muscleman

Thank you for providing this new data source. It is drastically different from Israel's numbers and Dallas County's numbers. I have no idea what is going on here. Any additional data source is welcome, and it is better to include the url to show it is a real chart.

Like most people, I've stopped tracking covid since I got fully vaccinated, and daily cases have been trending down well. But in the last few weeks, things have changed. With the Delta variant, cases are back up at a rate much faster than prior waves, while most people are unaware of it, and already went back to normal daily life. Recently, I came across this article, which shows that the antibody generated after taking the vaccine likely acted as the trojan horse and assisted the Delta variant to more effectively infect the human body, instead of neutralizing the virus itself. https://www.journalofinfection.com/article/S0163-4453(21)00392-3/fulltext This is in line with Israel's latest data. https://mobile.twitter.com/disclosetv/status/1424111796860956672 Note: "90% of the adult population is fully vaccinated" as reported in the above news is not equivalent to "90% of the entire population is fully vaccinated". I think Israel's 59% fully vaccinated right now. Based on this data, the vaccine does not help with either the infection or developing severe cases from Delta Variant, but instead make it worse. This phenomenon is called Antibody-dependent Enhancement (ADE). It has been observed in prior measles vaccines, and the FDA rejected the vaccine back then. This time, I think the FDA and the big pharma will never admit the ADE, but instead defend themselves to the end, because they have authorized emergency use, and so many people have taken it, so the potentially liability is too large to admit any mistakes. The other data point is on page 21 here. The % of hospitalization for the break through cases are concerning. https://www.dallascounty.org/Assets/uploads/docs/hhs/2019-nCoV/2021-COVID-19-Summaries/CV19-Summaries-08/DCHHS COVID-19 Summary 08062021.pdf So far I would not say ADE is confirmed with the covid vaccines but it is quite possible, and it is very hard to find any more data sources reporting the breakdown of daily new cases and hospitalizations of vaccinated vs unvaccinated. If anyone of you can find any more data sources, please let me know. If this vaccine has ADE, then we absolutely should NOT take the 3rd booster shot. It will only make us even more vulnerable against future variants. Hope you all stay safe.

Thank you! If covid cases start to get out of control, do you think that may impact this?

Hi Wabuffo, What's your take on the reverse repo situation now? Does this have a cap, or will it go up for any indefinite amount? If this has a cap, then will we have negative rates? Thank you!

And what if the 30 year bond yield starts to go back to 3%?

Still VERY cautious of equity exposure? Mind explaining when did you first start to get cautious of equity exposure?

Investing is a probabilty game. No one is able to be correct 100% of the time. And if someone builds his system to rely on 100% of correctness, he will fail big some day, sooner or later. I am a big fan of George Soros and have read his books over and over. I like his approach to form a thesis as the road map, and enter his positions according to what he actually sees is happening, not what he thinks is happening. Of course this is just my guess of how he operates after reading his books and interviews.

It is an educated guess. It is just like, when I look at the sky and there are tons of dark clouds and I predict a rain. You seem to be confused why the market goes up when covid is getting worse. In the covid thread in this board, I've explained that last year clearly and said once we get another wave of infections climbing, that's bullish for the market.

Rates should be going up soon. You can't have a government with the most reckless unproductive spending, (How many more trillion dollar bills will we see?) and still have low rates.

Trump period was an exception because he passed the massive tax stimulus and brought in a lot of overseas money back to the US. That acted like the quasi "QE". Yet in the end of 2018 when rates started to go up, the market went down quite a bit. Regarding 2, yes I think they will allow it to happen. No one can make the market go up forever. It is like a string that has to come back down sooner to later, and it is far better to have it come down during midterm, and go back up in 2024, than to keep pushing it up through midterm and it will be very hard to keep pushing it during the more critical 2024. My other theory (not sure if I will get banned saying this), is that the Democrats have mastered the winning formula last November through massive mail in votes + no voter id checks, which is why they pushed to pass that federal law this year to allow massive mail in voting + no voter id forever. (Never mind that they also want you to show your vaccine passport.) So they don't care about the market anymore. They will keep winning anyway.

