Futures are all over the place this morning. I’ll let you know what they mean arounbd 4pm today. Oh, and my morning train reads:
• Passive is Massive (FT)
• Why you should buy the most despised company in America (Marketwatch) see also Buy What You Hate (TBP)
• Nine Reasons Why Bond Yields Are Falling (Yardeni)
• Forget Emerging Markets. Hot Topic at Davos 2015 Is the U.S. (Bloomberg)
• Headline of the day: Bitcoin revealed: a Ponzi scheme for redistributing wealth from one libertarian to another (Wonkblog)
Interesting observation on “Education Plus Ideology….”
Evidently climate change remains a farce in the minds of many educated individuals, to the chagrin of the author. Crying WOLF 24/7 does have a numbing effect. Science on this important issue needs to be perceived as less politically driven and strident. There is no need to Al Sharpton the issue if the facts are logically and respectfully presented without insulting those who may view the issue differently.
When everyone around you is losing their heads, just yell “false alarm” to distract the mob while you get the hell out of there. Just kidding.
About that awful retail sales report
I’m going to take yesterday’s report with several grains of salt, see how it looks after tomorrow’s CPI report, compare it with the BEA’s personal spending and saving report for December later this month, and see what happens with revisions next month.
On CNBC today Rick Santelli and Peter Bockvar agree: The CENTRAL BANKS have created so much inflation (money printing is the definition of inflation you know!) that it’s actually deflationary!
ROFL.
…later on CNBC Ed Yardeni claims Central Banks are causing deflation with their bond purchases because it “makes” commodity producers borrow more and now that debt is at risk of default.
Huh?
Why does a wild catter “have” to borrow? He borrows because of the OPEC-created arbitrage not because of central banks. That arbitrage is gone (that’s what free markets do, folks) and so he’s going to have to unload his fracking business into the patient, UNLEVERAGED capitalists.
P.S. I am not truly sorry all these self-proclaimed arbitragers who have been short the Swissie got crucified today. You can’t complain about “central banks” and then believe what they say to the point of staking your career on it. You hypocritical, idiots.
…. ex-Hedgie, I’ll take extra-guac on my Chipotle Burrito please.
The Western Press demands marches for Whitey! No marches for darkies.
”…The slaughter of 17 people in the City of Light … was … not particularly bloody by the gruesome standards of radical Islamist terrorism. Paris was not even the deadliest scene of the week, which saw up to 2,000 people massacred in Nigeria by the militants of Boko Haram and nearly 40 people killed by what was likely an al-Qaeda car bomb in the capital of Yemen.”
http://time.com/3668763/the-european-front/
France sends their military to fight ISIS, FINALLY!
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/charlie-hebdo-sells-out-before-dawn-with-muhammad-on-cover/2015/01/14/62319e5a-9bc4-11e4-86a3-1b56f64925f6_story.html
Great to see them getting on board.
Great diplomatic work by President Obama and Sec. Kerry, as usual.
I guess Obama missed holding hands with the Prime Minister of Norway didn’t rally have any long lasting effect on anything.
The VSP’s (Very Serious Persons) are chanting a new, new mantra. No, it’s neither supported by a valid model nor empirical evidence any more than the demand for a ‘grand bargain’ (including entitlement cuts), or deficit cutting during an economic contraction, or any of the rest of the pseudo-intellectual garbage churned out in the echo chamber but, if you want to be perceived as morally upright (about other people) and very ‘serious’, it’s coming into vogue so up your game: don’t want to be seen as behind the times, or out of the loop, or a (gasp) socialist, eh.
Josh Bivens for the Win: The Fed Interest Rate Liftoff is the New Deficit Reduction
…I don’t imagine that a 15 or 25 basis point increase in the funds rate in the second half of the year will be a huge deal, especially with everyone seeing it coming. But why go there? What’s the substantive rationale? The risks here remain as asymmetric as ever: a pre-emptive rate hike that slowed growth and jobs and paychecks poses far more danger than the inflationary risks engendered by a hike that came too late.
I was chatting about that “why” question with EPI research director Josh Bivens this morning and he said, “the Fed’s interest rate increase is the new deficit reduction. Everyone just knows it needs to happen.”
“What gets us into trouble is not what we don’t know. It’s what we know for sure that just ain’t so.” –Mark Twain
well i am suspecting its the crowd that thinks that if the fed would just raise interest rates that their bonds and savings accounts will pay better. problem, there is really very little demand for money as business isnt investing much, which only leaves daily operations fund , and there isnt that much demand for products, so they can cut daily costs easily enough, and then consumers will have less of demand for loans too. all said that just means even if the fed raises rates, the impact will be little as interest income will be concerned.
Except we’re at record US GDP, record employment, five million open jobs, and 3-4% y-o-y global growth for years now.
Other than that. WHAT HAVE THE CENTRAL BANKS AND THE GOVERNMENTS OF THE WORLD EVER DONE FOR US?!
We need to shut NASA.
I’m a technologist, love space. But we just can’t afford it. We need to just shut it down. It really doesn’t matter. Nothing there is important. We don’t need to win in space. Just shut it down, execute ‘stop pays’ on any outstanding checks. Defund it. I don’t care how many votes it takes.
You know NASA’ Congressional chieftain WASN’T BORN IN THE US!
That’s right, Ted Cruz wasn’t born here. And you know something else?
WE MUST MAKE HIM A ONE TERM SENATOR.
Saudi Arabia Is Building A 600-Mile ‘Great Wall’ To Shield Itself From ISIS
http://www.businessinsider.com/saudi-arabia-is-building-a-600-mile-great-wall-to-shield-from-isis-2015-1
A real time test of the border fence concept. ROFL. Good Luck with that King! The Saudi Maginot line!
What is it with right wing nuts and fences?
Thank you for inventing the “Buy What you Hate” strategy years ago.
I hate Jack Bogle and Vanguard and their lies about how active management is a loser over the long run and had every in there, all in. Right in the middle of the greatest stock pickers market of all time…
I wept reading the comments. Why didn’t they listen BR? WHY!?
Look at all the capital gains taxes I’ll owe to Obama and Pelosi when I sell!
I guess islamist fanatics really are idiots
http://money.cnn.com/2015/01/15/technology/security/french-websites-hacked/index.html
They attacked an obscure magazine with a circulation of 60,000 for offensive cartoons – and they help that magazine selling millions of copies of Muhammad cartoons – millions of other copies of that image reprinted in other magazines and websites.
Don’t they see what they are provoking when they hack these websites?
Once again the cry goes out wholesale enrgy prices are down abetting disinflation. Why is this? If food and enrgy prices are not a concern for inflation why do they have any bearing on disinflation? If anything they should be a worry to inflation as there is an ability of the consumer to devote more income to the purchase of other goods increasing the demand for them.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/16/business/economy/producer-price-index-slides-back-complicating-feds-next-move.html?src=busln
Re The Upshot – The Depressions Unheeded Lessons,
” Mr. Eichengreen is reluctant to place personal blame, acknowledging that decisions that seem crystal-clear in hindsight are considerably harder to make given imperfect information and fast-moving events.” (both for 1929 & end of 2008)
Hopefully some effort is being placed on improving near real time information on economic indicators
to allow for better decision making even if it costs $$. Gonna be hard to do given the current congressional makeup. With the specter of deflation facing China, Japan, Europe, Russia and probably the mid-East, is inflation here much of a worry or can the U.S still carry the world economy?
Could econ. data here and worldwide be improved and at what cost?
PGL reminds us that today is the anniversary of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King’s birth in 1929.