Globalization Is Over. Put A Fork In It.

Coronavirus accelerated the demise of the consumption oriented lifestyle. Those who didn't get the memo will suffer in relation to their addiction to failure...


"All forward decks are now open for swimming"

Coronavirus imploded the global economic model known as Globalization. It was the last nail in the coffin, and a long time coming. Only ever-larger monetary bailouts post-2008 kept this fraud going this long. Globalization was never about solving global poverty it was solely about monetizing global poverty. Instead of raising Third World living standards, it lowered the developed world standard of living by imploding the middle class. A highly profitable, albeit temporary, industrial arbitrage brokered with massive amounts of deflationary debt.

Few if any of today's well known economists have ever openly admitted that it was a failure. Because from their lofty ivory tower, it was all going so well, for them. Fuck everyone else. Not only were their asset values constantly elevated, but their cost of living was constantly falling as well. 

Globalization and its vocal supporters, were human history's biggest example of survivor bias. The people who extolled the benefits of the model were those who were its prime beneficiaries. Bill Gates informed us in 2014, (and more than once since then) that by any measure the world has never been better. The richest man in the world is apparently the official spokesperson for the slums of Calcutta. Because who better qualified to know what it's like to live at the absolute bottom of the Ponzi scheme, than the guy at the absolute top. His entire life has been a fantasy. 

The moronic media and the dunces at large were of course complicit in this long running scam. Never once questioning official narratives, even as the economic body count stacked up.

Always the same failing rejoinder, "This is the best system ever invented".

Well now, this fantastic system is imploding in broad daylight. Even as moronic gamblers are currently of the belief that we have successfully transitioned to a totally online virtual economy -  The truth is the EXACT opposite, we have now "successfully" transitioned to a totally offline economy. The global economy is shutdown and it's never coming back in the same way as before. This is a new age of frugality. The average household entered this fiasco totally unprepared. Now they are facing extreme economic uncertainty. As we see below the personal savings rate is at a forty year high due to the lockdown. However, social distancing measures will make this re-opening an economic dud. Economic activity will be a fraction of its former level. This lockdown has changed peoples' work patterns and consumption patterns, perhaps forever. 

This week the Fed confirmed that they are NOT considering negative interest rates, which means that REAL interest rates are rising due to extreme deflation.

The deflationary mindset is fully in place. Meaning people know that if they wait they will get better prices on EVERYTHING. Want a used Ferrari? Wait 12 months for the 70% off sale. 

The average business is even far worse off than the "consumer". The vast majority of the bailout money was targeted to workers not businesses. Businesses of all sizes are now twisting in the wind. QE won't work in this environment due to the total collapse in demand. Under these prevailing conditions, the economic multiplier is the limit approaching zero. Meaning that money is not circulating amidst businesses, because the majority of businesses are shutdown.

Meanwhile, the Democrats keep pounding away at the universal basic income, while Republicans keep pushing back. I believe this will be the central issue of the 2020 election. Over the coming months, Republicans will be forced to choose between mass poverty and failing capitalism. All of their failed ideologies are on the table now. And their political future is the table stakes. If they pull the trigger and vote for FULL MMT it would be tantamount to admitting they've abandoned capitalism. The alternative is ever-deepening poverty.

Either way, the party goes under the bus, because today's Conservative "think tanks" such as the Heritage Foundation are adamant that there should be no more fiscal stimulus for anyone. 

"Individuals and businesses react to new government programs by scaling back their personal spending and shifting—rather than expanding—production, canceling out any theoretical benefits. Instead, Congress should allow the private sector to drive the recovery by removing barriers preventing businesses from expanding, hiring, and creating new products."


How many times have we heard this same bullshit in the past 40 years - we need to remove barriers such as labor protections and taxes to allow free enterprise to thrive.

“The problem is that quality of the stock of jobs on offer has been deteriorating for the last 30 years,”

The “whole story” told by the index, he adds, is “the devaluation of American labor.”


