33 Comments
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Flo.w's avatar

Thank you Michael for the timely update! Is there any asset that respond to PBoC pump more directly?

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Michael Howell's avatar

Traditionally commodities ex oil, and potentially Bitcoin and gold

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Pall's avatar

Hi Michael, I recently subscribed and am a big fan of your research. Just ordered Capital Wars! Thanks vm for the views.

I would be interested in your view regarding deregulation in the banking sector, potentially unlocking USD's on balance sheets which have been held tight since post GFC banking regulation. Could it make of an interesting dose of liquidity at a time the markets needs it most, in the second half of this year?

Many thanks again for the research!

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Michael Howell's avatar

Correct it could have a meaningful impact. Recall that any purchase of Treasuries by credit providers = monetization. Rules will be relaxed because Jamie Dimon is asking!

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Greg Banister's avatar

I think comments on “being of risk” need to be set based on liquidity of course but also at “where the market is at” also. Like say when SaP 500 is at 6000 and liquidity was not rising than yes “off risk”. But when SaP was at 5000 there was less reason to “be off risk” especially when liquidity seemed to be improving. Tone should have been more “buy quality companies from down here” than “stay off risk”. Granted the markets took a big swings up / down from one week to another. Just a comment on how things went the last few crazy months.

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MacroFly's avatar

A bit disappointing. Not your report but the notion that the complete impulse and final levels may not be as high as one would hope.

Michael, do let us know if you see other possible outcomes with probability that are a bit more robust.

Everyone is thirsty for a full pint of liquidity.

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Michael Howell's avatar

Liquidity is strong right now because of Fed (technical) and China (policy)... Hopefully US Fed comes to its seses soon

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Nga Tran's avatar

Why do you want to have a high level of liquidity? To push your btc or stock investment up much more? 😂.

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Michael Howell's avatar

That is a consequence because liquidity is fungible not an aim. Aim is financial stability and driver is Central Banks, not me unfortunately!

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MacroFly's avatar

Access to capital is the lubricant for markets.

On the one hand I’d love to see more responsible fiscal policy but alas overspending means currency debasement and the only game plan to deal with that is to be short dollars and long assets.

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Michael Howell's avatar

Agreed Precious metals should also shine

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BedBathandBeyond's avatar

oil is not 80 as you mentioed in the article, its closer to $60 and after news today from OPEC likely going lower. Any way to quantify the liquidity impact from lower crude?

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Michael Howell's avatar

As a rule of thumb, each US$10/bbl drop in oil prices adds around 2 index points to our Global Liquidity Index. The impact of oil prices on Global Liquidity is around 1/3 of the impact of an equivalent change in World GDP growth.

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stonkystocks53's avatar

I have the same question as well

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Michael Howell's avatar

See my reply about log trends

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Mark's avatar

Hi Michael,

In the GLI&BTC 6-week changes chart, we can see that the increase in liquidity is slowing down. Historically, as shown in the chart, when the momentum of GLI starts to decline, BTC tends to top out as well.

Do you think this is happening again now — that BTC might be temporarily topping out? Would it be wise to be cautious with BTC in the short term?

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Michael Howell's avatar

Liquidity should give you a 3m lead time, but momentum is important. Wise not to chase short-term trends

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Catena Capital's avatar

Hi there Michael, ref your chart Advanced Eco Debt/Liquidity Ratio, seeing Liquidity return to Mean, is that even possible, i mean, if that were to occur you'd have a depression (much worse than the 20's) and you'd wipe out the collateral base for the Western World System, essentially putting us into the dark ages... surely something akin to this will be correct - https://ibb.co/0pjjQJ6Q

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Michael Howell's avatar

Remember this is measuring just the amount of debt being refinanced each year Vs liquidity. It certainly risks deflation but I figure it would have to breech the median line.

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Redcap's avatar

Hi Michael,

thank you for your informative article. Can you recommend an ETF, REIT, fund or share exclusively for residential real estate?

Best regards

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Michael Howell's avatar

Sorry but sadly I cannot because it is not my area of expertise.

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Roy Barton's avatar

Michael - If your theories hold on liquidity and 2-3 month windows, we should be risk-on bulls through Q2. Maybe we keep getting good data and push the bull thesis even further.

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Michael Howell's avatar

Possibly so. China is helping, but Fed is playing an odd game while TGA must be rebuilt at some stage

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Hardly Looking's avatar

Thanks for the article, and also I like the new format of including summary TLDR and tables, from the last couple of posts. How do you think the potential QE, urged on by a newly appointed Fed chairman, next year affect your thinking on liquidity peak? Seems like that could drag out the cycle longer into a bigger crash of some kind eventually, while we may still get volatility or recession driven crashes before then?

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Michael Howell's avatar

Thats possible. The reality is that deficit must be funded. Higher long term yields will force Bessent to shorter end, and that will involve some monetisation. The cycles are interesting but the trend is inevitably

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Nikita's avatar

Can you explain why GLI 13w is falling whereas your weekly liquidity indicator has been steadily growing?

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Michael Howell's avatar

See my reply regarding log trends

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Michael Howell's avatar

To capture the cycle we have detrended both liquidity and BTC using logs. This avoids spurious correlation in regressions

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Christian's avatar

The line represents the acceleration (increase/decrease) of liquidity (over the past six weeks). A declining value—but still above zero—means that the increase in liquidity is slowing down: momentum is decreasing.

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Takosacks's avatar

Thank you for the update but I got the same question. Weekly GLI is steadily rising so how can the %change be negative/near zero ?

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Michael Howell's avatar

See my reply re logtrends

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Rob's avatar

The 13 weeks difference, measure the difference, example10-8=2, but 4-1=3, though, the GLI is highest at 10, but the difference is still small, like 2, just measure the increase with respect to 13 weeks ago,

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Takosacks's avatar

I think this is a prediction and not based on hard data yet (the descending part) ?

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