Friday, October 30, 2015

U.S. equity markets will crash in January

They'll crash in November-December, too, but should find the next support down at 1737 SPX.

It all keys off the FOMC Minutes released November 18th, and a promise to hike in December.  The market will front-run the move all the way to support from the 2009 lows trendline, forcing the Fed to kick the can again.  Once we are through the EOY bounce, the market will collapse.

When all the shorts are driven from the field (on marginal new highs), there will be no buyers left in this market.  Hedge funds and large financials blew that SKEW number out in the September-October cycle of this, so they are unlikely to hedge now until it is too late.

SPX rally into FOMC Minutes release 11/18
Long-term count


Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Janet Yellen: Just Do It

The equity market bounce has given you a free pass to hike, if only a little.

25 bps today will keep everyone on their toes.  Then you can stand pat in December and let them know you hear their concerns, etc. etc.

Friday, October 23, 2015

Central banks around the world

... are all pulling for this one now.  Anything to delay the inevitable.

The case now is that we are repeating 2011, with a low-volume continued rally into the Spring.

Finviz /ES weekly

Of course now we have the commodity implosion and attendant deflation at our doorstep.

Will it matter?

We kissed back the old rally channel this morning.

SPX

Will it matter?

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

S&P up against resistance

Shanghai Composite off 3.2% last night.  S&P 500 may get the memo soon.

NIRP announced at December FOMC?  They'll need a reason for it, of course.

SPX 10-21

Thursday, October 15, 2015

Can we make it to resistance @2046 into opex?

We are almost there.  It would leave us right at a critical juncture on the charts.

SPX 10-14

... and then Deutsche Bank blew up ...

Tuesday, October 13, 2015

All you can do is laugh

Take what you can from the markets while they last, exit the financial system when you have enough.

Disappear.

Don't look back.

Everyone out there who really gets the Austrian theme, knows what is coming, what reversion to reality will mean.

Disappear.

Don't look back.

Sunday, October 4, 2015

Power-thrifting by an actual Bohemian, in all his cheap glory

Even as a teacher will be proud of his students and their accomplishments, and their youthful enthusiasm, from time to time he must also show that he, too, is a well-established badass who still commands real fear from his charges.

I'm speaking of my good friend Bicycle, who is not only posting charts and used books he's gleaned from a dying civilization, but who has now made a most brazen foray into my own home turf, the Grosset and the Dunlap.  OMG!  What the bloody hell are you doing?!

Careful here, old friend, you need to tread lightly here, you are entering a world of pain.  Will the supply hold up?  We don't know.  We just don't know.

Like two old grizzlies, a show of potential force may be needed to keep actual fur from flying.

Thrifting in Seattle is serious business.  We have high-quality stores, excellent goods here, a general will to recycle and re-use old things, and there are many competitors among the customers.  I see books all the time that start out in the Value Village and wind up on the shelves of Magus Books over in the University District.  There are mooks who do this for a living, sifting out anything of marginal value and reselling it, while I am a simple end-user.  I buy to own.

Here's what I sifted from the world this weekend.

Pendleton board shirt, from Frederick & Nelson

Pendleton shirts are among the most sought-after items in the thrift stores.  They are beautiful and functional, perfect for the Pacific Northwest where I live.

This one has a store tag on it, from Frederick and Nelson, which closed in 1992.  The flagship Nordstrom full-line store is in their beautiful old building in downtown Seattle.  So this shirt, in flawless condition, has been sitting in some grandpa's closet, preserved from moths, sweat, regular use, the years of the grunge music and fashion, for over 23 years, so that I might pick it up for a mere $12.

I'll wear it to work this week.

I found this in the same Value Village (Lake City Way location):

Philip Woodhouse, Monte Cristo, Mountaineers, 1979 1st ed

I've been looking for a nice copy of this book on a Cascades ghost-town for a long time, seen it in shops for $30-$40.  Very happy to pick it up for $2.

And then I stumbled into this hoard at the Ballard Goodwill, for my kids.



You are entering a world of pain, Bicycle.  Do you understand the kind of sick animals that are out here?

A couple of local histories:



Ernest Renan,  a perennial favorite here in Deflation Land:



H. L. Mencken, because fuck you:

Knopf, 1990

Charles II, because someone's got to clean up the mess.

Hutton, Charles II, Oxford, 1989 

And last, a bit of cultural history that a lot of people do not know, that the horror of the 1960s actually began back in the 1950s as the dry-rot of the Beats and effete Northeast intellectuals.  I'm excited to read this one.

Fred Kaplan, 1959: The Year Everything Changed, Wiley, 2009

I hope that this is enough, that I have made my position clear for now.

Friday, October 2, 2015

Fed Minutes next Thursday?

Is Yellen finally going to hike rates now that everything is fine again?  There's a Bradley turn date next Friday (according to the Manfred Zimmel), if you believe in that stuff.

And where is our lower support in all this?  How much water does a waterfall fall?

SPX who knows