NASDAQ

Equity markets rallied into the close (pre-OPEX and index re-weightings tomorrow) to end near their highs for the day but this was only enough to get back to practically unchanged. The Dow was the only index to manage a green close on the day-session (as AAPL dragged NASDAQ lower and the S&P couldn't get above Tuesday's or Wednesday's closing levels). With the CDS market rolling today (and indices being recomposed), we saw a somewhat unusual selling pressure into the roll - suggesting many credit longs were less than willing to roll that long into the new index (though technicals do make this uncertain). HYG underperformed. Stocks seemed to levitate back up to track Gold and the afternoon's weakness in Treasuries (unch on the day but 3-4bps higher in the afternoon) and strength in Oil dragged risk-assets more in sync with stocks (after suggesting weakness in the middle of the day).

• Obama, Romney tiptoe around housing morass as they woo voters (Reuters) ... just as ZH expected
• Poll Finds Obama in Better Shape Than Any Nominee Since Clinton (Bloomberg)
• Romney on Offense, Says Obama Can’t Help Middle Class (Bloomberg)
• Fed’s Fisher Says U.S. Inflation Expectations Rising (Bloomberg)
• Citigroup Warns Irish Investors to Plan for Losses (Bloomberg)
• Central Banks Flex Muscles (WSJ)
• China says U.S. auto trade complaint driven by election race (Reuters)
• Brussels sidesteps China trade dispute (FT)
• How misstep over trading fractions wounded ICAP's EBS (Reuters)
• Ex-CME programmer pleads guilty to trade secret theft (Reuters)
• Income squeeze will persist, says BoE (FT)
• South African miners return to work, unrest rumbles on (Reuters)

Equity markets traded in an extremely narrow range once again today with NYSE volumes dreadfully low. The USD, Treasury yields, and the S&P 500 in general tracked each other well all day. Gold swung from underperformance to outperformance and stocks lifted into the close to try and catch-up - as well as manage a green close - they failed (except the Dow - with CAT and MCD accounting for 14 of the 11.5 point gain on the day). AAPL closed above $702 (of course it did, silly) but NASDAQ was unable to make hay off of that. VIX remained under pressure and stocks reverted to catch down to it. The USD strength (+0.5% on the week) was ignored by Gold ($1770 - unch on the week) and Silver ($34.75) which had solid days but Oil ($95.50) kept sliding - below yesterday's spike lows. JPY's risk-on sell-off on BoJ news was also shrugged off by the equity market. With Staples and Healthcare outperforming and Energy and Financials laggards, as we noted earlier, the sectors post-Fed have converged rather dramatically - as TSYs have retraced much of the post-Fed move. There was also a small plague of epic Flash Smashes into the close... on massive volume shifts... perfectly normal.

While AAPL keeps levitating (no matter how high complacency in its options stands), it seems the rest of the equity markets are less enamored (for now) with this strange new normal of the Fed/ECB's own making. Below we present four charts indicating regime shifts in average trade size, index dispersion, high-beta sector convergence, and high-beta financials convergence. Whether these are bullish consolidations, short-coverings, or total capitulations - who knows? But with the S&P 500 reverting lower to catch-down to VIX's less sanguine view and the total lack of a move on the BoJ news today - we suspect (at least for now) that all the good news is out.

Volume was extremely weak on a run-rate basis during the middle of the session, picked up once we started the oil-driven algo-correction, then faded as AAPL dragged equities up to their VWAPs leaving the Dow Transports notably underperforming, NASDAAPL just in the green and small drops in the Dow and the S&P. Notably the S&P reached back down to the day-session closing price from FOMC-day and reversed all the way back to its VWAP at the close - the machines were well and truly in charge today! Treasury yields were lower on the day with the long-end outperforming and so real pullback as stocks surged. Oil dominated the price action of the day as correlation monkeys pulled and pushed around the pit close and contract roll with un-priced-in SPR rumors blamed by some. USD strength on the day saw commodities in general leaking lower. Markets had a very illiquid EKG-like feeling to them today - more so than most in recent times - with post-Europe-close activity in equity, volatility, and credit appearing to almost stop entirely. The Trannies closed today below pre-FOMC statement levels.

"Everything will collapse" is the consequence Gloom, Boom, & Doom's Marc Faber sees from the Fed's latest 'stimulus' (and the fallacy and misconception of how money-printing can help employment). In a wondrously clarifying interview on Bloomberg TV this morning, Faber explained why he was 'happy', since "the asset values of his holdings will go up" but as a responsible citizen he is worried because "the monetary policies of the US will destroy the world." It truly is class warfare under a veil of 'its good for you' as he notes: "the fallacy of monetary policy in the U.S. is to believe this money will go to the man on the street. It won't. It goes to the Mayfair economy of the well-to-do people and boosts asset prices of Warhols." Congratulations, Mr. Bernanke.

There was one thing, ONE THING only that Bernanke could do, to become a gold bug's best friend today, than merely announcing QE 3/4. It was to announce open-ended QE. This means this is the Fed's final shot and there is no way to frontrun the Fed any more by definition. It means the terminal start of currency debasement is now here. It also means that the path to all time nominal (and inflation adjusted) highs in gold, which is now just $160 away, silver, platinum, and all other metals, as well as all other hard assets is now clear. It also means that very soon stocks are about to realize what soaring "input costs" mean for the bottom line.

Thank you Chairsatan: you are truly a gold bug's bestest friend!