Since last August, I've been forming a thesis of a repeat of the dot com bubble top and have been on the look out for that in 2021. I've been fully long until last month. Right now there are many signs showing that a major multi year top is forming. But it is still unclear if the top is going to be in now, or is it going to have a mini crash in the last part of August, then go up one more time into the end of the year to fool everyone, before it forms THE TOP by December 2021. FED is going to stop QE soon. They said they are on track to achieve their goals by December for sure, but may be earlier. That's very concerning. The market has been rising on heroin (QE) and brought high valuations to sky high valuations. Valuation does not matter when the central bank is printing like hell (See the attached picture for venezuela stock market index). But it will matter when monetary policy starts to tighten.

Thank you. A suspension of debt issuance means the supply of T-bills are disrupted. So price could go higher. Also it seems like a lot of commodity prices are coming down after reopening. Lumber for example. So the pressure for inflation has eased. Watch out for the Copper/Gold ratio as that seems to be in correlation with the rates. Copper seems to be forming a top right now. Massive Copper short futures positions were built last week by the commercial traders (smart money).

https://www.wsj.com/articles/janet-yellen-announces-measures-to-avoid-breaching-debt-ceiling-11627936540?mod=hp_lead_pos12 I can't see this article. Anyone?

Thank you so much for the insight! I actually closed my small TLT put position earlier today as I see the chart to be setting up for another leg up, and I thought, well, I really should be trading on the charts than trading on the predictions. It still sucks to have a small loss but that is entirely my fault. I get punished whenever I got off discipline.

Thank you so much! I really appreciate it!

I am a little confused. Can you please clarify? When you said "No, I don't think so.", do you mean that you don't think the TGA balance will continue to run down to $150 bn, or do you mean that you don't think rate spikes will postpone after August 1st?

Got it. Does this mean treasury will keep running this balance down to $150 bn next month? In that case, rate spike is likely postponed after August 1st?

I re-read your "explain this to 5 year old" post on page 10 over and over and I think I finally start to understand your rational here. i checked the balance here. https://fsapps.fiscal.treasury.gov/dts/issues As of July 27th it says "Federal Reserve Account" closing balance today is projected to be 564 Bn. Is this number supposed to run down to 150 bn by July 31st? That seems like a long way to go isn't it?

There is another article not behind a pay wall https://californianewstimes.com/debt-ceiling-replay-to-ignite-fresh-demand-for-fed-facility/460266/

I am buying TLT puts. I wonder if this is the best way to play this incoming rate spike? It all starts to make sense now, especially after Fed is considering to taper. IEF seems to move in a slower fashion. If I own TLT puts and they distribute interest to TLT holders, does that impact me in any way?

Thank you so much wabuffo! I previously totally could not understand what you were saying but now it starts to make sense. Would you please also explain about your TGA and its rate impact analysis in the above way if that is possible? I really appreciate your help!

Hi wabuffo Do you think this new repo would impact your prediction about the interest rate rise in August? It is really hard to understand what this is. https://www.wsj.com/articles/fed-launches-standing-repo-facility-to-boost-market-liquidity-11627496260

Officials will assess whether to begin shrinking their $120 billion in monthly asset purchases in coming meetings. https://www.wsj.com/articles/fed-says-economy-has-made-progress-toward-its-goals-teeing-up-bond-taper-11627495233?mod=hp_lead_pos1 That's what we got today. Really? Why can't they assess it now?

https://www.wsj.com/articles/new-aid-planned-for-mortgage-borrowers-at-risk-of-foreclosure-11627032601 Just as we are still discussing the new 3.5 Trillion bill last week, they now have one more stimulus bill today. It seems like this administration believes that all problems could be solved by throwing out money.

The bond market is due for a collapse starting in early August. I don't think it is wise to have any bond allocation at the moment. See wabafo's insights here