Why Central Banks Buying Gold & Institutions Hedging the Yields?While many of us celebrate the stock markets reaching new highs, central banks worldwide are actively purchasing gold, and institutions are hedging into treasuries and yields.
Interest rates are determined by the central banks whereas Yields are determined by the investors.
If you choose to lend or borrow money over a longer period, such as 10 or 30 years, you would typically expect to earn or pay more interest for this extended duration loan contract. However, currently, we are witnessing an inversion of this relationship, known as the inverted yield curve, where borrowers are required to pay higher interest on their short-term loans, such as the 2-year yield we're observing, compared to their longer-term borrowing.
2 Year Yield Futures
Ticker: 2YY
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US05Y
US05Y-EU05Y EURUSD, just went long $FXEMy two most recent posts were identifying a potential upcoming trade idea behind Euro bouncing back vs. USD soon, the chart today has made it looked more prime for reversal, finding ever increasing support, and slightly weakening 5 year yields in both Euro and U.S.. The difference between the two looks like it may start to contract a little in the coming weeks as well, which should send Euro higher.
As a slight update to my previous post linked at the bottom, I've updated that chart to include the EU05Y and US05Y yields on the same scale, and the difference between the two (US05Y-EU05Y) on a different scale on the left. It gives a little more complete picture that may help pick out the longer term trend shifts.
Zoomed in some on just the EURUSD, seeing how it's seemingly bottomed out, finding support here, and attempted a sharp rally this morning that was equally sharply rejected, but seems like this it's found support again and the trend for the coming weeks may well be a reversal to the upside for the Euro.
On the 5 year bonds side of things, both have set slightly lower highs than last week, with there being a bigger drop for the US 5 year than the Euro. Possible we're seeing a slow down of those yields going higher, with the US possibly losing a little more yield than the Euro. Seems prime for a reversal after more than a month and a half of the Euro sliding.
With that in mind, I did go long some AMEX:FXE 20 Oct 23 101 strike calls this morning. A little risky and out of the money with some time left, but if this rallies as I hope it will, the payoff should be pretty nice. Trading price at the time of trade was about $98.81. Ask side was 0.30. Contracts in the money at the moment trade for more than 1.00.
EURUSD bull case by way of $IEI support levelTalking some more about EURUSD and why I think it's about ready to have an about face and go back up, looking once more towards something that represents treasuries with maturities in the range I had shown as being useful for indicating EURUSD relationship moves.
NASDAQ:IEI represents 3 to 7 year maturity treasuries, and with the 5 year being the metric I've been using to get a feel for pending EURUSD moves, this could be useful.
The big thing I picked out is the long term support near enough to $113.50. NASDAQ:IEI has bounced off of that multiple times, dating back to last fall, even (I haven't drawn the lower trend line back that far, but you can see it--just before it broke down below that last fall).
We have descending line tracking the highs, compressing price action into this wedge. I have a feeling the lower support line holds and NASDAQ:IEI trends higher. If the underlying bond is going up in value, the yield comes back down.
With that being said, Euro's 5 year trades pretty similarly to the U.S. overall, but sometimes when you come to a juncture like this, one of them will make a larger % move. If the U.S. yield drops faster than the Euro's, EURUSD goes up. Euro yield is likely to drop in tandem with the U.S., I'm just betting it doesn't make as big of a down move, sending EURUSD up.
US05Y-EU05Y difference in bond yields as advance warningAdvance warning of longer term swing in EURUSD Forex pair thanks to difference between US 5 year yield and EU 5 year yield.
The challenge is, while it can point to an upcoming longer shift, it's still not going to tell you the perfect timing for the about face. It of course is not the only thing that will contribute towards a shift in the currency pair, but it is one of the fundamental underlying reasons why shifts can occur, especially during a short term interest rate hike cycle, ultimately leading to an inversion of the shorter term yields above the longer term yields which is what we have today.
First, the 2 year yields and shorter, while good to watch for the rate hike cycles, they can take more time to pick themselves off the mat before an about face. 10 year and higher yields may also change a little too slowly to act as a good signal. The difference between the two 5 year yields seem to be a pretty decent middle ground, though.
For example, below is US02Y-EU02Y:
The most glaring is in 2021, the about face in EURUSD effectively has already happened by the time the difference between the 2 year yields starts showing upwards movement signifying the US 2 year yield is increasing more than the Euro 2 year.
