USAs BIG RED FOREX NUCLEAR OPTION

As we explain in our book Splitting Pennies – the world is not as we think!  Every day, our money is worth less and less, and markets become more cumbersome, regulated, and overall disfunctional (except for an elite group of billionaires that can front run orders due to advanced computer-aided execution because of ‘order types’).  We explained in an article about America’s Big Red Forex Button, now we need to elaborate on the ‘nuclear option’ – considering that leading generals are saying more and more that war with Russia is ‘plausible’ if not ‘likely’.  Military politics in today’s world is a complicated mix of government politics, geopoliti#mce_temp_url#cs, and traditional statecraft.  It’s based on REAL geopolitics, meaning – not what you see on TV, but what goes in to build an energy pipeline, such as has been launched in Southern Europe.  This same politics is what goes into Forex.  Forex is a private market, the participants are 90% private banks, and it’s not regulated.  There’s no exchange.  It’s literally – a globalist capitialist free for all.  The rules are determined by the participants.  It’s all privatized – no government intervention.  HOWEVER.  The big linchpin is that FOREX markets operate at the licensure of the US Government.  The Fed, is a private bank.  But – the Federal Reserve Act was enacted by Congress, creating the Fed.  All these conspiracy nuts talking about the Fed is private blah blah blah 13 families, they missed the boat.  These people cherry pick facts that suit their pre determined beliefs, whatever they may be (The planet is run by Lizards – my personal favorite).  The point here, the Fed is the most powerful institution in the world, arguably.  Because of their powers, not their connections, not their clients, not their skills.  The Fed can tommorrow, set the benchmark rate to 10%, the world would explode – contracts would default, loans called in, companies bankrupt, the US Dollar would rise by huge a amount – it would be an 8.0 earthquake on the economic Richter scale.  And it’s not so far fetched, after all, Paul Volcker did it.  They can do it – and they can do even more.  The Fed can do things, that could literally put an end to the economic system on the planet.  They have all these powers, both legally and physically (meaning that, if the Fed acts electronically – it has the systems to do it, regardless of the legality).

But – the Fed derives its powers from the US Government.

The Fed isn’t a GSE, it’s in a unique situation.  To use the Military analogy, the CIA outsources an untold number of it’s functions, sometimes reported as high as 70% – 80%:

Among the many revelations in the Senate Intelligence Committee’s investigation into the use of torture by the CIA is this crucial detail: The CIA delegated much of its “enhanced interrogation” to others.The report discloses that in 2008, 85 percent of the workforce in the CIA’s Rendition, Detention and Interrogation Group was made up of contractors. Former FBI special agent Ali Soufan, who was at the center of the Sept. 11 investigations, told FRONTLINE that he believes that the CIA’s most troubling interrogation practices can be traced to the agency’s decision to hand over key responsibilities to these outsiders.“They hired people from outside,” said Soufan, who testified to Congress in 2009 about what he saw as the many flaws in the CIA’s procedures. “We hire the best and the brightest to work for the government, and then we outsourced to people who we have no clue who they are.”

This is, in fact, how government works.  The US Government has become the world’s largest business enterprise.  Defense was once a need – now it’s a business.  Every aspect of life from healthcare to managing your retirement has been commoditized and securitized for your consuming pleasure.

The ones who hold the big stick, it’s really the US Government, not the Fed, not the banks.  Because they have the ultimate power – the power to bomb.  Don’t take it lightly, and don’t misunderstand.  The fact that DC enjoys this power is not a critique or some kind of implication that “America is Evil” or some such nonsense.  Simply that, in REAL geopolitical terms, this is the reality of the world’s economy since World War 2.  All other explanations, like “Gunboat Diplomacy” are good metaphors, but the real power is derived from a small suitcase that POTUS carries that can eliminate a continent or the entire planet Earth.  

Is the Petro Dollar system coming to an end?  Yes, but it will be replaced by a new system – the NUCLEAR DOLLAR.  This is why one reason that the only real threat to the USD as a global reserve currency is Russia – not the EU, Africa, or Asia.  But as George Friedman explains in his latest book, the power which controls the trade routes in the Atlantic and Pacific, controls the world.  The United States is uniquely positioned on both coasts, with natural geologic advantages.  This, combined with the largest economy in the world, and Nukes, means that for the forseeable future, the United States will remain the world’s superpower.  This article is a must read for any Forex trader, would-be analyst, or conspiracy nut: 

The other part of the world that could produce a rival to the United States is Eurasia. Eurasia is a region of extremely varied geography, and it is the most likely birthplace of an American competitor that would be continental in scope. Geography, however, makes it extremely difficult for such a power (or a coalition of such powers) to arise. In fact, the southern sub-regions of Eurasia cannot contribute to such formation. The Ganges River Basin is the most agriculturally productive in the world, but the Ganges is not navigable. The combination of fertile lands and non-navigable waterways makes the region crushingly overpopulated and poor.

Things like Oil pipelines, can change this.  It’s why the politics is so complicated, and why the US has such an aggressive foreign policy promoting the use of US-involved contractors, or US-ally client states.

