The Vatican Isn’t Feeling The Bern, Lays Into Sanders For Inviting Himself to Event

One of the robe wearing psychotics at the Vatican called Sanders’ move to invite himself to a catholic conference, 4 days ahead of the NY primaries, “monumental discourtesy.”

Politicians are an incorrigible lot and this small event in time and space make me smile, ear to ear. Imagine the frown B. Sanders has on his face right now, after reading the response from the Vatican. This is a man who couldn’t care less about religion, who is assuredly an atheist, getting rebuked by leaders of a religion that he doesn’t even belong to. The only reason why he’s attempting to go in the first place is because of some asshole staffer, who cited some poll data, and thought it’d make a neat press clipping to curry the favor of idiot catholic fence sitting voters.

“Sanders made the first move, for the obvious reasons,” Margaret Archer, president of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, which is hosting the conference Sanders will attend, said in a telephone interview. “I think in a sense he may be going for the Catholic vote but this is not the Catholic vote and he should remember that and act accordingly — not that he will.”

Clearly, the Pope isn’t feeling The Bern.

Morons.

Never shy to declare wanton doom, Nouriel Roubini suggested that if England left the EU, the Scotts would leave England, the Catalonians would leave Spain and Norway and Greece would leave the EU too. I am sure if given the chance to discuss this further, Nouriel would’ve predicted Texas secession and a fucking break-off of the state of California, which would then drift and ram itself (homo) into N. Korea–at which point the former American state would become a prison torture camp for all inhabitants.

What the hell is going on here? According to Charlie’s Twitter account, Valeant was rumored to be putting its Bausch Lomb division for sale.

Maybe these bankers were simply playing a hypothetical game at one of Charlie’s favorite watering holes? At ant rate, the man, the myth, the Legend of Montauk, Bill Ackman, shot down these rumors, saying “It’s a core asset. “We’re only considering selling non-core assets.”

Since Pershing basically runs Valeant now, I’ll take him at his word.

Bankers are likely combing over all of Valeant’s assets, looking for parts to sell. Naturally, the Bausch division would be of supreme interest to any banker, as it would be easy to sell and fetch a high premium.

Shares of VRX are slightly lower today, off by 3%.

Oil stocks are crushing to the upside this morning, off an astounding 5.5% move in WTI. Some will tell you that the 4/17 OPEC meeting, which might impose a production freeze, is the catalyst. Truth is, there are no real reasons for these moves. It’s simply a matter of liquidity, sloshing in and out of assets.

Traders are making bets, just like with horses or Pete Rose baseball games, that XYZ will be able to restructure its debt and survive at $39 WTI.

This is silly poppycock. Hardly any small, marginal, players will thrive at $39 WTI. Then again, maybe WTI will trade back to $60 soon?

Right or wrong, that’s the bet now.

People remember the gains enjoyed the last time crude bottomed in the $30s–back in 2009. They want to repeat that glory.

You can’t blame people for dreaming.

Crude trades like a penny stock now.

WTI is higher by 5% now and a sundry of small, piece of shit, oil stocks are surging higher. Names like OAS and LEI will beat bears senseless with the buckle end of the belt today–mainly because it’s Friday.

NASDAQ futures are indicating unmitigated joy at the open.

The fact that we are to monitor every Fed speech, even assholes from Kansas, has me sick to my stomach. These people are incorrigible and beyond reproach. The audacity and self aggrandizement of the Federa Reserve is at a level that has never been seen before. It’d as if they had total control of the U.S. economy and our legislators were on permanent vacation.

When was the last time we heard anything from the fiscal side? It’s financial engineering all day, every day.

At any rate, the most important Fed head, next to Yellen, gave a speech at the University of Bridgeport (really?) today, citing disinflationary pressures and the need to chill the fuck out on the rate hike, or ‘normalization’, rhetoric.

Futures extended their gains on this news.

“I judge that a cautious and gradual approach to policy normalization is appropriate,” said Dudley, a close ally of Fed Chair Janet Yellen and a permanent voter on policy.

Caution, he added in a dovish tone, is needed “because of our limited ability to reduce the policy rate to respond to adverse developments, recognizing that we could also use forward guidance and balance sheet policies to provide additional accommodation if that proved warranted.”

“Although the downside risks have diminished since earlier in the year, I still judge the balance of risks to my inflation and growth outlooks to be tilted slightly to the downside,” he said at University of Bridgeport.

Low oil and commodity prices “may signal more persistent disinflationary pressures than I currently anticipate, while renewed tightening of financial market conditions could have a greater negative impact,” Dudley said, while “there is significant uncertainty about economic growth prospects abroad.”

Happy Friday.

Italian stocks, led by banks, are surging today on news that a ‘bad bank’ fund will be established and launched as early as Monday.

Here are the to gainers in the eurostoxx 50 now.

While this plan has been known for sometime now, it’s launch date was always in question. The fact that this Italian fund might be ready as early as Monday, investors are using that element of surprise to their advantage by roasting short sellers on the spigot.

Dow futures are up 85.

The boozehounds over at Moody’s concocted a number, seemingly while intoxicated, suggesting that under a dire scenario, banks would only need $9 billion to get back up to snuff with capital requirements.

“Yes, the sector is troubled,” said David Fanger, a Moody’s senior vice president and author of the report. “It will generate losses. But it’s not so large that it will blow a hole in the banks’ assets.”

With close to $400 billion in distressed oil and gas loans and recovery rates at just 20%, my instincts tell me this $9 billion number can grow should a ‘severe’ scenario materialize.

Is this even relevant? As I watched this, I thought to myself  ‘gee, this guy is somewhat dimwitted and lacks energy’ (extra Trump). He’s not telling me anything worthwhile, but maybe it will help some clown out there who thinks the fucking world is a giant rainbow with unicorns committing acts of fellatio on it.

It’s mid-evening, so I figured now was the time to attempt to scare you, in order to deprive you of sleep. I understand a great many of you are long stocks, myself included. With that in mind, have a look at this (extra Large Marge)!

To put that chart into actual numbers, here are the returns of the HYG v the XLF. Notice how wide that divergence is year to date.

That’s almost a 10% differential! You people are smoking large bags of heroin if you think buying some dumbfuck oil pipeline company is a better investment than JPM or GS.

A reckoning is coming.