15Jun2015 Market Update: DOW Off Triple Digits, Averages In The Red And Trading Sideways, A Green Day Not In The Cards

Here is the current market situation from CNN Money

North and South American markets are lower today with shares in Mexico off the most. The IPC is down 0.67% while Brazil’s Bovespa is off 0.60% and U.S.’s S&P 500 is lower by 0.40%.

Platinum Prices Hit Six-Year Low

Platinum prices hit a six-year low on the London spot market Monday as prices of precious metals sagged and the South African currency weakened.

Wall St. Sinks as Concern Grows Over Greece Debt Crisis

The country moved closer to default on its debts after weekend talks went nowhere.

Dramatic Footage: GTA Style Shootout With $7 Million Robber Gang In Moscow

A day after a special forces unit chased down a gang of cash van robbers through the streets of Moscow, and exchanged gunfire with them in a courtyard of a monastery, footage of the capture has been made public.

Russia Condemns “Aggressive” US Weapons Deployment; Will Send Troops To Protect Border

Cold War 2.0 is heating up week by week. In Ukraine, the fragile ceasefire struck four months ago in Minsk looks set to break down entirely with both the Ukrainian army and the Russia-backed separatists accusing each other of deploying heavy artillery in contested areas.

Meanwhile, GOP presidential candidates in the US are getting set to hit the campaign trail with foreign policy at the forefront in terms of the issues voters are likely to focus on in the primaries. All candidates seem prepared to attack the Obama administration’s handling of what is predictably being billed as “Russian aggression”, with Hillary Clinton’s 2009 “reset” button media spectacle serving as the tie-in between the current administration and the presumed Democratic nominee. As for The White House, the President is looking to dust off the Cold War playbook by implementing a modern day “containment” policy in the face of what the West claims are illegitimate attempts by the Kremlin to redraw European borders by violating territorial sovereignty.

As if all of this wasn’t enough to bring back memories of a bygone bipolarity, over the weekend we learned that the US is now set to “store” heavy weapons in Eastern Europe in an attempt to ensure NATO can respond quickly in the event Russia decides to do a bit more annexing. To recap (

Manufacturing, mining drag down U.S. industrial production

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. industrial production unexpectedly fell in May as manufacturing and mining activity remained weak, a sign that a strong dollar and spending cuts in the energy sector continued to constrain economic growth.

Planemakers’ order books bulge on Asia, Middle East demand

PARIS (Reuters) – Airbus and Boeing opened the Paris air show with a flurry of multi-billion-dollar plane deals on Monday as demand from Middle Eastern and Asian airlines swelled their already bulging order books.

ECB Government Debt Monetization Slows Most Since First Week Of May

Two weeks ago, we followed up on the unprecedented ECB leak to hedge funds in which Coeure told a select group of hedge funds the market moving information some 10 hours before disclosing the news publicly, that the ECB would front-load its monetizations under the PSPP program in May and June (due to “seasonal factors”, clearly the ECB did not want to admit that the acceleration in May/June purchases is because that is when European net issuance is highest and the entire ECB QE program was terribly conceived in a continent with no excess eligible collateral). We found that just as the ECB leaked, May purchases indeed jumped by a quite substantial 9%, mostly across German, French, Italian and Spanish sovereign bonds.

As a reminder, May was the month when the Bunds suffered the biggest yield surge in history, and many were worried that the ECB was about to lose control of the situation leading others to speculate that the only reason the ECB boosted its QE was to prevent further a plunge in Bunds, even as the ECB clearly desired a Bund yield far above the 0.0% it nearly touched 2 months ago, as a negative Bund yield would make it virtually impossible for European QE to continue excluding further cuts to the deposit rate.

Well, May came and went, and the Bund plunge and yields stabilized, which means that despite (or perhaps due to) Draghi’s recent warning of upcoming market volatility, the sell off in Bunds was permitted to continue: which, again, is precisely what the ECB wants …

Gold & Silver Prices Spike As Europe Closes

After a quiet sideways session, just as European markets closed, gold and silver prices have surged on heavy volume…

U.S. stocks sell off as Greek worries mount

(Reuters) – Wall Street was lower in late morning trading on Monday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average in negative territory for the year, as Greece came closer to a debt default after talks with its international creditors fell apart.

Fed on track for September rate hike as economy picks up: Reuters poll

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The U.S. Federal Reserve is on track to raise interest rates for the first time in nearly a decade in September, according to a Reuters poll that suggests economists now are mostly confident about that timing.

Bits Blog: Elon Musk Wants Your Hyperloop Ideas

SpaceX, Elon Musk’s rocket company, announces a competition to design and build vehicles for the Hyperloop, a proposed new kind of superfast pneumatic tube for people. It’s also building a test track.

Greece, creditors dig in after debt talks founder

ATHENS/BERLIN (Reuters) – Greece and its creditors stuck to their positions on Monday after the collapse of talks aimed at preventing a default and possible euro exit, while Germany’s EU commissioner said it was time to prepare for a “state of emergency”.

Citi faces headwinds in commodity trade finance, presses on with expansion

LONDON (Reuters) – Citigroup Inc and rivals in the commodity trade finance sector are facing headwinds of weak oil prices, sanctions on Russia and stiff competition, which have pressured fees.