So while the Fed is a private institution, and Forex is run by private banks (for profit corporations) – it does so because governments authorize them to do so.  States provide banking charters.  States can take away banking charters.  If the US Government wanted to, it could mint its own money, create its own currency, and be its own banker.  Many economists and leading analysts have suggested this as sound monetary policy.  But to understand the FOREX system we have today, and how the Fed operates, one must understand government thinking, as explained in our previous article:

The government approaches work in an entirely different way than in private enterprise.  Healthcare.gov – the world’s first billion dollar website, is another great example.  Now imagine the task the Department of Defense is given; protect America from external threats.  Their first step, to identify threats.  In the military, this is done by agencies such as the CIA and the NRO.  Actually if the CIA operated according to its public mission, it would be an analyst agency not much different than those seen on Wall St. – providing information to their DOD bosses who act on it.  Since 911, the potential for financial terrorism has been considered a national security issue.  It’s in the laws, it’s in the regulations, it’s serious.  What if the Saudis flood the market with US Dollars?  What if the Chinese dump treasuries crashing the US Dollar?  What if hackers take control of the NYSE and flood the market with sell orders, causing a crash?  These are all extremely improbably events, so rare there is a higher chance of a giant meteor striking Manhatten this year.  The probability is so low it’s difficult to calculate.  But just like the false threat of Russian’s launching nukes, billions of dollars have been spent building a Big Red Button to press in case it happens.  It’s because government workers have one thing in mind; protect themselves.  Avoid a potential disaster.  The last thing any government worker wants is to be in charge of security on a day like 911, even if the threat is financial.  Although the debate rages about TARP and government actions during the weekend of the Bear Stearns collapse – the financial system was saved.  They pressed the button.  But this wasn’t the Forex button.

The Fed is a method of outsourcing.  Government doesn’t really DO anything, except collect taxes, make laws, and delegate powers.  Things like USPS and Healthcare.gov are anomalies.  

The US Government maintains the ultimate currency Nuclear option:  Destroy the US Dollar.  The power to destroy, is real power.  They can do it – just like they can create a new currency.  If you think this is irrational or impractical, see hundreds of references where they’ve done this in the past 100 years, including but not limited to issuing Military Payment Certificates (MPCs) during times of war, and has been often accused of counterfeiting US Dollars.  There’s no better ‘slush fund’ to finance a ‘black budget’ than REAL currency printed off the books, that no one knows exists.  And why not, it doesn’t cost much to print, and as an ‘anonymous’ Congressman admits in a recent release, they’re just a sinkhole of leeches:

More details are being released about the anonymous expose of Washington D.C. corruption and largesse that confirms why Americans hate their national government and have rallied to anti-establishment presidential candidates like Donald TrumpAs NYPost reports, the 65-page manifesto called ‘The Confessions of Congressman X’ is based on years of transcribed private discussions, which the congressman last November gave editor Robert Atkinson, says more time is spent fundraising than reading bills and calls Washington a “sinkhole of leeches,” where money ‘corrupts’ and House members are “puppets” to lobbyists who bankroll their campaigns.

Recapping the FOREX NUCLEAR OPTIONS that USA has:

  • USA can revoke the powers of the Fed, and create their own government run central bank
  • USA can make null and void, use of the US Dollar as “Legal Tender” – to be replaced by a new currency, something electronically, centrally controlled
  • USA can freeze all incoming and outgoing Foreign Currency transactions (which are processed by the Fed)

This is all possible, and much more.  These are operating powers.  Does it imply that anything like this will ever happen?  Probably not.  But investors should understand the reason WHY NOT.  Because if someone is holding a gun to your head while you work, it’s not likely that you’re going to throw stones at him.  The French tried that, and Nixon pressed the button.  And finally, they didn’t get their Gold that they wanted.  They just got more worthless US Dollars.  

Learn how to turn your worthless US Dollars into more, less-worthless US Dollars – read Splitting Pennies, and Open an Account.

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Game Over Theranos: Elizabeth Holmes’ Personal Assistant Quits

The writing on the wall for Theranos has been clear for months, but it was only last night that the endgame started in earnest when the WSJ reported that the company itself effectively admitted its technology was a fraud, when it said it would restate and void two years of blood test results, and admitted that “some patients have received erroneous results that might have thrown off health decisions made with their doctors,” a sufficient admission for an endless barrage of civil and criminal lawsuits.

And nowhere is the endgame more visible than in the following LinkedIn posting as of 13 hours ago, which confirms that none other than Elizabeth Holmes own executive assistant has resigned and the company is trying to find a replacement for “executive assistant to the CEO.

To those desperate enough to apply for the position, our condolences: there is a great than 50% chance the company, which describes itself as follows:

Our mission is to make actionable health information accessible to people everywhere in the world at the time it matters, enabling early detection and intervention of disease, and empowering individuals with information to live the lives they want to live.

 

At Theranos, we’re working to shape the future of lab testing. Now, for the first time, our high-complexity CLIA-certified laboratory can perform your tests quickly and accurately on samples as small as a single drop.

… will not be around long enough to make even one salary payment.

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“Wussification Of America” Reaches Wall Street: Everyone Gets A Trophy As 91% “Beat” Estimates

Submitted by Lance Roberts via RealInvestmentAdvice.com,

Earnings: Everyone Gets A Trophy

The ongoing process of the wussifcation of America” has now spread from Main Street to Wall Street.

When I was growing up, we played sports. Coaches yelled at us, when we got hurt we were told to “rub some dirt on it” and “walk it off.” When we won a game we were cheered by our parents and coaches, when we lost we were disappointed.

Guess what? We got over it.

Come the end of the year, the top three teams received trophies, the rest were relegated to realizing that next year they would have to practice harder, work harder and play harder in order to win. What was learned is that the higher the bar was set, the more competitive we were and the better we became. 

Somewhere along the way, the liberal left infiltrated the heart of America. Dr. Spock took discipline out of homes and schools and replaced it with coddling and sensitivity training. The concern over “potentially offending” someone became more important than the issues themselves. Freedom of speech, religion and privacy have all deteriorated under this nauseous ideology that somehow, we as individuals, are just too stupid and weak to stand up for ourselves. (Please don’t send me nasty tweets, it hurts my feelings.)

When it came to sports, the “wussification” of America came to fruition with the idea there should be no “winners” or “losers,” and keeping “score” was simply a means to discriminate against those who were “athletically challenged.” 

Everyone gets a trophy.

Unfortunately, the same has become true with Wall Street. In the latest earnings season related nonsense, FactSet produced this gem of “wussification of Wall Street.”

