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Actual Home Sales Are Tanking – Here’s Proof
The National Association of Realtors (NAR – existing home sales reports) and the Census Bureau (new home sales reports) report monthly sales on a “seasonally adjusted annualized rate” basis (SAAR). Notwithstanding the reliability – or lack thereof – of the “seasonal adjustments,” it would seem absurd to report monthly home sales on an annualized rate basis.
To the extent the NAR and Census Bureau’s data sausage-grinder is fed inaccurate data and thereby vomits a bad monthly “adjusted” number, annualizing that result magnifies the error. As it turns out, when sales are declining, the regression models used to “seasonally 
adjust” the data collected overstates actual sales (year over year monthly existing home sales have declined 13 months in a row).
A better measure of real homes sales is to look at actual numbers from companies in the business of pimping used homes or building and selling new homes. Realogy (RLGY) is the perfect laboratory rat for existing home sales. Realogy is the leading provider of real estate services in the U.S. under the brand names of Coldwell Banker, ERA, Sotheby’s, and a few others. Its shares plunged 15% on Thursday as losses from Q4 accelerated in Q1. Revenue declined 9% year-over-year vs a 6.2% in drop in Q4. The culprit was a 4% drop in transaction volume. The actual “same store sales” decline was likely larger because RLGY’s Q1 numbers are skewed by the acquisition and franchising of Corcoran, making the this quarter’s year/year comps irrelevant.
If any business reflects the true condition of the housing market, it’s RLGY. Existing home sales represent 90% of total home sales and RLGY is the largest real estate brokerage concern in the country. Yes, some select areas may still be showing “red embers” of activity. But most of the country is headed into what will ultimately be a severe housing recession. RLGY was down another 8.7% on Friday. It’s now down 33% since reporting its numbers last week.
RLGY may still be worth shorting here. It’s bleeding cash. It lost $135 million on an earnings before taxes basis (the income statement did not show operating income as line item). Its operations burned $103 million. The Company added an additional $100mm in debt, which now stands at $3.3 billion. The bond issue which it floated in Q4 had a coupon of 9.375% – a triple-C rated yield. Triple-c rated companies typically have a high probability of eventually going bankrupt. The tangible book value of the company – i.e. subtracting goodwill – is negative $1.6 billion. I wouldn’t touch RLGY’s bonds any more than I would touch TSLA’s or NFLX’s bonds. RLGY is on track to run out of cash by the end of September.
In the new home sales arena, Beazer (BZH) stock has plunged 18.4% since reporting its latest quarterly numbers on Friday. BZH’s closings were down over 10%, revenue down 4.6% and its gross margin plummeted (sales incentives to move inventory). Even adding back the write-down of California inventory, BZH’s net income was nearly cut in half and new orders were down close to 8% in the first 6 months vs 2018.
Note: it looks like homebuilders will begin the inventory write-down cycle again. It starts slowly and snowballs into an avalanche. So much for the “tight inventory” narrative that shoved down our gullet the NAR’s little con-artist, Larry Yun.
In my weekly Short Seller’s Journal, I present detailed analysis of the housing market, pulling back the curtain of lies used by industry pimps to hide the truth. In addition, I provide specific short ideas along with suggestions for using options to short stocks synthetically. You can learn more about this newsletter here: Short Seller’s Journal information
Massive Asset Bubbles And Cheap Gold And Silver
Notwithstanding today’s absurdly phony and propagandistic employment report, it’s becoming more apparent by the week that the Fed and the U.S. Government are once again preparing to print more money. I don’t know when the Fed will revert to more QE but I would argue that the intense effort by the banks to use the Comex as a conduit to control the price of gold is a probable signal – just like in 2008 from March to October. Several FOMC officials have already hinted at the possibility of employing “radical” policy measures to keep the system from falling apart.
Silver Liberties invited on its podcast to discuss the extreme overvaluation of financial “assets” and the extreme undervaluation of real money – gold and silver – and the related derivative of real money – mining stocks.
Semiconductor Chips Are The Modern Dutch Tulip Bulbs
The semiconductor stocks continued melting up last week until Intel threw some cold water on the Dutch tulip bulb price-chasing party. TXN reported Tuesday after the close. Revenues declined 5% from the year-earlier quarter. The management stated that “demand continued to slow across most markets. TXN then said Q2 revenues would drop 10% from Q2 2018. It said earnings would be down 13%. Management also explained that historically down-cycles last 4-5 quarters. With the Company 2 quarters into a down-cycle, it would seem that the “green shoots” sighted by some companies in Q1 are nowhere in sight. TXN insiders have been very heavy sellers of the stock.
