Tag: finance

Last year, before the market collapsed in the XIV debacle, Universa’s Mark Spitznagel warned “a reckoning always follows…something really big is coming”

This is an age of massive artificial economic imbalances and systemic risks.

Repress change, and you repress all that it means. Repressing it is sheer hubris and, in Dylan’s words, “beyond your command.” You can only defer it, not stop it. (Juxtapose this view with outgoing U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen’s ambitious claim that there will not be another financial crisis “in our lifetimes.”) When we try enforcing stability by decree, a reckoning always follows. An unsustainable boom leads headlong to an inevitable bust. A hard rain falls.

Rather than fear it, we should “tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it.” This is Dylan’s resolve. Something really big is coming. Let the central bankers try to keep standing in its way, but as investors we need to recognize and accept its logical consequence of a return to the meaning of volatility. Change and volatility are good. “There is nothing perpetual but change”—according to Mises, who surely must have loved Dylan just as much as I do.

While this is a common theme from the guru of tail risks, he nailed it then; and again late last year as he warned before the December collapse.:

“All assets are priced where they are today because of central banks. That’s modern finance — it’s not about psychology or flows anymore, it’s about what the central banks are going to do next.”

And now he is back with perhaps his most ominous warning yet. In an interview with Bloomberg’s Eric Schatzker, the hedge fund manager exclaimed that “the negative rates we’re seeing throughout the world are an abomination, by any objective standards,”

“It’s part of this Rube Goldberg world we’re in where you’ve got these strange interconnectedness between different markets and they start lacking meaning…

“…making long term macro calls and macro trades like that successfully isn’t possible. I think it’s a fool’s errand.”

“…central banks can never step away from this. They can threaten to. And they can bluff, and they can do some probing bets like they did last year, and the market may fall for that, or call that bluff in the short term. But yes I think we’re in a position now where central banks can never back away…”

Full Transcript below:

ERIK SCHATZKER: Mark you and I have both been looking at and thinking about the bond market. Bonds are supposed to mitigate the risk of an equity slide in the event the economy slows down or perhaps even goes into recession. Is that still possible with the ten-year treasury yielding 160 basis points?

MARK SPITZNAGEL: It’s a lot harder today, that’s for sure. Bonds are kind of complicated by the fact that they have these cross-currents going on. When rates are low they raise the net present value of things like stocks. But at the same time there’s this historic flight to quality to bonds. So there are these informational cross-currents and it’s not clear what we’re going to see but of course rates where they are today and the negative rates we’re seeing throughout the world are an abomination and I think it’s pretty plain to see that bonds are not a safe place to be. Certainly not a good risk mitigation strategy.

ES: What about all the strategies that are built on the notion of bonds being a good risk mitigation strategy, specifically risk parity?

MS: Yeah, it’s a big problem. It’s a big, big problem. Especially when it’s done in the levered way that risk parity requires. It’s a big problem because—so what do we have, we have these sort of statistical hedges and we have more mechanical hedges. Bonds fall in the category of the statistical hedge, and we can extrapolate into this insanity where we can take such a levered bet thinking that this is going to balance our portfolio. A mechanical hedge would be something more like an option or even credit. By cap structure arbitrage credit has to go out in a crisis, vol has to go out in a crisis, really in a big enough crisis. Bonds it’s not clear. We don’t even know what the sign of that correlation could be in bonds versus stocks. That’s how bad it is.

ES: Now, from an investor’s point of view there are a number of ways f looking at this. You should be concerned about the risks you’re taking relative to the reward that you might get, but some people are just looking for returns and they say a year ago the ten-year treasury was yield 3 percent, today it’s yielding 1.60. Some people think it’s headed negative. If that’s the case, I just need to hold it, I’m going to make a lot of money.

MS: Yeah, yeah, that’s a great point. And I can’t argue with that. You make a great point in that we need to think about a trade like that, we need to think about bond investing much more as a tactical allocation as opposed to a strategic one. A tactical one would be you’ve got to make this call right, you’re making this macro call, you’re making this call on rates. You better be right. A strategic one would be more about how you structure your portfolio for the long run, how you’re going to balance your portfolio, how you’re going to raise your rate of compounding based on how all these pieces move together vis-à-vis each other. So I think it’s really important that people understand that when they’re putting all of this money in bonds it’s no longer a very good strategic allocation, but it might be a good tactical one, I don’t know.

ES: Well what if it is a strategic allocation and you need to hedge that. Where do you hedge your bond risk?

MS: So we need to hedge the hedges. Right? And then we need to hedge the hedges of the hedges. Once you start to even have to ask those questions I think it’s plain that this isn’t a very sound, safe risk mitigation strategy.

ES: You called the situation we’re in insanity. That’s a bit of a judgement don’t you think?

MS: Negative rates is insanity, by any objective standards.

ES: 17 trillion dollars of negative-yielding debt.

