Archives: November , 2014

The US Dollar – Novus Ordo Seclorum

Below excerpt courtesy of Hedge Fund Insight

Nov 17 2014 by Neil Azous Managing Member of Rareview Macro LLC

Most of us hand over dollar bills every day without ever really looking at them very closely. They are too familiar. But if you pause to look closely at the one dollar bill, you will see, right below the one-eyed pyramid, the Latin phrase “Novus Ordo Seclorum”.

The literal English translation of that is “a new order of the ages.” Taken from a book by the Roman poet Virgil, it first appeared on the Seal of the United States, and made its way onto the currency in 1835, where it has stayed ever since. Virgil was not a man to use words carelessly, so when he wrote it, he must have intended to emphasize “new” and, therefore, put it first in the sentence and in front of “ordo.”

A few readers might find that a slightly esoteric digression into Roman and monetary history, of little relevance to the markets today. In fact, they would be wrong. We started with that overlooked phrase because, over the second half of 2014, the professional investment community has come to believe that the US Dollar has indeed established a “new order” and the trend is now here for “the ages”. Continue reading

China Marts Open For Lunch & Dinner: ETFs Hot Menu Item; Fortune Cookie Reviews Say: “Sweet, Sour & Soggy”

chinesemenuA MarketsMuse special update, courtesy of compiling various columns from Bloomberg, ETF.com, Fortune and a special treat: this piece was sponsored by Mr. Chow’s! (see below)

After much fanfare, the “Shanghai-Hong Kong Stock Connect” is officially connected and ostensibly, this will be the link between brokers, dealers, ETF Issuers and global investors seeking access to a menu of mainland China stocks and bonds, whose market value is more than $4.2tril (if anyone knows another acronym for ‘Trillion”, please email us or simply comment below!). Even if trade volumes during the first 2 days appeared soggy (which some attribute to aversion to MSG, not China stocks or ETFs), this is a story that, according to many experts, is a watershed moment.

Noted Neil Azous, principal of global macro strategy think tank, Rareview Macro LLC,  “This is a transformational event. Though the first day ‘scorecard’ indicates that retail/local investor support in Shanghai has proven successful out of the gate, institutional interest is still nascent, as evidenced by the big drop in Hang Seng share prices yesterday.” Added Azous, “Because the liberalization of markets is 1 of 4 key anchors to China’s long-term game plan, it is easy to expect that the opening of China markets to foreign investors might be incremental, but also integral to the evolution of the global financial marketplace.”

Below please find a collection of excerpts and ETF mentions that MarketsMuse has ‘cherry-picked’ from news outlets: Continue reading

neil azous-global-macro

Global Macro Trading Update: Euro Short-Covering Inspires US Dollar Profit Taking

MarketsMuse coverage courtesy of out takes from a.m. edition of commentary produced by global macro trading guru Neil Azous, principal of macro-strategy think tank Rareview Macro LLC.. Editors Note: Aside from the prescience of “Sight Beyond Sight” outlooks throughout the past year (including select/specific and since successful trade ideas i.e. FX, Commodities (e.g. gold) and equities, Rareview’s process is uniquely aligned with the fundamental thesis embraced by the very smartest investors re macroeconomic investing: “mitigate exposure to risk, capture alpha in a conservative way, and never stay married to a position, particularly when the herd of wannabees comes to the party just when it seems like the main course has been consumed and coffee and desert are just starting to be served. 

Risk in Very Near-Term is a Euro Short Covering Rally…Closed Core Long US Dollar Positions

 A Lot of Importance Being Assigned to this Weeks US Inflation Data
 Federal Reserve Following Bank of England a Clear Talking Point
 Model Portfolio Update – November 14, 2014 COB: +0.27% WTD, +0.70% MTD,+17.57 % YTD

A Euro exchange rate short covering rally is the greatest risk going into the end of the week. The speed and degree of that is yet to be determined but our expectation is the Euro-Dollar (EUR/USD) will trade above 1.27 and if the US CPI on Thursday disappoints many investors will find themselves in a very difficult position.

After getting long on the US Dollar before the consensus on July 3rd we have reduced 100% our long exposure this morning. The following updates were sent in real-time via Twitter:

 Sold 1180 DXZ4 at 87.61.

 Sold 100% of USD/CHF at .9590.

The combination of our outperformance, lack of inspiration and our confusion over where the market will go next are the main reasons for that decision.

Options Mart Innovation: Now a 20-Minute Contract

What will they think of next? Is trading options with a weekly expiration too long? According to latest news, the newest binary option contract from Nadex, the 20 minute option, might suit some traders’ needs.

The North American Derivatives Exchange (Nadex), a regulated online binary options exchange in the U.S. announced the launch of 20-minute binary options contracts earlier this week.