The chart below is a good example of how the hedge fund algo and retail daytrader momentum chasers operate:
TXN closed around $116.50 before it reported. On the headline “beat,” TXN stock spiked up $6 almost immediately. Price-discovery then set in, as the after-hours traders dumped shares in response to the fundamental reality of TXN’s earnings report. The stock closed after-hours at $113.70, down nearly $9 from the initial reaction to the headlines.
But then on Wednesday Dutch tulip-mania gripped TXN’s stock price. TXN opened green from Tuesday’s regular close and traded as high as $118.99. This is despite the Company’s lowered guidance for the next few quarters. The last time TXN experienced a two-quarter sequential decline in revenues was in 2001 during a recession.
The only news that might have affected TXN’s stock price on Wednesday was a warning about possible further deterioration in its business that accompanied Amphenol’s Q1 earnings report. But Amphenol’s report should have affected TXN’s stock negatively. This market action is exactly like the price-chasing action in late 1999/early 2000.
Semiconductor stocks are the 2019 version of Dutch tulip bulbs. Recall the price of Dutch tulip bulbs rose to insanely high levels during the mid-1630’s, as people chased the price of Tulip bulbs higher, hoping to re-sell them for a profit. With no warning, the price crashed in February 1637.
That’s how the dot.com bubble behaved, including the sudden sell-off that began in March 2000 without any prior warnings other than common sense. I expect that is the same path that the chip stocks will follow. The chip stocks are melting-up in price in complete divergence from the underlying fundamentals. Whereas previously several companies expressed hope for green shoots in the second-half of the year, the last few companies to report (Siltronics, Nanya, TXN and Amphenol) have not mentioned the possibility of a recovery in the sector for the second half of the year.
Xilinx (XLNX) reported a “miss” on Wednesday after the close. Its stock plunged 17% on Thursday. Prior to that, the stock was trading at an insane 12x sales. XLNX’s data center business was down 12% sequentially and 7% yr/yr (the cloud growth is slowing).
Intel reported an obligatory revenue and EPS “beat.” But the market finally paid attention to guidance. INTC cut full-year and Q2 guidance. Management said customers were becoming more cautious, especially in China. Data center inventories are larger than was commonly thought. INTC also said it expected a much more difficult flash memory market. These are chips used in consumer electronics, scientific instrumentation, robotics, and medical electronics. INTC stock dropped 9% on Friday. Data centers can help a business keep its servers and storage systems all in one place, helping the running of the business in an efficient manner. Checking out websites such as https://m247.com/services/host/dedicated-servers/ can help businesses choose the right server for their needs with the security they require.
The chip stocks are setting up for an epic sell-off. Trump can slap the Fed around like a race-horse’s ass while making juvenile demands for lower rates and more money printing all he wants. At some point the collapsing underlying economic fundamentals will remove the termite-eaten legs from beneath the market’s barstool.
The commentary above is an excerpt from the latest Short Seller’s Journal. To learn about the semiconductor stocks I’m shorting and recommending to my subscribers, please visit this link: Short Seller’s Journal information.
The Historical Stock Bubble And Undervalued Gold And Silver
When the hedge fund algos inevitably turn the other way and unload stocks, a meaningful amount of the capital that leaves the stock market will likely rush into gold and silver. The record hedge fund net short position on the Comex will add fuel to the move in gold/silver.
James Anderson of Silver Doctors/SD Bullion invited me to discuss the largest stock bubble in U.S. history and why gold is extremely undervalued relative to the U.S. dollar. (Note: at the 20:44 mark I reference China’s foreign reserves to be $1.2 trillion. This is the dollar amount of China’s reserves; China’s total foreign reserve is $3 trillion).
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You can learn more about Investment Research Dynamics newsletters by following these links (note: a miniumum subscription period beyond the 1st month is not required): Short Seller’s Journal subscription information – Mining Stock Journal subscription information
Hedge Funds Record Net Short Paper Gold
The latest commitment of traders report (COT report) showed that the hedge funds on the Comex (the “managed money” account) is now net short 33.9k contract of paper gold. This is a record net short position in paper gold for the managed money account on the Comex. The previous all-time high was 27.2k contracts at the end of December 2015.