MS: It’s insane. And over a trillion of negative-yielding corporate debt. That too is insane. And how do you justify that with people thinking that rates so low and the yield curve so flat is signifying panic and coming recession?

ES: At the very least, the rate market in the United States is still positively yielding. But as we’ve just discussed, elsewhere in the developed world it’s mostly a situation of negative-yielding sovereign debt and in some cases if you will crazier things. Negative-yielding Danish mortgages. From a mechanical standpoint, because you think about things mechanically, what does it mean when assets are liabilities and liabilities are assets?

MS: Again, it’s insanity. It’s part of this Rube Goldberg world we’re in where you’ve got these strange interconnectedness between different markets and they start lacking meaning. So I can’t even answer that question because there isn’t any meaning to it any more. But I hear what you’re saying. Rates are higher here than elsewhere throughout the world, is it a bad tactical play to think that bonds could even edge higher, rates are going to go lower, and I do think there’s going to be endless accommodation by central banks and by the Fed specifically.

ES: So it might not be a bad tactical bet.

MS: See I’m not even in that business. I don’t want to make these macro calls. Frankly, I think long term making macro calls and macro trades like that successfully isn’t possible. I think it’s a fool’s errand.

ES: A lot of people have been carried out of the building trying to make those calls. Not this building. The other building. But to your point, Mark, that isn’t your business. Your business is providing what I have called before catastrophe insurance. People think of you as something of a financial Grim Reaper. Today as it happens you’re not dressed in black, but you have been before. Do you really want the markets to crash?

MS: No, I don’t want the markets to crash, I’ll be good if the markets crash, my clients will be good if the markets crash, at least in terms of the fact that they insured them. But, I don’t want the markets to crash. Would you ask a bodyguard if he wants his clients to get attacked. He doesn’t. He doesn’t want them to get hurt, or for someone to even try to harm them. He just knows that he is there so they can go on and do the things in their lives that they have to do—without the risks of getting attacked. So no, I’m a cheerleader for our economy, but I do think that we’ve done some insane things across the board.

ES: You’ve told me before, Mark, that you don’t think the Fed or the ECB or the BOJ or the Bank of England or the Bank of Canada, it doesn’t matter which central bank we’re talking about, will ever be able to normalize. In other words, the era of monetary intervention is, for all intents and purposes, never ending.

MS: That’s right. I’ve been saying for years that I’ve been saying for years that central banks can never step away from this. They can threaten to. And they can bluff, and they can do some probing bets like they did last year, and the market may fall for that, or call that bluff in the short term. But yes I think we’re in a position now where central banks can never back away, which sort of begs the question how can this ever end. Can asset markets get inflated forever? Of course they can’t. There are end games here, because this is unsustainable. There is a level of debt that becomes too much, too impossible to carry, at any rate environment. But we also have to think about price levels ticking up at some point. I know that to use the word stagflation is a bit quaint. But we have to think about that the more the world is printing money.

ES: Maybe, but nobody has been able to get paid thinking that way for the past ten years.

MS: Yeah, that’s the trap isn’t it?

ES: I suppose it is. Now, what happens if, in fact, the Fed continues to ease, which is what the market is pricing in? Is it inevitable that that just prolongs not just the downturn but makes whatever the next downturn looks like that much worse?

MS: It is inevitable. Because, you know, central banks have created this world where it’s the snowflake market, everyone gets a trophy. We know what happens, we know what that implies. It implies spoiled brats and a lack of resiliency, and that’s exactly what central banks have created in this market. An overreliance, a dangerous, dangerous overreliance.

ES: What about investors themselves? I think it’s a factual statement that the Capital Asset Pricing model doesn’t work in a negative rate environment, does it?

MS: I would argue it’s not such a good model in a normal environment. But, point taken. There’s a lot of things that we need to rethink in a zero or negative rate environment. But these are things that we should have been rethinking all along.

ES: A lot of people think, and when I say people I mean people in financial markets, that the safest place to hide is in private assets. There’s no mark to market in private assets. Hedge funds don’t have to puke out private assets, you know, in the middle of the downturn that we had in 2008, 2009. Do you believe that? Do you believe it’s a safe place to hide, and that it’s a better place to compound because you don’t have the mark to market, you’re not forced to mark to market?

MS: Not having mark to market is always a preferable thing, there’s no doubt about it. If I’m able to make a Buffet-type bet where I think the market is going to be at a certain point in ten or more years I would have much more confidence doing that without getting marked to market because it is path that ultimately gets people. Having said that, I wouldn’t want to make a broad statement about private equity any more than I would necessarily about all stocks. There are subsets of the market that are priced better and are better plays than others. So I wouldn’t want to throw the baby out with the bath water. But I certainly wouldn’t want to say that just because something is private equity and just because it’s not marked to market you should rush into that. There can be very expensive, bad deals, and mark to market or not it can be very costly.

