Interesting TACs of the Week (May 20 – May 27, 2024)

Summary – A top-down review of interesting calls and comments made last week in Treasuries, monetary policy, economics, stocks, bonds & commodities. TAC is our acronym for Tweets, Articles, & Clips – our basic inputs for this article.

Editor’s Note: In this series of articles, we include important or interesting Tweets, Articles, Video Clips with our comments. This is an article that expresses our personal opinions about comments made on Television, Tweeter, and in Print. It is NOT intended to provide any investment advice of any type whatsoever. No one should base any investing decisions or conclusions based on anything written in or inferred from this article. Macro Viewpoints & its affiliates expressly disclaim all liability in respect to actions taken based on any or all of the information in this article. Investing is a serious matter and all investment decisions should only be taken after a detailed discussion with your investment advisor and should be subject to your objectives, suitability requirements and risk tolerance.

 

1. A few tweets & charts

  • Bespoke@bespokeinvest – May 25The 10-year yield and US Dollar index have basically had the same exact pattern since last summer. Check out how similar these two charts look:

A simple test for the S&P direction?

  • Walter Deemer@WalterDeemer – May 27 – $SPY high Thursday was 533.06. Its low was 524.72. Near-term trend is in the direction of whichever gets penetrated first.

What have the Hedge Funds been doing?

  • Markets & Mayhem@Mayhem4Markets – May 27Hedge funds sold stocks at the fastest pace since January while simultaneously increasing their downside hedges, according to Goldman Sachs. 🚨

Was the selling sector-driven?

  • Markets & Mayhem@Mayhem4Markets – May 27You can really see that aggressive selling of more cyclical allocations in the Goldman Prime Book US Net Trading Flow chart

A sign of some sort from a strong economy state?

  • Nick Gerli@nickgerli1 – Housing inventory in Dallas, TX is absolutely exploding. With the number of homes for sale spiking 342% over the last two years. Pandemic Low: 5,419 listings Apr 2022 Current Level: 18,531 listings Apr 2024. This market is turning down fast. Don’t be surprised if prices drop in H2 2024Access housing inventory data here: https://map.reventure.app/dashboard?geo=metro&dataPoint=total_active_inventory&zoom=6&lnglat=%7B%22lng%22%3A-96.49314764097858%2C%22lat%22%3A32.8743760440977%7D&graphView=true&GEOID=19100

 

 

M. “The Americans are coming!”

On this Memorial Day, we think back to 100 years ago when the dark & evil forces began their surge in continental Europe. Some eighteen years later, a Great American “finally overruled his subordinates and, ordering into battle the largest American amphibious invasion force in the nation’s history …. astonishing the world … and giving rise to the slogan that would hearten millions across Europe: “The Americans are coming!“. 

And the most well-known Brit, “after the successful American landings in Northwest Africa which turned the tide of World War II“, remarked to the U.S. vice counsel in Marakesh” If anything happened to that man, I couldn’t stand it. He is the truest friend; he has the furthest vision; he is the greatest man I have ever known“.

In those words Winston Churchill expressed his feelings about the Great FDR, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, most probably the Greatest War-Time President in American history. And yes, that was in addition to fighting the Great Depression, the destructive banking crisis, the creation of the New Deal. 

FDR’s economic & political leadership in well-known. That may be why, “the popular image of President Roosevelt has become one of a great and august leader moral leader of his nation: an inspiring figure on a world stage, but one who largely delegated the “business of war” to others – including Winston Churchill“. 

The reality, the very fortunate reality of World War II was that, after Pearl Harbor, FDR became the President in every way as was laid out by Alexander Hamilton in Federalist No. 74:

  • the President of the United States was to have “the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces, as the first general and admiral of the nation.”

FDR, himself, said to his doctor, Ross McIntire, 

  • What is clearer than that the framers meant the President to be the chief executive in peace and in war the commander in chief

And this Roosevelt was, whether people liked it or not.” wrote Nigel Hamilton, in The Mantle of Command, the first of his trilogy of the Great FDR.

We can’t think of a more superlatively important book to celebrate and read on Memorial Day!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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