Labor share of the economy:

This isn't about "stimulus", this is about survival. Which means that these traitorous sleaze bags at these Stink Tanks will need to find a new country to bilk in their next life, because this one IS OVER. I see a much scaled down conservative movement on the other side of this collapse. One that constantly propagates the narrative that if we had only squeezed the middle class more we would have reached the promised land of broad based prosperity. The same lethal delusion they've been propagating for decades. Eventually someone dumb enough will come along and believe them again. In the meantime, today's Republican useful carbon is spent. 

Fear of Missing Crash 2.0. Panic Edition.

Back prior to the last election Trump predicted that the casino would explode due to excessive monetary lubrication. I usually hate when he's right, however, what remains of Trumptopia is rigged to explode. Having round tripped back to terminal delusion, the next stop for social mood is panic...

Most people don't believe that social mood drives markets, which is why it works. These people are too busy predicting the future to realize they got caught up in a dumbfuck mania in the here and now.

The zombies have had plenty of warning and yet TWICE they believed that the Corona pandemonium was a buying opportunity. Something about being a mindless social media Borg is interfering with their thought process. Needless to say they are well lubricated for what comes next. Of course I said the same thing in February and yet they came back for even more punishment. 

No question, central banks and momentum algos have in many ways supplanted the human footprint in markets. Fear and greed have been replaced by money printing and volatility compression, in order to ensure that nothing approaching reality sets foot in Trump Casino ever again. Nevertheless, outside of the passive mega indexes, the footprint of social mood is clearly visible:

Here we see the Global Dow which peaked over two years ago (January 2018) and is three wave corrective at ALL degrees of trend:

The average U.S. stock peaked in October 2018 and as we see, the 2019 rally exhibits the same three wave corrective form, albeit much flatter:

I can't really say why speculators were so exuberant at the top in February. All I know is that we are seeing the exact same FOMC (Fear of Missing Crash) now.

Greed is truly blindness:

Re: February 21st, 2020:

"You would think that the coronavirus concerns gripping China (and the world) would cause massive panic and fear in stock prices. And it sure felt like they were... for a moment at least. But it didn't last long."

This, my friend, is the Melt Up."

Indeed. The market peaked two days BEFORE this article was written (Feb. 19th). The U.S. stock melt-up arrived right before the most violent crash in U.S. history. 

Where it gets interesting - and I pointed this out in February - is that Chinese speculative Tech stocks were leading the global rally at that time. I "speculated" that Chinese gamblers were trapped at home bidding up their own portfolios:

Here we see the ChiNext (Chinese Nasdaq), wave 'c' was the Corona top, February 25th, which was a few days AFTER the S&P peaked. 

Where this gets interesting is that during the April rally, U.S. gamblers were trapped at home bidding up their own portfolios, just as the Chinese were doing in February. 

Whereas the February melt-up was lubricated by the PBOC, this latest melt-up was lubricated by the Fed. In other words TWO central bank sponsored Corona melt-ups in a row.

And yet despite the exact same circumstances a mere two months apart, every pundit today is still wondering what comes next. 

I think we have an idea. 

What these combined melt-ups have accomplished is to concentrate ALL market risk into a handful of massively overowned and overvalued stocks while leaving the majority of the market essentially bidless - outside of short-covering.

What was already a huge risk in January and February, just became an even bigger risk during the ensuing retracement rally, as everyone "hid" in the same COVID-safe virtual economy stocks.

On April 26th, Goldman warned about this increasing concentration. Which incidentally was the Monday prior to the FOMC meeting (29th), which also incidentally was the S&P top so far in this retracement rally.

"The five largest companies make up 20% of the gauge’s market capitalization, exceeding the 18% level the measure reached in March 2000"

If we look at the Tech ratio relative to Banks, this is what we see:

In summary, central banks have coordinated their efforts to create a Tech super bubble at the beginning of a new depression. Greed-addled gamblers have taken the exact same bait TWICE in two months.

And when this Virtual Economy super bubble explodes, not only will it explode the mass complacency bubble, but it will explode Trump Casino as well.

Exactly as Trump predicted it would in 2016 - due to excessive monetary lubrication:

Dead Money @ Peak Bullshit

The last and biggest bubble we face is the bubble in total bullshit and attendant addiction to printed money. This is the bubble that is about to explode with extreme dislocation. My assumption is that we have now seen peak stock market for the foreseeable future...

