Monthly Archives: December 2021

Slower than Planned

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There once was a firm, Evergrande
Whose ethos was just to expand
But its wanderlust
Led it to go bust
When China grew slower than planned

The aftermath now seems to be
Impacting the PBOC
They cut RRR
And could well do more
Inverse to Fed ending QE

As we begin a new week, and arguably the second to last where market liquidity will be close to its ordinary levels, the news of the day centers on the PBOC reducing its Reserve Ratio Requirement (RRR), as foreshadowed by Premier Li Keqiang last week.  While the official comments are focused on the government’s efforts to insure stable growth amid concerns over the omicron variant’s spread, it appears the reality may reach a little deeper.  Of more importance to market participants than the virus is the status of China Evergrande and the entire property sector in China.  It now appears that there is going to be an total restructuring of that company’s debt as it defaults on its remaining obligations.  Recall, Evergrande is was the largest property developer in China, and the most highly leveraged having total debts in excess of $300 billion as it expanded its business from purely property development to interests as far flung as theme parks, a soccer club and electric vehicles.  As of last night, it has notified creditors that a restructuring is on its way and that clearly has the PBOC a little concerned.

Property is the largest sector of the Chinese economy, representing more than 30%, and a key revenue source for most provinces and cities as they sell land to fund operations.  Evergrande was one of the largest purchasers, and so its slow-motion demise is being felt throughout the nation.  It is for this reason that the PBOC finds itself in a situation where it feels the need to add more liquidity to the economy, hence the RRR cut.  Interestingly, the problems here have not stopped the Chinese government’s crackdown on its tech sector, at least on the personal tech sector, as Didi Chuxing is being forced to delist from the NYSE and looks to reestablish its shares in Hong Kong.

From a vantage point some 7000 miles away, it appears that President Xi Jinping is moving quite rapidly in his efforts to completely control all aspects of the Chinese economy.  Do not be surprised to see every Chinese company listed outside Shanghai or Hong Kong to wind up moving that listing, nor to see further declines in those equity markets.  Capitalism with Chinese characteristics turns out to be socialism/communism after all, at least from the definitional perspective of the state controlling the means of production.  Whether this results in faster growth, or whether the rest of the world will even be able to determine that remains to be seen.  However, classical economics would suggest that the more internalization and the stricter the business regulations, the slower will be future growth.

Why, you may ask, is this important?  Well, first off it is reasonable to expect that ongoing liquidity injections in the Chinese economy are likely to eventually weaken the renminbi.  Second, if the growth trajectory of the Chinese economy is flattening, one of the few things the Chinese will be able to do to address that is weaken the currency to make its exporters more competitive.  The point is, while recent PBOC policy has been to maintain a strong and stable currency, and we have seen the renminbi appreciate more than 11% since it bottomed post-pandemic, the case for that trend to end and a weakening trend to develop appears to be growing.  For asset and receivables hedgers, careful consideration must be given to managing that risk.

With that in mind, let us turn to this morning’s activity.  Friday’s NFP report was mixed, with a weaker than expected headline number for jobs growth, but a much better than expected outcome in the Unemployment Rate as it appears more and more people are leaving large organizations and striking out on their own.  The upshot is labor market tightness is still with us and unlikely to ease in the short run.  Investors decided that was an equity market negative as it would encourage the Fed to taper policy even more quickly hence Friday’s equity sell-off.  At the same time, concerns over tighter policy slowing growth seem to have bond traders flattening the curve rapidly as they fear a Fed policy mistake of raising rates into slowing growth.  In other words, it’s all a mess!

Ok, overnight saw weakness in Asia (Nikkei -0.4%, Hang Seng -1.8%, Shanghai -0.5%) following the US Friday narrative, while Europe has decided things are far better this morning with rallies across the board (DAX +0.3%, CAC +0.7%, FTSE 100 +0.9%).  On a relative basis these moves make sense given the terrible Factory Orders data from Germany (-6.9% in October) while UK Construction PMI surprisingly rose to 55.5.  Meanwhile, US futures are a bit schizophrenic this morning with the DOW (+0.6%) looking to rebound from Friday while the NASDAQ (-0.4%) seems set to continue to slide.

