What are you trying to squeeze ?

It was 3 years ago when the DAX Index last traded at such extremes.

Mean reversion (or convergence) beckons.

Institutional Asset Allocators…..if you were advised to ‘go long’ and deploy more capital this week, ask why?

I hope the answer isn’t because German (EU) 2’s are yielding the lowest in 2 years?

More ‘extremes’ will be listed in tomorrows edition of Macro Extremes.

September 28, 2024

by Rob Zdravevski

rob@karriasset.com.au

Time to buy straw hats was 2 weeks ago

The Shanghai Composite and the CSI 300 indices have appeared in the oversold category of my past 2 weekend editions of Macro Extremes.

This week, these indices have risen 9.7% and 15.7% respectively.

It’s nice but I don’t like the set-up.

September 27, 2024

by Rob Zdravevski

rob@karriasset.com.au

Bitcoin mimics mood for risk

The strength of Bitcoin’s (BTC/USD) daily trend is waning.

It’s weekly trend is turning lower.

I’ll look for it to trade to $50,400 (+/- $1,000) before deciding on a call for a call to $40,000.

In the interest of correlating BTC/USD to the mood in risk taking, I’ve overlaid the AUD/JPY in the chart below.

September 26, 2024

by Rob Zdravevski

rob@karriasset.com.au

Screenshot

Mean reversion doesn’t apply to NVIDIA

NVIDIA is miles above its 200 week moving average.

September 25, 2024

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Macro Extremes (week ending September 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)

Palladium 

Sugar

AUD/CAD

ZAR/USD

IBEX

Copenhagen

PSE

Nasdaq Transportation Index

Thailand’s SET Index *

And Australia’s ASX 200

Overbought (RSI > 70)

U.S. 10 year minus U.S. 2 year government yield

U.S. 10 year minus U.S. 5 year government yield

Arabica and Robusta Coffee *

Gold as priced in AUD, CAD, EUR & USD *

MYR/USD *

NIFTY *

SENSEX *

And the ASX Financials Index *

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

Singapore’s Strait Times Index

Extremes below the Mean (at least 2.5 standard deviations)

None

Oversold (RSI < 30)

U.S. 2 year government bond yield *

Australian Coking Coal *

U.S. Midwest Hot Rolled Coil Steel *

North European Hot Rolled Coil Steel *

Lithium Carbonate *

Lithium Hydroxide *

CFR China Iron Ore *

USD/CNH

USD/IDR

USD/SGD *

Shanghai Composite *

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

U.S. 3 month bill yield

Notes & Ideas:

During a week when the investors were awaiting a lowering of the American central bank interest rates…….. Global government bond yields rose.

Chilean and Swiss 10’s yields aren’t oversold anymore.

Short dated Japanese yields bucked the global weekly trend. They fell.

The U.S. yield curve remains overbought (10 year – 2 year) as is the U.S. 10Y – 5Y spread.

The U.S. 5 year minus 5 year breakeven inflation rate is nearing an oversold extreme.

And incidentally, Brazil’s central bank hiked their policy interest rate.

Equities rose again.

We are seeing more indices entering overbought territory.

At this stage, most of them are in Asia driven by their stronger currencies.

Singapore’s Strait Times is in a 6 week winning streak.

Some Australian indices also feature in this week’s list.

The Shanghai Composite and CSI 300 broke their 4 week losing streaks.

And any of those which were oversold last week have bounced, such as the KOSPI.

Commodities mostly rose.

Gold and Palladium remain in overbought territory.

Sugar soared 19% for the week.

Lumber and Heating Oil moved out of overbought territory.

U.S. Henry Hub Natural Gas has risen 14% over the past 3 weeks.

Wheat broke its 3 week winning streak.

U.S.Midwest Hot Rolled Coil Steel has spent 17 weeks being oversold.

And Lithium Hydroxide has now spent 62 consecutive weeks in weekly oversold territory.

Currencies feature heavily in this week’s entrants of extremes.

The Aussie rose while the Canadian Loonie fell, again. Confusing perhaps?

The decline in the CAD juxtaposed the risk-on feeling for the week.

While the Yen’s decline of 2%-3% across a range of pairs and weakness in the Swissie confirmed the ‘risk-on’ mood.

