If you want to make a killing in the markets, you need to be willing to see the world the way it really is, NOT how you THINK it is. Most investors think the VIX measures the market’s risk, but really, it’s almost the opposite: a spike in the VIX almost always picks market bottoms!
So, we have investor sentiment showing record bullishness, investors are piling into stocks at a pace not seen since 1999-2000: at the height of the Tech Bubble, earnings are generally falling, the global economy is contracting, and the Fed is already buying $85 billion worth of assets per month.
While the US continues to engage in a delusional energy “debate” about whether we will continue to burn coal and whether natural gas is a panacea, China is struggling to acquire and deploy of energy resources to support its economic growth targets.
In the 1960s every new $1 in debt bought nearly $1 in GDP growth. In the 70s it began to fall as the debt climbed. By the time we hit the ‘80s and ‘90s, each new $1 in debt bought only $0.30-$0.50 in GDP growth. And today, each new $1 in debt buys only $0.10 in GDP growth at best.
In May-July 2013, Bernanke, like the rest of the Fed saw in simple terms that there is no such thing as a smooth exit. The market rebelled at the mere hint of tapering at a time when the Fed is buying $85 billion per month. If the Fed were to actually go ahead and taper what would rates do?
Once Gold was no longer pegged to world currencies there was only a single period in which stocks outperformed the precious metal. That period was from 1997-2000 during the height of the Tech Bubble (the single biggest stock market bubble in over 100 years).
Since the Financial Crisis erupted in 2007, the US Federal Reserve has engaged in dozens of interventions/ bailouts to try and prop up the financial system. Now, I realize that everyone knows the Fed is “printing money.” However, when you look at the list of bailouts/ money pumps it’s absolutely staggering how much money the Fed has thrown around.
However, the reality of higher inflation won’t show up in China’s inflation data (which clocks in at an absurdly low 3%). However, you can see clear signs of this in China’s civil unrest: you don’t get wage and labor strikes for nothing.
The Fed’s economic models, and 99% of the economic models employed by Central Banks in general, believe that monetary easing can bring about an economic recovery. The primary argument for this crowd if QE has thus far failed to produce a recovery is that the QE efforts have not been big enough. And then there’s Japan...
The big news that has somehow shocked the media is that the BLS was caught fudging the jobs numbers going into the 2012 election. How on earth is this news? Anyone with a working frontal cortex is aware that CPI, the unemployment numbers, GDP and virtually everything else reported by the Federal Government is massaged to the point of being fraudulent.
