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Beige Book Mediocrity Dominates 'Obamacare-Restrained' Moderate Growth

Tyler Durden's picture




 

Another Beige Book comes and goes providing little real color as to anything useful about the real world. The excessive use of words synonymous with 'mediocre' appears to be the best we can do (on a $1 trillion deficit?) - but of course, the Dow is still near all-time highs...

  • *FED SAYS ECONOMY GREW AT 'MODEST TO MODERATE PACE' IN FEBRUARY
  • *FED SAYS 'MANUFACTURING MODESTLY IMPROVED IN MOST REGIONS'
  • *FED SAYS SEVERAL DISTRICTS REPORTED 'RESTRAINED HIRING'
  • *FED SAYS MOST DISTRICTS SAW MODEST PRESSURES ON PRICES
  • *FED SAYS 'WAGE PRESSURES WERE MOSTLY LIMITED'

Of course, the spin will be, at least it's not bad... the S&P is 3 points off the highs, BTFD. Perhaps of most note, though: "Many District contacts commented on the expired payroll tax holiday and the Affordable Care Act as having restrained sales growth."


...and as Steve Liesman noted:


 

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Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:15 | 3305599 Cult_of_Reason
Cult_of_Reason's picture

Recent advice from Volcker to Bernanke: ...It's never popular to take the punch bowl away or to weaken the liquor... and there's a lot of liquor out there...

...You could make a mistake and go too quick, but the much more freq mistake is you go too slow...

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:15 | 3305623 Unprepared
Unprepared's picture

...You could make a mistake and go too quick, buut the much more freq mistake is you go too slow...

 

That's NOT what she said, unless she professes the oldest free-market job in the world.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:17 | 3305631 vmromk
vmromk's picture

Why don't the "Fed" members fucking die already ???

Is that so difficult ?

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:22 | 3305652 knukles
knukles's picture

Oldspeak = BTFD (Imaginary, blue pill induced)
Newspeak=  BFD  (red pill conundrum)

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 16:05 | 3305823 tickhound
tickhound's picture

 

 

LOL here we go freaking Beige Book... SCRIPTURE of the Gods.

An ENTIRE INDUSTRY's been created just to INTERPRET this shit... full of various little Ponzi Priests treating these things like scrolls. 

I mean WTF would Liesman do without his role of "translator" for the illiterate believers. 

- "What I took from it" or What the Fed is "pretty much" suggesting or What the Fed is "trying to say" is "sort of" like.....

These are actual quotes.  GUIDANCE is found in words like "sorta" and "pretty much."  He gets paid for this shit. 

We've got nano-tech and machines without bias but we need LIESMAN witch doctors.

"I saw an eagle today clutching a serpent.  This is a sign from the Gods foreshadowing a GREAT VICTORY!" 

"Bird Signs?  You want us to formulate a strategy around Bird Signs?"

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:17 | 3305632 Cult_of_Reason
Cult_of_Reason's picture

Who is "she"?! Paul Volcker?!

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:17 | 3305633 camaro68ss
camaro68ss's picture

FED’s are moderately full of bull shit  

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:22 | 3305655 Cult_of_Reason
Cult_of_Reason's picture

Volcker said Monday in a forum discussion in Washington. “You can make a mistake and go too quick, but the much more frequent mistake in my judgment is you go too slow, because it’s never popular to take the so-called punch bowl away or to weaken the liquor.”

http://www.moneynews.com/StreetTalk/Volcker-Fed-Punch-Bowl/2013/03/04/id/493013

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:41 | 3305752 Al Huxley
Al Huxley's picture

Volcker just proved that he's not really a reliable source of commentary anymore when he said this, as by saying it he's pretending that the option to remove the punchbowl even exists. In reality, the punchbowl will be continually refilled with increasingly low-grade sources of alcohol, and then when the vanilla, mouthwash and lysol run out it will be filled with gasoline or paint and everybody can stand around and huff the fumes, but it's not actually ever going away anymore.  Pretending that Fed tightening is an option means accepting the premise that 'if the Fed didn't want/need to monetize the deficit/debt, there would be plenty of others willing to lend the US govt money at ever decreasing nominal rates'.   It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the game here...

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 16:03 | 3305818 Cult_of_Reason
Cult_of_Reason's picture

Sooner or later, high inflation and/or the markets will force the Fed to remove the punchbowl.

