Business

A quick, if familiar, observation to start the day courtesy of Bank of America which in the latest overnight note from Michael Hartnett notes that central banks (ECB & BoJ) have bought $1 trillion of financial assets just in the first four months of 2017, which amounts to $3.6 trillion annualized, "the largest CB buying on record."

As Hartnett notes, the "Liquidity Supernova is the best explanation why global stocks & bonds both annualizing double-digit gains YTD despite Trump, Le Pen, China, macro..."

Authored by Lance Roberts via RealInvestmentAdvice.com,

On Tuesday, I discussed the issuance of the “weekly sell” signal and the implications for the markets over the intermediate term. However, I also stated the markets could well have a reflexive, oversold, bounce in the short-term with two potential outcomes. To wit:

Having largely disappeared from the market's scope for the past 6 months, ever since Europe "bent" its rule allowing the bailout of Monte Paschi and several smaller banks despite Italy having the greatest amount of disclosed NPLs of any European nation, moments ago Fitch decided to drag Italy right back in the spotlight when it downgraded Italy to BBB from BBB+, citing "Italy's persistent track record of fiscal slippage, back-loading of consolidation, weak economic growth, and resulting failure to bring down the very high level of general government debt has left it more exposed to pote

Authored by Wolf Richter via WolfStreet.com,

No one knows the full magnitude, but it’s huge.

How big is margin debt really, and how much of a threat is it to the stock market and to “financial stability,” as central banks like to call their concerns about crashes? Turns out, no one really knows.

In addition to Paul Tudor Jones making headlines overnight with his comments during a closed-door GSAM session, in which he warned that Yellen "should be terrified" by some of the market's key valuation metrics, he went so far as to predict what trading strategist would blow up the market and cause the next crash when volatility returns.

“Risk parity,” Jones told the Goldman audience, “will be the hammer on the downside.”