China Shadow Banking Giant Alarms Investors With Missed Payments
One of China’s largest private wealth managers is triggering fresh anxiety about the health of the country’s #shadowbanking industry after missing payments on multiple high-yield products. Zhongrong International Trust Co. missed payments on dozens of products and has no immediate plan to make clients whole, indicating troubles at the embattled Chinese shadow bank are deeper than previously known. Wang Qiang, board secretary of the firm partly owned by financial giant Zhongzhi Enterprise Group Co., told investors in a meeting earlier this week that the firm missed payments on a batch of products on Aug. 8, adding to delays on at least 10 others since late July, according to people familiar with the matter. At least 30 products are now overdue and Zhongrong also halted redemptions on some short-term instruments, one of the people said. Source: bloomberg
Watchcharts Rolex and Patek second-hand indices are dropping rapidly, down -11.5% and -16.8% respctively over the last 12 months
This is an interesting smooth time series for global economy as it is independent from manipulation and less prone to day-to-day shift in sentiment. Source: www.watchcharts.com
After adjusting for inflation, US retail sales fell 1.3% over the last year, the 9th consecutive YoY decline
That's the longest down streak since 2009. Nominal retail sales increased 2% YoY vs. a historical average of 4.7%. Source: Charlie Bilello
Hedge funds top 5 holdings Q2 2023
Recurring #themes: Hyperscalers $AMZN $GOOG $MSFT Semiconductor $AMD $NVDA $TSM Consumer tech $AAPL $TSLA Specialty Retail $BBWI $RH Global apps $META $NFLX Payments $MELI $V Source: App Economy Insights
The AI-hype has driven some stocks valuations to extreme levels
The most emblematic one among large-caps is Nvidia with a P/E ratio which went from under 50x to 224x in just 8 months. Source: Game of Trades
SEC delays set deadlines for Bitcoin ETF approval to early 2024
With a maximum 240-day window available to the #SEC to delay crypto ETF applications, some firms could wait until March 2024 to hear decisions on filings made in July 2023.
US stock market current mood in one picture
Source: Heisenberg - Mr_Derivatives
Michael Burry is an outstanding contrarian investor and did exceptionally well during the 2006-2008 US housing crash
However, performance is not always repeatable and his next bets haven't paid off that well (at least the market views shared publicly - hedge fund long-term performance looks quite strong on a sharper ratio basis). Adam Khoo had a look at all of Michael Burry's recent predictions and he shared it with a chart on X. Here's a summary: In 2005, Predicted the collapse of the subprime mortgage market -> Housing market crashes in 2008, Global Financial Crisis. On Dec 2015, he predicted that the stock market would crash within the next few months. -> SPX +11% Next 12 months. On May 2017, he predicted a global financial meltdown-> SPX +19% Next 12 months. On Sept 2019, he predicted that the stock market would crash due to a bubble in index ETFs -> SPX +15% Next 12 months. Source: Adam Khoo Trader
