Sovereigns

Portugal suffered the most - with its bond spreads now a huge 45bps wider on the week. It seems between the ever-increasing vol in Japan, a rapidly fading JPY carry funding mechanism, and lack of fresh meat from Draghi, Italian and Spanish bonds and stocks are losing their 'greater fool' bid. Sovereigns are seeing their worst day since February; stocks among their worst days since Feb - with several Spanish and Italian banks halted limit-down (as ECB's QE-like collateralization was not eased); and EUR is strengthening against the USD as risk-flows are repatriated. Italian and Spanish stocks are now at 6 week lows, and Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese credit spreads at six-week highs. European financial and corporate credit are now wider (worse) on the year and equities are catching down. And the ultimate 'greater fool' momentum trade - GGBs - is fading - now down 9.5% in the last week...

The European Central Bank warned yesterday that six quarters of recession are eroding the resilience of banks and risk ending what it describes as 'the calmest period in financial markets since 2011'. As Bloomberg's Niraj Shah notes, the Bloomberg Euro-area Financial Conditions Index has averaged 0.31 this year, compared with -1.47 in 2012 and the measure has only ended in negative territory on three days this year. However, it has very recently fallen to its lowest in a month as financial CDS begin to rise (even with Mrs. Watanabe's presence) to once again wider on the year. As The ECB adds, "Financial stability conditions in the euro area remain fragile. Several vulnerabilities in the interaction between sovereigns, banks and the macroeconomy persist."

Gold edged higher today supported by strong physical demand internationally and especially in Asia.

Demand in the physical market continued to hold prices near $1,400/oz as the recent drops in the spot market encourage buyers internationally to accumulate bullion.

Many are still wondering who (or what) stole the jam from the Japanese stock market's doughnut just three short days ago. Some blame an out-of-control bond market; others fear members of the BoJ recognizing they have blown the bubble too big too soon; still more fear the jawboning on JPY devaluation that has seemingly about-faced recently. The reality is - none of these were surprises or new to the marketplace. But in this world of free-flowing totally fungible central bank liquidity, we suspect the following chart is the real answer. Simply put, the S&P 500's bubble just couldn't keep pace with the Nikkei 225's and with USDJPY unable to support the relative price appreciation difference - the six-sigma richness of Japan to the US was just too much. Two-and-a-half months of 'outperformance' undone in 3 days leaves the question - is it over?

While yesterday saw the mainstream media cock-a-hoop at the fact that we pulled 'off-the-lows' with the phrase "buy the dip mentality" parrotted prayer-like every minute of the afternoon. Overnight shenanigans saw that BTFD mentality come and then quickly go and now the US market is fading fast. USDJPY has broken below 101 and US equity markets are testing below yesterday's lows... Treasury yields are now low on the week for the long-bond; gold and silver are holding up as JPY strength is weakening the USD broadly. Meanwhile, European peripheral debt is getting monkey-hammered (worst 2 days in 8 months)...

There was quite a bit of dispersion among European equity indices today (with Italy worst and Spain actually holding up - albeit down 1.4%) but the European equivalent of the S&P 500 (the BE500) dropped 2% - its biggest single-day plunge in 10 months. Credit markets - just as in the US - have been warning of a disconnect for two weeks and today's equity dive has more than halved that divergence. European sovereigns are wider by 10-15bps. Europe's VIX is over 2 vols higher at 18.4% (its highest in a month). European financial stocks dropped by their most in 3 months and European high-yield credit worsened by its most in 3 months. A late-day ramp made things alook a little better than they had earlier with a 100 pip rally in EURUSD off earlier lows seemingly providing some help.

"Preservation of Capital," has reached epic seriousness in a world with interest rates at unsustainable lows and underlying economic fundamentals that cannot support today's yields. The irrational game goes on based upon one thing and one thing only which is the creation of capital by all of the world's central banks. The money must go somewhere and so it does but the disconnect between the equity markets and bond yields from the real world is frightening. Nowhere on the planet is it scarier than in Europe.

Bill Gross, who manages the world’s largest bond fund, has indicated that the 30+ year old super cycle bull market in bonds has ended. This is very bad news for the markets.

It would appear that the credit markets both anticipated and began to price in what is now the worst recessionary period for the European Union on record a few days ago. However, their exuberant, ever-hungry colleagues over in equity land remain in the bad is good mode and can't get enough of these higher prices. Where ever we look around the developed world, equity prices are lifting as credit deteriorates. The masses ignored these lessons in 2007; are they ignoring it again? Or is this just another short-term divergence? If so, it is bond-buying time... if not, take your equity profits now because these divergences are unsustainable.