Current Fed policy -- money printing orgie -- is unsustainable.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 16:33 | 3305961 Al Huxley
Al Huxley's picture

No, I think sooner or later the system will collapse.  That's the only out here.  Pretending that there's going to be some economic event (unemployment rate, GDP growth, whatever) that's going to trigger a reasoned decision that 'it's time we started to raise rates again' by the Fed reflects either stupidity or dishonesty.  I'm pretty sure Volcker isn't stupid, so if he talks about 'removing the punchbowl' he's lying.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 17:29 | 3306056 Cult_of_Reason
Cult_of_Reason's picture

I agree.

"removing the punchbowl" = "system collapse"

"weaken the liquor" (gradual QE tapering) = major stock market plunge and a deep recession (allowing the system to adjust and to survive)

BTW, Volcker caused a deep recession in the 1980s in order to save the system (~10-13% stagflation after Arthur Burns debt monetization and money printing binge in the 1970s).

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:34 | 3305718 takeaction
takeaction's picture

HISTORY IN THE MAKING GENTLEMEN...Rand Paul Fillibustering the Senate.  Talk about BALLS.

LIVE

http://www.c-span.org/Live-Video/C-SPAN2/

 

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:39 | 3305742 john39
john39's picture

puppet show. rand paul is owned.  forget about politicians doing anything for the american people.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:12 | 3305601 swissaustrian
swissaustrian's picture

Behind the curve as usual

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:16 | 3305624 Cult_of_Reason
Cult_of_Reason's picture

Beige Book: "Employers ...cite Affordable Care Act ...as reasons for planned layoffs and reluctance to hire..."

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:24 | 3305664 knukles
knukles's picture

Mediocre, eh?

Propaganda, more like.  "Employers ...cite Affordable Care Act ...as reasons for planned layoffs"

When have you ever read in the Fed minutes about "planned layoffs" other than in "bad times"?

Affordable Care, my ass.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:26 | 3305677 Cult_of_Reason
Cult_of_Reason's picture

Yep, "it's the economy, stupid".

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:24 | 3305666 RopeADope
RopeADope's picture

Public company CEO's cite increased equity prices due to QE as a reason to increase tax evasion, accounting fraud and layoffs to generate higher ROE for bonus purposes.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:13 | 3305607 machineh
machineh's picture

Rand Paul rockin' the Senate in a filibuster against Brennan ... right here, right now.

http://www.c-span.org/Live-Video/C-SPAN2/

If there were a Zero Hedge TV channel, this would be it.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:29 | 3305691 dobermangang
dobermangang's picture

At least 1 politician still cares about the Constitution.  Give'em hell Senator Paul.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:45 | 3305764 john39
john39's picture

rand paul? the guy who backed Mittens Romney over his own father?  the guy who just got back from groveling in is-ra-el?   sure thing man...

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:14 | 3305609 Yen Cross
Yen Cross's picture

 Bad is good in a POMO world. We can't have the addicts showing any signs of withdrawal.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:16 | 3305629 slaughterer
slaughterer's picture

So when does the $$$ USD crash and PMs hockey stick?  I am getting impatient.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:19 | 3305637 SheepDog-One
SheepDog-One's picture

So, 'same old Goldilocks bullshit' again basically.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:27 | 3305681 fonzannoon
fonzannoon's picture

i thought it was the election but it seems they are waiting until just after I drop dead to crash it.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:39 | 3305747 SheepDog-One
SheepDog-One's picture

Sure does seem that way now.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:19 | 3305641 eclectic syncretist
eclectic syncretist's picture

Did it say anything about gold mining stocks suddenly getting some love today???!!!

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:19 | 3305643 101 years and c...
101 years and counting's picture

"wage pressures were limited"  no shit, fucking retards.  when a company has millions of umeployeds they can use to threaten their current workers with, its hard to demand a higher wage.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:21 | 3305647 RopeADope
RopeADope's picture

And yet the situation of every small business owner and under 50 worker I know is worsening.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:23 | 3305659 JustObserving
JustObserving's picture

Growth modest, Inflation modest, Wages subdued, Printing massive.

The printing will never end.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:24 | 3305665 _ConanTheLibert...
_ConanTheLibertarian_'s picture

Truth: sales collapsed starting second half of february

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:31 | 3305704 dobermangang
dobermangang's picture

Guns and ammo are selling well, if you can find them.  Booze is selling OK, but some of it is being watered down.  Lottery scratch-offs are also selling well.  That's about it.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:24 | 3305667 ebworthen
ebworthen's picture

What a bunch of bullshit.

These assholes have no idea what they are doing, other than bankrupting the future.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:34 | 3305693 TruthInSunshine
TruthInSunshine's picture

Au contraire. They know precisely what they're doing.

They're the lackeys that produce casino chip fiat that their masters get for free, even though they cost units of labor or real wealth for everyone else, and that form the basis of the circular, monopolistic monetary system, where assets get harvested and concentrated by "the masters" without having to lift a finger.

