Edge and Odds

The enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it’s the illusion of knowledge (Stephen Hawking)

It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so (Mark Twain)

Edge and Odds

Invest with smart knowledge and objective odds

THE DAILY EDGE: 27 AUGUST 2020

New U.S. Cases Rise for Third Day

The U.S. reported about 44,100 new cases on Wednesday, up from about 38,200 a day before, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. Total infections have passed 5.82 million nationwide, and nearly 180,000 have died. Around the world, some 24.18 million people have been infected and nearly 826,000 have died.

Louisiana, where Hurricane Laura made landfall just after midnight as a Category 4 storm, plans to remain in Phase 2 of its reopening plan for an additional two weeks, as it temporarily halts testing to deal with the impact of the storm. (…)

A new, $5 coronavirus test from Abbott Laboratories gained emergency-use authorization from the Food and Drug Administration. The test is about the size of a credit card and can give results in about 15 minutes. Abbott said Wednesday it plans to ship tens of millions of the newly authorized tests in September, with plans to increase production to 50 million tests in October.

Standards for testing in the U.S. are still the subject of debate. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has dialed back its guidelines about who should get tested for Covid-19, a move that has prompted pushback from public-health and infectious-disease experts.

The agency now says close contacts of confirmed Covid-19 cases don’t necessarily need to get tested if they don’t have symptoms. Earlier, it had advised that all people exposed to an infected person get tested.

Meanwhile, Moderna Inc. said Wednesday that its experimental coronavirus vaccine induced immune responses in people aged 56 years and older that were comparable to those seen in younger adults in a small study, a promising sign for a vulnerable age group. (…)

South Korea reported 441 new cases, the first time since March that its daily tally exceeded 400. The country now has 18,706 cases in total, and daily figures have stayed in the triple digits for the past couple of weeks. (…)

The recent surge in cases began in churches but has spread across the country. South Korea’s parliament will be closed Thursday after a journalist who attended a National Assembly meeting tested positive for the virus. The journalist had come in contact with more than 50 people, including 14 senior members of the ruling Democratic Party. (…)

For reasons of its own, the WSJ omitted to mention the controversy with the CDC’s pivot on testing. Here’s the NYT’s account:

Trump administration officials on Wednesday defended a new recommendation that people without Covid-19 symptoms abstain from testing, even as scientists warned that the policy could hobble an already weak federal response as schools reopen and a potential autumn wave looms.

The day after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued the revised guidance, there were conflicting reports on who was responsible. Two federal health officials said the shift came as a directive to the Atlanta-based C.D.C. from higher-ups in Washington at the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services.

Adm. Brett P. Giroir, the administration’s coronavirus testing czar, called it a “C.D.C. action,” written with input from the agency’s director, Dr. Robert R. Redfield. But he acknowledged that the revision came after a vigorous debate among members of the White House coronavirus task force — including its newest member, Dr. Scott W. Atlas, a frequent Fox News guest and a special adviser to President Trump.

“We all signed off on it, the docs, before it ever got to a place where the political leadership would have, you know, even seen it, and this document was approved by the task force by consensus,” Dr. Giroir said. “There was no weight on the scales by the president or the vice president or Secretary Azar,” he added, referring to Alex M. Azar II, the secretary of health and human services.

(…) Dr. Fauci said he had seen an early iteration of the guidelines and did not object. But the final debate over the revisions took place at a task force meeting on Thursday, when Dr. Fauci was having surgery under general anesthesia to remove a polyp on his vocal cord. In retrospect, he said, he now had “some concerns” about advising people against getting tested, because the virus could be spread through asymptomatic contact.

“My concern is that it will be misinterpreted,” Dr. Fauci said. (…)

Regardless of who is responsible, the shift is highly significant, running counter to scientific evidence that people without symptoms could be the most prolific spreaders of the coronavirus. And it comes at a very precarious moment. Hundreds of thousands of college and K-12 students are heading back to campus, and broad testing regimens are central to many of their schools’ plans. Businesses are reopening, and scientists inside and outside the administration are growing concerned about political interference in scientific decisions. (…)

Over the weekend, the Food and Drug Administration, under pressure from Mr. Trump, gave emergency approval to expand the use of antibody-rich blood plasma to treat Covid-19 patients. The move came just days after scientists, including Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, and Dr. Francis S. Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, intervened to stop the practice because of lack of evidence that it worked.

But the WSJ adds that

Adm. Giroir said that the change was meant to give more responsibility and power to public-health officials, as the state of the pandemic varies significantly across the U.S. and requires different local responses.

The health experts said local public-health authorities typically rely on the CDC for direction.

