BlackRock predicts a lasting fall in living standards for the many, alongside huge profits for the few
| Maureen McLean/Alamy Live News
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BlackRock says we’re all doomed. It’s being optimistic
BlackRock says we’re all doomed. It’s being optimistic
The world’s largest asset manager has forecast systemic economic chaos. The reality is even worse
BlackRock: Prepare For Recession “Unlike Any Other”… And What Worked Before “Won’t Work Now”
BlackRock: Prepare For Recession “Unlike Any Other”… And What Worked Before “Won’t Work Now”
The world’s largest investment manager has gone all in – and says a global recession is right around the corner. What’s more, the financial tricks deployed by Central Banks in the past ‘won’t work this time.’
According to BlackRock, the global economy has entered a phase of elevated volatility, and that a recession is imminent due to central banks aggressively boosting borrowing costs to tame inflation. Their actions, according to a team of BlackRock strategists, will ignite more market turbulence than ever before.
“Recession is foretold as central banks race to try to tame inflation. It’s the opposite of past recessions,” the team wrote In their 2023 Global Outlook (embedded below), which says that the global economy has already exited a four-decade period of stable growth and inflation, and has now entered a period of heightened instability.
And when things get bad, “Central bankers won’t ride to the rescue when growth slows in this new regime, contrary to what investors have come to expect. Equity valuations don’t yet reflect the damage ahead.”
“What worked in the past won’t work now,” said the strategists. “The old playbook of simply ‘buying the dip’ doesn’t apply in this regime of sharper trade-offs and greater macro volatility. We don’t see a return to conditions that will sustain a joint bull market in stocks and bonds of the kind we experienced in the prior decade.”
So what can actually tame inflation? A deep recession, according to the report.
To navigate the coming storm, BlackRock recommends more frequent portfolio changes and taking a more “granular view on sectors, regions and sub-asset classes.”
Compounding the issue is aging workforces around the world – which is one key reason that the supply of US labor is struggling to keep up with demand.
…click on the above link to read the rest…
Unbeknown to Most, A Financial Revolution Is Coming That Threatens to Change Everything (And Not for the Better)
Unbeknown to Most, A Financial Revolution Is Coming That Threatens to Change Everything (And Not for the Better)
Given how much is at stake, this financial revolution is among the most important questions today’s societies could possibly grapple with. It should be under discussion in every parliament of every land, and every dinner table in every country in the world.
Around 90 central banks are either in the process of experimenting with or are already piloting central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). In a world of just over 190 countries that is a large contingent, but given they include the European Central Bank (ECB) which alone represents 19 Euro Area economies, the actual number of economies involved is well over 100. They include all G20 economies and together represent more than 90% of global GDP.
Three CBDCs have already gone fully live in the past two years: the so-called DCash in the Eastern Caribbean, the Sand Dollar in the Bahamas and the eNaira in Nigeria. The International Monetary Fund, the world’s most powerful supranational financial institution, has been lending its expertise in the roll out of CBDCs. In a recent speech the Fund’s President Kristalina Georgieva lauded the potential benefits (on which more later) of CBDCs while heaping praise on the “ingenuity” of the central banks busily trying to conjure them into existence.
Also firmly on board is the world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, which helps many of the world’s largest central banks, including the Federal Reserve and the ECB, manage their assets while obviously keeping all potential conflicts of interests at bay. The fund was the largest beneficiary of the Federal Reserve’s bailout of exchange-traded funds during the market rout of Spring 2020.
In his latest letter to investors, the CEO of BlackRock, Larry Fink, said the Ukrainian conflict has the potential to accelerate the development of digital currencies across the world.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
2021 Year in Review: Crisis of Authority and the Age of Narratives
Every year, friend-of-the-site David Collum writes a detailed “Year in Review” synopsis full of keen perspective and plenty of wit. This year is no exception. Poignant and delightfully acerbic when necessary, considering the troubling times. As with past years, he selected Peak Prosperity as the site where it is published in full. It is longer than our usual posts, but worth the time to read in full. This is Part 1.
Introduction
Dave: You do lack self control, but I learned and laughed making my way thru this.
~ Larry Summers (@LHSummers), former Secretary of the Treasury
I’ve been trying to reach you about your car’s extended warranty. What began more than a dozen years ago as a synopsis of the year’s events in markets and finance for a few friends morphed beyond my control into a Year in Review (YIR)—an attempt to chronicle human folly and world events for the entire year. It captures key moments before they slip into the brain fog. The process of trying to write a coherent narrative helps me better understand WTF just happened and seminal moments that catch my eye.
