Global Market Comments
April 22, 2020
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(THE MAD HEDGE DICTIONARY OF TRADING SLANG)
Global Market Comments
April 21, 2020
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(OIL CATACLYSM)
(USO), (XLE)
I spent the day trying to charter a 500,000-tonne oil tanker.
No luck.
If I had found one, I could have bought oil at the close of the market today at negative -$37.78 a barrel and then immediately resold it for June delivery for $21, generating an instant $57.78 a barrel profit. At 7.33 barrels a metric ton that gives me a $211 million profit. All I have to do is keep the oil for a month. Big hedge funds are doing this right now.
When I toured Australia in February, I warned investors that crude would fall from $80 to $10 by 2030, which many called extreme. I warned them to get out of all energy investments immediately, as I have done with you for the past several years. It is an industry that is going the way of the buggy whip maker.
Instead, we saw a move from $80 to negative -$37 in two months. They must think I’m some kind of idiot, clueless about the functioning of this important commodity market, despite having invested and worked in the industry for five years.
Of course, the wild prices are a product of the futures market, where financial derivatives outnumber the underlying physical market by 100 to one. Anyone who buys here today has to take delivery by 2:30 EST on Tuesday. With all the world’s storage and shipping already committed that is impossible. You literally can’t give oil away right now.
All transportation use of oil has virtually ceased. Most airlines are grounded, no ships are sailing, and nobody is driving anymore. Of the world’s potential daily oil supply, we have crashed from 100 million b/d to 65 b/d in two months. It is a move unprecedented in history.
Throwing gasoline on the fire are 16 supertankers which sailed from Saudi Arabia but for which there are no buyers.
This panic is happening in the face of Cushing, Oklahoma’s storage capacity which is now at 61 million barrels and could be at its limit of 78 million barrels in a couple of weeks. Then where does the Texas tea go?
Since June futures are still trading at $21, I believe this carnage is due to the future expiration and should pass in a few days. But unless more storage shows up out of the blue, or the industry shuts in production of 35 million b/d, the Armageddon in the futures market will become a monthly affair.
All eyes are now on the United States Oil Fund (USO), which liquidated all its May oil contracts two weeks ago to avoid precisely this kind of debacle. All longs were rolled forward to June contracts, which expire on May 19, and into July.
(USO) now owns one-third of all June oil contracts. Some $1.5 billion poured into the (USO) last week, which then immediately dropped in value by half.
I know this sounds insane, but if you bought the (USO) at the Monday close of $3.75 and it returns to the $5.00 where it was trading last Thursday and oil was trading at $25 you should be able to make a quick 33% on your money in a few days.
I wouldn’t let this trade grow hair on it. I’ll be selling on the first rally. That’s why I’m only going with a 5% position instead of the usual 10%. Now is not the time to get greedy in the oil market.
Eventually, supply and demand will come into balance from a combination of production cuts and demand increases from a recovering global economy. Best guess is that happens in July or August at the earliest. OPEC has already cut production by 10 million barrels a day for two months and 8 million b/d for the rest of the year. After that, oil could trade back as high as $40 a barrel.
If oil stays this low for too long, the geopolitical implications are immense. There will be a second Russian Revolution, which depends on crude sales for 70% of total government revenues.
Saudi Arabia will go up in flames and the royal family will flee to Geneva, Switzerland where their money is, leaving 34 million citizens to perish. What population did the country support before the post-war oil industry took off in 1950? About 4 million. I remember Saudi Arabia in the 1960s and it was not a pleasant place. People walked barefoot on 150-degree sands.
But I diverge.
At some point, another trade of the century on the long side of oil is out there. But the price of being early is high.
A “BUY” Signal?
Global Market Comments
April 20, 2020
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(MARKET OUTLOOK FOR THE WEEK AHEAD, or WHAT’S A FED PUT WORTH?),
(INDU), (SPX), (TLT), (ZM), (TDOC),
(NFLX), (UAL), (WYNN), (CCL)
What is a Fed put worth?
That the question that traders and investors alike are pondering.
If the government had taken no action whatsoever in the face of the Corona pandemic the Dow average would easily be at 15,000 today, if not 12,000.
After all, the economic collapse we have seen has been even greater than the Great Depression. More than 22 million unemployed in four weeks? Back then, the Dow Average fell by 90%.
Enter the Feds.
Throw in $6 trillion in expected fiscal spending and $8-$0 trillion in Federal Reserve stabilization of the money markets and quantitative easing, and it makes a heck of a difference. As a result, the national debt will rocket from $23 trillion to at least $32 trillion by next year, a far faster increase than seen after Pearl Harbor.
Stocks love this.
