Showing posts with label fiscal stimulus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fiscal stimulus. Show all posts

2016-11-07

MacroView: It's All About The US Presidential Election on Tuesday

MacroView | © DomainMondo.com
Domain Mondo's weekly review of  macro economic and investing news:
The End Is Nigh | NYTimes.com"... the first day of her Senate confirmation hearings for secretary of state is the day she registered her server domain name: clintonemail.com. It was a reckless and entitled move that drew the F.B.I. into the election and set off a frenzy among House Republicans ... In the hacked emails, the candidate’s advisers Neera Tanden and John Podesta recoil from the Hillary henchmen. When Brock attacked Bernie Sanders about his health during the primaries, Tanden worried about Hillary’s trust in the “kind of a nut bar” Brock: “Hillary. God. Her instincts are suboptimal.” About Blumenthal, the Hillary consigliere who helped smear Monica Lewinsky and was part of the ethically blurry Clinton Inc., Podesta said to Tanden: “It always amazes me that people like Sid either completely lack self-awareness or self-respect. Maybe both. Will you promise to shoot me if I ever end up like that?”... even Chelsea was concerned about the foundation’s ethical morass. The problem with Donald Trump is: We don’t know which of the characters he has created he would bring to the Oval Office. The trouble with Hillary Clinton is: We do know. Nobody gets less paranoid in the White House."--by Maureen Dowd (emphasis added)
MacroView Feature • No matter where you live or whether you can vote in the U.S. Presidential Election which concludes Tuesday, November 8th, this coming week's macro economic event is the outcome of that election. As reported just 2 days ago:
"... retreat of the stock market ahead of the 2016 election continued Friday, with the market falling for a ninth straight day. Wall Street is now in its longest period of decline in more than three decades [since 1980 when Ronald Reagan won over Jimmy Carter]. Investors continue to focus on the U.S. presidential election, which has become too close for comfort for some investors ... " Translation: Wall Street thought the fix was in and this year's election would be a Hillary Clinton Coronation. A proven stock market metric (86% accuracy since 1928), the S&P 500 index, is signaling Donald Trump will win the election."
What happens if the S&P 500 is right, and Trump wins? Many expect a Brexit-like selloff in the stock market, which like Brexit, may be a buying opportunity. The "Bond King" Jeffrey Gundlach, who still thinks Trump is going to win, is predicting a Trump administration will provide fiscal stimulus in the form of  infrastructure spending which should be a positive for the economy. However, unlike others, Gundlach does not believe the election outcome to be particularly important, in terms of the market, since in his view a Clinton administration would also engage in fiscal stimulus spending.

Watch below the Financial Times video interview of Stephen Moore, Donald Trump's senior economic advisor, about the Republican candidate's trade and tax policies.

Trump's economic plan:

Video above published Nov 4, 2016: FT.com's Ed Luce goes head-to-head with Stephen Moore, Donald Trump's senior economic advisor, about the Republican candidate's trade and tax policies.

Where do we stand going into the Election on Tuesday? Here's one scenario (of many):

Click the map to create your own at 270toWin.com
Map above: Clinton 213 vs Trump 230 electoral votes, with 95 electoral votes in "toss up" states (shown in gray). Remember the Presidential Election is determined by Electoral College votes which total 538, not the popular vote totals. The winner needs at least 270 electoral votes. If the above map holds true when results come in Tuesday evening, Trump can win by gaining 40 additional electoral votes, e.g., Florida + Pennsylvania would put him over the top at 279 electoral votes. To create your own map click on the link above or go to: Create Your Own President Map | RealClearPolitics.com. For more on the Electoral College, see video at the bottom of this post.

Trump's schedule for the last 2 days of the campaign (Sunday and Monday), indicates he's hitting most of the swing states in play plus more: Iowa, Minnesota, Michigan (2 stops), Pennsylvania (2 stops), Virginia, Florida, North Carolina, and New Hampshire.

• Even if Trump doesn't win, the issues he raised are not going away and have already had an impact. See, e.g., International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director Christine Lagarde: Globalization has to work for all--Bloomberg.com.

•  Likewise, Trump's supporters are not just going to go away. For example, entrepreneur and venture capitalist Peter Thiel defends his most contrarian move yet--supporting Trump:
“The millions of people who vote for Trump are not doing it because of the worst things he said or did,” Mr. Thiel said. “That’s ridiculous. The Americans who are voting for Trump are doing it because they judge the situation of the country to be urgent. We’re at such a crucial point that you have to overlook personal characteristics ... San Francisco, Manhattan and Washington, D.C., are doing well, but the presidential campaign has laid bare the angst of many other places. Feelings of decline are rampant. “Most of the millennials have lower expectations than their baby boomer parents,” Mr. Thiel said. “Where I differ from others in Silicon Valley is in thinking that you can’t fence yourself off. If it continues, it will ultimately be bad for everybody.” And if Clinton wins? “There will be a very big need to push back on the sort of happy but misleading consensus about things,” Mr. Thiel said. “There will be an important role for me and others to somehow play in speaking truth to power.”--NYTimes.com
•  No matter the outcome Tuesday, remember after voting, that the actual outcome is beyond your control. What you can control is your own behavior, and how you respond to events, which in the final analysis, may matter much more than the event itself. So don't fear events that are outside of your own control. Instead, pay attention to your own responses and behavior.

