With the Fed's "imminent rate hike" announcement just three days away, the tremors not only continue but are getting bigger and more threatening with every passing day.
Overnight, despite the Chinese stock market posting a modest rebound, the Yuan continued to devalue in a less than stealthy fashion, with the offshore yuan falling another 0.24% to 6.5478 per dollar, weakest since March 2011 - the sixth consecutive day currency has declined, longest stretch since April. Meanwhile, the onshore yuan fell 0.06% to 6.4591 per dollar after dropping as much as 0.17% in morning versus the PBOC fixing of 6.4495, also down 0.21%, and the lowest since July 2011 in the aftermath of the PBOC telegraphing it would devalue its currency not just relative to the USD but to a basket of currencies.
It was not just China: once again the strong dollar panic is touching all the EMs as the rate hike tantrum strikes again, only this time on a very accelerated schedule, case in point:
- KAZAKH TENGE DECLINES 3.55% TO 324.4/USD
- INDONESIA 10-YEAR BOND YIELD SURGES 33 BPS, MOST SINCE JAN 2014
But wait there's more: moments ago WTI dropped below $35 to the lowest price since Febriary 2009...
... while nat gas dropped to a fresh 13 year low, continuing the carnage of commodities traders everywhere for whom the BTFD moment never comes.
And then, completing the trifecta, moments ago we got news of yet another fund, third in the past three days liquidating, this time Lucidus Capital Partners, a high-yield credit fund founded in 2009 by former employees of Bruce Kovner’s Caxton Associates, which Bloomberg reports has liquidated its entire portfolio and plans to return the $900 million to investors. As we expected, they are now dropping flies.
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So with just 72 hours to go until Yellen decides to soak up to $800 billion in liquidity, suddenly we have China and the Emerging Market fracturing, commodities plunging, and junk bonds everywhere desperate to avoid being the next to liquidate.
The immediate result of all thse latest developments is that US equity futures, which were up as much as 0.6%, slid and are now red, while the Europe-leading DAX wiped out all gains.
- S&P 500 futures unchanged
- Stoxx 600 up 0.3% to 357
- MSCI Asia Pacific down 1.3% to 128
- US 10-yr yield up 5bps to 2.18%
- Dollar Index up 0.3% to 97.86
- WTI Crude futures down 0.9% to $35.29
- Brent Futures down 1.4% to $37.40
- Gold spot down 0.7% to $1,068
- Silver spot down 0.7% to $13.83
A closer look at markets, shows a week kicking off in Europe and paring some of the sharp moves seen on Friday, with European equities residing modestly in the green (Euro Stoxx: +0.3%). Of note the notable outperformers in Europe have been Investec (+9.4%) and Old Mutual (+7.8%), with both companies benefiting from the newly instated South African finance minister given their exposure to the company and the recent political uncertainty . In terms of the session's laggard, energy names continue to underperform today amid softness in energy prices, with WTI trading below $35 for the first time since February 2009.
Fixed income markets have moved lower in tandem with the risk on sentiment seen in equities as Bunds spent the morning firmly in the red, while of note, EON IA forwards are pricing in further easing by the ECB in 2016, while today's excess liquidity printed above EUR 600bIn for the first time for almost 3 years.
“There was a bit too much of a sell-off last week, so the recovery makes sense,” said Otto Waser, chief investment officer at R&A Research & Asset Management AG in Zurich. “The strong rally in October and November wasn’t sustained in December and the magnitude of the selloff was bigger than people thought. How could the Fed surprise? It’s been the most spoken about increase in all financial markets."
Sorry Otto, this sell-off is far from over.