“Overall, 91% of the companies in the S&P 500 have reported earnings to date for the first quarter. Of these companies, 71% have reported actual EPS above the mean EPS estimate, 7% have reported actual EPS equal to the mean EPS estimate, and 22% have reported actual EPS below the mean EPS estimate. The percentage of companies reporting EPS above the mean EPS estimate is above both the 1-year (69%) average and the 5-year (67%) average.”

Of course, 71% of companies so far have beat their earnings. Why wouldn’t they considering how much those estimates have been revised since the beginning of this year?

As I showed previously, not only have estimates fallen sharply since the beginning of this year, they have continued to decline over the last two months.

SP500-Actual-Estimated-Earnings-Exuberance-051916

If FactSet was intellectually honest in their analysis, rather than contributing to the “wussification” of the investing class, a comparison to previous estimates would reveal that not only did 71% not beat their estimates, but in reality, would have been a nearly complete wipeout.

Combine that with a tempering of forward expectations by 33%, which is the average historical overestimation, and suddenly companies are not being rewarded for merely “showing up.”

Furthermore, remove “operating” and “proforma” estimates, which are almost complete fiction,  and hold Wall Street analysts accountable for their estimates, and investors would once again find an ability to truly “invest” for the long-term.

Such “truth” in reporting would quickly separate the “winners” from the “losers” and require CEO’s to actually do their job of “competing” in the global marketplace and returning true value to shareholders.

Why doesn’t this happen? Because “deep down in places that you can’t talk about parties” you don’t want to know the truth. You want the obfuscation to keep asset prices elevated for longer than value would dictate. You like the coddling that Wall Street provides you.

But the consequences are always the same in the end.

So, “just say ‘Thank You’ be on your way.”  Oh, and here’s your trophy.

 

Inflationary Reality

As I penned last week:

“Just recently Rob Arnott and Lillian Wu via Research Affiliates discussed this exact problem.

 

‘Surveys suggest that the average American’s daily experience [of inflation] may be quite different. One-year consumer inflation expectations have been consistently higher than trailing and realized inflation over the last 20 years, and higher than more recent market-based inflation expectations, measured by one-year swap rates. Figure 1 shows how this divergence has grown larger since the financial crisis, suggesting the average household might have been feeling even greater pain during the recovery process than has been believed.'”

Wheres-the-Beef_FIGURE-1_OVERLAY

This week, we saw inflationary pressures continuing to build pushing the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation towards their target of 2.0%. But exactly where is this inflation coming from?

Inflation can be both good and bad. Inflationary pressures can be representative of expanding economic strength if it is reflected in stronger pricing of both imports and exports. Such increases in prices would suggest stronger consumptive demand, which is 2/3rds of economic growth, and increases in wages allowing for absorption of higher prices. That would be the good.

The bad would be inflationary pressures in areas which are direct expenses to the household. Such increases curtail consumptive demand, which negatively impacts pricing pressure, by diverting consumer cash flows into non-productive goods or services.

If we take a look at import and export prices there is little indication that inflationary pressures are present. 

Import-Export-Prices-051916

However, if we take a look at the breakdown of the Consumer Price Index we can clearly see where inflationary pressures have risen over the last 5-months.

(Thank you to Doug Short for help with the design)

CPI-Breakdown-051916

As is clearly evident, the surge in “health care” related costs, due to the surging premiums of insurance due to the “Un-affordable Care Act” pushing both consumer-related spending measures and inflationary pressures higher. Unfortunately, higher health care premiums do not provide a boost to production but drains consumptive spending capabilities.  Housing costs, a very large portion of overall CPI, is also boosting inflationary pressures. But like “health care” costs, rising housing costs and rental rates also suppress consumptive spending ability.

For the middle-class and working poor, which is roughly 80% of households, rent, energy, medical and food comprise 80-90% of the aggregate consumption basket. “

The problem for the Fed is that by pushing interest rates higher the suppression of demand will only be exacerbated as the costs of variable rate interest payments also rise. With households already ramping up debt just to make ends meet, another increased expense will only serve to further suppress “consumer demand.” 

 

RCube – Small Business Warning Signs

Dennis Ouellet recently penned an interesting piece of work entitled “Margin Call No Marginal Risk.”  The whole piece is worth a read, but the analysis of the NFIB Small Business Survey peaked my attention.

Since small businesses make up roughly 80% of all employers, the analysis of that data is crucially important to understanding what is happening economically as a whole. To wit:

“Last week, I showed this smart chart to illustrate the margin squeeze currently impacting American small businesses.”

small business margins_0

Rcube, a French investment research boutique, has done excellent work on this concept. It developed a “Small Business Profit Indicator” using NFIB data to show that small biz earnings are about to tank and drag down U.S. equities earnings along:

Small-business-earnings-vs-optimism

Small-business-profits-optimism

Small-business-fwdearnings-optimism

“U.S. CEO confidence is directly related with Rcube’s SBPI:”

Small-business-CEOConfidence

“Poor CEO confidence is certainly not positive for capex investments (remember Edwards above?)…”

Small-business-CEOConfidence-2

“…nor is it, eventually, for employment:”

Small-business-employment

What these charts suggest is that profits are not about to turn up anytime soon unless something radically changes on the demand side of the economy. This something radical needs to show up pretty soon, otherwise employment growth will begin to fade, taking us into a vicious state of slow growth and rising wages. No wonder Mrs. Yellen is so cautious and uses the word ‘uncertainty’ so much these days.”

Just some things to think about.

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Hawk & Hawker Send Stocks Negative For 2016, Yield Curve Crush Continues

From uber-doves to ultra-hawks in 3 weeks (and a few hundred Dow points), today's FedSpeak did not rescue stocks as everyone assumed it did as Dudley's Dud dropped risk…

 

"Sell In May" is working once again…

 

And while The Dow craped back into green, S&P 500 closed red for 2016…

 

This week's chaos is more clearly seen in futures with every rip sold and every dip bought…

 

While the big dump occurred early, it wouldn't be 'Murica if we didn't ramp back maniacally trying to save the S&P from negative territory year-to-date… VIX topped 17.5 at the highs today (2-month highs)

 

Post-FOMC Minutes, Trannies and Small Caps are the worst performers…

 

Long Bonds are best since the hawkish minutes struck…

 

Treasuries were mixed with further weakness in the short-end but modest bid in the 30Y…

 

Pushing 2s30s even flatter…lowest since Dec 2008 which is not good news for financials..