By far my favorite end-of-year recap for the last ten years. Finished it yesterday. Once again David hasn’t disappointed. He’s on my I want to go to dinner with list.
~ Jim Pallotta (@jimpallotta13), money manager and former owner of Boston Celtics
I’m game, Jim, even if it’s just a pretzel, nachos, and a brewski. The title, “Crisis of Authority,” is a double entendre. On the one hand, previously trusted authorities that we relied on to better understand the world are long gone. Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite, and Tim Russert have been replaced with Chris Cuomo, Don Lemon, and Brian Stelter. Oops. Scratch Chris Cuomo..
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The Fed’s Visible Hand: Powell Buys $305 Million In ETFs In Two Days
The Fed’s Visible Hand: Powell Buys $305 Million In ETFs In Two Days
On Tuesday, the US officially crossed over into some bizarro version of a crony, centrally-planned mandated pricing model that is anything but a market when the Fed started buying corporate bond ETFs for the first time ever. Then, moments ago in its latest H.4.1 statement, the Fed – which disclosed that its balance sheet is now a record $6.934 trillion and well on its way to $12 or more than half of US GDP…
… also revealed that in the first two days the program was operational, the Fed purchased $305 million under the Corporate Credit Facility, i.e., the corporate bond ETF buying program, as of EOD May 13, or just two days after the Fed officially gave Blackrock the green light to start waving it in.
Of course, since the transactions were organized by the NY Fed which used Blackrock as agent for the buying, all of the ETFs were parked at the New York Fed.
Bloomberg’s ETF expert, Eric Blachunas, was sure he had observed the Fed in action two days ago when he noticed a jump in both LQD and HYG volumes around mid-day, which appears to be the time Blackrock will be active in the market for all those who feel like frontrunning the world’s largest asset manager, which in turn is frontrunning the world’s largest central bank.
HISTORY MADE: Looks like Fed made good on word as $LQD & $HYG both saw volume jumps today (via some sizable trades mid-day). No way to know for sure it was them, but given what they said yest & non-corp bond ETFs like $AGG, $TLT didn’t see similar jump, there’s good chance IMO.
What is a bit concerning is that even after the Fed bought millions in LQD on the 12th, the ETF closed red. However, Blackrock redeemed itself on the next two days when LQD posted a solid rebound, rising above 128 for the first time since May 5.
Fourth Turning Accelerating Towards Climax
FOURTH TURNING ACCELERATING TOWARDS CLIMAX
“At some point, America’s short-term Crisis psychology will catch up to the long-term post-Unraveling fundamentals. This might result in a Great Devaluation, a severe drop in the market price of most financial and real assets. This devaluation could be a short but horrific panic, a free-falling price in a market with no buyers. Or it could be a series of downward ratchets linked to political events that sequentially knock the supports out from under the residual popular trust in the system. As assets devalue, trust will further disintegrate, which will cause assets to devalue further, and so on. Every slide in asset prices, employment, and production will give every generation cause to grow more alarmed.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning
I’ve been writing articles about the Fourth Turning for over a decade and nothing has happened since its tumultuous onset in 2008, with the global financial collapse, created by the Federal Reserve and their Wall Street co-conspirator owners, that has not followed along the path described by Strauss and Howe in their 1997 book – The Fourth Turning.
Like molten lava bursting forth from a long dormant (80 years) volcano, the core elements of this Fourth Turning continue to flow along channels of distress, long ago built by bad decisions, corrupt politicians and the greed of bankers. The molten ingredients of this Crisis have been the central drivers since 2008 and this second major eruption is flowing along the same route. The core elements are debt, civic decay, and global disorder, just as Strauss & Howe anticipated over two decades ago.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
OPINION: Foxes in the henhouse – Who decides where bailout money goes?
OPINION: Foxes in the henhouse – Who decides where bailout money goes?
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, trillions of bailout dollars in the U.S. and Canada are about to be fire hosed into particular areas of the economy. Given that this is public money held by governments, who decides where and to whom these funds should go?
It is logical that workers, professionals, small and medium businesses should have a central role in this, given their critical involvement in the creation of value in the economy and that they constitute almost the entire population of North America. But they don’t. Instead, key power and authority has been handed over to a small group of private mega-banks and financiers.
For example, the U.S. Treasury, which will be providing the bailout funding in the U.S., is a public institution which is supposed to answer to Congress. Yet, for much of the bailout, the Trump administration has taken the authority away from the U.S. Treasury and given it to the private banks of the Federal Reserve. In turn, the Federal Reserve banks have appointed BlackRock, the largest private asset manager and “shadow bank” in the world, to oversee whole sections of the bailout and to decide which corporations and institutions are to live or die.
