What is becoming obvious now is the fact that the global central banks can no longer hide the fact that without their QE and balance sheet expansion, asset prices would fall and economies would reverse. The last month or so has seen a huge reversal in the markets expectations for future rate hikes and one by which certainly shouldn’t have surprised any of our readers. We have used and will continue to use the #QE4EVR theme as basically we are and will all continue to be bound to the low interest rate to negative rate environment. We aren’t stupid…

We decided to wait till the FOMC meeting to release this week’s letter so that we could capture the most important event of the week. It’s not that we didn’t expect a few of the tech giant earnings would be painted with bullishness, but we felt maybe the earnings didn’t really matter.

Let’s dig into some of the Q4 bank earnings that came out last week. First up Bank of America which posted its largest full year profit in history $28.15 billion. (WSJ) So how did they accomplish such a feat, well let’s just see what their interest rate differential was, i.e. what are they paying depositors compared to the risk-free rate they earn off those deposits.

Dead cat bounce or does the equity market have what it takes to reverse that negative bear market stigma? As we highlighted over the last few weekly notes, we suspected the equity markets would bounce. However now, we feel that the euphoria has hit some technical levels that should put to test the veracity of this rally. We like to take a longer-term approach in times like this as everyone is all goosed up about the rebound, because fundamentally nothing has really changed. In fact, one can argue where fundamentals are concerned, the backdrop continues to weaken, global instability continues to gain, and the US government furlough seems to be foolishly overlooked.

What a ride the beginning of the year has been so far. As we warned in our year end and 2019 outlook, the equity markets were most likely set up for some bottom pickers to step in and show their support out of the gates.