European Top News:
- RBS CEO Sees Investment Bank Profit 4 Years Away Amid Cuts: CEO aims to resolve most misconduct issues by year-end 2016
- Trafigura Profit Rises to $1.1 Billion on Record Oil Trading: Trader impairs assets by $407 million on distressed markets
- Shell Takeover of BG Cleared by Chinese Antitrust Authority: Paves way for shareholder vote; completion expected next year
- Le Pen’s National Front Shut Out as Hollande Surprises in French Vote: Socialists, traditional right united to block National Front
- Vivendi Won’t Vote on Telecom Italia Share Conversion Plan: To abstain from voting on plan to convert Telecom Italia’s savings shares into ordinary shares
- Shire Offer For Baxalta Up to $55/Shr Makes Sense: Barclays
Asian equity markets traded lower following last week's 10% declines in crude prices, with sentiment also remaining cautious ahead of the FOMC meeting on Wednesday. As a result, the energy sector weighed on both the ASX 200 (-2.0%) and Nikkei 225 (-1.8%), while the BoJ Tankan survey for Q4 also failed to inspire after Large Manufacturing Index and Capex beat expectations, but outlook figures suggested expectations for deterioration ahead with Large Manufacturing Outlook at an 11 quarter low. Chinese bourses traded mixed with the Hang Seng (-1.5%) index weighed on by losses in Casino, while the Shanghai Comp. (+0.6%) outperformed following encouraging industrial production and retail sales figures which posted 5-month and YTD highs respectively. 10yr JGBs traded higher as demand for the paper is stoked by sharp losses in Asia-Pac bourses, while the BoJ also entered the market to purchase JPY 780b1n in government bonds.
Asian Top News:
- China’s New Yuan Index: Here’s What the Market Needs to Know: Central bank seen setting stage for further depreciation
- Hong Kong Property Foreclosures Seen Doubling in 2016 on Economy: Pace has risen to 80 a mo. from 50-60 in 1HRally Hits Wall of Skepticism Among Funds in Tokyo, Seoul: Currency is down ~12% in 2015 as commodities prices fall
- Abe’s Growth Target ‘Pie in the Sky,’ Japanese Union Leader Says: Rengo says govt’s hopes for wage gains are unrealistic
- BOJ Said to Consider One-Year Extension of Loan-Support Programs: Would be third extension since Kuroda became governor
- India’s Two-Speed Economy Seen in Debt Upgrades at Smaller Firms: Crisil has 3.2 times more mid-cap upgrades than downgrades
- Alibaba to Buy South China Morning Post for $266 Million: Founder Jack Ma to follow Bezos in buying storied masthead
Commodities have kicked off the week in much the same fashion as last week ended, with prices remaining under pressure, weighed on by a stronger USD . After a 10% fall in prices last week, WTI and Brent futures reside in negative territory heading into the North American crossover, with WTI Jan'16 futures in close proximity to Friday's low of USD 35.16, while nat gas futures fell to fresh 2002 lows on mild weather in the US. Separately, precious metals have also been weighed on by the stronger USD, with spot gold lower by over USD 6 heading into the North American crossover.
In FX, the strength in USD has dictated play in FX markets, with the greenback gaining against major counterparts EUR and GBP overnight . While separately, on the back of the aforementioned finance minister move, the ZAR has pared back some of Friday's losses. Commodity currencies have benefitted across the board with the likes of CAD, NZD and AUD all benefitting against the USD after last week's losses.