This explains a lot to me about the character of the price decline in gold since early April. Just like in the stock market, the large macro “quant” funds use computer algorithms to momentum trade Comex futures. It’s this factor that caused the price of gold to drop quickly once it went below its 50 dma on April 12th. The shift to a net short positioned reflects hedge fund computers unloading long positions and piling into the short side.
At some point this dynamic will go the other way and, at the very least, there will be a significant short-covering rally as the hedge fund positioning swings back the other way. This will really get interesting if the hedge fund algo move to cover shorts on the Comex at the same time the stock market heads south again. This would stimulate a hedge fund algo party that could finally send gold over $1400.
The Mining Stock Journal focuses on junior exploration mining stock ideas and, on a selective basis, larger-cap producing mining stocks. You can learn more about this newsletter here: Mining Stock Journal information
Tuesday’s Paper Gold Raid And Fake Journalism
“Central banks stand ready to lease gold in increasing quantities should the price rise.” – Alan Greenspan, July 1998 testimony to Congress
At 8:39 a.m. EST 523,200 ozs of paper gold were unloaded onto the Comex in the space of less one minute:
Anyone who’s traded big positions on a trading desk knows that the best way to unload a position that is larger than the immediate liquidity of the market in which the security trades (yes, Comex contracts are “securities,” not actual physical gold) is to feed it out over time.
In that chart above, why wouldn’t the seller try to sell its position in a way that would enable it to get a price for the entire position that was in the vicinity of the market price at the time the sell-order was executed? After all, the market has clearly rebounded to the price level at the time massive sell-order bombed the trading systems, suggesting that the seller could have achieved much larger sell proceeds with a little bit of patience in its selling
This is all rhetorical, of course, because the all-too familiar “fishing line” 1-minute chart is the blatant footprint of market manipulation. Of course, Kitco’s “reporter” on the scene chose to attribute the sudden price plunge to a market “hamstrung by not much risk aversion in the world marketplace” Kitco.com.
It’s hard to believe an educated person wrote that commentary (“Gold Prices Sink To 4-Month Low On Scant Risk Aversion” by Jim Wycoff). Honestly, that headline makes me chuckle. Well then, Jim, the Dow is now up 153 points as I write this 5 hours later, which by your logic would imply there’s even less risk aversion than the “scant” risk aversion at 8:39 a.m. How come, Jim, the price of gold rebounded to the level where it was trading when fear of “scant” risk aversion triggered someone to unload 16 tons of paper gold in less than 60 seconds if indeed fear of scant risk aversion was the catalyst for sell order?
How Banks Create Money Out Of Thin Air
“The credit creation theory was something I intuitively grasped before from other alt-media sites, John nailed it down.” – Comment from someone who watched the podcast below
The “money supply” number as provided by official Federal Reserve statistics, it turns out, is not the true money supply. The fractional banking system allows banks to lend money on its reserve capital at a rate of 90 cents for every $1 of reserve capital. Technically, a loan is not considered “money creation” because of the legal provision that a loan has to be paid back. Because of this legal “glitch,” the creation of credit is not considered to be part of the money supply.
Yet, borrowed money behaves in the economy exactly like printed money until that point in time at which the borrow must pay back the loan. The spending power created by the creation of credit is identical to the spending power of printed money. The person or entity doing the spending does not know the difference.
This means that the amount of debt issued and outstanding by the U.S. Treasury should be added to the “official” money supply number (for example, M2) in order to calculate the true supply of money circulating in the system. This especially true because the amount of debt issued by the U.S. Government increases in quantity on a daily basis – it’s never repaid (anything considered “repaid” has been repaid with new debt).
In this podcast, which is the latest segment of John Titus’ “Mafiacracy” series, Titus explains how and why it is that banks create money out of thin air. Once you understand the principles reviewed in this podcast, you’ll understand how the U.S. became a giant Ponzi Scheme:
Orwell’s Funhouse: Mueller’s RussiaGate Tragi-Comedy
“…in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods.” – Hitler, “Mein Kampf”
The RussiaGate circus has been one gigantic waste of resources, time and money. It’s been the perfect cover-story for the elitists, who have played it perfectly as a device to redirect the masses’ attention while the system collapses – economically, financially and geopolitically. Don’t pay attention to fact that Government spending and debt continues to spiral higher. Instead, watch as the wealthy elites’ political pawns berate each other in public for the benefit of show. A media spectacle akin to herding the peasants into the Coliseum to watch Christians being fed to the lions.
