When planning to write this piece, the Dow was up 250 points or so with 45 minutes of trading left. The anticipated bounce (if China cut rates) arrived this morning with a 442 point upward thrust. This on a report card could be categorized as a “C-” or even a “D+”, very poor in my estimation. As I sat down to write the Dow was up 24 points and turned negative before I wrote the first word! This is HORRIBLE ACTION and outright scary if you are a Bull! The PPT (plunge protection team) got their butts kicked for the third or fourth day running. To let the market give up 500 points in just one hour shows their weakness or lack of capitalization. Many will look at today’s close and say “UH OH”!
What will this mean for tomorrow? We first have to see what happens tonight in the Asian markets and in particular China …which I suspect the big money brokers have already done. Somehow, my guess is they already sense a rout in Asia and this is the reason for the abrupt turnaround to front run another big dump tomorrow. The bounce was weak, it turned negative and closed at the worst levels of the day …NOT exactly that warm fuzzy feeling! “Look out below” seems to now be a continuing theme.
To reiterate what I’ve written over the last few days, this is all about the Great Credit Unwinding. It is my belief the players are beginning to sense this. Lower rates did nothing to fix Japan’s economy for 25 years, it has done less than nothing in aiding the U.S. economy for the last 8 years …why will it do anything for China? So far China has used versions of the Western playbook to thwart the rout. They have outlawed short selling, made it illegal for many institutions to sell and the PBOC has overtly come in to support the markets… to no avail!
This is really scary folks, even the most bearish expected a better bounce than we got today. What happens tomorrow if Asia/China get no bounce at all? The Fed has no room to lower rates, neither does the ECB. To be a central bank(er) and to get no “respect” from the markets is the most terrifying event one could think of.
Digging deeper, what do you suppose has happened over the last few days in the derivatives arena? There have been HUGE gains and losses in the $trillions or even $10′s of trillions! Notice I wrote “gains and losses”? How would you like to be an institution with a losing position of some sort …hedged so there would be no loss …only to find out your counterparty cannot pay? Do you suppose this might have already happened? I can almost guarantee it already has and in many different markets, we just haven’t heard about it nor “who” died. In reality, it doesn’t matter “who died”. Just as someone drowning hangs on to their rescuer, the derivatives chain is connected from start to finish and loops back where the “start connects with the end”. In other words, when losers cannot pay, the gleeful winners get the bad news they are also losers. If one drowns, they all drown!
I also mentioned yesterday it would be good to monitor interest rates. The 10 year yield was as low as 1.9% yesterday and as high as 2.13% today. I believe the panic number will be 2.4%. Should this yield level give way (and you will hear it spun as “good” on CNBC), it will signal major central bank selling (led by China) overwhelming the Fed’s ability to sop up the selling. Time will tell but this is something I will continue to monitor.
The overleveraged world is experiencing deflation. “Beggar thy neighbor” by central banks to increase trade at the expense of other nations is the game. The “game” by the way is a static or shrinking (global GDP)! This is a no win strategy on a global basis because someone has to lose …and then you have the same scenario as in derivatives. Sovereign nations will default! The point is this, “losses” which have been hidden so far will need to be booked and realized. There are NO BALANCE SHEETS left, strong enough to absorb the losses! The Fed commencing another round of QE is now a lock. Outright monetization will be sniffed out and the current outsized demand for gold and silver may double or more …just as inventories and vaults in the West are running out.
Lastly let’s look at the dollar. Commodities including oil are being sold …for dollars. Demand for product is down and so is “price”. The petro dollar cannot function with 60% haircuts in dollar usage. This acts to also lessen velocity of dollars. A very bad combination for any Ponzi scheme, less demand and lower velocity. The previous “good” leverage reverses and comes down on itself. In this instance, the world’s reserve currency loses acceptance for the very reason “safety capital” should flock to it, deflation! Can you see this? The dollar cannot survive with deflation because not enough new money comes in to prop it up. The dollar MUST have inflation, without it, it dies. Today’s dollar is not the 1930′s dollar, pegged to gold that was deflation proof. The foundation then was gold. Today the dollar’s foundation is nothing more than debt, TOO MUCH DEBT! In fact, dollars are only promises …to pay you more dollars! The perfect financial storm? Yes. There is still time (probably very little) to get your affairs and positions in order. I pray anyone reading this does so!
Standing watch,
