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Yellen Is Trapped in the Worst Nightmare Ever
Yellen Is Trapped in the Worst Nightmare Ever
Yellen has inherited a complete nightmare. Thursday’s decision to delay yet again the long-awaited liftoff from zero interest rates is illustrating that the world economy is totally screwed. There is a lot of speculation about why the Fed seems so reluctant to“normalize monetary policy”. There are of course the typical domestic issues that there is low inflation, weak wage gains in the face of strong job growth, a hike will increase the Federal deficit and then there is the argument that corporations that now have $12.5 trillion in debt. All that is nice, but with corporate debt, our clients are locking in long-term at these levels, not funding anything short-term. Those clients who have listened are preparing for what is to come unlike government which has been forced to shorten the average duration of their debts blind to what happens when rates rise, which will be set in motion by the markets – not Yellen.
Fed is really caught between a rock and a very dark place. Yes, they have the IMF and the world pleading with them not to raise rates for it will hurt other debtors who borrowed excessively using dollars to save money. The Fed is also caught between domestic policy objectives that dictate they MUST raise rates of they will bankrupt countless pension funds and international where emerging markets will go into default because commodities have collapsed and they have no way of paying off this debt that has risen to about 50% of the US national debt.
By avoiding the normalization of interest rates (hikes), the Fed has encouraged government to spend far more than they realize because money is cheap. This will eventually light the fire under the economy helping to fuel the Sovereign Debt Crisis. There appears to be no hope for the Fed and they will be forced to raise rates only when they see asset inflation in equities. Then they will have no choice. This is the worst possible mess and the longer they have waited to normalize interest rates, the worst the total crisis is becoming for they will have zero control over the economy and once that is seen, holy Hell will break lose.
Why The Keynesian Chorus Is Cackling Like Chicken Little
Why The Keynesian Chorus Is Cackling Like Chicken Little
This is getting way too stupid. The Keynesian Chorus has launched a full blast trilling campaign, emitting a shrill cackle of warnings against a Fed rate hike. Yes, 80 months of pumping free money into the canyons of Wall Street is not enough.
Why?
Well, this is hard to type with a straight face, but according to the cackling gaggle of Keynesian Chicken Littles, the Fed has already tightened too much!
Paul Kasriel, the former chief economist at Northern Trust who now writes “The Econtrarian” blog, argues that “in recent months Fed monetary policy has become downright restrictive.”
Would that Kasriel could be dismissed as merely a Wall Street shill, but its seems that he’s taking his cues directly from John Maynard Keynes’ very vicar on earth. That would be Larry Summers, who yesterday blogged an identical bit of tommyrot:
I believe the case against a rate increase has become somewhat more compelling even than it looked two weeks ago…..First, markets have already done the work of tightening. The U.S. stock market is worth $700 billion less than it was 2 weeks ago and credit spreads have widened noticeably. Financial conditions as measured by Goldman Sachs or the Chicago Fed index have tightened in the last 2 weeks by the impact equivalent of more than a 25 BP tightening. So even if resisting inflation required a 25 BP tightening as of two weeks ago, this is no longer the case.
You can’t make this stuff up! And you don’t have to mince any words, either. This whole mantra that free money is actually tight money is the product of a tiny circle of academic scribblers and Wall Street hirelings who have invented what amounts to an alternate vocabulary of economic newspeak.
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Emerging Market Currencies To Crash 30-50%, Jen Says
Emerging Market Currencies To Crash 30-50%, Jen Says
Less than 24 hours ago, we argued that although it might have seemed as though Brazil hit rock bottom in Q2 when it suffered through the worst inflation-growth mix in over a decade, things were likely to get worse still.
The country, which is also coping with twin deficits and a terribly fractious political environment, is at the center of what Morgan Stanley recently called “a triple unwind of EM credit, China’s leverage, and US monetary easing” and now that its most critical trading partner has officially entered the global currency war, all roads lead to further devaluation of the faltering BRL.
And it’s not just the BRL. As Bloomberg reports, former IMF economist Stephen Jen (who called the 1997 Asian crisis while at Morgan Stanley) thinks EM currencies could fall by an average of 30% going forward on the back of the PBoC’s move to devalue the yuan. Here’s more:
[The] devaluation of the yuan risks a new round of competitive easing that may send currencies from Brazil’s real to Indonesia’s rupiah tumbling by an average 30 percent to 50 percent in the next nine months, according to investor and former International Monetary Fund economist Stephen Jen.