Any who takes the time and effort to follow this tragi-comedy is wasting time and brain cells. The narrative is taking the public down a rabbit hole that never ends. Keep ’em distracted while the elitists loot the system as each side of the political “aisle” roots for their favorite propagandist, unaware that their pockets are being picked clean. It’s like the chickens in the barnyard cheering for Colonel Sanders when he shows up to feed them.
I hope everyone who wakes up everyday to follow the vicissitudes of this stage production is enjoying the show. After all, it’s being entirely funded with your tax money.
The Stock Market’s Great Fool Theory
The current stock market is the most dangerous stock market I have seen in my 34+ year career as a financial markets professional. This includes 1987, 1999-2000 and 2007-2008. The run-up in stocks has been largely a product of momentum-chasing hedge fund algos on behalf of the large universe of sophisticated hedge funds which are desperate for performance. In the context of the obviously deteriorating economic fundamentals, the performance-chasing game has become a combination of FOMO – “fear of missing out” – and the Greater Fool Theory – praying someone else will pay more for the stock than you just paid. There’s also likely some official intervention going on as well per the chart below.
Most, if not all, of you are aware of the degree to which the Trump Administration – primarily The Donald and Larry Kudlow – are using the ongoing the trade negotiations to issue opportunistic headline statements about the progress of a potential deal at times when the market appears ready to drop off a cliff and for which Trump’s advisors know the hedge fund fund algos will respond positively. This chart shows this “positive trade war news” effect (from Northman Trader w/my edits):
The problem with relying on this device is that eventually the market will fatigue of “false-positive” news releases and revert to bona-fide price-discovery.
To see an example of the algos’ response to a headline report and the subsequent “price-discovery” action, let’s examine the release of Bed Bath and Beyond’s (BBBY – $17.99) earnings. BBBY announced its Q4 2018 earnings on Wednesday this past week after the close:
The initial headlines reported an earnings “beat.” The algos drove the stock from its $19.40 closing price to as high as $21.27 on those headlines. But in the real world, the details of BBBY’s financial statements showed that sales declined both in Q4 vs Q4 2018 and for the full-year 2018 vs 2017. Even adding back the large impairment charge which BBBY took in Q4 this year, operating income was still down 37% vs Q4 2017. The stock closed Wednesday’s extended hours trading session 18% below the headline-driven high-tick. This is what happens when reality gets its claws into the market.
The best example of the Greater Fool Theory right now is the semiconductor sector. Semiconductors are “hyper” cyclical. The companies mint money in a strong economy and come close to hemorrhaging to death in recessions. The SMH ETF has gone up 55% since the Fed/Trump began re-inflating the stock bubble. Some individual stocks have nearly doubled.
I’m sorry I missed the opportunity to get long this sector on December 26th. But, given that the move up has been in complete defiance of the actual industry fundamentals, would I have held onto a long position until today? Probably not. The momentum-junkies have been chasing the sector higher with fury based on the faith in the “second-half of 2019” recovery narrative currently preached by CEO’s who have to deliver bad results in Q1 and take a chain-saw to guidance for 2Q. But the message is: “trust me, there’s a huge recovery coming in Q3”
Semiconductor CEO’s are notorious for rose-colored forecasts for the market out in the future. Interestingly, a German wafer manufacturer issued stern, if not refreshingly honest, guidance for 2019 when it said that previous guidance was “under the condition that order intake would need to revive meaningfully in the second half of 2019.” The Company went on to explain that “because of the general economic slowdown and geopolitical uncertainties as well as ongoing inventory corrections in the whole value chain, the timing of a market rebound is not visible.”
Wafers are the building block for semiconductors and integrate circuits. Siltronic is a leading global wafer manufacturer. If Siltronic is seeing a meaningful decline in wafer orders, it means the companies that make the semiconductors and integrated circuits are flush with inventory that reflects lack of demand from companies that use chips to manufacture the end-user products.
The higher probability trade right now is to short the semiconductor sector (along with the overall stock market). Trading volume across the board is declining, standard market internals are fading and sentiment is back to extreme bullishness (Barron’s cover two weeks ago wondered, “is the bull unstoppable?”).