However, neither the Federal Reserve nor BlackRock will be liable for any of the risk associated with the bailout loans no matter their quality. All the risk and backstopping of corporate defaults will fall onto the U.S. Treasury and by extension the American people (1). This is not a minor issue. With BlackRock and other financial institutions at the helm, who is going to benefit from these bailouts to selected corporations which will amount to $4.5 trillion (or by some estimates even more)?
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Amazon Chaos: “BlackRock Is Literally Reaping Profits As The World’s Jungles Burn”
Amazon Chaos: “BlackRock Is Literally Reaping Profits As The World’s Jungles Burn”
According to a new report from the Friends of the Earth U.S.; Amazon Watch; and Profundo, Larry Fink’s BlackRock Inc is one of the top investors in companies “responsible for tropical forest destruction in the Amazon and around the world.”
The report called BlackRock’s Big Deforestation Problem, published on Amazon Watch’s website, claims BlackRock is the top three shareholders in 25 of the world’s biggest publicly traded deforestation-risk companies; these companies are known for producing soya, beef, palm oil, pulp and paper, rubber and timber, but also have a long track record in burning down forests to clear land for agriculture purposes. The New York-based investment bank is also a top ten shareholder in another 50 of the world’s top deforestation-risk companies, the report added.
“The data is clear: from the Amazon to the great forests of Africa and Southeast Asia, BlackRock is a global leader in financing forest destruction,” said Jeff Conant, senior international forest program manager with Friends of the Earth U.S., the report’s lead author.
“As long as this financial behemoth continues to unconditionally back the world’s most destructive agribusiness companies, the forests of the world, and consequently the climate and the rights of forest-dwelling people, will continue to go up in flames. BlackRock is literally reaping profits as the world’s jungles burn.”
BlackRock: Leveraged Loan, High-Yield Markets ‘Increasingly Converging’
BlackRock’s investment in deforestation-risk companies has been increasing in the last half-decade. In 4Q14, BlackRock owned roughly $1 billion in deforestation-risk investments. By 4Q18, the value of these investments jumped to $1.6 billion.
The report said the investment firm’s deforestation-linked commodity holdings are comprised mainly of index funds. In 2014, 80% of BlackRock’s deforestation-linked commodity holdings were through index funds; by 2018, it had jumped to 94%.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
World’s Largest Asset Manager Warns: The Dollar’s Days As Global Reserve Currency Are Numbered
Have BlackRock CEO Larry Fink and Russian President Vladimir Putin been comparing notes?
In comments that sound eerily similar to a warning issued by Putin, who warned during a speech last month that the US risked undermining the dollar’s reserve currency status with its sanctions regime, the CEO of the world’s largest asset-management firm said Tuesday during a panel discussion at the New Economic Forum in Singapore that the US dollar’s status as the world’s dominant currency wouldn’t last forever.
And instead of citing external factors like China’s expanding economic clout and influence, or an insurgent Russia, Fink pointed to the widening US budget deficit as the biggest risk to the dollar’s status as the global hegemon. And while it might not happen tomorrow, or next year, over time, as US interest rates rise and the federal government strains under its tremendous debt burden, the creditors who were once eager to buy up Treasury bonds will gradually disappear.
“We’re going to move there over time” Fink said.
Instead of working with its creditors like China, the US is fighting them by engaging in an acrimonious trade war. Fink said that, in his experience, it’s never wise to fight with your lenders.
“The problem is we are living with a deficit that is very large. We are fighting with our creditors right now worldwide,” Fink said.
“Generally, when you fight with your banker, it’s not a good outcome,” he said.
“I wouldn’t recommend you fight with your lenders, and we’re fighting with our lenders. Forty percent of the U.S. deficit is funded by external factors. No other country has that.”
And as interest rates rise and the government struggles with its newfound debt premium, collateral damage in the equity market will be almost inevitable.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
BlackRock Warns Geopolitical Risk Is Highest Since 2014’s Crimea Invasion
Rising geopolitical risk is not automatically bad news for risk assets, but, as Richard Turnill explains, BlackRock believes a new U.S. approach to trade bears watching.
The economy is expanding, equities are at new highs, and markets appear calm. What is there to worry about?
Geopolitical risks are ticking up, according to our BlackRock Geopolitical Risk Indicator (BGRI). But this isn’t automatically bad news for markets.
The BGRI gauges the degree of financial market concern about geopolitical risk. It tracks the frequency of geopolitical risk mentions in media and brokerage reports, adjusting for sentiment reflected in the text. A positive score indicates markets appear more concerned about geopolitical risks relative to recent history, whereas a negative score implies less concern.
