Despite Bank of Japan and ECB talk, and thanks to a tanking VIX, the new normal of utter tranquility in markets continued...
Soft Data rolled over again today...
Draghi didn't sound dovish enough and EUR spiked, sending the dollar dumping (down 8 of the last 10 days) to its lowest level since August 2016...
The Dollar Index is now unchanged since January 2015..
But Bund and Treasury yields found what Draghi said to be a little more dovish... 30Y touched 2.80% handle - lowest since June 29th...
Every effort was made to ensure the Nasdaq completed its 10th day higher in a row (longest streak since Feb 2015), smashing VIX to 9.51... if tomorrow is green, then that will be longest streak since 2009
This is easy...
And Mueller headlines early on gave dip-buyers the perfect opportunity to ignore the shitty data earlier in the day...but major indices generally flatlined all day in a very narrow range, Trannies were worst...S&P and Dow closed red
Utes outperformed and Financials slumped into the last hour as early gains in energy were erased...
FANG Stocks ended the day unchanged...
Chipotle was hammered once again because of rats and norovirus (yeah that's all) - now unchanged since April 2013...
Treasury yields went nowhere today - ending unch across the board (except 30Y -2bps) after being bid on Mueller's headlines...
Draghi-driven EURUSD strength weighed on the Dollar index
Gold gained on the day with a kneejerk higher after headlines on Mueller's probe of Trump...
While many seem convinced that this latest rally in WTI means something... it doesn't - more of the same range-bound trading and a reverse today...back below $47 to settle
Bitcoin surged 18% today - best day since June 2016...
While no catalyst was obvious, we do note that the move began almost to the second as news broke of the AlphaBay Dark Web bust...
And finally, as we noted earlier, the debt ceiling anxiety is starting to get real...
Traders are already willing to pay more for bills maturing after Oct. 19 to avoid being caught holding securities vulnerable to a technical default -- in line with Congressional Budget Office forecasts that predict the federal government will hit the debt ceiling around early- to mid-October.