Institutional Investors

First it was humans. Now it is vaccum tubes.

Among those who’ll get to eat the losses: unsuspecting retail investors.

It was just one short month ago when, on the back of the soaring dollar (which has since soared even more), as well as "diminished global GDP growth and lower crude prices", Goldman's David Kostin cut his EPS for 2015 and 2016 from $125 and $132 to $122 and $131. Then, it was just two short weeks ago, the same David Kostin said "we expect the P/E will contract and the index will slip during the second-half of 2015 as the Fed takes its first step in the long-awaited tightening cycle. Our S&P 500 year-end 2015 target of 2100 implies a modest 5-10% P/E multiple compression to 16.0x our top-down 2016 EPS estimate or 14.6x bottom-up consensus earnings estimates." And then, with the S&P now about 20 points away from Goldman's 2015 year end target (and just 120 points from the government-backed hedge fund's 2016 year end target!), the very same David Kostin admits that he was only kidding and that the S&P may in fact rise to a whopping 2300 in the coming year...

In any economy, nothing works in isolation. For every dollar increase that occurs in one part of the economy, there is a dollars worth of reduction somewhere else. The real issue is what the fall in commodities in general, including oil, is telling us about the real state of the economy.

The Fed can do only do two concrete things to influence these income and credit sources of spending - both of which are unsustainable, dangerous and an assault on free market capitalism’s capacity to generate growth and wealth. It can induce households to consume a higher fraction of current income by radically suppressing interest rates on liquid savings. And it can inject reserves into the financial system to induce higher levels of credit creation. But the passage of time soon catches up with both of these parlor tricks.

A little over a year ago, we presented a "Yellow" asset, which was "the best performer of the past year." It wasn't gold: it was yellow cab medallions.  As we wrote then, "the best returning asset class traded in the NY Metro area is yellow but doesn't change hands on Wall Street.... over the last 12 months New York City taxi medallions have risen 49% in price, besting the relatively humdrum returns of the S&P 500 (up 21%), the NASDAQ (22%) and the Dow (18%).  Medallions – essentially the right to operate a for-hail taxi in New York City – now trade for as much as $1.3 million, an all-time record."  In retrospect it was also the perfect time to cash out on the "yellow" euphoria. According to the NYT, "the average price of an individual New York City taxi medallion fell to $872,000 in October, down 17 percent from a peak reached in the spring of 2013, according to an analysis of sales data. Previous figures published by the city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission — showing flat prices — appear to have been incorrect, and the commission removed them from its website after an inquiry from The New York Times."

A few points the "stocks are cheap" crowd should consider.

‘Punishment Interest,’ as Germans call it with Teutonic precision, becomes a pandemic.

While Wall Street is certainly free to broken record that Michael Lewis' hugely popular story about HFT and market rigging did not impact the natural course of events, the reality is it did: the collapse in Barclays' dark pool LX (shown in the bolded red line on the chart below), in the aftermath of the NY AG case against the British bank, has been documented in the past, and is just one example. An even more vivid case study comes from the surge in popularity of upstart dark pool IEX (green dotted line below), the protagonist of Lewis' Flash Boys book, and which out of nowhere, has just tied with Lavaflow's dark pool for fourth spot in ATS trading with just over 200 million shares in the week ended October 27. The catalyst? Norway's sovereign wealth fund just said not to HFT parasites.

As Europe gets hungrier and hungrier for a feel-good story, as Brussels longs more and more for a poster child for its 'crisis management' efforts of 2008-2013, as Dublin politicians get closer and closer to facing the crisis-hit electorate, the sunshine being lavished by politicians and the media onto Ireland's economy is likely to get only brighter. It might not feel much warmer, though, on the ground. Nor will it stave off the onset of winter.

Success in investing, in other words, comes not from over-reach, in straining to make the winning shot, but simply through the avoidance of easy errors. There is now a grave risk that an overzealous commitment to benchmarking is about to lead hundreds of billions of dollars of invested capital off a cliff. When a sufficient number of elephants start charging inelegantly towards the door, not all of them will make it through unscathed.

• Obama urges China to be partner in ensuring world order (Reuters)
• China Sees Itself at Center of New Asian Order (WSJ)
• Xi Dangles $1.25 Trillion as China Counters U.S. Refocus (BBG)
• China's Xi, Japan's Abe hold landmark meeting after awkward handshake (Reuters)
• Revenue Softness Worries Stock Investors (WSJ)
• How BOJ’s Kuroda Won the Vote for Stimulus Expansion (WSJ)
• Bonus Season Brings More Pain for Traders (WSJ)
• Russia’s Military Encounters Risk Clash in Europe (BBG)

These people know the gravy train is about to run off the rails and they’re looking for safety. They don’t care if they miss out on another 5% gain in the stock market, they want to get out of stocks NOW.

• Fed set to end one crisis chapter even as global risks rise (Reuters)... you mean, for the third time?
• Insider-Trading Probe Focuses on Medicare Agency (WSJ)
• He's sorry: Rajoy Apologizes as New Wave of Graft Allegations Hits Spain (BBG)
• China could 'punish' Hong Kong over protests, says ex-HK central bank chief (Reuters)
• Dubai Insists the Boom is Not a Bubble This Time Around (BBG)
• Bank-Data Sharing Accord Expands Push to Find Tax Cheats (BBG)
• Deutsche Bank Sinks to Third-Quarter Loss on Legal Costs (BBG)
• Kim Jong Un Executes 10 Officials for Watching Soap Operas (BBG)
• French drugmaker Sanofi sacks CEO Viehbacher (Reuters)