Credit Suisse

There is a saying that it is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt. Today, the San Fran Fed's John Williams, and by proxy the Federal Reserve in general, spoke out, and once again removed all doubt that they have no idea how modern money and inflation interact. In a speech titled, appropriately enough, "Monetary Policy, Money, and Inflation", essentially made the case that this time is different and that no matter how much printing the Fed engages in, there will be no inflation. To wit: "In a world where the Fed pays interest on bank reserves, traditional theories that tell of a mechanical link between reserves, money supply, and, ultimately, inflation are no longer valid. Over the past four years, the Federal Reserve has more than tripled the monetary base, a key determinant of money supply. Some commentators have sounded an alarm that this massive expansion of the monetary base will inexorably lead to high inflation, à la Friedman.Despite these dire predictions, inflation in the United States has been the dog that didn’t bark." He then proceeds to add some pretty (if completely irrelevant) charts of the money multipliers which as we all know have plummeted and concludes by saying "Recent developments make a compelling case that traditional textbook views of the connections between monetary policy, money, and inflation are outdated and need to be revised." And actually, he is correct: the way most people approach monetary policy is 100% wrong. The problem is that the Fed is the biggest culprit, and while others merely conceive of gibberish in the form of three letter economic theories, which usually has the words Modern, or Revised (and why note Super or Turbo), to make them sound more credible, they ultimately harm nobody. The Fed's power to impair, however, is endless, and as such it bears analyzing just how and why the Fed is absolutely wrong.

In line with our views on Europe's endgame, Marc Faber opined on Bloomberg TV this morning that if he "was running Germany, [he] would have abandoned the eurozone last week". We suspect that given the lack of real steps forward and no additional exposure (as yet) for Germany that they can hang on a little longer before they reach the final phase of the game-theoretically optimal exit (that Credit Suisse and us share) of a mercantilist GERxit occurring sooner than many think (benefiting from deposit inflows and low-EUR-based high profitability from exports for as long as possible and not a moment longer). The "cosmetic fix" of this latest summit, as Faber calls it, simply does not solve the fundamental problem of over-investment in the euro-zone. He is bottom-fishing in some European equities (though avoiding banks) and is not long the Euro here as he sees the modest rally in risk assets in Europe as merely a reflection of illiquidity and a grossly oversold market reverting on 'not a total disaster' though he reminds us early on that "pooling 100 sick banks does not make them healthy."

The spread between HSBC's and China's version of Manufacturing PMI increased a little over the weekend when the headline of China's data point managed to cling perilously above the 50-line of expansion over contraction (while HSBC's drifts lower and lower under 50). The headline print - still its lowest since Nov 11 - however, hides a much less sanguine truth in the sub-indices with the new orders index fell once again staying in the contractionary territory under 50. What is more worrisome for China (and implicitly the rest of the world) is that while transport equipment and electrical machinery improved (explicitly thanks to government funded infrastructure projects) there has been no multiplier effect of a broad-based investment rebound. As Credit Suisse notes: "The stimuli launched in middle of May seems to have failed to jump-start the overall economy, yet the moderation in PMI is not severe enough to justify a much more aggressive rescue package."

Sell side Wall Street vs Reggie Middleton on FB - 6 buys, 3 neutrals, avg price target $39. NOBODY came out with a short @ IPO besides moi. Guess where I stand now...

Here we come:

• MOODY'S CUTS 4 FIRMS BY 1 NOTCH
• MOODY'S CUTS 10 FIRMS' RATINGS BY 2 NOTCHES
• MOODY'S CUTS 1 FIRM BY 3 NOTCHES
• MORGAN STANLEY L-T SR DEBT CUT TO Baa1 FROM A2 BY MOODY'S
• MOODY'S CUTS MORGAN STANLEY 2 LEVELS, HAD SEEN UP TO 3
• MORGAN STANLEY OUTLOOK NEGATIVE BY MOODY'S
• MORGAN STANLEY S-T RATING CUT TO P-2 FROM P-1 BY MOODY'S
• BANK OF AMERICA L-T SR DEBT CUT TO Baa2 BY MOODY'S;OUTLOOK NEG

So the reason for the delay were last minute negotiations, most certainly involving extensive monetary explanations, by Morgan Stanley's Gorman (potentially with Moody's investor Warren Buffett on the call) to get only a two notch downgrade. And Wall Street wins again.

