The Emperor Has No Clothes

Hubris is at an all time.  The people we all see on TV and read on the interwebs, regularly, are proclaiming the housing recovery, the consumer recovery, the market recovery, and the all around economic recovery.  These people are idiots.

Pro-HFTers Butting Into The Conversation Are A Half-Decade Late

It's no secret that for years I have written about and interacted on the telephone and in person (and even was the connection for the making of a documentary.  That's yours truly on the wall on the iPad) with people who shared the same questions and worry about the equity and option market micro-structure.  

Recent M&A Activity And What It Means Re: FED Taper

Jason Raznick, the CEO of Benzinga has a Tumblr account that he recently started and his most recent post on M&A activity is worth reading.  The ramp in M&A and the increase in Covenant-Lite backing leveraged loan LBO's has enticed money away from traditional markets (big money went to Alt. Investments as equity risk premium pushed historic threshold and the appeal of low-rate fixed-income lost its luster). 

Apple's Weak Sauce

Apple is showing a weak hand with the talk about buying Beats Electronics, LLC, which has HTC Europe and Carlyle Group as their top investors.  Initial commentary focused on the headphones, a quality of which will never match Bose in my opinion.  There’s a reason Chrysler was in talks with Beats while Mercedes was in talks with Bose.  And guess who drove a Mercedes?  Steve Jobs.  

Goldman's Global Leading Indicator

Goldman Sachs has released their Global Leading Indicator and highlighted a slight contraction, 3.5% year-on-year for April, down from 3.6% year-on-year in March.  

$150 Oil

Nordea analyst Thina Saltvedt is out with a note on the impact of the crisis in the Ukraine on oil and its potential to send the EU back into a recession.

Margin Credit Drops For First Time In 8 Months

Since May, United States Margin Credit accounts have been increasing on a monthly basis according to NYXData.com.  As stock investors have continued to borrow to fund their purchasing of equities, Investor Net Worth as measured by the difference between Total Free Credit and Total Margin Debt as grown to historic levels.   

Global GDP Reports Show Growth Is Slowing

The United States has GDP being released this AM at 8:30 AM EST.  Nations around the world have been posting GDP levels that show contractions in the growth with one outlier posting a nearly 3% turn around in their Gross Domestic Product growth (Greece).  The US itself is expected to report 1.1% year-on-year GDP levels compared with prior reported 2.6%.

Big Pharma M&A

Pharmaceuticals were on fire this morning.  When I originally wrote this before forgetting to post it this AM, GWPH is up 16% on news that the FDA decided to Fast Track the Sativex pain treatment for clients with advanced cancers (read the filing here).  

Money Market Fund Charts

During sell-offs like we just saw I always like to highlight and share the levels of Money Market Fund data that is publicly available through ICI.