The 10 year, you can see after the US 10 year gets ahead a decent amount, the difference between it and the Euro 10 year flattens out and becomes unclear on signaling the pending reversal that happened in 2022 as EURUSD hits an all time low.
Whereas, back with the difference between the 5 year yields, you can see a clear divergence start several weeks before the EURUSD price shift. With that in mind, the difference in favor of the US yields has been trending up since April while the Euro ping ponged higher somewhat slowly. We may be at the point where the USD resumes its role as wrecking ball, going against the simple channel analysis I bought up just a couple days ago.
A part of me still thinks the Euro has another brief rally back upwards left in it before this confirms and the Euro devalues vs. the dollar on a longer term swing. So, I'm still considering long Euro for now, but if the trending difference between the 5 year yields continues in the meantime, it will be time to flatten and reverse that position.
Japanese Yen & USD Death Spiral In Action - YCC Yin Yang
Things are getting interesting in bond land, Japanese central bank balance sheet increasing after 09 to keep US bond yields down is finally starting to show signs of fail.
This system is starting to break due to investors losing faith in the system.
As faith is lost US bonds are sold, as US bonds are sold Yields go parabolic, Japan has been a US proxy since 09 to keep US yields in place
Stage 1
This works very well from Japan points of view due to how bad 1989 was and how the mentality of debt, leverage got destroyed essentially making the speculation market dead.
It allows the Central Bank Of Japan to create money and allow cheap credit near 0% interest rates without the problem of inflation. Now since 2020 this model has broken and Japan is getting inflation this is almost red alert due to the leverage of money supply in bonds.
Stage 2
US M2 / JP M2 debasement work together making the illusion the DXY is strong when in reality the US is forcing the EU / JP to debase pushing up the DXY.
Japanese Bond Yields have started to break causing actual investors to dump Japan bonds and US Bonds forcing the Japan Central Bank to do hard YCC on both JP and US Bonds.
BUT the increase in us interest rates has sparked even more selling of US Bonds and even more Japan YCC, the treasury debt interest is also almost at 1 Trillion.
Conclusion
Japanese Bonds & The US Bonds are finally in a Yin Yang death spiral feeding off each other and its starting to get out of control, Bank of Japan are even starting to panic.
Japan literally cannot raise interest rates as they would blow up the entire system due to debt interest being the largest holder of US debt.
The FRED will be forced to implement some type of Yield Curve Control on Japanese Debt while giving Japan time to Yield Curve Control the US Debt, meanwhile? Bitcoin is actually moving in correlation with the Japanese Central Bank Balance sheet.
QE To Infinity is closer than people think for those who don't know the US bond market is valued at $51tn.
Japan valued at $12.3tn
This market will have to be forced into QE / YCC as the bonds are the collateral for the world banks if they fail the world fails.
ICARUS , known to most as 2Y-10Y Yield ~ I am nicknaming the 2-10 year yield "Icarus".
Pushing back towards to the sun with haste it would seem .
Kind of interesting how this is off the media radar today .
Oh my wings! See my two wings! How I love to fly!
-The final words between: Icarus, and his father~
DOW JONES LONGS ACTIVE📉📉📉📉 Expecting bullish price action on DOW JONES as we have to make the retracement move because price rejected bullish orderblock area on M15 that acts as a valuable area of ,,support,, if you will. We also have a clear liquidity pool way above the old high (buy side liquidity) 4530. VIX opened in the european market with a huge GAP that should be filled asap, VIX bearish means STOCK go BULLISH.
What do you think ? Comment below..
Visualizing Yield InversionWhen investors have a poor outlook for the economy, what do they do? They buy the longest term debt they can because it's one of the ways to price in the uncertainty of "right now" into the long term. Therefore, rational actors would do something like this:
Buy 30 year treasuries. Buying ensues, yield goes down, price goes up. Eventually 20 year yield becomes greater than 30, as described in purple. Right now for example, you'd get about 3% more yield buying the 20 year VERSUS the 30 year (note: relative yield, not nominal yield), giving us a purple line of 0.968.
The teal line (1.0) is where the relative yields are inverted if the price is below this line. Short term debt pays more than long term debt under this line, which is usually not the case and signals that things are awry.
