OPEC

Chinese stocks opened with a bang, and as we previously noted soared higher at the open after China's long 4-day holiday weekend, which however subsequently slowly (but very surely) fizzled, eating away at the hope that the 3-day drop in the Shanghai Composite would finally come to an end following comments from PBOC governor Zhou that the recent rout in Chinese stocks is almost over, and result in a relief rally in Europe and the US. Alas, all that was promptly swept away at the end of trading in China when the Shanghai Composite tumbled at close of trading to confirm just how unpleasant a "death cross" is coupled with loss of central bank control, and to push the Shanghai Composite down 2.5% for the day and 3.4% for the year.

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Saudi Arabia is staring down a current account-fiscal account outcome that makes Brazil look favorable by comparison. With the fiscal budget deficit projected at some 20% of GDP and two proxy wars combined with the necessity of maintaining the status quo for ordinary Saudis serving to make fiscal retrenchment next to impossible, you might be wondering how high oil prices need to climb in order for the Saudis to plug the gap. Deutsche Bank has the answer.

After the worst day since last November's OPEC meeting, WTI crude is falling further tonight as API reported a huge 7.6 million barrel inventory build. This is the biggest build (compared to DOE data) since early April! WTI Crude is now down 9.85% on the day - that is a bigger drop (close to close) than the Nov OPEC meeting drop and is not matched back to 2008/9's collapse.

Surprise!!! Month-end window-dressing manipulation massacred...

Gold rose 3.5% in August as stocks globally saw sharp falls on growing concerns about the Chinese and the global economy.  

Just like the last time when Chinese flash PMI data came out at the lowest level since the financial crisis, so overnight when both the official Chinese manufacturing and service PMI data, as well as the Caixin final PMI,s confirmed China's economy has not only ground to a halt but is now contracting with the official manufacturing data the lowest in 3 years and the first contraction in 6 months, stocks around the globe tumbled on concerns another major devaluation round by the PBOC is just around the corner with the drop led by the Shanghai Composite which plunged as much as 4% before, the cavalry arrived and bought every piece of SSE 50 index of China's biggest companies  it could find, and in a rerun of yestterday sent it to a green close, with the SHCOMP closing just -1.23% in the red. So much for the "no interventions" myth. We wonder which journalist will take the blame for today's rout.

Just when you thought it was safe to listen to the stability-preaching talking heads, crude futures are sliding and US equity futures are tumbling as Asia opens. Worse still XIV (VIX inverse ETF) has tumbled to fresh lows with a 24 handle in the after-hours market, suggesting more downside for stocks. With all eyes on China PMIs - though, there is little need for a weak PMI to be present for China to unleash moar measures, and a strong PMI will be scoffed at - it seems, the end-of-month rip-fest is fading fast...

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The equity market momo-igniters tried USDJPY - and failed. Then they tried XIV - and failed. So what next? WTI crude of course which has just exploded back to Friday's highs, with Brent Crude also breaking back above $50.

With 30% of Venzuelans eating two or fewer meals per day, social unrest is mounting rapidly in President Nicolas Maduro's socialist utopia. As WSJ reports, soldiers have now been deployed to stem rampant food smuggling and price speculation, which Maduro blames for triple-digit inflation and scarcity. "Due to the shortage of food... the desperation is enormous," local opposition politician Andres Camejo said, and nowhere is that more evident than the trampling death of an 80-year-old woman outside a state-subsidized supermarket.

...one theory is that some within the Fed realized that QE wasn’t working, and never worked, thus another path was needed. But what alternative did they have, since rates were already ZERO? So maybe they changed course and took a strong dollar policy vs. a weak one to intentionally weaken the commodity sector and thus boost consumer spending. Throughout this down turn, that message has been repeated by Yellen herself many times, as a source of economic stimulus and for sure has been repeated over and over in the media and the talking heads of Wall Street.

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