Housing Market

We’ve been keeping the long lost idea of our long lost society alive by squeezing our own children wherever we can, and telling them that if they only work hard enough, they can be whoever they want to be. But they can’t, that notion is also long lost. When you keep home prices artificially high, homeowners don’t suffer as much, even if they bought at insanely high prices, but the suffering is switched to potential buyers, who remain just that, potential, while they live in their mom’s basements for years. A surefire way to kill a society while everyone’s eagerly awaiting the growth that is just around the corner and will forever remain there. Take it from your kids. Take it from somewhere else in the world. And that’s where we’re now passing a barrier: there’s no-one to take it from anymore.

The global economy is like a jetliner that needs all of its engines operational to take off and steer clear of clouds and storms. Unfortunately, as Nouriel Roubini tells The Guardian, only one of its four engines is functioning properly: the Anglosphere (the United States and its close cousin, the United Kingdom). As Roubini continues, the question is whether and for how long the global economy can remain aloft on a single engine. Weakness in the rest of the world implies a stronger dollar, which will invariably weaken US growth. The deeper the slowdown in other countries and the higher the dollar rises, the less the US will be able to decouple from the funk everywhere else, even if domestic demand seems robust. But it's not just the rest of the world that is decoupling from US growth... as the following uncomfortable chart shows, so is a crucial pillar of monetary policy transmission, consumer wealth perception, and economic stability - the US housing market itself.

Prepare to once again hear the word "decoupling" a whole lot more.

The idea that Hillary Clinton, or any of these politicians (like Bush, Romney and Obama) can create jobs is lunacy. It’s scary to realize just how demented our political leaders truly are. Hillary’s wrong on the idea that government creates jobs – the government destroys jobs. Here are seven reasons why...

Presented with little comment.. because realistically what is there to say about a so-called 'housing recovery' when the volume of applications for home purchases is the lowest since August 1995. Keep believing that lower rates will support home prices... keep believing the Fed's QE worked... or face facts, this is not your mother's housing market any more...

The Swiss establishment has been reliant upon the public’s ignorance, but now they are up against a formidable opponent in Egon von Greyerz. Not only that, but they can clearly see that, as elsewhere around the world, the public is fast becoming disenchanted with the status quo; and that is potentially very dangerous for these people. What is important to understand here is that if the initiative passes it will be part of the Swiss constitution IMMEDIATELY - as some are suggesting. This means that the government and parliament cannot touch it. Only another referendum can change it. This is proper democracy for you. The closer we get to the vote on November 30, the bigger this story is going to become, and the bigger it becomes, the higher the chance that the yes vote wins. Should that happen, it will undoubtedly set off alarm bells throughout the gold market, as yet more physical gold will need to be repatriated and another sizeable, price-insensitive buyer will enter the marketplace.

As the chart demonstrates, there has never been a time when the all important leading indicator that is the San Fran housing market (see here for the reasons why) has posted such a steep slowdown in annual price increases without a bubble of some sort, be it the dot com, the first housing or the European sovereign debt bubble, having burst. Will this time finally be different?

Less than a week after the NAR reported September existing home sales which surged at a 5.17 million annualized pace, the highest since September 2013, rebounding from the August drubbing which was also the worst miss in 2014, today the NAR flip-flopped and disappointed sellside expectations of a 1.0% rebound following the August -1.0% decline, rising a modest 0.3%, and less than half the 2.2% expected increase from a year ago, rising only 1.0% Y/Y. This was the third miss in the series in the last 4 prints.

It has been over six months since the Chinese housing bubble has popped. What's worse, as overnight housing numbers out of China confirmed, the government has so far failed to contain the fallout, and according to the National Bureau of Statistics, which is anything but, after a fifth straight monthly decline, Chinese home prices have now wiped out all price gains in the past year. This was immediately spun as bullish by media outlets and sellside experts as "raising expectations the government will have to implement more economic support measures to cushion the blow." I.e., buy stocks because central banks will push risk prices artificially higher yet again. In other words, bad is still good and failure continues to be success.