 

The USD Index extended post-FOMC Minutes gains but only modestly as Cable remains the week's big winner amid falling Brexit polls…

 

The modest strength in the dollar pressured most commodities lower but once Europe closed, crude oil was panic bid…

 

Gold & Silver have tumbled since The FOMC Minutes (but bounced back this afternoon)…

 

Charts: Bloomberg

Bonus Chart: This won't end well…

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China Furious After US Launches Trade War “Nuke” With 522% Duty

Now that China’s brief infatuation with “rationalizing” excess capacity in its massively glutted (and insolvent) steel sector is over after lasting all of 2-3 months, China is back to doing what it did in late 2015 (and what it has always done) when as we reported, a surge in Chinese exports led to the first salvos in the trade war between China – the world’s biggest exporter of various steel products and is responsible for half the entire world’s steel output – and countries who are importing dumped Chinese products at the expense of their own steel and mining industries.

Nowhere has this trade tension been more obvious than in the UK, where in recent months angry, protesting steel workers have been demanding rising protectionist steps against a country they, rightfully, see as unleashing a global commodity deflation driven by out of control, and unprofitable by highly subsidized, production by Chinese steel mills.

The US was not left unscathed: we reported in December that “The Trade Wars Begin: U.S. Imposes 256% Tariff On Chinese Steel Imports” and since then things have progressively turned worse, finally culminating overnight with an outburst of anger from Chinese officials who, after attempting to flood not just the US but also the entire world with their commodity in general and steel in particular, exports…

 

… Pushing prices even lower…

 

….  have criticized U.S. anti-dumping penalties imposed on Chinese steel amid mounting complaints Beijing is exporting at improperly low prices to clear a backlog at home.

The numbers, however, do not lie and confirm that China is engaging in massive global commodity dumping.

Chinese exports hit a record 112 million tonnes last year, with rivals claiming that Chinese steelmakers have been undercutting them in their home markets. According to Reuters, in the four months to April, China’s steel exports have risen nearly 7.6% to 36.9 million tonnes.

In some regard, China has reason to be angry: the US unleashed what is nothing short of a nuclear bomb in its rapidly escalating trade war with China, and recently imposed duties of 522% on cold-rolled steel used in automobiles and other manufacturing,  In doing so it has rendered Chinese exports to the US unsustainable and will force even more excess Chinese production to remain landlocked within China’s borders, making the domestic glut, and price collapse, that much worse.


An employee talks on his mobile phone near stacks of rebar at

Shanxi Zhongsheng Iron and Steel in Fenyang, Shanxi Province

On the other hand, the only reason the US is forced to unveil such unprecedented protectionist measures (we wonder how the “impartial” WTO will argue that US trade practices are fair) is because of China’s own capital misallocation which, however, unlike in the US where the capital markets are a perpetual store of newly printed money, in China those $30 trillion in deposits ultimately end up allocated toward fixed investment. The result is the current historic plunge in Chinese commodity prices (now that the recent bubble has burst) and the unleashing of even more exported, quite literally, deflation.

Sure enough, as AP reports, Beijing faces mounting criticism from the United States and Europe over a flood of low-cost steel that Western governments complain hurts their producers and threatens thousands of jobs.

The Chinese government is trying to shrink bloated industries including steel, coal, cement, aluminum and solar panel manufacturing in which supplies exceed demand. That has led to price-cutting wars that are driving producers into bankruptcy. It is also leading to mass layoffs, and is why in recent months the government decided to, far less publicly, stop shrinking its bloated industries and revert to the old and broken model, one which lead to the export surge in the first place.

The result has been immediate: the latest U.S. duties include 266% for anti-dumping and 256% to offset what investigators concluded were improper subsidies, for a grand total of over 500%!

As noted previously, China is furious. The Commerce Ministry complained regulators engaged in “unfair practices” and improperly hampered the ability of Chinese companies to defend themselves but gave no details.

“There’s too much trade friction and it’s not good for the market,” Liu Zhenjiang, secretary general of the China Iron and Steel Association told Reuters when asked if China will appeal U.S. anti-dumping duties at the World Trade Organization. While a flood of cheap Chinese steel has been blamed for putting some overseas producers out of business, China has denied its mills have been dumping their products  on foreign markets, stressing that local steelmakers are more efficient and enjoy far lower costs than their international counterparts.

“High taxes are unfair …. China doesn’t have a large market share in the United States,” Zhang Dianbo, deputy general manager at Baosteel Group, said recently during a Singapore conference. Mr. Dianbo may be interested to know that creating $1 trillion in new loans in the first quarter as China did, is also to some, “unfair” as all that money goes to subsidize insolvent industries, and results in the export glut that is the heart of the problem.

To be sure, China at least tangentially acknowledged that it was the cause of the problem: a surge in Chinese steel prices helped restart once-shut mills, and might slow Beijing’s bid to address excess capacity, said Baosteel’s Zhang. “The price rebound is not beneficial to the overcapacity situation…. It will delay the shutdown of (inefficient) capacity,” he said.

Steel prices have come off around a quarter since their April peaks and could weaken further in the second half of the year, but Zhang said they were unlikely to return to recent lows.

We disagree, and so do US steel producers who are relying on Washington to do everything in its power to prevent a price collapse.

Washington was responding to a 2015 complaint by five steel producers that said they have been forced to lay off thousands of employees due to unfair foreign competition. One of the producers, United States Steel Corp., filed a separate complaint last month accusing the biggest Chinese steel producers of conspiring to fix prices, stealing trade secrets and skirting duties on imports in the U.S. with false labeling.