The bond market, which rallied sharply Friday (Treasury yields falling 10bps) is giving back some of those price gains with the 10-year yield higher by 5.2bps this morning.  European yields are also a higher, but by much less (Bunds +0.9bps, OATs +0.7bps, Gilts +1.2bps), which are also consolidative moves, just not quite as dramatic.

On the commodity front, oil continues to whipsaw with a sharp rebound today (+3.25%) although NatGas (-7.9%) is getting crushed on a combination of forecasts for warmer weather in the Northeast as well as lower LNG prices in Europe.  In the metals markets, gold (-0.2%) continues to trade just below $1800/oz, neither rallying alongside inflation nor collapsing.  Copper (+0.8%) seems to be following oil, but aluminum (-0.85%) and tin (-1.9%) both seem to be in a more fearful mode.

Turning to the FX markets, mixed is the best description as we have both substantial gainers and losers vs. the dollar.  In the G10, AUD (+0.5%), SEK (+0.5%) and NOK (+0.5%) are leading the way higher on the back of the better commodity sentiment.  Meanwhile, CHF (-0.5%) and JPY (-0.3%) are both under pressure on the same story plus the European risk appetite.  In the EMG bloc, ZAR (+0.7%) leads the way with CLP (+0.3%) next as the commodity story seems to be driving thing here too.  On the downside, TRY (-0.45%) continues its volatile trading while the other laggards are from both APAC and EEMEA but have not seen significant declines.

On the data front, it is inflation week with CPI on Friday the biggest number to watch.  Leading up to that is the following:

Tuesday Q3 Nonfarm Productivity -4.9%
Q3 Unit Labor Costs 8.3%
Trade Balance -$66.9B
Wednesday JOLTS Job Openings 10500K
Thursday Initial Claims 225K
Continuing Claims 1910K
Friday CPI 0.7% (6.7% Y/Y)
-ex food & energy 0.5% (4.9% Y/Y)
Michigan Sentiment 68.0

Source: Bloomberg

In addition to this data, we hear from the Bank of Canada on Wednesday, where expectations are for no rate movement although they have been amongst the most hawkish of the G10 central banks of late.  As to CPI, while it is not the Fed’s preferred gauge, Chairman Powell clearly feels the pressure and so next week we can expect to see just how much faster they are going to reduce QE purchases…at least for now.

There are so many cross-currents driving markets right now, it is very difficult to find a specific underlying theme in the short-term.  Longer term, nothing has changed my view that the Fed will halt their tapering/tightening script as soon as equity markets begin to decline a little more substantially.  At that point, I feel like the dollar may come under pressure, although during the decline, it should probably rally further.  Payables hedgers should be taking advantage of this relatively strong dollar as I don’t think it will last that long.

Good luck and stay safe
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Doves in Retreat

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It seems the transition’s complete
As every Fed dove’s in retreat
From Powell to Daly,
And like Andrew Bailey,
They want to end QE tout de suite

Regarding the Fed’s hawks, Mester, George, Bostic and Bullard, we already knew they were ready to end QE.  They have been saying so since much earlier this year, before two of their kettle were forced to resign in disgrace (you remember Rosengren and Kaplan).  Just yesterday, Cleveland’s Loretta Mester reiterated she was “very open” to quickening the tapering process in order to give the Fed the option to raise rates early next year if they deem it necessary.  But of more interest has been the transition of the erstwhile dovish contingent with Mary Daly’s apparent desire to quicken the taper amongst the most surprising given her consistently dovish leanings.  In fact, the only holdout that I can determine is Neel Kashkari from Minneapolis, who has yet to agree inflation is a problem.  However, no one is more important than Chairman Powell, who over the past two days, in testimony to Congress, made it clear that come the FOMC meeting on December 15th, the pace of tapering will be increased.

