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Is Santa Poised To Fill Christmas Stockings With Coal?

Tyler Durden's picture




 

Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog,

Perhaps a retail coals-in-the-stockings Christmas will awaken the mainstream media to the reality that recession is now a global phenomenon.

If container shipping is any reflection of the upcoming Christmas season, Santa is poised to fill the nation's Christmas stockings with coal. Let's start by noting that Baltic Dry Index Falls Below 500 for First Time Ever (gcaptain.com) and Container Freight Rates Plummet 70% In 3 Weeks (Zero Hedge).

For a corroborative report on shipping along America's Atlantic Coast, we turn to correspondent J.M., who works in the shipping industry. Here's is J.M.'s sobering first-hand observations:

We just arrived back in New York after a multi-port run down the Atlantic seaboard. My observations of the box ship trade in and out of those major ports, as well as coastwise between the ports, is that business is dismal.

I've never seen so many big container ships running around high in the water with nearly empty decks and holds. Not even in 2008-2011.

Admittedly, these are only anecdotal observations. And I'm well aware of the confirmation-bias tendencies we are prone to. Having said that, my experienced eye calculated that less than a third of the dozens of box ships I've seen this past 2 weeks were "normally" loaded, meaning roughly 2/3 to 3/4 of capacity or better. About half were obviously very light on cargo, 1/3 or less.

The most consistently glaring anomaly: the empty deck space, with lots of bottom paint showing. Translation: little cargo, and they weren't even deadheading empty boxes around between ports to keep the global system supplied logistically.

Aside from the record-low BDI, an obviously ominous canary-in-the-coal-mine moment by my reckoning.

Thank you, J.M., for the first-hand report. Now perhaps the all-important Christmas Industry received all its goodies in September, and the current flotilla of nearly empty container ships is not relevant to the coming shopping season.

But the pathetically frantic poaching of retailers suggests otherwise. The tsunami of web, email, print and mail adverts are reeking of desperation--a desperation to snag the few dollars consumers are willing to spend this holiday season before some competing retailer entices the tightfisted consumer first.

There's a noticeable weariness in the air this shopping season, bordering on retail-mania exhaustion. Even Black Friday has been drained of shopaholic excitement by pre-sales and pre-pre-sales.

It's now essentially impossible to parody the absurdity and excess of Christmas in America. Can't live without a $800 fake Christmas tree made in China for the Martha Stewart brand? I suspect a great many people are realizing they either 1) can in fact live quite well without the absurd excess of credit card-funded spending or 2) they can't afford the absurd excess of credit card-funded spending.

Perhaps a retail coals-in-the-stockings Christmas will awaken the mainstream media to the reality that recession is now a global phenomenon.

 

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Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:19 | 6826963 Latina Lover
Latina Lover's picture

There is no Santa Claus, just Central Banksters robbing us blind.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:24 | 6826983 NoWayJose
NoWayJose's picture

Need a Banzai of Jamie as the Grinch!

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:24 | 6826985 junction
junction's picture

On Long Island, the sales have started early and yesterday, Sunday, was a giant shopping day.  What customers bought is another matter. 

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:43 | 6827048 Took Red Pill
Took Red Pill's picture

You know what pisses me off, when stores open on Thanksgiving. Workers can't even get one day off to celebrate with their families. It doesn't help sales either, just dilutes it.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:53 | 6827070 JRobby
JRobby's picture

You won't even get physical coal. You will get a worthless piece of paper with a February settlement and like it.

Retailers will experience the worst season on record. What they report through the MSM filters may be another story.......

 

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:16 | 6827134 Stuck on Zero
Stuck on Zero's picture

Coal? How awful. Santa should know it causes global warming.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:27 | 6827167 Anonymous User
Anonymous User's picture

Santa's farts cause global warming.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:42 | 6827197 kralizec
kralizec's picture

At least coal has value...

How about filing those socks with shit?

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:04 | 6827268 sodbuster
sodbuster's picture

Gonna take a pretty big stocking to stuff Obummer in it.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:01 | 6827258 TrumpXVI
TrumpXVI's picture

Paper coal!!

