Japan

The time has come to raise the 'noise' level for global markets to Defcon 3 as Clive Hale, of View from the Bridge, discusses his four largest stressors currently. Instead of going 'hmmm' as Grant Williams regularly does, Hale is screaming 'aaargh' as he sees Japanese radioactivity uncertainty, market manipulation, the main-stream media's anaesthetising propaganda, and finally the euro (that last lingering but fatally flawed bastion of european union) plethora problems all increasingly weighing on global macro concerns.

The February TIC data is out and here are the notable items. Total long-term purchases across all securities classes came in at an underwhelming $10.1 billion on expectations of a $42.5 billion increase, although when combined with Short-Term transactions, the total rose to $107.7 billion, greater than expected. However, since this series includes extensive irrelevant noise, tracking just LT data on a sequential basis, shows that in February foreign purchases of the 4 key security classes (TSYs, Stocks, Agencies and Corporate bonds) came in at a relatively weak $24.8 billion, down from $95.7 billion in February, of which $15.4 billion was US Treasurys. What is notable is that equities accounted for $7.6 billion of this total, the largest foreign purchase of US equities since May of 2011. Well, if US consumers will not buy stocks at least foreigners stepped up, and it also explains where at least some demand came from.  It also means that the 6 month moving average of foreign stock dumping has finally reversed from all time lows. However, what chart 1 vividly shows, is that over the past several months foreign flows into US securities, previously stable regardless of global events, has also become Risk On - Risk Off, with ever increasing a monthly amplitude. In other words everyone now has a 30 day attention span tops. Finally, now that the UK has been "disambiguated" from Chinese data, and thus saw its holdings drop to a realistic $103 and about to slide into double digit territory for the first time in years, Chinese holdings in turn tose to $1178.9, the highest since the big selloff in December, while Japan continues to find better bargains in US paper, with its holdings soaring to a record $1.095.9 billion.

All you need to read and some more.

Eurozone periphery concerns continue to loom as Italian and Spanish spreads against the German 10yr remain elevated, but have come off their widest levels in recent trade amid some unconfirmed market talk of real money accounts buying Spanish paper.  Despite the concerns in Europe, the major European bourses are trading higher with individual stocks news from over the weekend propping up indices with reports of intra-European M&A and a string of good news for mining stocks pushing up markets today. Some stock stories of note include the agreement of an offer between France’s GDF Suez and UK’s International Power for GBP 4.18 per share, and a speculated merger of BHP Billiton’s and Rio Tinto’s diamond units by private equity firm KKR. The financials sector, however, is showing the strain, as the 3m EUR basis swap moves sharply lower to -53.87 from approximately -50 on Friday, with particular underperformance noted in the French banking sector.  The session so far has been very data-light, with Eurozone trade balance coming in slightly lower than expectations but markets remained unreactive to the release.

• Downgrades Loom for Banks (WSJ)
• China Loosens Grip on Yuan (WSJ)
• Sarkozy Embraces Growth Role for ECB (WSJ)
• A Top Euro Banker Calls for Boost to IMF (WSJ)
• Wolfgang Münchau - Spain has accepted mission impossible (FT)
• Hong Kong Takeovers Loom Large With Banks Lending Yuan: Real M&A (Bloomberg)
• Banks urge Fed retreat on credit exposure (FT)
• Drought in U.K. Adds to Inflation Fears (WSJ)
• France faces revival of radical left (FT)
• Euro Area Seeks Bigger IMF War Chest as Spanish Concerns Mount (Bloomberg)

What a difference a month makes. About 4 weeks ago the European crisis was "over" - French President Sarkozy exclaimed that: “Today, the problem is solved!” Christine Lagarde, former French finance minister, and current IMF head following the framing of DSK, added that “Economic spring is in the air!”... Fast forward to today when following the inevitable end of the transitory favorable effects of the LTRO (remember: flow not stock, a/k/a the shark can not stop moving forward), the collapse of the Spanish stock market, the now daily halting of Italian financial stocks, the inevitable announcement that shorting of financials in Europe is again forbidden, and finally the record spike in Spanish CDS, Europe is broken all over again. Which brings us again the Sarkozy and Lagarde. The Frenchman who is about to lose the presidential race to socialist competitor Hollande (an event which will have major ramifications for Europe as UBS' George Magnus patiently explained two months ago), no longer sees anything as solved, and instead is openly begging for the ECB to inject more, more, more money into the system to pretend that "problems are solved" for a few more months. Incidentally, so is Lagarde, for whom in an odd change of seasons, economic spring is about to be followed by a depressionary winter. The problem is both will end up empty handed, as the well may just have run dry.

Better stock up on the Depends now. 

Until you see pictures, it is hard to get a sense of what all this means ...

