MUST LISTEN: Ann Barnhardt – The Financial System a House of Cards Ready to Topple

Living on Borrowed Time
from FinancialSense.com:
Jim welcomes back Ann Barnhardt for another compelling conversation. Going beyond the MF Global collapse, Barnhardt believes that the financial system is at risk, and we are living on borrowed time. She also adds that it’s time to go on strike against the big Wall Street firms.
Click Here to Listen to the Interview

 

 

Crude Surges On News Europe Agrees To Ban Iran Oil Imports

As if the situation in the Gulf was not enough on edge, here comes Europe with news, via Reuters, that EU governments have reached a deal to ban Iranian oil imports. The only thing pending is the determination of the starting date and other details. The result, as expected, is another leg up in crude. Sooner or later, this relentless rise higher will spill through to the pump, which according to the Michigan Bizarro confidence indicator will sent consumer optimism to historic levels. And now, the escalation hot grenade is back in Iran's court. Expect more missiles to be fired into the water and more rhetoric about Straits of Hormuz closure in 5...4...3...

 

Gold Jumps As Citi Says Gold Sell Off Over, Reiterates $2400 Target

Wondering why gold has moved by over $20 in the last few minues? Wonder no more - according to a note just released by Citi analyst Tom Fitzpatrick, the gold correction "has run its course and a rally is now back on the cards." Granted it is not all smooth sailing - "Gold may drop to $1,550 before turning", but when the turn comes, Fitzpatrick sees it as going all the way up to $2,400. He has the following technical observations: "Only a weekly close below $1,535/oz means corrections may be deeper." The result can be seen on the chart below. Incidentally this is a 1:24 scale replica of what will happen once the Fed and ECB proceed with the only logical step which is doing what they do best. Unless, of course, the plan is to have a modest war in the middle east to distract everyone from the economy. Because we have never seen that movie before.

 

Stunner: Bank Of America Responsible For 14% Of Projected 2012 S&P500 Earnings Growth

If there is one piece of data that should make you scrap all optimistic forecasts for 2012 year end S&P price targets and EPS forecasts, it is the following chart from Morgan Stanley which shows the relative contribution of financial stocks to the change in full S&P earnings (combined they account for 26.3% of the change from the actual $883.5 billion to $970.6 billion). Specifically we are looking at Bank of America, which with a forecast surge in Earnings from ($2.5) billion to $10 billion accounts for 14.1% of the entire change in S&P earnings forecasts. And since the S&P is simply the Earnings number multiplied by some multiple, all consensus views that have 1400 as their 2012 year end forecast rely on bank of America to account for nearly 20 S&P points! The US market has now devolved to such a sad state when the most insolvent of all US banks has to carry nearly the bulk of earnings growth in 2012. At least with Apple they produce something - unfortunately in BAC's case it is only legal fees for the avalanche of endless litigation against them.

Euro Declines After Bund Auction, Hungary CDS Soars To Record, Massive New Issue Discount In UniCredit Stock Sale

All eyes were on Germany this morning, where up to €5 billion in new 10 Year Bunds would hit the market, with many dreading a repeat of November's failed auction. As it turns out, the auction was a success in relative terms, with the government getting bids of €5.14 billion or more than the desired maximum - something it could not do two months ago. At the end of the day, Germany sold €4.06 billion and the resulting bid/cover ratio of 1.3 was well higher than the failed auction of November which came at  1.1, when a large amount of paper was retained and bids were not enough to cover the amount of paper on offer. Wednesday's auction is still below the average of 1.54 seen at 10-year sales in 2011 and a 19 percent retention rate is also above the 2011 average. In other words, as we suggested, the November failure has nothing to do with the Buba pushing the ECB into auction and everything to do with prevailing rates: the average yield dropped to 1.93 percent from 1.98 percent but the dwindling returns on offer due to the sharp rally in safe-haven assets as the euro zone debt crisis has intensified have led to lower than average demand at recent German auctions. And while the auction was better than expected it was still quite weak, which explains why the EURUSD is trading at overnight lows, back at around 1.2980. Not helping things is Hungary, which had a failed bond auction last week, and whose IMF rescue package is now in tatters. As a result the CDS on the country just hit an all time record 688 bps and moving much wider, while the forint dropped to record lows. As everyone knows if Hungary falls, which is now operating in a bailoutless vacuum, Austria will tumble promptly next. Next, leading to a blow out in Spanish-Bund spreads is a report in Spanish Expansion which said that Spain may request EU, IMF loans to help banks. In other words - this morning's news shows a potential risk reflaring in the European core, periphery and deep periphery which was immune until now. And finally, a UniCredit €7.5 billion new stock issue pricing at a whopping 43% discount to market price shows that fair value of actual demand for European banks is about half of where the artificially propped up price is (recall Europe still has a short selling ban)