Bill Gross may be credited with inventing the term 'the New Normal', although his recommendation to purchase gold above all other asset classes, something which only fringe blogs such as this one have been saying is the best trade (in terms of return, Sharpe Ratio, and the ability to sleep soundly) for the past three and a half years, he is sure to be increasingly ostracized by the establishment, and told to take all his newfangled idioms with him in his exile to less than serious people land. Which takes us to David Rosenberg, who today revisits his own definition of the New Normal. And it, too, is just as applicable as that of the Pimco boss: "The new normal is that the economy doesn't drive markets any more." Short and sweet, although it also is up for debate whether the economy ever drove the markets in the first place. But that would open up a whole new conspiratorial can of worms, and is a discussion best saved for after Ben Bernanke decides to save the "housing market" by buying more hundreds of billions in MBS and lowering mortgage yields further, even though mortgage rates already are at record lows (something that mortgage applications apparently couldn't care less about as we showed last week), while "avoiding" to do everything in his power to boost the S&P, which recently was at 5 year highs, and certainly "avoiding" to listen to Chuck Schumer telling him to do his CTRL+P job, and "get to work" guaranteeing Schumer's donors have another whopper of a bonus season.

SocGen’s Sebastian Galy:

The market decided rose tinted glasses were not enough, put on its dark shades and hit the nightlife.

And the uber-bullishness is based on what? Hopium. Hope that the Fed will unleash QE3, or nominal GDP level targeting and buy, buy, buy — because what the market really needs right now is more bond flippers, right? Hope that Europeans have finally gotten their act together in respect to buying up periphery debt to create a ceiling on borrowing costs. Hope that this time is different in China, and that throwing a huge splash of stimulus cash at infrastructure will soften the landing.

Casting a broad eye across all asset classes today, the theme of QE-Off was quite apparent. USD strength, Gold/Silver leaking lower, Stocks gathering downward momentum (as high-beta hotels underperform - AAPL 2nd biggest drop in over 3 months), Treasuries underperforming, and VIX rising rapidly with notable term structure flattening (to its lowest of the year). Volume was on the light side - which suggests this was more longs covering than shorts being laid out (as positioning into recent strength was light and looks to have capitulated Thurs/Fri. Dow Transports outperformed - which appeared more a value rotation as NASDAQ fell back to practically unch (along with the Dow) from the 8/21 swing highs. Equities definitely led the weakness today as cross-asset-class correlation broke down, and futures kept falling after-hours with S&P 500 e-mini futures closing down 12pts - right at the up-trendline of the recent move.

It's time for the FACEBOOK FIASCO MSM blame game...

Earlier this week, former U.S. president Bill Clinton gave the keynote address to the Democractic National Convention in an effort to lend some of his popularity to Barack Obama.  With the unemployment rate still stubbornly high at 8.1%, Obama has lost many of the enthused voters who put him into the Oval Office in 2008.  Clinton was tapped to deliver the speech not only because of his image of a wonkish pragmatist but because of his presiding over the booming economy of the late 1990s.  Like a prized mule, Clinton was dragged out to give Democrats someone to point to and say that his policies were the hallmark of smart governance.  Today, Clinton still takes credit for Greenspan’s manipulated boom.  His supporters on the left love nothing more than to point at his presidency as vindication of the backwards theory that higher taxes equal more growth.  Clinton wasn’t a policy wonk; he was a politician who dipped into the Social Security trust fund to give an appearance of balancing the budget while the national debt still climbed higher. Through all of his financial scandals, womanizing, aggressive foreign policy approaches, and possible cover ups, it is actually fitting that Clinton is still looked to by the political establishment as someone worthy of respect.  He is representative of F.A. Hayek’s timeless lesson: in government the worst rise to the top and state power corrupts.

Central Banks United have the upper hand these days. So don’t mess with them…

At least not this week…

The EURophoria which commenced yesterday after the repeatedly pre-leaked Mario Draghi speech, has continued into the overnight session, this time getting a helping hand from China, whose Shanghai Composite index is up by just under 4% or the most in eight months following an announcement that The National Development & Reform Commission, China’s top planning agency, said it approved plans to build 2,018 kilometers (1,254 miles) of roads, a day after it backed plans for subway projects in 18 cities. In other words China's empty cities will still be empty but will now be connected and have even better infrastructure. Irrelevant of how the extra money has been injected, or for what ends, the stock and bond markets around the world are enjoying the news, with the EURUSD rising to 1.2700 recently, the Spanish 10 Year sliding to under 6% and the lowest since March despite Industrial Output sliding 5.4% or more than the 5.2% expected, even as German 2 year yield rise to the highest since July despite strong German trade surplus and Industrial Production data, with European equities green across the board and the EURCHF in mid-1.21 territory on louder unfounded rumors the SNB will hike the peg to 1.22/1.23. And with the European action in teh rearview mirror (more below), all eyes turn to today's key report, the August Non-Farm Payrolls.

Draghi spaketh and the bulls taketh. Risk assets re-correlated in a hurry as Draghi stopped speaking and the US day-session opened (and buoyed by better than expected - though implicitly QE-off - data) risk was on like Donkey Kong. We ripped through recent swing highs, up to the year's highs, and then on to 4-year highs in the S&P and 12-year highs in the NASDAQ. But it wasn't all faeries and unicorns; after the European close, CONTEXT (our proxy for risk-assets) diverged notably lower as stocks extending their trend for the day; Oil dropped hard on rumors of an imminent SPR release and Gold and Silver trod water (after a busy night admittedly). The S&P 500 e-mini futures (ES) stayed in a very narrow range just above early August highs for the rest of the day as Treasury yields also started to stabilize at last Friday's levels with the 30Y up around 12-13bps on the week (notably more than the front-end). JPY weakness (carry-driven) as Draghi spoke, faded in the afternoon and along with the drift lower in TSY 2s10s30s there was a much less ebullient feel to everything - even as stocks decided to close at their highs of the day (as VIX fell back below 16% in the last few minutes down around 2 vols on the day). Volume was mediocre, average trade size above average, as the vinegar-strokes at the cash close saw bigger blocks come through.