Notes Today:

• Moody’s sees risk that US banking turmoil can’t be contained. Well, that does not sound very good. 

• WSJ: Elon Musk’s Twitter is now a gigantic $13 billion in debt due to advertisers fleeing to “protect their brands” from Twitter’s toxicity. 

• Yet another crypto dude, Do Kwon, is charged with fraud by US Prosecutors in New York. Could Munger be right and crypto is just an open sewer, full of malicious organisms?

Notes Today: 

• US FED raises interest rates for ninth time in a row despite recent banking turmoil. Recognizing "serious problems" in a small number of banks.

• Trump thinks perp walk in front of cameras might be "FUN." 

• A new paper argues there’s another way to hold big oil accountable for climate damage: trying companies for homicide. 

• Ford is about to break out big EV losses for the first time. Ford will begin reporting its financial results by business unit, instead of by region. The changes amount to the most detailed look yet by any legacy automaker into finances behind EV business. 

Very Interesting Chart:  

Periods When to Make Money

Via https://twitter.com/AlessioUrban  retweeted

Menthor Q@MenthorQpro

This chart is crazy, made in 1875 by Samuel Benner showing periods of panic, good time to sell assets and good times to buy. Mind blowing that he predicted so many events. Really telling. Don’t have the source someone sent it to me.

 

S&P 500 stocks making 52 week lows (36)

Instrument Name	Close	Symbol
Advance Auto Parts Ord Shs	119.4	AAP
Alexandria Real Estate Equities REIT Ord Shs	120.87	ARE
Allstate Ord Shs	105.11	ALL
American International Group Ord Shs	47.24	AIG
Assurant Ord Shs	104.92	AIZ
Bank of America Ord Shs	27.82	BAC
Baxter International Ord Shs	37.58	BAX
Boston Properties REIT Ord Shs	51.1	BXP
Camden Property Trust REIT Ord Shs	101.72	CPT
Centene Ord Shs	62.55	CNC
CF Industries Holdings Ord Shs	70.93	CF
CVS Health Ord Shs	74.37	CVS
DISH Network Ord Shs Class A	9.1	DISH.O
DXC Technology Ord Shs	22.92	DXC
Fifth Third Bancorp Ord Shs	24.95	FITB.O
First Republic Bank Ord Shs	23.03	FRC
Healthpeak Properties Ord Shs	20.74	PEAK.K
Hormel Foods Ord Shs	38.35	HRL
Huntington Bancshares Ord Shs	10.34	HBAN.O
Kimco Realty REIT Ord Shs	17.67	KIM
Lincoln National Ord Shs	20.3	LNC
Lumen Technologies Ord Shs	2.48	LUMN.K
M&T Bank Ord Shs	122.5	MTB
MetLife Ord Shs	54.87	MET
Newell Brands Ord Shs	11.39	NWL.O
Norfolk Southern Ord Shs	203.9	NSC
PNC Financial Services Group Ord Shs	123.72	PNC
Prudential Financial Ord Shs	78.02	PRU
Signature Bank Ord Shs	70	SBNY.O
SVB Financial Group Ord Shs	106.04	SIVB.O
Truist Financial Ord Shs	30.56	TFC
US Bancorp Ord Shs	32.95	USB
Westrock Ord Shs	27.07	WRK
Whirlpool Ord Shs	128.45	WHR
Williams Ord Shs	28.3	WMB
Zions Bancorporation Ord Shs	29.94	ZION.O

 

S&P 500 stocks making 52 week highs (3)

ANET.K	Arista Networks Ord Shs		163.26
MKTX.O	MarketAxess Holdings Ord Shs		389.77
NVR	NVR Ord Shs		5503

Notes Today:

• UBS's $3.3 billion buyout of CS met with a big yawn in the S&P futures market so far.

• Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc (BRKa.N) has stepped up its pace of stock buybacks, repurchasing more than $1.8 billion of its own stock this year.

Gold over the previous hump, only just..

• 
  
  
  

 

Latest Dow Theory prediction

3/19/2022 Samll change in Dow Theory Prediction:

   Returning to bullish view if

   DJIA closes above 34581 "and"

   DJTA closes above 15587

 Quick Overview is up to date

A Four-Decade Secret: One Man’s Untold Story of Sabotaging Carter’s Re-election

“History needs to know that this happened,” Mr. Barnes, who turns 85 next month, said in one of several interviews, his first with a news organization about the episode. “I think it’s so significant and I guess knowing that the end is near for President Carter put it on my mind more and more and m
ore. I just feel like we’ve got to get it down some way.”

Better late than never!

Notes Today:

• Trump claims he ‘will be arrested’ on Tuesday in New York criminal case..

• After a pretty epic and  awful 12 months, crypto evangelists are enjoying a moment – what could go wrong?
• First Republic Bank (FRC) was cut to junk by S&P Global  and Fitch
• 

• Reminder: Under Trump, banks  with less than $250bn in assets (SVB -FRC) werefreed from the tightest regulatory scrutiny.

