bank is panicking over the fact that Congress is unhappy with the job it has been doing.

Futures are modestly higher in early trading having tracked the USDJPY once again almost tick for tick, with the carry trade of choice rising to 123 shortly after Mario Draghi's latest speech pushed the dollar strong initially only to see most gains promptly evaporate against both the Yen and the Euro. European shares are likewise little changed, after gaining earlier, while Asian stocks rise; oil also advanced in early trading only to drop to its lowest overnight level moments ago, a few dimes over $40, with aluminum and copper both posting modest increases.

"If you just exclude all the bad stuff, earnings look quite good."

There is no way Fed policy can be win-win-win for all participants.

"The reason for our recession concern is not so much because of what the Fed is about to do – likely embark on a slow hiking cycle beginning in December – but because it did not start the tightening much sooner."

The Fed was out in force yesterday peddling some pretty heavy-duty malarkey about the up-coming rate liftoff at the December meeting..."If we begin to raise interest rates, that’s a good thing." That’s not a bad thing." Goldman is putting out the final mullet call for this Bubble Cycle because it knows that this bull is dying; that insiders still have massive amounts of stock winnings to unload; and that the clock is fast running out. The expiring clock is evident in the S&P 500’s one-year round trip to nowhere. Despite the fact that the Fed has ponied-up a stick save at every single meeting this year, the market’s 27 separate efforts to rally have all failed for the simple reason that the jig is up.

Moments ago, the in a 241-185 vote, the House passed passed H.R. 3189, aka  Fed Oversight Reform and Modernization Act. The bill would make changes to how the Fed conducts monetary policy and regulatory activities and would direct the Fed to take a rules-based approach to interest rate decisions; require audits of more Fed functions such as monetary policy; and place restrictions on its emergency lending powers. In other words, everything that the banks that are direct and indirect stakeholders in the Fed would fight to the death to prevent.

There are seemingly always “good reasons” why troubles in a sector of the credit markets are supposed to be ignored – or so people are telling us, every single time. Some still recall how the developing problems in the sub-prime sector of the mortgage credit market were greeted by officials and countless market observers in the beginning in 2007. Meanwhile, the foundation of the economy continues to look rotten (the newest round of Fed surveys has begun with another bomb and other manufacturing-related data continue to disappoint as well). This isn’t going to end well, if history is any guide.

Presenting 8 charts that proof Wall Street pundits are (mostly) WRONG...

If the U.S. economy really is in “great shape”, then why do all of the numbers keep telling us that we are in a recession? In 2008, stocks didn’t crash until well after the U.S. economy as a whole started crashing, and the same thing is apparently happening this time around as well.

Central planners around the world are waging a War on Cash because, as Ron Paul so eloquently put it "the cashless society is the [government]’s dream: total knowledge of, and control over, the finances of every single [citizen]." It is perhaps ironic then that Sweden, which became the first country in Europe to issue paper money in 1661, is probably going to be the first in the world to entirely eliminate it.

"Federal Reserve officials meeting last month anticipated it “could well be” time to raise short-term interest rates at a December policy meeting after keeping them pinned near zero for seven years. Fed officials thus decided to change the wording of their Oct. 28 policy statement to ensure their options were open for a move in December, according to minutes of the October meeting released Wednesday with the regular three-week lag."