Yellen’s Shocking Announcement: The $USD is TOAST

 

Fed Chair Janet Yellen just announced that the Fed will be kicking the $USD off a cliff.

She didn’t use those words, but the words she did use weren’t all that different.

But first a little context…

This Is What A Financial Crisis Looks Like

Just within the past few days, three major high yield funds have completely imploded, and panic is spreading rapidly on Wall Street.  Funds run by Third Avenue Management and Stone Lion Capital Partners have suspended payments to investors, and a fund run by Lucidus Capital Partners has liquidated its entire portfolio.  We are witnessing a race for the exits unlike anything that we have seen since the great financial crash of 2008, and many of those that choose to hesitate are going to end up getting totally wiped out.  In case you are wondering, this is what a financial crisis looks like.  In 2008, other global stock markets started to tumble, then junk bonds began to crash, and finally U.S. stocks followed.  The exact same pattern is playing out again, and the carnage that we have seen so far is just the tip of the iceberg.

Bank of America: Markets Are in a ‘Twilight Zone’ and It’s Time to Hold More Cash and Gold

You can’t find a bigger warning of lately than what just came from BoA.

 

In a note sent out this morning, Bank of America Merrill Lynch has a warning for investors:

Investors remain trapped in “The Twilight Zone”, the transition period between the end of QE and the first rate hike by the Fed, the start of policy normalization…until (a) the US economy is unambiguously robust enough to allow the Fed to hike and (b) the Fed’s exit from zero rates is seen not to cause either a market or macro shock (as it infamously did in 1936-7), the investment backdrop will likely continue to be cursed by mediocre returns, volatile trading rotation, correlation breakdowns and flash crashes. For this reason we continue to advocate higher than normal levels of cash, adding gold and owning volatility in mid 2015. Given extremities of liquidity, profits, technological disruption, regulation, income inequality…potential for a cleansing drop in asset prices cannot be dismissed. Most likely catalysts: Consumer, Rates, A-shares, Speculation, High Yield.

Repatriation of Gold from Fed Suggests Historic Vote of No Confidence

Since 2012, there’s been an unprecedented call from foreign nations to repatriate their gold from Federal Reserve vaults in the U.S. This is an incredible development given many countries’ 71-year reliance on the Fed as a custodian for their bullion. Over the last few years, countries including, but not limited to, Germany, the Netherlands, France, Belgium, Austria, Poland, Ecuador, Finland, Switzerland, Venezuela, and Romania have either formally requested repatriation of their gold or are in discussions with the Fed about it. Some of these nations, mind you, have held more than 50% of their entire reserves of bullion in the U.S. since 1944, when the Dollar became the world’s reserve currency.

Something huge must have happened in the last few years to prompt such action. That something may be a break in foreign gold holders’ trust in the Fed as a custodian of their precious metals.

Yardeni: Markets all rigged, it is what it is

The stock market is “rigged,” but that’s not necessarily a bad thing, strategist Ed Yardeni said Thursday, a day after the latest dovish signal from the Federal Reserve.

“I love these central bankers, they’ve been very good to the stock market,” the president of Yardeni Research said in an interview on CNBC’s “Halftime Report.”

The Full Explanation Of How The ECB Broke Europe’s Bond Market

It was almost three years ago to the day when Zero Hedge first explained the biggest problem facing Europe when it comes to unconventional monetary policy: the lack, not scarcity, but outright shortage of collateral.

Initially, our focus was on private-sector collateral, and if one had to summarize the key difference between the US and Europe in one chart, it would be this one, showing that while in the US the split between secured and unsecured funding was roughly even, in Europe, some 90% of corporate funding was on bank loan books, with only 10% in the form of (unsecured) corporate bonds (which also explains why in Europe NPLs, aka bad bank debt is by far the biggest problem facing the financial industry).

Federal Reserve Insider Alan Greenspan Warns: There Will Be a “Significant Market Event… Something Big Is Going To Happen”

 

With the Federal Reserve printing trillions upon trillions of dollars to keep the economic system afloat, many investors and financial pundits have surmised that the fundamental economic problems facing the United States during the crash of 2008 have been resolved. Stocks are, after all, at historic highs.

Black swan in bonds puts Fed on notice

NOTE: For anyone interested, this article in full is available with a paid subscription only. Global Geopolitics benefits in no way from this.

 

Last week the bond market did something it’s only done one other time in 45 years. Yet not many people noticed.

Did the Fed Just Enter the Currency Wars?

(Bloomberg) — The minutes from the Federal Reserve’s meeting last month have foreign-exchange traders wondering whether Janet Yellen has joined the currency wars.

…

Central bankers from Europe to Australia have engaged this year in bouts of rate-cutting oneupmanship, leaving the U.S., and possibly Britain, as the only developed nations seen as likely to raise borrowing costs in 2015. The dollar climbed to its strongest in more than a decade as a result, prompting billionaire Warren Buffett and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. President Gary Cohn to question whether the Fed can now increase rates without damaging the U.S. economy.

Central banks ‘have lost credibility’

Many share markets may be riding higher on hopes of European stimulus this week and overlooking plunging oil prices, and even lower global growth targets, but experts say its time that investors woke up to the fact that central bankers aren’t doing a great job.

The Australian share market rose 0.7 per cent in early trade on Wednesday joining a global rally on expectations that the European Central Bank will announce a 1 trillion bond buying program to help revive economic growth.

U.S. Federal Reserve to review how it supervises major banks

(Reuters) – The U.S. Federal Reserve said on Thursday it has launched a review of how it oversees major banks, calling on its inspector general to help with the probe after a series of critical reports.

Separate studies to be undertaken by the Fed’s Washington-based Board of Governors and its Office of Inspector General are meant to ensure that “divergent views” about the state of large banks are adequately aired.

The reviews will determine whether frontline supervisors and other officials at the regional Federal Reserve banks, as well as at the board level, “receive the information needed to ensure consistent and sound supervisory decisions,” the Fed said in a press release.

Is your money safe at the bank? An economist says ‘no’ and withdraws his

And he’s right about the FDIC having less funds available than what it needs to cover its obligations.

Last week I had over $1,000,000 in a checking account at Bank of America. Next week, I will have $10,000.

Why am I getting in line to take my money out of Bank of America? Because of Ben Bernanke and Janet Yellen, who officially begins her term as chairwoman on Feb. 1.

Before I explain, let me disclose that I have been a stopped clock of criticism of the Federal Reserve for half a decade. That’s because I believe that when the Fed intervenes in markets, it has two effects — both negative. First, it decreases overall wealth by distorting markets and causing bad investment decisions. Second, the members of the Fed become reverse Robin Hoods as they take from the poor (and unsophisticated) investors and give to the rich (and politically connected). These effects have been noticed; a Gallup poll taken in the last few days reports that only the richest Americans support the Fed. (See the table.)

Fear Is Mounting On Wall Street That The Fed Will ‘Fall Behind The Curve’ Like In 1994

There is growing concern on Wall Street that there may be less slack in the job market than the Federal Reserve perceives, leading to a scenario where the central bank finds itself “behind the curve” with regard to winding down unprecedented levels of extraordinary monetary stimulus as inflation returns.

Aneta Markowska, chief U.S. economist at Société Générale, writes in a note to clients that “Could the Fed hike rates in 2014?” is one of the top questions that has come up in recent meetings with investors.