Top Global News
- Investors See More Carnage Amid Third Avenue Contagion Risk: Minerd says 15% of high-yield funds may face high withdrawals
- Third Avenue Said to Part Ways With CEO David Barse: WSJ
- Third Point’s Loeb Said to Seek Removal of Dow Chemical CEO: Activist investor said to question timing of DuPont merger
- Micron Technology Agrees to Buy Rest of Inotera for $3.2b: Offer is worth NT$30 a share for 67 percent not owned already
- AstraZeneca Explores Deal With Acerta to Gain Cancer Drug: Deal would give Astra potential blockbuster drug for blood cancers
- Oil Sinks to Lowest in Almost 7 Years as Iran Vows More Supply: Speculators raise bearish bets on WTI to all-time high
- U.S. Natural Gas Falls to Lowest Intraday Level Since 2002
- The Five Key Decisions Made in the UN Climate Deal in Paris: Envoys set goal to cap temperature rise below 2 degrees C
- BTG Avoids Fire Sale as $1.5 Billion Credit Lifeline Buys Time: struggling firm said to reject offer for Banco Pan
- Cheniere Replaces CEO Souki Who Icahn Says Had Divergent Vision: Co-founder cut stake by 1/3, leaves LNG co. after 19 yrs
- Pep Boys Accepts Higher Bridgestone Offer After Icahn Counterbid: Accepted $15.50/shr bid
BUlletin Headline Summary from RanSquawk and Bloomberg
- The strength in USD has dictated play in FX markets, with the greenback gaining against major counterparts EUR and GBP overnight
- The week has kicked off in Europe in a paring of some of the sharp moves seen on Friday, with European equities residing firmly in the green
- On a light day in terms of economic releases, focus may fall on scheduled comments from BoE's Shafik and ECB's Draghi and Costa
- Treasuries decline overnight after Friday rally that pushed yields across the curve to multi-month lows amid rout in high yield, commodities; all eyes on Fed, with statement set for 2pm on Wednesday.
- Lucidus Capital Partners, a high-yield credit fund founded in 2009 by former employees of Bruce Kovner’s Caxton Associates, has liquidated its entire portfolio and plans to return the $900m it has under management to investors next month, the company said Monday
- With the Fed set to push the lift-off button in two days, financial markets may have already overshot in betting on a split in U.S. and euro-area monetary policies even as the ECB extends stimulus, according to Deutsche Bank and UBS
- Oil extended declines, with WTI falling below $35/bbl for the first time since 2009, as Iran pledged to boost crude exports, bolstering speculation OPEC members will exacerbate the global oversupply
- It’s hard to know which would be worse for U.S. equity investors right now: a contraction in valuations, or if stocks were left to rely on earnings growth to push them higher. Both are likely outcomes of this week’s Fed meeting
- Donald Trump has tapped into a cohort of Americans who have experienced the uglier side of a grinding, decades-long economic transformation; middle-class households are the minority for the first time since at least 1971 while inequality has soared to a 45-year peak
- South Africa’s government was left trying to shore up credibility after President Jacob Zuma’s debacle over who should run the finance ministry called into question his ability to oversee the economy
- In the second round of France’s regional elections, voters from the left and the traditional right ganged up to deliver a series of defeats nationwide to the National Front
- $32.2b IG priced last week, $225m HY. BofAML Corporate Master Index OAS +4bp to +171, YTD range 180/129. High Yield Master II OAS +39bp to new YTD wide +710, YTD low 438
- Sovereign 10Y bond yields higher. Asian stocks mixed, with Japan lower, China higher. European stocks and U.S. equity- index futures decline. Crude oil, copper, gold higher
US Event Calendar
- Economic Data11:00am: U.S. to announce plans for auction of 4W bills
- 11:30am: U.S. to sell $28b 3M bills, $26b 6M bills
DB' Jim Reid completes the weekend wrap
There are so many balls in the air at the moment, especially for this late stage and normally sleepy part of the year. This week we'll likely have the first US rate hike for 9 years, we've had a weekend where the China data showed signs of stabilisation and we start the week with a lot of debris to get through in the US credit market after the story we discussed on Friday about the mutual fund halting withdrawals at a HY credit fund. Since then we've also seen news of a credit hedge fund suspending redemptions in a $400m fund over the weekend adding to the gloom.
So straight to the US HY news. For sentiment this is clearly bad news with Friday a bruising day (see below). This story has echoes of the sub-prime fund suspensions that hit Bear Stearns and BNP in June and August 2007 respectively. We should note though that it took over a year for the Lehman default to come through (September 2008) and for the US economy to enter recession. We would also say that the cash high yield market is a different beast to the complicated and highly levered structured credit products that destroyed markets and helped contribute to the GFC.
