OK, let’s go through this one more time. Despite what we keep hearing from the politicians and moneymen, things are not getting better. Yes, we have seen the economic equivalent of a dead cat bounce — how could we not, given the trillions that have been thrown at the system — but it is simply not sustainable.
The reality is that we’ve just careened through decades of overborrowing and malinvestment, which created an array of dangerous imbalances and undermined our nation’s economic foundations. Now that the party is over, the wreckage is going to weigh on our prospects for years, if not decades.
Unfortunately, those who live in a bubble (i.e., Washington) or who’ve come to depend on them (e.g., Wall Street) have not seen through the fog of funny money policymaking. But as Bloomberg reports in "Americans Grow More Pessimistic on Economy, Nation’s Direction," the average Joe (and Jane) seem to have their eyes wide open when it comes to today’s depressing reality.
[Click on table to enlarge]
Americans have grown gloomier about both the economy and the nation’s direction over the past three months even as the U.S. shows signs of moving from recession to recovery.
Almost half the people now feel less financially secure than when President Barack Obama took office in January, a Bloomberg National Poll shows.
Those concerns have put consumers in a miserly mood as they head to the mall for holiday shopping, with half the country planning to spend less on gifts than last year and few buyers willing to run up credit-card debt for Christmas.
“The recession may be over, but the administration seems to be losing the battle when it comes to winning the hearts and minds of Americans,” says Chris Rupkey, chief financial economist for Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York. “This is important because the spending of consumers is the main factor that will turn the economic recovery into a self- sustaining one.”
Obama yesterday addressed anxiety over the economy with a speech proposing new spending on the nation’s transportation system, tax credits to spur hiring by small businesses and incentives to make homes more energy efficient.
Unemployment in November stood at 10 percent, a drop from 10.2 percent in
We are attentive to the implications of changes in the value of the dollar and will continue to formulate policy to guard against risks to our dual mandate to foster both maximum employment and price stability. Our commitment to our dual objectives, together with the underlying strengths of the U.S. economy, will help ensure that the dollar is strong and a source of global financial stability.
That’s a new one. You are attentive to it eh?
Well then about this, Sir Jackass?
An EXACT correlation as soon as Bernanke’s words were released – synchronized EXACTLY as to time. Dollar spiked, the S&P 500 dropped.
The Fed has the lever to force this carry trade out of the system before it grows large enough to destroy our economy and productivity. They need only raise rates – not a lot – just enough to make our markets unattractive. 2% should do it nicely.
Who can argue that 2% isn’t "very accommodative" in terms of rates?
Bernanke claims:
My own view is that the recent pickup reflects more than purely temporary factors and that continued growth next year is likely.
He’s lying. If he truly believed this The Fed Funds rate would not be at zero – but it is.
Bernanke "outs" himself by saying:
The demand for credit also has fallen significantly: For example, households are spending less than they did last year on big-ticket durable goods typically purchased with credit, and businesses are reducing investment outlays and thus have less need to borrow. Because of weakened balance sheets, fewer potential borrowers are creditworthy, even if they are willing to take on more debt.
Here’s the most-recent Z1 credit graph:
Note that The Fed’s "base money" is at present about $1.8 trillion, which is $1 trillion larger than the "normal" $800 billion.
But credit outstanding is some $53 trillion dollars.
Clearly, without credit expansion it is not possible for economic growth to occur. But credit expansion requires economic activity that in turn allows the coupon payments – interest and principal –…
The global central banks have flooded the world economy with hot money for years. Why has this created massive asset bubbles rather than inflation?
In the 1970s, expanding credit triggered a decade-long bout of high inflation as cheap money chased scarce goods. Why hasn’t the massive expansion of credit/hot money of the past decade caused inflation? Short answer: overcapacity.
Let’s look at a few charts to recall the enormity of the current credit bubble: the trillions of dollars of credit created, the trillions borrowed in mortgages and other credit to chase asset prices upward, the trillions created as assets like housing rose in bubblicious euphoria, and the trillions extracted from those skyrocketing assets:
Despite the trillions being created, borrowed and pumped into the economy, inflation remained benign:
With all that money flowing around, jobs were relatively plentiful, setting a floor under consumption and consumer credit:
Even as all this money chased goods, services and assets, interest rates fell, earning savers less and less return:
Meanwhile, the capacity to make stuff like steel exploded:
So here’s the dynamic which enabled low interest rates and low inflation even as credit exploded and bubbles rose in one asset class after another.
