Yesterday we wrote about how we feel that the Euro is headed lower due to overvaluation, the technical picture, and market positioning.  In light of that we thought that we would show the technical picture of the US Dollar index.

In the chart below you can see a chart of the US Dollar index all the way back to 1971.  In the lower panel we have plotted the distance from the 200-day sma shown as a percentage.  Not surprisingly the index rarely strays more than 10% away from the 200-day.  In fact since 1971 it has only gone above or below by 10% 11 times.  Since 1992 it has only breached the 10% level once back in 2008 in the midst of the financial crisis. Right now we are close to the lower levels of a typical move.  Could it go lower?  Of course the answer is that yes it can, but if history is any guide we doubt that we have much lower to go before a decent sized bounce. (Click on chart twice to enlarge)

US Dollar Index

Happy Trading,

Dave@TheMacroTrader.com

Disclaimer-In The Macro Trader newsletter we are currently short the EUR/USD

If you’re getting value out of our posts, you can do us a favor by linking to us and mentioning The Macro Trader to friends and co-workers. Here’s the link information for this article:
Title: Is It Time To Buy The US Dollar?
URL: http://www.themacrotrader.com/2009/12/10/time-for-us-dollar/

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We have been bearish on the EUR/USD for some time now.  Some investors are convinced that the USD is going down forever and that the US is the next Zimbabwe.  The reality is that while the United States has a ton of issues such as the huge and rapidly expanding deficit, the rest of the world is not exactly in great shape either.

One of the weaker areas of the world happens to be the European Union.  They continue to have issues such as Spain and its almost 25% unemployment rate, the IMF estimate that EU banks have only written off 50% of their bad debt, and the potential for major defaults in Eastern European nations.

The timing for a short position is starting to look right.  As you can see in the chart below on a purchasing power parity basis the Euro is 35% overvalued to the USD.  In previous periods of over and undervaluation this is past the levels that are typically seen before a reversal of trend. (Click on chart twice to enlarge)

EUR/USD PPP

Another indicator that we follow is that of FX risk reversals.  Risk reversals essentially show how option traders are positioned.  A negative reading means that option traders expect a move lower and positive reading mean that they expect a move higher.

Typically we look for contrarian signals at the extremes, usually when the reading is very negative or positive the trade is crowded and the price goes in the opposite direction.  This time however is a bit different as option traders are extremely bearish but the spot price has remained strong.  Because of this we suspect that if the price breaks we could see a swift move lower.(Click on chart twice to enlarge)

EUR/USD 25R 3M Risk Reversal

Looking at the chart below of the Euro ETF you can see that the price has broken below its current trend line.  In the lower panel you can also see that we also have had a momentum divergence during the last part of the advance.(Click on chart twice to enlarge)

FXE-Euro ETF

All of these signs point to a lower Euro.  We think that the timing is right to dip our toes in the water.  If the trade starts to move in our favor we will be looking to add to it as it could move quite a bit lower due to how overcrowded the trade is, valuations, and the fact that the EU in our view is just as broken as the US.

Happy Trading,

Dave@TheMacroTrader.com

Disclaimer-we are currently short the Euro in The Macro Trader newsletter.

If you’re getting value out of our posts, you can do us a favor by linking to us and mentioning The Macro Trader to friends and co-workers. Here’s the link information for this article:
Title: Is it Finally Time To Short The Euro?
URL: http://www.themacrotrader.com/2009/12/09/shorting-the-euro/

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One of our major themes here at The Macro Trader over the past two years has been to short Europe.  We mean that in a general sense as we have been short Spain and Italy off and on for over a year and are bearish on most things EU relative to most of the world.  One area that we have been looking at a lot lately is that of the Euro.

After being overvalued by 40% back in March of 2008 the Euro fell about 20% as investors went into risk aversion mode and bought the US Dollar.  Since March of this year the Euro has once again climbed into wildly overvalued territory again and is currently about 35% overvalued. As you can see in the chart below when the Euro gets very far above or below the 20% bands it has a relatively sharp tendency to revert to the mean. (Click on chart twice to enlarge)

EUR/USD PPP Chart

Our view is that sometime in the next few months we will have a modest US Dollar rally as investors leave the Euro.  In fact this is one of the primary reasons why we think that gold has been working out so well.  Basically the EUR, USD, and JPY are all really weak and investors are doing anything possible to diversify out of them.