Now simply repeat this cycle until the rational short term outlook is priced into all irrationally priced long term treasuries. Prices are too low, therefore yields are too high, and rational actors begin buying them. Prices go up, yields go down.
Next up, we have 20Y/10Y (red) at 1.235, which is intriguingly lagging behind the shorter term inversions of 10Y/5Y and 5Y/2Y. If anyone knows why, I would be interested to know! I'm not exactly an expert on debt.
Eventually this cycle repeats until the ratio of short term yields are all very close to long term yields. These conditions always precede a recession, which, by the way, is NOT a well defined term. A recession simply describes "a general decline in economic activity". Not very scientific, is it? Economists utilize a wide range of data to attempt to foresee a recession, yet the outcome is inevitable and uncontrollable. As history shows, any attempt to control the economy and avoid recession (1930s, 1970s) often make things much worse than had policy makers simply let the storm pass initially.
I like to use ratios of yields. Some people subtract the yield of one from the other, which is fine too. I think a ratioized signal is much more pure as ratios rule the world around us. Not only that, given that we're monitoring multiple relative yields, we can get a good overall picture of the current landscape.
Unfortunately there's not much history for the longer term instruments, though as I believe the 30 year has been around for atleast 50 years but only has a few years of TradingView data.
Hopefully the illustrations on this chart along with relative yields help you visualize some of what's happening. I keep this chart of relative yields up ALL the time in a tab! If you have any feedback or comments, I would appreciate it.
Good luck and hedge your bets!
Quick note: In March 2020 not only did the FED setup new centralized repo facilities directly (reverse repo, unprecedented, it's ILLEGAL by the way) and at the same time, engaged in "QE Infinity". In essence there's more avenues at which they are "forced" to buy things that nobody wants. Albeit, they buy it at about market price, assume that's the right price and that they are somehow protecting the economy by pricing in bankruptcy in one asset class and spreading it to the rest of the economy. Belligerent and thoughtless, what more could you want? At the same time, they've sucked a lot of excess cash out of the system once again by offering banks an interest rate of 0.05% for their cash in exchange for some FED junk assets. So suddenly banks are bagholding assets nobody wanted, in order to get interest on their cash, genius huh? OH yeah, and banks are SHORTING those assets on the open market! Effectively making the cash tend towards zero value (the real contract value of those assets which were originally exchanged). Next time something goes wrong, they will unload this ~1.5T diaper of dollars directly into our faces, probably sooner than later, causing more inflation.
5’s & 30’sKeeping the ZIRP thesis alive for now, 30s & 20s remain inverted now 5s could overtake 10s then 30s. Bonds are screaming for sure with inflation still growing m/m, more printing is inevitable to keep the economy going, and printing is how we got here. The next announcement for fed QE expansion, I believe will be the catalyst for golds big move out of the major coil. When there’s nothing left to eat the snake eats it’s own tail.
Black Swan - Risk Parity EventIdea for Bonds:
- US05Y and US02Y printed immense spikes in the pre-market. Glitch? Probably not. Bond market in general is having extreme events globally, US markets not immune.
- Not shown on TV, but HYG also printed -7% in the AH on Friday... and traded there for several minutes.
- Dollar is unstoppable with global shortage. Pension funds have elected to use leverage to meet a 5.5 trillion dollar liability gap. I'm betting they will not succeed.
In the context of everything, more likely it is a dark pool trade and people are running for the exits.
GLHF
- DPT
My Forecasts: PostscriptLet me say this from the outset; within the 2's5's curve is a manual, given that I do not have a great deal of time, it is not possible for me to go into great dimensions or detail I have chosen. Instead we will have to content ourselves with the revolutionary charts/diagrams both before and of the period where I have gone into more details. The same is true of the other important charts (VIX and Unemployment Claims) I refer to below. So now that we are all prepared and understand the knowledge, we must start to turn the dusty pages.
Firstly lets review a chart on which I stack tremendous value: I would not wish to enter into conspiracies. There have been a handful of inversions in the manuscripts over the past three decades which all speak historical truth in advance of the crisis. The advance in the 5 year suggests salvation from the Fed can only come in the medium term as the 2 year lags behind.
And now to the point around Alpha Protocol Seeking Immediate Extraction .
The 2's5's is already under the nature in an impulsive form. The prior three inversions (Housing and Credit, Dot com, GFC) also suffered from a lagging Fed, that of being at least 10-12 months behind! This means that it is not uninteresting to highlight the totally overlooked inversion in 2019, it was a loud SOS signal that the economy was clearly running out of steam.