ECB Deposit Facility Usage Hits New Record

Not much to say here that has not been said daily for the past 2 weeks: the ECB's Deposit Facility use soared to a new all time high of €453 billion, and increase of €7 billion overnight and higher than, well, ever. The conclusions here are well known - there was no seasonality to the year end spike (because it is now next year), and the LTRO cash is not being used, as pessimistically expected here first. When the next LTRO prices on February 29, expect this number to peak at around €700 billion. And so LTRO by LTRO, the ECB will prefund the entire roughly €2-3 trillion capitalization shortfall in European banks but not before the 3rd 2012 European bank stress test tells us banks only need €0.69 billion in capital (and Dexia is fine despite its bankruptcy).

Net Asset Value Premiums of Certain Precious Metal Trusts and Funds

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MF Global Sold Assets to Goldman While It Was Looting Their Customer Accounts

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Gold: We Are In A Correction Phase

Admin at Marc Faber Blog - 4 hours ago

In the case of gold, as you know we had a 10-year bull market and we peaked out in dollar terms on September 6. 2011 at USD 1,921 per ounce at which stage the gold price had somewhat overshot on the upside and we are in a correction phase. I happen to think that the correction phase is not completely over but recently sentiment on both silver and gold have turned very negative. We may have a trading rebound year -trading rally and then some further weakness into possibly February-March and then probably a major low. Then the question will be whether the precious metals rally again a... more » 

 

 

 

 

CNBC Video: A Lot of Governments will Print Money in 2012

Admin at Jim Rogers Blog - 4 hours ago

Latest CNBC video interview. Jim Rogers, CEO and chairman of Rogers Holdings, told CNBC, "I suspect that Merkel and that crowd are going to do something to make us feel better, remember the French have an election this year and I think they would like to win the election, so I suspect you are going to see things coming out of governments for the euro." *Jim Rogers is an author, financial commentator and successful international investor. He has been frequently featured in Time, The New York Times, Barron’s, Forbes, Fortune, The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times and is a reg... more » 

 

 

 

 

Industrial Commodities Will Probably Disappoint

Admin at Marc Faber Blog - 5 hours ago

We have to distinguish between precious metals and industrial commodities. My concern is that the Chinese economy is going to be weaker than is expected and that the demand for industrial commodities will probably disappoint. Related, Powershares DB Base Metals Fund ETF (DBB) *(Source: MoneyControl)* *Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.* 

On Austerity, Unrest, And Quantifying Chaos

Politically speaking, austerity is a challenge. While we would expect that governments imposing spending cuts on their voting public may face electability issues, in fact, a recent paper from the Center for Economic Policy Research finds that there is no empirical evidence to confirm this - i.e. a budget-cutting government is no less likely to be re-relected than a spend-heavy government. However, what the CEPR paper does find as a factor in delaying austerity is much more worrisome - a fear of instability and unrest. The authors found a very clear relationship between CHAOS (their variable name for demonstrations, riots, strikes and worse) and expenditure cuts. As JPMorgan notes, austerity sounds straightforward as a policy, until the consequences bite. It remains unclear that the road Europe is taking is less costly in the long run, in economic, political and social terms. The history of Europe over the last 100 years shows that austerity can have severe consequences and outcomes and perhaps most notably, the independent variable that did result in more unrest was higher levels of government debt in the first place. Judging from France's Noyer's recent jab at Britain's credit rating, at a time of increasing budgetary pressures and declining growth, there may also be limits to European solidarity.