Even as Moody is now about a week late on its Spanish bank downgrade where the banks are rated higher than the sovereign (which obviously is kept in check to prevent yields on bonds from soaring even more), here comes the next wholesale bank downgrade:

• Moody's expected to announce ratings downgrade for UK banks this evening - Sky Sources
• Exclusive: Big news - I'm told Moody's will announce downgrades of some of world's biggest banks, incl in UK, after US mkts close tonight. - Sky's Mark Kleinman

Looks like that fabricated 2 notch Margin Stanley downgrade (because 3 notches just won't do - those 4 months of Gorman-led "negotiations" made that painfully clear) is about to strike. The real question is: What Would Egan Who Do?

Believing 'people familiar with the matter', extending rumors of large trades, and extrapolating DTCC (the CDS data repository) data has apparently caused a number of mainstream media reporters to believe that the JPMorgan 'Whale Trade' has been 60-75% unwound. The assertion appears to be based on two things: 1) a rumor from a Credit Suisse desk of heavy volumes in the last few days; and 2) DTCC data showing open trades falling. While we restate that no-one knows what the trade was, we offer three retorts to these assertions: 1) there is nothing in DTCC data that suggests any recent change in trend (or dramatic shift in net or gross notionals); 2) the aggregate nature of DTCC data offers little insight into the actual changes (whether they be unwinds or opposing positions); and 3) today is single-name CDS and index credit option expiration which means the few days leading up to this will ALWAYS have heavy volume - especially at the end of a very dramatic quarter such as the one we have just witnessed. The bottom-line is that the 'price' changes in IG9, HY9, and IG18 do not suggest any 'recent' change in the unwind scale and while we would expect that JPM has been unwinding (at least the hedge of the hedge), no-one knows how much and given the market's awareness of the position, IG9 would dramatically underperform its whale-driven rally move (which it has not yet). Anything else is speculation - though it is clear that IG9 tranche notionals suggest the original tail-risk position remains on the books.

• Prepare for Lehmans (sic) re-run, Bank official warns (Telegraph)
• Fed Seen Extending Operation Twist While Avoiding Bond Buying (Bloomberg)
• US Watchdog Hits at ‘Risky’ London (FT)
• G20 Bid to Cut Cost of Euro Borrowing (FT)
• Romney Says Rubio Being Examined as Possible Running Mate (Bloomberg)
• Hollande Says Worth Exploring ESM Bond Buys (Reuters)
• US Upbeat After Eurozone Debt Crisis Talks (FT)
• BOJ Members Say Japan Could Be ‘Adversely Affected’ by Europe (Bloomberg)
• China Steps Said to Grow Bond Market, Add Issuer Scrutiny (Bloomberg)
• How Asia Will Fare if Europe Cracks (WSJ)

All you can read.

There are five problems that need to be resolved within the European crisis and Credit Suisse provides a scorecard for the progress towards these 'risk factors'. The key issues are: growth, peripheral current account balances, solvency of the insolvent, ring-fencing the insolvent, and mutualization of government debt; but what is more worrisome is that while they have raised the average score to 2.0 out of 5 (from 0.6 out of 5 in Nov' 2011), it has not budged now in four months. The lack of growth, fiscal tightening, continuing insolvency concerns and excess leverage in the private sector, and de minimus deleveraging in Spain, Greece, Portugal, and Ireland leaves the vicious circle of progress on the European scorecard much harder from here.

News & headlines from the day

All you need to know.

News & headlines from the day

As Many Have Predicted for Years

"It’s all about Spain”, so now we are cutting to the chase. Recapitalization of the banks versus funding the sovereign is of course a semantic issue given the nature of the interplay. But it enables the attempted finesse we describe below. Given the market’s adaptive learning behaviour, we suspect that this finesse might last two [months]. The eventual denouement should be flagged by symptoms of the failure of  the credit of EFSF/ESM and/or France."