ES: Do you think though that the nature of public markets today and the way that they are influenced if not manipulated, some would use the word manipulation by central banks, makes private markets more attractive?

MS: Well it might. You know, markets are very bad at pricing risk. They’re very bad at pricing risk. At best, markets price risk by looking in the rear-view mirror. At worst, they look ahead two feet. So the markets price things very poorly and, again, that path can really hurt you in that sense. Too much mark to market, too much looking at the ticks on your Bloomberg screen is a bad thing. And being exposed to that makes it even worse. I can agree with you, but having said that, I have to assume that much of the valuation in private equity is at least as bad as the historically high valuations we’re seeing in public markets today, pretty much across the board.     

Authored by Tom Luongo,

The attack on Saudi Arabia’s major oil processing station in Abqaiq over the weekend was a major turning point in global politics. It may be even bigger than many of us realize.

While forces within U.S. political circles, Israel and Saudi Arabia keep trying to shift the blame to Iran, the most likely scenario is that the Houthis in North Yemen were responsible for the attack as a follow up to last month’s hit which showed off the capabilities of their new drones.

That attack set the stage for the latest one in a classic case of the past being prologue. By showing the world it was capable of throwing drones anywhere in Saudi Arabia rebels in Yemen created plausibility for last weekend’s attack.

And as I said the other day this attack begs a lot of questions. And the ham-fisted push to blame Iran for it, after President Trump all but ruled out a military response from the U.S. from all corners of the U.S. and Saudi establishment opens up even more.

If this was a swarm attack from Iraq and Iran, as claimed now (and supported by factless conjecture) then how did all the vaunted U.S. technology fail to account for it?

U.S. Naval CENTCOM is in Bahrain folks. Are these people blind as well as incompetent?

No. I don’t think they are. Say what you want about U.S. political leadership and the nigh-treasonous bureaucracy supporting it, I don’t think our military is that fundamentally corrupt, lazy or stupid.

What are we spending all of the money on, after all?

By continuing to spin this attack up as Iranian in origin people like Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the Saudi Arabian government are throwing the Pentagon under the bus.

The truth is that by trying to re-frame this as an attack by Iraqi Shi’ite militias, the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), in conjunction with the IRGC, we are trying to further separate them from the Iraqi government who still openly support them and deflect against Saudi Arabia’s inherent weakness.

The PMUs have been our target politically in Iraq for months now so as to restart the chaos in Iraq.

Iraq and Syria continue to try and re-open the Al-Bukumai border crossing near Deir Ezzor. In response to the drone attack on Saudi Arabia there were two sets of airstrikes there on the 17th and the 18th. Saudi Arabia denies being involved and blamed Israel for the strikes.

The Shia Crescent is forming. The PMUs are an important part of this. Iran is investing billions in new road and rail links from Tehran to Beirut. So, the existential threat to Saudi Arabia and Israel is real.

Of that I have zero doubt.

But, notice what’s happening. Everyone’s pointing fingers at each other within the the U.S. alliance now.

Meanwhile Iran very calmly keeps denying the attack. I fully expect proof from them in the near future if the U.S. shows “proof” of Iran’s involvement.

Think back to the drone incident in June which nearly landed us in a war with Iran. The story morphed and changed with each day. The Iranians had the data, the proof, on their side and they let morons like Pompeo say provably false things before releasing it.

“Drip Drip Drip” is the strategy, as Andrew Breitbart used to call it. Drip out some information and allow your target to lie about it. Then drip out the next bit exposing that lie. And so on, and so on.

That’s what Iran did in June, humiliating Trump at every turn. And I’m sure if they weren’t behind this attack they will do the same thing in the coming days.

And I also think the U.S knows this as well. And that’s why nothing much more will come of it. It will be used diplomatically to tie Trump’s hands and front a lie to conceal more important truths.

• The Saudi Arabians cannot defend their home. As Moon of Alabama points out Saudi air defense coverage is poor.

• U.S. naval positioning is not prepared for a step up in violence. Carrier Groups are not in the Persian Gulf.

• The Iranians believe they can hit targets up to 2000 kilometers away. How true that is versus U.S. air defense systems is questionable.

• The Saudis have lost nearly all of their external support. The coalition against Yemen has collapsed.

• The Houthis are winning.

• Qatar hates them.

• Egypt wouldn’t join Trump’s Arab NATO.

• OPEC+ is floundering and Russia sets the tone.

And this brings me to the stark possibility Pepe Escobar laid out in his recent column. The Houthis may, right now, be in a position to launch an all-out attack from Yemen on Saudi Arabia and destabilize the country.

The situation has now reached a point where there’s plenty of chatter across the Persian Gulf about a spectacular scenario: the Houthis investing in a mad dash across the Arabian desert to capture Mecca and Medina in conjunction with a mass Shiite uprising in the Eastern oil belt. That’s not far-fetched anymore. Stranger things have happened in the Middle East. After all, the Saudis can’t even win a bar brawl – that’s why they rely on mercenaries.

