Month: October 2018

Authored by Chris Hamilton via Econimica blog,

Most Bearish of Economic Charts Are Reason To Be Most Bullish on Financial Assets

In the land of the blind (economics), the one eyed man is king.  So, forget everything you know (or don’t know) about economics and follow some very simple math that economists (and financiers, Fed chiefs, and administration after administration) are unwilling to publicly acknowledge.  Disregard theories about ever greater production equating to economic growth…all that truly matters is the ability to consume that production (otherwise production turns into excess inventories).

Simply put, every person on earth is a unit of consumption multiplied by their income, savings, and access to and/or utilization of credit (even if it is government provided via social programs).  Thus, it is the annual change in the population (multiplied by these levers) which is the primary driver for the annual change in consumption.  But population growth among the nations with the income, savings, and access to credit has fallen in half since peaking decades ago…and growth among the all important work force is facing imminent and ongoing decline.

Thus to maintain consumptive growth, a series of stop-gap steps have been undertaken, each more drastic than the last.  First, unfunded governmental social programs alongside interest rate cuts were used to entice higher consumption absent higher income or savings.  Once this broke down, governments and central banks took over debt creation and asset eradication in an attempt to maintain still higher consumption without the concomitant rise in income/savings.

However, these policies and actions to maintain consumptive growth (enabling higher production) are about to become far more difficult if not impossible.  The lack of population growth among the consumer nations coupled with the negative distribution of that growth (almost solely among the elderly) is set to slow growth to a crawl or cause outright declines.  Why?

Decelerating US Population Growth

As the chart below details, household income and expenditures are a bell curve generally following the labor force participation rates.  On average, labor force participation rates, income, and spending rise from entry into the working age population and peak at about 50 years old.  By the time the head of household is 75+ years old, labor force participation has fallen to a scant 8% and income and spending fallen in half.  Couple this collapse in spending with the credit averse nature of 75+ year olds, and the relatively minimal economic activity of this age segment compared to the younger population should be apparent.

The chart below details annual US population growth broken down by age segment for select years from 1951 through 2028.  Economically speaking, growth among the green is good, yellow cautionary, red is bad.  In fact, the growth rate among 65 to 74 year olds (yellow columns) peaks in 2018 and will be decelerating from here on.  The majority of US population growth for decades to come will be among the 75+ year olds (red columns) with minimal labor force participation, fixed incomes, and minimal utilization of credit…or said otherwise, minimal multiplier and relatively minimal economic activity.

The chart below details full US population growth (%) versus US GDP growth (%).  The ’98 peak in population growth and deceleration since is clear.  But given the low labor force participation rate among 65 to 74 year olds and just 8% labor force participation rate among 75+ year olds…a fresh look at the population growth is necessary.  Those who claim the US need create 225 thousand jobs monthly to keep up with population growth are totally off base given the changes in US demographics.  The present reality is that the US need only create about 40 thousand jobs monthly, as this is the actual monthly growth in the labor force!

For those curious to see the change in the segments isolated.  The large decelerations of growth among the 0-64 year olds prior to the last two recessions and now the decelerating growth among the 65 to 74 year olds is disconcerting.  But the imminent shift to the majority of growth among 75+ year olds is an obvious and forseeable economic catastrophe.

The chart below details the annual change in the potential work force, and given the bulk of population growth presently among 65+ and 75+ year olds, why the potential labor force growth won’t budge (while the “not in labor force” will swell with 75+ year olds).  Multiplying the annual population growth by each age groups labor force participation rate, a fast decelerating population growth rate alongside the decelerating GDP growth rate is even more evident.  And it’s pretty simple math to see why elevated targets of present and future GDP growth are not possible absent significantly lower rates and significantly greater debt creation.

The chart below details what happens as the US core population growth decelerates and elderly population growth increases…and one can only surmise what happens over the next decades as both trends become more acute while public (marketable) debt creation will necessarily need go vertical in order to foolishly attempt to maintain artificially elevated rates of economic growth.

Decelerating Population Growth Among Global Consumer Nations

The chart below details the same phenomenon throughout the high and upper middle income nations of the world (the nations with nearly 50% of the worlds population but 90% of the income and 90% of the energy / commodity consumption).

