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“Aqualung”: Jeff Gundlach Webcast Live Feed

"Aqualung": Jeff Gundlach Webcast Live Feed

The start of a new year, means it is time for the bond king Jeff Gundlach, CEO and CIO of DoubleLine, to address investors and the broader market in his live webcast which is open to anyone, and…

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"Aqualung": Jeff Gundlach Webcast Live Feed

The start of a new year, means it is time for the bond king Jeff Gundlach, CEO and CIO of DoubleLine, to address investors and the broader market in his live webcast which is open to anyone, and which this time is titled "aqualung", perhaps in reference to traders' ability to exist only thanks to being constantly flooded by central bank liquidity while being propped up by life-saving stimulus.

As a reminder, courtesy of Bloomberg here are some of the predictions Gundlach made in his “Just Markets” presentation in 2020.

  • He said his strongest market conviction is that the then-resilient dollar will weaken. He said growing U.S. government and trade deficits, a steepening yield curve and a pull-back in foreign investment may finally hit the currency.
  • On broader stock and bond market returns he said he didn’t expect 2020 to come “anywhere close” to 2019, when virtually all major assets delivered once-a-decade. “It won’t be the roaring ’20s and it won’t be the boring ’20s,” he said.
  • He said investors could expect higher volatility.
  • Bitcoin could climb as high as $15,000 in 2020.
  • Forward economic indicators are “flashing yellow” for recession, the bond manager said. He continued to put the odds of a U.S. recession by the end of 2020 at 30%-35%, though he warned that the probability would rise if there’s lower purchasing managers and consumer confidence data as well as higher unemployment.

One topical observation he made last time, is to watch out if the 10-year yield gets above 1%, because it will then head straight for 2% unless the Fed steps in. This is relevant because the 10Y yield has climbed notably since it crossed that threshold after Georgia’s elections last week, and today approached 1.20% before reversing sharply after today's strong 10Y auction. That suggests buyers are ready to step up as the market weakens, which may slow the yield’s climb.

Investors will be closely listening to hear what Gundlach says about his view on the Fed plans for its asset purchases, specifically whether Powell will taper its current $120BN in bond purchases per month if additional government stimulus spurs the recovery. Of note, in the past two weeks, several Fed speakers over the past week have flagged a possible “taper” as early as this year.

As usual, the webcast can be followed by clicking on the image below and registering for the free webcast...

... and we will try to point out any of the more notable observations brought up by the DoubleLine billionaire.

At the start of the presentation, Gundlach points out that EM equities have sustained a 22% jump, similar to the 23% for U.S. equities. He lists them both under “favorites of 2021” referring to a recent Deutsche Bank survey of investors.

Gundlach also pointed out that Asian equities are extremely disliked, something he called “unfounded", and would put that asset class high on the “like list.” The bond king also lists emerging-market, U.S. equities as 2021 favorites

Gundlach next discusses the wild gyrations in global GDP, saying that he doesn't "believe that we’ve left the recession yet" and referencing the "house of mirrors" we find ourselves as a result of all the various policies.

Gundlach said he has cast away many of his usual economic indicator slides because of the way that Covid-19 has skewed several of them. He points out average hourly earnings, referencing to the surge in earnings in December which however is because of job losses in lower-pay roles.

Instead, Gundlach pulls a chart of TSA travelers -- the same chart he posted in the Doubleline December webcast - which shows the depressed number of travelers, which he believes is an indication of pent up demand, but he wonders if this will be an "aqualung" or an indication of true recovery. “I think this supports the narrative that there’s pent-up demand."

He then moves on to the broad shift to work from home and e-commerce, and says that the “never work from home” crowd is now at 4% from 32% pre-Covid. He says this will have longer effects as business leaders have to “make the tough decision to restructure their business that accommodates more work from home.”

Gundlach says that what started with bartenders, baristas, will gradually shift to a malaise that affects middle management.

Going back to the aqualung analogy, it's hardly a surprise that Gundlach shows a chart of the global money supply which has exploded by $20 trillion in 2020.