An uprising in the east has always been on the table. It’s why the Saudis need $80+ per barrel oil. They have to pay for social programs that keep the population relatively happy.

From every side now, the Saudi Kingdom is under existential threat. So, I’m not surprised they are trying to push the blame for this incident onto Iran.

The quick announcement by newly-minted Saudi Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman that Aramco’s production will be back to normal quickly was done to reassure potential investors in the upcoming Aramco IPO, a $400 billion affair. It is the lynchpin to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s (MbS) Vision 2030 plan for modernizing the kingdom’s economy.

That fits with the desire to deflect the source of the attack away from their war in Yemen. Because, as bad as the optics are for the U.S. military, they are far worse for the Saudis if the Houthis are truly the culprits.

At a minimum the changing of the energy minister was a signal that a shift in Saudi policy is forthcoming. But without suing for peace soon MbS may not have time he thought he did.

Because there is no appetite for all out war with Iran in the U.S. The Saudis are no longer the ‘good Arabs’ to most Americans.

The military doesn’t want to put the soldiers at risk, Wall St. doesn’t want to see a financial collapse that makes Lehman Bros. look like a couple of Amish kids on rumspringa.

The MIC doesn’t want to expose their toys to the potential for them failing to dominate in the field.

War with Iran will not be conventional. It will come from all sides, all across the Shia Crescent, but especially Yemen. Of this the Iranians have been very clear, regardless of the outcome. They believe their missile technology is superior to U.S. air defense systems.

They may be correct and the last thing the U.S. wants is an actual shooting war where the outcome isn’t a foregone conclusion. The U.S. military is better served as a bogeyman, politically, rather than an actual physical threat.

So, MbS better come to the conclusion quick that a settlement in Yemen is the key to his near-term survival. Because in a quick strike by the Houthis which creates an uprising across the country there’s precious little the U.S. can or will do to oppose that.

And while an all-out war would certainly bring $150+ per barrel oil which the Saudis need to balance their budget, they most likely wouldn’t be the ones selling into that market.

*  *  *

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Auto Motor Und Sport has revealed that Tesla installed a Supercharger station, powered by a diesel generator at Nürburgring motorsports complex, located in the town of Nürburg, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, earlier this week.

A large shipping container from the US arrived at the track on Monday. Tesla employees spent the day unpacking the Supercharger and a large diesel generator that has since powered the Model S, expected to perform three weeks of tests at the track. 

The German magazine said the noisy generator is running 24/7, which has made the neighbors of the racetrack very angry. The diesel generator is expected to be operational through the end of September.

Tesla tweeted on Wednesday: “We installed a Supercharger at Nürburgring. Makes it feel like home, you know?,” but left out the fact that a dirty diesel generator is supplying the Supercharger power.

We installed a Supercharger at Nürburgring. Makes it feel like home, you know? pic.twitter.com/x1tPjI7bi0

— Tesla (@Tesla) September 18, 2019

One social media user reportedly snapped a picture of the diesel generator at Nürburgring.

with Diesel? pic.twitter.com/30ANpdBzKx

— Michael Mulinski (@MichaelMulinski) September 18, 2019

A Tesla charging map of Nürburg reveals a charging station is located about a quarter-mile away in town. But it appears the charging station isn’t a Supercharger and would take too long to charge the Model S. So it makes sense, on a logistical basis, why Tesla brought a mobile diesel generator, considering the town nor racetrack have Supercharger stations.

Nürburgring track officials have so far timed the Model S at 7:23, which is 19 seconds quicker than the Porsche Taycan’s record for an EV sedan around the track. Tesla had to make drastic changes to the Model S, such as a significant powertrain upgrade, new fender flares, and wider tires. It’s unknown if Porsche did the same for the Taycan.

There was no mention from the German magazine about how Porsche charged Taycan’s batteries. 

The magazine concluded by saying (translated by Google):

“Porsche’s electric rider Taycan seems to be making sleepless nights for Elon Musk – now the Tesla boss wants to prove that he still has the sporting authority over electric cars. Should one of his charged over diesel aggregates Model S actually crack the Nordschleife time of the Taycan, Porsche is in the duty – after all, despite hype and Taycan sell-off with waiting a start as the second most sporty electric car is a salted start. If Tesla fails, that would be a hard blow for Musk. But the Laguna Seca record was already a good start to the record hunt. And the hand-stopped Nordschleife time is ever a real announcement.”

And the dirty truth for virtue-signaling electric car drivers, especially those who drive Teslas, is that the energy has to come from somewhere. And it appears a diesel generator is currently powering one Tesla at the Nürburgring track this month. 

Authored by William Gensert via The American Thinker,

The machinations of an illiberal left, on display in its ever-increasing violence accompanied by the ululations of a propagandist media in contravention of an imaginary “white supremacist” right, have riven the nation into diametrically opposed camps.

The right will never accept socialism, while the left will accept nothing less.

