Authored by Chris Hamilton via Econimica blog,
After nearly a half century of unlimited dollar creation, multiple bubbles and busts...the current asset reflation has been the most spectacular...but alas, perhaps too successful. The Fed's answer to control or restrain this present reflation is raising interest rates to stem the flow of business activity, lending, and excessive leverage in financial markets. But in the Fed's post QE world, a massive $2 trillion in private bank excess reserves still waits like a coil under tension, ready to release if it leaves the Federal Reserve. Thus, the only means to control this centrally created asset bubble is to continuously pay banks higher interest rates (almost like paying the mafia for protection...from the mafia) not to return those dollars to their original owners or put them to work. With each successive hike, banks are paid another quarter point to take no risk, make no loan, and just get paid billions for literally doing nothing.
The chart below shows the nearly $4.4 trillion Federal Reserve balance sheet, (acquired via QE, red line), nearly $2 trillion in private bank excess reserves (blue line), and the interest rate paid on those excess reserves (black line). While the Fed's balance sheet has begun the process of "normalization", declining from peak by just over a hundred billion, bank excess reserves have fallen by over $700 billion since QE ended. So what?
The difference between the Federal Reserve balance sheet and the excess reserves of private banks is simply pure monetization (the yellow line in the chart below). This is the quantity of dollars that were conjured from nothing to purchase Treasury's and mortgage backed securities from the banks. But instead of heading to the Fed to be held as excess reserves, went in search of assets, likely leveraged 2x's to 5x's (resulting anywhere from $3 trillion to $7.5+ trillion in new buying power).
From world war II until 1995, equities were closely tied to the disposable personal income of the American citizens (DPI representing total annual national income remaining after all taxation is paid, blue line). However, since '95 lower and longer interest rate cuts have induced extreme levels of leverage and debt.
The Fed actions have created progressively larger asset bubbles more divergent from disposable personal income at peak...but falling below DPI during market troughs. But after the '07 bubble, the pure monetization found its way into the market with spectacular effect. As the chart below shows, the Wilshire 5000 (representing the market value of all publicly traded US equities, red line) has deviated from the basis of US spending, US total disposable income (the total amount of money left nationally after all taxes are paid, blue line).
In the chart below, the growth in monetization has acted as a very nice leading indicator for equities. As each successive pump of new money left the Federal Reserve and entered found its way to the market in search of assets, assets subsequently reacted. Likewise, each drawdown in monetization saw a similar pullback in equities.
What happens next?
The Federal Reserve plans to systematically reduce its balance sheet via raising interest rates on excess reserves. This is to incent and richly reward the largest of banks to maintain these trillions at the Federal Reserve. As the chart below shows, theoretically this means the monetized money is set to continue evaporating, and assuming it was highly levered, then the unwind and volatility of deleveraging should only continue to worsen.
And...if the Federal Reserve is true to its word and even halves its balance sheet while banks maintain the excess reserves at the Fed, then all the digitally conjured $1.5 trillion is set to be "un-conjured". Again, assuming the monetized monies were at least somewhat levered, the unwind of that leverage will continue to produce a chaotic and volatile slide in markets. As the chart below suggests, if US equities (and broader assets) follow the unwind of the monetization, then equities are likely on their way back down to and through their natural support line, disposable personal income. Conversely, I've included the 7.5% long term anticipated market appreciation for reference (green dashed line). Quite a spread between those differing views on future asset valuations.
Of course, the "data dependent" Fed could change its mind, but perhaps this is something worth thinking about.
Comments
Keep inflating, keep inflating!
/Mulder
Is the bubble going to pop or is it just going to fizzle like a fart-cushion?
In reply to Keep inflating, keep… by Fox Mulder
That's actually a very good parable - And I'm not going to guess either. I'll stay out of all asset classes until then.
In reply to Is the bubble going to pop… by Erek
reject the claim of normalization. next!
lockbox bitchez
In reply to That's actually a very good… by Fox Mulder
This is the Public Balance sheet, the one that is made for the Sheep. I believe that the real one bares no resemblence.