International Criminal Court Issues Arrest Warrant for Putin for War Crimes

The States Parties to the Rome Statute

 

Notes Today:

 

• Pornhub acquired … Ethical Venture bought them. No joke!

• Credit Suisse is exercising an option to borrow $53.75 billion (CHF 50 billion) from the Swiss National Bank - to stay afloat. 

• Goldman raised US recession probability to 35% on banking stress – I would put it a bit higher 50%? 

• March 16 (Reuters) - Bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX made transfers of about $2.2 billion to company founder Sam Bankman-Fried through related entities, the company's new management said. (Btw, why is this dude  out on no money down bail? - remarkable)

• The Baltic Exchange’s main sea freight index, tracking rates for ships carrying dry bulk commodities, snapped its 19-session winning streak on Thursday, weighed by weakness in the capesize and panamax segments. 

  The overall index, which factors in rates for capesize, panamax and supramax shipping vessels, lost 43 points, or about 2.7%, to 1,560 – its biggest dip since Feb. 15. 

  The capesize index lost 128 points, or about 6.1%, to 1,976. 

  Average daily earnings for capesizes, which typically transport 150,000-tonne cargoes such as iron ore and coal, decreased $1,066 to $16,387. 

  Dalian and Singapore iron ore futures slumped on Thursday, along with steel benchmarks in China as sentiment soured, mirroring a broader risk aversion triggered by fears of a banking crisis.  (Helllenic Shipping)

 

 Vacant US office space

 

Notes today:

• Deploying regulators: Treasury department reviewing us bank exposure to credit swiss..
• Credit Swisse: Today’s 24% share price decline eclipses even the worst days of the Global Financial Crisis of 2008. (weekly chart)
• Probability of default is 47% - so says the market (CDS).

"There is never just one cockroach in the kitchen" Warren Buffett 

With more cockroaches making an appearance, could gold perhaps  take out the previous hump?

Regulators have been warning for some time of the myriad crypto risks seeping into the mainstream banking system, comparing them directly to the $1.3 trillion subprime mortgage market that incentivized greed, exploited regulatory arbitrage and eventually led to the 2008 economic meltdown. 

 

Notes today:

Lawrence H. Summers on CNN: SVB committed one of the most elementary errors in banking: borrowing money in the short term and investing in the long term. When interest rates went up, the assets lost their value and put the institution in a problematic situation. 

Quite true Larry, however borrowing short and lending long is what banks always do and have always done - it’s the only thing banks seem to know how to do. (see banking and commercial real estate)

Perhaps the Fed (and the regulation opposing dudes) could make sure that all banks have a risk manager in "place" (and not  across the country away from the rest of SVB’s top fools) that understands duration and conceivably even understands how to hedge a bond portfolio. Perhaps someone could point these risk managers to the futures exchanges.

This stuff is learnable. 

• In a case that starkly illustrates the deadly consequences that the US’s permissive gun culture has on the country’s youth, a three-year-old girl accidentally shot her four-year-old sister to death in their Texas home late on Sunday, according to authorities.

• Biden approves controversial Willow oil drilling project in Alaska.👎

 

Notes today:

• Recession may arrive sooner than anticipated..

• First Republic (FRC) down more than 60% in premarket trading as measures taken by regulators so far fail to calm investors.

• Silicon Valley Bank's depositors are helped, equity and bondholders are being wiped out. 

• Signature Bank (crypto scheme focused) closed by regulators ..

• Former board member 

•   

• Ayn Rand  - not so popular in silicon valley today.. But no worries, welfare for adherents,
  hypocrites and frauds -  continues...

• The decision of the Swiss authorities to destroy decommissioned but fully operational and not obsolete air defence systems instead of deliver/sell them to Ukraine is like a decision to destroy bread amid famine. It is way more than just coldness or lack of empathy. It is cruelty. Sergej Sumlenny @sumlenny

• The Russia situation:
• Artist:
  @Patbagley
  
  
• 
  
  
  

 

Billions Worth of Crypto Trades at Risk as Bank Shutdowns Take Toll...

Crypto: I just avoid it as if it were an open sewer, full of malicious organisms,” Munger said in an interview with the Australian Financial Review.

• Nassin Nicholas Taleb on Crypto / Bitcoin     (Internalize)

• "'It turned out that one of the biggest risks to our business model was catering to a very tightly knit group of investors who exhibit herd-like mentalities,' said a [SVB] executive.... 'I mean, doesn’t that sound like a bank run waiting to happen?'" https://ft.com/content/b556badb-8e98-42fa-b88e-6e7e0ca758b8

 

Quick Overview is up to date

• Silicon Valley Bank chief pressed Congress to weaken risk regulations 😫Touting “SVB’s deep understanding of the markets it serves, our strong risk management practices”.....

• German banks also suffering due to SVBC collapse. German Bank index at 1980 levels..