Trump Wins

Those on the left will not allow a Trump victory, even should he win the popular vote and the Electoral College.  They are used to getting what they want and like spoiled brats, have learned that tantrums work.

Should Donald Trump prevail in his bid for a second term, the left will go insane, deploying every “insurance policy” weapon at their disposal to negate four more years of the Orange Man.  What Obama, Comey, and Brennan et al. did to Trump in his first term will seem mild in comparison to what the left is planning should he win.

Antifa, the military arm of the Democratic Party, has not spent the last three years practicing and organizing merely to sit on the sidelines.  They have used the interregnum to mobilize and learn tactics, while probing to find what government will allow, media will trumpet, and the public will endure.

The skirling “resistance” has morphed from pajama-boy blobs of perpetually offended little dictators and pussy-hat sporting shriekers into balaclava-wearing avengers who crave the opportunity to put deplorables in their place and give them the government they deserve good and hard.  They will flood the streets after a Trump victory in their Antifa costumes looking to bust the heads of anyone near enough to become part of their 15 minutes of YouTube fame.

It will start in the cities — the Democrat-run cities, of course — where the political leadership will provide them a measure of protection against identification and arrest.  Seattle, Portland, LA, San Francisco, NYC, Chicago, Atlanta, Boston, and Baltimore, among others, will become flashpoints of unrest.

The riots will be portrayed by the media and the Democrats as a groundswell of support for deposing a racist president.  They will bemoan the necessity of the violence, destruction, and loss of life, but remind Americans that “the people have spoken.”  Some among the Antifa will be championed.  In lockstep, both the New York Times and the Washington Post will run headlines calling them: “The New Founding Fathers.”  People who fight back will quickly grow in number — even as the media label them “white supremacists.”  Blood will be spilled.

China, Iran, Russia, and Venezuela will plead for calm and offer to mediate the evolving humanitarian crisis…

Trump Loses

The right will never believe the Democrats didn’t cheat their way to victory; in addition to understanding that a Democratic President will undemocratically implement policies by executive order that are inimical to their interests and desires.

Many on the right are weary of leaders who prioritize good press over good policy, and who prefer losing gracefully over winning ugly.  They believe they did build that and that they have not yet made enough money and are fed up with being portrayed as ignorant and evil just because of political disagreements.  Eight years of Obama and three years of watching his slow-motion coup have made them angry.

Tone-deaf to this silent majority and emboldened by victory, the new president will borrow Barry’s “pen and phone” and start issuing executive orders throwing open our borders, banning fossil fuels, and of course, implementing “common sense” gun control.  Buoyed by media, the new president will start with universal background checks and a gun registry.

Eventually, the president will overreach, signing an order for gun confiscation, euphemistically called, “mandatory buybacks.”  Antifa and their ilk will flood the streets in support of seizing these “weapons of war.”  Media will declare, “It’s the will of the people.”

And for the right, that will be the last straw (plastic or paper).

The left doesn’t understand that every gun owner is a single-issue-voter; millions will refuse to give up their guns.  And, many gun owners in this country will not go “meekly into the night,” there will be “rage” against what they will see as a usurpation of their constitutional rights.

Confiscation will go well at first, with gun owners in the cities acquiescing to the knock on the door in the middle of the night and the intimidation of, “Papers please.”

But in flyover country, a different scenario will play out.  Most gun owners will hide their weapons and most local police departments will accept that, not wanting to jail their neighbors.  Resistance will be broad, perhaps encompassing hundreds of millions of Americans.  Barack Obama, for once in the dismal history of his efforts to kill the America we love, will be proven correct.  Americans do “cling to their guns.”

The media will call it “white supremacy,” but a still unregulated internet will be rife with videos of an out of control government battling its own citizens.

The president will call for mobilizing the National Guard.  Some governors will refuse, and army units now overseas will be sent home to deal with the growing unrest.  Mistakes will be made and there will be gunfire in the streets; people will die on both sides.  The  president will desperately call for martial law.

Many Army, National Guard, and police will defect, or desert, or simply refuse orders.

What will happen after that is anybody’s guess.

The Associated Press reports that famous American gun maker Colt is suspending production of the popular AR-15 and possibly other assault style rifles for the civilian market. 

The monumental announcement Thursday could likely ripple across the industry after a summer of multiple tragic mass killings, as well as almost yearly school shootings, many involving assault weapons such as the AR-15 along with high capacity magazines. 

But amid a raging national debate in the wake of deadly shootings, the decision appears fundamentally market-driven, given a company statement cited lack of public demand and excess market capacity.

“At the end of the day, we believe it is good sense to follow consumer demand and to adjust as market dynamics change,” an official company statement said. “Colt has been a stout supporter of the Second Amendment for over 180 years, remains so, and will continue to provide its customers with the finest quality firearms in the world.” 