In the past three weeks, the Dow Average has jumped an eye-popping 35% from 18,000 to over 24,000. We are likely trading at 25 X 2020 earnings, but that is just a guess at best. Nobody knows, with essentially all companies withdrawing guidance. On a valuation basis, stocks are now more expensive than at any time since 1929.
You can be excused for being confused, befuddled, and gob-sacked.
All of this adds up to a value of the Fed put of 9,000 in Dow Average terms, 17,000 in a worst-case scenario, and 27,000 if you want to go back to 1933 share valuations.
Stocks here are now priced for perfection. To buy shares here, you are making the following rosy assumptions:
1) The Corona epidemic is peaking and it is clear sailing from here.
2) Shelters-in-place ends in two weeks.
3) Critical shortages of medical supplies end.
4) US Deaths top out at 60,000 from the current 40,000, the most optimistic White House forecast.
4) Business will immediately bounce back to pre-epidemic levels
5) Domestic and international travel resume immediately
If all of the above take place, then at a stretch, shares are justified at maintaining current levels and will churn sideways from here.
Here is what is more likely:
1) We are nowhere close to a peak, especially in states that never sheltered-in-place, and there could be a secondary peak in the fall. At 2,000 a day, US deaths will easily top 100,000 in a month.
2) Shelters-in-place will extend to June in the most populous states.
3) Medical supply shortages will continue for the indefinite future, with 50 states bidding against each other to buy fake masks from China.
4) Dozens of large companies and perhaps a quarter of the country’s 30 million small businesses will go bankrupt before the recovery begins.
5) There is no sign that domestic and international travels are getting off the runway anytime soon.
If that is the case, then stocks here that are wildly overpriced are due for a retest of the Dow 18,000 and (SPX) 2,400 lows.
No matter what happens, traders should be cognizant of an enormous bifurcation of the market that has taken place.
Stay at Home stocks, like Zoom (ZM), Teladoc (TDOC), and Netflix (NFLX), have spectacularly outperformed the market. Many of these had already been recommended by the Mad Hedge Technology letter and the Mad Hedge Biotech & Healthcare letter because they were leaders in their own technologies (click here).
The problem with these companies is that they are all expensive, in some cases trading at hundreds of times their earnings.
Then there are the Reopening Stocks that will deliver outsized returns once we make it to the downslope of the epidemic. These include United Airlines (UAL), Wynn Hotels (WYNN), and Carnival Cruise Lines (CCL), which we heavily sold short near the market top, and led the recovery of the last three weeks.
The problem with these companies is that they may have to go bankrupt first, or at least accept a heavy government ownership and dilution of existing shareholders before they return to normal.
It’s a quandary that would vex Solomon.
I always tell people, if you want to make an easy, reliable, and safe living, get a job at the Post Office. Avoid the stock market.
OPEC cut oil production by 10 million barrels/day, for two months, and then 8 million barrels a day for the rest of the year. Oil prices plunged anyway to a 20-year low at $18.50 a barrel, as it only puts a small dent in the 34 million barrel a day oversupply. It only postpones the day when many energy companies go bankrupt.
The Economy could be turning on and off for 18 months, believes Fed governor Neil Kashkari. He may be partly right. I am expecting two Coronavirus waves to lead to two shutdowns in the spring and fall, and the stock market may reflect the same. If so, stocks are wildly overpriced here, and the bear market could last another year. Sell shorts, or at least add hedges, and buy the (SDS).
US Budget Deficit to top $3.8 trillion this year, the most since WWII. We were already headed for a monster $1.5 trillion in red ink before the virus hit. Now we are pouring gasoline on the fire. It'sis my worst-case scenario, I had the national debt rising from $23 trillion today to $30 trillion in a decade. It looks like that will happen by next year.
Only 90,000 cleared US airport security in one day, down from a typical 2.2 million, or down 95%. It appears that 90,000 people a day don’t care if they get Covid-19 or have already had it. Some 80% of all flights globally are grounded, with many countries now stranded. With massive debt loads, it is only a question of how soon the big US airlines go bankrupt and how much the government gets to own on the way back up. Don’t buy any airlines no matter how cheap they get.
US Retails Sales collapsed by 8.7% as the paycheck-free economics takes hold. The March Empire State Manufacturing Index crashed to a record low of 78% and March Industrial Production is off 5.4%, the lowest since 1946. The parade of the worst economic data in history has begun. And we go into this with stocks at record high valuations, more expensive than they were in January.
Goldman Sachs says this depression will be four times worse than the Great Recession of 2008-2009, likely falling 35% annualized in Q2. Unemployment will hit 15% or higher, but stocks will not retest the March lows. The bounce back in H2 will be bigger than any seen. It more or less corresponds to my view. They must have some smart people at (GS).
