• Pivotfarm
    05/24/2013 - 10:04
    Everyone has heard of Marie-Antoinette screaming from her balcony at the Palace of Versailles in the early hours of the French Revolution: “if there’s no bread, then let them eat cake!”. Right!
  • Pivotfarm
    05/24/2013 - 08:38
    What was that single that soul singer Otis Clay brought out in 1980? Oh yeah, ‘The only way is up’! Well, if ever there were a more fitting signature tune these days for CEOs in the USA, then that’s...
  • 05/24/2013 - 08:21
    ...understand the national threat that is our fragmented and perverted equity market microstructure that is driven by such esoteric order-types such a Post No Preference Blind Limit Order created...

Japan

Tyler Durden's picture

BNP Warns On Japanese Repression: Echoes Of The 1940s Fed





In the 1940s, the Fed adopted pegging operations to protect the financial system against rising interest rates and to ensure the smooth financing of the war effort. In effect, the Fed became part of the Treasury’s debt management team; as the budget deficit hit 25% of GDP in WW2, it capped 1Y notes at 87.5bps and 30Y bonds at 2.5%. From the massive bond holdings of its domestic banks to its exploding public debt, Japan today faces a situation very similar to the US in the 1940s. When the long-term rate climbs above 2%, the BoJ will probably adopt outright measures to underpin JGB prices to prevent turmoil in the financial system and a fiscal crisis - and just as Kyle Bass noted yesterday, they are going to need a bigger boat as direct financial repression in Japan is unavoidable.


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

Where's The "Buy The Dip Mentality" Today?





While yesterday saw the mainstream media cock-a-hoop at the fact that we pulled 'off-the-lows' with the phrase "buy the dip mentality" parrotted prayer-like every minute of the afternoon. Overnight shenanigans saw that BTFD mentality come and then quickly go and now the US market is fading fast. USDJPY has broken below 101 and US equity markets are testing below yesterday's lows... Treasury yields are now low on the week for the long-bond; gold and silver are holding up as JPY strength is weakening the USD broadly. Meanwhile, European peripheral debt is getting monkey-hammered (worst 2 days in 8 months)...


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

Nikkei Futures Resume Plunge





Japanese stocks had another violent night with record trading volumes on the TOPIX. The early 'buy the dip mentality' rapidly escalated into sell-Mortimer-sell as the Nikkei 225 dropped another 1000 points after the lunch break. A late day recovery managed to close the index just in the green and all could relax that the world was once again a better place thanks to Abenomics. However, since Japan closed, Nikkei futures have been sold aggressively now testing back down towards overnight lows.


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

Why Italian Bonds Have A Long Way Down To Go





As we hinted last night, and as the market is starting to realize, one of the bigger downstream casualties of the first rumblings that Abenomics is starting to crack, have been peripheral bond yields, with Spanish, Italian and Portuguese yields all wider by 10 bps and rising. However, that is only half the story. The other half is that, with its usual 6-8 week delay, the market is finally grasping the biggest danger in Europe - one which we have been pounding the table on week after week after week (most recently here): the soaring non-performing loans held by European banks. In fact, it took the FT to confirm what we have been warning about all along. And just so the market has a sense of how much downside may be imminent if indeed reality reasserts itself and frontrunning the Japanese carry trade both occur at the same time, here is a rather unpleasant chart courtesy of Diapason, of what expects all those who bought up Italian bonds in the recent dash-for-trash, oblivious of the collapsing fundamentals, and driven purely by FOMO. The downside could be big to quite big.


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

Bizarro Time As Better Data Sends Stocks Lower





"The last 36 hours have perhaps been evidence as to what might happen if stimulus is withdrawn before the global recovery has been cemented and what might happen if Japan makes mistakes along the way to their attempted new dawn. With the Chinese data still ambiguous, Europe still in recession, Japan in the very  early stages of a growth experiment and with the US recovery still historically very weak one has to say that liquidity has been the main market fuel in recent months. So central banks have to tread carefully and the Fed tapering talk and the BoJ's seemingly benign neglect policy towards JGBs has had the market fretting." - Deutsche Bank


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

Japan Has Officially Gone Insane





On one hand:

  • BOJ OFFERS TO BUY 300B YEN DEBT WITH MORE THAN 10YR MATURITY
  • BOJ OFFERS TO BUY 600B YEN IN 5-10YR GOVT DEBT

and on the other

  • ABE SAYS BOJ ISN’T DIRECTLY BUYING GOVERNMENT DEBT

We give up: raging schizophrenia and a sado-maso fetish is now a core prerequisite for anyone who wishes to follow the daily lies these central planning sociopaths spew with impunity.


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

Japanese Stocks Open +1.5%; Bonds Half-Way To Limit Down





It seems the correlation to USDJPY has started to disintegrate and what is more worrisome for the BoJ is the linkage between JGBs and the Nikkei 225. Equities in Japan are about to open to a modest bounce around 1.5% but JGB prices are down around 0.50 (half the limit-down price moves). So, the problem for the BoJ is - do you let JGBs flop to maintain your equity market's appearance of normality? Or are Japanese stocks about to be as implicitly repressed as the bond market? It would appear TPTB are doping their best to ramp the JPY to keep this bounce alive (USDJPY opening just shy of 102.50).

