AM Brew, Jun 24th 2022

Lufthansa is cancelling 3100 flights this summer due to labor issues. This is becoming an increasing disruption to the "old way of life". Ryanair Europe is striking this weekend, and BritishAir Heathrow checkin staff are scheduled to strike. We have a friend that just had an August Tokyo-to-Taipei flight cancelled. Its worldwide.

Pre-Market, stocks look very healthy. Chinese stocks are strong, with BABA & NIO both up +3% pre-market. ZEN jumped 50% on anticipated takeover news. The continued strong takeover environment means this is not a typical bear market - its a valuation bear in a strong economy. Powell told Congress on Wednesday that the Fed's commitment to getting inflation to 2% is "unconditional". Of course, it is conditional that there is no stock market crash, which would then make inflation instantly negative. Remember, deflation is worse than inflation, a LOT worse. Inflation inflicts pain and fear on 80% of people but deflation inflicts pain & fear on closer to 100%. The amount of pain & fear in deflation is substantial. This is why central banks have been printing money since the dawn of time - they will keep printing money, lots of it. The Fed is a printing press. The speed of the printing is unknown, but they will print more next year and even more in 2024. Count on it.

The Fed announced that all banks passed the stress test: this is bullish. The Fed tested bank performance if unemployment was 10%, stocks dropped 55%, commercial real estate prices dropped 40%, home prices down 28.5%, not all at once of course :-). A few banks will likely be raising dividends and announcing buybacks next week (they are not allowed today).

Fedex reported a healthy quarter, which is to be expected after a recent 50% dividend hike. Along the same lines, I have been shorting OTM one-week Puts on CAR - they reported an insane quarter and things are strong in travel land, so I expect CAR's earnings to be huge. So far, all good, as all puts have expired worthless or have been able to cover at a profit, but I am rolling the trade as CAR keeps trading down and the quarter should be huge.

A blockchain bridge called Harmony was hacked yesterday for $100 million in crypto. Evidently bridges are not as secure.

Bloomberg is reporting that 10-year treasuries don't look too attractive for European or Asian investors, as the curve is so flat:

Our speaking technicals post is quite interesting. Our technical team covered the energy shorts yesterday, and over here in London, after getting caught in nasty-rail-strike-related-traffic for 2 days straight, I went out and bought an oil futures contract late yesteday. Over here, the roads are jammed and people are gladly paying $8.60 a gallon to get to their destination. Same will happen in the USA - people won't stop driving at $10 or even $20 gas - they will just drive smarter using more efficient vehicles, car-pooling and cutting out senseless trips. I still remember my dad being upset at the posted $0.45 a gallon at a particular station. My dad said "I will never ever pay $0.45 for gas." I was young, but I remember thinking to myself, "yes, I agree, he won't pay $0.45 because he is going to be paying double that" :-)