“We look to the CDC for uniformity, especially in a pandemic,” Joshua Barocas, an infectious-disease physician at Boston Medical Center and member of the Infectious Diseases Society of America’s public-health committee, said in an interview. (…)

Sad and dangerous messiness…

A 7-day average cases/deaths chart:8_US Cross Curves (3)

Nationwide, 223,900 more people have died than usual from March 15 to Aug. 8, according to C.D.C. estimates, which adjust current death records to account for typical reporting lags. That number is 62,000 higher than the official count of coronavirus deaths for that period. Higher-than-normal death rates are now widespread across the country; only Alaska and Hawaii, states outside the contiguous United States, show numbers that look similar to recent years. (NYT)

Fathom Consulting:

Among the major economies, the UK, Spain and Italy now look very similar in terms of their total fatality rates, with France less badly affected and Germany substantially better, and China, Japan and South Korea virtually invisible on the chart below on this metric. The US looks as though it will join the UK and the others at the top in due course and might yet go through those levels. The same might be true for Brazil and other South American countries too.

Meanwhile, case trends in the E.U. are trending up as schools have been reopening:

coronavirus-data-explorer (2)

Countries down under also had what looks like their second wave as winter arrived and schools reopened. South Korea is having its own flare up. Note the smaller scales:

coronavirus-data-explorer (6)

NBF has this table showing that 61% of listed countries are in a 7-day uptrend in new cases per million pop. and 69% of the risers are in the E.U.:

image

Millennials Help Power Housing-Market Rebound Long viewed as perennial home renters who were reluctant or unable to buy, the generation now in their mid-20s to late 30s is emerging as a driving force in the U.S. housing market’s recent recovery.

Millennials reached a housing milestone early last year when the group first accounted for more than half of all new home loans, and they consistently held above that level in the first months of this year, the most recent period for which data are available, according to Realtor.com. The generation made up 38% of home buyers in the year that ended July 2019, up from 32% in 2015, according to the National Association of Realtors.

The group last year also surpassed baby boomers as the biggest living adult generation in the U.S., according to the Pew Research Center. The largest cohort of millennial births was in 1990, Pew said, meaning that group turns 30 sometime this year. (…)

Older millennials are marrying and having children later in life than previous generations, after finishing their education and building up savings.

That growing demand is compounded by younger millennials, who are now entering their 30s and starting to buy homes more actively. That is more in line with the ages at which many baby boomers and Generation X, the group born before millennials, began buying homes. (…)

First-time buyers accounted for 34% of sales in July, up from 32% a year earlier, NAR said. (…)Image

EQUITIES

Bianco Research notes that the Q2 earnings season’s beat rate ranks as the best for a quarterly reporting period since the first quarter of 2007.  FYI, earnings rose 9.6% YoY in Q1’07. They rose another 9.4% in Q2 but declined 5.7% in Q3 and cratered 28.1% in Q4. And for the record, the S&P 500 Index peaked in May 2007.

This chart from NDR via CMG Wealth is with yesterday’s close:

And we continue to make history:

Image

TECHNICALS WATCH

The 13/34–Week EMA Trend has been as helpful as powerful, so far:

NDR also has its own NDR Crowd Sentiment Poll:

The current weekly sentiment reading is 66.3. It was 65.1 last week. The current regime is highlighted in yellow.

NDR measured 92 incidences of Crowd Sentiment extremes since 1996. There have been 92 extremes since 1996. The crowd was right just one time and wrong 91 times. Had one followed the crowd at the time at those extremes, one would have lost over 12,000 S&P 500 points (according to NDR).  The last Extreme Pessimistic was reached on December 24, 2018 and the last Extreme Optimistic was reached in early April 2019.

Source: Ned Davis Research (via CMG Wealth)

SentimenTrader:

I’ve watched nearly every tick in markets for 25 years. I’ve posted over 10,000 notes. And this might be the weirdest market I’ve ever seen. Once again on Wednesday, major indexes like the S&P 500 soared while the average stock fell. We’ve been noting these oddities for weeks, and they haven’t mattered, at least for the S&P index that everyone watches. As a result of the relentless rise in the indexes and consistent weakness in most securities, the S&P reached yet another 52-week high, yet the McClellan Oscillator closed at -37 on Wednesday. Of the 10 worst-ever Oscillator readings on a day the S&P reached a new high since 1962, 4 of them were set in the past week.

Lowry’s Research last night wrote that yesterday’s 1% advance in the S&P 500 was narrow, noting that the Small-Cap Index lost 0.9% and “Decliners took 61% of Adv/Dec issues. Demand was also weak (…) the Percent of NYSE Stocks Above 10-DMA fell to below 50% (…)”.