•  November 8 is election day in the U.S.--How the U.S. elects its President:


-- John Poole, Editor, Domain Mondo 

feedback & comments via twitter @DomainMondo


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2016-10-17

MacroView: Gradually and Then Suddenly, How Markets & Companies Fail

MacroView | © DomainMondo.com
Domain Mondo's weekly review of  macro economic and investing news:

MacroView Feature  •  Sometimes you don’t exactly notice how bad things really are. It’s not always as apparent as it would seem.--Sarah Dunn

Gradually and Then Suddenly: In Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises, one character asks another how he went bust. The response is a classic: “Two ways, gradually and then suddenly." That's how companies, governments, pension funds, and individuals often fail:
"And it’s how conditions in complex markets shift as well. The underlying circumstances that shape the environment in which you operate can evolve at a snail’s pace, and then shift quickly, either as new actions are introduced, or as the agglomeration of changes reaching a tipping point."--strategy-business.com
Wilbur Ross: U.S. Recession Likely in Next 18 Months:

Video above published on Oct 14, 2016: Billionaire distressed-debt investor Wilbur Ross, chairman of WL Ross & Co., comments on U.S. financial markets and the possibility of a recession. He speaks during an interview with Bloomberg's Matt Miller and Scarlet Fu on "Bloomberg Markets."

Gradually and then suddenly?
•  Goldman Sachs Sees Shock Potential for U.S., European Stocks | Bloomberg.com"Political risks, exacerbated by a weak economy in Europe and high stock prices in the U.S., make those markets vulnerable to declines in the next three months. The firm projects that the S&P 500 Index and the Stoxx Europe 600 Index will each drop by about 2 percent by December." See also Goldman Tells Clients To Go To Cash As "Growth Shocks" Are Coming | ZeroHedge.com.

•  Next European bank bombshell: DoubleLine’s Jeffrey Gundlach dropped a new name to worry about on the European bank front. He says if “push comes to shove,” the German government will support Deutsche Bank. “But what about Credit Suisse, which has shown a similar decline in stock price? Who’s there to bail them out?”--MarketWatch.com. Italy’s Intesa Sanpaolo is matching Credit Suisse’s year-to-date losses. Spain’s Banco Popular is down 60% year-to-date. Gundlach has also said the ECB’s negative-interest-rate policy is running the risk of bankrupting its lenders, and Deutsche is a poster child for this: “You cannot save your faltering economy by killing your financial system.”

•  Rail Freight Gets Clocked from all Sides in this Economy | Wolf Street: "Total US freight rail traffic, as measured in carloads and intermodal units, fell 6.1% in the week ended October 8, from the same week last year, the Association of American Railroads reported today. It was down 10% from the same week two years ago." See also: Freight Rail Traffic Plunges: Haunting Pictures of Transportation Recession | Wolf Street.

•  ‘Bulletproof’ Public Pensions | NYTimes.com"The California Public Employees’ Retirement System, or Calpers, said Loyalton had 30 days to hand over $1.6 million, more than its entire annual budget, to fund the pensions of its four retirees. Otherwise, Loyalton stood to become the first place in California — perhaps in the nation — where a powerful state retirement system cut retirees’ pensions because their town was a deadbeat." See also The state government pension crisis: You will be made to care | Washington Examiner.

•  Sheila Bair called the financial crisis but her new nightmare is student loans"The problem is much worse," Bair replied. "The percentage of [former] students in distress on their student loans is significantly higher than we saw during the subprime crisis."--Bloomberg.com

•  Chinese Property Owners are in for a Very Rude Awakening, but the Damage Will Reverberate around Globe --WolfStreet.com: "The biggest bubble in history." See also: Wall St. Tumbles After China Trade Report Disappoints | NYTimes.com 13 Oct 2016: "Data showed that China’s exports last month fell 10 percent from a year earlier in dollar terms, compared with a 2.8 percent fall in August."