Annual population growth of the consumer nations broken down by the change of in each age segment.  Global growth in the population (but more importantly the 0 to 64 year old population) double peaked in ’69 and ’88.  Total annual population growth among these nations has slowed by 50% since but growth among the all important core of 0 to 64 year olds has fallen 87% and will turn negative in the next decade.  A declining core that makes up all the potential employees and does the vast majority of consuming in secular decline.

The correlation of the annual population growth (multiplied by labor force participation rates among the differing age groups) within the nations that do 90% of the global consuming and drive 90% of global GDP (%, black line) plus linear trend line (dashed black line, chart below).  Economically, this trend “ain’t yer friend”…but from an “investor” standpoint, BTFD as the powers that be will digitally and literally continue to go all in.

This is the unwinnable battle governments and central banks are fighting (infinite economic and financial growth amid a very finite population of potential consumers).  And although it is ultimately impossible to succeed, they will break any and every rule necessary, do “whatever it takes”, extend and pretend, all just to kick the can one more time.  Of course, currencies, income earners, and savers will pay the price while asset holders will be made wildly wealthy…until suddenly and inexplicably (LOL), it all falls apart.

All population data for this article comes from the UN; World Population Prospects, 2017 Revision.  All forward looking estimates are the from the UN’s median variant (which I believe has and continues to significantly overstate future population growth).

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The case for cryptocurrencies sure looks to have gotten stronger over the past week and Venezuela’s “Petro” looks like it may be the concept’s first “beta test” on a country-wide scale.  

We recently reported that the Yale endowment had invested in a $400 million cryptocurrency fund focused on investing in digital coins and blockchain startup companies. Now, Bloomberg is reporting that the only way Venezuelans can get a passport is through the country’s new “Petro” cryptocurrency, which is backed by Venezuela’s oil and mineral reserves.

This development in Venezuela could be viewed as a very real step away from Fiat currency and a very real step toward a permanent commodity-backed currency. The government has priced new passports at 2 Petros, which is the cryptocurrency equivalent to 7200 Bolivars – or four times the national monthly minimum wage. For Venezuelans that are looking to get out of the country, passports are key. The United Nations says an estimated 5,000 people are leaving Venezuela per day because of the economic collapse in the country.

Lack of materials and government corruption, coupled with the Bolivar’s collapse, has made passports in the country a rare find. Getting out of the country is even more difficult because, as a result of the ongoing crisis, many airlines, including Avianca, Latam Airlines, United Airlines, Aeromexico and Deutsche Lufthansa, have stopped taking flights that originate from the country.

Nicolas Maduro, the president of Venezuela, announced the new currency last week – about eight months after what was supposed to be its initial launch date. It is now scheduled to go on sale starting on November 5.

Although cryptocurrencies have seen a precipitous decline in value over the last six months, Venezuela’s resorting to the idea after a true currency collapse could prove to be the first real test as to whether or not the concept, idea and execution can hold up for an entire country’s government.

The world is watching. And so is Novogratz. 

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Authored by Tom Luongo,

Yesterday’s dramatic cloture vote to push SCOTUS nominee Brett Kavanaugh to a final confirmation vote is one of those political moments of pure victory.  It was messy and it was tense, but the ultimate outcome was better than I could have ever originally expected.

Because it’s pretty clear to me that we’re looking at the kind of big operation run on the Democrats and the Soros Group to expose not only their tactics, the classic “Nuts and Sluts” shaming technique, but also in the process crush certain powerful members of the Democratic party which have been the conduit through which ‘the Resistance’ has driven our political process to the point of no return.

Christine Blasey Ford’s accusation was supposed to create the kind of uproar that would have Kavanaugh withdraw well before any of the dots could be connected by Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley and others.

The rapid succession of accusers was supposed to overwhelm the news cycle with outrage porn and the Rebpublicans were supposed to fold like they always have in the past.

But we’re well beyond that point.  I’ve been warning about this since Trump began rising in the polls.  He out-Alinsky’s the Alinskyites and by doing so gives spine to the spineless and energizes a frustrated conservative/libertarian base of voters to go after these obviously corrupt, venal, power-mad freaks that run both the GOP and the DNC.

