Morning Report

Basically, the price of everything is down, except Treasurys. I guess that’s risk off. Gold is down, along with other metals and soft commodities. Crude is down 2.3%. Lagarde is trying to talk the Euro down. It’s certainly going up against the Turkish Lira, which may be about to implode. Tech is holding up relatively well, but only now $AAPL has already declined 20%.

Trevor Milton, of Nikola was forced out earlier. The stock is down 50% but some banks still rate it as worth something.

It is hard to see this being a risk-off Monday, but the trend has been very strong, and I’m sure the Plunge Protection Team are standing by.

Coins in the fuse box

I had never before heard this metaphor, but Greenspan used it to explain the role of the Fed in the Great Depression. The CBB has a great article about why this time isn’t different. It’s the same stuff about the Fed acting irresponsibly, and not being able to stop inflation when it gets to 2%. The Bulletin is nothing if not consistent, but has a lot of good factual content too.

Conspiracy theory spot

Whitney Webb, who is a bit mad, is convinced that the DNC fixed it for Kamala Harris to become president, in spite of not doing very well in the primaries, by putting Biden in as a shield for her, until he stands down immediately after the election. If it all seems a bit far fetched, it is. But I think we should be allowed to make our own minds up, so I commend to you this episode of the QTR podcast, to hear from the lady herself. She does not sound like a mad conspiracy theorist, but that may say more about my assumptions than objective reality.

It does not seem very radical to suggest that this presidential election is exceptionally polarizing, or that Biden is not obviously the most electable of the main candidates in the Democrat primaries. The increased risk shows up in the term structure of the VIX.

Wrap

Markets were looking rough, but the NDX finished green (as it always does on a Monday), so everything is good. The VIX was up a lot (+1.93), though, and govts. were up. BTC was down 3.7%.

Commodities were down a lot, Silver nearly 8% and NG 10.3%. Gold was down nearly 2%. This was, presumably, driven by a surge in the dollar, e.g. the Euro ending down 0.64% against it.