The new contracts are geared at retail traders who have a short-term speculative focus and want to get involved in the options market. The new 20-minute binary contracts will be listed between the hours of 9:40am and 4pm EST, Monday through Friday and are available on the top U.S. Index products.
Prior to the launch, Nadex options have had hourly, daily and weekly expiration time. Prior to the launch, Nadex options have had hourly, daily and weekly expiration times. Nadex’s new binary contracts will have durations of 20 minutes, with expirations on the hour, at 20 minutes after the hour and 40 minutes after the hour

In just one week, options contracts with an expiration of 20 minutes have become the second most popular offering on trading platform Nadex, as retail investors seek faster and faster gratification. Continue reading

US Equities: Lower Is More Likely Than Higher: A RareView Global Macro View Point

Below is excerpt from opening lines of today’s edition of “Sight Beyond Sight”, the macro-strategy commentary courtesy of Stamford, CT-based think tank Rareview Macro LLC. Our thanks to firm principal Neil Azous for the following observations.

Neil Azous, Rareview Macro LLC
Neil Azous, Rareview Macro LLC

Model Portfolio Update:   Significantly Reduced Equity Net Long Exposure

Our inspiration level today is almost as low as the price of gold – that is, close to touching a low for the year.

We are struggling to find a meaningful macro catalyst or new top-down theme. None of the specific ideas we have analyzed recently are an “A Trade” and we will not deploy them ourselves, or ask you to either. The risk-reward in the short-term in many consensus themes are up 1 and down 2, not the profile of up 3 and down 1 that in the past we have always looked for.

In fact, we are finding that the psychology that has driven us all year is dissipating and for the first time we are more concerned about giving back performance in the model portfolio than generating further profits.

In the absence of a new opportunity, and following a period of healthy outperformance, a dilemma has arisen for us – markets/positions by nature mean revert. Now everyone has their own metric they watch for,  and their own threshold for the mean reversion in their portfolio to start with. But let us just say that ours has been breached and it has served us well in the past to pay attention to that.

Now that may not be the case for many of you, and if we were in your position there is little question we would be pursuing the same ideas/themes in order to catch up with our benchmark. For today, we have little to offer you. However, like the Homebuilder seasonality and beta observation made yesterday (reminder BZH reported this morning and is in small cap basket we presented), we will continue to highlight ideas as and when they arise.

So in that spirit, we significantly reduced our net long equity exposure. Continue reading

Arab Spring Comes to Saudi Bourse; BlackRock Leads ETF Charge in Advance of Doors Opening to Foreign Investors;

broker_dealer_logo_light Below courtesy of brokerdealer.com blog update

Based on recent developments, global investors are now slated to drill for stakes in Saudi Bourse offerings thanks to yesterday’s announcement from ETF behemoth BlackRock, coupled with the next year’s scheduled opening of markets to foreign investors, whose appetite for stakes in Middle East companies is expected to surpass demand for oil, currently the country’s primary export.

Excerpts below courtesy of Bloomberg LP reporting by Arif Sharif

arab spring
BlackRock Inc. (BLK) plans to start an exchange-traded fund for Saudi Arabian shares as the biggest Arab bourse prepares to open its market to foreigners. The world’s largest money manager has sought approval for its iShares MSCI Saudi Arabia Capped ETF from the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission, according to a filing posted on the SEC’s website. The fund will seek to track the results of an MSCI provisional Saudi Arabia index, according to the filing.

Continue reading

SEC Flip-Flops on Non-Transparent ETFs; What’s Next? “NextShares!” ; Eaton Vance 18, BlackRock: 0

Neale Donald Walsch - Believing is SeeingA MarketsMuse Special column….

Within less than 2 weeks after the all-visionary SEC blocked NYSE Arca from listing non-transparent, actively managed ETFs developed by ETF Industry icon BlackRock Inc., as well as those designed by upstart Issuer Precidian Investments (see MM edition Oct 23), this past Thursday, the same almighty securities regulator over-ruled itself and approved a different set of similarly non-transparent and actively-managed ETFs concocted by Eaton Vance, a competing ETF powerhouse and multi-billion asset manager within the $2tril + exchanged-traded fund marketplace.

Why was BlackRock “boxed out from under the board”, yet Eaton Vance victorious in the eyes of the SEC, the agency that is presumably mandated to protect retail investors from fund managers who prefer not to disclose their so-called ‘secret strategy sauce’? Its a head-scratcher for sure, particularly when the SEC’s turn-down ruling against BlackRock included the following statement: Continue reading

Professional Traders Lining Up to Sell SPX For the Wrong Reasons: Be Wary of the Good Idea Fairy: A Rareview View

Below commentary is courtesy of extract from a.m. edition of today’s Rareview Macro’s “Sight Beyond Sight”

A Simple View:  US Dollar, Gold, SPX, UST’s

Neil Azous, Rareview Macro LLC
Neil Azous, Rareview Macro LLC

The objectives we have laid out continue to materialize across the themes we are focused on.

The Q&A session with President Mario Draghi following today’s European Central Bank (ECB) meeting has concluded. We will leave it to the people with PHDs to debate the intricacies of what he had to say. But if price is the voting machine that always tells you the truth, then the weakness in the Euro exchange rate highlights that the press conference was simply dovish. Expect these same PHD’s to keep chasing as they lower their price targets again.