Volatility measures were already signaling rising distress in emerging markets even before China’s shock move. An index of anticipated price swings climbed above a rich-world gauge at the end of July, reversing the trend seen for most of the past six months.
“If this is the beginning of a new phase in Beijing’s currency policy, it would be the biggest development in the currency world this year,” said Jen, founder of London-based hedge fund SLJ Macro Partners LLP. “The emerging-market currency weakening trend is now going global.”
Latin America is a particular concern because of the region’s high levels of corporate debt, said Jen
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The Rich Get Richer: Titanic Stock Bubble Fueled by Buyback Blitz
The Rich Get Richer: Titanic Stock Bubble Fueled by Buyback Blitz
Why are stocks still flying-high when the smart money has fled overseas and the US economy has ground to a halt?
According to Marketwatch:
“For the eighth week in a row, long-term mutual funds saw more money flowing out of U.S. stocks and into international stocks, according to the Investment Company Institute……For the week ended April 22, U.S. stocks saw $3.4 billion in net outflows from long-term mutual funds…For the year to date, net outflows for U.S. stocks are $13.79 billion, while inflows for international stocks are $41.12 billion.
Those figures, however, don’t count exchange-traded funds. In April alone, mutual funds and ETFs that focus on international stocks saw $31.8 billion in net inflows, while U.S.-focused funds and ETFs shed $15.4 billion, according to TrimTabs Investment Research.” (“Why U.S. stocks are near highs even as fund investors flee“, Marketwatch)
So if retail investors are moving their cash to Europe and Japan (to take advantage of QE), and the US economy is dead-in-the-water, (First Quarter GDP checked in at an abysmal 0.1 percent) then why are stocks still just two percent off their peak?
Answer: Stock buybacks.
The Fed’s uber-accommodative monetary policy has created an environment in which corporate bosses can borrow boatloads of money at historic low rates in the bond market which they then use to purchase their own company’s shares. When a company reduces the number of outstanding shares on the market, stock prices move higher which provides lavish rewards for both management and shareholders. Of course, goosing prices adds nothing to the company’s overall productivity or growth prospects, in fact, it undermines future earnings by adding more red ink to the balance sheet. But these “negatives” are never factored into the decision-making which focuses exclusively on short-term profits. Now get a load of this from Morgan Stanley via Zero Hedge:
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High End Real Estate in Canada in Frenzied Bubble Blow-Off
High End Real Estate in Canada in Frenzied Bubble Blow-Off
Throwing Caution to the Wind
We have discussed the dangerous housing and consumer credit bubble in Canada in these pages on several previous occasions in some detail (see “Carney’s Legacy” and “A Tale of Two Bubbles” as examples). Since we first wrote about Canadian real estate, the bubble has continued to grow with nary a pause. Why are we calling it a bubble? The gap between incomes and house prices is widening ever more, and has been far above what is considered normal for several years already.
This decline in affordability is the result of monetary pumping and ultra-low administered interest rates imposed by Canada’s central bank. Moreover, the boom is subsidized by a giant state-owned mortgage insurer, an institution that has the potential to severely impair the government’s finances once the bubble bursts.
Vancouver skyline at night – no doubt a nice place, but a bit pricey.
Photo credit: Mohsen Kamalzadeh, imaginion.wordpress.com
The housing bubble is most pronounced in big cities like Toronto and especially Vancouver. Trophy properties are selling like hotcakes to people who evidently don’t care much about money. In fact, the frenzy proves that the demand for money has long been overwhelmed by the huge growth in its supply among the richer strata of society
A friend has pointed us to a short video at CTV News about a recent high end property sale in Vancouver that is quite remarkable, to say the least.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
China Considers Launching QE; Shanghai Stocks Soar
China Considers Launching QE; Shanghai Stocks Soar
Nearly two months ago we explained “How Beijing Is Responding To A Soaring Dollar, And Why QE In China Is Now Inevitable” in which we cited Cornerstone who reminded us “that from 2007 to late 2008, U.S. fed funds dropped 500 bp, and then the Fed still needed to do QE? The backdrop for China looks a bit similar. We had a credit bubble, they have a credit bubble. We had a housing bubble, they have a housing/investment bubble. Will China eventually have to go down the same path as the U.S., and the Eurozone? … The PBoC will first cut rates to 0%, before contemplating QE.”
