FRANTIC SCRAMBLE TO THE ARK: Treasuries Enjoy Best Start to a New Year Since 2008

Go ahead and laugh at me, as I build the ark, packing giraffe’s, zebra and a few humans onto it. I am not the only one buying treasuries. As a matter of fact, it has become a hedge fund fav.

I am going to quote a retard from BBG news in a second. Just know, I haven’t the slightest idea where he’s getting his numbers from. I posit he’s looking at shorter duration treasuries.

Treasuries have returned 3.1 percent this year, the best start to a year since 2008, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch index data, amid financial-market volatility and concern that global growth is slowing. Fed officials this month lowered their median projection to two interest-rate increases in 2016 from four at the December meeting. Fed Chair Janet Yellen said this week that an uncertain global environment calls for a more gradual approach to tightening policy.

“The tone of the market has changed dramatically” since Yellen spoke, said Thomas Roth, senior Treasury trader in New York at Mitsubishi UFJ Securities USA Inc. “The rate structure changed, the curve changed, and today is a continuation of that.’’

TLT, 20 yr+ treasuries, are higher by 9% for 2016, no including dividends, which are paid monthly. This is, by far, the single best, low beta, performer of 2016. When it’s all said and done, people just want a little yield. The oil space and their spastic pipeline schemes have imploded. The high yield ETFs have proven to be heart attack material. So, and in very somber tones, investors have put hat in hand and gotten on the government treasury line. It’s a very sad thing to see, all of these once virile men hiding in treasuries.

Nevertheless, I am playing TLT strategically and couldn’t care less about dividends, although I gladly accept them. I am holding TLT until the yield curve, 2s and 10s, inverts. That will equate to supreme winship on my behalf. I might even get to sell TLT 20, 30 maybe 40 points higher from current prices.

After announcing that they’d hired JP Morgan to discuss ‘takeover approaches’ and this morning’s Credit Suisse note that said the company was worth $75 on a takeover, the entirety of the biotech sector–led by MDVN–has caught fire today. It’s worth noting, the $75 target, affixed by Credit Suisse on a takeover, is an all-time high. This has the crazy people out shopping biotech again.

INCY +6%
BMRN +6%
JAZZ +6%
ALNY +7%
SGEN +4%
IONS +5.5%
JUNO +5.5%

Then you have a slew of smaller biotechs, like RARE, ACRS, EDIT, up double digits. We’ve seen this all before. Nevertheless, biotech has been the worst performer of Q1, lower by 27%. Many of these stocks are down 50% over the past 6 months, due to political jawboning and also because of VRX. The core thesis against the sector is that pricing power will dissipate, as the politicians crack down on predatorial, Valeant like, practices.

We’ll see about that.

It was a very fanciful quarter. I hope you enjoyed this version of capitalism, as markets careened lower then picked itself up to soar to new heights. Sure, this was standard operating procedure for many years. We’ve just been a little spoiled by the manipulation and absence of volatility.

Nevertheless, my core thesis remains deeply embedded in the fundamentals.

As such, I am here to remind you that you have, all of you have, just 3 weeks to leave the stock market–or else burn in the fires of vengeance. This Federal Reserve trick of playing good and bad cop every other day, menacing us with sticks, then placating us with carrots, is going to blow up–as sure as I’m sitting here. The next time Yellen offers us one of her carrots, it will be a stick of dynamite and we’ll all blow up.

Ironically, due to Exodus, I am long SPY now, so I don’t mind a little upside. My XLE short will work, providing I am afforded enough time to see it through. If you recall, I am mitigating risk my limiting my holding period to just 10 trading days. 2016 is something of an experiment for me, so bear with the methodical nature of my robotic investment style.

Deep down, all I want is for the market to burn. All of the perfidy and corruption and seasoned mountebanks need a comeuppance. God willing, all of them with suffer greatly, and soon!

I’ve always hated gold. I found it to be a supreme waste of time when allocating dollars to invest. But in 2016, the embattled sector, often maligned by soft money loving critiques, has been nothing short of stellar.

The raw commodity shot higher by 15.5% in Q1, the best quarterly return in 25 years. More than that, gold stocks were up 50 some odd percent, with HMY being the best performer–higher by an astounding 300%.

“The dovish remarks by Yellen earlier this week which reinforced the Fed’s stance to proceed gradually and cautiously with rate hikes this year have weighed on the U.S. dollar index, which is a positive for gold,” Vyanne Lai, an economist at National Australia Bank Ltd., said by e-mail. “Investment demand for gold appears to be holding up.”

