The ECB did exactly as expected, which was less than its deposit rate (if that’s even possible). President Draghi answered questions for an hour and said absolutely nothing except that risks were now weighted to the downside. The structural theme of his composed narrative was the concept of persistence and assessment. Draghi laid the need for continued ECB monetary ease on many factors inhibiting growth:
German auto production slowing;
U.S.trade actions are creating greater uncertainty due to tariff threats;
The Bank of Japan did not surprise the markets as they remained committed to the lunacy of QQE, even with positive growth for many years. In an effort to make the central bank’s policy ever more relevant the BOJ lowered their inflation expectations, which the markets interpreted as lower for longer, resulting in a flurry of YEN selling of against all of the major traded currencies. There was even movement in the Swiss/yen cross as both central banks battle to keep their currencies in check by keeping interest rates negative.
As we head into the final two weeks of the year, the global equity markets are “sliding into home.” Equities sold off again on Friday as the Chinese tariff saga is failing to provide support to the market. Weekend news conveyed the idea that the market was reacting to this week’s FED meeting and the very high probability of another increase in the central bank’s target range. This is a stretch because investors have been aware of the FED‘s limitations under its own “forward guidance,” trapped into a rate hike for fear of spooking the market if no increase was decided.
Germany chose a new CDU party leader to replace Angela Merkel. Membership chose Merkel’s hand-picked choice Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, also known as AKK. This is a very poor choice as it reflects a continuation of the status quo at a time that the traditional German ruling parties are struggling to maintain voter support. These are turbulent times for Germany, Europe and the world and Chancellor Merkel has proven to be too staid to deal with a world threatened by a populist upheaval.
I’ve been thinking about the Churchill quote referring to Russia. Rather than referencing Russia my thoughts turn to the flattening yield curves that began on Monday. As commodity, global equities markets, the Chinese yuan and the precious metals all staged strong rallies, the long-end of the yield curve also rallied, especially the 10-YEAR. As a result, the 2/10 curve flattened to a 10-year low of 15 basis points. On Tuesday, the curves flattened even more as the 2/10 closed at 10.7 basis points. As Vizzini from the Princess Bride would say, “INCONCEIVABLE!” To support the rally in the long-end of the curve there was a retracement of the recent rally in global equity markets (the NIKKEI, DAX and S&Ps were all down substantially). This suggests that the positive news from the G-20 meeting has now been cast asunder because investors are struggling to comprehend what actually took place in Buenos Aires between the U.S. and Chinese delegations.
Tonight, we at Notes From Underground will clean up some unfinished business. We will discuss a couple of important speeches and articles from the past two weeks.
Then I will answer the questions Mike Temple made on the previous blog post. In responding to some of Mike’s points I come back to the idea of INFRASTRUCTURE, which I addressed in a few other blog posts. The reason I foresee aggressive fiscal stimulus put forth by the G-20 is precisely because of some of the fears that Mike raises about the damage coming to the investment grade corporate bond market while the FED’s shrinks its balance sheet and raise interest rates. It may be having a greater impact than the FOMC wants to acknowledge.
There was singing in Rome when Angela Merkel announced that she is stepping down as the leader of the Christian Democratic Union. The two most recent German regional elections has solidified the unmitigated truth about the weakened condition of the German chancellor. For the last six years, I have been highly critical about Merkel’s policies. The bumbling French President Nicholas Sarkozy out-maneuvered Merkel in 2011 as he prevented then-Bundesbank President Axel Weber from leading the ECB.
First,I have the extreme pleasure of participating in another PODCAST with Richard Bonugli at the Financial Repression Authority. It is always a pleasure to “JAM” with Peter Boockvar in an effort to discern the rhythms of the global financial system. Peter, along with Jim Bianco, are two of the best analysts covering the entire rubric of money flows being impacted by the data. Enjoy the exchange and remember that this recorded on Tuesday, October 23. There was a great deal of volatility and data after our podcast, but much of it is relevant heading into this week’s trading.
After the Swedish Riksbank’s decision on Wednesday to keep rates at -50 basis points and pledging to raise rates in the coming months, the Bank of Canada met market expectations by raising its overnight rate by 25 basis points. The most important information from Governor Poloz is that the BOC raised rates even though last week’s inflation data was much softer than expected. The BOC official statement noted that the global economy is solid, the reconciliation over the USMCA is positive and “rates to rise to a neutral stance to achieve inflation target.”