Gundlach mentions one argument on money supply is that it’s leading to enormous gains in the S&P 500. Gundlach didn’t mention if he agrees with that thinking (although we doubt he disagrees).

The biggest culprit here is well-known: the Fed continues to inject $120BN in liquidity every month.

Gundlach then touches on one of the key trades in the market right now, which is the continued piling of USD shorts. Gundlach here disagrees and lays out two charts which provide a technical support for the dollar, at least in the short-term, the first being the 2017 support level...

... the next being the downward wedge:

There is of course the fundamental limit that is the 2s10s curve which may have gone about as far as it can without sparking the Fed to invoke YCC. That said, Gundlach says “once again, the market was right” when the yield curve bottomed out in 2020 and the dollar has moved accordingly.

He said we could go back in a correlated market where stocks and bonds rise and fall together in the case where inflation returns to the market narrative. Looking ahead, Gundlach says we could go back in a correlated market where stocks and bonds rise and fall together in the case where inflation returns to the market narrative.

Gundlach next looks at equities, and specifically the Nasdaq vs SPX, a familiar chart, which as shown below is at the highest level on record, surpassing the dot com bubble highs. Looking at the chart below he says "the 20 year trend is likely over" if the “super six” Generals drop below their historical tech bubble high, and if there is a trend change and tech rolls over and falls below its historical high.

Of course, while the chart above would reverse quickly if inflation does accelerate, Gundlach admits that the Fed's ultra low policy is keeping enabling an army of corporate zombies which is deflationary.

Looking outside the US, Gundlach observes that the outperformance of the US vs the rest of the world is starting to moderate...

... a similar reversion in the trend can be observed in the US' outperformance vs Europe...

... and will likely continue to compress with global equity valuations roughly half of the US.

Going back to global markets, Gundlach says he has been “pounding the table” for emerging markets including Latin America “if you have that type of risk tolerance" and shows a handful of charts to justify his point:

Gundlach also looked at EMs versus industrial metals, where the latter is clearly outperforming - an interesting divergence because EM is a key exporter for commodities. One narrative there is hopes of a massive infrastructure plan under Biden or a repeat of a Chinese infrastructure plan (as the country did in 2009, which arguably helped the global recovery).

Gundlach also touched on bitcoin, which he discussed a year ago and was bullish. Discussing the divergence between bitcoin and gold, Gundlach says that goldbugs have failed miserably to make their case in light of the massive outperformance of bitcoin, whose upward catalyst may have been legendary trader Paul Tudor Jones who got Bitcoin going.

Gundlach said that he turned neutral on gold, as well as Bitcoin at $23,000.

Going back to the source of all asset bubbles, Gundlach shows the Fed's balance sheet and its divergent impact on stocks vs commodities.

Much more in Gundlach's full presentation below:

Tyler Durden Tue, 01/12/2021 - 16:28

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Government

Mike Pompeo Doesn’t Rule Out Serving In 2nd Trump Administration

Mike Pompeo Doesn’t Rule Out Serving In 2nd Trump Administration

Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Former Secretary…

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Mike Pompeo Doesn't Rule Out Serving In 2nd Trump Administration

Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a new interview that he’s not ruling out accepting a White House position if former President Donald Trump is reelected in November.

“If I get a chance to serve and think that I can make a difference ... I’m almost certainly going to say yes to that opportunity to try and deliver on behalf of the American people,” he told Fox News, when asked during a interview if he would work for President Trump again.

I’m confident President Trump will be looking for people who will faithfully execute what it is he asked them to do,” Mr. Pompeo said during the interview, which aired on March 8. “I think as a president, you should always want that from everyone.”

Then-President Donald Trump (C), then- Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (L), and then-Vice President Mike Pence, take a question during the daily briefing on the novel coronavirus at the White House in Washington on April 8, 2020. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

He said that as a former secretary of state, “I certainly wanted my team to do what I was asking them to do and was enormously frustrated when I found that I couldn’t get them to do that.”