I was the one who was able to properly understand that manoeuvre in both Unemployment Claims and Vix ahead of time, calling the move from 12 to 85; with complex inversions, always look to play against the crowd. See our opening in US Claims and VIX before the fact:
Given we are facing both inflation via contractions in globalisation and deflation via advancements in technology etc all at the same time, it is causing a major paradox/dissonance across the board. It would serve no purpose to mention or not hint at what will happen next; my personal sense is that because the Fed ALWAYS lags behind, we will see another example of the long end of the curve driving the flows ( for those interested in bull steepening and bear flattening I have also omitted the exclamations in bold ). This would suggest that it is likely that we could be heading into an environment where you see nominal yields receiving a booster shot while real yields flatten causing further pressure on USD.
ridethepig | US10Y testing resistanceA timely update to the US10Y Yields chart as we approach key areas. The 1.35% pivot level in the very short term is our line in the sand and will define which battlefield we will play Q3 on.
↳ The waterfall lows from 2020 started the next five wave impulsive sequence to the topside, it will take years for the moves to unfold but critical to understand our long term direction (higher yields).
↳ Typically we will see ebb and flow, particularly in summer months. Now with 1.35% & 1.45% the key resistance areas defined and ready to monitor, all we need to track is for a sustained breach above as will imply buyers are in control and demand reassessment in the view that a base is already in .
↳ Here actively tracking for one more leg lower towards 1.00%, it should be enough to unlock the pressure valve in USD one more time before we see the next leg lower in global equity markets in October (more on this over the coming weeks).
[/chart
Macro - Reading The CurveForecast for Macro:
- Falling Wedge Breakout must be re-tested.
- Bear Flattener coming as short-term rates rise with Fed tightening expectations:
- 2x ATR spike in US02Y:
- The Fed members will probably all have their turn to make comments, leaning hawkish. This should cause a rally in the US02Y.
- Bonds Volatility Technically Bullish:
- However, this will be followed by a steepener, respecting the Falling Wedge Breakout, as the Fed implements monetary policies to control Deflation, creating a Stagflation environment.
- US30Y, this is bearish and deflationary:
- USOIL, deflationary. The US economy depends on Oil:
- US Manufacturing Employment Index, looks to be at the top of the range, and on a decline:
- Capital goods are the heart of every economy. Without manufacturing employment, no capital goods. No capital goods, no innovation.
- CN30Y, also bearish and deflationary:
- China's Credit Impulse, and consequently - global credit impulse turns negative.
- No more credit flows means no more liquidity to flow into risk assets.
- M2V declining, if the economy was booming and growing, money velocity should be increasing:
- Business destruction cannot be inflationary. Thriving tech businesses lead the recovery, but Tech is inherently deflationary.
- Reading the curve will be critical to see the macro turns coming!
GLHF
- DPT
US10Y - Strategy WeeklyA couple of things to note here as the chart clearly shows the attempt of a break on the log-chart.
We now know Sellers are attempting the strategical and important pin on their opponent. It is clear the inflation trade is deteriorating, and in the most profound sense looks rather like a deeper mission that is underway. On the technical side, the next levels in play with a break on the chart here are at 1.00% and 0.50%.
The next charts is clearer as to what we were tracking, firstly the US10Y has completed the full retrace back towards 1.5%/1.75%, and secondly, a lot of unwinding has begun in Commodities and Cyclicals as Oil retreats from the key 75 resistance.
With a break in the log-chart, these larger areas of the chart are now rendered useful for freer manoeuvring and can trigger a sharp uptick in volatility for those who are becoming quite rigid. We need to keep an eye on the state of affairs in inflation and wages in particular, although when looking at the headings cooking for the US via fiscal tightening and etc, it looks like the inflation trade as a lot further to unwind yet.
Game, Set and Match!📌 ridethepig | Game, Set and Match!
In order to inform ourselves about the dangers of this move, we shall in what follows point to a few live charts which we called live together from 2019 that the 2s5s was going to invert frantically , and was a bad sign. It enables occupation of the dominos, which for those following long enough will know the one thing we always through individually is our playbook .