To this we added that “once China, that final quasi-Western nation, proceeds to engage in outright monetization of its debt, then and only then will the terminal phase of the global currency wars start: a phase which will, because global economic growth and that all important lifeblood of a globalized economy – trade – at that point will be zero if not negatve, will see an unprecedented crescendo of money printing by absolutely everyone, before coordinated devaluations mutate into uncoordinated, and when central bank actions morph from “all for one” to “each man for himself.”
We may not have long to wait because just hours ago, MarketNews first among the wire services hinted at what we suggested was the endgame.
- *PBOC DISCUSSING DIRECT PURCHASES OF LOCAL GOVT BONDS: MNI
- *PBOC IS DISCUSSING UNCONVENTIONAL POLICIES: MNI
Bloomberg adds more, citing MNI as saying that the Chinese central bank discussing “adopting unconventional policies to rebuild its balance sheet and reinvigorate economy, including making direct purchases of local government bonds from market.”
Of just as we predicted.
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The Fed Blew It
The Fed Blew It
The Fed had multiple opportunities to let the air out of unsustainable asset bubbles by notching interest rates higher and tapering its asset purchases (QE).
The Federal Reserve blew it by not normalizing interest rates a long time ago. The consensus in financial circles is the exact opposite: the Fed has blown it in the past by nudging rates up too early.
Let’s examine the idea that the Fed can’t possibly go wrong keeping interest rates at near-zero for as long as it takes to create inflation (the Keynesian Cargo Cult’s talisman) and push unemployment below 6% (mission accomplished).
One problem with this “keep interest rates low forever” strategy is that it leaves the Fed no room to lower rates in the next recession. By keeping interest rates at near-zero for six long years of “recovery,” the Fed is now facing a global recession with no real policy option to lower rates.
The Fed blew it by waiting six long years to even discuss raising rates.
Let’s consider the impact on the real economy of a 1% rise in the Fed funds rate. The move from 0% to 1% is not very large in terms of its impact on monthly payments for borrowers. Borrowers with poor credit are paying in excess of 15% right now on credit cards and subprime auto loans, and many student loans are in the 7%-8% range. A 1% increase isn’t going to impact these borrowers much.
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The ECB’s Lunatic Full Monty Treatment
The ECB’s Lunatic Full Monty Treatment
Not Quite Right in the Head?
The belief that the market economy requires “steering” by altruistic central bankers, who make decisions influencing the entire economy based on their personal epiphanies, has rarely been more pronounced than today. Most probably it has actually never been stronger. It is both highly amusing and disconcerting that so many economists who would probably almost to a man agree that it would be a very bad idea if the government were to e.g. take over the computer industry and begin designing PCs and smart phones by committee, think that government bureaucrats should determine the height of interest rates and the size of the money supply.
We know of course that central banks are the major income source for many of today’s macro-economists, so it is in their own interest not to make any impolitic noises about these central planning institutions and their activities. Besides, most Western economists have not exactly covered themselves with glory back when the old Soviet Union still existed. Even in the late 1980s, Über-Keynesian Alan Blinder for instance still remarked that the question was not whether we should follow its example and adopt socialism, but rather how much of it we should adopt.
The recent ECB announcement detailing its new “QE” program once again confirms though that there is nothing even remotely “scientific” about what these planners are doing. Common sense doesn’t seem to play any discernible role either. Below are the 10-year government bond yields of Italy and Spain. These are actually among the higher bond yields in Europe right now.
Italy’s 10 year government bond yield is now below 1.3% – click to enlarge.
Spain’s 10-year yield is also below 1.3% – click to enlarge.
Leaving for the moment aside how sensible it is for the bond yields of virtually insolvent governments mired in “debt trap” dynamics to trade at less than 1.3%, one must wonder: what can possibly be gained by pushing them even lower? Does this make any sense whatsoever?
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“Default Monday”: Oil & Gas Companies Face Their Creditors
“Default Monday”: Oil & Gas Companies Face Their Creditors
Debt funded the fracking boom. Now oil and gas prices have collapsed, and so has the ability to service that debt. The oil bust of the 1980s took down 700 banks, including 9 of the 10 largest in Texas. But this time, it’s different. This time, bondholders are on the hook.
And these bonds – they’re called “junk bonds” for a reason – are already cracking. Busts start with small companies and proceed to larger ones. “Bankruptcy” and “restructuring” are the terms that wipe out stockholders and leave bondholders and other creditors to tussle over the scraps.
Early January, WBH Energy, a fracking outfit in Texas, kicked off the series by filing forbankruptcy protection. It listed assets and liabilities of $10 million to $50 million. Small fry.