Mr. Pompeo, a former U.S. representative from Kansas, served as Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director in the Trump administration from 2017 to 2018 before he was secretary of state from 2018 to 2021. After he left office, there was speculation that he could mount a Republican presidential bid in 2024, but announced that he wouldn’t be running.

President Trump hasn’t publicly commented about Mr. Pompeo’s remarks.

In 2023, amid speculation that he would make a run for the White House, Mr. Pompeo took a swipe at his former boss, telling Fox News at the time that “the Trump administration spent $6 trillion more than it took in, adding to the deficit.”

“That’s never the right direction for the country,” he said.

In a public appearance last year, Mr. Pompeo also appeared to take a shot at the 45th president by criticizing “celebrity leaders” when urging GOP voters to choose ahead of the 2024 election.

2024 Race

Mr. Pompeo’s interview comes as the former president was named the “presumptive nominee” by the Republican National Committee (RNC) last week after his last major Republican challenger, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, dropped out of the 2024 race after failing to secure enough delegates. President Trump won 14 out of 15 states on Super Tuesday, with only Vermont—which notably has an open primary—going for Ms. Haley, who served as President Trump’s U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

On March 8, the RNC held a meeting in Houston during which committee members voted in favor of President Trump’s nomination.

“Congratulations to President Donald J. Trump on his huge primary victory!” the organization said in a statement last week. “I’d also like to congratulate Nikki Haley for running a hard-fought campaign and becoming the first woman to win a Republican presidential contest.”

Earlier this year, the former president criticized the idea of being named the presumptive nominee after reports suggested that the RNC would do so before the Super Tuesday contests and while Ms. Haley was still in the race.

Also on March 8, the RNC voted to name Trump-endorsed officials to head the organization. Michael Whatley, a North Carolina Republican, was elected the party’s new national chairman in a vote in Houston, and Lara Trump, the former president’s daughter-in-law, was voted in as co-chair.

“The RNC is going to be the vanguard of a movement that will work tirelessly every single day to elect our nominee, Donald J. Trump, as the 47th President of the United States,” Mr. Whatley told RNC members in a speech after being elected, replacing former chair Ronna McDaniel. Ms. Trump is expected to focus largely on fundraising and media appearances.

President Trump hasn’t signaled whom he would appoint to various federal agencies if he’s reelected in November. He also hasn’t said who his pick for a running mate would be, but has offered several suggestions in recent interviews.

In various interviews, the former president has mentioned Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), Vivek Ramaswamy, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, among others.

Tyler Durden Wed, 03/13/2024 - 17:00

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International

Riley Gaines Explains How Women’s Sports Are Rigged To Promote The Trans Agenda

Riley Gaines Explains How Women’s Sports Are Rigged To Promote The Trans Agenda

Is there a light forming when it comes to the long, dark and…

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Riley Gaines Explains How Women's Sports Are Rigged To Promote The Trans Agenda

Is there a light forming when it comes to the long, dark and bewildering tunnel of social justice cultism?  Global events have been so frenetic that many people might not remember, but only a couple years ago Big Tech companies and numerous governments were openly aligned in favor of mass censorship.  Not just to prevent the public from investigating the facts surrounding the pandemic farce, but to silence anyone questioning the validity of woke concepts like trans ideology. 

From 2020-2022 was the closest the west has come in a long time to a complete erasure of freedom of speech.  Even today there are still countries and Europe and places like Canada or Australia that are charging forward with draconian speech laws.  The phrase "radical speech" is starting to circulate within pro-censorship circles in reference to any platform where people are allowed to talk critically.  What is radical speech?  Basically, it's any discussion that runs contrary to the beliefs of the political left.

Open hatred of moderate or conservative ideals is perfectly acceptable, but don't ever shine a negative light on woke activism, or you might be a terrorist.

Riley Gaines has experienced this double standard first hand.  She was even assaulted and taken hostage at an event in 2023 at San Francisco State University when leftists protester tried to trap her in a room and demanded she "pay them to let her go."  Campus police allegedly witnessed the incident but charges were never filed and surveillance footage from the college was never released.  