There must be an ETF for coal somewheres.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:04 | 6827098 seabiscuit
seabiscuit's picture

I agree - yet if the people voted with their feet and did not buy Chinese shit on Thanksgiving then the problem would fix itself.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:42 | 6827033 MadVladtheconquerer
MadVladtheconquerer's picture

"I don't think there are any Russians;

and there ain't no yanks;

just corporate crim'nals

playin' with tanks:"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kX8lqXAONg

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:22 | 6826976 buzzsaw99
buzzsaw99's picture

those $800 xmas trees are nice

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:25 | 6826987 Abitdodgie
Abitdodgie's picture

People will still go out and spend money on credit, why because their god (television) told them everything is awesome after all it must be true it was on the news.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:28 | 6826996 buzzsaw99
buzzsaw99's picture

what kills retailers in a bad eCONoME is returns. Yes, people with money or credit still buy gifts but the poor ass recipients return them for cash, credit, groceries, etc.. If I know someone is hurting I give them cash, not some made in China pos.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:34 | 6827377 Skiprrrdog
Skiprrrdog's picture

Im gonna do my 'gubmint imitation' this holiday season...buy everything on credit, and then not pay it back...

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:25 | 6826990 stant
stant's picture

Santa works for Mercedes these days,

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:55 | 6827075 JRobby
JRobby's picture

Don't forget "The Season of Audi"

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:30 | 6827174 Anonymous User
Anonymous User's picture

These days Santa works for BigPharma and delivers vaccines to little childrens. 

Because autistic children might still keep believing in him.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:26 | 6826992 Being Free
Being Free's picture

Silver and Gold in my stocking again. I know I'll be spending less than last year. Thank you very much!

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:38 | 6826993 Crocodile
Crocodile's picture

Anyone not see this one coming?  I wish this "buying spree" would just die already.  Children have way too much time on there hands and spend it in the destruction of their souls and we, the parents, exacerbate that problem if not down right encourage it.  

 

I wonder if parents even know what real love looks like anymore; judgment has come upon us and we haven't seen anything yet; all we have seen since 9/11 is just the beginning of the pain that will be put upon us in my opinion based solely by looking at the world events filtered through the lens of Scripture.

 

Added:  The main bright spot will be Hasbro with all the Stars Wars sales in anticipation of the new movie, which we will wait till the DVD comes out.  Never seen such mania with Star Wars as I have seen this year; even a Niagara bottled water has gotten into the act.  Surprised that Tampax has come out with a Star Wars variety.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:19 | 6827321 GooseShtepping Moron
GooseShtepping Moron's picture

Surprised that Tampax has come out with a Star Wars variety.

A saber for your "lite" days...

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:30 | 6827002 Citium
Citium's picture

Krampus gonna get the naughty ones this year.

I have friends in big retail like macy's and best buy and sales are already plunging. Also don't buy anything TV wise from Best Buy on Black Friday as they are made with refurbished parts and break within 2 years... thus how they can sell them that low. they just change one number or letter on the model # to make you think its the same TV from last month.

Boycott christmas this year and just buy small items or make arts and crafts. Kids don't need Xbox 1's or PS4's or that new $5,000 TV that wont last... Lets hit em where it hurts. 

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:03 | 6827264 Omen IV
Omen IV's picture

Serious Economic Analysis:

go to a Saloon in Elizabeth NJ - Largest Container Port on East Coast - to a random old guy bar in town - ask 3 guys at three bars  - what is going on today / last year / 2009 - on the docks

 

The picture is very very unsettling at best

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:29 | 6827005 Whoa Dammit
Whoa Dammit's picture

The numbers for Christmas sales will be fudged, just like the sales numbers for the past several years. It will be said that prior to Christmas, people just saved up for their big Christmas buying spree. And so the average American, who is  getting poorer every year, will once again feel bad because he or she didn't have money to spend like all of the people in the fictitious storyline, When in fact only the elite and government workers have any money nowadays.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:36 | 6827023 Crocodile
Crocodile's picture

I know plenty of people with money in our own family while we struggle somewhat; but that it is written that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a sewing needle than or a rich person to enter into heaven because their god is their appetite...they never recognize a need and over indulge on their selves and seem to be quite miserable keeping up with all their "junk" while complaining about spending a $100 on "____________" (fill in the blank).

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:32 | 6827368 Skiprrrdog
Skiprrrdog's picture

"Christmas sales down this year because of unexpected cold weather"... film at eleven...

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:32 | 6827011 FranSix
FranSix's picture

In business, everyone wants to be SUNSHINE!

http://youtu.be/iKcWu0tsiZM

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:35 | 6827017 silverer
silverer's picture

It's time to get creative.  I'm offering a day's worth of labor to another family member toward a house project they have to do as a gift.  That's worth a lot, and beats some cheap piece of plastic something or other that will end up on the curb someday anyway.  Take someone to a nice place for lunch as a gift.  Stop shoving material shit at them.  Share your time, that's what matters in life.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:45 | 6827052 rsnoble
rsnoble's picture

That's it, zero rates for you!