The AP summarized the statement from the West Hartford, Connecticut-based company as follows:  

Colt’s chief executive officer, Dennis Veilleux, says it is not permanently ending production but believes there is already an adequate supply of sporting rifles on the market. He said in a statement Thursday the company will concentrate on fulfilling military and law enforcement contracts with its rifle manufacturing.

Perhaps anticipating expected push back from gun rights advocates and lobbyists, Colt assured that it would remain committed to manufacturing and sales to the military and law enforcement community. 

“On the other hand, our warfighters and law enforcement personnel continue to demand Colt rifles and we are fortunate enough to have been awarded significant military and law enforcement contracts,” the statement continued. 

“Currently, these high-volume contracts are absorbing all of Colt’s manufacturing capacity for rifles,” Veilleux said in the statement.

Likely this is attributable to the historic American company’s assault rifles’ $1,000+ price tag, combined with lower priced competitors moving into the market. 

Possibly even of the year… pic.twitter.com/ESnA4Qur93

— NRA (@NRA) September 19, 2019

Meanwhile, with this announcement as well as Democrat presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke promising to confiscate Americans’ AR-15s, we might likely see a run on assault rifles at local gun stores continue. 

Via SchiffGold.com,

Peter Schiff appeared on RT Boom Bust on Tuesday (Sept. 17) to talk about interest rates, gold and the dollar. Peter said the fiat currency system may not survive the next recession.

The conversation started focusing on the repo operations conducted by the Federal Reserve early in the week, Peter said the financial media and Wall Street are being much too complacent about what’s going on.

Their instinct is to sweep it under the rug as no big deal, but I think it really is a harbinger of what’s to come.”

Peter noted that the Fed has been artificially suppressing interest rates, particularly since the 2008 financial crisis.

And by keeping interest rates artificially low, they have created a bubble that’s much bigger than the one that popped in 2008. And what happened this morning is you could see the air coming out of that bubble, because the market is trying to bring interest rates higher because we have no real savings in this country. We have enormous debt. Everybody is levered up to the max — government, the private sector, business, consumers — because rates have been so low, we’ve borrowed so much money. The market wants interest rates to be higher but the Fed doesn’t want that to happen because the road back to normal interest rates is a very bumpy one because it’s going to take us right through another financial crisis. So, the Fed is trying to keep interest rates artificially low and they almost lost control of it this morning. “

In effect, the Fed created about $50 to $70 billion out of thin air to supply the liquidity that the market needed.

But what happens next time? What happens if we need $100 billion? What happens if we need a trillion? Because eventually, we will. Eventually, the Fed has to choose between destroying the dollar and allowing the market to bring interest rates to a level that makes sense for an economy with this much debt. Then all hell breaks loose because we have a much worse financial crisis than the one we had in ‘o8.”

Peter said as far as the Federal Reserve goes, we are heading toward a recession, but the cure for what ails us is not cutting interest rates. He said we need to go through the recession and higher rates are part of the cleansing process.

But the Federal Reserve has no stomach for doing what’s right, so, they will cut interest rates becuase that’s what the addicts on Wall Street demand. So, we’re not going to have a real recovery. We’re just going to try to maintain this bubble.”

Peter reiterated what he’s been saying for months. The Fed will go back to zero. It might even go negative. It will launch another round of QE. But it won’t work this time.

They also discussed what Peter has called a very violent move in the bond market. Peter said the real problem is in the long end of the market where 30-year yields are barely above 2%.

Who in their right mind would loan the US government money for 30 years — you’re not getting your money back for 30 years — at 2% coupons for the next 30 years, waiting to get repaid?”

Peter touched on recent charges brought against JP Morgan employees relating to the manipulations of the gold price. He said price manipulation isn’t the reason the price of gold is relatively low.

It’s not much higher because too many people don’t understand what’s going on. You know, they have confidence in the Federal Reserve, other central banks. They believe in this bubble. They are as fooled now as they were going into the 2008 financial crisis. The difference was they were bailed out last time. As wrong as all the experts were on Wall Street and in other countries who couldn’t see an obvious crisis coming, when they were blindsided, their pals at the Federal Reserve and other central banks were able to bail them out. It’s not going to work this time. It doesn’t mean the central banks won’t try. But as I said, it won’t succeed. They’re going to destroy the dollar in the process, maybe even bring down the entire fiat monetary system. And gold is already rising. Gold is telling you on the ashes of this old system we’re going to resurrect the gold standard. Because that’s what we had prior to the dollar taking over. We had a much sounder monetary system then. We had a more viable global economy. Once we took the money out of the economy, once we substituted real money for fiat, that was the beginning of these problems and the end of these problems is going to be returning to honest money, which is gold.”

Commenting on yesterday’s FOMC announcement, BMO’s Jon Hill points out that whereas the dot plot suggests the Fed is now down cutting for 2019, “consensus remains a 1990s-style 75 bp of aggregate easing followed by an on-hold period to assess the impact of the recent moves.” And while the dot plot showed a dramatic schism within the FOMC, with 7 members expecting more rate cuts, while 10 happy with rates either where they are or higher, “in its own way, the Fed has tacitly endorsed this assumption by not shifting to a data-dependent stance this week.”

