Historical Archives

Risk parity funds. Volatility-targeting programs. Statistical arbitrage. Sometimes the U.S. stock market seems like a giant science project, one that can quickly turn hazardous for its human inhabitants…….While it’s impossible to say for sure what was at work when the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell as much as 1,597 points, the worst part of the […]

For several years we have lived in an investment world, dominated by passive strategies — that has underpriced risk and has ignored a number of potential headwinds and adverse outcomes. Importantly, clear and seemingly dangerous structural market issues have also been disregarded.   http://davidstockmanscontracorner.com/?p=175977&preview_id=175977&preview_nonce=4d81f2b88f&preview=true  

In addition to “diversifying” its nuclear arsenal, the Pentagon notes that it will seek to “expand the range of credible U.S. options for responding to nuclear or non-nuclear strategic attack,” raising concerns that President Donald Trump will argue for the use of nuclear force as a deterrent—a significant departure from previous administrations which saw nuclear

The deepening selloff in cryptocurrencies has just claimed another victim: Bitcoin’s kimchi premium. Prices for the virtual currency in South Korea have tumbled back in line with those on overseas exchanges for the first time in seven weeks, erasing a gap that had swelled to 51 percent in early January. The premium had been so

The recent frantic moves in Treasurys and the dollar continued on Monday as we enter what is set to be a juggernaut of a “rollercoaster week“, and while the dollar collapse seems to have slowed for now, this is as a result of an acceleration in the Treasury selloff, with 10Y yields blowing out to

Although it was not a comprehensive policy statement, the Tillerson speech completed a months-long process in which the Pentagon has succeeded in enlisting the Trump administration to sign on for a semi-permanent US military engagement in three countries with significant US troops contingents: Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. This trifecta of semi-permanent US military engagements reflects

That fact was reinforced by GDP statistics released yesterday. For the first time since 2008, South Korean real GDP shrank quarter-over-quarter. Exports fell by a stunning 5.5%, the largest quarterly decline in three decades. Construction spending also fell, really putting a dent in those October projections.   http://davidstockmanscontracorner.com/?p=174889&preview_id=174889&preview_nonce=b1afe1acc7&preview=true

This incompetence on full display in Davos this week has been all at once breathtakingly frightening and fall-in-the-floor funny. What started with Mnuchin landing in  Switzerland and immediately triggering a further slide in the dollar escalated dramatically on Thursday, first with Mario Draghi calling out a certain “someone” at the post-ECB meeting presser and then

Yes, indeed. Everything does seem to be firing on all cylinders as long as you don’t scratch too deeply beneath the surface. Even if you do, and see the ugly scars of minuscule wage growth, plummeting savings rate and surging delinquencies – investors just don’t “give a shit” as markets continue to rocket higher…..Call it the