The BGRI is now at the highest level since March 2015, and well above early 2017 levels, when markets were digesting Donald Trump’s election win, worrying about the French election outcome and fearing the potential for a hard Brexit.
How worried should we be about the recent BGRI uptick?
The indicator is still well below its longer-term peak, as the chart above shows. But we believe risks such as a more muscular U.S. approach on trade bear watching.
Trade is the risk to watch
Sudden geopolitical shocks tend to hurt global risk assets only briefly if the economic backdrop is sound, according to our analysis of asset performance following shocks since 1962. U.S. Treasuries can be an effective hedge during such episodes, we find. This perceived safe haven also tends to rally ahead of “known unknowns” such as elections with binary outcomes, then lag after the event as the lifting of uncertainty boosts risk assets. Market effects of localized geopolitical shocks tend to linger longer where the events occur. A longer-lasting and more acute negative global market reaction is more likely if multiple shocks occur simultaneously or if the economy is weak, we find.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The Geopolitical Implications Of Renewable Energy
The Geopolitical Implications Of Renewable Energy
An October report from BlackRock (BLK)—the world’s largest publicly traded investment management firm—wisely states, “markets are calm but geopolitics are anything but.”
Wind and solar energy—two leading renewable energy options—could possibly become a dangerous part of an energy mix as the world continues on a downward geopolitical slope.
Both are intermittent and unreliable, and can only produce consistent energy under certain weather parameters, and neither, at this time, can be stored at scale. Renewable energy options are also tough on the environment because wind and solar energy requires large amounts of land compared to conventional, reliable fossil fuel energy.
However, renewables are consistently publicized as growing faster than fossil fuels, but that’s misleading. Unless hydroelectricity is being produced under a controlled scenario with dammed water then renewable energy is inferior to coal, nuclear and natural gas powered electricity.
While renewables don’t emit carbon dioxide, they may not, unfortunately, be the solution to lower emissions. This is where renewables can create a dangerous geopolitical climate for nations pursuing them wholeheartedly.
A new paper by the Center of the American Experiment, “Energy Policy in Minnesota the High Cost of Failure,” chronicles Minnesota’s $15 billion experiment with wind energy over traditional fossil fuels, which didn’t lower CO2 emissions and caused Minnesota’s price of electricity to rise above the national average for the first time on record.
Imagine this on a larger scale. Think Africa—where 635 million citizens are without any form of modern energy at this time. This lack of scalable, affordable energy that fossil fuels and nuclear energy provide can be construed as a direct correlation for the inherent instability of Africa, its lower economic growth, higher rates of overpopulation and lacking the wherewithal to combat radicalization by groups like ISIS throughout the continent.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
These Are The Top Geopolitical Risks According To The World’s Largest Asset Manager
These Are The Top Geopolitical Risks According To The World’s Largest Asset Manager
Like many others, the world‘s largest money manager with $5.9 trillion in (ETF) investments, BlackRock, is not too worried about a market which no matter what, promptly rebounds from any and every selloff, and seems to close at all time highs day after day as if by magic. To be sure, BlackRock’s employees are delighted: the less the volatility, and the higher the S&P goes, the more likely retail investors are to hand over their cash to BlackRock. So far so good. Still, not even Blackrock can state that after looking at this chart, which unveils unprecedented economic policy uncertainty at a time when equity uncertainty has never been lower…
… that everything is ok.
And it doesn’t: in a blog post by BlackRock’s Isabelle Mateos y Lago, Blackrock’s chief multi-asset strategist writes that while markets may be a sea of calm, geopolitics are anything but. As a result, the world’s biggest ETF administrator has its eyes on 10 geopolitical risks and is tracking their likelihood and potential market impact, as it wrote recently in the firm’s Global Investment Outlook Q4 2017.
The “world of risk” map below is a quick snapshot of all
Among the Top risks tracked by Blackrock are:
- North American trade negotiations
- Russia-NATO conflict
- South China Sea conflict
- US-China tensions
- Escalations in Syria and Iraq
- North Korea conflict
- Fragmentation in Europe
- Gulf conflicts
Of the risks listed above, which are the ones BlackRock is most worried about? According to Mateos y Lago, the top three right now: North American trade negotiations, a North Korea conflict and U.S.-China tensions, with the second and third particularly interrelated.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
It’s Time We Talked About Our Owners
It’s Time We Talked About Our Owners
How vast asset managers impact “our increasingly cartelized economy.”
The world’s biggest asset manager, BlackRock, was splashed across the front pages of the Spanish financial news yesterday. The firm had just raised raised its stake in Spain’s telecoms giant Telefónica to 336 million shares — the equivalent of 6.7% of Telefónica’s total capital, with a market value of just under €3 billion.
