2s10s

For the few, the proud, the stuck in the 19th century, with an "originate to hold" business model (such an anachronism when originate to distribute by hedge funds, pardon, banks is all the rage), the latest data by Freddie Mac, in which the 30 Year Fixed just dropped to a new fresh all time low of 4.56%, down 1 bp from the last two weeks, is about the worst news possible. While the short end is still cheap (and in the case of 2 Year, near record), the ongoing flattening is a death knell for anyone who still relies on funding curves to a some profit. As the Bloomberg article pointed out earlier today, the 60 bp tightening in the 2s10s is a huge impact to P&Ls, which is now actively reverting profits afforded to financial companies in 2009 and early 2010. Soon enough, the Fed's active management of the yield curve will force banks to come up with new and improved ways to pinch pennies from US consumers now that the profitability margin on the curve has been cut by 25% in a couple of months. Alas, that would mean the risk of inflation would have to be taken seriously. In its absence, look for flattening to continue as all on the wrong side of the trade continue capitulating, and making the future for JPM, Wells and BofA uglier by the day.

Bill Miller says: "U.S. large capitalization stocks represent a once in a lifetime opportunity in my opinion to buy the best quality companies in the world at bargain prices. The last time they were this cheap relative to bonds was 1951." That's funny, because according to our regression analysis (recreated below), the fair value of stocks is 750. But who needs facts when you have propaganda and a massively underwater stock position to offload. Bill Miller's desperation letter to sucker mom and pops in buying his dangling tech holdings can be found below, but here is a quick refutation of his point, which we discussed as recently as three weeks ago. And just in case there is any confusion, the dividend yield on the S&P compared to that of 10 Year Bonds, implies a fair value for the S&P of... 655! Perhaps Bill was experiencing a "Warren Buffett" moment and actually meant stocks are a once in a lifetime opportunity to short?

There was a time when stocks, bonds, gold, dollar, oil, correlations, and pretty much anything that isn't nailed down, going up concurrently would make at least some market participants frown. Not so much any more - with the average "trader" an 18 year old pustular math whiz-kid with the personality of a paper clip and a Ph.D. from a prestigious institution to boot, with no idea of just the level of death and destruction their "sentient", "self-aware" and "learning" programs are about bring to the market, nobody cares about that little thing called logic. Yet going off that, and basing observations on the last rational market indicator, i.e. bonds, it appears stocks continue to be about 70 points rich and have a fair value around 1,020 as implied by 10 Year Yields. As the deranged schizophrenic computer algos were blowing threw vacuum tubes like Ukranian hookers go through crack on any given Hamptons weekend, they totally forgot to bring bond yields higher for validation. Which is why the stocks-bonds (10 Year) convergence is now more pronounced than ever. Sell stocks, Sell bonds (Long Yields) and wait for the big Mahwah collocation facility black out that will eliminate 80% of binary market participants that will allow the spread to close.

Spreads closed considerably wider today, with the biggest close-to-close widening since 6/22, as HY dramatically underperformed (pushing back above 600bps for the first time since 7/7) with the macro fears that we have been discussing crystallized and micro issues seem to be turning the same way.

Dismal confidence data along with more worrisome in-/de-flation data set the early tone and stocks and spreads pushed quickly lower (wider) out of the gate. The eight day rally that we have seen, and we have been vociferous in our view of what caused this and what was under the surface, was an exact mirror of the rally a month ago in credit. The swing from wides to tights from 6/10 to 6/21 (8 trading days) was 132 to 104.125 (which was the swing tights since 5/10's 95bps). The recent swing from 7/1 wides to 7/13 tights (126.755 to 106.5) was also over 8 trading days and the same pattern of index outperformance of intrinsics was very evident - which supports our thesis of macro hedge unwinds and underlying selling.

