Macro Extremes (week ending December 20, 2024)

A weekly Macro, Cross Asset review of prices trading at extremes which may generate future investment ideas and opportunities.

The following assets (on a weekly timeframe) either registered an Overbought or Oversold reading and/or have traded more than 2.5 standard deviations above or below its rolling mean.

* denotes multiple week inclusion

Extremes above the Mean (at least 2.5 standard deviations)

U.S. 5 year bond yield minus the U.S. 5 year breakeven inflation rate

U.S. 10 year bond yield minus the Australia’s 10 year bond yield *

U.S. 10 year bond yield divided by Australia’s 10 year bond yield *

Natural Gas

CHF/AUD

GBP/AUD *

Overbought (RSI > 70)

U.S. 5 year bond yield minus the U.S. 3 month bill yield

Arabica coffee *

RMB/USD *

Pakistan’s KSE Index *

Czech Republic’s PX Index *

Israel’s TA35 *

The Overbought Quinella (Both Overbought and Traded at > 2.5 standard deviations above the weekly mean)

Brazil 10 year government bond yield

Orange Juice

Extremes below the Mean (at least 2.5 standard deviations)

Australian 10 year bond yield minus the U.S. 10 year bond yield *

Rice

AUD/CHF

AUD/GBP

AUD/IDR

AUD/INR

AUD/SGD

AUD/USD

IDR/USD

Bovespa

Nasdaq Biotech Index

Swiss SMI

FTSE 100

Oversold (RSI < 30)

U.S. 3 month government bill yield *

Australian Coking Coal *

U.S. Midwest Hot Rolled Coil Steel *

North European Hot Rolled Coil Steel *

Lithium Carbonate *

Lithium Hydroxide *

Newcastle Coal *

AUD/THB *

KRW/USD

The Oversold Quinella (Both Oversold and Traded at < 2.5 standard deviations below the weekly mean)

Chinese 10 year government bond yields *

BRL/USD

CAD/USD

INR/USD *

Copenhagen’s OMX 25 Index

Notes & Ideas:

Government bond yields rose again, leaving those recently oversold as a memory.

Only a few fell such as those in Belgium and Finland.

Brazilian 10’s have risen for 7 weeks.

Chinese yields have declined for 6 consecutive weeks.

Korean 10’s are not oversold anymore.

The U.S. 10 minus Euro 10 spread is nearly overbought.

The U.S. 5 year ‘real interest rate’ is overbought. The 10 year version is close to being so too.

And as pre-empted in last week’s edition, the U.S. 5 year minus U.S. 3 month bill spread is overbought this week.

Equities were weaker, adding to last week’s general weaker bias.

U.S. small and mid caps got hit the hardest.

The Nasdaq Composite and 100 broke their 4 week rising streak. Both also performed a bearish outside reversal week. 

Chile’s stock market broke its 5 straight weeks of advance.

Pakistan’s KSE snapped its 8 week winning streak.

The KBW Banking Index has fallen 8% in the past 3 weeks since its recent overbought extreme.

The Regional Banks (KRE) Index and Oslo’s OBX Index are in 4 week losing streaks.

Helsinki’s OMX Index has fallen for 10 of the past 12 weeks.

The Dow Jones Transports has sunk 10% over the past 3 weeks.

Indonesia’s IDX is nearly oversold.

And Czechia’s PX Index is among the rare advancers for the week.

Commodity prices were mostly weaker.

Only Cocoa, Orange Juice, Gases and Lumber were amongst the notable gainers.

The latter broke its 5 week losing streak.

The extensive list of decliners appear below.

Aluminium and JKM LNG (in Yen) are in 4 week losing streaks.

The Baltic Dry Index and Uranium have fallen for 5 consecutive weeks.

Inversely, Lean Hogs and Cocoa have risen for 5 and 6 straight weeks, respectively. 

Soybeans are nearly oversold.

U.S.Midwest Hot Rolled Coil Steel has spent 30 weeks being oversold,

while Lithium Hydroxide has now lingered in weekly oversold territory for 81 consecutive weeks.

Currencies were active, again.

The Aussie was weaker and it features in this weeks list of extremes.

It has fallen for 4 consecutive weeks versus the USD.

The Loonie was also weaker. It’s now oversold versus the USD.

The Swiss was firmer as was the Euro.

The British Pound also saw strength against all except the USD.

Japan’s Yen softened. 

ZAR/USD broke its streak of 4 consecutive weeks of gains. 

And the NZD/USD has fallen for 10 of the past 12 weeks.

The larger advancers over the past week comprised of;

Cocoa 5.8%, JKM LNG 4.4%, Lumber 5.4%, Natural Gas 14.3%, Orange Juice 3.1% and Dutch TTF Gas rose 7.1%.

The group of largest decliners from the week included;

Aluminium (1.6%), Baltic Dry Index (5.8%), Brent Crude (1.9%), WTI Crude (2%), Cotton (1.8%), Copper (2.3%), Heating Oil (1.6%), Cattle (1.9%), Tin (3.6%), Newcastle Coal (2.6%), Nickel (2%), Palladium (4.4%), Gasoline (2.9%), Robusta Coffee (3.8%), Sugar (2.7%), Gasoil (2%), Uranium (4.8%), Silver in AUD (1.7%), Silver in USD (3.4%), Oats (4.8%), Rice (6.3%), Wheat (3.5%), All World Developed ex USA (3.6%), AEX (2%), KBW Banks (3.4%), BUX (l.8%), CAC (1.8%), DAX (2.6%), DJ Industrials (2.5%), DJ Transports (4.9%), MIB (3.2%), IBEX (2.4%), BOVESPA (2%), IDX (6.1%), S&P SmallCap 600 (5.7%),Russell 2000 (4.8%), TAEIX (2.2%), Nasdaq Composite (1.8%), KRE Regional Banks (6.1%), KSE (4.2%), KOSPI (3.6%), FTSE 250 (2.1%), S&P MidCap 400 (4.9%), Mexico (3.9%), Nasdaq Biotech (2.6%), Nasdaq 100 (2.6%), Nikkei 225 (2%), NIFTY (4.8%), Oslo (3.1%), Copenhagen (5.1%), Helsinki (2.4%), Stockholm (3.2%), PSE (3.2%), SA40 (3.3%), SENSEX (5%), SET (4.7%), SMI (2.7%), SOX (3.6%), S&P 500 (2%), STI (2.4%), Nasdaq Transports (4.5%), TSX (2.7%), FTSE (2.6%), WIG (2.6%), BIST (4%), ASX Financials (3.4%), ASX 200 (2.8%), ASX Materials (4.8%) and the ASX Small Caps fell 3%.

December 22, 2024

By Rob Zdravevski

rob@karriasset.com.au