"Whatever the disease… The Fed is the cure…"
Today's market action was up there for the "most fucking idiotically algo-driven ever" award… as equity indices and VIX were spanked at 930, 1030, 1130, 1230, 1330, and 1430 before the self-organization idiots figured out their own pattern and backed off… (NO, there was no headline catalysts for these moves)
This has the smell of major gamma in options markets with the flushes in VIX anchoring around 18500. Also note that the plunge in VIX after NYMEX closed had little to no effect on stocks.
As Nanex illustrated oh so well – this was algo-driven orchestrated chaos…
Orchestrating Chaos.
A detailed look at momentum ignition eventshttps://t.co/7Q5doEDikb http://pic.twitter.com/P2VDN3QTcP— Eric Scott Hunsader (@nanexllc) August 22, 2016
Which left stocks mixed on the day – Small Caps and Nasdaq gained (another squeezefest) and Trannies were the biggest loser…
"Most Shorted" stocks saw 5 squeeze attampts today…
Ironically, Fed Veep Fischer's hawkish tone sparked some USDollar strength in Sunday trading and through Asian trading but early morning as USDJPY neared 101.00, the surge stalled and USD Index fell all day…
So stocks did what they did – in some manic-bipolar dance – but bonds, the dollar, and oil did not…
CAD was whacked today on weaker oil but cable rallied most of the majors offsetting Fischer's hawkish tone on Sunday…leaving the USDollar index lower on the day..
Treasury yields all fell on the day (with 2Y underperforming)
Collapsing 2s30s to its post-Brexit lows…
Which financials no longer care about…
Commodities were all lower (despite the usd weakness) but gold outpeformed (silver slammed on the open after Fischer) as crude was crushed…
Nigeria's Delta Avengers ceasefire chatter and increased supply from Iraq – along with early USD strength – sent crude lower…
Notably the gold/silver ratio keep surging – the last 2 days are the biggest gold outperformance since China's devaluation in Aug 2015…
Charts: Bloomberg
via http://ift.tt/2bPLrNZ Tyler Durden