G-Bye G-Pap

Former Greek PM, and career politician, George Papandreou, is effectively retiring. Per Reuters: "Greece's former prime minister George Papandreou told his PASOK socialist party on Wednesday that he will step down as party leader and not seek re-election, a socialist deputy told Reuters. "He told us that he will resign as PASOK leader and that he will not run for prime minister again," said the deputy who attended a party meeting on the leadership succession. Papandreou stepped down as prime minister in November last year to make way for a coalition government to help Greece exit its biggest financial crisis in decades." Nothing like scurrying away in the last lifeboat just as your country is caught in the 21st century equivalent of the 22nd Catch, where your tax collectors, so critical for procuring the much needed tax revenue (sorry Greece, only America can "print" its revenues) are on what seems to be perpetual strike.

European Credit Markets Tanking Ahead Of Key Issuance Day

With Unicredit's stock down 14% and sovereign spreads continuing their decompression trend, European corporate and financial credit markets are tanking - dramatically underperforming European equity markets. Perhaps the credit market is much more acutely aware of the 'bumpy road' ahead in terms of supply and the heavy calendar of both sovereign and corporate issuance at a time when demand (away from Ponzi bonds) seems weak. Nowhere is that pressure more obvious than in French government debt spreads which have popped over 40% in the last week, ahead of tomorrow's huge issuance and redemptions.

Reading Into The Euro-Risk Decoupling

Since the start of December, the tight correlation between EURUSD and risk assets has deteriorated. Most notably from the middle of December, as LTRO pronouncements began, the positive correlation has flipped to negative and EURUSD became considerably less relevant while AUD (and other carry currencies) dominated as correlated drivers. Citi's Steven Englander notes this divergence and sees two reasons for it: the LTRO has contributed by theoretically underpinning eurozone (EZ) bank funding, reducing one source of EZ risk, but leaving in place broader concerns on sovereign debt (risk transfer from private to public balance sheets once again); and the growing confidence in the US that growth will be mediocre but not disastrous. However, even though growth expectations have bounced back to some degree, taking the S&P with it, expectations of future Fed policy have not adjusted upwards at all. Our fear, in agreement with Englander, is that asset markets may be much more sensitive to economic outcomes than is commonly expected and with growth expectations having angled up, the risk rally may be very sensitive to disappointment. The deterioration of European sovereign and corporate credit along with the EUR, combined with US credits underperforming equities in the last few days suggests cracks in the risk divergence are quickly starting to appear.

Bill Gross Exposes "The New Paranormal" In Which "The Financial Markets And Global Economies Are At Great Risk"

In his latest letter, Bill Gross, obviously for his own reasons, essentially channels Zero Hedge, and repeats everything we have been saying over the past 3 years. We'll take that as a compliment. Next thing you know he will convert the TRF into a gold-only physical fund in anticipation of the wrong-end of the "fat tail" hitting reality head on at full speed, and sending the entire house of centrally planned cards crashing down. "How many ways can you say “it’s different this time?” There’s “abnormal,” “subnormal,” “paranormal” and of course “new normal.” Mohamed El-Erian’s awakening phrase of several years past has virtually been adopted into the lexicon these days, but now it has an almost antiquated vapor to it that reflected calmer seas in 2011 as opposed to the possibility of a perfect storm in 2012. The New Normal as PIMCO and other economists would describe it was a world of muted western growth, high unemployment and relatively orderly delevering. Now we appear to be morphing into a world with much fatter tails, bordering on bimodal. It’s as if the Earth now has two moons instead of one and both are growing in size like a cancerous tumor that may threaten the financial tides, oceans and economic life as we have known it for the past half century. Welcome to 2012...For 2012, in the face of a delevering zero-bound interest rate world, investors must lower return expectations. 2–5% for stocks, bonds and commodities are expected long term returns for global financial markets that have been pushed to the zero bound, a world where substantial real price appreciation is getting close to mathematically improbable. Adjust your expectations, prepare for bimodal outcomes. It is different this time and will continue to be for a number of years. The New Normal is “Sub,” “Ab,” “Para” and then some. The financial markets and global economies are at great risk."

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