Macro Dump, Earnings Slump & Hawkish-Fed Pump Spark 4th Best October For Stocks Since 1929

IIF Warns Household Wealth Gains Will Disappear Unless Fed Normalizes Rates Soon

"Easy policy has passed the point of diminishing return and keeping it longer would only increase moral hazard and distort financial markets," exclaims the Institute of International Finance, warning that the gap between the value of Americans' holdings of stocks, bonds and other financial assets and the trend growth rate of the economy is still large and not far off the level that prevailed in 2007 before the financial crisis. "The Fed should start to normalize policy as soon as possible," removing the excess as the 'gap' "typically ends up being narrowed by a correction in the stock market."

MOMO Rules: In A "World Of Disappointments" Trade Like An Idiot, Citi Recommends

In a "world of disappointments", where beta is king and where alpha has become a joke (or, now that equity is a risk-free asset and debt is risky, is outright punished) where growth no longer exists, drowning under the weight of $200 trillion in debt, and where value strategies have been all but forgotten replaced instead with "stories" about companies that have no cash flows but just might be "the next big thing" (one day), what should one to do? Why, engage in the most idiotic of strategies: chase momentum.

What Really Matters?

by Bill Holter, JS Mineset, SGT Report:
My original thought for a writing was the hilarious action following yesterday’s Fed meeting and to comment on last night’s debate. Something far more “real” has arisen in the last 24 hours of far more importance, before getting to that, let’s look at the Fed’s “hawkish” statement first.
Janet Yellen and crew would have you believe they “will”… “might” raise interest rates in December. They say this because the Fed (as all central banks have) has lost credibility and are forced to jawbone as this is their only “policy option” left. They absolutely CANNOT raise interest rates as the rest of the world is easing in futile attempts to reflate declining economic activity. The U.S. economy is in reality declining, John Crudele does a great job of picking the latest GDP report apart: The Commerce Department’s GDP Numbers Don’t Make Any Sense. I cannot believe the e-mails I’ve recently received on this topic with people petrified the Fed can raise rates …which will supposedly hurt gold?
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Weekend Reading: Fed Stampedes The Bulls

“It wasn't raining when Noah built the ark.”

'Happy' Halloween Kids!

Trick... No Treat!

S&P Downgrades Saudi Arabia On Slumping Crude, Ballooning Fiscal Deficit

"We expect the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's general government fiscal deficit will increase to 16% of GDP in 2015, from 1.5% in 2014, primarily reflecting the sharp drop in oil prices. Hydrocarbons account for about 80% of Saudi Arabia's fiscal revenues."

Mother Yellen's Little Helper - The Rate-Hike Placebo Effect

Americans are increasingly likely to respond positively to a placebo in a drug trial – more so than other nationalities. That’s the upshot of a recently published academic paper that looked at 84 clinical trials for pain medication done between 1990 and 2013. These findings, while bad for drug researchers, does shed some light on our favorite topic: behavioral finance. Trust and confidence makes placebos work, and those attributes also play a role in the societal effectiveness of central banks. That’s what makes the Fed’s eventual move to higher rates so difficult; even if zero interest rates are more placebo than actual medicine, markets believe they work to support asset prices.

Tying The Valeant Roll-Up Together: Presenting The Goldman "Missing Link"

While the Valeant soap opera has had constant, heart-pounding drama for weeks and following yesterday's report that it allegedly fabricated prescriptions, even an element of career-ending (and prison-time launching) criminality, so far one thing had been missing: an antagonist tied to Goldman Sachs. We are delighted to reveal the "missing link", one which ties everything together. Its name is Howard Schiller.

The Housing Mega-Bubble Is Definitely Not Different This Time - It's Much More Of The Same

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 10/30/2015 - 14:32 To believe this isn’t a bubble is to believe that all of the hot momo money from insti’s, high/biotech, flipper, flappers, fraudsters, and foreigners buying houses is fundamental and here to stay, which is exactly what everybody thought in 2006. Or, to believe that interest rates will keep falling 1% per year going forward, which would lend an element of support to prices.

S&P 500 "Most Overbought" In 11 Months

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 10/30/2015 - 14:15 The last time S&P 500 rallied at such a pace (from an extreme of oversoldness) and reached such an extreme level of overboughtness, things went south rather quickly...

Caption Contest: Obama "Playing Like A Girl" Selfie Edition

Having crushed all in front of them to win The World Cup, the US women's football soccer team met with President Obama at The White House this week who just could not resist but pose for another selfie... adding that "this team taught all of America's children that 'playing like a girl' means you're a badass."