Life for China’s exporters is only going to get more difficult: the European Union launched its own investigation of Chinese steel exports last week following protests by steelworkers. In Britain, Tata Steel cited low-cost Chinese competition when it announced plans last month to sell money-losing operations that employ 20,000 people.

And just to assure that this is nowhere near the end of the ongoing trade wars, China pushed back against its trading partners in April, announcing anti-dumping duties on steel from the European Union, Japan and South Korea.

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‘There Will Be Banker Blood’: Why JPM Is Afraid Of “Quiet Trading Floors”

With banker bonuses set to drop this year, it should be no surprise that things are not all sunshine and roses on Wall Street. After 30 years of dramatically outperforming Main Street, Wall Street wages may be set for some mean-reversion as JPMorgan analysts take an ax to the biggest global investment banks' earnings. As Bloomberg reports, "quiet trading floors" are set to depress global investment banks’ second-quarter revenue 24 percent, with weakness across equities, interest rates, currencies, with a regionally-driven weakness from Asia.

While equity trading volume declines are well known, FX trading volumes are tumbling…

 

And bond trading is declining rapidly…

 

As Bloomberg reports, trading revenue at investment banks on both sides of the Atlantic has been under pressure as volatility in financial markets and fears over global growth resulted in the most subdued start to a year since 2009. Backed by a healthier domestic economy, U.S. investment banks are continuing to take market share from their retreating European competitors, and trading is becoming more concentrated in the largest five firms, Citigroup Inc. said in a note last week.

Deutsche Bank AG is the JPMorgan analysts’ top pick as it could cut costs faster than investors expect. Credit trading revenue will probably outperform that of macro products, benefiting firms such as Deutsche Bank and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. compared to their commercial bank rivals, according to the note.

 

Second-quarter advisory and capital markets revenue will plummet 32 percent on last year, the analysts wrote. While equity underwriting fees will rebound from the first quarter, they’ll drop more than 60 percent from a year earlier at the biggest firms, according to the estimates.

 

Credit Suisse Group AG, in the midst of a major overhaul shedding billions of euros of assets under new Chief Executive Officer Tidjane Thiam, will probably post the biggest drop in second-quarter investment banking and trading revenue at 32 percent, followed by UBS Group AG’s 28 percent decline, according to the report. Barclays Plc revenue in those businesses will probably fall 14 percent, the least of the global banks tracked by JPMorgan’s analysts.

With bonuses being cut…fixed income trading and investment bank underwriting will be hardest hit, estimating that bonuses for those roles will fall as much as 15 percent to 20 percent from last year.

 

Headcount will be next…

 

Will this bring bank stocks back to reality?

 

Time for some mean-reversion to Main Street?

 

Or will it be a systemic change that drives the drop?

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SaxoBank CIO Warns “Central Banks Can Do Nothing”

Authored by SaxoBank's Michael McKenna via Tradingfloor.com,

  • 2016 has seen a popular reaction against zero-bound policies
  • Political elites are struggling to preserve an unfruitful status quo
  • 'The world has become elitist in every way': Jakobsen
  • Political middle has become crowded, stagnant; new spectrum of ideas needed
  • Investment in education and research needed; zero rates are a dead end
  • Saxo chief economist remains 'very positive' overall

In April 2015, Saxo Bank chief economist Steen Jakobsen said that zero rates, zero growth, zero productivity, and zero reforms have left a great many countries adrift in a “new nothingness”.

The products of this nothingness, said Jakobsen, include apathy, stagnation and “an economic outlook based more in peoples’ heads than in reality”. On the cultural level, he continued, the widespread lack of dynamism and new ideas has empowered a political class that is “mainly interested in maintaining the status quo”, even as that status quo provides sharply diminishing returns.

US GDP growth, for instance, is hugging the zero line:

US real GDP

Source: Federal Reserve Economic Data
 
A little more than one year on and we remain, in terms of economics and monetary policy at least, profoundly entranced by this combination of zero-bound policies and continual “emergency measures”.
 
Culturally and politically, however, the past 12 months have demonstrated time and time again that nature abhors a vacuum. 
 
In Europe, for instance, we have the spectacle of the European Union’s second-largest economy voting on whether it wants to leave the union next month. In the United States, the candidacies of Democratic senator Bernie Sanders and Republican front-runner Donald Trump have benefitted enormously from widespread frustration with the current consensus, particularly in the realm of trade where both candidates – one hard left, one populist right – point to a declining US manufacturing sector and a recovery bereft of “breadwinner” jobs as signs that the country has been led astray.
 
The list doesn’t end there. From the European migrant crisis to the rise of far-right political parties such as Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland and France’s Front National; from the the apparent stalling of the Federal Reserve’s policy normalisation plans to the European Central Bank’s continued adventures in quasi-permanent stimulus, the past 12 months have demonstrated that “nothingness” breeds restlessness.
 
This restlessness, as we have seen, will find release on the cultural level despite the hesitancy of central bank policy mandarins and political elites.
 
With this in mind, we sat down with Jakobsen to discuss the new nothingness, the even newer reactions to such, and his outlook for the global economy.
 
TradingFloor.com: The “new nothingness” thesis was based on zero rates, zero growth, zero reforms. But you hinted that all of this nothingness has spilled over into culture and politics as well… do these macro facts hinder peoples’ imagination, or their ability to deal with the problem?
 
Steen Jakobsen: Yes, I think so. This year, we see a growing gap between the central banks’ narrative – which is that you have a trickle-down impact from lower rates – and [the situation on the ground].
 
People understand that zero interest rates are a reflection of zero growth, zero inflation, zero hope for changes, and zero reforms.
 
In my opinion as an economist and a market observer, people are smarter than central banks. And because they are smarter, they can live with policy mistakes for a while because the narrative is very strong and because people like (European Central Bank head Mario) Draghi and (Federal Reserve chief Janet) Yellen have these platforms from which they not only talk but occasionally shout, and they are deemed to be “credible”, scare quotes mine…
 
We see [this gap] in the Brexit debate as well, where the elite and the academics talk down to the average voter. By doing that, of course, they alienate the voters from their representatives.
 