Even as stocks continue to ignore the broader economic decline, and trade exclusively to kneejerks on one-time items such as Goldman's settlement and BPs pressure tests, the far more liquid and rational bond market is hunkering down. Today, the 2 Year hit an all time low yield, even as the 2s10s tightened by yet another 6 bps to 240 bps. The impact of today's curve flattening alone will have a far more profound impact on Goldman EPS than the latest SEC wristslap farce. And as we pointed out previously, the spread between the S&P and the 10 Year yield continues to diverge. In fact, it is now so wide, that in the latest John Noyce piece, the Goldman Strategist says: "As in mid-June, the S&P looks very overvalued relative to yields. Yields are also beginning to decline again as equities stall." Sure enough the reverse is also true, and bonds may be rich to stocks, but either way, we reiterate our observation that the short stocks-short bonds trade will eventually converge (luckily with the yield on the 10 Y so low, the carry is marginal and the repo rate will likely be a greater burden until the spread recouples).

Stocks were the worst performers on a beta-adjusted basis relative to IG and HY in the US as EUR seemed to lose it status as worst of a bad bunch for a week as SovX and FINLs managed decent gains on the week. It seems our view of the credit market anticipating a turn in the cycle was correct and the consumer-sensitive sectors have seen equity play catch up to credit's warning signs from MAY. Many sectors are getting closer to fair across the capital structure but Leisure, Energy, Telecoms, and Consumer NonCyclicals still have room to drop in equities relative to credit's perception of risk. Tech, if anything, looks a little overdone in its sell-off in equities but this is perhaps due to less liquid credit and more highly levered Tech plays in stocks.

The2s10s has plumbed fresh new lows: - the most levered trade in the history of the world (the curve steepener for the uninitiated) is now the most abhorred. The amount of neg P&L incurred here over the past 2 months is just staggering. After hitting an all time of 290 in March, the 2s10s has collapsed by over 20% in the last three months. And as the leverage associated with this trade is second to none, the impact of this collapse is magnified hundreds of times, not to mention that the money banks charge for mortgages (if anyone wanted these to begin with) and credit cards is marginally so much lower that Q2 and certainly Q3 bank profitability will be very badly impaired. Which is why we were eagerly anticipating the one firm which has been the biggest defendant of the steepener trade to come out with its "double or nothing" all-in on the economic rebound which is critical for this bearish flattening to terminate. Today, we got our wish. As expected, Morgan Stanley's Jim Caron throws the kitchen sink into the bull case, and this time also pitches the "no fat tails" trade - the same trade that worked miracles for Boaz Weinstein and Merrill Lynch. Alas, with MS clients sick and tired of losing money, almost as much as Goldman's FX clients, this could be too little too late. Furthermore, with trite claims such as "no ‘double-dip’, We expect growth in China to slow but expect a soft landing, No deflation in 2H10, Policy rates to remain lower for longer, Europe to muddle along, and solvency risks in 2H10 overstated" it may be difficult for MS to find the last standing greatest fool out there. As for pitching the "Iron Butterfly" to said fool, good luck. But it sure sounds cool.

Today's action in CDS land was negative pretty much across the board with breadth extremely negative as only a handful of single-names managed to eke out gains as there was a quite evident up-in-quality shift. HY names handily underperformed IG names on the day. High beta IG names also underperformed significantly as off-the-run indices underperformed on-the-run once again and the Top 100 CDO referenced names significantly underperformed the broad market.

One of the less discussed topics by the propaganda machine is that with bond yields approaching record yields, and in the case of the 2Y below them, the S&P has no place trading over 1,000. There was a time when bonds and stocks would correlate, and as bond prices surged, equities would plunge and vice versa. Now that we live in HFT days where stock values are completely disconnected from fundamentals, and even the bond market, courtesy of the Fed's seemingly endless market interference,  it makes sense to extrapolate what the fair value of stocks would be implied purely based on bond yields stripping away for the Fed. Attached we present a very simple regression analysis between simple 10 year spreads and the S&P, and the 2s10s (steepness between the 2 and 10 Year) and the S&P. What both analyses indicate is that stocks are approximately 30% overvalued, at least based on historical regression patterns relying on yields to imply stock prices. Yet even though this analysis is purely statistical, here is a simple extension: with US stocks at about $13 trillion in market cap, if one assumes the suggested 30% haircut the result is $9.1 trillion in fair market value. Considering that the Fed has pumped $2.5 trillion in the form of monetary stimulus, and Obama's various fiscal stimuli now amount to just over $1 trillion, that explains the delta. Bonds are implying where stocks should be almost to the dot, absent the $3.5 trillion pumped into stocks by the administration and the Chairman. Fair value of stocks, when stripped away from the printer and Congress, is 750.