In reply to reject the claim of… by cheka
Nothing the FED does is "normal"
If they are selling "on the record" they are buying "off the record" until the Rothschilde's Et. Al. Cabel tells them to dump it. Dump it all.
In reply to This is the Public Balance… by gatorengineer
Bernanke once famously said that the Fed was NOT monetizing the debt because its Balance Sheet was "only temporary". Depending on one's definition of "temporary" that was another lie. And even now, "normalizing" its Balance Sheet means reducing it to $2-2.5 Trillion. Now, that is still quite a lot of money? You know, a Trillion here and Trillion there and pretty soon we'll be talking real money? And, of course, that's if we ever get there, which is unlikely IMHO.
In reply to Nothing the FED does is … by JRobby
ALL ponzis completely collapse eventually. The problem is we have a World Wide Debt Ponzi, with many "sovereign" levers to keep it propped up. So the timing of the collapse is tricky to say the least. But ALL ponzis MUST eventually collapse. And most importantly, the designers of the ponzi know this fact better then anyone else. Plan accordingly.
In reply to Is the bubble going to pop… by Erek
Odds the balance sheet hits 8 trillion before it goes below 4 trillion? Where are the London bookies?
In reply to Keep inflating, keep… by Fox Mulder
Stormy?
In reply to Keep inflating, keep… by Fox Mulder
The people this will ambush might not even have a clue as to what the next item up for bids will be. If credit tightens, I see social unrest on the horizon.
Moar CDO!, Moar sub-prime car loans!, Moar stawks!, Moar bitcoin !!!!
MOAR, MOAR, MOAR !
Buy all the things !
Buy silver and push it around in a wheelbarrow. I have 1.5 tons. That's just for starters. Smart money making money on crypto first. That means 50% are dumb fuks hahaha
In reply to Moar CDO!, Moar sub-prime… by JoeTurner
US energy consumption has remained stagnant for close to two decades. Keep printing faster Alice, we're running on the hedonic treadmill to nowhere.
let all chant....MAKE THE DOLLAR WORTH LESS!!!
The central banks' policy to focus on asset valuations instead of the economy will not end well. We need to get back to market price discovery.
Targeting perpetual economic growth and inflation in an attempt to control a complex, dynamic and chaotic economy will not work.
End the Fed and neo-classical economic theory.
To understand how illogical neo-classical economic theory, basis for the central banks' policies, really is, please read Debunking Economics: The Naked Emperor Dethroned? by Prof. Steve Keen. Please support, intellectually and financially, his efforts to develop new theories that are relevant to the complex, dynamic and chaotic economy and markets that exist. www.patreon.com/ProfSteveKeen/
Oh god, a dollar for every fucking time SOMETHING signal an asset decline around here.
I give it a couple of more years and then tippsy kaboom.
The two elements of neoclassical economics that come together to cause financial crises.
Everyone marvels at the wealth creation of rising asset prices, no one looks at the debt that is driving it.
https://cdn.opendemocracy.net/neweconomics/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2017/04/Screen-Shot-2017-04-21-at-13.52.41.png
The “black swan” was obvious all along and it was pretty much the same as 1929.
1929 – Inflating US stock prices with debt (margin lending)
2008 - Inflating US real estate prices with debt (mortgage lending)
“Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau.” Irving Fisher 1929.
An earlier neoclassical economist believed in price discovery, stable equilibriums and the rational decisions of market participants, and what the neoclassical economist believes about the markets means can’t even imagine there could be a bubble.
The amount of real wealth stored in the markets becomes apparent once the bubble has burst.
http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/default/files/images/user5/imageroot/2017/10/01/DB central bank balance sheet.jpg
What happens now?
Hard, isn't it.
It doesn't consider energy either. Neoclassical models are deliberate frauds hoisted on the population to serve the interests of the ruling elite. The wealth trickles up and they piss down.
In reply to The two elements of… by Batman11
Didnt know the Neoclassical model considered 1) Derivatives, 2) Quote stuffing bots, 3) direct Central Bank Intervention
In reply to It doesn't consider energy… by VK
It's all BS.
When the next recession/catastrophic market crash happens, Zero-hedge will have predicted it years in advance, 100 times over.