Nevertheless similar timings to the Bear Stearns/BNP story would fit in with our long-term view that 2017 could likely be the next big problem year for financial markets and the global economy. This view is further fleshed out in our 2016 Outlook this morning which is called 'Late Cycle... But How Late?'
Clearly the risks are that the credit market drags us there sooner. Indeed in the note we go through different variables showing that the US looks late cycle from a macro and micro basis. However many of these suggest we're late cycle rather than at the end and what keeps us optimistic on Europe is that it looks well behind the US credit cycle for now and with fairly attractive valuations. We expect EUR non-fin IG to provide total and excess returns of 1.6% & 2.3% respectively in ‘16. The equivalent numbers for GBP IG are 2.1% & 3.7% and for EUR HY 5.5% & 5.8%. EUR HY defaults will edge up to 3%. These forecasts look optimistic but in spread terms only take us back to August/September 2015 levels. It seems highly unlikely we'll get there without periods of wider spreads though. In addition given that credit market liquidity is likely to cause huge problems when the credit and economic cycle both end we would have sympathy for those prepared to forgo a positive 2016 in order to reduce positions that are going to be more difficult to unwind quickly ahead of more difficult times. So dilemmas when you're at late cycle in an illiquid asset class.
The big issue for global financial markets is whether this US high yield stress is enough to turn the economy. At the moment in the US (and other parts of the world) we see a rare divergence between manufacturing and the service economy. The former being dragged down by China/EM and commodity woes and with a much higher influence (constituents wise) on the US HY market than the US economy, equity markets and European credit markets. If the service sector can withstand the turmoil in US credit then this shockwave can be contained.
One area to watch carefully for this remains China. Over the weekend we finally had some better news following the release of the November economic activity indicators. Retail sales rose two-tenths last month to an above market +11.2% yoy (vs. +11.1% expected), setting a ten-month high in the process. Industrial production was up a robust six-tenths to +6.2% yoy (vs. +5.7% expected) and while fixed asset investment was unchanged at +10.2% yoy, it still came in a bit above expectations of +10.1%. DB’s Zhiwei Zhang noted that these indicators suggest positive momentum ahead, highlighting in particular that planned investment for new projects and total funds available for FAI were both up strongly last month. This pickup is consistent with Zhiwei’s expectation that GDP growth will rebound to 7.2% in Q4. Beyond this Zhiwei still expects growth to slow next year and is forecasting GDP growth of 7.0% for 2015 and 6.7% in 2016. He still expects a small positive fiscal impulse in 2016 and continued loosening of monetary policy with four RRR cuts (one per quarter) in 2016 and two interest rate cuts (Q3 and Q4 2016).
Also generally plenty of buzz was the news out of the PBoC on Friday of the publishing of a new trade weighted exchange rate index for the Renminbi. The statement released said that the intention of this is to ‘shift how the public and the market observe the RMB exchange rate movements’ and that in their view ‘the bilateral RMB/USD exchange rate is not considered a good indicator of the international parity of tradable goods’. The statement goes on to say that it would be more appropriate to measure the performance of the RMB against both the US Dollar and also the basket of trade weighted currencies. The report attached below from our China Economists highlight some key questions emerging from this latest move. They expect the new basket of currencies to be a more explicit reference in setting the value of the RMB in the future and believe that this move implies that, if the US Dollar appreciates against some other currencies, the PBoC will likely tolerate some depreciation of the RMB against the US Dollar as long as its value against the basket of currencies remains stable. Most importantly, they see this as a signal that China does not intend to engage in competitive devaluation. That is, the RMB is actually likely to appreciate against the other EM currencies if the US Dollar strengthens globally. There will be some with more negative views on this though, viewing it as paving the way for a devaluation as soon as they feel able to justify it. At least now the market is being better prepared for the scenario than it was in August.