Saudi Stocks Slip as Foreigners Gain Access

Saudi Arabia’s stock market, which opened to foreigners on Monday, closed lower as local investors cashed in after a runup earlier this year, while international institutions largely stayed away on valuation concerns.

With Stocks 3% Off Record Highs, Investor Confidence Crashes To “Extreme Fear”

You know The Fed has suppressed vol too low for too long when stocks drop 3% from their all-time record-est highs and sentiment collapses into “Extreme Fear”…

For some context…

All 7 of the underlying components are now flashing red…

Source: CNN Money

Volkswagen to be revamped into four holding companies: sources

BERLIN/FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Volkswagen’s corporate structure will be overhauled into a decentralized system with four holding companies in a bid to boost profits at Europe’s largest carmarker, three VW sources said on Monday.

On The Floridian Clod & Hillary Is The New Nixon

Submitted by James Kunstler via Kunstler.com,

The Floridian clod seeking to don the mantle of Millard Fillmore made an amazing foreign policy speech at an economic conference in Berlin last week. Inveighing against Russian President Vladimir Putin, he gave a very vivid impression of a man who has no idea what he is talking about.

“Russia must respect the sovereignty of all of its neighbors. And who can doubt that Russia will do what it pleases if its aggression goes unanswered?”

Jeb Bush was averring elliptically to the failed state formerly known as Ukraine, trying to put over the shopworn story that Russia was needlessly making war on its neighbor (and former province).

“Bush called for increased clarity on what type of sanctions would be imposed on the country if Prime Minister Vladimir Putin does not back down against a united international front…. ‘I don’t think we should be reacting to bad behavior [Bush said]. By being clear what the consequences of “bad behavior” is in advance, I think we will deter the kind of aggression that we fear from Russia. But always reacting, and giving the sense we’re reacting in a tepid fashion, only enables the bad behavior of Putin.'”

Note, by the way, that here is yet another scion of the Bush clan who was inexplicably brought up speaking Ebonics: “What the consequences… is?” Say what?

Ukraine became a failed state due to a coup d’état engineered by Barack Obama’s state department. US policy wonks did not like the prospect of Ukraine joining Russia’s regional trade …

Our Phantom Economy

Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog,

Those who believe that phantom recoveries and phantom metrics can be substituted for reality are in for a shock in the next downturn.

Stripped of artifice, there are only two kinds of media stories: those that support the status quo narrative, and those that are skeptical of that narrative. What is the status quo narrative? Simply this: not only is this the best possible arrangement of labor, assets and money, it is the only possible arrangement of labor, assets and money.
It is impossible to challenge a system that is the only possible arrangement; the only option is to accept it.
In effect, the mainstream media is a vast Psychological Operation (PSYOPS) aimed at persuading the American public that the status quo Imperial system of predatory, debt-based crony-capitalism that benefits the few at the expense of the many is not just beneficial to all its debt-serfs and welfare recipients, but it is the only possible system–there is no alternative(TINA).
One of the greatest and most important PSYOPS of the Imperial State (U.S. Government) and its faithful lapdog the mainstream media is the unemployment rate. As I will show tomorrow, the real unemployment rate is between 20% and 40%, depending on whether you think someone earning $1,500 a year selling stuff on eBay and Etsy should be counted as “employed.”
&n …

CVS Health to buy Target’s pharmacy business for $1.9 billion

(Reuters) – Drugstore operator CVS Health Corp said it will acquire Target Corp’s U.S. pharmacy and clinics businesses in a $1.9 billion deal that will help it bargain with drug makers for lower prices.

A “Pivotal” Week (But No Time For Cowboys)

It is fair to say, Bloomberg’s Richard Breslow dares to say – without being trite, that this really is a very interesting pivotal week we are heading into.

The FOMC trying to thread the needle of moving on, keeping everyone calm and keeping a wary eye on a geopolitical landscape that isn’t getting better. Greek negotiations that layer existential questions of problem resolution paralysis on top of default and Grexit. And let’s not forget MERS, Turkey coalition issues, Hong Kong bomb makers, Ukraine and meaningful MPCs given Kuroda’s comments, CHF wariness and NOK economic projections. Feels to me like Act 4 of Macbeth, “Double, double toil and trouble.” Lots of predictions, forecasts and pronouncements, but what will it all really mean and should we beware what we ask for?

Really no good news from Europe on the Greek front. Yet everyone still thinks the base case is some cobbled together patch. EUR/USD hasn’t made a serious attempt to get back below 1.1100 in the last week and the way it has traded around that level it is certainly a support area to be watched and respected. So 1.11/1.14 remains a very profitable range to trade. Greece is saved on the bid. Coeure and Merkel on the offer. EUR vols are higher but more reflective of intra-day opportunities than belief in a breakout

The one question that markets haven’t addressed is the third alternative beyond Greece is saved and Grexit. That is, default and no exit. That will be the biggest threat to the EU, EUR and the lift-off scenario. Unlikely SNB makes a move before this plays out

Take a look at YTD USD/JPY, and despite the end of May leap, it has done very little. It trades like 120.00 is pretty much fair value and forays too far away from there are the aberrations. And I’m a USD bull.