The puts are still expensive (used to be ridiculously expensive, now just plain expensive). The problem with the "test" argument is that the SNB selling CHF in unlimited size hardly presents a challenge. How can they fail this test?
Must read piece on the DSK case. Incredible detail about the his and the maid's movements that day. What a travesty, with still more than a few unanswered questions. It should have been clear to any police detective within minutes that her story couldn't be at all truthful. Also the press made a big deal of reporting that DSK rushed from the hotel to the airport - turns out he left the hotel to go have lunch with his daughter a few blocks away and only then left for the airport. http://www.nybooks.com/articles/arc...eally-happened-dominique-strauss-kahn/?page=1 Instead, they send this (admittedly douchebag of a guy) to Rikers for the weekend where one can only imagine what could happen to a guy like that there, and he's ousted from maybe being France's next Prez. Hmmm ...
Tilson in Barrons still bullish on NFLX. Not really news, although the suckup reporter doesn't mention that "Whit" is down about 20% in weeks from his initial NFLX buy. Of more interest, is that Tilson has 4% of his funds in the stock. Of even more interest, Tilson manages $150M - this guy is basically running the equivalent of a small family office. At 2% mgmt fee, his business brings in $3M/year. What we have here is a guy, fighting for his business' survival by making big, loud plays in the press in the hope that he scores and captures some investor interest. This is not a man who should be listened to, but instead a desperate business owner using his genius for getting in the press (and not his genius for managing money) to drum up assets. http://online.barrons.com/article/SB50001424052748704854004577052211122984188.html?mod=BOL_hpp_dc
It's actually quite an interesting observation that normally the most vocal and publicized managers that you see in the media are ones that don't run a lot of money (with the exception of Bill Gross, I guess). Hayman AUM is only arnd $700 million, for instance, and you rarely or never see someone like Ray Dalio, Alan Howard or Yan Huo in the media. I would guess that, for a smaller fund (and PIMCO), the value of free marketing far exceeds the various negatives associated with being in the headlines.
As you know, Debaser, I rate neither these pundits, nor the various traders that make regularly appearances on TV... I rate economists who just report facts, without telling stories. Best example of this is someone like Bruce Kasman. So what you think about the current situation in Belgium? Looks pretty grim to me, but I am only observing from a distance.
A government is formed last night. I guess the downgrade from last night (AA+ to AA) was finally enough to get them to agree. Over the years country after country got it's time in the spotlight and pundits had their say on what was wrong and how it will progress. I'd say there are 3 main reasons for people to be rightfully bearish about Belgium. We have a historical debt load. We have an overleveraged banking system Our political situation is even worse then in Italy. (Today newspapers reported their ECB sources laughed at the suggestion of intervening in Belgian government paper. Sources say they are pissed as hell for these last 2 years without government... ) In contrast our deficit is a mere 4 %, an almost positive balance of trade, public wealth can match that of the Swiss, unemployment is in check, etc but I understand these facts do not change anything about the 3 big negatives. Lastly ofcourse we can not escape the shift in balance of power that has been in place for the last years if not decades as in seeing wealth being lost in the western world in favour of other parts. Belgium used to be a top 5 world economy 50 years ago and the state used to own 1500 tons of gold in the 80's. 200 tons of those remain. Clearly the decline is there but these things can take a long time and no region has ever been the center of wealth creation for ever so I'm not too worried about that. Ofcourse nobody knows this particular crisis how deep the knife will cut. Argentina was equally a place of riches once yet 50 years later you had doctors and lawyers selling tupperware door by door. For now we probably are a footnote in the shadow of Italy's troubles but who knows maybe we are this crisis it's Austria from the 30's. Time will tell.
Agree that puts are still expensive. Btw, if SNB does move the floor to 1.25/1.3, that will give an even better opportunity to load up on some puts. However, disagree with your argument that a central bank can print as much money as possible and keep their currency as low as they want. Even though theoretically it makes sense, but we have seen practically time and again CBs fail trying to weaken their currencies. Examples: Japan which has failed time and again to stem yen's strength while yen kept moving from 90 to 75 and even Swiss failed when they tried to first defend 1.50 level (2008 March-2009 Q1) and then their repeated interventions couldn't stop the ccy to move to almost parity, before the erstwhile trader (now head of SNB) decided to counter by using nuke on the market and moved the floor to 1.20.
I don't think these examples are relevant. How many fixed exchange rate regimes have collapsed to the strong side of the currency after less than 1 year of being implemented?I can't think of one example in all history