The negative tone from Friday has carried over into most of Asia this morning where equity markets are largely trading in the red. The Nikkei has fallen -1.91%, while the Hang Seng (-1.01%), Kospi (-1.01%) and ASX (-1.54%) are also lower. Credit markets have followed up with material moves wider too. Itraxx indices for Asia and Australia are +8bps and +6bps wider respectively. Bucking the trend however are markets in China, seemingly buoyed by the weekend data. The Shanghai Comp is +0.54% while the CSI 300 is up a similar amount as we go to print. Meanwhile, the PBoC set the onshore Yuan 0.21% weaker this morning, the sixth consecutive day of weakening. The fix was moved to the lowest mid-rate valuation since July 2011 having weakened for the fifth consecutive week last week.
Datawise this morning the only release of note has been out of Japan where the Q4 Tankan Survey is out. The data was reasonably marginal, with no change to the indices for large manufacturers (+12), large non-manufacturers (+25) and small manufacturers (0). The only improvement in fact came for small non-manufacturers (+5 from +3) although all came in slightly ahead of expectations. In contrast the outlook surveys for all indices were a little more disappointing than expected, declining broadly from the Q3 survey.
It shows how much is going on that it's taken us 1,300 words to get to the main event of the week - the highly likely Fed rate hike on Wednesday. This time last year we were convinced that the Fed wouldn't raise rates in 2015. We'll it looks like we'll be proved 15 days wrong. However with all that's going on in the world and with global nominal growth so low, it's hard for us to imagine they'll get very far in their hiking cycle. We suspect that the terminal funds rate will be lower than the market expects and certainly lower than the Fed expect. Assuming they do hike and that the US HY story doesn't escalate quickly and stop them in their tracks the main story will be how dovish they make the hike. It's hard to think they'll be hawkish given the current global uncertainty and the carnage in the $1.3tr US HY market.
Back to Friday and recapping those sharp moves in risk assets that we mentioned earlier. The end result for US credit was a huge widening for CDX IG by +8.5bps. CDX HY finished down nearly 2pts which was the second weakest day this year. US HY energy spreads finished +56bps wider at 1240bps and a fresh record wide. That was the largest single day move wider in spread terms this year by a decent margin (next nearest being +45bps in August). Meanwhile, two of the largest and most closely followed US HY ETF’s closed at their lowest levels since 2009.
While still under plenty of pressure on Friday, the moves were less severe in European credit with Main and Crossover finishing +4.5bps and +23bps wider respectively. The moves in credit largely overshadowed the falls for most major equity bourses on Friday. The S&P 500 capped off a tough week by closing down -1.94%. The index finished -3.79% for the week, marking only the second down week since September. It was however the second-worst weekly return this year. Prior to this in Europe the Stoxx 600 (-2.04%) closed down for the eighth time in the last nine days.
The US HY moves are clearly weighing on sentiment but it’s the compounding effect on this from more steep losses for Oil which is hard to ignore. Friday saw WTI close at its lowest level since February 18th 2009 after tumbling -3.10% to close below $36. The moves in Brent were even more extreme, closing down -4.53% and a shade below $38 which is the lowest close now since December 24th 2008. Both have weakened around 1% further this morning. It wasn’t much better for Natural Gas on Friday which closed below $2 and at one stage traded down below those 2012 lows.
The risk off tone meant we saw a decent safe-haven bid for Treasuries on Friday, with yields plummeting south in a hurry. The benchmark 10y finished down -10.3bps at 2.128%, the lowest level since the end of October. 2y yields finished nearly -7bps lower at 0.877%. On a more positive note, the US dataflow was relatively constructive on Friday. Despite headline retail sales for November rising less than expected (+0.2% mom vs. +0.3% expected), there were beats for all of the core readings. The ex-auto (+0.4% mom vs. +0.3% expected), ex-auto & gas (+0.5% mom vs. +0.4% expected) and control group component (+0.6% mom vs. +0.4% expected) all coming in above market. Headline PPI last month was also up a better than expected +0.3% mom (vs. 0.0% expected), while the core print was in-line at +0.1% mom. Business inventories were a touch softer than expected however at 0.0% mom for October (vs. +0.1% expected).