 

I honestly don't think they'll push that shit thru so easily here in the US, people are going to fly apart at the fucking seams.  I know i'm going to.  If they think they're having a hard time getting a handle on shit now, just wait.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:37 | 6827027 Cautiously Pess...
Cautiously Pessimistic's picture

Santa can't use coal any longer.  EPA has been up his azz sideways over residual coal dust causing polar bears to fall over dead.  Perhaps he can leave tiny windmills or solar panels instead?

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:38 | 6827028 Chuckster
Chuckster's picture

After spending a week worrying about Charlie Sheen....now I have to worry about Christmas?  Who writes this crap?  Next I will have to worry about Obama's certain to come library.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:30 | 6827362 Skiprrrdog
Skiprrrdog's picture

Oh yeah, one of those new libraries where you read everything on a teleprompter?

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:40 | 6827034 NoWayJose
NoWayJose's picture

Unless you need to upgrade your 40 inch TV to a 52 inch TV - I am not seeing much in these Black Friday sales. As for freight volume, I am seeing odd things like 5 gallon bucket lids not in stock at a local big box store for over a week (and counting). This is a just-in-time retailer who gets deliveries 4 or 5 days a week (like many other retailers today they have little inventory in the back of store). That means their distribution center is out too - reflecting the 'empty freighter' story again. But it also may signal that many retailers are 'going light' this year in inventory.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:40 | 6827035 PhiBetaZappa
PhiBetaZappa's picture

After paying his Obamacare premiums, Santa can't even afford the coal.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:47 | 6827059 JD59
JD59's picture

Just wait till they have to pay their deductible.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:56 | 6827079 mijev
mijev's picture

They used to speculate that hitler committed suicide after he got his gas bill. I'd kinda miss not having santa around to wish us happy holidays.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:42 | 6827042 rsnoble
rsnoble's picture

I'll take some coal if Yellen sits on it first.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:43 | 6827205 o r c k
o r c k's picture

She planned to but got coal feet.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:46 | 6827054 JD59
JD59's picture

The whole fricken world is in a global DEPRESSION. There is no demand, except for guns & ammo.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:26 | 6827164 Zero-Hegemon
Zero-Hegemon's picture

Oh just imagine the joy we'll see in the kid's faces when they see five new boxes of magnum!

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:54 | 6827069 JDFX
JDFX's picture

The UN has declared the consumers NEED to stop consuming, so , although consuming economies may, " halve " their consumption of crap over the next x years, all on target of whats been mandated from above !

 

 

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 09:54 | 6827071 Peak Finance
Peak Finance's picture

Well, it's been 20+ years since I was in retail, but from what I remember whatever the shipping idexes are *today* dosn't mean much for the holidays, the loads of containerized christmas shit is mostly already here. To see the christmas figures in the shipping idexes look at Aug - Oct. And yea the numbers were bad a few months ago.  

Todays rates tell me they are looking to clear inventory for this qtr and then tighten GREATLY 1qtr - 2qtr 2016, maybe even buying much less to account for the post-season store closings. 

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:44 | 6827404 GooseShtepping Moron
GooseShtepping Moron's picture

I think you're exactly right about clearing the inventory, although that would presume a bit more rationality on the part of the retailers than I'm used to seeing. They ought to make use of the Christmas shopping season to help clear their already dangerously high inventory overhang, but store-level managers and POS-ordering software will keep bringing the stuff in anyway, so it doesn't always work out in practice. Looking at the bigger picture, this tells me that real final sales have been somewhere between flat and terrible for six months now, and the backlash is finally starting to mess things up at the wholesale/producer level. When you couple this with the fact that sales this Chirstmas will be so tepid that they won't actually clear the inventory anyway, you're looking at a very stalled retail sector.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:12 | 6827121 slaughterer
slaughterer's picture

My wife wants books, and I want ES 1800. Please Santa, make it happen.  

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:19 | 6827144 conscious being
conscious being's picture

I hate the way Christmas was transformed from a spiritual event into a materialist orgy.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:24 | 6827157 Zero-Hegemon
Zero-Hegemon's picture

Corzine has perfected the technique of leveraging his lying ass to turn your coal into diamonds in a short squeeze

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:39 | 6827187 Temerity Trader
Temerity Trader's picture

The best thing that could ever happen to this country would be if people bought nothing for Christmas. To turn a religious holiday into a gluttonous debt-driven shopping frenzy is a true sign of a disintegrating culture. There is no Christ in Christmas and hasn’t been for decades. Shop ‘till you drop! Get out the plastic, become an Amazon Prime member! Buy more useless crap you don’t need and can’t afford; all made in China. Maybe this X-Mas will be a complete bust, good! Then the Fed will be forced to do QE 4, 5 and 6… Then it will all come apart and the final battle between good and evil (ISIS, etc), can begin. Stocks will plunge and Black Friday will be real black, indeed!