March Homebuilder Confidence brings the biggest crash in history, down 42 points to a reading of only 30. It's the greatest decline since the 35-year history of the index. The last time we were this low was in June 2012. Some 21% of builders are reporting virus disruption.
Housing Starts collapsed a stunning 22.3% in March, the worst one-month figure ever recorded. Social distancing makes open houses impossible. But this will be one sector that leads us out of the depression. There is still a chronic generational housing shortage.
Weekly Jobless Claims topped 5.1 million, taking the grim four-week tally to a staggering 21 million. Out of the frying pan, into the fire.
Gilead Sciences (GILD) drug sent stocks soaring, up 900 points overnight. Its Remdesivir brought rapid recovery in already infected patients at the University of Chicago in a phase three trial. The market is hypersensitive to any good Corona news. Sell into the rally.
China GDP took a 6.8% hit in Q1 as the Corona pandemic takes its toll. Services are recovering faster than manufacturing, which is why the smog has not come back yet. And international trade has ground down to zero. Public transit has been abandoned for private cars. It could be a preview to our own recovery.
When we come out on the other side of this, we will be perfectly poised to launch into my new American Golden Age, or the next Roaring Twenties. With interest rates at zero, oil at $18 a barrel, and many stocks down by three quarters, there will be no reason not to. The Dow Average will rise by 400% or more in the coming decade.
My Global Trading Dispatch performance recovered nicely this week, thanks to some frenetic trading. I used the Monday 700-point dive in the market to cover most of my bearish positions and add short-dated longs in Apple (AAPL) and Facebook (FB).
Finally, I dove back into selling short the US bond market on the assumption that unprecedented borrowing will destroy prices.
My short volatility positions (VXX) were hammered again, even though volatility declined on the week. There seems to be heavy short selling of deep out-of-the-money puts on the assumption that the Volatility Index (VIX) won’t rise above $50 again.
We are now up +0.45% in April, taking my 2020 YTD return down to -7.97%. That compares to a loss for the Dow Average of -15% from the February top. My trailing one-year return returned to 33.88%. My ten-year average annualized profit returned to +33.67%.
This week, Q1 earnings reports continue, and so far, they are coming in much worse than the most dire forecasts. The only numbers that count for the market are the number of US Coronavirus cases and deaths, which you can find here.
On Monday, April 20 at 7:30 AM, the Chicago Fed National Activity Index comes out.
On Tuesday, April 21 at 9:00 AM, the March Existing Homes Sales are released.
On Wednesday, April 22, at 9:30 AM, the Cushing Crude Oil Stocks are announced.
On Thursday, April 23 at 8:30 AM, Weekly Jobless Claims will announce another blockbuster number.
On Friday, April 24 at 7:30 AM, US Durable Goods for March are printed. The Baker Hughes Rig Count follows at 2:00 PM. Expect these figures to crash as well.
As for me, I am sitting here eating a pineapple upside-down cake that my daughter just whipped up. It's my favorite cake made by my mother, which I always got on my birthday.
Of course, I have to wash the dishes. If anyone wants to supplement their trading income, housekeeper and domestic and wants to live in mansions at Lake Tahoe and San Francisco, please contact customer support immediately.
Stay healthy.
John Thomas
CEO & Publisher
The Diary of a Mad Hedge Fund Trader
“The worst advice I have received is to look in the rearview mirror and think that what led to success somehow can lead you to new success. Because it doesn’t. History will come back and bite you in the ass,” said Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft.
Global Market Comments
April 17, 2020
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(REMEMBERING GUADALCANAL)
When the Commandant of the Marine Corps asks for a favor, I say “Yes Sir” without hesitating.
So, when General David H. Berger called me and asked to represent him at the 78th annual memorial service for the 1942 Battle of Guadalcanal, I started booking my flight. It turned out to be one of the most amazing experiences of my life. It also may have saved my life.
He needed a Marine veteran who had family members on both sides of the battle and spoke fluent English and Japanese. It turns out that there is only one such individual in the United States, and that would be me.
Both my father and my uncle Mitch fought at the Canal, where he won a Medal of Honor. My late wife’s father was a Captain in the Japanese Army. His family had the government monopoly for supplying “sniper boots”, or “jikatabi.” That enabled me to sympathize with the Japanese families attending the service who lost loved ones.
I have acted as a diplomatic representative for the Marine Corps for many decades. Over the years, I have met presidents, most Medal of Honor winners, and Navaho code talkers.
Guadalcanal was the decisive battle of WWII. The Americans lost 7,000 men, 25 ships, and 175 planes. The Japanese lost 30,000 men, 25 ships, including a major battleship, and 450 planes.
Before Guadalcanal, the Japanese had never lost a battle. After Guadalcanal, they never won. If the US had lost the battle of Guadalcanal, WWII would have continued until 1948 or 1949.