George Soros Accused Of Stoking Europe's Refugee Crisis By Hungarian PM

"His name is perhaps the strongest example of those who support anything that weakens nation states, they support everything that changes the traditional European lifestyle. These activists who support immigrants inadvertently become part of this international human-smuggling network."

Republicans Declare War On CNBC: Suspend NBC Relationship Over CNBC's "Downright Offensive" Questions

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 10/30/2015 - 13:27 Nearly a year after CNBC said it would no longer rely on Nielsen to measure its daytime audience (due to the collapse in viewership we had previously profiled), it has managed to do it again, only this time slamming not the financial cheerleading cable network but its Comcast affiliate, NBC News, whom its just cost hundreds of millions in advertising revenues after moments ago Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Preibus announced he was suspending the partnership with NBC News for the Republican primary debate at the University of Houston on February 26, 2016.

Australia Proposes Eliminating Passports. There’s Just One Problem…

from Sovereign Man:
It wasn’t that long ago that you could travel from one corner of the world to another with nothing but your good looks.
There are people still alive today, in fact, who were born into a world where passports were not widely used for international travel.
The passport itself is a relatively recent invention, an unfortunate consequence of World War I. And they didn’t really become ubiquitous until the late 20th century.
Now, in many respects you can’t leave your own country without one, especially if you hail from the Land of the Free.
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Market Report: FOMC Hits PM Prices

by Alasdair Macleod, Gold Money:
Besides a mid-week rally that took gold up to $1181 and silver to $16.38, gold and silver had a disappointing week, ending down on balance at close of play last night (Thursday) at $1147 and $15.60 respectively.
Prices in early European trade this morning were marginally firmer.
The kybosh was a reaction to the FOMC interest rate decision (no change) and the Fed’s statement that went with it. The statement was the usual non-committal language, waffling around unemployment rates (which we know to be misleading) and inflation, which the committee expects to pick up as the economy recovers. What recovery?
The day after this statement, the Bureau of Economic Affairs announced that preliminary Q3 GDP grew at a disappointing annualised 1.49%. The fall in inventories was part of the problem, but 30% of the growth came from healthcare, boosted by government spending. Without the boost from healthcare the figure would have been truly dire. This goes counter to the Panglossian FOMC statement of the day before about their confidence in economic recovery.
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CDC Scientist Admits Data of Vaccines and Autism Was Trashed

from Ben Swann:

WiFi Can See You Through Walls: “Even Within Your House, Where You Go Can Reveal a Lot”

by Mac Slavo, SHTFPlan:

The implications for privacy under a big brother police state are obvious.
Researchers at MIT have come up with a way to use WiFi signals to see behind walls, and map a room in 3-D. By reflecting the signal, it can also locate the movements of people or objects in the room. The Daily Mail reports:

Using a wireless transmitter fitted behind a wall, computer scientists have developed a device that can map a nearby room in 3D while scanning for human bodies.
Using the signals that bounce and reflect off these people, the device creates an accurate silhouette and can even use this silhouette to identify who that person is.
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Financial System Global Economic Collapse of Deflation as Banks Fail

from TheMoneyGPS:

Muslim Migrants Invited to Take Over German Church; Altar, Cross, Pulpit Removed

by Paul Joseph Watson, Infowars:
A Protestant church in Oberhausen, Germany is set to remove Christian crosses, altars and pulpits in order to accomodate 50 Muslim migrants who were invited to stay in the building.

“The parish had offered that to the city,” Oberhausen city spokesperson Rainer Suhr told media outlets.

“Before the refugees can move in, the seats have to be taken away. Also the altar, the pulpit and font are movable,” said the superintendent of the Oberhausen church district Oberhausen, Pastor Joachim Deterding.

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The Demobilization of the American People and the Spectacle of Election 2016

by Tom Engelhardt, Tom Dispatch:
You may not know it, but you’re living in a futuristic science fiction novel. And that’s a fact.  If you were to read about our American world in such a novel, you would be amazed by its strangeness.  Since you exist right smack in the middle of it, it seems like normal life (Donald Trump and Ben Carson aside).  But make no bones about it, so far this has been a bizarre American century.
Let me start with one of the odder moments we’ve lived through and give it the attention it’s always deserved.  If you follow my train of thought and the history it leads us into, I guarantee you that you’ll end up back exactly where we are — in the midst of the strangest presidential campaign in our history.
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