New Normal

The mainstream media would have us believe that the U.S. economy must be in great shape since the stock market has been setting new all-time record highs this month.  But is that really true?  Yes, surging stock prices have enabled sales of beach homes in the Hamptons to hit a brand new record high.  However, the reality is that stock prices have not risen dramatically in recent years because corporations are doing so much better than before.  In fact, the growth in stock prices has been far, far greater than the growth of corporate revenues.  The only reason that stock prices have been climbing so much is because the Federal Reserve has been flooding the financial system with hundreds of billions of dollars that it has created out of thin air.  The Fed has created an artificial stock market bubble that is completely and totally divorced from economic reality. Meanwhile, everything is not so fine for the rest of the U.S. economy.

The July edition of Insight aptly titled ‘As The Crisis Deepens, Gold Flows East’ builds on our recent commentary and offers another viewpoint on why there is a marked flow of gold from west to east.

The next three editions of Market Update will quote extensively from ‘As The Crisis Deepens, Gold Flows East’ as we delve deeper into the story and its implications for our financial well being.

While many draw comparisons to 1994's Fed actions, rate rises, and the subsequent economic and equity market performance, UBS' commodity team examines the five main drivers of that mid-90s disinflationary boom and how (or if) they are applicable in the US' current new normal. Their findings "this may be a 1994 redux, but it ain't no 1995 replay," as they note, in fact, it's a bear market waiting to happen. Every one of these processes is deflationary, not disinflationary. And they are self reinforcing. And deflation, in direct contrast to disinflation, is very bad for asset prices (with a serious equity and credit bear-market). So just as we have noted previously any taper will likely eventually lead to an 'un-taper' reflation effort (which will see gold once again strengthen) along with the exposure of the fallacy that the Fed really has become.

While everyone's attention is focused on the Detroit bankruptcy, and just what assets the city will sell in lieu of raising a DIP loan, perhaps it is time to refocus attention to the city 300 miles west: Chicago. According to the Chicago Sun Times, Obama's former right hand man, Rahm Emanuel, closed the books on 2012 with $33.4 million in unallocated cash on hand — down from $167 million the year before — while adding to the mountain of debt piled on Chicago taxpayers, citing year-end audits. In addition to a liquidity problem, Chicago may also be quite insolvent as the city's total long-term debt soared to nearly $29 billion. That’s $10,780 for every one of the city’s nearly 2.69 million residents. More than a decade ago, the debt load was $9.6 billion or $3,338 per resident. Of course, in a world in which debt is "wealth", this is great news... at least until debt becomes "bankruptcy."

While this story is not Friday humor, it may explain the preponderance of "erect hockeystick" formations in IMF's legacy projection charts. Former IMF head Dominique Strauss-Kahn is no stranger to sexual scandal - in fact Anthony Weiner may learn a thing or two from the man who once upon a time was said would be France's next president. However, being charged with "aggravated pimping" may be a new low even for DSK, or new high if in the New Normal it is finally 50 Cent who sets ethical and moral standards. The reason for the lawsuit is that during numerous sex parties which DSK had attended in various cities over the years, there were prostitutes also present, often times in groups.

As municipal bankruptcies become the New Normal, it's worth noting that litigation does not generate more wealth to distribute, it simply burns existing wealth, leaving less to distribute. Yes, this is stating the obvious, but what's obvious is precisely what's ignored when fantasy attempts to trump reality. Every constituency in every municipal bankruptcy believes they're the most deserving, and they believe that litigation will reveal the obvious truth of their claim. Unfortunately for those counting on the Grand Federal Bailout, the queue at the Federal bailout window is already long: $100+ billion bailout of FHA, which issued hundreds of billions of dollars of mortgages to unqualified buyers; $100+ billion in uncollectible student loans owned or guaranteed by Federal agencies, and of course the $1+ trillion annual deficits needed just to fill the massive feeding troughs of the Status Quo.

No really, that is the actual name of the hearing that the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs will hold today in order to "clarify" why banks like Goldman are currently the owners of the largest aluminum warehouse in the US, or why Goldman, JPM and BlackRock are set to control 80% of all copper stores. The hearing's official name: "Examining Financial Holding Companies: Should Banks Control Power Plants, Warehouses, and Oil Refineries?"