At least, that is the view to which the market is turning.  Equity market weakness, a flattening yield curve and rising volatility all demonstrate that investors and traders are beginning to adjust the strategies they have been following since QE1 in the wake of the GFC.  This helps explain how the stock market could decline more than 1% two days in a row (!) and why it has fallen, already, nearly 5% from its all-time-high set back on November 22.  While I am being somewhat facetious with respect to dramatizing the recent declines, there are many in the market who seem to believe these are unprecedented moves.

And it is this last issue which is likely to become a major concern for the Fed going forward.  More than a decade of Fed easy money has taught people to buy every dip in asset prices.  Post Covid Fed policy has encouraged people to lever up when they buy those dips and so margin debt has reached historic highs on both a nominal ($581 billion) and percentage of GDP (2.5%) basis.  The problem here arises if when stock prices decline, and margin calls are made. Just like the Fed is a price insensitive buyer of Treasuries, and index funds are price insensitive buyers of equities, margin calls result in price insensitive selling of equities.  When this happens, equity prices can decline VERY quickly.  Know, too, that exchanges can raise margin requirements intra-day, so if a decline starts at the open, they can raise margin requirements by lunchtime to protect their members.  All this matters because the sudden hawkish tilt by the Fed could cause a very severe reaction in the financial markets.  And if there is one thing about which we should all be sure, it is that a very sharp decline, anything over 10% in a short period, will be met with a change in behavior by those very same Fed hawks.  Talk is cheap.  Sticking to their guns because they are trying to address rampant inflation will make them all very unpopular, something which the current denizens of the Marriner Eccles building seem unlikely to be able to handle very well.

Is this the beginning of the end?  I don’t believe so, especially as nothing has actually changed yet.  However, when it comes to sentiment shifts, they can occur in a heartbeat, so do not rule anything out.  Of more importance, though, is what we can expect if the shift comes.

In a classic risk-off scenario, where margin selling is rampant and equity prices are falling sharply, there is very likely to be contagion, so equities worldwide will decline.  We are very likely to see Treasuries, Bunds and Gilts in demand, with yields there declining sharply.  However, I would expect that the sovereign debt of the PIGS nations will more likely follow the equity market than Bunds, so spreads will widen.  Commodity prices will come under severe pressure as this will be seen as a precursor to a recession. And the dollar will rise sharply vs. its EMG counterparts as well as the commodity bloc of the G10.  JPY and CHF are both likely to do very well while the enigma is the euro, although my sense is the single currency would decline, just not as aggressively as, say, SEK.  We are not at that point but be aware that the current market setup is such that the opportunity for a move of that nature is quite real.  If you read Mark Buchanan’s terrific book, Ubiquity, you will recognize the “fingers of instability” described there as being present in every market.  It just seems that those fingers are more prevalent currently. (If you haven’t read the book, I cannot recommend it highly enough.)

Ok, let’s take a tour of markets today.  Yesterday’s late day US equity decline saw a continuation in Tokyo (Nikkei -0.65%) although the Hang Seng (+0.55%) managed to rally while Shanghai (-0.1%) was roughly flat.  I believe HK benefitted from the word that China was going to force the tech companies listed in the US to delist likely driving them to the HK market.  Europe, too, has been following that late day sell-off with the DAX (-1.3%) leading the major exchanges lower, followed by the CAC (-1.0%) and FTSE 100 (-0.8%).  However, US futures are all pointing higher led by the DOW (+0.9%) as it seems two down days in a row are enough.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the bond market is behaving in a split fashion as well, with Treasury yields (+3.4bps) rising while European sovereigns (Bunds -1.2bps, OATs -2.0bps, Gilts -1.4bps) all slipping as risk is shed on the Continent.

The rebound thesis is alive and well in oil markets with WTI (+0.4%) edging higher, although it is off its early session highs.  NatGas (+0.15%) is a touch firmer while precious metals are mixed (Au -0.3%, Ag +0.4%).  Mixed also defines the industrial space with copper (+0.5%) doing well while aluminum (-0.6%) is under a bit of pressure.  One thing that is universal today, though is the ags, all of which are higher by between 0.5% and 1.5%.