For those who say that no one can predict the future, I am merely predicting that massive amounts of bullshit are about to explode. I don't know if that necessarily makes me prescient. 

Among today's predictions, Wharton money printing expert Jeremy Siegel is saying we will never see the recent lows again and I am saying we will never see the recent highs again (inflation adjusted). Two diametrically opposed predictions. If I am right, then sooner rather than later those who believe that printed money is the secret to effortless wealth are about to shit a massive brick. 

I would point out that when new NYSE lows reached this same level in October 2008, the final market low was five months and -50% lower (equal weight). The key difference being THAT was a recession and THIS is a depression.

I realize that predicting peak stock market is a bold assumption given the amount of money printing taking place, however, my overall belief is that we have now achieved FULL Japanification. The Japanese Nikkei reached its peak in early 1990 - thirty years ago. Since that time - notwithstanding epic money printing and a 200% debt to GDP ratio - the old high still stands. Inflation adjusted of course, the REAL annualized return is much lower.

The Nikkei is currently at 1986 levels, the year I graduated from high school:

From a top down perspective I believe that we have achieved peak debt, peak tax cuts, peak profit margins, peak revenues, peak stock buybacks, peak valuation multiples, and peak corporate bailouts. Which means that overtaking the February highs will be challenging for years if not decades to come. On an inflation adjusted basis. 

The age of plundering the middle class for fun and profit is over.

"Mass bankruptcies, empty planes, cautious consumers and an increase in the corporate tax rate to as high as 29% were part of a vision Fink sketched out on a call this week. The message from the leader of the world’s biggest asset manager contrasts with the ebullient tones of a stock market that has snapped back from recent lows."

From a bottoms up perspective, these are the U.S. industries that I believe are on the verge of consolidation and bankruptcy over the coming year(s). Most of these industries will survive however, the equity holders will be wiped out, as will much of the debt:

Airlines, cruise lines, commercial real estate, mall retail, half of all restaurants, oil producers, commodity miners, some industrials (GE, Boeing, GM, Ford), profitless small caps, hotels, casinos, homebuilders, and most banks.

Of the remaining sectors, I believe that the healthcare sector is about to come under severe regulatory price controls. Staples, utilities, and defense stocks are now massively overvalued. 

Large cap Tech is a mega bubble ready to implode deja vu of Y2K. 

Here we see the Dow Internet index has round tripped to the February highs, however, the VVIX is back to where the most extreme part of the March collapse began (wave iii). Which portends much more extreme volatility this time around:

Post-crash, I expect the sectors that rally first will be gold miners, semiconductors and small cap value ex-banks. This not investment advice, merely observations that I will adjust as we go forward. 

As for the overall market, I believe that the inflation-adjusted peak was achieved in February at the Corona blow-off top. From this point forward, I believe the market will swing in a very wide range. Meaning that stocks can be rented but not owned. This being the top of the range. I believe central banks can keep the bottom from falling out entirely, so perhaps the range is -60% lower, not as low as the Great Depression decline of -90%. Although the Nikkei above lost -80% at the lows. 

All of which means that the stock market based retirement is now a widely believed popular fiction. The only way most people will retire is via Social Security which is why policy-makers need to make the changes ASAP to shore up the system. Corporations have failed society via health, wealth, and environmental destruction on a biblical scale. 

Meanwhile, public pensions are on the verge of mass insolvency as well, as payouts far exceed returns and contributions. Overly-optimistic predictions have put these state and local programs at risk of implosion. Ironically, Mitch McConnell's state of Kentucky is the WORST off in terms of under-funded public pensions. So maybe he will come around to a state and local bailout after all. Nevertheless, it will be a fraction of what is really needed. 

The biggest mistake ALL public pensions have made is to over-invest in stocks and bonds and make asinine predictions of future returns in the 6-7% range in an extreme deflationary environment. Most of these money managers will not successfully navigate the extreme deflationary/extreme inflationary paradigm we now face. Inflation-adjusted returns will likely be negative for years. In addition, state tax collections will collapse.

The vast majority of people who believe in rampant lying, extreme greed, money printing, bailouts for the rich, and mass delusion are merely call options on a multi-decade super-cycle. Massively levered to King Donny and his reign of circus. 

Useful carbon. In the American tradition.