1. Massive expansion of credit was paralleled by a massive expansion of industrial capacity in China and indeed the entire world.
2. This expansion of capacity was matched by an expansion of supply in commodities. As the industrialization of China (one of the so-called BRIC nations--China, Russia, India and Brazil) and other developing nations drove demand for commodities, the incentives to exploit new sources drove up supply of almost everything: oil, iron ore, coffee, etc.
3. While prices have fluctuated in an upward bias, at no time did the cost of commodities rise to levels which threatened global growth except for the oil spike in 2008. Adjusted for inflation, oil is well within historical boundaries even at $80/barrel.
4. To feed the giant credit-dependent machine they’d fostered, central banks kept lowering interest rates and increasing liquidity/money supply. This drove the returns on savings and bonds down to absurdly low levels, forcing money managers to chase riskier assets to make a decent return on investments.
John asks: "Why is the government trying to spread its public health message through children rather than parents?" Perhaps because a significant proportion of the nation’s parents distrust it and the pharmaceutical companies, so going straight to the kids may be a viable option. – Ilene
Remember when tobacco companies were accused of targeting children with advertisements and promotional items featuring cartoons?
Everyone thought it was terrible because children could be convinced smoking was cool by cartoons.
(Or something. This never made a whole lot of sense since we’ve never really had a child smoking problem in the United States. Sure sometimes kids will take a puff or two as an experiment but real smoking didn’t stop until much later and there was never any evidence that teenagers were convinced to start smoking because of cartoons.)
The thing that really creeped most people out was that the use of cartoons seemed aimed at undermining parental authority and influence, getting between kids and their mom and dad. Oh, and the fact that most people are convinced that smoking is deadly.
So what should we make of this advertisement promoting flu shots? Believe it or not, flu shots are pretty controversial. There are a lot of people who believe that serious health issues are associated with the shots, although the evidence for this seems scant. Many more people just don’t think the risk of childhood flu is really worth the quite common side effects, limited risks and cost of getting the shot.
And a few of us have figured out that you can pretty effectively be a free rider when it comes to vaccinations. When my brother enrolled his daughter in pre-school, he was told that chicken pox shots were mandatory. As a Roman Catholic, he objected to the vaccine on pro-life grounds (lung tissue from aborted fetuses are used to generate the vaccine) and pointed out that if everyone else at school was vaccinated, there’s no way his daughter would catch or spread the chicken pox. She was effectively but indirectly vaccinated.
In any case, the risks and benefits of getting a flu shot seem to be something that should be left up to parents rather than decided by bureaucrats. Certainly, the image of the
“The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.”
Bertrand Russell
Don McLean was born in 1945 and grew up in New Rochelle, New York. He was one of the earliest Baby Boomers. He was born at the beginning of America’s last High, as described by Strauss & Howe in their book The Fourth Turning. America’s victory in World War II began a new 80 to 100 year cycle consisting of four turnings of 20 to 25 years. The four cycles are a High, an Awakening, an Unraveling and a Crisis. These cycles have been recurring throughout history due to the generational mood changes as people age. Don McLean grew up during a High. This was an episode of safety and security. He basked in “Dr. Spock permissiveness, suburban conformism, Sputnik-era schooling, Beaver Cleaver friendliness, and Father Knows Best family order.” His idyllic life changed on the morning of February 3, 1959 when he read the headline in the newspaper he was about to deliver.
A long long time ago
I can still remember
How that music used to make me smile
And I knew if I had my chance
That I could make those people dance
And maybe they’d be happy for a while
But February made me shiver
With every paper I’d deliver
Bad news on the doorstep
I couldn’t take one more step
I can’t remember if I cried
When I read about his widowed bride
But something touched me deep inside
The day the music died
So bye, bye Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry
And them good old boys were drinking whiskey and rye
Singing this’ll be the day that I die
Stephen Roach doesn’t mince words. He calls monetary policy during the bubble years “reckless and irresponsible” and he thinks politics is thwarting any meaningful regulatory reform, a view I also hold. I think the point of Roach’s attack is that a lot of finger-pointing has been directed at Wall Street and even Main Street. But, policy makers share much of the blame. This is a point I tried to make in a post “Forget about Goldman” from this past summer.
Moreover, as Roach indicates, the concept that a central planner (which a central bank most certainly is) can allow bubbles to form and then clean up after the mess- is on it’s face absurd. But, clearly the Federal Reserve and other central banks are doing their level best to re-create the conditions which led to a near-financial collapse.