Finally, mixed describes the dollar as well, with half the G10 rising and the other half falling on the session.  NOK (-0.35%) is the laggard, while GBP (+0.3%) is the leader.  However, given the relatively modest movement, and the lack of news or data, there can be many things leading to these movements.  In the EMG bloc, ZAR (+1.1%) is the leader despite (because of?) the omicron variant spreading so rapidly there.  Information on the issue of omicron’s impact remains very difficult to come by, but the market appears to be taking the stance that it will not be a very big deal as the rand has rallied 3.5% from its lows seen last week when the news first hit.  Away from that, RUB (+0.7%) and MXN (+0.7%) are the next best performers although both are outperforming their key export, oil.  On the downside, TRY (-1.2%) continues to fall with no end in sight.  Yesterday, President Erdogan sacked his FinMin and replaced him with a new, more pliant deputy, in order to be certain the central bank will continue cutting interest rates in the face of quickly rising inflation.  This currency has much further to fall.  Away from this, the decliners have been far less impressive led by THB (-0.4%) as local traders see concerns over the impact of the omicron variant.

On the data front, Initial (exp 240K) and Continuing (2003K) Claims are on the docket as all eyes turn to tomorrow’s NFP report.  Yesterday’s ADP data was right on expectations which will give comfort to those looking for 545K in the NFP tomorrow.

Bostic, Quarles, Daly and Barkin take the stage today on behalf of the Fed and I would expect to hear more about a faster taper from all of them as this is clearly the new message.  Looking at the dollar with all this in mind, it still appears to be following the 10-year trade more than the 2-year trade.  As such, if the curve continues to flatten, I would look for the dollar to continue to consolidate its recent gains.

One last thing, I will be out tomorrow so there will be no poetry.  However, my take is the NFP data is likely to be in line with expectations so not have much impact overall.

Good luck, good weekend and stay safe
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Transitory is Dead

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Said Jay, transitory is dead
And now when we’re looking ahead
To our consternation
It seems that inflation
Has climbed up to levels we dread

The market heard this and was stunned
Thus, equities quickly were shunned
The dollar was bought
And everyone thought
They’re better off buying the Bund

Finally!  It only took Chairman Powell 9 months to accept the reality on the ground that inflation is not likely to disappear anytime soon.  He officially ‘retired’ the word transitory as a description and confessed that inflation has been more persistent than he and the Fed had forecast.  The question that was not addressed is why the Fed thought that the supply chain bottlenecks were going to be short-lived to begin with.  After all, the primary use of ultra-cheap funding by the corporate community has been capital structure rebalancing (i.e. share repurchases) as that was the most efficient way to improve company valuations.  At least their stock market valuations.  Thus, there was never any evidence that investment was flowing toward areas that were bottle(necke)d up.

Ironically, this was partly Powell’s fault as his continued confidence that inflation was transitory, and bottlenecks would ease discouraged any company from making the investments to ease those very same bottlenecks.  Consider this, why would a company spend money to increase capacity if the benefits to be gained would be so short-lived?  And so, investments were not made, capacity remained the same and the bottlenecks persisted.

But now the Fed has acknowledged that inflation is a problem and Mr Powell has indicated that the pace of tapering QE ought to be increased.  The market read this as a doubling of the pace and so QE is now set to end in March, at least according to the punditry.  We will find out more precisely come the FOMC meeting in two weeks’ time.

Ultimately, the problem for Powell and the Fed is that a more aggressive timeline to tighten policy could potentially have a fairly negative impact on both stock and bond markets.  If that is the case, and there is no reason to believe it won’t be, Mr Powell may find himself in a similar situation as Q4 2018, when comments regarding the fact that the Fed was “nowhere near neutral” interest rates, which implied further tightening, resulted in a 20% decline in the S&P 500 Index and led to the infamous Powell Pivot on Boxing Day, when the Fed stopped tightening and began to ease policy.  Can Powell withstand a 20% decline in the S&P 500 today?  I doubt it.  10%?  Even that will be tough.  In essence, Powell now finds himself caught between President Biden’s growing concerns over inflation and the market’s likely concerns over tighter policy.  If nothing else, we should finally learn the Fed’s true master as this plays out.

