Yeah, It’s Still Water (follow-up)
You know, I was a big fan of stock buybacks back when I was running a fund, and I still think that most of the macro reasons to oppose stock buybacks …
Category: In Summary
Domino Theory
I'm not THAT into dominoes, but I am into figuring out what's next for changes in the Fed narrative and how that impacts markets.
More evidence that…
Coal Mine, Meet Canary
I think these emergency actions in the repo market – and to be sure, these ARE emergency actions – and now the expansion of the balance sheet to g…
The Wages of Populism
There are two necessary narratives for EM investing to work:
1) Yay, EM growth!
2) Yay, EM property rights!
Both of these narratives are broken, whi…
The Old Man and the Sea
The line between the anchor and the boat has been cut. The line between the fisherman and the fish has been cut.
Everyone knows that everyone knows t…
Hello Darkness My Old Friend
Our most impactful structural attribute of narrative is Attention – the level of “drum-beating” for a certain narrative relative to all of the O…
The US Recession That Wasn’t
I’ve never seen a US-oriented macro query that yielded more non-US narrative clusters.
Also, the past few days in markets have felt like 2008-2009,…
Two Things I Think I Think
First, I think I think that the "cover story" for the Fed - that they act to help the real economy - has evaporated.
Second, I think I think Trump ha…
I Was Shook
The news about Jeffrey Epstein’s death on Saturday hit me hard, as did the escalation in the Hong Kong protests over the weekend, as did the collaps…
The Second Horseman
The First Horseman was a tightening Fed, and markets suffered its wrath in Q4 last year.
Markets are now suffering the Second Horseman, as China “s…
The Dog That Didn’t Bark
I've been looking at narrative maps for a long time now, and I don't think I've ever seen as complacent a market narrative as what our Narrative Machi…
They’re. Not. Even. Pretending. Anymore.
I’ve met Rick Rieder and Larry Fink a couple of times, but I don’t know them. At all. Maybe they’re decent guys. Maybe they really believe in th…
Get Up and Dance
That line about dancing by Chuck Prince is the perfect quote for any age and any asset class where institutions intentionally take risks they know are…
You Are Here, June 2019
Yes, we’re still in a zeitgeist of Central Bank Omnipotence, where deflationary shocks simply can’t take the market down for much or for long. Tha…
ETNA Research Update
The major update in today’s research deck is a simulation of a market neutral / absolute return strategy using our narrative-driven S&P 500 sector u…
Epsilon Theory Narrative Alpha (ETNA)
US Sector Strategies Presentation Deck (downloadable PDF)
For ET Professional subscribers only.
In the Flow – Chef’s Knives
It's easy to get waaaay too precious when it comes to professional kitchens, whether we're talking about restaurants or a trading desk.
But credit de…
In the Flow – You Are Here, May 2019
Each month we update our five narrative Monitors and summarize the main findings from each.
The big reveal for May? There’s a tremendous amount of…
In the Flow – Wage Growth, Groucho Marx Edition
Wage stagnation in 2016 was actually much worse than you were told. Did this make a difference in the Midwestern states that swung the election, in th…
In the Flow – It’s Toasted
When Donald Trump tells you that there’s no inflation, that up is down and black is white, that monetary policy … It’s toasted! … you’ve got…