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:46 | 6827216 TuPhat
TuPhat's picture

I would like some coal please.  I can't find any place to buy it in small quantities.  I would like to try my hand at some small blacksmithing projects but don't know where to get coal.  I'll have to try charcoal I guess.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:05 | 6827274 Zero-Hegemon
Zero-Hegemon's picture

Antracite coal from Eastern PA or NW NJ, maybe somebody ships it in small quantities?

Charcoal is no good for metal working, doesn't get hot enough. I've never worked metal in my life, but I know it's true, because I read it on the internet.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:19 | 6827319 rejected
rejected's picture

Use Jet fuel,,, it melts hardened steel.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:48 | 6827227 SoDamnMad
SoDamnMad's picture

My grocery store here in Lithuania started playing  "We wish you a Merry Christmas" a week ago and today it snowed after warm weather up until 2 days ago.  It's going to be a long winter. I'll take everyone's coal if you don't mind.  We don't want to use that Gazprom stuff.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 10:53 | 6827243 yogibear
yogibear's picture

Wall Street needs to nice year-end bonuses. Fund managers have to show a good year. So another year-end tape painting.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 12:29 | 6827544 SirBarksAlot
SirBarksAlot's picture

Draghi wants a new Rolls Royce,

Christine wants a face lift,

Janet wants some kitchen toys,

she thinks math is bullshit

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:01 | 6827259 Jim in MN
Jim in MN's picture

Silly heads.  Stockings are now backup petroleum storage units.  Spread newspaper to catch the drips, it can really hose your carpet.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:08 | 6827282 Zero-Hegemon
Zero-Hegemon's picture

Santa doesn't leave the coal, Black Peter does. The Netherlands are full of white people who paint their faces brown/black in December, to honor him. But they just raciss' white folks.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:27 | 6827351 Skiprrrdog
Skiprrrdog's picture

you said 'black peter'...

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 12:06 | 6827471 Zero-Hegemon
Zero-Hegemon's picture

I hear he's big in the porn genre

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 11:15 | 6827303 rejected
rejected's picture

They've completely ruined Christmas for us with their political correctness don't offend this or that group. No decoration in the city or stores,,, Chinese / Mexican Christmas junk off to the seasonal corner of the store. Anything that might look halfway decent you have to buy online as box stores are limiting inventory getting everyone ready for the future... online purchasing only,,, except for food and a few other essentials. Yea, that's a lot of fun, sitting home staring at a monitor.

We never go out anywhere on a holiday thinking others need a day off too,,, but doesn't work. So many asshole ameriKans could care less with some even thinking their doing people a favor giving them extra earnings seemingly unaware that soon their holidays off will be passe too. But we try.

Yes,,, the Christmas holidays is a disgusting sight for us that remember all the decorated stores, the displays (not nailed down, no fist fights, and no armed guards at the exits) and the nice sometimes exuberant sales staff who would say Merry Christmas and go around the store singing Christmas songs. Today their encouraged to say happy holidays if cornered with some stores even playing music in Spanish (Sears) or other languages. Incidentally, we spoke to a manager at Sears about that and was told we could shop elsewhere... which we do. Hell, they carry the same old foreign junk,,, just a little pricier.

And the worse thing is all  those hordes of supposed Christians participating in the destruction one of their most holy days. When the stores start opening on Christmas day I'm sure they'll be first in line,,, right after mass,,, unless, of course,  they're at work in those stores. Couldn't happen to a nicer group.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 12:25 | 6827531 SirBarksAlot
SirBarksAlot's picture

While you're online, check out the websites that promote products Made in USA, like

www.madeintheusa.com,

www.americansworking.com,

www.stillmadeinusa.com and

www.shopamericathischristmas.com.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 12:25 | 6827530 dogbert8
dogbert8's picture

"Perhaps a retail coals-in-the-stockings Christmas will awaken the mainstream media to the reality that recession is now a global phenomenon."  I think it's time that we consumers close our pocketbooks and let this holiday season go by without shopping; that's what we intend to do.  The season has lost its meaning for me and my family, anyway; no sense in wallowing in excess when we better enjoy living simply and without the hassle.  It's time consumers exercised the power they don't know they have.

Mon, 11/23/2015 - 13:23 | 6827758 Kirk2NCC1701
Kirk2NCC1701's picture

Environmentalists will ban coal, even from Santa's supply, and replace it with Carbon Credits, made from recycled bovine droppings.

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