As volatility has increased dramatically in world markets, this now threatens to bring the system to its knees.

Commodities & Interest Rates On The Move!
By Peter Boockvar, author of the Boock Report
April 19 (King World News) – Here is what Peter Boockvar wrote today as the world awaits the next round of monetary madness: The commodity spike continues, especially in aluminum and nickel. Yesterday’s close in the CRB index was up 1.8% to the highest since July 2015 which led to a near 4 yr high in inflation expectations in 10 yr TIPS.  For those that drive, gasoline prices at the pump are up 14% y/o/y. For those that like chocolate (I’m a fan of dark), cocoa closed at the most expensive since October 2016.

Because of the sharp spread between US dollar LIBOR and Hong Kong HIBOR with the former much higher than the later notwithstanding the currency peg, there has been persistent pressure on the Hong Kong dollar where the Hong Kong Monetary Authority has been intervening to relieve. It finally worked a bit overnight as the HKD rallied and HIBOR rates continued to rise. The issue though becomes if interest rates continue higher in Hong Kong is the potential threat to their real estate market. Hong Kong is the most expensive place in the world to live.

HIBOR Rate Surge Threatens Hong Kong — World’s Most Expensive Real Estate Market!

King World News note: Rising interest rates into a massive global debt load is a recipe for disaster. It’s just a question of when the shocks to the global financial system will come — tick-tock, tick-tock.

And this from important note from Art Cashin…

Here is a portion of today’s note from legend Art Cashin: As Public Pares Back, Buybacks Increase – My friend and fellow market veteran, Jim Brown, the guru at Option Investor, noted that different groups of investors are taking different approaches to stock ownership.

On the public, Jim wrote:

Bank of America said equity ownership in individual accounts has declined to 29% compared to the 41% in January. The 29% is an 18 month low. That can be seen as positive from a contrarian perspective. If the market continues higher, individual investors could begin scrambling to add equities to their portfolio. Since the average individual investor functions in a herd mentality, the surge of new buying a couple weeks from now could be at a market top. I wrote back in January that I expected a market decline in late April, early May once all the major earnings had been released. I was not expecting a February decline but my outlook for May is still cautious.

A little later in his report, Jim notes that buybacks have grown and may grow even further:

Offsetting this to some extent is the increase in stock buybacks. In 2017, there was roughly $500 billion in buybacks. That is expected to rise to $800 billion in 2018. Most of that will be in Q2 as a result of the change in taxes and investor demand that companies do something with the money.

The impact of the corporate buybacks has been much larger than most people assumed. It grew even more impactful.

Overnight And Overseas – Asian equity markets leaned to the plus side. Japan saw fractional gains while Hong Kong and Shanghai bounced smartly amid speculation of government “aid” to the markets and/or the economy. India saw a moderate rally.

In Europe stocks are seeing very modest gains.

Among other assets Bitcoin is rallying. Gold is down slightly but crude remains strong with WTI pressing hard toward $69. The euro is basically flat against the dollar with yields virtually unchanged.

Consensus – Talk about the yield curve inverting is beginning to heat up. Despite that, however, futures markets see a couple of Fed rate hikes looming.

Earnings season continues to roll on with impressive results so far.

Stay wary, alert and, very, very nimble.

UPDATE: Egon von Greyerz!

For those who missed it, this is Egon von Greyerz’s greatest audio interviews ever and I would encourage everyone around the world to stop what they are doing and listen to it immediately by CLICKING HERE.

ALSO RELEASED: The Silver Market Is Readying For One Of Its Greatest Upside Breakouts! CLICK HERE TO READ.

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