OPEC

Greenspan’s phony disinflation success led to the Fed’s embrace of fully mobilized and massively intrusive monetary policy in the guise of the Great Moderation and the wealth effects theory of financial asset levitation. In due course, Greenspan’s self-aggrandizing but purely experimental forays of massive central bank intrusion in the financial markets were supplanted by the hard-core Keynesian model of Bernanke and Yellen. Alas, they operated under the grand illusion that a domestic wage and price spiral would tell them when the domestic GDP bathtub was filled to the full employment brim, and therefore when to lift their foot from the monetary accelerator. It never happened, and they never did. The era of Lite Touch monetary policy was by now ancient history.

The world of Bubble Finance economies created by the Fed and other central banks is fundamentally different than that prevailing under the “Lite Touch” monetary policies which preceded the Greenspan era. The problem today is that the PhDs running the Fed have an economic model which is a relic of the Lite Touch era. It is not only utterly irrelevant in today’s casino driven system, but is actually tantamount to a blindfold. It causes them to look at a dashboard full of lagging indicators like jobs and GDP components, while ignoring the explosive leading indicators starring them in the face on CNBC. The clueless inhabitants of the Eccles Building do not recognize that they have created a world in which Wall Street supersedes main street.

In true stop-running algo common sense, WTI crude jumped overnight, back above $42 briefly. However, a double whammy of warnings from IEA (of a "massive cushion" of 3 billion barrels worldwide) and the highest volume of supertankers for this time of year since 2013 has sent crude sliding back below $42.

For once, the overnight session was not dominated by weak Chinese economic data (which probably explains why the Shanghai Composite dropped for the second day in a row, declining 1.4%, and ending an impressive run since the beginning of November) and instead Europe took the spotlight with its own poor data in the form of Q3 GDP which printed below expectations at 0.3% Q/Q, down also from the 0.4% increase in Q2, with several key economies rolling over including Germany, Italy, and Spain while Europe's poster child of "successful austerity" saw Q3 GDP stagnate, far worse than the 0.5% growth consensus expected.

“This is [a] man-made crisis in our industry we have created,” al-Rhumy said. “And I think all we’re doing is irresponsible.”

Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse - amid supply gluts, production surges, market share scrambles, and demand disappointment - it does. OPEC this morning confirmed not only no change in the already weak global demand picture but the current oil inventrory surplus is the largest in at least a decade. This has driven WTI prices down close to a $41 handle this morning (from over $48 a week ago) as simply put, there's too much oil and OPEC's grand strategy for solving this imbalance - pray for a colder winter...

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Empires, like adolescents, think they’ll live forever. In geopolitics, as in biology, expiration dates are never visible. When death comes, it’s always a shock. "At the beginning of the great unraveling, in 2015, I was still a young man. Like everyone else, I didn’t see this coming. Today, in 2050, fewer and fewer people can recall what it was like to live among those leviathans... Thirty-five years and endless catastrophes later on a poorer, bleaker, less hospitable planet, it’s clear that we just weren’t paying sufficient attention. Had we been listening, we would have heard the termites. There, in the basement of our common home, they were eating the very foundations out from under us. Suddenly, before we knew quite what was happening, all that was solid had melted into air."

Venezuela is at a political crossroads, with an all-important parliamentary election set to take place in December. Meanwhile, the Venezuelan economy continues to deteriorate as the state seeks to stave off default and a brewing financial crisis. Late last month, Brazil withdrew its involvement in election monitoring after Venezuela rejected the officials Brazil put forward. Maduro is doing his best to keep international observers from scrutinizing the election. The election will take place just as the OPEC meeting will be wrapping up in Vienna, which is expected to yield few benefits for Venezuela. All signs point to OPEC continuing its market share strategy, keeping a lid on any substantial price rebound in the short-run. That does not bode well for Venezuela as it teeters on the brink of catastrophe.

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The ongoing failure of China to achieve any stabilization in its economy, after already cutting interest rates six times in the past year, and the prospect of a U.S. interest rate hike in December, had made markets increasingly jittery and worried which is not only why the S&P 500 Index had its biggest drop in a month, but thanks to the soaring dollar emerging market stocks are falling for a fourth day - led by China - bringing their decline in that period to almost 4 percent, and the global stock index down for a 5th consecutive day.

While ridiculous, Venezuela's decision to liquidate some of its gold is perhaps understandable under the circumstances: Venezulea relies on crude oil for 95% of its export revenue, and with prices refusing to rebound, the only question is when do all those CDS which price in a Venezuela default finally get paid. What is even more understandable is what Venezuela should have done in the first place before dumping a fifth of its gold, but got to do eventually, namely raiding all of the IMF capital held under its name in a special SDR reserve account.

Once again, the two major macroeconomic announcements over the weekend came from China, where we first saw an unexpected, if still to be confirmed, increase in FX reserves, and then Chinese trade data once again disappointed tumbling by 6.9% while imports plunged 18.8%. So how did the market react? The Shanghai Composite Index rose for a fourth day and reached its highest since August 20because more bad data means more easing from the PBOC, and just to give what few investors are left the green light to come back into the pool, overnight Chinese brokers soared after Chinese IPOs returned after a 5 month hiatus. Elsewhere, Stocks and currencies in emerging markets slump on prospect of higher U.S. borrowing costs before year-end and after data underscored slowdown in Asia’s biggest economy. Euro strengthens.