"Money is for nothin', and your swag's for free."

The Harvest excerpted from the book The Creature from Jekyll Island
FDR's son-in-law, Curtis Dall, was right when he wrote: "It was the calculated 'shearing' of the public [the World Money Powers."

p500
It is human nature for man to place personal priorities ahead of all others. Even the best of men cannot long resist the temptation to benefit at the expense of their neighbors if the occasion is placed squarely before them. This is especially true when the means by which they benefit is obscure and not likely to be perceived as such. There may be exceptional men from time to time who can resist that temptation, but their numbers are small. The general rule will prevail in the long run.


A managed economy presents men with precisely that kind of opportunity. The power to create and extinguish the nation's money supply provides unlimited potential for personal gain. Throughout history the granting of that power has been justified as being necessary to protect the public, but the results have always been the opposite. It has been used against the public and for the personal gain of those who control. Therefore,


When men are entrusted with the power to control the money supply, they will eventually use that power to confiscate the wealth of their neighbors.


There is no better illustration of that law than the Crash of 1929 and the lingering depression that followed.


p501
The lingering [1929] depression is an important part of the story. The speculators had been ruined, but what they lost was money acquired without effort. There were some unfortunate souls who also lost their life savings, but only because they gambled those savings on call loans. Those who bought stock with money they actually possessed did not have to sell, and they did quite well in the long run. For the most part, something-for-nothing had merely been converted back into nothing. The price of stocks had plummeted, but the companies behind them were still producing products, still employing people, and still paying dividends. No one lost his job just because the market fell. The tulips were gone, but the wheat crop remained.


So, where was the problem? In truth, there was none-at least not yet. The crash, as devastating as it was to the speculators, had little effect on the average American. Unemployment didn't become rampant until the depression years which came later and were caused by continued government restraint of the free market. The drop of prices in the stock market was really a long-overdue and healthy adjustment to the economy. The stage was now set for recovery and sound economic growth, as always had happened in the past.


It did not happen this time. The monetary and political scientists who had created the problem now were in full charge of the rescue. They saw the crash as a golden opportunity to justify even more controls than before. Herbert Hoover launched a multitude of government programs to bolster wage rates, prevent prices from dropping, prop up failing firms, stimulate construction, guarantee home loans, protect the depositors, rescue the banks, subsidize the farmers, and provide public works. FDR was swept into office by promising even more of the same under the slogan of a New Deal. And the Federal Reserve launched a series of "banking reforms," all of which were measures to further extend its power over the money supply.


In 1931, fresh money was pumped into the economy to restart the cycle, but this time the rocket would not lift off. The dead weight of new bureaucracies and government regulations and subsidies and taxes and welfare benefits and deficit spending and tinkering with prices had kept it on the launching pad.


Eventually, the productive foundation of the country also began to crumble under the weight. Taxes and regulatory agencies forced companies out of business. Those that remained had to curtail production. Unemployment began to spread. By every economic measure, the economy was no better or worse in 1939 than it was in 1930 when the rescue began. It wasn't until the outbreak of World War II, and the tooling up for war production that followed, that the depression was finally brought to an end.


It was a dubious save. In almost every way, it was a repeat of the drama played out with World War I, even to the names of two of its most important players. FDR and Churchill worked together behind the scenes to bring America into the conflict-Churchill wanting American assistance in a war England was losing and could not afford, FDR wanting a jolt to the economy for political reasons, and the financiers, gathered behind J.P. Morgan, wanting profits of war.


p502
During the nine years before the crash of 1929, the Federal Reserve was responsible for a massive expansion of the money supply. A primary motive for that policy was to assist the government of Great Britain to pay for its socialist programs which, by then, had drained its treasury. By devaluing the dollar and depressing interest rates in America, investors would move their money to England where rates and values were higher. That strategy succeeded in helping Great Britain for a while, but it set in motion the forces that made the stock-market crash inevitable.


The money supply expanded throughout this period, but the trend was interspersed with short spasms of contraction which were the result of attempts to halt the expansions. Each resolve to use restraint was broken by the higher political agenda of helping the governments of Europe. In the long view, the result of plentiful money and easy credit was a wave of speculation in the stock market and urban real estate that intensified with each passing month.


There is circumstantial evidence that the Bank of England and the Federal Reserve had concluded, at a secret meeting in February of 1929, that a collapse in the market was inevitable and that the best action was to let nature take its course. Immediately after that meeting, the financiers sent advisory warnings to lists of preferred customers-wealthy industrialists, prominent politicians, and high officials in foreign governments-to get out of the stock market. Meanwhile, the American people were being assured that the economy was in sound condition.