*AMARI SAYS 'ABENOMICS' IS PROGRESSING STEADILY (this is progress?)
*AMARI SAYS BOJ IS COMMUNICATING CLOSELY WITH MARKETS (we suspect the market is communicating back even more)

"Central bankers dream of getting back to "normal" – normal interest rates, a normal balance sheet, and so on. But that point isn't going to come any time soon. They are stuck on a money printing treadmill, and there appears no way off.


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

Are Covert Operations Underway In The Global Currency Wars?





In an age of economic policy activism, including widespread quantitative easing and associated purchases of bonds and other assets, Amphora's John Butler reminds us that it is perhaps easy to forget that foreign exchange intervention has always been and remains an important economic policy tool. Recently, for example, Japan, Switzerland and New Zealand have openly intervened to weaken their currencies and several other countries have expressed a desire for some degree of currency weakness. In this report, Butler summarizes the goals and methods of foreign exchange intervention and places today’s policies in their historical context; but moreover he discusses the evidence of where covert intervention - quite common historically - might possibly be taking place: perhaps where you would least expect it... And if the currency wars continue to escalate as they have of late, it seems reasonable to expect that covert interventions will grow in size, scope and frequency.


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

Bass On Japan's Turbo QE: "It Won't Be Enough"





If JGB investors 'believe' as Richard Koo earlier noted, in the BoJ's new actions and Abenomics (to double the monetary base and generate inflation), then, Kyle Bass explains, a rational investor is likely to sell a portion if not all of them. The BoJ only has JPY10 trillion cushion (after the JPY60 trillion deficit) to soak up this 'rational investor paradox' selling and this is dwarfed by the holdings of JGBs in the largest Japanese banks (who are now starting to rotate away from JGBs into foreign bonds). Simply out, Bass exclaims, they are going to have make the plan even bigger... if they are to successfully contain rates. With a quadrillion JPY of JGBs out there, if a mere 5% is sold (from 'Abe'lievers) then Japan's Turbo QE is not big enough which leads to the paradoxical increase in the QQE, moar inflationary 'belief', and moar selling pressure... The BoJ has been in the market every day but 2 since April 4th trying to hold rates down (and is failing)...


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

Quote Of The Day





The only sane central banker in the world, the Bundesbank's Jens Weidmann, take the prize for today's quote of the day with the following:

  • ECB'S WEIDMANN WISHES JAPAN `GOOD LUCK IN THEIR EXPERIMENTS'

So do we. They will need it.


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

Richard Koo Warns Of "Beginning Of The End" For Japanese Economy





The surge in Japanese long-term interest rates is likely causing some lost sleep among bond market participants and policymakers (despite their ignorance of the moves in the BoJ minutes) as Nomura's Richard Koo notes, if this trend continues (now added to by the collapse in stock prices) it could well mark the “beginning of the end” for the Japanese economy. Although the stock market has (until now) welcomed the yen’s continued slide against the dollar, Koo warns that this trend needs to be carefully monitored, as simultaneous declines in JGBs and the yen can be interpreted as a loss of faith in the Japanese government and the Bank of Japan. The biggest concerns are that the extreme volatility in Japanese stocks and bonds is occurring at a time when the BOJ was buying large quantities of government bonds. It is now clear that even large-scale BOJ purchases of JGBs cannot stop yields from rising. Simply put, Koo notes, the BoJ needs to rein itself in and state it will not stand for overshooting inflation expectations or the 'bad' rise in rates could crush both the nascent recovery and the nation's banking system.


 

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Tyler Durden's picture

UBS On Japan - Are You 'Abe'liever?





We totally get why many are excited by the recent cyclical improvement in the Japanese economy. However, just because industrial production is turning up on the back of exports and 1Q GDP grew more than expected doesn’t mean Abeconomics is working. Most of the improvement in Japan is probably best described as a standard cyclical improvement in the aftermath of very depressed growth that was also heavily influenced by last year’s downturn in global trade. There are definitely signs that Japan’s economy are improving cyclically. However, as UBS notes, structurally, demographics remain a major headwind to raising aggregate demand. We feel many investors have not yet considered what slower growth for Asia will mean for Japan in the medium term. This will make it more difficult to raise aggregate demand above supply since capacity is sticky and Japan already has excess capacity. So for Abe-believers there will be fuel to support their optimism. However, once you move beyond that and think about what comes afterwards things look more challenging.


 

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Phoenix Capital Research's picture

Will Japan Trigger a Global Financial Meltdown?





As Japan has indicated, when bonds start to plunge, it’s not good for stocks. Today the Japanese Bond market fell and the Nikkei plunged 7%. The entire market down 7%... despite the Bank of Japan funneling $19 billion into it to hold things together.


 

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Marc To Market's picture

Japanese Corporates Are Not Yen Bears (any more)





The globalization of production makes corporate fx interests less clear. A Reuters survey finds Japanese corporates bearish the yen. Japanese investors also have not behaved as if they expect yen weakness to be sustained.


 

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GoldCore's picture

Gold Up 1.5% As Stocks Globally Fall After Nikkei Crashes 7.3%





Today’s AM fix was USD 1,386.00, EUR 1,074.92 and GBP 919.16 per ounce.  
Yesterday’s AM fix was USD 1,385.25, EUR 1,071.43 and GBP 917.75 per ounce. 


 

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