Today, Guadalcanal is one of the poorest countries in the world, with a per capita income of about $3,000 a year, That’s just a guess from Australian aid workers. Less than 50% of the population participate in the modern economy. Some 70% of the modern economy is accounted for by Chinese logging of ancient tropical hardwood trees.
The rest live a more traditional lifestyle of fishing and growing jungle fruits and vegetables. There are countless barefoot kids running around everywhere. Most families have more than five kids and birth control is unknown. Not helpful to the island's poverty of course is the still present devastation by this military activity from WWII; you can read about it's impacts here.
I hired a local guide and translator of the local language of pigeon, a sturdy four-wheel drive SUV, and sought out the local WWII battlefields. It wasn’t easy, as there were only 20 miles of paved road in the entire country and no street signs.
I was not disappointed.
The first stop was Paige’s Ridge, also known as “Hennikan’s Ridge”, where my uncle won his Medal of Honor, fighting a heroic night battle where he mowed down 2,000 charging Japanese in a torrential rainstorm. For a more detailed description of Mitch, please click here.
Reading from his diary, I was able to locate his exact fighting position, where I used a shovel to dig out several Japanese 6.5mm Arisaka bullet that had been fired at him.
A mob of local kids huddled around me watching my every move. I finally told them to bring me their souvenirs so I might buy some.
What came back was amazing.
One boy around nine years old showed up with a tattered old Marine rucksack and spilled the contents on the ground. There were several live Japanese hand grenades, some unexploded mortar shells, and spent bullets of several kinds. I warned him, these could explode at any time and that he should be careful not to drop them.
My next stop was Hill 27, the subject of the 1998 movie Thin Red Line, and where my dad fought. I found my dad’s foxhole dug out of the coral and extracted out more Japanese bullets. It was moving to finally grasp the suffering he went through as a 19-year-old, starving, afraid, and suffering with malaria.
Scouring the hill, I managed to dig up some USMC dog tags still readable. I forwarded them to the US Marine Corps Historical division so that I might return them to the families. My dad gave me his dog tags right before he died 20 years ago.
In the village near the summit of Hill 27, everyone had huge collections of war relics; pieces of Japanese zero fighters, helmets, coke bottles, rusted-out machine guns, and prewar coins from both sides. One citizen had amassed at least a kilo of morphine in military sachets. I even found a bottle of Old Spice aftershave, my dad’s favorite.
Another offered me a Japanese skeleton in a plastic bag for $10. He said I could get as many as I wanted. There are in fact 23,000 Japanese missing in action on Guadalcanal. So, I emailed a friend in the Japanese government in Tokyo asking if he wanted any wartime remains.
He said not to worry. Once a year, the government sends a scouting party to pick up all the remains they can find. They then cremate them, take the ashes back to Japan, and inter them at Yasakuni Jinja, the country’s equivalent of Arlington National Cemetery.
Next, I drove deep into the jungle to find a graveyard of US fighter planes. They were all there, rusting away in all their glory; Wildcats, Corsairs, and Aircobras. On the way back, I managed to find a battered Sherman tank.
I was invited to explore an intact Boeing B-17 bomber discovered only two years ago. But it involved hiking four hours into the mountains. Since one of my companions hadn’t taken anti-malaria drugs and the mosquitoes were present in great clouds, I passed.
I went on to visit several other historic sites. I saw Red Beach, site of the initial Marine landing, where I found a nearly buried Japanese tank. I spent time at the Alligator Creek, where the Marines wiped out the Ichiki battalion.
With great difficulty, I found John Basilone’s machine gun bunker. John also won a Medal of Honor. I stopped by the soaring monuments of Bloody Ridge, where Edson’s raiders held off another Japanese onslaught. The original wartime tower for Henderson field can still be found at the airport.
Only recently did I realize that this trip commemorating the battle of Guadalcanal may have saved my life. To keep malaria at bay, I took Chloroquine for a week before, during, and after the trip. It is now being explored as a Coronavirus drug.
My original intention had been to make a 45-minute documentary video and give it to you and the Marine Corps. The stock market crashed the day I got back so everything is now on hold. Maybe if things quiet down this summer, I can get to it.
After all, I won’t be going anywhere.
Captain John Thomas
USMC, retired
Dad on Right
Mitchell Paige
A Crashed Marine F4F Wildcat
Dad’s Old Spice
A US Browning 30 Caliber Light Machine Gun
A Crashed US Carrier Plane
A Kilo of Morphine
Landing at Henderson Field
“The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marine Corps!” said Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady of the United States, 1945.
Global Market Comments
April 16, 2020
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(MORE LONG-TERM LEAPS TO BUY AT THE BOTTOM),
(TSLA), (CRSP), (MU)