•  Starbucks held $1.2 billion in customer funds loaded onto Starbucks cards and its app as of Q1 2016, according to MarketWatch.com based on data from S&P Global Market Intelligence. Starbucks holds more money than some banks hold in deposits. But Starbucks doesn't have to worry about the most powerful man in banking, Fed governor Daniel Tarullo, who heads the Fed’s Committee on Bank Supervision. Tarullo took office at the Fed in 2009 at a moment of broad public support for a more aggressive tack and has pressed that advantage ever since. His influence ranges over everything from corporate strategy to how many billions of dollars banks must maintain in capital. Through the stress tests he championed to evaluate how banks might fare in another market shock, the Fed wields control over whether banks can raise the dividends they pay to shareholders--WSJ.com. See also: “All organizations with sales goals are going to be susceptible to falsified sales records,” said Kane, who worked at Wells Fargo in the 1980s and ’90s before founding Kane Bank Services, which focuses on bank sales practices.--LATimes.com

•  Canada’s Big Bet on Fiscal Stimulus Drawing Global Attention: "Trudeau’s move to lean on infrastructure spending to boost growth is regaining currency"--WSJ.com

•  Week ahead: U.S. presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump hold their final debate in Las Vegas on October 19, 2016, 9:00-10:30 pm EDT. The moderator is Fox News anchor Chris Wallace, who will question each nominee. Watch LIVE online here. See also: Glenn Greenwald: WikiLeaks Emails Clearly Show Serious Media Impropriety | Mediaite.com and In the Democratic Echo Chamber, Inconvenient Truths Are Recast as Putin Plots | TheIntercept.com by Glenn Greenwald: "... The tactics they [Democrats] are now embracing will endure past the election, making them worthy of scrutiny. Those tactics now most prominently include dismissing away any facts or documents that reflect negatively on their leaders as fake, and strongly insinuating that anyone who questions or opposes those leaders is a stooge or agent of the Kremlin, tasked with a subversive and dangerously un-American mission on behalf of hostile actors in Moscow. To see how extreme and damaging this behavior has become, let’s just quickly examine two utterly false claims that Democrats over the past four days — led by party-loyal journalists — have disseminated and induced thousands of people, if not more, to believe ..." See also: It’s Official: This Election Is Driving Americans Nuts | Bloomberg.com and Most "news" is misinformation | DomainMondo.com.

One more reading recommendation:
•  "In order for investors to beat the performance of an index fund they must have a view that is different than the crowd and they must be right about that different view."--A Half Dozen Things I’ve Learned from Robert Cialdini’s book “Influence” | 25iq/com

-- John Poole, Editor, Domain Mondo 

feedback & comments via twitter @DomainMondo


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2016-05-04

Europe's 'Banking Depression' (video); Sohn Conference New York May 4

Carl Weinberg: Europe's Stuck in a 'Banking Depression:'

Video above: Europe in a 8-year "banking depression" says Carl Weinberg, chief economist at High Frequency Economics [hifreqecon.com]. He and Jeff Degraaf, chairman at Renaissance Macro [renmac.com], examine the European economy and the need for fiscal stimulus as the banking industry faces an eighth straight year of crisis. They speak on "Bloomberg Surveillance," May 2, 2016.
********

CNBC Sneak Peek | 2016 Sohn New York Investment Conference:

Evan Sohn discusses the upcoming May 4th New York Sohn Investment Conference. Joining him in the CNBC studio is 2015 Sohn Investment Idea Contest winner, Angelo Martorell. Published April 21, 2016.

Sohn Investment Conference | SOHN May 4, 2016 David Geffen Hall, Lincoln Center 10 Lincoln Center Plaza New York City: Since 1995, the world-renowned Sohn Investment Conference, held annually in New York, has been the premier investment event, bringing the world’s savviest investors together to share fresh insights and money-making ideas to benefit the Sohn Conference Foundation’s work to end childhood cancer.

AGENDA:
12:00 Opening Remarks: Doug Hirsch, Co-Chair, Sohn Conference Foundation
12:05 Larry Robbins, Founder, Portfolio Manager and CEO, Glenview Capital Management LLC
12:25 Carson Block, Chief Investment Officer, Muddy Waters Capital LLC
12:45 John Khoury, Founder and Managing Partner, Long Pond Capital, LP
1:05 Chamath Palihapitiya, Founder and CEO, Social Capital LP

1:25 Intermission
1:55 Jeffrey Smith, Managing Member, Chief Executive Officer, and Chief Investment Officer, Starboard Value LP
2:15 Richard Deitz, Founder, President and Fund Manager, VR Capital Group Ltd.
2:35 Stanley Druckenmiller, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Duquesne Family Office LLC
2:55 Eli Manning, Sohn-Manning Pediatric Cancer Survivorship Program at Hackensack University Medical Center
3:10 Jeffrey Gundlach, Chief Executive Officer, DoubleLine Capital LP

3:30 Intermission
4:00 Zachary Schreiber, Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and Chief Investment Officer, PointState Capital LP
4:20 Sohn Idea Contest Winner
4:35 Adam Fisher, Co-Founder and Chief Investment Officer, Commonwealth Opportunity Capital GP LLC
4:55 Dan Ariely, James B. Duke Professor of Psychology & Behavioral Economics, Duke University
5:15 David Einhorn, President, Greenlight Capital, Inc.
5:35 James Chanos, Founder and Managing Partner, Kynikos Associates LP
5:55 Closing Remarks: Dan Nir, Co-Chair, Sohn Conference Foundation

Tweets about Sohn Conference


See also reporting via thereformedbroker.com, valuewalk.com and WSJ.com



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