India

It was a tale of two markets overnight: Asia first - where all commodity hell broke loose - and then Europe (and the US), where central banks did everything they could to stabilize the already terrible sentiment.

There’s an enormous and growing disconnect between the cash and physical markets for gold. This is exactly what we would expect to precede a major market-shaking event based on a physical gold shortage.

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Neoliberal economics is blind to reality and serves to justify the destruction of the economic prospects of the Western World. It remains to be seen if Russia and China can develop a different economics or whether these rising superpowers will fall victim to the “junk economics” that has destroyed the West. With so many Chinese and Russian economists educated in the US tradition, the prospects of Russia and China might not be any better than ours. The entire world could go down the tubes together.

"...there’s an enormous and growing disconnect between the cash and physical markets for gold. This is exactly what we would expect to precede a major market-shaking event based on a physical gold shortage."

Forget currency collapses, capital outflows, crashing confidence, and current account carnage, there is one major reason why Brazil - no matter what - will not bounce back quickly...

When will the “nothing is happening” crowd finally wake up?

The evening started on a high note when Janet Yellen's survival giving a speech warranted a 100 point rip in Dow futures (and USD strength). Then Japan stepped up with its first deflationary CPI print since April 2013 (which of course was met with stock-buying because moar QQE is overdue but that soon faded). EM FX is tumbling further (with Malaysia leading the charge). Chinese credit risk jumps tro a new 2 year high (as SHIBOR remains entirely manipulated flat) as China halts its 4-day devaluation with a tiny nudge stronger in the Yuan fix.

Oe of the most surprising developments in recent months has been the relative scarcity of any high-profile commodity blow-ups or trader snafus, despite the tumbling commodity prices. That changed today when Dutch grain-trading firm, Nidera BV (whose name is an acronym consisting of the countries in which it operates: Netherlands, India, Deutschland, England, Russia, Argentina) has suffered a crushing blow as a result of a "rogue trader" whose actions led to "significant losses" in the company's biofuels business. Nidera CEO Ton van der Laan said the grain-trading house has since exited the biofuels business and closed all the deals linked to the losses. "There is a significant loss."

The global race to the bottom continued on Thursday as Norway and Taiwan moved to cut rates sending NOK plunging to its weakest level against the dollar in 13 years and pressing Tawain dollar forwards to six year lows. 

Palladium surged 6% yesterday. The move appeared to be a short squeeze and may be the precursor for the long awaited move higher in gold and silver.

"Softer growth prospects for the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and India, and a slow recovery in the major industrial economies, will combine to push growth in developing Asia for 2015 and 2016 below previous projections."

After 35 years of falling and now zero rates, the direction is only up for the cost of money, as is the cost to service debt, along with the burden to those who are most indebted (i.e. the U.S.). What should no longer be unthinkable is that the clock is ticking on America’s status as the holder of the reserve currency. If you still doubt this proposition, consider that China is in the process of setting up a third benchmark for oil, along with Brent and West Texas Intermediate, for trading oil futures contracts. And unlike the existing contracts, these will be traded in Renminbi. Who needs the dollar?

Most economists and financial analysts think that 'currency war' merely refers to the competitive devaluations that nations sometimes engage in to help boost their domestic economies, as they had done in the 1930's for example. This time the currency war is a much more profound confrontation of differing agendas revolving around the historically unusual role of the US dollar, based on nothing more than the will of the Federal Reserve and the 'full faith and credit' of the US, as the reserve currency for global central banks and international trade.

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