So, to me, it looks like some form of ‘operation’ was run on Feinstein and the Democrats here.  That the chum that was Brett Kavanaugh — young, rich, white, successful, etc. — they couldn’t ignore.

Like flies to a bug zapper they flew too close to the light and were fried unmercifully.  Feinstein knows she’s done.

This letter tells you so much about what is really going on behind the scenes.  

Grassley is telling this group of feckless jackasses he has has them dead-to-rights.  He has their texts/IM’s and knows this was all coordinated through Feinstein’s office.  That’s why DiFi looked like she was crying while Chuck Schumer handled the press.

Feinstein’s done.  The woman should have been arrested for treason after the scandal about her driver working for the Chinese broke earlier this year.  But, we should be able to connect a dot or two here and see that that was used as leverage against her to hold Blasey-Ford’s accusation until the most politically-damaging moment.

Wait for the fall-out from this.  The Republicans had a win/win situation on their hands here as long as Kavanaugh was 1) not guilty and 2) willing to endure the process.

It looks like he was able to do both.  Because if the Democrats force a failure of the vote, it will energize people to go to the polls in numbers unheard of for a mid-term election.

Or, if the Republicans finally fight back the way they are supposed to, then they 2) energize the base to finally crush these venal scumbags that so richly deserve it.

One of the two major parties has to fail for the Swamp to truly be Drained.  Old power structures within the Senate and House need to crumble.  Diane Feinstein is staring (with tears in her eyes) at censure, being stripped of her seniority and possible forced retirement.

All of those relationships get shattered. There are ripple effects up and down the lobby circuit in D.C.

What’s sad is that they really thought the rules hadn’t changed.  And if I’m right that this was an operation planned from the beginning to frame Kavanaugh with a known liar, not only Ford but Julie Swetnick as well, then by the time this is done everything in Washington will look very different over the next six months.

George Soros and Tom Steyer will have to spend even more money on their next losing battle.  And at some point, the situation in D.C. will turn against them far enough for asset seizure and possible imprisonment.

While watching the livestream keep all of that in mind as well as anything else I’m not catching in my initial read on this most fascinating political victory.  As always NSFW rules apply (so headphones, folx).

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All of those new crypto-focused hedge funds hoping to extract profits from volatile cryptocurrencies are about to be very disappointed. 

In what some hope will be a sign of maturity (and a harbinger of positive returns) for the struggling market,  volatility in the world’s oldest cryptocurrency has fallen to their lowest levels in 17 months, since before last year’s spectacular bubble. Meanwhile, trading volume has also tapered off, which has prompted Bloomberg to question: Are we at an inflection point in the market, and if we are, is this the start of a new phase for Bitcoin? Or is it the beginning of the end?

Lower volume might disappoint exchanges that handle trading in bitcoin futures.

But technicals suggest the price could be on the verge of a breakout. As Bloomberg explains, neither a strong positive or negative divergence has occurred over the past month. The last time bitcoin traded in this pattern back in June, its price jumped from around $5,900 to around $8,200.

Bitcoin’s rapid boom-and-bust has disabused thousands of investors of the notion that the cryptocurrency is a worthwhile investment with enduring intrinsic value.

That said, there are still some who remain optimistic about the cryptocurrency’s long-term prospects. And they’re inclined to see this drop in volatility as a sign that bitcoin is finally “maturing.”

“This could be a signal that the cryptocurrency market is maturing,” said Nigel Green, founder of DeVere Group, a financial advisory organization.

“This is a maturing market, so volatility should continue to decline,” said Mike McGlone, Bloomberg Intelligence commodity strategist. “When you have a new market, it will be highly volatile until it establishes itself,” he said. “There are more participants, more derivatives, more ways of trading, hedging and arbitraging.”

One crypto trader argued that lower trading volumes meant more investors were holding on for the long term.

That sentiment rang true for David Tawil, president of ProChain Capital, a crypto-focused fund. Lower volatility makes sense as Bitcoin’s illiquidity means there’s a lack of momentum. “The buying community are folks that are invested on a long basis for a long period of time,” he said.

While speculators are being driven out of the market. 