On August 9, the Federal Reserve applied the pin to the bubble. It increased the bank-loan rate and began to sell securities in the open market. Both actions have the effect of reducing the money supply. Rates on brokers' loans jumped to 20%. On October 29, the stock market collapsed. Thousands of investors were wiped out in a single day. The insiders who were forewarned had converted their stocks into cash while prices were still high. They now became the buyers. Some of the greatest fortunes in America were made in that fashion.
Wed, 03/06/2013 - 16:17 | 3305905 walküre
walküre's picture

Ben Shalom Bernanke is a self-proclaimed student of the Great Depression. Naturally we should assume that he's trying to avert a repeat of that economic desaster. The jackass will use it for his own playbook. He is following the script to a tee. The call to his buddies to sell into this fake rally has happened and the crash will be engineered in the same fashion as 1929 as well. The elite wants to buy on the cheap and keep the Dollar alive. Is anything cheap right now? Is the Dollar a strong bastion of purchasing power? NOPE. Ben will come through for them just like he's learned from the past.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:32 | 3305707 fonzannoon
fonzannoon's picture

it just occured to me that we are all insane. we have been waiting 5 years for the stock market to reflect the economic depression we are in. the fact that 5 years later we still think it's going to happen is a testament to just how insane we have gone.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:29 | 3305695 PontifexMaximus
PontifexMaximus's picture

Again, good news for the algos, not to say markets.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:33 | 3305713 PAWNMAN
PAWNMAN's picture

The 2 biggest movers in the report were autos and real estate. Both sectors are terminally addicted to the Feds juice.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:38 | 3305733 TruthInSunshine
TruthInSunshine's picture

 "The 2 biggest movers in the report were autos and real estate. Both sectors are terminally addicted to the Feds juice." - PAWNMAN

"Dope credit" (aka "credit crack") expansion is an essential, critical component of Bernanke's continued "reflation of spectular asset bubble classes recovery plan," which is all part of the historical track record of central reserve fractional fiat banks "old standby" game plan of blowing & enticing "investors" to chase said bubbles.

Modern Monetary Mechanics (Modern Monetary Theory simplified) = When an economy no longer produces net-positive incremental units of productive value, kick the can by inflating & reflating alternative asset classes to batshit crazy levels, and sometimes, as in the current period, inflate nearly every asset class imaginable to batshit crazy levels, simultaneously, by punching The Easy Button that the Fed uses to monetize debt/print fiat.

  • The Federal Government (via FHA, meaning taxpayers will stuck for the default boom once again) is guaranteeing 90% of all new home mortgages with 3.5% down non-conventional mortgages - FHA inches closer and closer to bailout
  • The trillion dollar Student Loan Bubble is well underway; expect massive levels of default, with taxpayers to pick up the tab

 

All's well that ends well, and for that which ends badly, well...

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:54 | 3305769 PAWNMAN
PAWNMAN's picture

No doubt this will end badly. The U.S. is addicted to cheap credit like Charlie Sheen to hookers. Curious to hear your explanation on the Gold market "End The Fed."

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:39 | 3305738 Edward Fiatski
Edward Fiatski's picture

Aww, Fed, you're so modest. :'-)

BTFD - Up, Up & Away..!

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:50 | 3305785 venturen
venturen's picture

STOP THE INSANITY!

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:53 | 3305795 Catullus
Catullus's picture

Adam Sandler's "At a Medium Pace"

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 15:55 | 3305798 Michelle
Michelle's picture

Whatever happens here in the short term pales in comparison to Europe's troubles, as Tyler says BTFD.

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 17:07 | 3306076 WhiteNight123129
WhiteNight123129's picture

Benny B. and Pals are great. Wage pressures were modestly limited. There is no way to repress wages anymore. Unemployment rock bottom, bonds losses on long duration starting to accumulate. You ve got to spend your cash coporations not because you have nice projects but the Fed is cornering you into spending.

 

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 17:08 | 3306082 MFLTucson
MFLTucson's picture

*FED SAYS ECONOMY GREW AT 'MODEST TO MODERATE PACE' IN FEBRUARY

 

Really Ben, what was the exact fuckin number or is this just another bit of bullshit?

Wed, 03/06/2013 - 22:43 | 3307381 Trucker Glock
Trucker Glock's picture

*FED SAYS ECONOMY GREW AT 'MODEST TO MODERATE PACE' IN FEBRUARY

*TRUCKER GLOCK SAYS THE BEN BERNANKE'S NOSE GREW AT ACCELERATED PACE

*TRUCKER GLOCK SAYS MAOBAMA'S RECTUM GREW PROPORTIONALLY

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