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.Don Peebles wins; but does the Fed win?
We quoted Don Peebles last week and we need to keep doing so until the people who need to watch-listen to what he said on CNBC Power Lunch on January 30 get his message:
- “High interest rates have created tremendous stress in local and regional banks. Local and regional banks are the primary lenders. Small businesses, and they’re not making loans anymore. And what has happened is that the local lenders are stressed. “
- “But the hidden inflation is what Americans spend the vast majority of their money on. They spend it on housing and automobiles. Those are the top two purchases. Both are interest rate sensitive and without attractive interest rates, they can’t afford to buy either one. And what happens when they buy fewer homes and fewer cars? Then jobs are lost. And so there’s a double impact there. And what you’re seeing now in many sectors now are job cuts are beginning to take place now, and more are going to start happening and they’re going to be in banking, they’re going to be in real estate, they’re going to be in construction. And, you know, and unless we see a change in policy, I think we’re going to we could be dangerously close to a recession.
- “the reality is, is that the fed should have cut made bigger cuts. They should have been 50 basis points at a minimum every time. And they should have been there should have been at least a 100 basis point cut in that process. And now to make these minimal cuts and then to do nothing and look all around you,”
This week showed that he might be right. And it seems Bespoke agrees as well:
- Kevin Gordon@KevRGordon – From @bespokeinvest – “On a 12-month average basis…Housing Starts have completely rolled over from their peak nearly three years ago falling from 1.67 million to 1.37 million now…Recessions have always followed a rollover in Housing Starts, and the only question is timing.”
Bespoke also wrote:
- Bespoke@bespokeinvest – Feb 21 – 4.41 on the 10-year, down nearly 40 bps from its high of 4.8% on 1/14. This would be the lowest close of the year. Remember a few weeks ago when higher bond yields was the big concern? Now it’s the economy.
We fear that the Fed is either as backward-looking as ever or they are playing a political game with the President. We heard a CNBC anchor say that Powell looked satisfied & confident in his last presser and that was presumably meant to instill confidence in the anchor’s viewers. Frankly, we lost confidence with that statement, because Powell has been wrong every time he has displayed confidence – saying inflation is transitory to promising 100 bps in cuts last September. He is the perfect backward looking driver we have seen at the helm of the Fed. So is it possible that he might soon exhibit real concern about the economy after waxing confident in January?
Or, Heaven Forbid, is the Fed is playing politics with President Trump by trying to send a message of displeasure about his tariffs? If they are, then aren’t they playing into the President’s hands? President Trump has already said he wants lower rates. Now if the economy slows down to a measurable extent, wouldn’t the President be able to blame the Fed?
The above is pure speculation on our part but we hope the Fed is watching the economic signals of this week. They should at least listen to people like Don Peebles if not to President Trump. Perhaps Mr. Peebles can also shed some light on Banks falling hard this week – C down 5.3%; GS down 5.4%; JPM down 4.3%; BAC down 4.2%; while KRE was only down 3.6%. Is commercial real estate stress moving to Banks with bigger balance sheets?
Kudos to the many people we quoted last week recommending buying Treasuries. Most of them were bullish on stocks but mainly because they expect the Fed to cut interest rates. But that might depend on the Jobs number to be released in March. Recall that Warren Pies said last week that “the Fed will remain recalcitrant until April” before they decide to cut rates.
At least Pies is more optimistic than Bespoke:
- Bespoke@bespokeinvest – Feb 21 – Today’s sell-off has rate cut odds moving higher. Market pricing for the odds of at least one 25 bps cut by the June meeting are up to 64%. Had been 50/50 a week ago.
What would Don Peebles say to postponing rate cuts to June? Would someone kindly ask him?
The Treasury market did speak somewhat decisively last week with:
- 30-yr yield down 2 bps; 20-yr down 4.5 bps; 10-yr down 5 bps; 7-yr down 5.3 bps; 5-yr down 6.4 bps; 7-yr down 6.8 bps; 2-yr down 6.1 bps; 1-yr down 5.9 bps; &
- TLT up 30 bps; EDV up 50 bps; ZROZ up 46 bps with credit down HYG down 15 bps; JNK down 5 bps;
And speaking visually was:
- Mike Zaccardi, CFA, CMT 🍖@MikeZaccardi – Feb 21 – $TNX 10yr yield lowest since Dec 16
Ryan Detrick, who warned last week about a drawdown in mid-February, seems not unduly bothered:
- Ryan Detrick, CMT@RyanDetrick – Feb 21 – Some Friday weakness in 2025 is normal. Some weakness in late February is normal.