But a stabilization in Bitcoin’s price has led to a decline in speculative investments, said Gil Luria, director of research at D.A. Davidson & Co. Bitcoin saw volume spikes last year from a combination of people investing in the digital token and speculators wanting to profit from its up and down moves regardless of its underlying value, he said. Now that the price has stabilized, there’s less speculation, he added.

“Volatility and volumes are two sides of the same coin,” he said. “When speculators are involved, they drive unusually high volumes as well as volatility by trading the asset with high frequency. As speculator involvement is diminished, volumes go down and volatility goes down as well.”

Others are more cynical…

Naeem Aslam, chief market analyst at TF Global Markets U.K., struck a more sober tone. If volatility and volume both remain low, he said, it means “capitulation.”

…With one investor telling Bloomberg that bitcoin “isn’t exciting anymore”, something that might trigger flashbacks to the bear market from 2014 and 2015.

But for Stephen Innes, head of Asia Pacific trading at Oanda Corp., it suggests investors may be losing interest in cryptocurrencies after a more than $600 billion selloff since the start of 2018. While the slump has been interspersed with several market rallies, they’ve gotten smaller and smaller as the year has progressed.

“It’s not that exciting anymore,” Innes said.

Either way, one thing is clear: bitcoin has ceded its status as the faddish investment du jour to the marijuana stocks, which are experiencing a volatility explosion.

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Authored by Wolf Richter via WolfStreet.com,

The “up to” begins to matter for the first time.

The Fed released its weekly balance sheet Thursday afternoon. Over the four-week period from September 6 through October 3, total assets on the Fed’s balance sheet dropped by $34 billion. This brought the decline since October 2017, when the QE unwind began, to $285 billion. At $4,175 billion, total assets are now at the lowest level since March 5, 2014:

During QE, the Fed bought Treasury securities and mortgage-backed securities (MBS). During the “balance sheet normalization,” the Fed is shedding those securities. But the balance sheet also reflects the Fed’s other activities, and so the amount of its total assets is higher than the combined amount of Treasury securities and MBS it holds, and the changes in total assets also reflect its other activities.

The QE unwind was still in ramp-up mode in September, according to the Fed’s plan. For September, the Fed was scheduled to shed “up to” $24 billion in Treasuries and “up to” $16 billion in MBS.

From September 6 through October 3, the Fed’s holdings of Treasury Securities fell by $19 billion to $2,294 billion, the lowest since March 5, 2014. Since the beginning of the QE-Unwind, the Fed has shed $172 billion in Treasuries:

The “up to” begins to matter

Though the plan calls for shedding “up to” $24 billion in Treasury securities in September, the Fed shed only $19 billion. Here’s what happened – and why this will happen more often going forward:

When the Fed sheds Treasury securities, it doesn’t sell them outright but allows them to “roll off” when they mature; Treasuries mature mid-month or at the end of the month. Hence, the step-pattern of the QE unwind in the chart above.

On September 15, no Treasury securities matured. On September 30, two security issues in the Fed’s holdings matured, totaling $19 billion. Those were allowed to “roll off” entirely without replacement. In other words, the Treasury Department redeemed them and paid the Fed $19 billion for them. The Fed then destroyed this money – in a reverse process of QE when it created this money with which to buy securities.

But since only $19 billion in Treasury securities matured, only $19 billion could roll off, and the “up to” $24 billion cap could not be reached.

This will happen again. For example, in October, $22.9 billion in Treasury securities will mature. In October the “up to” cap increases to the final cruising speed of $30 billion a month, but only $22.9 billion can roll off.

In November, however, $50 billion in Treasury securities will mature. The Fed will let $30 billion roll off, maxing out the “up to” cap of $30 billion, and will replace the remaining $20 billion.

Mortgage-Backed Securities (MBS)

The Fed is also shedding the MBS on its balance sheet. The Fed acquired residential MBS that were issued and guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Ginnie Mae. Residential MBS differ from regular bonds; holders receive principal payments as the underlying mortgages are paid down or are paid off. At maturity, the remaining principal is paid off. To keep the balance of these ever-shrinking MBS from declining after QE ended, the New York Fed’s Open Market Operations (OMO) kept buying MBS.