The money quote comes just about 4:45 through the eleven minute clip below:
Central bankers say trust us. We know what we’re doing. I don’t trust them one bit. They got us into this mess in the first place.
As for Asia, Roach sees a bright future. However, he warns that it has risen on the back of an unsustainable export-led macro-policy by selling things to people in the West who can’t afford them. With continued private-sector deleveraging in the west likely, this dynamic has ended.
(video embedded below)
As an aside, Roach also correctly adds that the recent protectionist tariff administered by President Obama was not the result of tire manufacturers’ lobbying. Four of five of the Chinese importers are subsidiaries of U.S. firms. Obama did this to gain credibility and support from unions, a key Democratic constituency in the health care debate and in the run-up to the mid-term elections.
I should also point out that much of the U.S. trade deficit comes from such arrangements, where a U.S. company imports goods from its own foreign subsidiary.
One year after America’s brush with economic catastrophe, there’s plenty of looking back at the bubbles that caused financial chaos.
But what’s next?
There are surely dangerous economic bubbles forming as we speak. As Alan Greenspan warned this week, "They [financial crises] are all different, but they have one fundamental source," he said. "That is the unquenchable capability of human beings when confronted with long periods of prosperity to presume that it will continue."
The trick, of course, is spotting them. By definition, most people don’t spot a bubble before they form and burst.
Considering the source – this is a quite sobering warning to America of what the Chinese are thinking. Nothing surprising as we have seen China up their stake in gold, sign bilateral currency agreements with other countries to avoid the dollar, purchasing hard assets to redeploy out of dollars, move their bond purchases to near term maturities and the like, but you can see in their words both a dismay at what we have done, and what they are slowly planning for in the long term. [Feb 13, 2009: FT.com - China to US: "We Hate You Guys"] [May 21, 2009: China Becoming More Picky About Debt]
Of course, as we have said many times – for now they are stuck with us, because any move to detach from the States or our bond market would destabilize both countries.
The US Federal Reserve’s Policy of printing money to buy Treasury debt threatens to set off a serious decline of the dollar and compel China to redesign its foreign reserve policy, according to a top member of the Communist hierarchy.
Cheng Siwei, former vice-chairman of the Standing Committee and now head of China’s green energy drive, said Beijing was dismayed by the Fed’s recourse to "credit easing". "We hope there will be a change in monetary policy as soon as they have positive growth again," he said.
"If they keep printing money to buy bonds it will lead to inflation, and after a year or two the dollar will fall hard. Most of our foreign reserves are in US bonds and this is very difficult to change, so
The Elements of Deflation
The Failure of Economics
The Super Trend Puzzle
Final Demand and Income
Unemployment Was NOT a Green Shoot
As every school child knows, water is formed by the two elements of hydrogen and oxygen in a very simple formula we all know as H2O. Today we start a series that starts with the question, What are the elements that comprise deflation? Far from being simple, the "equation" for deflation is as complex as that of DNA. And sadly, while the genome project has helped us with great insights into how DNA works, economic analysis is still back in the 1950s when it comes to decoding deflation. Notwithstanding the paucity of understanding we can glean from the dismal science, in this week’s letter we will start thinking about the most fundamentally important question of the day: is inflation, or deflation, in our future?
But quickly, I want to thank the many people who wrote very kind words about last week’s letter. Many thought it was one of the better letters I have done in a long time. If you did not read it, you can read it here. And of course, you can go there and sign up to get this letter sent to you each week for free. Why not become of my 1 million (plus and growing) closest friends?
The Failure of Economics
Among the economists and writers I regularly read, there are some who, if they agree with me, I go back and check my assumptions – I must have been wrong. Paul Krugman is one of those thinkers. I admit to his brilliance, but his left-leaning philosophy does not particularly square with mine, and I find that most of the time I disagree.
That being said, I strongly encourage you to read his essay in the New York Times Magazine, which comes out this weekend. It is worth the high price of the Times to read it, if you can’t get it online. It is a very hard critique and analysis of the failure of current macro and financial economic thought, which didn’t even come close to predicting the current financial malaise. Indeed, as he points out, most schools of thought said the state we…
107 Ways of Being Wrong
As we’ve seen in The Big List of Behavioral Biases, there are 101 (well, 107 at the time of writing) ways in which people exhibit irrational biases. The basic idea, that we’re affected by these biases in predictable ways, is now well accepted. The problem is that there are simply too many biases for this to be the be-all and end-all of the explanation of market irrationality.
