Markets today

Everyone is focussed on the presidential election. It’s an extremely ugly slow-motion car crash. It seems unbelievable that any good will come of it, but somehow within a week or so at max (surely?) we’ll know the result. The markets seem to have risk off fatigue …

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VIX about to take off?

I am a fan of The Market Ear. Usually they post interesting charts. Today’s post was them talking to “The VIX guy” who said that the VIX was heading higher. Certainly, a lot of overvalued (IMHO) stocks are trending lower. Maybe this is when …

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Companies House

It’s nice to know that Companies House is focussed on diversity and inclusivity issues. It’s just a pity that it cannot bring as many resources to check key information on directors and shareholders of the legal entities in the registers it maintains. As anyone who has …

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Mid session comment

Most global equity markets down ~2.5% or more. MA down on earnings miss. Social media and Google stocks down because of congressional hearing. This is the sort of market where everything that can be sold is sold. The FAANG stocks are all faltering, but they have …

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ACB Confirmed

Amy Coney Barrett is now a SCOTUS judge. I don’t suppose she’ll be quite as bad as the progressives fear, but it’s depressing that the judicial pillar is so heavility politicized in the US. The root case is the extent to which power is concentrated …

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Opening call

Things seem risk off. Mondays in Europe are odd, because the US sets the tone for markets, but DX is up, commodities are generally down, European equities down quite a bit (ESTX50 down 1.4%). 10 years are up (yields down). This is almost a full house of …

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Fragments

House sales are up a lot.

Some FAANG type stocks are beginning to crumble,

• $NFLX Netflix fell nearly 10% as user growth and profits disappointed
• $SNAP Snap rose over 40% as ad revenue grew over 50% and brands resume advertising spending
• $TSLA Tesla ended down on the week. The …

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Well done Robert Armstrong

In this piece, the author explains why ESG investing is not going to work. Basically, ESG funds have outperformed because they are stuffed with FAANG stocks (which are notionally green, although often have terrible corporate governance). This is not going to work forever. The article is …

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Wrap

Equities, yields, commodities, dollar (vs Euro) up. Precious metals down. NDX flat, $INTC down.

News

US election, stimulus measures (UK & US), Covid, regional lockdowns, Brexit. The usual suspects. No real resolution.

I was busy with personal stuff today. Normal service to be resumed tomorrow, hopefully. Something to ponder:

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Steepener in mainstream

The FT devoted a long article about the steepener trade. The headline was that Biden would cause long-dated bond yields to blow. Various authorities were quoted, including Paul Singer, Russell Clark, Dymon Capital, as well as an analyst at JPM.

This will not happen overnight, and it …

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