The only sector that has done better is silver, +69%. Foreign utilities followed gold for the third best performing sector, up 32%.

Throw seasonality out the window when half the industry is scheduled (British annunciation) to go by the wayside. Listen to me, these companies are going down. Their main source of income is maligned each and every day by sordid people. There is a war to crush marginal suppliers and to bankrupt the weak. For all of the talk about impending doom in the oil patch, the raw commodity getting halved over the past nine months, the components of the major oil index are up 7.5% for 2016. Moreover, the smaller capped, highly debt-burdened names, are up more than 35% since February. There aren’t any budget reductions or financial rejiggering that will save these small companies.

They are going out.

Instead of handling this in the streets and selling short small cap sticks of dynamite, I am short the majors, via XLE. Stocks like XOM, CVX and SLB have boomed in 2016, due to a misconception that because they are large and likely to survive–they are good. Since when has the bar been this low, and the onus of only surviving, been good enough for successful investing? This is preposterous.

In my estimation, both oil and oil related stocks will go back to the February lows. The 6-10% returns that are widespread amongst the oil majors will be needled, rescinded and then crushed.

In spite of the 35% rally in energy related equities since February, there is still over $200 billion in distressed debt, defined by companies whose debt/eq levels are greater than 5. Just behind that, looking at the debt of companies whose debt/eq ratios are between 2 & 5, the level of doom swells to $447 billion.

In all, there is a storm brewing that can annihilate the market place and wreak havoc upon those being ‘sophisticatedly invested’, like morons, in the high yield space.

I’ve been writing here since 2007 and before that on my blogspot locale since 2005. I rarely maintain a short bias and always default to a bullish demeanor. Many have accused me of being permanently bullish, a term that I wore with a badge of honor. Yes, like so many others, I too called the 2008 crash. The only difference between them and me is I have proof to back it up. Go seek out my archives.

While some of you lament of the somber tone that I’ve put forth since 2016 had begun, this is my position and it’s one that I will not waiver from. Either I save a great many of you from the dangers that lie ahead, or you ignore me and go about your business like you always had had done before. There isn’t a hesitant bone in my body or a scenario that could alter my opinion. This will happen– and when it does–I will reign over you like a madman atop a mountain of bones, shooting cannons of fire unto those without shelter–crushing my enemies and reducing their flaccid Bernie Sanders like frames into dust.

This is interesting.

In an amended lawsuit filed on Tuesday in Delaware Chancery Court, Appaloosa said SunEdison and various TerraForm directors dismantled TerraForm’s corporate governance and Conflicts Committee, replacing it with a “sham committee” to enable SunEdison to take advantage of TerraForm and stockholders “at will.”

Appaloosa is calling for removal of Peter Blackmore, Jack Jenkins-Stark and Christopher Compton from TerraForm’s Conflicts Committee. Appaloosa had also called for the removal of Brian Wuebbels as TerraForm’s chief executive officer. Late on Wednesday, TerraForm Global said Wuebbels had resigned as president and CEO and as a member of the company’s board of directors, effective immediately.

Wuebbels is SunEdison’s chief financial officer, but SunEdison has announced that he is being replaced as CFO in April 2016.

A spokesman for SunEdison said, “SunEdison continues to believe that Appaloosa’s claims are without merit.” TerraForm did not return emails and telephone calls seeking comment.

All three companies involved are pieces of shit: SUNE, TERP and GLBL. I don’t even know why I am talking about it.

Brian Wuebbels, CFO of SUNE, CEO of GLBL and TERP, has resigned, effective immediately. Instead of fighting Short Hills Mall Tepper in court, Wuebbels decided it made more sense to fire himself and subsequently cower in the corner of his shower, crying like a baby for driving 3 companies into ther ground.

Is there anything insightful to say about this? SUNE is a zero. GLBL might be a zero. And TERP is, whatever.

Moving on.

This is supreme horseshit of the first magnitude.

The differences between the economic outlook and conditions of 1999 to now are so numerous and perverse, I’d be lowering myself to 3rd grade discourse by addressing them. Let’s just summarize the discrepancies as ‘wide-ranging’ and ‘broadly different’, in regard to the depth and growth trajectories concerned. After all, when was the last time the internet was invented?

One of the lemmings from Brandywine Global says we’re gonna reflate like it was 1999. He cites Fed policy divergence from other central banks, a strong dollar, and subsequent collapse of commodities being boolish for stocks.

In the very next sentence, he then says the Fed will remain dovish and commodities will rally, which will bode well for emerging markets–because ‘they’re soooo cheap’, like Oh my God cheap.