He also sounded somewhat bullish in another message:
- Ryan Detrick, CMT@RyanDetrick – Feb 21 – After today, the S&P 500 is down an annualized 86.1% on Friday. Only 1937 was worse. We’ve been talking a lot how weakness on Friday has been the play in 2025. News heavy markets = sell ahead of the weekend. I’ll take it as the good news, as it has to improve. Right?
2. Equities:
What does a bullish investor wonder?
- Macro Charts@MacroCharts – Feb 22 – Biggest spike in uncertainty since the Global Pandemic and 9/11. Wall of worry? Or this time is different?
Was this “biggest spike in uncertainty” matched by the up 23% rise in $VIX this week?
- Macro Charts@MacroCharts – Feb 22 – VIX Sentiment is spiking to one of the highest levels in history. Nearly *tied* with AUG 5 2024 — when VIX spiked to 65 and Stocks bottomed. Absolutely stunning — especially with S&P barely off the highs.
How about a clear sailing signal?
- Seth Golden@SethCL – Fearful of a recession as tariffs, DOGE, housing weigh on the economy? The last time economy hit a peak and rolled over from a trailing 12-month 35% gain in $SPX was… NEVER! Sailing looks clear at least through October 2025 folks! $ES_F $SPY $QQQ $NYA $IWM $MACRO $DIA $VOO
Winners continued to be winners this past week with FXI up 3.4% & KWEB up 2.8%. And losers keep getting sideswiped – INDY down 1.9%; INDA down 54 bps; EPI down 40 bps; SMIN flat. And stay away is a trading message:
- Jay Kaeppel@jaykaeppel – Feb 20 – India is one of the largest and most important economies in the world. Too bad their stock market has been such a bust. Could it turn around from here? Absolutely. Am I in a hurry to jump on board? As a trend-follower, not even close. @sentimentrader
But US corporate interest in India seems Ok given last week’s news that Lam Research has signed a memorandum of understanding to invest over $1 Billion in semiconductors in India’s Southern State of Karnaatak.
More immediately something of major socio-political significance happened in India as discussed in the next section. In another Bollywood theme, look how the White House Staff celebrated the confirmation of Mr. Kash Patel as the new FBI Director. (The clip is a meme of a famous military victory song from “BaajiRao Mastani”.)
3. A Look Back to 1700 & with Total Victory in hand
What took place in America in 1700? Delaware Colony was granted an independent colonial legislature and in 1701 Yale University was founded. The Province of New Jersey was established in 1702. It was a slow beginning towards the establishment of USA.
What did the world look like economically in 1700? The US was just beginning to be registered in the Share of World GDP below in 1700 while the richest country in the world was India. Not as rich as it was in 1,000 before the Afghan-Muslims began attacking but the richest & most developed land nonetheless.
What did India look like geo-politically in 1700? It was a mass of Green, Islamic Green under the most successful, most rabid Islamic ruler Muhi-Ud-din Mohammed titled Aurang-Zeb or Jewel of the Throne. It was, as you can see, the riches & most dominant region of the world, safe from predators from the North like Uzbekistan & from the West like Iran & Turkey. They all knew the aura & power of Aurang-Zeb, the descendant of Mongols with a joint lineage from Genghis Khan & Timur the Lame.
Now focus on the small semi-coastal area in brown on the lower left side labelled Maratha Territories. It was the territory of the Maratha State that had successfully defeated all attempts of Aurang & his huge army to conquer them.
Look at the map & wonder why the mighty Aurang would care so much about a tiny area that had declared its independence. Because he had taken the title of Aalam-Gir (conqueror of the world) & he could not allow a Hindu kingdom to survive, not just any Hindu kingdom but one that had been coronated in 1674 by the Greatest Pandits of Kaashi, the Holiest Hindu city. Tolerating its existence might inspire other North Indian Hindu princes to rebel as well.
Look at the predicament that faced Aurangya (an insulting spelling), the de facto Muslim emperor of all India:
- either he had to tolerate a religiously sanctified Hindu Emperor in the south who, as the Hindu savior, could inspire similar revolts in Aurangya’s own Hindu majority North India
- or march at the Head of his so far invincible army into the Maratha territory despite the dismal fate of his army’s earlier defeats.
Aurangy simply waited & it seemed to pay off. In 1680, the Great Shivaaji, founder & King of the Maratha State, passed away & a short civil war erupted between his tempestuous son Sambhaaji & followers of his younger son Raja-Ram. It was a short tussle & Sambhaaji became the new King. But his support was narrow & he did not have a mandate from the people.
