I’m not a US person, or at least not anymore, so Housing Doom’s pet dragon Igor had to clue me in about this plant that’s been in the news so much recently. It grows in South Carolina, and Igor also tells me that it’s there, over the next six days, that most of the juice of this year’s presidential election will be squeezed.  Pollsters predict primary election or caucus outcomes by measuring the intentions of likely participants / voters, but this week’s Republican party aspirants are depending so heavily on un-likely supporters that the statisticians are severely off-balance.  So some…
Read more…

So Thursday the radio is carrying a promo for the new David Cronenberg film and today the library’s e-mail notification comes for Timothy Findey’s Pilgrim and I spend the afternoon reading the first few chapters. Oops! Just reviewed the comments under twist’s old post “Pheonix Realtors: Don’t Worry, Be Happy.” Weird, especially considering the date. I’ve learned to appreciate that these co-incidence clusters (aka synchronicity, which given the context is likely the preferred term) often come just before interesting events. Time will tell … The Fed’s own holdings of MBS eased back $2.535 billion and the foreign cenbanks’ holdings of…
Read more…

A headline worthy of the Halifax Chronicle-Herald’s Bill Smith, circa 1975 … CBC News (1/12 ’12): “Same-sex divorce options explored by Harper government” The mind boggles.  Meanwhile, the foreign central banks continue to steadily reduce their holdings of US obligations … more on this in due course

The Fed’s own holdings of MBS were flat, rebounding up a small $0.444 billion while foreign central banks’ holdings of agencies fell by a similar amount. However the bleeding continued (at a reduced rate) with the treasuries number dropping at a more-than-$billion-a-day rate once again. Last week’s Reuters report1 was, as usual, based on the weekly update from the NY Fed’s H.4.1 table site,2 but they seem to be among the missing again this week. Here is Doom’s updated CSV version3 of the agencies and treasuries foreign central bank holdings data set. Treasuries slumped $8.560 billion, and while that’s barely…
Read more…

Well, Igor, it’s been quite a while since we’ve tried one of these Monday posts, but for some reason I couldn’t let this opportunity slip by.  Wikipedia has that my birthdate (and Charles Bernstein’s, go figure!) is within a few days of this guy’s (we’ll need lots of silly coincidences like this in future, it would seem): NYT (12/29 ’11): “Charles Krauthammer: Are we alone in the universe?” … As we inevitably find more and more exo-planets where intelligent life can exist, why have we found no evidence — no signals, no radio waves — that intelligent life does exist?…
Read more…

…gears, and just for fun consider this recent huff from the land of Cockney rhyming slang: Economist (12/28 ’11): Lexington — “Ron Paul’s big moment” … Even if he wins in quirky Iowa, Ron Paul will never be America’s president. But his coming this far tells you something about the mood of Republican voters. A substantial number like a man who wants to abolish the Federal Reserve, introduce a new currency to compete with the dollar, eliminate five departments of the federal government within a year, pull out of the United Nations and close all America’s foreign bases, which he…
Read more…

The Fed’s own holdings of MBS resumed its fall, dropping $6.352 billion after the extraordinary rise in the previous week. The December 8th Reuters report1 was, as usual, based on the weekly update from the NY Fed’s H.4.1 table site,2 however they are apparently either suppressing that particular information, or have gone fast asleep. Here is Doom’s updated CSV version3 of the agencies and treasuries foreign central bank holdings data set. Treasuries slumped a further $11.754 billion. Agencies surged $10.235 billion, neutralizing most of the treasuries dump.  You’ll notice from the above chart that this is something of a trend-buster. …
Read more…

The Fed’s own holdings of MBS which have been consistently dropping, if at a decelerating rate, ever since they peaked in mid-July 2010 suddenly surged up $31.026 billion last week. If Doom is reading the tea leaves on this one correctly the anomaly suggests there are some counterparty institutions who really want to hide some of their exposure to agencies from the calendar year end reports … BL / BW (12/6 ’11): “Fed Uses ‘Dollar Rolls’ in Mortgage-Bond Program Shift” With dollar rolls, an investor seeking to borrow money enters into contracts to sell mortgage securities in any month and…
Read more…