As evidenced in our most recent editions of Sight Beyond Sight, there was little doubt that Draghi would not strike a dovish tone. With his emphasis on a unanimous vote for further action if necessary and formally adding in the notion that the ECB’s balance sheet will return to 2012 levels (i.e. ~1 trillion higher), Draghi did a good job of walking back the negative tone that the media have tried to portray over the last 48-hours, especially the speculation about an internal battle/dissent/revolt building up against Draghi.

For us, it was never about whether the professionals sold the Euro after the event. They were going to do that anyway as the trading dynamics continue to point towards the Euro buckling under its own weight regardless of what Draghi says. Instead, we were more focused on a short covering event not materializing ahead of tomorrow’s US employment data and that has been largely removed for today.

So those bearish have to contend with the following factors: Continue reading

Global Macro View: The Best Bet Based On Mid-Term US Elections, Traders’ Pattern Recognition and Plain Smart Thinking

Global macro trading perspective courtesy of Rareview Macro Nov 3 edition of Sight Beyond Sight. MarketsMuse Editor Note: Rareview Macro’s model portfolio has gained 16.5% YTD, during which time the majority of macro-style funds have returned less than 5% on average, illustrating why this newsletter is more than just a newsletter.

Neil Azous, Rareview Macro LLC
Neil Azous, Rareview Macro LLC

We start with the global benchmark for beta and risk – the S&P 500. The debate amongst professionals is focused on two big issues:

  1.  An expectation that seasonality will override any negative factors.
  1.  There is historical precedent for consolidation and/or weakness. If weakness were to become the overriding theme, then it could be longer and deeper than expected because a series of market studies that looked at the speed and degree of the recent gains show a poor risk/reward profile in the near term.

So which is it?

After speaking with 10 investors in our circle, all of whom we respect, the current score is that 7 would side with seasonality being the overriding factor and 3 are calling for a 5% pullback in the S&P 500 and expect the market to remain range bound for the remainder of the year.

Personally, we struggle with this debate and the 7-3 scorecard. We pride ourselves on not being dogmatic in our views, especially around bulls, bears, inflation, deflation or simplifying our model portfolio into two polar viewpoints. This is particularly true given this stock market is well-known for behaving in unprecedented ways.

What we would say instead is this: Continue reading

Wall Street’s Mischler Financial Announces Veteran’s Day Profit Pledge

Immediate News Release

Newport Beach, CA & Stamford, CT, November 3, 2014—Mischler Financial Group (“MFG”), the securities industry’s oldest minority investment bank and institutional brokerage owned and operated by Service-Disabled Veterans announced today that in connection with the firm’s annual recognition of Veteran’s Day, Mischler has expanded its giving-back program and will be supporting 3 separate non-profit organizations in honor of those who have served our country’s military.

dean1
CEO Dean Chamberlain, Mischler Financial Group

In a statement issued by Dean Chamberlain CEO and Principal of Mischler Financial Group, he said, “Through our ongoing commitment to Veterans on Wall Street (VOWS), this Veteran’s Day we are honored to pledge our financial support to The Bob Woodruff Foundation, whose mission is to ensure injured veterans and their families are thriving long after they return home. In addition, we are equally-honored to further extend our commitment to Children of Fallen Patriots, the organization dedicated to providing college scholarships and long-term educational counseling to children of fallen patriots. We also look forward to continuing our commitment to BuildOn.org, the non-profit devoted to inspiring our young generation to drive positive change through community service and education.”

About Mischler Financial Group

Headquartered in Newport Beach, California with regional offices in Stamford, CT, Boston, MA and Chicago, IL. Mischler Financial Group is a federally-certified minority broker-dealer and a Service-Disabled Veterans Business Enterprise that provides capital markets services, agency-only execution within the global equities and fixed income markets and asset management for liquid and alternative investment strategies. Clients of the firm include leading institutional investment managers, corporate and municipal treasurers, public plan sponsors, endowments, and foundations. The firm’s website is located at http://www.mischlerfinancial.com

Continue reading

ETFs in Europe: What’s Next?: Continent’s First Corporate Share Buyback ETF Courtesy of Powershares

Below extract courtesy of Wealth Manager Magazine

The Invesco subsidiary Powershares officially launched its European PowerShares Global Buyback Achievers Ucits on the London Stock Exchange on 28 October.

The ETF, which is the first of its kind to be available in Europe according to Morningstar, invests in companies which have bought back at least 5% of their own shares in the past twelve months.

It tracks the Nasdaq Global Buyback Achievers Net Total Return Index, comprising securities from the Nasdaq US Buyback Achievers Index, through full physical replication as well as the Nasdaq International Buyback Achievers Index.

Bryon Lake, head of Invesco Powershares said: ‘This new product offers an innovative yet simple factor-based way to invest in global equities. Through the underlying index, the PowerShares Global Buyback Achievers Ucits ETF provides access to a “smart beta” approach to investing in companies that return value by buying back shares.

He added: ‘Buybacks can be more tax efficient than dividends, and this new ETF offers a low-cost, transparent and liquid vehicle through which to access this strategy.’