There was a time when the US housing market was not "driven" by hedge funds armed with government-subsidized, "REO-to-Rent" loans loading up on distressed properties, by banks refusing to release foreclosed properties into the market (thus creating a market subsidy) or by foreigners eager to park their "tax-evaded" wealth with the Anti Money-Laundering exempt National Association of Realtors. Instead, the main driver of US housing were first-time home buyers, "typically couples in their late 20s or early 30s" who historically have accounted for about 40% of home sales. Alas, last year, and all throughout the New Normal, this number has been about 25% lower, or representing just 30% of all sales (except for a brief spike to 50% in 2009 courtesy of recession-era tax credits). Then again, what 30 year old needs a home when one can now get an E-trade terminal under the bridge to generate "the wealth effect"?

It's good to see that as more of the US spirals into chaos, someone still has a sarcastic sense of humor. For those who missed it, in the Kevyn Odd statement listing the primary reason for the bankruptcy of Detroit, this was the punchline: "For years, the City has spent more than it takes in and has borrowed and deferred paying certain obligations to make ends meet. The City is insolvent." In other words, a pure pyramid scheme whose final can kicking day has finally come. Which perhaps explains why the just appointed Judge to preside over the largest municipal bankruptcy in US history is none other than Judge Steven Rhodes, 64, who just happens to be the co-author of "The Ponzi Book: A Legal Resource for Unraveling Ponzi Schemes." In other words, if there is anyone qualified to oversee the biggest Ponzi scheme collapse to date in US public sector history, it would be Judge Rhodes. We can only hope, however, that he leaves some time in his busy schedule over the next several years, for that other, biggest of all Ponzi schemes, the United States of America.

The grotesque days of the first housing bubble are now being flatly trounced by the surreal second coming of the housing bubble, where courtesy of RealtyTrac we find that the old gross maximum profit potential of 63% realized in Orlando, FL house flipping, has two short months been eclipsed by flipping a house in Daytona Beach, generating a mindblowing 82% "flip that house" return! In brief: in the first half of 2013 there were 136,184 single family home flips — where a home is purchased and subsequently sold again within six months — in the first half of 2013, up 19 percent from a year ago and up 74 percent from the first half of 2011. Real estate investors made an average gross profit of $18,391 on single family home flips in the first half of the year, a 9 percent gross return on the initial purchase price. That was up 246 percent from an average gross return of $5,321 in the first half of 2012 and an average loss of -$13,206 in the first half of 2011.

As part of the Appendixed disclosures in the aftermath of JPM's London Whale fiasco, we learned the source of funding that Bruno Iksil and company at the firm's Chief Investment Office used to rig and corner the IG and HY market, making billions in profits in what, on paper, were supposed to be safe, hedging investments until it all went to hell and resulted in the most humiliating episode of Jamie Dimon's career and huge losses: it was excess customer customer deposits arising from a $400+ billion gap between loans and deposits. After JPM's fiasco went public, the firm hunkered down and promptly unwound (or is still in the process of doing so) its existing CIO positions at a huge loss. However, that meant that suddenly the firm found itself with nearly $400 billion billion in inert, nonmargined cash: something that was unacceptable to the CEO and the firm's shareholders. In other words, it was time to get to work, Mr. Dimon, and put that cash to good, or bad as the case almost always is, use. So what has JPM allocated all those billions in excess deposits over loans? Courtesy of Fortune magazine we now know the answer - CLOs.

The current regime of extreme monetary policy that has become the new normal - to which we have become entirely desensitized and addicted - remains the biggest (and most dangerous) experiment in central planning in the 100 year history of the Fed. Trusting the beard and his band of PhDs to get this right may be a stretch though, as UBS' Art Cashin notes, their track record has not been stellar and as he notes from the 10th Annual Report of the Fed: "the Fed was supposed to extend credit only for 'productive' and not for 'speculative' purposes."

When we reported on the Initial Claims print we said that "we will have to see the Philly Fed today, where we expect either a huge beat or huge miss to both be catalysts for fresh all time market highs." Well, we just got the all time highs, first in the DJIA for moments ago in the S&P cash as well, following news that the Philly Fed soared from 12.5 to 19.8, slamming expectations of a modest decline to 8.0, and despite a drop in New Orders from 16.6 to 10.2, and a crash in Inventories from -6.6 to -21.6, the headline print coming at the highest since March 2011.

"Perhaps the success that central bankers had in preventing the collapse of the financial system after the crisis secured them the public's trust to go further into the deeper waters of quantitative easing. Could success at rescuing the banks have also mislead some central bankers into thinking they had the Midas touch? So a combination of public confidence, tinged with central-banker hubris could explain the foray into quantitative easing. Yet this too seems only a partial explanation. For few amongst the lay public were happy that the bankers were rescued, and many on Main Street did not understand why the financial system had to be saved when their own employers were laying off workers or closing down." - Raghuram Rajan

A quick look at job creation on a state by state basis shows some very distinct losers, and one very obvious winner: Texas.