Quantitative Easing

Following last week's bad news for the economy (terrible ADP private payrolls, confirmed by a miss in the NFP) which also resulted in bad news for the market which suffered its worst week in years, many were focused on how the market would react to the latest battery of terrible economic news out of China which as we observed over the weekend reported abysmal trade data, and the worst plunge in Chinese factory prices in 6 years. We now know: the Shanghai Composite soared by 5%, rising to 3,928 and approaching the key 4000 level because the ongoing economic collapse led Pavlov's dog to believe that much more easing is coming from the country which as we showed last night has literally thrown the kitchen sink at stabilizing the plunge in stocks.

In a murky world of market fantasy, our first guideposts are the fundamentals themselves. Supply and demand can be misrepresented for a time through manipulated statistics, but the tangible effects of decline cannot be. Our secondary guideposts are the paths that internationalists and central banks bulldoze through the fiscal forest. To anyone with any sense, the endgame is clear: Total centralization is the goal, and economic fear is the tool they hope to use to get there. We have written on numerous solutions to this threat in past articles; but the first and most important action is for each of us to acknowledge, wholeheartedly, that the system we know is ending. It is over. What replaces that system will either be up to us or up to them. Only by admitting that there is an end to the fantasy, a painful end, will we then be able to help determine our future reality.

Six years ago, hardly anybody outside financial circles had any idea what Quantitative Easing was – hell, many within financial circles had no idea what QE entailed. The success of the narrative created around QE; that it is the mythical ‘free lunch’ that we all intuitively know can’t exist but secretly hope does, has played perfectly to the public and now, having endured for two electoral cycles, the next wave of politicians also believe it will have no consequences and are actually using it when planning the message they feel will endear them to the electorate. What plays better than free money?

It has been more of the same in the latest quiet overnight session where many await tomorrow's NFP data for much needed guidance, and where Chinese markets opened weaker, rose during the day, then went through a mini rollercoaster, then sold off in the afternoon.  The Shanghai Composite and HS China Enterprises indices finished down .9% and .3%, respectively. Trading volume continued to be very subdued, running at half the thirty day average as some 20 million "investors" have pulled out of the market to be replaced with HFTs such as Virtu.  But while stock action has been muted, the story of the night so far is oil and the energy complex broke out of a tight overnight range early in the European session to continue yesterday's downward trend, seeing WTI Sep'15 futures fall below the USD 45.00 handle after yesterday's DoE crude oil inventories saw US crude output rise by 0.552%. As of this moment oil was trading at $44.72, just pennies above the low print of 2015.

"What can we do?"

What if the assumptions about a U.S. economic recovery and Fed rate hikes were wrong? Could observers be mistaken now about the trajectory of the Dollar vs. the Euro as they were back in 2000? Confidence is the only thing that really undergirds modern fiat currencies. But confidence can be very ephemeral...disappearing as quickly as it arrives. The U.S. Dollar benefits from confidence that the Euro currency may just be unworkable, that the U.S. economy will continue to improve, and that the Fed will raise rates throughout the remainder of 2015 and into 2016. If these expectations are unfulfilled, there could be a Euro reversal.

"If circumstances cause these price-insensitive buyers to turn around and become price-insensitive sellers, there are not a lot of candidates to take the other side. Be prepared for the possibility that some of the same assets that have again and again risen to prices that many investors said were impossible show more downside volatility than investors have bargained for."

The bear market in bullion is an artificial creation. This artificial, indeed fraudulent, increase in the supply of paper bullion contracts drives down the price in the futures market despite high demand for bullion in the physical market and constrained supply. 

A former BOE employee and Mervyn King speechwriter who went on to a lucrative private sector career as a bond strategist at Deutsche Bank, and then as a hedge fund economist, is now going back to the BOE as a voting member. And that's not all. This revolving door story has a punchline...

Grant: "I am very bullish indeed". ”Recent fall in prices “terrifically vexing but a wonderful opportunity”; the reasons for owning gold have not gone away.

Having gazed ominously at the extreme monetary policy smoke-and-mirrors intervention in bond markets, and previously explained that "the stock market is to important to leave to the vagaries of an actual market." While the rest of the world's central banks' direct (BoJ) and indirect (Fed, ECB) manipulation of equity markets, nobody bats an eyelid; but when PBOC steps on market volatility's throat (like a bull in a China bear store), people start complaining... finally. There is no difference - none! And no lesser Asian expert than Stephen Roach warns that we should be afraid, very afraid as he states, the great irony of manipulation, he explains, is that "the more we depend on markets, the less we trust them."

Just as Japan thought they could go back to pre-Plaza Accord growth rates by holding on to the old ways in the 1990s, the Chinese will expect the growth miracle to return in 2016 with the “right” policies. It will not. It is all a mirage though. Just as in Japan, the Chinese will not allow the market process to do its magic to get the economy back on a stable footing. Draconian measures to stop the recent stock market rout are a clear testimony of that. In other words, the Chinese economy will resemble that of Japan, and it will do so very soon, if it is not already there.  China is heading straight into a zero growth environment, and will be mired there for years to come.

"Central bank quantitative easing drove traditional investors seeking mid-to-high single digit yields out of investment grade/ crossover credit into high yield, loan and emerging market debt to satisfy yield bogeys. The problem, however, is some of the tourists underappreciate the exponential loss and mark-to-market functions for low quality high yield assets."

Over the last five-plus years in regard to today’s financial markets, the most revered memes that are recited in unison whether it’s in the form of a silent prayer or, it’s done in a near backwoods revival fashion from the televised financial shows “pulpit” in a “Can I get an …. !!!” stylized homily are: “It’s different this time!” followed with “The Fed’s got you’re back.” However, what they mean today may find those that put all their “faith” into such dogma finding that faith severely tested. For as of today July, 26, 2015 It truly is – different this time. And what else is different is: the Fed. may indeed have one’s back. Only problem this time is – that back may no longer be “yours.”