This was what Aurangya had been waiting for. He marched into the Maratha territories at the Head of a huge 250,000 + plus army with artillery & an unlimited Treasury determined to end this Hindu insurrection & fulfill his dream of Islamizing making all of India. He knew from experience that sons of smart, powerful Hindu rulers were hardly as smart or powerful as their fathers had been & they had all quickly surrendered.
But Sambhaaji proved different. His war with Aurangya continued for 9 years with the Maratha expertise in mobile warfare. Yes, the Lion (Shivaaji) had passed away but his Chhaava (young son) was still roaming in the forest killing at will.
It was a brutal & intense fight and it become a stalemate. Then in another stroke of great fortune, almost a gift from Allah to the devout Aurangya, his tactical forces managed to capture King Sambhaaji as he was resting for the night in an isolated area. Aurangya’s dream had come true. The current King & the heir of the Great Shivaaji was in his custody & there was no other natural leader for the Maratha Kingdom.
Aurangya had waited too long to demonstrate once & for all to all of India that strong leaders like Shivaaji may come & go, but his Muslim rule was permanent for India. So he arranged a public spectacle for his army & viewers of Mahaa-Raashtra, a spectacle in which he would give Sambhaaji a chance to apologize and convert to Islam. He had done so to strong-willed sons of other defeated Hindu kings and all those sons had fallen at Aurangya’s feet.
To his stunned surprise, Sambhaaji treated Aurangya’s offer and words with derisive contempt. Sambhaaji recited publicly, in front of Aurangya’s army & all the viewers, the various crimes Aurangya had committed. And he offered Aurangya the opportunity to join his noble cause & told him Aurangya would not even have to give up his Muslim religion.
This public expression of derisive contempt in front of his entire court, his army & the people inflamed Aurangya. He said he wanted to hear screams of Sambhaaji and told his prison team to hurt Sambhaaji so badly that Sambhaaji would himself beg for his death. As we wrote last week,
- “His tongue was removed, his eyes burnt out by inserting red hot iron rods & then his skin was slowly roasted & peeled. Eyewitnesses of that era told this story all over Mahaa-Rashtra. On his death, Sambhaji’s body was cut into pieces, fed to wild dogs & paraded all through the Mughal Army to scare the Maratha warriors & people.”
King Sambhaaji bore all the torture without even a whimper. And what was intended to scare the Marathi people into submission, backfired enormously. The Marathi army received large numbers of new recruits & adopted a brilliant technique under great commanders like Santaaji Ghorpade & Dhanaaki Jadhav. For over 18 years, from 1689 to 1707, the Marathi armies essentially wrecked the Mughal Army & the Mughal Treasury. As British writer Stanley-Lane-Poole wrote in his book “Mediaeval India under Mohamadan Rule”,
- “To fight such people was to battle with air or to strike blows upon water. The Moghul might hold as much ground as his camp and cities covered, but the rest of the Deccan was in the hands of the Marathas.”
Do you see the similarity between the final period of Soviet occupation of Afghanistan? The Soviets withdrew in 1989 but their myth of dominance was broken and their regime slowly shrunk over the next 10 years. One difference is that the Afghan Mujahedeen were trained, supported & funded by the Reagan Administration while the Marathas from 1689 to 1710 survived, developed their unique technique & won a huge war on their own.
There is a bigger difference. The Mujahedeen were content to drive the Soviets out of Afghanistan & could/did not pursue them into Central Asia. The Marathas installed the young son of Sambhaaji as King and stabilized the regime from 1710 to 1720. Then, under the leadership of the 20-year old Peshva (prime minister), the Marathas exploded into North India and look what the Maratha kingdom became by 1759. The Mughal empire was gone & replaced by the new Maratha Empire.
Seriously, compare the map of Aurangya’s empire above in 1700 to the above Maratha empire map in 1759 to understand the resultant impact of Aurangya’s criminal torture of Chhaava Sambhaji in 1689.
But why discuss this now? Because Chhaava has returned as a film in full intensity &, this time, before the entire Indian population. How has it been received & what might be the consequences?
4. Return of Chhaava & the response in India – Har Har Mahadev
As we had written last week, Bollywood films have always been soft with song & dance sequences & almost theatrical fights. Even films that celebrated military successes were first & foremost love films. Chhaava proved to be a Huge Exception. The film has been wildly successful reportedly grossing over about 3 billion Rupees in a week & half.