He makes zero sense, whatsoever.

This guy wants to eat his cake, eat it too, then have more cake delivered to him via Fedex to repeat the process. Instead, he will get, eventually, the black flag– and driven out from existence in the world of professional money management.

One of my readers sent me a note the other day, bedraggled with rage over my recent Donald Trump advocacy, coupled with ‘click-baiting’ styled blog posts and a wanton disregard for persons on CNBC, as well as my alleged ‘islamophobia’ (it’s worth noting, I am not afraid of muslims).

Since I have nothing to hide, I’ll post his love letter here, in its entirety.

The political discourse on this iBC has become fucking repulsive and completely beneath the likes of learned gentlemen. Where iBankcoin used to cut through the noise of financial markets to deliver epic winship, now we’re drubbed over the head daily with non-seguitar liberal bashing, Trump glorification, Islamophobia, CNBC guest mockery, and of course, endless plugs to join ‘The Ark’. The best, actionable content is completely buried on the main page under a heaping pile of worthless crap.

Fuck that. I’ll be damned if I’m going to spend another dime on this site filled with such mindless, click-baiting horseshit. The Internet is filled to the brim with such dreck. If I wanted to read zerohedge and Breitbart, I’d go to those sites.

I’ll refrain from correcting his numerous and egregious grammatical errors and instead address the obvious. I enjoy publishing ‘piles of shit’ and engaging in ‘non-sequitur’ attacks upon my readers, most of whom are domiciled in government controlled housing tenements. At the present, I am working with Congress to make iBankCoin MANDATORY READING for all those living on the dole, afraid to head out to the corner bodega due to wanton gunfire. Also and admittedly, I do mock CNBC, regrettably so. After further inspection, I’ve found that my anger towards CNBC has more to do with my childhood, growing up with the rats and the thieves in Brooklyn, than the mundane content provided by CNBC.

I do speak of the ark often. I have an obsession with building large vessels and housing giraffes, parrots and jaguars on it.

As far as click-baiting is concerned, I grouchily take exception to that charge, as I regularly dissuade readers from visiting the site. Inception to date, I’ve banned over 3,500 people from visiting these halls and my content is designed for mass consumption, touching on topics ranging from Janet Yellen’s egg sandwich luncheons to impending nuclear war on foreign planets.

As far is Trump is concerned, I just want the wall God damn it. And, more than that, I want those devilish Mexicans to pay for it. America is going to be great again!

For the record, I am long SPY since last week and have a vested in seeing prices rise. But this move higher is more than unjustifiable; it is treasonous!

Back in the old days, men would be whipped at the gibbet for buying stocks on news that the Fed was going to hike rates, one day following news it would not hike rates. In other words, the Yellen Fed has lost all semblances of respectability. Her underlings do not respect her– or she’s playing a duplicitous game of good cop v bad cop, like an idiot in the 4th grade.

The wholesome idea that corporate profits are going to flourish in this environment is inspirational and filled with zest. I invite you to go long equities, into the energetic blades of a lawnmower. While the months of March and even April are a boon for investors, especially those intent on investing like imbeciles, I challenge you to try that sort of vaudeville in May or even June, when markets fall in under the grips of shock therapy–heading into the wondrous vote for BREXIT and the seasonal summer doldrums that should pose as an unstinted bridgehead to the apocalypse.

So Chipotle is now the inverse Jack in the Box (ticker: JACK)? Jack in the Box owns a chain of disgusting hamburger shops and pivoted to the Qdoba brand of slop, after recognizing Chipotle’s immense success serving quality Mexican fare. Lo and behold, times have changed and Chipotle tacos are now synonymous with debilitating food poisoning.

Shares of CMG are higher by $7 or 1.5% on this news.

This is more of an indictment of how poorly the Chipotle brand is struggling to regain its footing than a pivot into a market that is seemingly attractive to restaurateurs. It’s an act of weakness and the stock should be sold.

If CMG wants to play this game right, they should bid $55 for SHAK and help fuel growth under that pristine brand, instead of trying to flip burgers themselves. They’ll likely poison people in their hamburger shops too, since they still haven’t figured out what the culprit was that has caused so many cases of food poisoning.

UPDATE: “We have two non-Chipotle growth seeds open now ? ShopHouse and Pizzeria Locale ? and have noted before that the Chipotle model could be applied to a wide variety of foods,” a spokesman from Chipotle told CNBC.

UPDATE: They have trademarked the name ‘BetterBurger.’