1️⃣ Every other time this happened it ended badly for the global economy via recession. ✅
2️⃣ A Fed that lags and finances the Whitehouse will only add fuel to the flames... "it's different this time". ✅
3️⃣ The longer the delay in USD devaluation from Fed, the worst the blow is going to be in Equity markets. Assuming USD does not devalue materially into 2020 its repo will grow and continue expanding the balance sheet , one way or another eventually this is going to look like Fed has been financing the WhiteHouse and then the game is up. ✅ ✅
Powell's noble attempt to pick a fight with the end game in an economic cycle can be regarded as having come to nothing. The threat comes from confidence and credit . Aiming for a complete annihilation across risk assets later in 2021, the presence of the inversion was sufficient. Now this move is being made with momentum.
Game
Set
... & Match
The simplest example is to explain the move with diagrams which was the wish here. To occupy a piece of tradingview real estate with a live walk through in the end of an economic cycle. This could be considered as a momentum move in the sense of the word. The rule is:
I’m long vol for a very long time.
Insane risks are palatable but you need to understand the game otherwise you have a very high likelihood of total destruction.
Stay long vol short dollars.
We are entering into a series of exchanges between public and private assets, the door is closing, like in the Star Wars movie when Chewy and Harrison Ford are running to the doors, we can see the door closing in China, and in Russia and yet we still have a chance to get out.
An exchange towards a decentralised world is possibly into 2032.
A Macro Thread on YieldsThe bond market can be quite tricky.
In terms of yield curves consider the following:
Bear steepening
Bull Steepening
Bear Flattening
Bull Flattening
> Steepening (the premium for longer debt is growing)
> Flattening (the premium is shrinking)
For example, bull steepening, which is exactly what we have been doing this since the start of this year:
The short-end of the yield curve (typically driven via fed funds rate) falls faster than the long-end, steepening the yield curve.
The long end of the yield curve is driven by a wide range of factors, including - economic growth, expectations, inflation expectations, and supply and demand of longer-maturity Treasury securities and etc
📍 A bull steepener
↳ is a shift in the yield curve caused by falling interest rates - rising bond price - hence the term “bull”.
📍 A bull flattener
↳ is the opposite of a steepener - a situation of rising bond prices which causes the long-end to fall faster than the short-end.
📍 Bear steepness and flatteners
↳ are caused by falling bond prices across the curve
A bull steepener is a change in the yield curve caused by short-term interest rates falling faster than long-term rates, resulting in higher spread between the two rates. A bull steepener occurs when the Fed reserve is expected to lower interest rates. This expectation causes consumers and investors to become optimistic about the economy and bullish about prices in the stock market above the short-term.
Thanks as usual for keeping the feedback coming 👍 or 👎
It's Different This Time... Right...📌 Endgame in the economic cycle and illustrating a painful recession
Yields had the opportunity to move and successfully played the 'elastic band' rejection from the inversion in 2019, which despite the length of the global CB combination, can be expressed in no other terms than reckless. FED was obviously aiming for the ideal position (the frontal defence from Fiscal this time around) which is a well known counter when the issue comes from private debt, however they were forced to 'bend the knee'.
Things proceed as follows:
1️⃣ Every other time this happened it ended badly for the global economy via recession. ✅
2️⃣ A Fed that lags and finances the Whitehouse will only add fuel to the flames... "it's different this time". ✅
3️⃣ The longer the delay in USD devaluation from Fed, the worst the blow is going to be in Equity markets. Assuming USD does not devalue materially into 2020 its repo will grow and continue expanding the balance sheet, one way or another eventually this is going to look like Fed has been financing the WhiteHouse and then the game is up. 👈 'we are currently here'
The Whitehouse has decided to follow hyperinflation, Dem voters were naive in this sense and thought they could hold rates lower forever without any consequences. Now we must waste more time pursuing their distant dream that taxation is a solution.
Wishful thinking if you ask me... the kind of overdrafts these governments have run up are several multiples beyond even Piketty's theoretical tax base. This ending of a cycle is a pragmatic demonstration of the lust to keep 'putting it on the card' and leaving private debt problems to future generations because of time being finite.
Finally a notion which carries its own duties:
In a debt crisis, as Japan have known for some 30 years a) you do not want an appreciating currency as the cost of servicing those debts will skyrocket in real terms and b) remain nimble...(get a peloton if necessary).
Thanks as usual for keeping the feedback coming 👍 or 👎