Price Action

Abe's honeymoon is over. Read why.

• Italy sold EUR 6.5bln in 5y and 10y BTPs this morning, solid b/c and competitive yields, especially when considering the  uncertain political situation in Italy.
• Moody's also said that Italian election is indirectly credit negative for other pressured EU sovereigns.
• Fears rise that ECB plan has a weakness as the strings in the Eurozone bond buying programme may be its frailty.

One of the least well-known precious metals continues to shine brightly this year - palladium.

Italy is driving the markets. Japanese developments means the market is closer to give Abenomics its first test. Bernanke to set the record straight after many gave the regional non-voting Fed presidents too much weight in understanding trajectory of Fed policy.

Equities suffer their biggest single day loss on the year with financials performing the worst. Treasuries rallied sharply on the day in line with the broader risk off move. 10s rallied nearly 10bp on the day though flows were skewed towards better selling – hedge funds selling in the belly in both cash and swaps as accounts looked to fade the rally. Later in the day flows shifted as tactical shorts looked to cover. Gold finished up $11.60 to 1593.50 on a day characterized by broad based liquidation in the macro markets.

Instead of looking at the daily bar charts for the major currencies that we provide every week, given the large moves, we thought it might be helpful to look at the longer term charts.  It is one thing for pundits and other observers to argue that QE drives currencies down, it quite another to operationalize and use that as a decision-making rule for investing or trading the foreign currencies.  The way people make money in the markets is not being right more often, but disciplined risk management.  Technicals allow one to quantify risk and admit where one can be wrong.  

Every voice in the FOMC minutes is not a voting member. Bernanke, Yellen, Dudley are the keys and they are committed to QE. That is a descriptive claim not normative. Debt market has shown little reaction to FOMC minutes compared with the dollar and stocks. PBOC drained, but did not really tighten monetary policy. Euro zone PMI poor and gap between Germany and France grows. And what's up with Abe's trip to the US ?

We noted yesterday the strange intraday pattern emerging in Silver price movements - the alarmingly predictable morning takedown of the precious metals when the NYMEX opens. It's a reality that we need to be eyes wide open about, as it underscores the challenges of being long in an asset that powerful players don't want to appreciate. And while it's important to understand the risks in play here (e.g. these raids may continue for longer than we think possible), we emphasize the importance for precious metal owners to hold fast with the courage of their convictions - ultimately fundamentals will prevail and gold and silver prices will rise to their true levels. So, if you decide to bet on the continued success of the status quo, your choices are easy: Get in the paper markets and go long. The Fed will be adding $85 billion of liquidity rocket fuel each month for the rest of the year to push the prices of your paper investments even higher. But if you choose the fundamentals, here are a few important guidelines to keep in mind.

There are just too many variables, too much information, and even unknown variables that play into market dynamics. 

The price action in the foreign exchange market is choppy as short-term participants seem nervous after being whipsawed yesterday. Sterling fell nearly a cent to new multi-month lows following the BOE's inflation report that confirmed official expectations that price pressures will remain above target and King welcomed the recent depreciation of the point. Also of note the Australian dollar, which staged a sharp recovery off the year's lows yesterday and has seen follow through buying today, helped perhaps by gains in a consumer confidence measure.

The was nothing in the rogue G7 sourced comment yesterday that that Japanese Finance Minister Aso did not say prior to the G7 statement and before the weekend. The pace of the yen's depreciation was too fast. The market reacted to it at the time.

Movements in equity prices are driven by many factors, such as the economy, government policy, earnings, interest rates and valuation. But we think tactical moves (<3 months) are often better explained by sentiment, positioning and technicals. While macro, policy and valuations matter, sentiment has worked well in recent years as a contrarian tool to identify short-term inflection points in asset prices. According to BofAML's new Bull & Bear Index investor sentiment toward risk assets is at a more bullish level today than 99% of all readings since 2002. The current reading of 9.6 (out of 10) is close to max bullish and thus triggers a contrarian "sell" signal for risk assets. In their view, the relative risk-reward of owning equities is unfavorable at this juncture. Since 2002 a "sell" signal of 8.0+ was on average followed by a 12% peak-to-trough correction in global equities within three months.

With the world so obviously gripped in currency war even the hotdog guy has moved away from saying how technically undervalued AAPL stock is to opining on who is leading the global race to debase, it was only a matter of time before the G-7 confirmed the only strategy left is FX devaluation by denying it. Sure enough, a preliminary statement from the G-7 came earlier, in which the leading "developed" nations said, well, absolutely nothing:

We, the G7 Ministers and Governors, reaffirm our longstanding commitment to market determined exchange rates and to consult closely in regard to actions in foreign exchange markets. We reaffirm that our fiscal and monetary policies have been and will remain oriented towards meeting our respective domestic objectives using domestic instruments, and that we will not target exchange rates. We are agreed that excessive volatility and disorderly movements in exchange rates can have adverse implications for economic and financial stability. We will continue to consult closely on exchange markets and cooperate as appropriate.

This follows a statement by the US Treasury's Lael Branaird yesterday in which she said that she is supportive of the effort in Japan to end deflation and “reinvigorate growth”. Lastly, the SNB's Jordan also confirmed that the Swiss National Bank will continue to do everything to crush its own currency, and will the 1.20 EURCHF floor, stating that Japan is merely doing the right thing to stimulate growth (i.e., doing what "we" are doing).  In other words, let the FX wars continue and may the biggest balance sheet win, all the while everyone pretends nothing is happening.

The markets generate noise and a signal.  Reasonable people can and do differ on which is which.  This brief note address the signals for the yen and euro.  Secondarily it looks at sterling and the Australian dollar. 

Coffee is just that kind of market great for traders and well worth putting on your trading radar screens.