Road To Perdition

What we've seen to date was merely a very useful and therefore widely ignored warning of what's coming. This next phase of dislocation will make the past several weeks seem like a picnic. Suffice to say in this next leg down NO ONE will be BTFD. The staycation phase is ending. America's tradition of bailing out the rich at the expense of everyone else, is coming to an end...

Mind the gap:

As I've said, as circumstances evolve I will continue to update my future state economic model. Which is what we see below. My overall summary of events per date is mass denial and complacency in the face of dire economic collapse. Basically stock market speculation amid a sprinkle of unrest. Central banks have done a fantastic job of sponsoring mass delusion. So good that the vast majority will not see this coming. They had plenty of assistance from Trump and today's glue sniffing economic pundits. However, this entire delusion was propagated on social media, the cerebral cortex of today's mindless and obedient corporate Borg. 

My view of what comes next follows a similar pattern to what we saw in March, only this time a much deeper dive into extreme deflation. Once again, market crash will kick things off in style any day or week now. 

This time, as the last "safe havens" implode - MAGA Tech, gold, recession stocks etc. I suggest that central banks will fail in their bid to keep asset prices pinned to the Disney level. Hence this entire fraud will explode on a global basis taking all risk assets down with it.

From that point, I suggest that societal acrimony will explode in latent rage, in conjunction with the phased out social distancing measures. At that point appetite for corporate bailouts will reach the level it should have achieved a long time ago - ZERO. 

Which will force Occupied Wall Street to update their financial models to price in mass defaults. Layoffs will accelerate, reaching into the managerial class who to date have been the ones wielding the axe rather than receiving the axe. As the model above shows, food insecurity will grow acute leading to desperate measures - looting and hoarding of food and other necessities. COVID deaths will re-accelerate and martial law will attend the next shut down.

At some point in this long hot summer, policy-makers will reach for MMT for the masses, which will arrive amid a zero economic multiplier. Hence it will have no reflationary impact. Over time, into the fall and winter, unrest will abate, social distancing will eventually relax and nascent reflation will begin, albeit from a much collapsed economic level. By the end of this year, no one will be in denial as to whether or not we are in depression.

On the bright side, those who can live on the stipend provided by government will be fine. Meaning that FINALLY the working class will be better off than the casino class on average. Those who can't fit their bloated lifestyles inside an average American income will of course implode with only a decade of warning. 

Getting to the charts, as I've said, I believe that gasoline demand is a good proxy for economic activity in the absence of real-time economic data. This week, gasoline demand ticked up, but still remains -37% below year ago levels. In the end, no amount of soaring virtual economy and simulated prosperity can replace the REAL thing. Hard to believe, I know. 

FULL Disclosure, I am once again long brick shitting volatility and still short gold via put options. I will buy gold when the Casino class pukes it out of their over-margined accounts. 

Gamble in Trump Casino at your own risk. You never know when it might go bankrupt.

The virtual economy was soaring this week as the real economy imploded

In summary, today's casino class had the choice to close the economic divide the easy way. Now, however, America's Grand Canyon economic divide is about to be closed, the hard way. 

The Age Of Greed Is Ending. Badly

The U.S. has entered confirmed depression. The U.S. stock market is soaring. The age of greed is ending as expected, amid extreme greed. Go figure...

Going back several decades, the deconstruction of the domestic economy to the benefit of multinational corporations began with "free trade" during the Reagan era. There was nothing free about it - the cost was measured in factories, jobs, industries, and lives. The ascension of China to the WTO in 2000 - which was facilitated by the U.S. - put industrial arbitrage on steroids to the tune of 17 factories per day on average between 2000 and 2012. That collapse in manufacturing coincided with the collapse in labor share of GDP:

Labor share of economy (blue, left scale)

Manufacturing employment (red, right scale)

This annihilation of the economy took place amid the unchallenged belief that to question capitalism is "unAmerican". The fantasy that deconstructing the past could lead to a better future. Today's mental midgets had no idea that most of America's trading past was built upon Mercantilist principles based upon protecting the domestic economy. Which means that all of this economic deconstruction was merely one generation cannibalizing what all prior generations had created, under the belief that they were the heir apparent of success. Having no clue they were merely greedy morons.