• Canada PM vows crackdown after capital shocked by fatal attacks (Reuters)
• Canada Gunman Was Convert to Islam With Criminal Record (BBG)
• Some U.S. hospitals weigh withholding care to Ebola patients (Reuters)
• But... Great rotation... Bond funds stock up on Treasuries in prep for market shock (Reuters)
• Saudis at War With Islamic State Confront Echo of Kingdom’s Past (BBG)
• EU’s Top Banker Warns of Rule Fixation ‘Going Beyond Reason (BBG)
• U.S.-led air strikes killed 521 fighters, 32 civilians in Syria (Reuters)
• Growing Kurdish Unity Helps West, Worries Turkey (WSJ)
• Don’t Be Distracted by the Pass Rate in ECB’s Bank Exams (BBG)
• Hedge Funds Add to Venture-Capital Bounty (WSJ)
• Speed-of-Light Trading Grows in Europe With McKay Network (BBG)

Whocouldanode? Chinese GDP managed (thanks to record-breaking credit creation and QE-lite) to beat expectations of +7.2% and come in at +7.3% (still its slowest growth since April 2009). Notably this was the biggest decoupling from Bloomberg's high-frequency economic data forecast (i.e. real data) since May 2010. Despite weakness in Cement and Steel output, Industrial Production also managed to beat and actually improve (another miracle). Retail Sales missed expectations, rose only 11.6% YoY - its weakest since Feb 2006. Initial kneejerk is a lift in USDJPY, AUDJPY, TSY yields, and S&P and NKY futures... but that has now faded...

Yesterday, Obama made a rare campaign trail appearance in Maryland where he spoke in support of Democratic candidate for governor, Anthony Brown, proceeded with his usual bulletin of reading fabricated economic data off the teleprompter in which he highlighted improvements in US unemployment (if not the 46.5 million people on foodstamps or the 93 million Americans out of the labor force), a rebounding housing market (just as the bouncing dead cat is once again dead), the benefits of health insurance (if no mention of the disaster for small businesses that Obamacare now definitively is) a resurgent manufacturing sector (just don't look at this chart) even if he did point out the unfairness of families having "two folks working", and... a mass audience exodus followed.

We suspect the market will be disappointed by this morning's headlines from China. Chinese rate markets are implying a RRR cut is coming soon (as swap rates drop below deposit rates - previously signaled 2 RRR cuts) but the PBOC announced this morning a muich more focused injection of cash to 20 of the nations' largest banks. RRR cuts, are (theoretically) considerably more broadly stimulative to lending than a $32.8 billion cash injection to banks - which are struggling to lend as demand for loans (given high costs of debt for the firms that need the money the most) is weak. One can only imagine the holes in bank balance sheets that exist if the PBOC is forced to do this. Simply put, no matter how much hope there is, as we noted previously, the PBOC will not be providing broad stimulus.

If the last three days all started with a rout in futures before the US market open only to ramp higher all day, today it may well be the opposite, when shortly after Europe opened it was the ECB's turn to talk stocks higher, when literally within minutes of the European market's open, ECB's Coeure said that:

• COEURE SAYS ECB WILL START WITHIN DAYS TO BUY ASSETS

Which was today's code word for all is clear, and within minutes US futures, which until that moment had languished unchanged, soared by 25 points. So will today be more of the same and whatever early action was directed by the central bankers will be faded into a weekend in which only more bad news can come out of Ebola-land?

Surprise! Having been fooled twice before in the last housing bubble by the NAHB's persistent optimism in the face of dismal realities, it appears October was the beginning of a breaking point in realtor confidence. The headline sentiment index dropped to 54, missing extrapolated expectations of 59, led by a collapse in prospective buyers traffic (from 47 to 41). The headline 54 level is below the lowest estimate of 56 from 52 economists surveyed. Both present and future sales sub-indices also dropped but have no fear, as the NAHB notes, "while there was a dip this month, builders are still positive about the housing market," as cheaper borrowing costs may help draw more prospectiev buyers into the market (umm yeah that hasn't worked).