Jean-Claude Juncker

says European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker
 
That’s what we see globally, that’s why Brazil is going to change presidents, why Ireland could not get its government re-elected with 6% growth. It’s not about the top line, but about the average person seeing that we need real, fundamental change.
 
TF: Earlier this year, you said that the social contract – the agreement between rulers and the ruled – is broken. It made me think of this year’s Davos meeting, which showed a leadership class terrified of slowing jobs growth and enamoured with the idea that population movements might be used to address this. Given the current unpopularity of globalisation and its effects, would you say that there are some things it is impossible for 21st century leaders and the led to agree upon? Is a social contract impossible?
 
SJ: No, it could be re-established, but it needs to be established on terra firma. Right now, we have a panacea in the form of low rates and the idea that things will somehow improve in six months. This has led to buyback programmes, a lack of motivation [and all the rest].
 
We as a society have to recognise that productivity comes from raising the average education level. People forget that all the revolutionary trends, the changes we’ve seen in history, have come from basic research. I don’t mean research driven by profit, but by an individual’s particular interest in one very minute area of a specific topic. This is what creates new inventions.
 
The second thing we often forget is that the military has been behind a lot of the industrial revolution. Mobile telephony, for example, had nothing to do with private citizens or companies – instead, it had a lot to do with the US military.
 
The key thing here is that we need to be more productive. If everyone has a job, there is no need to renegotiate the social contract.
 
The world has become elitist in every way. Before, you could start a company and build a small franchise; now, you have to be global, you have to have a billion users (if you’re an IT company), and [the pursuit of this] does not necessarily provide the best technologies, but only the biggest ones, the ones backed by [the firms with] the deepest pockets and largest web of connections.
 
We need to democratise the ability to be educated because we don’t know what’s going to work and not going to work. What we do know is that the social contract needs to come from better education levels.
 
There exist a huge number of studies that show a correlation – in mathematical terms, an R squared value – of 80% between the average education of a country or company and the productivity of same.
 
US unemployment rates

Source: Federal Reserve Economic Data 
 
TF: Last week, you retweeted an article claiming that $127 billion in labour and services could be replaced by drones. Is automation, and the consequent lack of working-class jobs, partly responsible for “the new nothingness”?
 
SJ: Like everything else, there is an equilibrium between supply and demand at work here. On the supply side, we must consider that, in Western Europe at least, the amount of people needing jobs will be smaller in 10 or 20 years […] we need automation to pay for the lack of people in the workforce.
 
This is probably the first period in the evolution of technology where tech is deducting rather than adding jobs. But I think it ultimately will add jobs again, because productivity will pick up.
 
The demographic component here is that we will have less supply in labour markets in the future, so we need a more efficient way of doing things, a cheaper way.
 
That’s the good news. The bad news is that the next decade will be very, very challenging, and you haven’t even spoken about immigration and refugees – [this phenomenon] is adding to the labour market’s net supply while the net demand from employers is very low because of indirect taxes, regulations and the like.
 
So again, we need to go back and address what is feasible, or possible. I very rarely agree with the International Monetary Fund, for example, but if Germany can borrow at negative interest rates and invest in infrastructure, why wouldn’t they do it?
 
Infrastructure is and always will be productive; productivity improvements don’t happen because of silly shenanigans concerning politics…
 
There are a lot of things that can be done in the short term, but underneath all of this is a long-term view that you need to make people smarter. If they’re smarter, they’ll be more productive, more self-reliant, they’ll have better lives.
 
Yes, the political system is doing us a disservice, but we as individuals have also become extremely lazy and we are not intellectually challenged.
 
TF: You mentioned supply and demand and demographic changes. Before German chancellor Angela Merkel launched the refugee programme that has seen over a million people arrive in Germany, there were several reports from EU banks and think tanks calling for an injection of new working-aged people into Europe. Why were they calling for that if growth and the jobs market are stuck at zero?
 
SJ: Again there are two sides. Looking at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s report on immigration and migration, for example, it shows that in the history of European immigration, 75% of all immigrants have been put into some kind of work and become productive taxpayers within one year of their arrival.
 
Refugees

A refugee family arrives in Greece: Despite concerns about jobs and culture, Europe has historically had a great deal of success economically integrating newcomers. Photo: iStock
 
If you can retain that 75% inclusion rate, immigration will provide a huge boost in terms of injecting workers into a faltering demographic context. These are young, aggressive, multicultural people who are going to add colour and flavour to a continent that has been too homogenous for too long.
 
TF: But isn’t this very difference what is currently unpopular, what is fueling the rise of right-wing nationalism and other such movements?
 
SJ: People are always afraid of change. We are programmed to want today to be very much like yesterday. We don’t have high aspirations.
 
[On the other hand], people thrive when they are challenged. While the political narrative on refugees might follow the script you just laid out, for an economist like me it’s very clear: immigration is positive.
 
Of course, you can get too much of a good thing in too short of a time. If we knew now that the maximum amount [of incoming migrants] would be, for argument’s sake, 3 million over the next 10 years, then Europe could easily adapt and put these people to work.
 
The problem is that we currently have an infinite number and it is seen as an issue in the political spectrum – it’s not an economic issue.
 
There is nothing empirically that says refugees are a negative. It can challenge the social fabric, it can challenge the political spectrum, but to me that’s a good thing – we need openness.
 
Are there problems with this? Yes, but there are also problems with being a startup, or with riding your bike for the first time. I don’t think there is anything in life that doesn’t come with some pain. I think you need to play through the pain to become better.
 
TF: We mentioned the expansion of the political spectrum, how we’re seeing more interest in the far left, but I think notably we’re seeing more interest in the far-right with FN, with AfD and with Donald Trump in the US. Now, a huge amount of his support comes from the perception that globalisation – NAFTA, the TPP, Chinese manufacturing – has harmed US workers, and his solution is protectionism. What would a world in which the US enacted protectionist policies look like?
 
