Business

It seems that the never-ending "thirst for yield" from the world's massive pension funds, combined with the ever-present "cash on the sidelines" problem, is driving the creation of yet another global financial bubble in emerging market junk bonds.  Alas, as the FT points out today, the world's largest fixed income investors can't seem to get enough of the risky paper as bond issuance by the most financially vulnerable countries has suddenly spiked to a all-time high of $75 billion just as spreads are tightening to all-time lows.

Being the first data following The National Congress, we are expecting little in the way of disappointment from China's macro data. However, the slowdown in credit supply has been well telegraphed, and sure enough the data was not pretty with FAI growth at its weakest in 17 years, Retail Sales and Industrial Production both disappoint.

Early indicators for October industrial output aren't positive - the official PMI and export growth both edged down and came in below expectations, writes Bloomberg Economics economist Qian Wan:

Authored by Kevin Muir via The Macro Tourist blog,

A few years ago, the Japanese government made an announcement that went unnoticed by many market pundits.

Authored by Chris Hamilton via Econimica blog,

I hope this article brings forward important questions about the Federal Reserves role in the US and I openly admit this is by no means a comprehensive article...it simply attempts to begin a broader dialogue about the financial and economic impacts of allowing the Federal Reserve to direct America's economy.

Is the largest public pension fund in the United States getting ready to dump about $50 billion worth of stocks?  According to a new note from Bloomberg, CalPERS' board is meeting for a workshop today in Sacramento to discuss asset allocations for the upcoming year which could include a doubling of the fund's bond allocation from 19% to 44% which would be funded with a massive $50 billion sell down of equities.