A week later, GASFRAC filed for bankruptcy in Alberta, where it’s based, and in Texas – under Chapter 15 for cross-border bankruptcies. Not long ago, it was a highly touted IPO, whose “waterless fracking” technology would change a parched world. Instead of water, the system pumps liquid propane gel (similar to Napalm) into the ground; much of it can be recaptured, in theory.
Ironically, it went bankrupt for other reasons: operating losses, “reduced industry activity,” the inability to find a buyer that would have paid enough to bail out its creditors, and “limited access to capital markets.” The endless source of money without which fracking doesn’t work had dried up.
One Last Look At The Real Economy Before It Implodes – Part 1
One Last Look At The Real Economy Before It Implodes – Part 1
We are only two months into 2015, and it has already proven to be the most volatile year for the economic environment since 2008-2009. We have seen oil markets collapsing by about 50 percent in the span of a few months (just as the Federal Reserve announced the end of QE3, indicating fiat money was used to hide falling demand), the Baltic Dry Index losing 30 percent since the beginning of the year, the Swiss currency surprise, the Greeks threatening EU exit (and now Greek citizens threatening violent protests with the new four-month can-kicking deal), and the effects of the nine-month-long West Coast port strike not yet quantified. This is not just a fleeting expression of a negative first quarter; it is a sign of things to come.
Stock markets are, of course, once again at all-time highs after a shaky start, despite nearly every single fundamental indicator flashing red. But as Zero Hedge recently pointed out in its article on artificial juicing of equities by corporations using massive stock buybacks, this is not going to last much longer, simply because the debt companies are generating is outpacing their ability to prop up the markets.
This conundrum is also visible in central bank stimulus measures. As I have related in past articles, the ability of central banks to goose the global financial system is faltering, as bailouts and low-interest-rate capital infusions now have little to no effect on overall economic performance. The fiat fuel is no longer enough; and when this becomes apparent in the mainstream, all hell will indeed break loose.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
JANET YELLEN IS A COWARD
JANET YELLEN IS A COWARD
Headline:
Yellen Is Loathe To Change Easy Money Policy
With her diminutive stature, dutch-boy haircut and puffy facial features Janet Yellen certainly does not look like a leader…more like a Brooklyn grandmother eager to tell you her special recipe for
chocolate chip cookies. In this case, unfortunately, her appearance does not deceive.
You might ask What Are The Traits of a Leader? Naturally, there are many but one trait, I can assure you, that does not define a leader = COWARDICE…and that dubious characteristic seems to describe Yellen’s recent tenure at The Federal Reserve.
It is a strong statement. I am aware. But, sadly, it is an assertion that is not too difficult to support.
Definition of Coward:
a person who lacks courage in facing danger, difficulty, opposition, pain, etc.
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First of all, Yellen has demonstrated no thought leadership at The Fed. She is simply “preaching the same gospel” as her nerdy predecessor Ben Bernanke. I suppose that since her “hero” [her words] decided that debt monetization and interest rate suppression were a sound strategy for the economy then she might as well continue with the same approach…despite its limitations. This copycat approach seems to suit her well and, of course, that is unfortunate. Her lack of rational action, with respect to interest rate policy, reminds me of those that just do not have the courage to think for themselves…always wanting to piggyback on other people’s ideas rather than to devise thoughts of their own. Anyway it seems change is not in Yellen’s DNA [as it would require original thought] while she is forcefully fighting a logical change of course on interest rate policy. Maybe because any type of change is painful [see definition of coward above] even if the change itself is relatively minor [as in a 25-75 basis point increase in interest rates]?
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China Cuts Interest Rates, Takes Number Of Central Banks Easing In 2015 To 21
China Cuts Interest Rates, Takes Number Of Central Banks Easing In 2015 To 21
And then there were 21.
Hours ago on Saturday, the country whose currency is largely pegged to the dollar which itself is now anticipating a rate hike in the coming months, surprised the world by confirming its economic slowdown yet again following a recent rate cut just this past November when it lowered its benchmark rate by 40 bps, after it again cut benchmark lending and deposit rates by 25 bps starting on March 1. Specifically, the PBOC will lower the one-year lending rate to 5.35% from 5.6% and its one-year deposit rate to 2.5% from 2.75%. It also said it would raise the maximum interest rate on bank deposits to 130% of the benchmark rate from 120%.
