Swiss National Bank

We were amused to learn that in the quarter in which AAPL stock almost hit a new all time high, the Swiss Central Bank, which reported a record $20 billion loss in the second quarter, and a record $52 billion in the first half, added another 500,000 AAPL shares, bringing its new grand total to a whopping 9.4 million shares, equivalent to $1.2 billion as of June 30 (well below that now following the recent 10% correction).

It's time to challenge the notion that the decline of a currency can be measured simply by the rate of price increases. This price-centric view misses the ongoing hyperinflation.

The SNB reported a record loss, but the real meaning and implication is not what most are claiming.  See why.

Earlier today, the SNB which is perhaps the most transparent hedge fund of all central banks and actually lays out its financial statements in a respectable manner every quarter, released its results for the second quarter (and first half) of 2015. The result: another absolutely epic loss, amounting to €50.1 billion ($51.8 billion) of which €47.2 billion on currency positions - a whopping 7% of Swiss GDP - meaning that in Q2 the SNB lost another €20 billion. This happened despite the SNB having invested 17%, or $94 billion, in foreign - mostly US -stocks.

Greece has no future, so long as it clings to the euro. The dollar won't servce you much better. A drachma will only harm the Greek people. That leaves one other option.

Deflation is back on the front burner and it's going to destroy all of the careful central planning and related market manipulation of the past 6 years. Clear signs from the periphery indicate that a destructive deflationary pulse has been unleashed. After years of suppression, the forces of reality are threatening to overwhelm our managed global ""markets"'. And it's about damn time.

The divergence theme is not longer being eclipsed by the Greek drama and the Chinese stock market slide.  See how this week's developments fit into the bigger picture.  

What happened in the China stock market is the latest culmination of the slippery slope of governmental and central bank intervention in financial markets.....

Markets are beginning to signal that policy makers are losing control.  Many second-order-effects of the unprecedented and experimental global actions taken since the 2008 crisis are beginning to manifest.  There are always causes and effects that develop; but they do so at different speeds. Many actions in recent years have prioritized 'benefits today' over 'consequences tomorrow'.  'Tomorrow' is approaching ever more quickly. There is no 'free lunch'.

The Big Crisis, the one in which entire countries go bust, has begun. It will not unfold in a matter of weeks; these sorts of things take months to complete. But it has begun.

In hyperinflation, the currency's purchasing power collapses. Many Fed critics have predicted this will come soon, though it hasn't happened yet. However all is not well with the dollar.

More than even the unfolding "chaos theory" pandemonium in Greece, market watchers were even more focused on whether or not China and the PBOC will succeed in rescuing its market from what is now a crash that threatens social stability in the world's most populous nation. And, at the open it did. The problem is that as the trading session progressed, the initial 8% surge in stocks faded as every bout of buying was roundly sold into until every other index but the benchmark Shanghai Composite turned sharply red.

We warned previously that when (not if) the market crashes next, The Fed is going to need a scapegoat (other than British traders living at home with their parents) and judging by The Fed's Lael Brainard's comments today, high-frequency-traders (HFT) are in the crosshairs. Crucially, Brainard warns that HFT "may amplify market shocks," and The Fed is "studying possible changes in liquidity resilience." 

At the open, Europe looked in the abyss, and with no help coming from China, it did not like what it saw: And then the answer came from the Swiss National Bank, which stepped in to prevent the collapse just as Europe was opening. Because seemingly out of nowhere, a tremendous bid came in to life the EURCHF, buying Euros (against the CHF and the USD) and selling Europe's last left safety currency. We now know that it was the SNB, the same central bank which is the proud owner of well over $1 billion in Apple stock.