China

After a furious three day "dash for trash", no volume, no breadth, commodity-driven rally, even Santa is now exhausted and overnight US equity index futures were little changed with European and Asian shares mixed. The dollar has declines as gold, silver gain, with WTI initially continuing its recent meteoric rise (up over 8% in the past three days, nearly hitting $38), only to reverse and give up all overnight gains moments ago. Copper falls after Chinese stocks see a second day of weakness, down 0.7% while an unexpected tumble in the USDJPY to 7 weeks lows has dragged the Nikkei (-0.5%) and its futures down.

Rather, economic collapse is the greatest weapon at the disposal of globalists. National panic, riots, looting, starvation, magnified crime: All of these things result in mass die-offs and desperation. Desperation leads to calls for "strong leadership", and strong leadership usually results in totalitarianism. It might seem sensationalist to tie all of these possible outcomes to the Fed rate hike decision, but give it a little time. Those who make accusations of sensationalism and “fear mongering” today will be asserting tomorrow that such developments were “easily predictable.”

There is one thing that could dramatically slow down China's metal exports - tariffs, anti-dumping duties and other forms of protectionism.  “What may slow down the exports is anti-dumping and protectionist measures that several countries have taken against cheap imports,” said Ernst & Young’s Agrawal. In other words, a trade war... which is precisely what the U.S. just launched by hiking tariffs on Chinese steel imports by a whopping 256%.

Trump is popular not so much for his stance on issues as for the fact that he is not another Washington politican, and he is respected for not backing down and apologizing when he makes strong statements for which he is criticized. What people see in Trump is strength and leadership. This is what is unusual about a political candidate, and it is this strength to which voters are responding. For that reason, the corrupt American political establishment has issued a “get Trump” command to its presstitute media.

“I was really worried. Everyone who thought of going for the end of the year will have to cancel. Nobody is going to pay 2,000 reais for a holiday package to go to a place where people say the mud is."

The market is well aware the price of risk is not correct, but they can’t fight it, and everyone is forced to crowd into the same trade by central bank (CB) intervention. By manipulating markets they have also reduced investors’ inherent conviction by rendering fundamentals less relevant, creating a highly unstable (fragile) situation that breaks violently when a sufficient catalyst causes risk to rise – overly crowded positioning meets a market with little conviction. Catalysts From BofAML's global equity derivatives desk's vantage point, it becomes clear that the biggest visible risk to financial markets is a loss of confidence in this omnipotent CB put.

In an unexpected turn of events, the disappearance of not just synthetic but very physical dollars has hit one region much harder and much faster than we expected. Africa.

At the end of the day, the Fed led central bank money printing spree of the past two decades resulted in what is functionally a massive dollar short. Once the Fed stopped expanding its balance sheet when QE officially ended in October 2014, it was only a matter of time before all the “near-dollars” of the world would come under enormous downward pressure in the FX markets. Our Keynesian witch doctors believe that sinking currencies are a wonderful thing, of course. They claim making your country poorer is a good way to stimulate export growth and a virtuous cycle of spending and growth. But there is another thing. It is also a good way to generate capital flight and the ensuing chaos that creates.

Good things are coming for beaten-down commodity investors in 2016...

• Oil up after U.S. crude stocks drop, still close to 11-year lows (Reuters)
• Global Stocks Rally; Mining, Metals Shares Lead Gains (WSJ)
• OPEC Sees Demand for Its Crude Oil Falling for Rest of Decade (BBG)
• The Trouble With Sovereign-Wealth Funds (WSJ)
• U.S. Calls for 256% Tariff on Imports of Steel From China (BBG)
• Iraqi troops expected to drive ISIS from Ramadi in days (Reuters)

With just a handful of trading sessions left in the year, this is how the major global markets look as 2015 is about to close. As of this moment, and in keeping with the Christmas spirit, the biggest question is whether the S&P500 will close green or red for the year.

Russia adds another 700,000 ounces (22 tonnes) to gold reserves in November. Ally Kazakhstan increased gold reserves for 38th month –  to over 7 million ounces. Russia views gold bullion as “100% guarantee from legal and political risks ...”

In a shocking new report, Seymour Hersh reveals what he says was a covert operation run by the Joint Chiefs of Staff who sought to undermine the Obama administration and the CIA's goal of overthrowing the Assad regime in Syria. "If the American public saw the intelligence we were producing daily, at the most sensitive level, they would go ballistic."

While Sweden is over-flowing with excess cash on bank balance sheets, it appears that banks in Hong Kong are desperate to borrow Yuan (or scared to lend) as overnight HIBOR just exploded higher to 9.45% - a record for the interbank offered rate. The HKD and CNY/CNH FX markets remain relatively stable (with Yuan fixed marginally higher again for the 3rd day). The last time 1-week HIBOR rates spiked like this, US equity markets crashed on Black Monday.