So, with that in mind, let’s take a look at how markets have responded overnight.  While yesterday saw an immediate rejection of risk assets, the first bargain hunters have returned and equity markets were largely in the green overnight and on into this morning.  The Nikkei (+0.4%), Hang Seng (+0.8%) and Shanghai (+0.35%) all managed to rally amid mixed data (Japan’s PMI rising to 54.5, China’s Caixin PMI falling to 49.9) and despite ongoing concerns the omicron variant would lead to further lockdowns.

European bourses (DAX +1.4%. CAC +1.3%, FTSE 100 +1.3%) are all much firmer after the PMI data there was generally better than expected.  This is despite the fact that the OECD released its latest forecasts, slightly downgrading global growth for 2021 although maintaining its 2022 global growth forecast of 4.5%.  Pointed comments about the risks of the omicron variant accompanied the release as all the work was done before that variant became known.  Perhaps investors are looking at omicron and assuming it will delay tightening further, thus support equity values.  Finally, US futures are all pointing sharply higher this morning, at least 1.0% with NASDAQ futures +1.5% at this hour.

It should be no surprise, given risk is back in vogue, that bonds are selling off again.  The one thing that has been evident is that volatility in markets has increased and shows no signs of abating until there is a more coherent story and clarity on ultimate central bank policy.  This morning, Treasury yields (+3.6bps) have jumped as have Bunds (+2.7bps), OATs (+3.1bps) and Gilts (+5.6bps).  Perhaps more surprising is that Italian BTPs (+6.5bps) have been the worst performer on the continent as during a risk-on session, these bonds tend to outperform.  Asian bond markets performed in a similar manner as yields rallied everywhere there.

Commodity prices are at least making sense today as we are seeing strength virtually across the board.  Oil (+4.5%) is leading the energy space higher, although NatGas (-3.4%) remains disconnected and is the sole outlier.  Metals are firmer as both precious (Au +0.7%, Ag +0.2%) and industrial (Cu +0.45%, Al +0.7%, Sn +0.3%) see buying interest and agricultural prices are firmer as well.

The dollar, though, has less direction today with the G10 seeing commodity currencies stronger (NZD +0.35%, AUD +0.3%, CAD +0.25%) while financials are under modest pressure (CHF -0.2%, JPY -0.15%, EUR -0.15%).  Now, in fairness, none of these moves are that large and most likely they represent position adjustment more than anything else.  In the emerging markets, TRY (+1.8%) remains the most volatile, rising sharply (more than 8.5% at its peak) after the central bank announced they were intervening due to “unhealthy price formations” in the market.  It seems those price formations have been the result of President Erdogan continuing his campaign to lower interest rates in the face of soaring inflation.  But there were other gainers of note including MXN (+0.9%) backed by oil’s rebound, KRW (+0.8%) on the strength of stronger than forecast output data and CLP (+0.7%) on the rise in copper prices.

Data this morning brings ADP Employment (exp 525K), ISM Manufacturing (61.2) and Prices Paid (85.5) and at 2:00 this afternoon, the Fed releases the Beige Book.  Chairman Powell and Secretary Yellen testify to the House Financial Services Committee starting at 10:00, and remember, that was when the fireworks started yesterday.  I doubt we will see the same type of movement but be alert.

The dollar story has lost its conviction as previously, the thought of a more aggressive Fed would have led to a much firmer dollar.  However, we are not witnessing that type of price action here.  While I still believe that will impact the currency’s near-term movement, right now it appears that many currencies are trading on their own idiosyncratic issues without the benefit of the big picture.  If the Fed does taper more quickly and begin to raise rates, I do expect the dollar will benefit and we can see 1.10 or lower in the euro as there is absolutely no indication the ECB is going to follow suit.  However, I suspect that equity market pain will become too much for the Fed to tolerate, and that any dollar strength will be somewhat short-lived.  Payables hedgers should take advantage over the next few weeks/months, but if you are a receivables hedger, I think patience may be a virtue here.

Good luck and stay safe
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