Exactly one year and one month ago, I penned "Fu$k the Fundamentals!": Negative Rates In EU Will Absolutely Wreck the Very System the ECB Sought to Save" a piece that warned of the consequences of the EU negative rate policy and how it would effect Spain and Denmark among other EU nations, in particular. To wit:
The reason why oil has resumed its ascendant ways today is due to yet another focus, this time from the sellside, on the various disruptions in the oil market, following notes from Goldman, Bank of America, and Morgan Stanley according to which the millions in barrels of oil taken offline as a result of the Canada wildfire and persistent Nigerian supply problems will push the market into equilibrium much faster than originally expected.
The last 2 days have seen South African Rand plunge 5% relative to the USDollar, back to 2 month lows, after reports that police are set to arrest Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan over alleged irregularities at the nation’s revenue service.
As Bloomberg reports,
Gordhan is aware of plans to arrest him and described them as an effort to thwart his campaign to end government corruption, Beeld newspaper reported on Monday.
After last week's key event, the retail sales number, which the market discounted as being too unrealistic (and overly seasonally adjusted) after printing at a 13 month high and attempting to refute the reality observed by countless retailers, this week has a quiet start today with no data of note due out of Europe and just Empire manufacturing (which moments ago missed badly) and the NAHB housing market index of note in the US session this morning.
The “recovery” is over, at least as far as retail is concerned.
The retail ETF (XRT) has taken out its bull market trendline dating back to the 2009 bottom.
Even more than this, XRT has not only taken out its trendline, but it has since failed to reclaim former support. Instead we’ve had a dead cat bounce resulting in a “kiss” of former support, before rolling over again.