To be sure, as Hill notes, “it was a formidable communications challenge and given the muted market response to yesterday’s events, Powell can chalk this one up to a win; or at least a non-loss.”

Furthermore, it’s not as if the dot plot is indicative of anything: back in June, the Fed’s Summary of Economic Projections did not expect any rates cuts for 2019; three months later it had already delivered two.

In any case, the degree to which additional 2019 easing is priced in or out in the near-term will be useful in gauging how one might expect policymakers to respond via any coordinated Fed-speak. As such, according to the BMO strategist, “In the event a final 25 bp cut isn’t the default position of core Committee members, then a campaign to dissuade investors from this assumption will begin in earnest.” To be sure, one look at the Fed Funds market shows that while the odds of a December 2019 cut are still well above 50%, they are shrinking fast, with the probability of not change up to 30%.

Of course, the same is true in the other direction, and if the market starts to reflect growing expectations for more than a final quarter-point cut in this ‘fine tuning’ endeavor, that’s an environment in which BMO would look for more intermeeting guidance from Fed officials. “Watch this space.”

Meanwhile, looking at the bond market, the fallout on the rest of the US rates complex from any clarity vis-à-vis the path of policy comes down to the ongoing debate in the shape of the curve; policy-error flattening versus reflationary-steepener.

This dynamic according to Hill, is not new, although it is one which will come back into focus as the competing global ‘uncertainties’ meet the reality of firming domestic data.

All of this contributes to our assumption that the broader tone for the market for the balance of 2019 will be established as we enter the fourth quarter. Our temporary bearish inclinations persist; with the caveat that there is a very real chance the 47 bp selloff in 10s thus far in September might represent the extent of the weakness we’ll see from the pendulum of pessimism’s trip out of the danger zone.

In this case, BMO predicts that the stage would be set for another round of consolidation with 1.80% as the interim focal-point until the time at which there is further clarification on the trade war, geopolitical tensions, Brexit, the dimming global outlook, and the flagging domestic manufacturing sector.

Said differently, if the market fails to stage another foray toward incrementally higher rates after a period of consolidation between now and the October FOMC meeting, it becomes increasingly difficult to envision any such backup given the low-to-negative global rate environment.

In short, the Treasury selling – which we believe was largely a by-product of the record IG issuance at the start of the month as a result of some $100BN in rate locks – has now ended, alongside the scramble to refi investment grade corporate debt.

What if we are wrong? Well, then according to Hill, “even an attempt to reach 2.25-2.50% 10s at this point in the policy and economic cycle would presumably be short-lived and met by a round of dip-buying interest from a variety of different investor bases.”

In short, buy the dip… in rates.

Via Global Macro Monitor,

Once again, seeing lots of articles and talking heads mocking bubbles and the bears, which is usually a sign a big bubble is going to burst.  The last time we saw this kind of taunting of the bears was three days before the bear market, which we think is on, began in January 2018.

Here’s what we wrote,

Finally, you also see the investing public openly mocking the bears during the later stages of a bull market. We see a lot of that these days. Just check your twitter feed.  –  GMM, January 23, 2018

Stress In Money Markets

Nobody really knows for certain what is causing the stress in the money markets, but our calculated guess is it is:

1)  somehow related to the massive new issuance of Treasuries, which is sucking liquidity out of the markets, as prices are repressed and not allowed to clear –>  think,  a) rent control, where the excesses have to be cleared through quantities,  and  b) Le Chatelier’s principle, where, in a dynamic equilibrium, pressure on one variable has to be offset by movement in other variables; 

2) primary dealers stuffed with Treasuries having to fund themselves, and

3) though there are still $1.4 trillion of excess reserves in the banking system, it is possible only a few banks hold the bulk and are hoarders.  In other words, another top-heavy distribution problem, along with wealth and income, where the few own the much.

Whatever the case, the markets are so distorted now and becoming more so, especially by the false belief that central banks can even now fine-tune a Stradivarius violin.  Haha!

We believe quantitative easing and the massive expansion of central bank balance sheets are the financial equivalence of global warming, ie, excessive carbon emissions. Thus, traders and investors should expect more extreme weather  market conditions.

Didn’t you see this coming?

To be fair to Adam,  we took the headline a bit out of context to make our point.  Please read his article here.

Discount The Street

During my days on Wall Street, it was stunning to watch how many would sell their souls and anything else to help them make their year-end bonus.  I specifically remember a sales pitch by some bozo about how the Mexican Peso was going to become the next dollar, less than 12 months before it fricking blew!   We laughed him out of the office.

This is one reason why Mr. Market is so cold-blooded,  doesn’t correctly discount risk, and tends to have a one in every 10,000-year event (high sigma crash) almost every 10 years.