For its part, Edge and Odds says that while the S&P 500 rose 1.0% yesterday, its equal-weight version declined 0.2%.

SPY VS RSP

Sad smile More sad and dangerous messiness…

Police have charged Kyle Rittenhouse, 17, with murder for allegedly killing that man and another protester in a shooting after driving to Kenosha with a rifle to stand with others in self-styled militias claiming to guard local businesses.

But [Fox Carlson] Tucker argued that the teen’s actions were understandable after days of chaos.

“Are we really surprised that looting and arson accelerated to murder?” Carlson said. “How shocked are we that 17-year-olds with rifles decided they had to maintain order when no one else would?”

Totally shocked! Really, who wouldn’t be, first that a 17-year old would be street walking with a rifle, then that he would shoot somebody pretending to be a militia maintaining order? Where was that again? What century is this?

Axios’ Dion Rabouin’s today note:

I can’t write a newsletter today.

NBA players began a strike last night, refusing to play basketball and effectively saying that while we cannot control the laws or the courts or the actions of others, what we can control is ourselves. We control our bodies and our minds, and no matter what you take from us, you cannot take that.

Whenever someone stands up to fight for justice, one must always ask whether that stand is a moment or a movement. I hope that what the NBA started last night was a movement. I hope it was a movement for change, and a movement for justice and for equality.

I don’t have much to give to that movement, but I have my body and I have my mind and I have this little newsletter that you all read. Maybe I can make a difference somehow by showing that you don’t have to be a superstar to take a stand.

Jacob Blake was shot in the back seven times while walking away. To my eyes, he walked away because he was sick and tired of being harassed by armed agents of the state whose occupation is supposed to be to protect him. I don’t know Jacob Blake but I know what it’s like to be tired of police harassment and to decide that enough is enough.

So did Eric Garner. So did Sandra Bland. So did so many others. This is must end.

I’ve been stopped and frisked. I’ve been assaulted. I’ve been thrown to the ground or on the hood of a car and handcuffed by these same armed agents of the state for the crime of looking suspicious or being in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong skin.

And I know exactly what it’s like to have that pit well up in the back of my throat as I decided that I had taken enough. I was fortunate enough to not end up dead. Or paralyzed.

Many of you reading this are CEOs, presidents, founders, and asset managers who oversee billions of dollars. If I have the chance to speak to you and say one thing from my heart, it’s this: Understand that there is profound injustice happening in this country and it has been happening for as long as any of us can remember and it eats away at us every day.

Nothing changes until people decide it’s unconscionable for things to continue the way they are. It feels like we may have reached that point, and I stand with the people who are taking a stand for change. Even if all I have is a little newsletter. Red rose

THE DAILY EDGE: 26 AUGUST 2020

  • The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Monday updated guidance to say that Americans who have recently been exposed to someone with COVID-19 for more than 15 minutes and do not have symptoms do not need to get tested. “You do not necessarily need a test unless you are a vulnerable individual or your health care provider or state or local public health officials recommend you take one,” the CDC said. This is a change from previous guidance that said people who had spent more than 15 minutes with an individual who has tested positive for the virus should also get tested, regardless of symptoms. The U.S. has conducted more than 73 million tests this year, and about 6 million of them have come back positive. The CDC’s decision has been criticized by some in the medical community. “Our work on the ‘silent’ spread underscores the importance of testing people who have been exposed to COVID-19 regardless of symptoms,” Alison Galvani, an epidemiologist and director of the Center for Infectious Disease Modeling and Analysis, tweeted. “This change in policy will kill.” It is estimated that up to 40% of people who have COVID-19 are asymptomatic, meaning they do not demonstrate common symptoms of an infection like coughing or muscle aches, according to one research letter published in May in JAMA Network.

8_US Cross Curves (2)

Activity Data Show South Korea Drop as Europe Reverses

The economic rebound in major advanced economies is stalling or even reversing, according to Bloomberg Economics gauges that integrate high-frequency data such as credit-card use, travel and location information. South Korea stands out with the steepest apparent drop, and Italy, France and Spain also appear to have turned down while the recovery in Germany and Sweden remains sluggish. The U.K., U.S. and Canada are still very far below pre-crisis levels of activity, but have recently made up some lost ground.

Rebound in Reverse

unnamed (53)

chart (5)

chart (6)

Germany Boosts Already Hefty Coronavirus Stimulus Germany is beefing up its already formidable stimulus package to prop up its economy through the Covid-19 pandemic, brushing away concerns from some economists that the state is keeping insolvent businesses afloat artificially.

