Hedge Fund CIO: If We Can't Bounce After Being Down 7 Weeks In A Row, Something Is Seriously Wrong

By Eric Peters, CIO of One River Asset Management

“Biggie’s bearish and annoying, ignored,” bellowed Biggie Too, 3rd person. “That’s how the crowd treats Biggie when these cycles get started, when stocks are still at their highs and Biggie turns bearish,” said the chief global strategist for one of Wall Street’s too-big-to-fail affairs, one of only a few such cats to call this market right. “Biggie’s bearish and they congratulate, kiss Biggie’s ring — that’s step Number Two,” barked Biggie, slipping into a slow groove, hands in the air holding two fingers up. “Step Number Three — Biggie stays bearish, and the crowd hates Biggie,” said Too, sharing Biggie’s Three-Step Market Manual.

“If we can’t bounce after being down seven weeks in a row, something’s seriously wrong with this market. But you gotta get to Number Three before the big bottom is in. And Biggie’s still stuck somewhere in step Number Two – getting lotta praise, no haters, no hate mail. Not yet.”

Overall:

“Achieving price stability, restoring price stability, is an unconditional need,” said Jerome Powell. “Something we have to do because really the economy doesn’t work for workers or for businesses or for anybody without price stability. It’s the bedrock of the economy really,” added the Fed Chairman.

“If that involves moving past broadly understood levels of ‘neutral’ we won’t hesitate to do that,” he said, calm, threatening. “We will go until we feel we are at a place where we can say ‘yes, financial conditions are at an appropriate place, we see inflation coming down.’”

It’s been decades since a Fed Chairman told investors to sell rallies until inflation cools or something breaks. US equities closed the week lower again, a historic run, but devoid of panic. It’s a market re-price, not a fracture, a break, at least not yet.

“It’s in everyone’s interest for both the US and EU to make investments in a coordinated way that deepens the entire ecosystem of the semiconductor supply chain,” said US Commerce Secretary Raimondo, unveiling initiatives in high-tech, AI, industrial standards, and global food security. “It will be good for both industry and national security,” she added, as the US and Europe retreat to a fractured world of trading blocs, security alliances.

Echoes of Europe’s disastrous dependency on Russian energy exports are found in the West’s reliance on Taiwanese semiconductors and Chinese technology, rare earths.

“We intend to exclude Huawei and ZTE from our 5G networks,” said Canada’s Industry Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne, joining the rest of the Five Eyes intelligence sharing network. “Providers who already have this equipment installed will be required to cease its use and remove it under the plans we’re announcing today.”

Beijing banned senior officials from owning overseas assets or stakes in foreign entities, whether directly or through spouses, children. Xi naturally wants to insulate his politicians from Western influence/sanctions in a conflict.

The most consequential redrawing of global relations since WWII has begun. So far it has produced a re-price, not a market fracture. At least not yet.