Spread & Containment
Drum Roll of Earnings Season Getting Loud This Week
The first two weeks of January were up and away for all 11 market sectors fueled by the grand reopening of China, a rally in bonds, a selloff in the dollar…

The first two weeks of January were up and away for all 11 market sectors fueled by the grand reopening of China, a rally in bonds, a selloff in the dollar and crude oil catching a fresh bid.
The third week of January had the market giving back most of the gains, except for Friday’s rally that smacked of options expiration manipulation and short-covering on strong earnings from a video streaming company and news of tens of thousands of techies losing their jobs to slash costs.
The optimism a soft read on the Producer Price Index (PPI) generated last Wednesday turned to despair as the narrative radically changed. Wall Street took to heart the very negative reports on retail sales, manufacturing and industrial production against the furthering of the Fed’s drumbeat that short-term rates are headed to 5.0%, regardless of the alarm bells going off along the yield curve. The 10-year Treasury yield is down to 3.48% from 4.34% exactly three months ago. In the meantime, the six-month T-Bill is paying 4.83%. The 1-year T-Bill is at 4.69% and the two-year T-Note is 4.18%.
We’re talking serious inversion as “provisions for credit losses (PCLs) among the top four lenders in the United States ballooned to $6.2 billion in the fourth quarter of 2022 — the most in over a decade, bar the Covid-19 pandemic’s earliest months. PCLs collectively booked by Bank of America, Citi, JP Morgan and Wells Fargo were up 35% compared with the previous quarter and marked the third-largest amount since Q4 2012.” The 10/2 spread closed Friday at -66 bps, off the high of -84 bps set on Dec. 7, but nowhere near a level that suggests the bond market isn’t highly worried about the Fed overtightening.
On the flip side, some of the root causes that were responsible for the spike in inflation, namely supply chain disruptions, soaring commodity prices and shipping costs have all eased materially from a year ago. In supply chain circles battered by more than two years of upheaval, the word “normal” is creeping into the outlook for 2023.
In the latest Logistics Managers’ Index, “September’s future predictions hint at normalization and a return to business as usual over the next year.” Analysis from Sea-Intelligence, gauging the amount of bogged-down shipping capacity, shows “all three models suggest we should be back at the ‘normal’ 2% capacity loss baseline by early 2023.” The year-to-date improvements in New York Fed’s Global Supply Chain Pressure Index “suggest that global supply chain pressures are beginning to fall back in line with historical levels.”

Federal Reserve Bank of New York – January 13, 2023
It has also been reported that ‘someone above’ must give a hoot about Europe, because that region has effectively skirted tough winter conditions as warm weather has brought huge relief from the threat of gut-wrenching heating and power bills for businesses and consumers alike. Here too, what was a highly anticipated inflationary hyper-catalyst never really materialized.
Although still high, inflation across Europe dropped for the second consecutive month in December, according to preliminary data shared by Eurostat, the European statistics agency. Eurozone annual inflation was down to 9.2% year-on-year last month from 10.1% in November, finally dropping from the realm of double-digit-percentage figures reached for the first time in October, when it surged to the 41-year high of 11.1%.
In yet another positive development, commodity prices are easing off the 2022 highs that peaked in May 2022. Although up from the low of September 2022 due to the anticipated reopening of China, prices for most commodities, especially those in the agricultural sector, have stabilized, even as the war in Ukraine carries on.

www.tradingecoomics.com
Against this backdrop of Consumer Price Index (CPI), PPI, industrial production, retail sales and personal savings trending lower with a counter lever of a rebounding Chinese economy driving demand for U.S. goods and services, one can argue the proposition of the S&P 500 maintaining a trading range is reasonable. But this assumption comes with the fact that investors are flying blind into earnings season where evidence of cautionary spending by both consumers and businesses could call into question the soft-landing narrative that has been touted by the Fed and embraced by a growing read on investor sentiment based on recent surveys like that of the American Association of Individual Investors (AAII).