The USD was generally weaker and is prominently oversold against various Asian currencies.

And the British Pound is nearing an overbought level again the USD.

The larger advancers over the past week comprised of;

Bloomberg Commodity Index 2.1%, Baltic Dry Index 4.6%, WTI Crude Oil 5.3%, Cotton 5.3%, Lean Hogs 4.8%, Copper 2.5%, Heating Oil 3.5%, Lumber 2.3%, Cattle 2.5%, LNG JKM in Yen 4.4%, Newcastle Coal 2.9%, Natural Gas 5.6%, Nickel 4.1%, Gasoline 5.3%, Sugar 19.2%, S&P GSCI 2.8%, CRB Index 3.1%, Brent Crude 3.6%, Gasoil 2.5%, Gold in CHF 1.8%, Gold in USD 1.7%, Rice 1.9%, KBW Bank Index 4.7%, DJ Industrials 1.6%, HSCEI 5.1%, Hang Seng 5.1%, IBEX 1.9%, IDX 1.6%, S&P Small Cap 600 2.3%, MOEX 3.9%, Russell 2000 2.2%, TAEIX 1.8%, Nasdaq Composite 1.5%, KSE 3.5%, S&P MidCap 400 2%, Nikkei 225 3.1%, Stockholm 2.1%, PSI 3.3%, South Africa 2%, Sensex 2%, SET 1.9%, S&P 500 1.4%, STI 1.7%, ASX Financials 2.4%, ASX Small Caps 1.8% and Turkiye’s BIST rose 2.2%.

The group of largest decliners from the week included;

JKM LNG (2.7%), Arabica Coffee (3.4%), Platinum (2.5%), Robusta Coffee (4%), Dutch TTG Gas (3.4%), Corn (2.8%), Oats (2.7%), Wheat (4.4%), BOVESPA (2.8%), Copenhagen (2.6%) and the Tel Aviv 35 fell 2.8%

September 22, 2024

by Rob Zdravevski

rob@karriasset.com.au

Watching Oil prices

Last week WTI Crude #Oil traded down to $64.04.

I’ve been calling $64 for sometime as its first stop.

While its downtrend needs to be respected for now, it is not yet exhibiting the required strength to send it lower.

No action for now.

Pause and Watching before I call $46.

September 19, 2024

by Rob Zdravevski

rob@karriasset.com.au

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Brazil’s read on inflation

#Brazil (and #Chile‘s) central banks see #inflation before the rest of them.

Today, Brazil’s central bank raised interest rates.

They changed direction.

Forget what the U.S. is doing.

It pays to queue off their moves.

The circles in the chart below denotes when Brazil’s central bank 

changed interest rates direction compared to where the Brazil’s inflation rate was, at the time.

September 19, 2024

by Rob Zdravevski

rob@karriasset.com.au

Screenshot
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Manufacturing in China

As wage rates in China increase, more of its labour intensive manufacturing have shifted to Indonesia, Mexico and Vietnam.

When that happens, other parts of its manufacturing sector advance up the value chain mainly as its technology processes improve.

For example, China has overtaken Japan as the world’s largest exporter of automobiles.

Keep in mind that China still has a working population of nearly 1 billion.

That is 3 times larger than the combined working population of Indonesia, Mexico and Vietnam.

American buildings are ageing

I read somewhere that the average age of U.S. commercial buildings are approximately over 50 years old.

and according to Joint Center of Housing Studies of Harvard University;

in 2021, that the median American home age was 43 years. It has never been older.

That average was 27 years old in 1991.

#construction #remodelling

Doing numbers on real estate

I was recently asked my view about real estate valuations.
My response was wasn’t brief and it had many variables.

Today, I walked past a house in South Yarra (which is a really nice inner-city suburb in Melbourne, Australia) which caught my eye.

Then I looked up the specific property’s transaction history.

Over 30 years, the gross annual compounded return for this property has been 9% (without any considerations made for any financing, maintenance or carrying costs) that the various owners may have incurred.

And this gross 9% p.a. capital return is from a property in a seriously fancy street, in a sought after suburb within one of the world’s most hottest real estate markets over that time.

My scribbles below are showing the gross annual compounded return achieved from each transaction to the other.

There is nothing like doing the numbers….