Greece was the standout in Europe (and in fact across most sovereigns) with a 60bps decompression today (closing below 1000bps but managing to get above and trade handily upfront for much of the day). This is a 200bps decompression since the roll and while volumes remain marginal, bonds have weakened with the 2-5Y range inverting even more significantly. Calls for 50% haircuts on Greek sovereign debt in the stress tests, and an increasingly glib view of the effectiveness of the stress tests saw FINLs shift wider once again with SEN and SUB moving pretty much in line and notably FINLs and ExFINLs not decompressing. This is interesting as perhaps we are seeing the contagion leaking back into non FINLs (which would make sense via direct channel from lending/credit as well as indirect via austerity/growth slowing).

Two days ago, we posted a story titled "Why VaR Is A Joke: Morgan Stanley Admits Losses in April And May Were "Much Higher" Than Anticipated" in which we extracted a segment from a report by Jim Caron to claim that VaR models are broken beyond fixing. Today, Morgan Stanley has asked us to provide a clarification on our post. We gladly comply.

Tyler,
The comments from Jim Caron that you reference in this article concern a model portfolio maintained by Morgan Stanley Research.  This fact isn't clearly reflected in the headline or in the article.  The headline in particular suggests that the Firm is disclosing losses.  This is not the case.  Again, Caron's comments concern a model portfolio within Morgan Stanley Research.  Please let me know if you can clarify this in an update, and let me know if you have any questions.

Thanks,
xxx
Morgan Stanley | Corporate Communications

We hope this clarifies everything.

Stress in the Spanish banking system is nothing new but with DS-K swooping in this week from the IMF, and the oh-so-trustworthy Stress-Tests due to be announced, anxiety was running high as Spain sovereign risk broke back above 250bps and BBVA and Santander struggled wider and flattened (CEE sovereigns also floundered today). Of course, far more importantly, World Cup favorites Spain lost their first round football match to the Swiss 1-0 (shame I hear you all cry).

George Osborne, the UK's Chancellor of the Exchequer, a role equivalent to that of Tim Geithner in the US, at least in public office, not sure about tax "avoidance", has just announced the abolition of the FSA - the English just as worthless equivalent to the SEC. It is time Mary Schapiro's corrupt organization share the same fate. From the FT: "George Osborne moved to redress what he described as the spectacular regulatory failure of the City, announcing the abolition of the Financial Services Authority and a sweeping increase in the Bank of England’s powers." And in other news, UK's Bernanke-equivalent will now double up as uber regulator and Viceroy of the West Indies, due to amazing new powers given to him by the Osbourne super mushroom: "Mervyn King, the Bank’s governor, will become one of the most powerful central bankers in the world, with a new remit to prevent the build-up of risk in the financial system in addition to his monetary policy role." In other words, one big step forward, and an infinite number of steps back. After all why bother with petty theft, when the Central Banks will soon be funneling trillions away from what's left of the global middle class, perfectly legally, in broad daylight, and at record 2s10s.

Spreads were mixed this week with indices modestly tighter but intrinsics notable wider as our view of the overlay unwinds into idiosyncratic derisking appears to be playing out in cash and synthetic credit. Europe outperformed US this week with help broadly from FINLs and Sovereigns but the same theme of underlying name underperformance against index outperformance was evident everywhere (especially at the HY/XOver end of the credit spectrum). Watch this week for further bond underperformance and/or skew compression - there is much more going on down here in the weeds than is evident at the aggregate levels and we suspect sooner rather than later this sentiment will spread back up to the indices (and the realities of short- and longer-term funding markets).

Bottom line - while a 3% rally in stocks and the best performance day in IG and HY credit since 5/27 hide what we think is going on under the covers. Breadth was much more mixed in single-names and the unwinding of index overlays and single-name longs (bonds or CDS) that was evident today seem to signal a risk-off sentiment from the top-down (with technicals dominating index moves today). The increasing correlation (and again we are careful to avoid using the term dependence) between stocks, credit indices, and carry currency crosses appears to be getting tighter (with EURJPY and ES_F hardly leaving each other's side today) but for the third day in a row, stocks have outperformed credit.