So while the basic concepts of behavioral finance are understood, in the sense that irrationality is a dr...
To learn more, sign up for David's free newsletter and receive the free report from All About Trends - "How To Outperform 90% Of Wall Street With Just $500 A Week." Tell David PSW sent you. - Ilene...
Rich Adamonis, NYSE (NYSE: NYX) spokesperson told Benzinga "In response to incorrect reports re: NYX and Facebook (NDAQ: FB): There have been no discussions with Facebook regarding switching their listing in light of the events of the last week, nor do we think a discussion along those lines would be appropriate at this time.”
First we'll go to the technicals. Back in mid April I had opined a 'bear flag' formation was being created. [Apr 17, 2012: Potential Bear Flag Forming] But the market being the difficult beast it is, head faked everyone and rather than a break down from said flag it first went UP and nearly touched yearly highs. This caused everyone to think the bear flag had failed…. only to lead to a horrid May in the market. Generally a bear flag will resolve relatively quickly but the longer...
Despite the fact that U.S. equities are well-positioned and well-supported to go up, once again it is the headlines out of Europe—especially Greece—that are scaring off investors. Some are saying that it is now likely (and even desirable) that Greece will default on all its sovereign debt, withdraw from the euro, and severely devalue its domestic currency (Drachma?). This will allow them to operate a balanced budget while pumping cash into growth initiatives, rather than suffer the ravages of Germany-mandated austerity.
Some say, so what? Greece makes up only about 2% of the Eurozone’s overall economy. Nevertheless, you might say that this new “Grecian Formula” is creating the opposite effect to the men’s hair product, i.e.., rather than losing the gray we are al...
Markets died and then rallied to flat again as European leaders “prepared contingencies” for a possible Grexit
Markets died hard and fast earlier today as major indexes registered as much as 1.5% of losses after news that Euro zone officials were unofficially “preparing contingencies” for a Greek exit from the Euro. Unofficial statements were not enough to keep markets down however, as major indexes rallied back to flat levels by the end of the day.
So the world continues to wait on Europe, as the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (NYSEACA:SPY) gained .05%, the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF (NYSEARCA:...
T - AT&T, Inc. – U.S. equities are on the decline as Europe’s woes once again take center stage. Shares in AT&T, down 0.90% at $33.24 this afternoon, are faring better than most of the other Dow components so far, though options activity on the wireless carrier suggests some strategists are bracing for further declines ahead of the long w...
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This post is for all our live virtual trade ideas and daily comments. Please click on "comments" below to follow our live discussion. All of our current trades are listed in the spreadsheet below, with entry price (1/2 in and All in), and exit prices (1/3 out, 2/3 out, and All out).
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Here is this week's test version of the latest newsletter. We apologize for some formatting issues that need to be worked out. Please tell us what you think.
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In this article, please revisit an article written two years ago titled, "The Calm Before the Storm." This article focused on the patent cliff that was looming in the pharmaceutical industry, that was later picked up by the New York Times and several other bloggers! Subsequent articles were written about big pharma company's revenue streams, and the pros and cons of of their later stage pipelines. Other articles have also attempted to identify smaller biotechs with the potential to reap big reward...
My last weekend update is dated from January 30 so after a long hiatus, here is an update of our virtual portfolio. Since the last update, we have closed the AA Money portfolio due to a lack of enthusiasm (and activity) and I have stopped tracking the FAS strangle as the low VIX makes it hard to get rewarded for the risk! But we have added a small $5KP virtual portfolio which does not use any margin.
FAS Money
We have had to recover from a big move up by FAS and a low VIX which keeps option prices low. But the portfolio has gaine about 10% since the last update.
Last update P&L - $5499.00
IWM Money
Not a lot of activity in this portfolio where the main focus is on the large IWM BCS. But the portfolio has grown over 20% since the last update.
Last update P&L - $1998.00
$5KP Portfolio
This is the virtual portfolio that replaced the AA Money portfolio. It does not use margin and we will keep holdings under $5K.
AAPL $50K P...
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Among the economists and writers I regularly read, there are some who, if they agree with me, I go back and check my assumptions – I must have been wrong. Paul Krugman is one of those thinkers. I admit to his brilliance, but his left-leaning philosophy does not particularly square with mine, and I find that most of the time I disagree.
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Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...
Ilene is editor and affiliate program
coordinator for PSW. She manages the Favorites backup site
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