So, folks, when listening to the Street, bubble vision, the market talking heads, and even central bankers and policymakers,  take heed the words of the great American author,  Upton Sinclair.

Billions more in immediate liquidity, a promise of moar to come, but indications are that things are not improving and stocks gave up their early gains… somebody do something!!

First things first, The Fed increased its liquidity provision once again today and EFF-IOER continues to be out of control…

Source: Bloomberg

Since The Fed cut rates, stocks are outperforming, but gave back their hyped up gains considerably today…

Trannies and Small Caps are red post-FOMC…

But the odds of a trade deal tumbled after hawkish comments on tariffs from Washington…

Source: Bloomberg

And this didn’t help from The Global Times: “Both China and the US should cherish the current talks. Many US officials easily misread China’s goodwill, think it shows Beijing’s weakness. China doesn’t like talking tough before the negotiations, but I know China is not as anxious to reach a deal as the US side though.”

Chinese stocks managed gains on the back of The Fed’s promises but remain red on the week…

Source: Bloomberg

European stocks rallied back to unchanged on the week today…

Source: Bloomberg

US equity indices (apart from Trannies) started the day off exuberantly extending yesterday’s Fed-Induced euphoria – but trade comments spoiled the party – Nasdaq managed gains, S&P unch…

NOTE – US equities reversed around the EU close

Source: Bloomberg

S&P 500 algos were all about 3,000 once again…

Banks eased back from their gains yesterday as they reached a key resistance level…

Source: Bloomberg

Momo extended its gains relative to value today…

Source: Bloomberg

Stocks decoupled from bonds, gold, and the dollar early on…

Source: Bloomberg

 

US Treasury yields fell 2bps across the entire curve today…

Source: Bloomberg

30Y Yields continued to slide after peaking last Friday…

Source: Bloomberg

The Dollar erased all of the supposed “hawkish cut” gains from yesterday…

Source: Bloomberg

Offshore yuan tumbled after tagging the fix briefly after The Fed move yesterday…

Source: Bloomberg

Cryptos dumped and pumped in the last 24 hours but Ethereum continues to lead the week… (but the these of Altcoin outperformance continues)

Source: Bloomberg

A quiet day in commodityland for a change with modest gains…

Source: Bloomberg

Gold futures bounce back above $1500…

But Cheese-flation is rife…

Source: Bloomberg

Finally, if you think you had a bad day?

*TRUDEAU: ‘WARY OF BEING DEFINITIVE’ ON NUMBER OF INCIDENTS

Don’t forget, it’s Quad Witch tomorrow – so hold on to your hats – as S&P 500 looks pinned around 3,000…

It was perhaps bound to happen, especially as months of bellicose threats against Iran now give way to mere new sanctions roll out, and the White House remains painted into a corner facing all “bad options” after the so-called ‘maximum pressure’ campaign has failed. Recently dismissed national security adviser John Bolton has for the first time ripped into his former boss, attacking Trump’s foreign policy during a closed door lunch on Wednesday hosted by the conservative Gatestone Institute. 

“He ripped Trump, without using his name, several times,” one anonymous attendee told Politico. The blunt of Bolton’s criticism focused on “doomed to failure” efforts at negotiating with North Korea and Iran, which he said would only result in softening sanctions but crucially with no change in the regimes’ behavior.

Among the most specific anecdotes revealed a frustrated Bolton who was thwarted from the decision-making process during an escalating summer of crisis in the gulf. The story related to the US being very close to attacking Iran in June, after the IRGC shot down a US drone over the Strait of Hormuz.

Bolton told the audience, according to Politico:

After the attack in June, Trump was poised to launch a military response against the Iranians — strongly urged by Bolton — but pulled back after Fox News host Tucker Carlson and others warned him that it was a bad idea.

During Wednesday’s luncheon, Bolton said the planned response had gone through the full process and everybody in the White House had agreed on the retaliatory strike.

The former national security adviser followed with some biting sarcasm which appeared a further slam of Trump: But “a high authority, at the very last minute,” without telling anyone, decided not to do it, Bolton complained, the report relates.

The report also notes Bolton’s strongest criticisms related to Trump’s plan, which the president had called off, to negotiate with top Taliban officials at Camp David. Bolton echoed the common mainstream media attacks on that one, saying the timing so close to the 9/11 anniversary was “disrespectful” to 9/11 victims and their families, and that it sent “terrible signal” to America’s allies. 

Trump for his part had previously described Bolton soon after the latter’s dismissal as “holding [him] back” and making some “very big mistakes,” and further wanting to use the disastrous “Libyan model” for everything. 

Meanwhile, Trump told Fox News on Thursday morning, “If we could have a peaceful solution, that’s good, it’s possible that that won’t happen” — a statement sure to only frustrate hawks further given Trump’s characteristic ambiguity when it comes to dealing with Iran.