European Central Bank

Back in September, Draghi set the stage for the unleashing of an imminent QE bazooka, something the market was fully convinced would take place on December 3, pushing the EUR lower by nearly 10 big figures and pushing European stocks to nosebleed levels. When it didn't, and when Draghi unveiled a water pistol instead, the EUR soared by a near record amount, and Euro assets crashed.

Fast forward to today, when as we previewed earlier today, nobody was expecting much if anything from Draghi, to wit:

Unlike December 3 of last year, when there so much hope just ahead of the ECB's statement and Mario Draghi's press conference, which was all soundly crushed when the European central bank disappointed everyone leading to the biggest surge in the EUR since the announcement of QE1, this time few if anyone harbor any hopes about an upside surprise from not so super Mario.

Things are looking increasingly shaky for central planners around the globe.

Only the most intellectually dishonest can claim that last night's Chinese economic data deluge was anything but miserable. As we showed last night, everything missed:

• Industrial Production +5.9% (MISS vs +6.0% YoY expectations)
• Retail Sales +11.1% (MISS vs +11.3% YoY expectations)
• Fixed Asset Investment +10.0% (MISS vs +10.2% YoY expectations),
• Q4 GDP growth +6.8% (MISS vs +6.9% YoY expectations).

Even as the real full year GDP of 6.9% was in line, it was still the lowest since 1990...

More than six weeks after the governing council of the European Central Bank has met in Frankfurt, the ECB has finally published the minutes of the meeting which paved the way for a disappointing action from the ECB. The expectations before the meeting and monthly decisions were set very high, and the market was clearly disappointed with a deposit rate cut that was just 0.10%, resulting in a new deposit rate of -0.30%.