It seems people watching almost every show were met outside with Cameras & interviewers asking for their reactions. We watched about 20-25 such YouTube reviews from all over India & the feedback was unanimous. Not only was the film rated 5 or 5, 10 of 10 & 100 or 100, but the reaction was incredibly joyous despite the torture shown.
Yes, as we heard from so many, the incredibly murderous torture was shown for the last 25-30 minutes of the film & the theaters fell totally silent. One woman said that when the guards brought red hot irons to burn out King Sambhaaji’s eyes, they asked him to close his eyes. Sambhaaji’s tongue was already cut & he, the woman said, gestured with his eyes for the guards to go ahead & insert the red hot pointed iron into his open eyes. The woman reviewer did not express sadness but expressed intense pride for Sambhaaji.
The overwhelming feeling we heard in the reviews was that “they” had hidden true history from “us”. Except for a portion of our state of Mahaa-Raashtra, rest of India had not been exposed to the story of Aurangya’s torture of King Sambhaaji until now. As we all know or should now, the British white-washed the Timurid Mongols & called them Mughals. Nehru, the first & the most Brit-bootlicker Prime Minister, made Mughal rule into a great treasure of Indian society. This tradition was followed until PM Modi’s 1st victory in 2014. Even then, the propaganda about Mughals being Indian & lovers of beauty/arts was so ingrained that even PM Modi did NOT attempt to challenge it.
That changed on February 14, 2025 with & due to a great film true to history and the most candid portrayal of Aurangya, the most dominant Timorid-Mongol ruler & his determination to make India all-Muslim. The film showed about 30 minutes of torture of King Sambhaaji while the actual torture is documented to have lasted for 3 days. The 30 minutes of torture & the absolute blazing reality of King Sambhaaji’s patriotism has totally destroyed the presentation of Mughals as even remotely “Indian”.
Hence the intense anger against the Nehru, Congress Party & all the Bollywood Muslim stars who participated in the white wash of the Timurid Mongols. The reaction of the people has been so intense that the dominant Muslim-Pushtun stars of Bollywood over the last 20 years ALL came out & praised the Chhaava film and said “this film is our history“.
Speaking of history, do you know that there isn’t a single major statue of Chhaava, Sambhaaji Maharaj in India? In contrast, look at the marble tomb of Aurangya glamorized by Trip Advisor’s picturesque coverage of this evil Aurangya’s tomb in Mahaa-Raashtra:
This is the marble tomb of a ruler in Hindu majority India who tried to wipe out all Hindus. Wasn’t there a country in Europe whose ruler wanted to wipe out all Jews from that country? Is there a similar marble tomb that commemorates Hitler in Germany? Why should India be so pathetically different? How different? As we recall, UNESCO has labelled this Aurangya statue as “cultural heritage” of India at the request of a previous Congress government of India!!!!
Perhaps it may time for a reawakening. There has already been a demand for a bulldozer run to destroy Aurangya’s tomb in what used to be called Auranga-bad. That name was changed recently to Chhatrapati Sambhaaji Nagar. Is it time for the next step to destroy Aurangya’s tomb? India’s capital has major roads named after major Mughal rulers including Aurangya. Already some young men went to tried to erase those names.
All this might be a flare up of temporary emotion and it might pass. It is probably not appropriate for the Modi government to initiate major steps of this sort. The first major step might be to erect a massive memorial to Chhatrapati Shivaaji in Agra, in front of what used to be the court of Aurangya. The previous BJP government had installed a statue in 2001:
The current government of Mahaa-Raashtra has announced that they would build a memorial to Shivaaji Maharaj in Agra that would rival the Taj Mahal.
This past week was a birth anniversary of Chhatra-pati Shivaaji Maharaj. Look & read what PM Modi said about this incredibly great man:
- PM Modi said for us, Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj is not just a name or a ruler—he is our revered deity. His bravery, vision, and commitment to justice continue to inspire generations. His strategic brilliance and governance model remain relevant worldwide. Even today, nations study his policies. As we march towards a Viksit Bharat, we draw strength from his ideals of Swaraj, good governance, and self-reliance. The PM bows to Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj with utmost reverence.
And the famous war cry of the Marathas “Har Har Mahadev” that was raised from South India to Afghanistan is now on the lips of many Indians:
We know what the original torture of Sambhaaji Maharaj did to Aurangya & his precious Mongol regime. Let us see what a film depicting that torture leads to in today’s India!
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