In some surprising news, and quite contrary to what its record low bond yields would indicate (for a key reason for said artificial demand for French, see The Greater Fool) today the Pew Research center released results from a poll of 7646 EU citizens in March 2013, showing that the new sick man of Europe is Europe itself, or rather the great unification project itself: the European Union. Perhaps most surprisingly, nowehere is this more evident than in France itself - the country where the idea of a European Union germinated in the first place - and where the decline in support for the EU has been the greatest in the past year, with just 22% responding affirmatively to the question whether 'economic integration strenghtened the economy', down from 36% a year ago, and the biggest drop of all surveyed EU member states.

Spanish stocks ended the week slightly in the red (the only European major to accomplish that feat) and its sovereign bond spreads ended very modestly wider. Away from that 'weakness' everywhere else was green-green-green - European stocks generally surged (though giving some back today) and bonds rallied further, compressing spreads further into pre-crisis territory. All this with a background of the worst week for the EUR (against the USD) in almost two months. Swiss 2Y rates saw some significant demand today (-2bps to -6.4bps) but are higher on the week and Europe's VIX ends the week modestly lower. Away from sovereign markets, corporate and financial credit markets did not play along with the exuberance at all...

The Cypriot deposit confiscation has come and gone (and in a parallel world in which the global Bernanke-put never existed and in which bank shareholders were not untouchable, this is precisely how real-time bank restructurings should have taken place), but fears remain that the country's "resolution" mechanism will be the template for future instances of "resolving" insolvent banks. That may or may not be the case: the only way to know for sure is during the next European bank bailout, but one thing is certain - Cyprus was certainly a template when it comes to how a world full of insolvent sovereigns (all engaged in currency warfare), where easing, quantitative or otherwise no longer works to boost the economy, will approach what is the last chance for monetary replenishment - taxation of financial assets, just as we warned first back in 2011. Specifically, Cyprus showed the "template" for confiscating Russian oligarch billionaire "ill-gotten", untaxed cash, which many in Germany demanded should be the quid for ongoing German-funded quo. And here's the rub. There is more where said "ill-gotten" cash has come from. Much more... $32 trillion more.

On the third year anniversary of the flash crash, and in a week in which earnings season unwinds and in which there is very little macro news, the bulk of the newsflow happened overnight, starting with a drop in the Chinese Service PMI, which tumbled from 54.3 to 51.1, the lowest in two years, then we got Australian retail sales which dropped -0.1% on expectations of 0.4% gain, indicating that the Chinese slowdown is dragging down the entire Asia-Pac region further.  Afterwards, we got a barrage of European non-manufacturing PMI data starting with Spain, at 44.4, down from 45.3, the lowest since December (although one wonder if Spain has finally opened a branch of the BLS, reporting that unemployment actually dipped by 46.1k, on expectations of just a 2k decline, and down from 5k the prior month: how curious the timing of the "end of austerity" and the immediate "improvement" in the economy), then Italy Service PMI printing at 47.0, up from 45.5, on expectations of a 45.8 print, the highest since August 2011, French Services PMI rising modestly from 44.1 to 44.3, Germany's up from 49.2 to 49.6, on expectations of an unchanged print, all of which leading to a combined Eurozone PMI at 47.0, up from 46.6, and beating expectations of a 46.6 print.

With equity valuations no longer levitating but in a different, 4th dimension altogether, and credit spreads compressing dramatically (and unreasonably)... It is in situations like these, when the crash comes, that the proverbial run for liquidity forces central banks to coordinate liquidity injections. However, something tells me that this time, the trick won’t work. Over almost a century, we have witnessed the slow and progressive destruction of the best global mechanism available to cooperate in the creation and allocation of resources. This process began with the loss of the ability to address flow imbalances (i.e. savings, trade). After the World Wars, it became clear that we had also lost the ability to address stock imbalances, and by 1971 we ensured that any price flexibility left to reset the system in the face of an adjustment would be wiped out too. From this moment, adjustments can only make way through a growing series of global systemic risk events with increasingly relevant consequences. Swaps, as a tool, will no longer be able to face the upcoming challenges. When this fact finally sets in, governments will be forced to resort directly to basic asset confiscation.

Over a year ago, we first explained what one of the key terminal problems affecting the modern financial system is: namely the increasing scarcity and disappearance of money-good assets ("safe" or otherwise) which due to the way "modern" finance is structured, where a set universe of assets forms what is known as "high-quality collateral" backstopping trillions of rehypothecated shadow liabilities all of which have negligible margin requirements (and thus provide virtually unlimited leverage) until times turn rough and there is a scramble for collateral, has become perhaps the most critical, and missing, lynchpin of financial stability. Not surprisingly, recent attempts to replenish assets (read collateral) backing shadow money, most recently via attempted Basel III regulations, failed miserably as it became clear it would be impossible to procure the just $1-$2.5 trillion in collateral needed according to regulatory requirements. The reason why this is a big problem is that as the Matt Zames-headed Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee (TBAC) showed today as part of the appendix to the quarterly refunding presentation, total demand for "High Qualty Collateral" (HQC) would and could be as high as $11.2 trillion under stressed market conditions.