https://www.aaii.com/sentimentsurvey
Stock indexes could very well be weighed down by underperformance by the mega caps that rule the major averages. And at the same time, one out of five companies will likely beat expectations and raise guidance, making this a quintessential stock picker’s market, at least for the next few months, until the economy proves it will avert a recession altogether and effect a soft landing that results in a broad revenue and earnings recovery accompanied by the Fed’s reduced rates amid falling inflation with the yield curve normalizing.
Again, the market is driving into the thick fog of earnings season. The market went from a very downtrodden finish to December 2022, to a euphoric first half for January 2023, followed by a sharp pullback this past week based on a reality check that bad economic news isn’t good news for inflation and stocks — but instead, is bad news for corporate profits. And nothing can spoil the party on Wall Street more than the price-to-earnings (P/E) contraction, which hammers valuations and stock prices in kind.
So, welcome to fourth-quarter earnings season. In the words of head risk manager Eric Dale, played by Stanley Tucci in the now-cult movie “Margin Call” based on the 2007-2008 mortgage meltdown on Wall Street, as he is handing a zip drive to his protégé after being fired: “Be careful.”
I couldn’t agree more.
The post Drum Roll of Earnings Season Getting Loud This Week appeared first on Stock Investor.
recession pandemic covid-19 reopening bonds yield curve sp 500 stocks fed federal reserve spread recession recovery commodities oil european europe ukraine chinaInternational
Repeated COVID-19 Vaccination Weakens Immune System: Study
Repeated COVID-19 Vaccination Weakens Immune System: Study
Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Repeated COVID-19…

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Repeated COVID-19 vaccination weakens the immune system, potentially making people susceptible to life-threatening conditions such as cancer, according to a new study.
Multiple doses of the Pfizer or Moderna COVID-19 vaccines lead to higher levels of antibodies called IgG4, which can provide a protective effect. But a growing body of evidence indicates that the “abnormally high levels” of the immunoglobulin subclass actually make the immune system more susceptible to the COVID-19 spike protein in the vaccines, researchers said in the paper.
They pointed to experiments performed on mice that found multiple boosters on top of the initial COVID-19 vaccination “significantly decreased” protection against both the Delta and Omicron virus variants and testing that found a spike in IgG4 levels after repeat Pfizer vaccination, suggesting immune exhaustion.
Studies have detected higher levels of IgG4 in people who died with COVID-19 when compared to those who recovered and linked the levels with another known determinant of COVID-19-related mortality, the researchers also noted.
A review of the literature also showed that vaccines against HIV, malaria, and pertussis also induce the production of IgG4.
“In sum, COVID-19 epidemiological studies cited in our work plus the failure of HIV, Malaria, and Pertussis vaccines constitute irrefutable evidence demonstrating that an increase in IgG4 levels impairs immune responses,” Alberto Rubio Casillas, a researcher with the biology laboratory at the University of Guadalajara in Mexico and one of the authors of the new paper, told The Epoch Times via email.
The paper was published by the journal Vaccines in May.
Pfizer and Moderna officials didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Both companies utilize messenger RNA (mRNA) technology in their vaccines.
Dr. Robert Malone, who helped invent the technology, said the paper illustrates why he’s been warning about the negative effects of repeated vaccination.
“I warned that more jabs can result in what’s called high zone tolerance, of which the switch to IgG4 is one of the mechanisms. And now we have data that clearly demonstrate that’s occurring in the case of this as well as some other vaccines,” Malone, who wasn’t involved with the study, told The Epoch Times.
“So it’s basically validating that this rush to administer and re-administer without having solid data to back those decisions was highly counterproductive and appears to have resulted in a cohort of people that are actually more susceptible to the disease.”
Possible Problems
The weakened immune systems brought about by repeated vaccination could lead to serious problems, including cancer, the researchers said.
Read more here...
Spread & Containment
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Banned By Major Social Media Site, Campaign Pages Blocked
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Banned By Major Social Media Site, Campaign Pages Blocked
Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Twitter…

Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Twitter owner Elon Musk invited Democrat presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for a discussion on his Twitter Spaces after Kennedy said his campaign was suspended by Meta-owned Instagram.
“Interesting… when we use our TeamKennedy email address to set up @instagram accounts we get an automatic 180-day ban. Can anyone guess why that’s happening?” he wrote on Twitter.
An accompanying image shows that Instagram said it “suspended” his “Team Kennedy” account and that there “are 180 days remaining to disagree” with the company’s decision.
In response to his post, Musk wrote: “Would you like to do a Spaces discussion with me next week?” Kennedy agreed, saying he would do it Monday at 2 p.m. ET.
Hours later, Kennedy wrote that Instagram “still hasn’t reinstated my account, which was banned years ago with more than 900k followers.” He argued that “to silence a major political candidate is profoundly undemocratic.”
“Social media is the modern equivalent of the town square,” the candidate, who is the nephew of former President John F. Kennedy, wrote. “How can democracy function if only some candidates have access to it?”
The Epoch Times approached Instagram for comment.
Interesting… when we use our TeamKennedy email address to set up @instagram accounts we get an automatic 180-day ban. Can anyone guess why that’s happening? pic.twitter.com/0G8oRnoXTv
— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) June 2, 2023
It’s not the first time that either Facebook or Instagram has taken action against Kennedy. In 2021, Instagram banned him from posting claims about vaccine safety and COVID-19.
After he was banned by the platform, Kennedy said that his Instagram posts raised legitimate concerns about vaccines and were backed by research. His account was banned just days after Facebook and Instagram announced they would block the spread of what they described as misinformation about vaccines, including research saying the shots cause autism, are dangerous, or are ineffective.
“This kind of censorship is counterproductive if our objective is a safe and effective vaccine supply,” he said at the time.
Read more here...
International
Study Falsely Linking Hydroxychloroquine To Increased Deaths Frequently Cited Even After Retraction
Study Falsely Linking Hydroxychloroquine To Increased Deaths Frequently Cited Even After Retraction
Authored by Jessie Zhang via Thje Epoch…

Authored by Jessie Zhang via Thje Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
An Australian and Swedish investigation has found that among the hundreds of COVID-19 research papers that have been withdrawn, a retracted study linking the drug hydroxychloroquine to increased mortality was the most cited paper.
With 1,360 citations at the time of data extraction, researchers in the field were still referring to the paper “Hydroxychloroquine or chloroquine with or without a macrolide for treatment of COVID-19: a multinational registry analysis” long after it was retracted.
Authors of the analysis involving the University of Wollongong, Linköping University, and Western Sydney Local Health District wrote (pdf) that “most researchers who cite retracted research do not identify that the paper is retracted, even when submitting long after the paper has been withdrawn.”
“This has serious implications for the reliability of published research and the academic literature, which need to be addressed,” they said.
“Retraction is the final safeguard against academic error and misconduct, and thus a cornerstone of the entire process of knowledge generation.”
Scientists Question Findings
Over 100 medical professionals wrote an open letter, raising ten major issues with the paper.
These included the fact that there was “no ethics review” and “unusually small reported variances in baseline variables, interventions and outcomes,” as well as “no mention of the countries or hospitals that contributed to the data source and no acknowledgments to their contributions.”

Other concerns were that the average daily doses of hydroxychloroquine were higher than the FDA-recommended amounts, which would present skewed results.
They also found that the data that was reportedly from Australian patients did not seem to match data from the Australian government.
Eventually, the study led the World Health Organization to temporarily suspend the trial of hydroxychloroquine on COVID-19 patients and to the UK regulatory body, MHRA, requesting the temporary pause of recruitment into all hydroxychloroquine trials in the UK.
France also changed its national recommendation of the drug in COVID-19 treatments and halted all trials.
Currently, a total of 337 research papers on COVID-19 have been retracted, according to Retraction Watch.
Further retractions are expected as the investigation of proceeds.
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