The Fed books the trades at settlement, which occurs two to three months after the trade. Due to this lag of two to three months, the Fed’s balance of MBS at the end of September reflects trades from around June, give or take a few weeks. In September, the “up to” cap for shedding MBS was $16 billion. But at the time of the trades, through June, the cap was $12 billion. In July, it increased to $16 billion. So we would expect the roll-off that was booked in September to be somewhere between the June cap of $12 billion and the July cap of $16 billion.

And this is what we got. Over the period from September 6 through October 3, the balance of MBS fell by $14.2 billion, to $1,682 billion, the lowest since September 10, 2014. In total, $89 billion in MBS have been shed since the beginning of the QE unwind:

Based on various tidbits in speeches and discussions by Fed governors, it seems that a consensus is building that the Fed wants to get rid of all its MBS and only hold Treasury Securities. The Fed’s strategy of buying MBS under what Wall Street had wishful-thinkingly called “QE infinity” was designed to lower long-term interest rates, particularly mortgage rates. If the Fed decides to shed all its MBS and stay out of this market, it would further reduce the official support for – or rather, official manipulation of – the mortgage market, and by extension, the housing market.

The Fed has been raising rates to where Wall Street is starting to squeal. But Fed Chairman Jerome Powell says, “We’re a long way from neutral at this point.” Read…  Powell Explains Just How Hawkish the Fed is Getting  

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Recently declassified documents from the Vietnam era reveal that the United States’ top military commander in Saigon activated a plan in 1968 to place nuclear weapons in South Vietnam, but was overruled by President Lyndon B. Johnson, reports the New York Times. 

The commander, Gen. William C. Westmoreland, had been preparing the nuclear option in secret – drafting plans to have nuclear weapons on hand in case American forces should find themselves near-defeat in the battle of Khe Sanh – one of the most gruesome battles in the war. 

“Should the situation in the DMZ area change dramatically, we should be prepared to introduce weapons of greater effectiveness against massed forces,” General Westmoreland wrote in a cable that was declassified in 2014 but did not come to light until Mr. Beschloss cited it in his forthcoming book.

“Under such circumstances, I visualize that either tactical nuclear weapons or chemical agents would be active candidates for employment.” –NY Times

The plan to use nukes, code-named Fracture Jaw, would see nuclear weapons placed in South Vietnam for use on short notice against Vietnamese troops. It was scuttled by LBJ after Johnson’s National Security Adviser, Walt Rostow, alerted the president to the plan in a memorandum. 

The president immediately rejected the plan and ordered a turnaround, according to presidential assistant Tom Johnson, who took notes during the meetings on the issue which were held in the family dining room on the second floor of the White House. 

“When he learned that the planning had been set in motion, he was extraordinarily upset and forcefully sent word through Rostow, and I think directly to Westmoreland, to shut it down,” said Johnson Johnson in an interview, who added that LBJ was greatly concerned over a “wider war” in which Beijing would enter the fray as they had done 18 years prior in Korea.

“Johnson never fully trusted his generals,” said the former assistant. “He had great admiration for General Westmoreland, but he didn’t want his generals to run the war.” 

Had the weapons been used, it would have added to the horrors of what was one of the most tumultuous and violent years in modern American history. Johnson announced weeks later that he would not run for re-election. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated shortly thereafter.

The story of how close the United States came to reaching for nuclear weapons in Vietnam, 23 years after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki forced Japan to surrender, is contained in “Presidents of War,” a coming book by Michael Beschloss, the presidential historian. –NY Times

“Johnson certainly made serious mistakes in waging the Vietnam War,” said Breschloss, who discovered the documents while researching for his book. “But we have to thank him for making sure that there was no chance in early 1968 of that tragic conflict going nuclear.” 

Johnson – knowing that the Khe Sanh battle was imminent, pressed his military chiefs to make sure that the United States did not suffer an embarrassing defeat, while the North Vietnamese forces were throwing everything in their arsenal at two regiments of United States Marines and a small number of South Vietnamese troops. 

And while Gen. Westmoreland publicly expressed confidence that they would win, he was privately organizing a group which would meet in Okinawa to plan how to move nuclear weapons into South Korea – and draw up plans for how they would be strategically used against North Vietnamese forces. 