SJ: The irony is that we already have protectionism. Trade volume and trade value has been collapsing for the past 24 months. If you look at the trade talks that happen under the umbrella of the World Trade Organization, they have achieved absolutely nothing since China’s inclusion.
 
Donald Trump

"Bad deals!" Photo: iStock 
 
There are also signs, practically and economically, that you can have too much of a good thing in terms of the division of labour. You can actually come to a point where you end up with an endless deficit in one country and an endless surplus in another if the deficit country does not have the ability to respond to the deficit, whether through a weaker currency or by being more productive.
 
The US is the prime example of this phenomenon which is why Trump is having so much of a tailwind.
 
The US has basically been living off of cheaper imports for a very long time. There is a lot of pain in the US, but for the middle class the pain has been cushioned by the fact that Chinese imports, Vietnamese shoes and the like are just so much cheaper.
 
Trump is having a good time right now, but it is not because he is right about protectionism versus free trade. It’s because we are at the end of the cycle where the US benefitted massively from lower import prices on consumer goods, which make up 70% of US consumption.
 
If, like Trump wants, an iPhone were to be produced in the US, it would cost $2,000 or more. This is why Trump is wrong – if that were the case, we wouldn’t see the sales that we do, we wouldn’t see the share price that we do.
 
TF: Wouldn’t his argument, or the protectionist one, be that real wages are stagnant, and if working class or manufacturing jobs had remained in the US, then people might not be so dependent on low prices?
 
SJ: That’s a circular argument. The fact is that the US doesn’t have a competitive productive base anymore. In some industries they do, like in cars, but to a large extent the car industry is subsidised.
 
It’s not that the US worker can’t do the work, he’s just massively more expensive. The price difference between producing Nike shoes in the US versus Vietnam is, in my best estimation, one to 10 if not one to 20.
 
The amount of US workers at or below the minimum wage is decreasing:
 
US wage growth

Source: Federal Reserve Economic Data
 
If you want to pay $500 for trainers, you can have the Trump version. The reality, as with so many things in life, lies between Trump and globalisation.
 
Let’s look at a Danish example: I never understood, for example, why [pharmaceuticals giant] Novo Nordisk don’t use some of the money they put into funds and trusts and [architecture] for basic research, for something – like penicillin, for example – that might do some good in the world.
 
Of course, they don’t do it because there’s no profit in, but [they are overlooking the fact that] something could come out of that research, something that would give them a new product…
 
Everyone in the world is just looking out for number one. We’ve lost the coherent belief that underlies the social contract.
 
Historically speaking, the most successful examples of social contract formation occurred under benign kings, under regimes that tolerated a sophisticated bureaucratic class and a robust opposition.
 
You have the [Russian president Vladimir] Putins and [Turkish president Recep Tayyip] Erdogans and these people who can execute power… they destroy society. You need both sides, and that’s why I talk about the far left and the far right creating a new spectrum a new middle ground.
 
The problem now is that the middle has effectively disappeared. Everyone wants to be in the middle, and the result is that there are no new ideas.
 
The media are always considering demand independent of supply and vice versa – nobody is covering the balance.
 
TF: Finally, you have said that continual emergency measures are unhealthy, and that’s very much where we are with central banks – negative rates, zero rates. But following the one US rate hike that happened, we saw a huge retreat from the US normalisation narrative.
 
If continual emergency measures are unhealthy, but the world’s arguably strongest economy has stalled on the road to normalisation, what can central bankers do?
 
SJ: They can do nothing. They should do nothing. They should go away.
 
If you look at monetary history prior to the formation of the Bank of England – the world’s first central bank – you will find that economic cycles were more stable then. Since the founding of the BoE and the Fed 102 years ago, we’ve seen an increased amount of business cycle up and downs.
 
Bank of England

The Old Lady of Volatility Street? Photo: iStock 
 
The problem is that the fractional monetary system is based on access to credit, and the only institutions that create credit in this system are the banks.
 
Central banks keep these institutions alive with one hand, but choke them with the other. [The result, as we see this year] is that they are underperforming relative to the broader indices, so their ability to go to the marketplace and get more money is diluted.
 
We have a very vicious negative cycle that is initiated by the central banks. They’re not exclusively guilty, of course, and central bankers would rebut this argument with one saying that monetary policy cannot work on its own, you also need fiscal stimulus… but that’s all nonsense.
 
The way societies survive is by creating frameworks in which people can be productive. This is based, again, on basic research, which is in turn based on general education levels.
 
Let me end this little talk by saying that I am very positive. I think [the reaction to the new nothingness] is the best news that has happened in the last 10 years, because now people are starting to ask about the social contract.
 
We are now questioning the central banks’ model.
 
I could be wrong with all my criticism, but I am not wrong in saying that if you give people incentives and if you educate people, you become more productive.
 
If I'm running a football team, I don't try and improve my players' performance by feeding them pizza every day, but this is what the central banks are doing. They're feeding us burgers and pizza when we need food – training programmes, education, intellectual stimulation.
 
Fast food

The "Janet and Mario diet" is known to cause bloating, fatigue, 
and a loss of motivation. Photo: iStock
 
That is inarguably the way to go. And it’s beautiful, it means our kids can be better-educated, can have more access to information, and hopefully down the line we see better practices in terms of politicians laying out both the supply and demand cases.
 
That, of course, is a big reach in any political sphere, but the ones who will survive will be the honest ones and the ones who take both sides into account before proceeding in a rational and disciplined manner.

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Insurer Sues US Government For $223 Million In Obamacare Related Back Payments

In yet another development in the train wreck that is Obamacare, while we know that the legislation is failing individuals and businesses, the government is now failing to live up to its obligations made to the insurers who chose to participate in the healthcare exchanges.