In the short space of five months BlackRock has almost doubled its holdings and is now the largest owner of Telefónica stock, ahead of Spain’s second biggest bank, BBVA, which holds 6% of the shares. The asset manager has also expanded its participation in Telefónica’s international subsidiaries, raising its holdings in Telefónica Deutschland to 0.76% and Telefónica Brasil to almost 2%, making it the firm’s biggest institutional shareholder.
BlackRock is the largest institutional shareholder of Telefónica’s two main market rivals in Spain, holding 7.3% of Vodafone and 1.96% of part state-owned Orange. It’s also the second largest investor in British Telecom, after Deutsche Telekom, with a 7.84% stake. In the U.S. market BlackRock has the third largest position in Verizon, with 6.17% of the capital, and the second largest position in AT&T, with 5.84%.
A Vast, Sprawling Empire
The US fund manager has built up such a vast, sprawling financial empire since its creation 29 years ago that it has even begun to draw unwanted attention from the academic world. Two blockbuster studies – one by Einer Elhauge of Harvard Law School and the other by Martin C. Schmalz of Stephen M. Ross School of Business and José Azar and Isabel Tecu of Charles River Associates – have confirmed that BlackRock and some other big funds have acquired such large shareholdings throughout the U.S. and global economy that they cause the companies they jointly own to compete less vigorously with one another.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The “Terrifying Prospect” Of A Triumph Of Politics Over Economics
The “Terrifying Prospect” Of A Triumph Of Politics Over Economics
The Triumph of Politics
All of life’s odds aren’t 3:2, but that’s how you’re supposed to bet, or so they say. They are not saying that so much anymore, or saying that history rhymes, or that nothing’s new under the sun. More and more theys seem to be figuring out that past economic and market experiences can’t be extrapolated forward – a terrifying prospect for the social and political order.
Consider today’s realities:
Global economies have grown to their current scale thanks to a glorious secular expansion of worldwide credit – credit unreserved with bank assets and deposits; credit extended to brand new capitalists; credit that can never be extinguished without significant debt deflation or hyper monetary inflationEconomies no longer form sufficient capital to sustain their scales or to justify broad asset values in real terms
Markets cannot price assets fairly in real terms without risking significant declines in collateral values supporting them and their underlying economies
Politicians that used to anguish (rhetorically) over the right mix of potential fiscal policies, ostensibly to get things back on track (as if somehow finding the right path would have actually been legislated into existence), have come to realize the limits of their power to have a meaningful impact
Monetary authorities have become the only game in town,assassinating all economic logic so they may juggle public expectations in the hope – so far successfully executed – that neither man nor nature will be the wiser.
The good news for policy makers is that man remains collectively unaware and vacuous; the bad news is that nature abhors a vacuum. The massive scale of economies relative to necessary production (not to mention already embedded systemic leverage) suggests this time is truly different.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
BlackRock Suspends ETF Issuance Due To “Surging Demand For Gold”
BlackRock Suspends ETF Issuance Due To “Surging Demand For Gold”
BlackRock’s Gold ETF (IAU) has seen fund inflows every day in 2016 (no outflows at all) and with the stock trading above its NAV for most of the year, the world’s largest asset manager has made a significant decision:
- *BLACKROCK SAYS ISSUANCE OF GOLD TRUST SHARES SUSPENDED
- *BLACKROCK SAYS SUSPENSION DUE TO DEMAND FOR GOLD
Issuance of New IAU (Gold Trust) Shares Temporarily Suspended; Existing Shares to Trade Normally for Retail and Institutional Investors on NYSE Arca and Other VenuesSuspension results from surging demand for gold, which requires registration of new shares
iShares Delaware Trust Sponsor LLC, in its capacity as the sponsor of iShares Gold Trust (IAU), has temporarily suspended the creation of new shares of IAU until additional shares are registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
This suspension does not affect the ability of retail and institutional investors to trade on stock exchanges. Retail and institutional investors will continue to be able to buy and sell shares in IAU.
IAU holds gold as a physical asset. IAU is an exchange-traded commodity (ETC), which therefore is not eligible for registration as an investment company under the ’40 Act. IAU may only be registered under the ’33 Act as a grantor trust. Under the ’33 Act, subscriptions for new shares in excess of those registered requires additional filings with the SEC.
Nearly all other U.S. iShares are exchange-traded funds (ETFs), registered as investment companies under the ’40 Act. The ’40 Act provides for the continuous offering of shares and does not require registration of additional shares as the fund grows due to investor demand in connection to new subscriptions.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