As the aggregate corporate revenue curve flattened and rolled over due to the implosion of the middle class, it became necessary to utilize stock buybacks on an ever increasing basis to provide the illusion of profit growth. Shrinking the share count became the only way to "grow" profits. What ensued was human history's largest leveraged buyout.  

This continual accumulation of corporate debt in order to increase return on investment has made the economy more and more vulnerable to downside shocks. In 2008 it took 9 months to erase the prior decade of job creation. In this downturn it took a mere two months to rollback TWO decades of job creation:

All of this chicanery has continued year in and year out without question. Sure Bernie Sanders questioned it, but he has been unceremoniously shutdown by his own party TWO elections in a row. He was leading ALL other candidates going into Super Tuesday in March, but then ALL remaining candidates threw their votes to the incontinent Biden to stop Sanders.

Of course since Coronavirus only six weeks later the policies dreamed up by the GOP and Dems alike are FULL Communist compared to what Sanders was suggesting only weeks ago. As we see, this newfound ideology of embracing constant failure is highly malleable. In boom times it's capitalist and in the bust it's pure communism. The best of both worlds for those who are in line for bailouts. And the worst of both worlds for everyone else. 

Capitalism exploded spectacularly in 2008 you should have seen it. What followed was a decade of constant monetary bailouts that kept the deflationary policies of economic destruction in place for another decade. The continual swapping out of good jobs for junk jobs. Now an entire decade of junk jobs vanished overnight. 

Protecting the economy is what ALL other major economies in the world do - Japan, China, Germany. The U.S. is the exceptional outlier. That will change.

We are in the teeth of a new greater depression, however, because it was kicked off by the Coronavirus, today's Idiocracy is of the well-cultivated belief that depression is temporary. For proof they look to the sky-rocketing stock market which is their ONLY trusted proxy for the economy. The fact that stocks are rising at the expense of the economy gives them no pause to question this mass buffoonery.

Day by day those who buy into this last fraud are getting closer to losing EVERYTHING, merely because they mistook mass insanity for failed ideology. Failure for success. Stocks for an economy. Bullshit for truth. Con men for experts. Greed for morality.

The Biggest Dumb Money Bubble In Human History

MAGA will forever be known as the biggest dumb money bubble in human history. Biblical plague, global economy shut down, 33 million U.S. unemployed, 75,000 COVID deaths, no toilet paper...

Dow up 400.

Every time they announce millions more unemployed, the stock market skyrockets. Highlighting what is wrong with America. 

   

We only have to go back to the February highs for a reminder of mass insanity. Back then moronic gamblers could pretend this was a Black Swan event even though they piled into risk at the top. However, now they have no such excuse. That was the COVID melt-up rally, and this is the COVID meltdown rally. The same dumb idea, except this time far more lethal.

Here we see the beloved mega caps are not only green on the year, they have blown through the February top. What took four months last time took five weeks this time:

The S&P 500 has been battling the 50 day moving average (blue line) for four weeks straight. As we see in the lower pane, compared to last year's rally, new highs are minimal:

This is the eye of the storm.

Here we see volatility has declined substantially and yet is coiling far above the lows of February:

Among the other risky sectors leading this rally is Biotech which was the leading sector in August 2015 just prior to the Smash Crash.

Cloud internets are among the speculative stocks going back to vertical mode, as if the new great depression never even happened:

The rest of the world is not impressed with this spectacular show of extreme denial:

The apex of the dumb money bubble is the bet on reflation i.e. gold. These are the people who are ignoring the fact that 3 million+ unemployed per week is over 3x the highest MONTHLY total in 2008.

He is half right, stocks will get cut in half. However, relative to commodities and silver, gold is the most overvalued it's ever been, going back 5,000 years:

WHEN, not IF, mass delusion explodes all over again, the impending retest will be beyond the control of central banks and algos. As the largest cap stocks lead the way down:

"In the broadening top formation five minor reversals are followed by a substantial decline"

"It is a common saying that smart money is out of market in such formation and market is out of control. In its formation, most of the selling is completed in the early stage by big players and the participation is from general public in the later stage."

MAGA will forever be known as the biggest dumb money bubble in human history