The Affordable Care Act set up what is called a risk-corridor program to entice insurers to participate. Essentially the program limits the risk of loss an insurer can take due to its participation in the healthcare exchange by being reimbursed for part of the loss. The program works the other way as well, meaning that if an insurer profits above a certain threshold, those profits get paid into the program.

In 2014, insurers paid $362 million into the program, however they requested a whopping $2.87 billion in payments to help cover losses. Due to this, the federal Department of Health and Human Services promptly backed out of the agreement it had made with insurers, and decided to announce that insurers would only receive 12.6% of the money they claimed under the risk-corridor program in 2014. Perhaps the bill came due for that $4.4 billion destroyer the Navy decided it needed and the money went to pay for that instead.

It turns out that at least one insurer isn’t going accept that the the government isn’t going to fulfill its end of the bargain. Highmark, the insurance arm of Pittsburgh based nonprofit Highmark Health, is suing the US government for $223 million in back payments owed to it under the risk-corridor program.

All we’re asking is for the federal government to do what they promised” said Highmark Health CEO David Holmberg.

Highmark Health had a loss of around $85 million last year, on revenue of about $17.7 billion. The losses are largely due in part to its ACA-plan business, and one can see why the company would expect the government to live up to its promises.

This is a textbook example of how Obamacare will not only drive up insurance premiums, drive out small businesses, and leave patients scrambling for medical attention, but it will also continue to drive health insurance companies out of business. That change we could all believe in? That’s the pennies on the dollar that the government is paying out on its own promises,

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Oil-For-Drugs Swap: India’s Answer To Venezuela’s Unpaid Bills

Submitted by Charles Kennedy of Oilprice.com,

Venezuela can’t pay its millions of dollars in debt to Indian pharmaceutical companies, say Indian officials, so officials are considering a proposal that would see the Latin American country swap oil for its drug debts.

After an unlucky gamble on India’s part that Venezuela’s emerging economy would be a good place to hawk Indian pharmaceuticals, the debt is now mounting and poor crisis management coupled with the long-running oil price slump has left Venezuela too cash strapped to pay up.

Already, according to Indian media, India’s Dr Reddy’s pharmaceutical company has written off US$65 million in debt in the first quarter of this year, while Glenmark Pharmaceuticals Inc is looking to collect some US$45 million in unpaid debt from Venezuela.

“The situation in Venezuela is very precarious … the government knows it needs to do something about the medicine shortage, that’s why it is willing to discuss such a deal,” Reuters quoted an Indian official as saying.

Indian officials cited by local media have suggested that the oil-for-drugs proposal has come from the Trade Ministry, which envisions using the State Bank of India as a mediator in the swap.

“The finance ministry has assured us that the government is fully committed to it, but it will take time,” India’s Economic Times quoted P.V. Appaji, Director General of the Pharmaceutical Export Promotion Council of India, a body under the country’s commerce ministry, as saying.

It’s not an unprecedented idea. India has swapped rice and wheat for Iranian oil when Iran was under sanctions.

For now, the deal proposal is embryonic, though Indian officials cited by local media claim that Venezuela is on board with the idea, while high-level meetings should take place this summer.

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Meanwhile In The U.S. Congress: “Chaos And Shouting” After LGBT Measure Fails To Pass

The US economy must be truly fixed and all geopolitical conflicts resolved, because as the world enjoys its global utopia on a day when yet another airplane was taken down by terrorist according to the latest news, the US Congress is busy dealing with stuff like this: according to the Hill, “the house floor devolved into chaos and shouting on Thursday as a measure to ensure protections for members of the LGBT community narrowly failed to pass after Republican leaders urged their members to change their votes.”

 

Initially, it appeared Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney’s (D-N.Y.) amendment had enough votes to pass as “yes” votes piled up to 217 against 206 “no” votes. But it eventually failed on a 212-213 vote after a number of Republican lawmakers changed their votes from “yes” to “no.” GOP leaders held the vote open as they allegedly pressured members to change sides.

The result was total chaos.

“Shame! Shame! Shame!” Democrats chanted as they watched the vote tally go from passage of Maloney’s amendment to narrow failure.

Twenty-nine Republicans voted for Maloney’s amendment to a spending bill for the Department of Veterans Affairs and military construction projects, along with all Democrats in the final roll call.

This is one of the ugliest episodes I’ve experienced in my three-plus years as a member of this House,” Maloney, who is openly gay, said while offering his amendment.

The amendment would have effectively nullified a provision in the defense authorization that the House passed late Wednesday night. The language embedded in the defense bill states that religious corporations, associations and institutions that receive federal contracts can’t be discriminated against on the basis of religion.

Democrats warn that such a provision could potentially allow discrimination against the LGBT community in the name of religious freedom. Maloney’s amendment specifically would prohibit funds to implement contracts with any company that doesn’t comply with President Obama’s executive order prohibiting federal contractors from discriminating against LGBT workers.

When asked about the vote-switching, Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) denied knowing whether his leadership team pressured Republicans.

“I don’t know the answer. I don’t even know,” Ryan told reporters.

He defended the provision in the defense bill.

“This is federalism; the states should do this. The federal government shouldn’t stick its nose in its business,” he said.

House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) blasted Republicans for changing their votes without coming to the center of the chamber and exposing themselves for switching.

“No one had the courage to come into the well to change their vote,” Hoyer said.

* * *

Meanwhile, as the house was going bananas over a law about LGBT rights, earlier on Thursday, the same House passed an amendment from Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) that would restrict the display of the Confederate flag in national cemeteries.

So to summarize: while the Fed is complaining about the lack of fiscal stimulus by Congress and the world is drowning in the biggest central bank-inflated asset bubble in history, the laws that the US congress focuses on have to do with LGBT protections and whether or not confederate flags should be on display in cemeteries.

Is it any wonder, then, why market has a panic attack every time the Fed threatens to pull even the smallest 25 bps thread of support from under this massive ponzi scheme?

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