It's probably the last thing a champion female swimmer ever expects, but her head-on collision with the trans movement and the institutional conspiracy to push it on the public forced her to become a counter-culture voice of reason rather than just an athlete.

For years the independent media argued that no matter how much we expose the insanity of men posing as women to compete and dominate women's sports, nothing will really change until the real female athletes speak up and fight back.  Riley Gaines and those like her represent that necessary rebellion and a desperately needed return to common sense and reason.

In a recent interview on the Joe Rogan Podcast, Gaines related some interesting information on the inner workings of the NCAA and the subversive schemes surrounding trans athletes.  Not only were women participants essentially strong-armed by colleges and officials into quietly going along with the program, there was also a concerted propaganda effort.  Competition ceremonies were rigged as vehicles for promoting trans athletes over everyone else. 

The bottom line?  The competitions didn't matter.  The real women and their achievements didn't matter.  The only thing that mattered to officials were the photo ops; dudes pretending to be chicks posing with awards for the gushing corporate media.  The agenda took precedence.

Lia Thomas, formerly known as William Thomas, was more than an activist invading female sports, he was also apparently a science project fostered and protected by the athletic establishment.  It's important to understand that the political left does not care about female athletes.  They do not care about women's sports.  They don't care about the integrity of the environments they co-opt.  Their only goal is to identify viable platforms with social impact and take control of them.  Women's sports are seen as a vehicle for public indoctrination, nothing more.

The reasons why they covet women's sports are varied, but a primary motive is the desire to assert the fallacy that men and women are "the same" psychologically as well as physically.  They want the deconstruction of biological sex and identity as nothing more than "social constructs" subject to personal preference.  If they can destroy what it means to be a man or a woman, they can destroy the very foundations of relationships, families and even procreation.  

For now it seems as though the trans agenda is hitting a wall with much of the public aware of it and less afraid to criticize it.  Social media companies might be able to silence some people, but they can't silence everyone.  However, there is still a significant threat as the movement continues to target children through the public education system and women's sports are not out of the woods yet.   

The ultimate solution is for women athletes around the world to organize and widely refuse to participate in any competitions in which biological men are allowed.  The only way to save women's sports is for women to be willing to end them, at least until institutions that put doctrine ahead of logic are made irrelevant.          

Tyler Durden Wed, 03/13/2024 - 17:20

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Part 1: Current State of the Housing Market; Overview for mid-March 2024

Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Part 1: Current State of the Housing Market; Overview for mid-March 2024
A brief excerpt: This 2-part overview for mid-March provides a snapshot of the current housing market.

I always like to star…

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Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Part 1: Current State of the Housing Market; Overview for mid-March 2024

A brief excerpt:
This 2-part overview for mid-March provides a snapshot of the current housing market.

I always like to start with inventory, since inventory usually tells the tale!
...
Here is a graph of new listing from Realtor.com’s February 2024 Monthly Housing Market Trends Report showing new listings were up 11.3% year-over-year in February. This is still well below pre-pandemic levels. From Realtor.com:

However, providing a boost to overall inventory, sellers turned out in higher numbers this February as newly listed homes were 11.3% above last year’s levels. This marked the fourth month of increasing listing activity after a 17-month streak of decline.
Note the seasonality for new listings. December and January are seasonally the weakest months of the year for new listings, followed by February and November. New listings will be up year-over-year in 2024, but we will have to wait for the March and April data to see how close new listings are to normal levels.

There are always people that need to sell due to the so-called 3 D’s: Death, Divorce, and Disease. Also, in certain times, some homeowners will need to sell due to unemployment or excessive debt (neither is much of an issue right now).

And there are homeowners who want to sell for a number of reasons: upsizing (more babies), downsizing, moving for a new job, or moving to a nicer home or location (move-up buyers). It is some of the “want to sell” group that has been locked in with the golden handcuffs over the last couple of years, since it is financially difficult to move when your current mortgage rate is around 3%, and your new mortgage rate will be in the 6 1/2% to 7% range.

But time is a factor for this “want to sell” group, and eventually some of them will take the plunge. That is probably why we are seeing more new listings now.
There is much more in the article.

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