(…) Wage subsidies for furloughed workers, the flagship measure in the country’s new package, will be extended by 12 months to the end of 2021, in contrast with most other European countries whose schemes are set to expire in the coming months.

Furlough schemes, known in Europe as short-time work, allow companies to temporarily idle workers without resorting to payroll cuts. So far, the scheme has allowed Germany to avoid a spike in unemployment and it could help businesses adjust faster to rising demand when the economy normalizes. The 5.6 million workers currently enrolled can earn up to 87% of their pay from benefits while working reduced hours or not at all.

Other steps announced late Tuesday after more than eight hours of internal government negotiations, include extending until the year-end a provision allowing companies not to file for insolvency if they cannot service their debt. Grants to help companies cover their fixed costs will be extended by four months until Dec. 31. (…)

Since the start of the crisis, Berlin has pledged direct payments, tax relief, equity, loans and guarantees—not all of which have been tapped— 40.1% of Germany’s gross domestic product, compared with 23% for the U.K., 18.9% for France, and 14.8% for the U.S., according to the International Monetary Fund.

Germany’s economy is already among the continent’s better performers this year despite its reliance on international trade, which collapsed in the spring. That partly reflects the nation’s relatively short and mild lockdown, but economists also point to the fiscal stimulus.

The German economy contracted by 9.7% in the second quarter compared with the first, the federal statics office said Tuesday, roughly in line with the U.S. and far outperforming major European economies such as France and Italy whose economies shrank by around 20% during the same period. Recent economic data suggest Germany’s economy is now recovering more strongly than its neighbors.

After years of fiscal restraint and with historically low interest rates, Germany’s government can afford to spend more than its neighbors. (…)

A fresh increase in state spending could bring political benefits for Germany’s ruling parties, which face a national election late next year. (…)

EARNINGS WATCH

We now have 479 reports in, an 82% beat rate and a +22.5% surprise factor. Q2 earnings are now seen down 30.2% on revenues down 8.9%. Health Care, Utilities and Tech are expected to show positive earnings growth in Q2.

image

In Europe, 281 companies have reported. The beat rate is 60% and the surprise factor is +36.8% but the blended growth rate for Q2 earnings is a still bleak -51.9%. Revenues are seen cratering 20.1% in Q2. Only the Health Care sector is expected to post positive earnings growth (+1.1%)

image

While Industrials have posted a strong earnings beat this quarter, it appears that analysts continue to remain bearish on this sector, as they have downgraded next quarter estimates by -7.0% for those companies who have reported Q2 earnings and -14.0% for companies yet-to-report Q2 earnings. (Refinitiv)

U.S. Firms in China Say Trump’s WeChat Ban Will Hit Them Where It Hurts U.S. businesses in China are pushing back against a looming Trump administration ban on Tencent’s WeChat app, with a report shedding light on just how vital the tool is to companies doing business in the world’s second-largest economy.

The American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai warned of an “enormous negative impact” on U.S. companies with international businesses if the order, whose scope has yet to be revealed, was enacted too broadly. (…)

Should the ban extend to China and U.S. companies and citizens there, almost nine in 10 companies said the ban would hurt operations in China by hindering their ability to effectively communicate with staff and local authorities. More than half of those polled said it would result in a loss of competitiveness in the market, and 42% of the respondents say extending the WeChat ban to China would result in revenue loss.

More than a dozen firms, including Apple Inc., Walmart Inc. and Ford Motor Co., have approached the White House in recent weeks to voice their concerns that the order, typically used in emergency situations to protect national security, could extend into China, where the app has become a vital business tool. (…)

Beyond interpersonal communication, consumers in China use the app to pay for goods and services, while companies including Starbucks Corp. and McDonald’s Corp. use WeChat as a key marketing tool and e-commerce platform. (…)

The AmCham Shanghai survey showed that the app is often used by U.S. businesses in China to communicate with staff, Chinese consumers and local government officials. Replies showed there was no good alternative to WeChat in China, should the platform be banned. Facebook Inc.’s eponymous messaging app, Instagram and Twitter are blocked in China and Facebook-owned WhatsApp chat messenger is sporadically unusable. There is no comparable Chinese alternative. (…)

  • Hemorrhaging cash could be the pair’s biggest problem.  Analysts at Bloomberg Intelligence estimated Friday that Uber and Lyft will see $3.5 billion and $1 billion in cash burn, respectively, for full-year 2020, figures which exclude the potential effects of higher labor costs or a California shutdown related to the AB5 legislation. Bloomberg Intelligence’s Mandeep Singh and Matthew Martino further note that “even after laying off more than 20% of their workforce[s], the companies may have to continue cutting fixed costs.”  (Almost Daily Grant)