From the PBOC announcement:
People’s Bank of China decided to cut financial institutions RMB benchmark lending and deposit interest rates since March 1, 2015. The one-year benchmark lending rate by 0.25 percentage point to 5.35%; year benchmark deposit rate by 0.25 percentage points to 2.5%, while the combination of market-oriented reforms to promote the interest rate, the upper limit of the floating range of interest rates on deposits of financial institutions by the deposit base 1.2 times to 1.3 times the interest rate adjustment; adjusted lending rates and individual housing provident fund deposit and other deposit and lending rates.
As the WSJ notes, “the latest move took place just as China’s legislature, the National People’s Congress, prepared to gather Thursday for its annual meeting. The gathering is usually when China unveils its economic growth target for the year. Last year’s growth of 7.4% came in just below the 2014 target of about 7.5%. It was the lowest growth rate in nearly a quarter century.”
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The “Liquidity Glut” Springs Eternal: Global Central Bank Easing Quadruples In 2015
The “Liquidity Glut” Springs Eternal: Global Central Bank Easing Quadruples In 2015
Thanks to global disinflationary pressures driven by the savings glut, an oil glut, and universally high (peak) debt levels (crushing the transmission mechanisms of textbook economists), central planners have gone full ease-tard in 2015. From a ‘balanced’ 10 easing, 9 tightening bias (~1:1) in December, Morgan Stanley illustrates in the following chart there are now 16 central banks easing and only 4 with a tightening bias (4:1) as it appears the one-trick pony brigade are trying moar of what didn’t work the first, second, and last times in an effort to prove this time is different…
Source: Morgan Stanley
With so many central planners piling up in the lower left corner… and global growth expectations crashing… when oh when does the world wake up to smoke and mirrors they have been witnessing and, as Marc Faber recently warned, lose faith in central bank omnipotence?
Central Banks Have Lost Control Of The World
Central Banks Have Lost Control Of The World
With the world’s oldest central bank – Sweden’s Riksbank – taking the plunge into negative rates, there have been 19 ‘eases’ by central banks this year, Morgan Stanley warns of “ghosts of the 1930s.” With competitive ‘easing’ stoking fears of international currency wars,The Telegraph notes however that looser monetary policy is not the order of the day everywhere in the world, and herein lies potential danger for the world economy.
The world’s interest-rate policies…
Click image for interactive version
Looser monetary policy is not the order of the day everywhere in the world (see map above), and herein lies potential danger for the world economy.The expectation of a normalisation of monetary policy by the Federal Reserve has resulted a sustained rally in the US dollar. Such strength in the world’s reserve currency has simultaneously applied pressure on economies pegged to the greenback.
Meanwhile rate hikes from the Fed – which are expected to begin later this year – will naturally leader to tighter monetary conditions in economies everywhere from Mexico to Hong Kong.
It is this divergence in the actions of the world’s major central banks which could lead to a new global liquidity crisis, according to the governor of the Bank of England.
Despite robust job creation and economic output in the domestic economy of the US, the trend towards lower global interest rates will probably slow the extent of the Fed’s rate hikes once it finally gets off zero, according to Kit Juckes at Société Générale.
“The best we can hope now is that the dollar’s advance is orderly and the impact on global capital flows is limited” said Mr Juckes.
The 19 Policy ‘eases’ so far… (or 24 if Romania’s 2 and Denmark’s 4 are counted)
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Shale sub-prime and the Ides of March
Shale sub-prime and the Ides of March
“Sub-prime” is the term by which became known the debt market segment that served low quality housing in the US. Essentially these were products supporting mortgages to low-middle class families, that in 2006/07, up against the simultaneous rise in interest rates and commodities prices, produced a wave of defaults that lead to the 2008 financial crisis.
The rise in petroleum prices was a key element to the 2008 crisis, but would eventually bring something positive to the US. Petroleum is usually extracted from large underground cavities known as reservoirs. However, it is formed at greater depth, within source rocks, where organic matter is slowly cooked by the internal heat of the planet until it degrades, first into petroleum and finally into gas. Prices persistently above 100 dollars per barrel meant that beyond traditional reservoirs it also became feasible to drill deeper for petroleum, down to source rocks and other rock formations of low permeability.
In 2010 the US Government and media thus embarked in a promotional campaign for source rock drilling, erroneously calling “shales” to these resources to ease the marketing. Vast amounts of money started flowing to the sector, the industry quivered with activity, plenty of new jobs were created and the country soon emerged from economic recession. The end result: in three years petroleum extraction in the US grew by 50%, returning to levels not seen since the 1980s.
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