George Soros has been a busy man the last few days. Appearing at the INET Conference a number of times and penning detailed articles for the FT (and here at Project Syndicate) describing the terrible situation in which Europe finds itself - and furthermore offering a potential solution. Critically, he opines, the European crisis is complex since it is a vicious circle of competing crises: sovereign debt, balance of payments, banking, competitiveness, and structurally defective non-optimal currency union. The fact is 'we are very far from equilibrium...of the Maastricht criteria' with his very clear insight that the massive gap, or cognitive dissonance, between the 'official authorities' hope and the outside world who see how abnormal the situation is, is troublesome at best. Analogizing the periphery countries as third-world countries that are heavily indebted in a foreign currency (that they cannot print), his initial conclusion ends with the blunt statement that "the euro has really broken down" and the ensuing discussion of just what this means from both an economic and socially devastating perspective: the destruction of the common market and the European Union and how this will end in acrimonious recriminations with worse conflicts between European states than before.

But they forgot to check with the Germans.

Red headline time. From Yonhap:

North Korea launches rocket - S.Korea's YTN Television
U.S official confirms North Korea has launched rocket
Rocket launch took place at 7:39 local time - South Korea Defense Ministry,

Japan likely in full mobilization mode right about now. Or not: this just in:

ABC's Martha Raddatz reports the North Korean rocket launch has FAILED.

Somebody is about to be punished big time since local rockets no fly long time.

Reiterating his earlier year call to dollar-cost-average into long Gold via GLD and short Euro (FXE) positions, Charles Biderman of TrimTabs suggests that while the sell-off in stocks may have begun, he does not expect it to pick up steam until after April. His thesis for being long Gold remains the same, the US, Europe, and Japan continue to create ever-increasing amounts of paper-money with which they pay bills - and that is not going to end soon. EM central banks will continue to load up on gold in reserves with an endgame of replacing USD reserve status quo. His short Euro thesis has, in his view, become more prescient as the European recession grows deeper and the EUR drifts towards parity with the USD (whether or not the Fed 'allows' it). He ends with a noteworthy comment on the removal of safe-haven status for common carry currencies such as NZD, AUD, and CAD due to crumbling housing fundamentals.

A Monetary Cliff or a Fiscal Cliff: these are the two poisons that Barton Biggs sees rushing straight toward America, with little hope of an uneventful collision. While we have not been shy of our opinions on Barton Biggs' flip-flopping positions, his note on the US "as a nation of totally self-centered special interest groups that terrorize our politicians" struck a chord and deserves praise in its clarity. Noting that Europe seems stuck again, he points to the US market being data and Europe-dependent for the next month and believes the correction is little less than half way over (in terms of size not time). In Biggs opinion "although the Monetary Cliff is more long-term dangerous, the proximity of the Fiscal Cliff, if not dealt with, will trigger the dreaded double-dip recession we are all terrified of and bring on another financial crisis."

"In the last three plus years, central banks have had little choice but to do the unsustainable in order to sustain the unsustainable until others do the sustainable to restore sustainability!" is how PIMCO's El-Erian introduces the game-theoretic catastrophe that is potentially occurring around us. In a lecture to the St.Louis Fed, the moustachioed maestro of monetary munificence states "let me say right here that the analysis will suggest that central banks can no longer – indeed, should no longer – carry the bulk of the policy burden" and "it is a recognition of the declining effectiveness of central banks’ tools in countering deleveraging forces amid impediments to growth that dominate the outlook. It is also about the growing risk of collateral damage and unintended circumstances." It appears that we have reached the legitimate point of – and the need for – much greater debate on whether the benefits of such unusual central bank activism sufficiently justify the costs and risks. This is not an issue of central banks’ desire to do good in a world facing an “unusually uncertain” outlook. Rather, it relates to questions about diminishing returns and the eroding potency of the current policy stances. The question is will investors remain "numb and sedated…. by the money sloshing around the system?" or will "the welfare of millions in the United States, if not billions of people around the world, will have suffered greatly if central banks end up in the unpleasant position of having to clean up after a parade of advanced nations that headed straight into a global recession and a disorderly debt deflation." Of course, it is a rhetorical question.

• Fed's No. 2 Strongly Backs Low-Rate Policy (Hilsenrath)
• World Bank Cuts China 2012 Growth Outlook on Exports  (Bloomberg)
• BlackRock's Street Shortcut: Big Banks Would Be Bypassed With Bond Platform; 'Not Going to Cannibalize' (WSJ)
• George Soros - Europe’s Future is Not Up to The Bundesbank (FT)
• Fed May Have Aggravated Income Inequality, El-Erian Says(Bloomberg)
• Shirakawa Pledges Japan Easing Amid Political Pressure (Bloomberg)
• Spain’s Debt Struggle Opens Door to Sarkozy Campaign Message (Bloomberg)
• Iran Woos Oil Buyers With Easy Credit (FT)
• Syria Pledges to Observe Ceasefire (FT)