“Oplan Fracture Jaw has been approved by me,” General Westmoreland wrote to Adm. Ulysses S. Grant Sharp Jr., the American commander in the Pacific, on Feb. 10, 1968. (The admiral was named for the Civil War general and president, who was married to an ancestor.) –NY Times

Westmoreland’s plan did not last long. The same day as his memorandum, Rostow sent an “eyes only” memorandum to LBJ – his second that week – warning of the impending plan. Two days later, Admiral Sharp gave the order to “discontinue all planning for Fracture Jaw” and to place all the planning material, “including messages and correspondence relating thereto, under positive security.“

Operation Fracture Jaw echoes other moments when US presidents were forced to consider – or bluff – over the use of nuclear weapons, most famously during the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. Prior to that, Gen. Douglas MacArthur explored the use of nuclear weapons in the Korean War, before he was dismissed by President Harry Truman, who feared that MacArthur’s aggressive strategy would ignite a broad war with China. At one point he did move atomic warheads to Pacific bases, however, though they were not placed in Korea itself. 

But the case of Khe Sanh was different, the documents show.

“In Korea, MacArthur did not make a direct appeal to move nuclear weapons into the theater almost immediately,” when it appeared that South Korea might fall to the North’s invasion in 1950, Mr. Beschloss said. “But in Vietnam, Westmoreland was pressuring the president to do exactly that.” –NY Times

Within four days of Westmoreland’s letter, US Pacific commander Admiral Sharp wrote that he had “been briefed on the contingency plan for the employement [sic] of tactical nuclear weapons in the Khe Sanh/DMZ area which was drafted by members of our respective staffs last week in Okinawa.” He declared that it was “conceptually sound,” and asked for a full plan to be forwarded to him “on an expedited basis so that the necessary supporting plans can be drawn up.” 

Three days later, Westmoreland wrote back to say that he had approved the plan, while at the White House, Rostow told the President: “There are no nuclear weapons in South Vietnam. Presidential authority would be required to put them there.”

This led to LBJ’s “angry eruption” over the plan, and within days, Sharp ordered a shutdown. 

The entire plan was drafted in secret, and was kept from American Marines and other soldiers at Khe Sanh. 

“I don’t remember any discussion of atomic weapons on the ground at Khe Sanh,” Lewis M. Simons, then an Associated Press reporter on the ground with the troops, and later a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter who worked at The Washington Post and Knight Ridder newspapers. –NY Times

According to former Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman, J. William Fulbright (D-AK), “we were just plain lied to” and that the lies had resulted in the loss of “a form of democracy,” according to the transcripts. 

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Having secured the crucial endorsement of GOP swing vote Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the Senate now votes to confirm Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, after the embattled Judge finally secured the necessary votes to become the next Associate Justice.

Kavanaugh overcame allegations of sexual assault in the early 1980s – ranging from groping to “gang bang mastermind.” The claims were levied against Kavanaugh at the 11th hour, following several weeks of testimony to vet the highly accomplished Supreme Court nominee – President Trump’s second after Justice Neil Gorsuch. 

With Kavanaugh’s ascension to the highest court in the land, liberals have raised concerns that a firmly conservative Supreme Court may roll back abortion rights, outlaw affirmative action, protect religious rights and limit federal regulatory power. 

Kavanaugh’s work on a federal appeals court suggests he will align with his four fellow Republican appointees in ideologically divisive cases. Kavanaugh will succeed the retired Justice Anthony Kennedy, the court’s swing vote for the last decade. –Bloomberg

“It is quite possible we will have not just a conservative court, but an aggressively conservative court — a court that would not merely refrain from protecting civil rights, but one that may be poised affirmatively to strike down progressive state and federal laws and regulations for decades to come,” said Walter Dellinger, Bill Clinton’s top Supreme Court attorney

That said, Kavanaugh says he considers the landmark abortion legislation of Roe v. Wade as “important precedent” and “settled law.”  

Also of concern to the left is how a decidedly conservative Supreme Court would weigh in over a presidential subpoena in the Mueller investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 US election. The Supreme Court has never said whether a president is required to obey a DOJ subpoena to testify in a criminal investigation. 

The USSC may also weigh in on pending appeals to decide whether federal law outlaws employers from discriminating on the basis of gender identity or sexual orientation, as well as Trump’s efforts to roll back deportation protections for undocumented migrants. 

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