I can hear a bell in the distance signalling the top. I suspect a large herd of price-chasers will realize collectively all at once that there’s going to be a rush to find the next Greater Fool but the Greater Fool will be those stuck at the top.
The above commentary is an excerpt from my weekly subscription newsletter. I bought puts on a semiconductor stock today that has gone parabolic despite horrendous numbers for Q4. I’ll be discussing that stock and a couple others this Sunday. To learn more, click on this link: Short Seller’s Journal information
The Wheels Are Coming Off Musk And Tesla
Literally, the wheels are coming off. Panasonic, which supplies batteries that it manufactures for Tesla at the Gigafactory in Nevada announced that it was cutting back on its plans to expand production capacity at the plant. It also announced that it was suspending plans to produce batteries at Tesla’s planned Shanghai Gigafactory. In an article in a Japanese business publication, Panasonic had less than flattering things to say about working with Tesla. The move by Panasonic at the Nevada Gigafactory likely reflects concern over the falling demand for Teslas.
Tesla is sticking by its guidance to produce and deliver 360-400k vehicles in 2019. In Q1, Tesla delivered 63k vehicles – a 252k annualized rate. David Einhorn, the proprietor of the high profile Greenlight Capital hedge fund, is vocally short Tesla. His team believes Tesla will deliver less than 250k vehicles in 2019. Q1 and Q2 will likely have higher deliveries than Q3 and Q4 because of the temporary “bump” in demand from rolling out the Model 3 in Europe and China in Q1. I believe there’s a chance that deliveries in 2019 are closer to 200k than 250k.
This graphic shows the demand drop for the Models S&X combined in, Norway, one of Tesla’s largest markets (visit @teslacharts to see more well-produced analytic charts like this):
That chart looks similar or worse in all of Tesla’s markets, including the U.S. After a brief bump in deliveries from the effect from the start of delivering the Model 3 to Europe’s and China’s “must-have the latest tech device” crowd, the Model 3 chart will soon look like the delivery chart for the S/X. European’s are already complaining about the poor reliability and service on the Model 3.
Tesla also rolled out its leasing program, which left most analysts, including me, thoroughly baffled. The lease program ostensibly is primarily to boost demand for the Model 3. But Tesla does not offer a lease for the basic $35,000 Model 3. It also announced that the basic Model 3 would only be offered for online purchase. The lease for the Standard Range-plus Model 3 is structured such that the lessee will need to put down roughly $4k upfront. The lowest monthly payment option is $504 and there’s no purchase option at the end of the lease. I won’t go into Musk’s rationale for this because it would be a waste of your time to read about it. In short, the ill-conceived lease program will likely have a minimal effect on unit deliveries.
There’s three primary reasons Tesla’s sales are falling rapidly: 1) the 50% drop in the tax credit (which drops even lower to $1875 starting July 1st this year and goes away completely after December 31st); 2) Tesla’s growing reputation for poor reliability and even worse service; 3) Growing competition in the luxury EV space.
With each passing week, the operational decisions and musings of Musk become more bizarre. The growth narrative is over. The Company is shrinking its service centers and delivery infrastructure in order to cut costs. Senior employees are leaving pretty much on a weekly basis. In fact, last week the senior manager who was responsible for building Tesla’s lithium ion battery supply chain from May 2017 to April 2019 left the Company. Perhaps more troubling, Tesla’s Director of Global Treasury also left recently. This function of this position is to oversee the Company’s worldwide cash management and liquidity activities. It’s likely this person, Pedro Glaser, was not interested in sticking around until the cash runs out.
The Company continues to spiral downward in a toxic cloud of operational dysfunction, financial deterioration, decaying auto industry fundamentals and growing fraud. It remains a mystery to anyone who examines Tesla closely how the stock manages to remain at a level that assigns a $47 billion market cap to the Company. I suspect there’s a continuous short squeeze on the shares because the short-interest is quiet high and the “free” float of shares is low relative to the overall short-interest. Ultimately the shorts will prevail – of that I’m 100% confident.
In my view, Tesla continues to circle the drain. The stock is down nearly 20% YTD in the context of one of the most torrid upside moves in the overall stock market in history. The stock appears ready to test the $250 level again. If it drops below that, it could fall below $200 quickly.