The Fed’s own holdings of MBS were unchanged with the foreign central banks continuing their mild selling trend of agencies, but they lurched from a huge buy to a significant sell-off in Treasury Debt. For all the wild fluctuations, the foreign central bank holdings of treasuries now stand at just about where they were in early August. This week’s Reuters report1 is, as usual, based on the weekly update from the NY Fed’s H.4.1 table site.2 Here is Doom’s updated CSV version3 of the agencies and treasuries foreign central bank holdings data set. Treasuries from Sep ’08 chart Treasures from…
Read more…

The Fed’s own holdings of MBS plunged $14.548 billion with the foreign central banks subtracting about 1/10th that much, while the cenbanks gyrated back into a huge buy of treasuries, erasing the bulk of last week’s dump, the third largest ever. Trend? Has anyone got a trend? Last week’s Reuters report1 was (this week’s will be placed there when available), as usual, based on the weekly update from the NY Fed’s H.4.1 table site.2 Here is Doom’s updated CSV version3 of the agencies and treasuries foreign central bank holdings data set. Treasury Debt sailed up $18.135 billion, reversing about 85…
Read more…

The Fed’s own holdings of MBS dropped a mild $0.383 billion with the foreign central banks adding almost a billion to their holdings, but after a huge buying splurge in US Treasury Debt in the previous week the cenbanks swung to one of the biggest dumps of the stuff ever. This week’s Reuters report1 is, as usual, based on the weekly update from the NY Fed’s H.4.1 table site.2 Here is Doom’s updated CSV version3 of the agencies and treasuries foreign central bank holdings data set.   Treasury Debt spun down $20.446 billion (Reuters’ anonymous reporter allowed that it “tumbled”…
Read more…

And yes, I have seen the fnords, but you’d think that they would at least have the decency to let Natalie Wood rest in peace  The Fed’s own holdings of MBS dropped a thudding $7.278 billion with the foreign central banks divesting themselves of a bit more than half that amount, but after a slight easing of their treasuries holdings in the previous week, this week sees another monumental surge in cenbankers’ appetite for US gilts, one of the biggest ever. While the cenbankers work in almost complete secrecy, the sloshing in the trim tanks has lately become all too…
Read more…

The Fed’s own holdings of MBS rose $34 million, exactly the trivial amount they fell in the previous week. Too bad there’s no real auditing of the Fed or we could make fun of the mailroom clerk who put insufficient postage on the paperwork last month After shocking treasuries changes the last few weeks all the numbers in the series have suddenly become completely flat. The MSM usually terms such a juddering halt “a return to calm,” but we’ll have to see in coming weeks. This week’s Reuters report1 is, as usual, based on the weekly update from the NY…
Read more…

The Fed’s own holdings of MBS were almost unchanged, dropping a measily $34 million, while the foreign cenbank holdings of agencies were pretty flat. On the other hand, the treasuries number went completely bonkers. Now the pay-walled financial media are becoming nearly as secretive as the cenbanks, but there seems to be a consensus that a BoJ desperate to control the upward spiral of the yen bought about $100B of Treasury Debt on Halloween, which would seem to imply that while in the aggregate we’re looking at a record weekly buy of treasuries, if you take away Japan there was…
Read more…

The Fed’s own holdings of MBS dropped an accelerating $12.814 billion and foreign central banks resumed their headlong rush to the exits, bringing their hoard of US Treasury Debt held in trust at the NY Fed to levels last seen six months ago in late May. This week’s Reuters report1 is, as usual, based on the weekly update from the NY Fed’s H.4.1 table site.2 Here is Doom’s updated CSV version3 of the agencies and treasuries foreign central bank holdings data set.   After last week’s respite treasuries got crushed again, plunging $19.132 billion in the third largest Treasury Debt…
Read more…