One tool that we use a lot to gauge our timing in regards to trading currencies via PPP valuations is that of the different volatility indexes.  While you can monitor the EVZ Euro VIX, we also look at the JP Morgan G-7 VIX so to help us gauge the risk aversion in other G-7 currencies as well.  Right now this is important as there are several currencies overvalued by 20% or more, but that is for another post.  Anyways as you can see in the chart below the JP Morgan G-7 VIX is at relatively low levels and is showing little sign that anything is happening yet.  (Click on chart twice to enlarge)

JP Morgan G-7 VIX

Happy Trading,

Dave@TheMacroTrader.com

Disclaimer-The Macro Trader is currently not short the EUR/USD  but that will change at some point.

If you’re getting value out of our posts, you can do us a favor by linking to us and mentioning The Macro Trader to friends and co-workers. Here’s the link information for this article:
Title: The Euro Is Overvalued
URL: http://www.themacrotrader.com/2009/11/13/euro-is-overvalued/

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Why are bonds going up at the same time that gold is climbing? Real yields are the highest that they have been since the late 1980′s and the third highest in the last 100 years, investors expecting slow to negative inflation and growth are buying and will keep buying as they grasp for yield. (click on chart to enlarge)

10-Year T-Note Real Yield

Why has the SP500 continued higher even when earnings have been weak and unsustainable and demand has been virtually non-existent?  There are several contributing factors such as the oversold condition, sentiment, etc. but our favorite one is that the Government is debasing our currency and in the process it is driving asset prices but not their actual values higher, if your investment in the SP500 is up but the actual value of your dollar is equally low then have you actually made any money? (click on chart to enlarge)

SP500 and US Dollar Index

If we are in a deflationary environment then why is gold climbing higher?  No one wants to hold the US Dollar so instead of being a inflation/deflation play the current move of gold is based more on the devaluation of the US Dollar than anything else-It’s a currency trade. (click on chart to enlarge)

GLD-Gold ETF and US Dollar Index

If housing is cheap, interest rates are low, and everyone wants to trade their US Dollars for other assets than why aren’t housing sales going through the roof?  While your mortgage broker may be calling and saying that rates are at or close to all time lows the reality is that real rates are at their highest levels since 1987, cheap money my #%$. (click on chart to enlarge)

Real 30-Year Fixed Mortgage Rates

If demand is so weak than why has oil been so strong?  Once again it gets back to not wanting to hold US Dollars, when the USD bounces oil will likely get hit hard. (click on chart to enlarge)

West Texas Crude Oil and US Dollar Index

Happy Trading,

Dave@TheMacroTrader.com

Disclaimer-We are long some GLD-Gold ETF

If you’re getting value out of our posts, you can do us a favor by linking to us and mentioning The Macro Trader to friends and co-workers. Here’s the link information for this article:
Title: One Question, One Sentence, and One Chart Answers
URL: http://www.themacrotrader.com/2009/10/08/macro-trading-one-chart-answers/

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If over the past six months or so it has seemed as if you were partying like it was 1999 it might be time to reevaluate your stance.  One thing that we have been taking a closer look at lately is the pricing of risk.  Obviously when investors think that risks are low they will demonstrate risk seeking behavior.  We have seen this as the SP500 has climbed 56.6% from the March lows to the highs on 8/28/09.  With a rise like that you would think that 2008 never happened, of course if you believe that then you also believe  in a land of make believe with money trees, the fountain of youth, and SI models for all of us.

Of course some investors counter saying that while things could be better we are seeing the beginning of a recovery.  They then say that while the market will likely climb slower, that it will still climb higher.

While the above scenario is possible, anything is possible.  The more important question is to decide if the rewards outweigh the risk involved in being long equities right now.  Or even if at this point the better risk reward trade is to the downside.

Lets look at a few “risk gauges” or “fear indexes” as the press likes to call volatility indexes.  The first is of course the VIX.  After spiking to all time highs in October and November of 2008 we are already well on our way towards what was considered a “normal” level back in early 2008 before Bear Stearns.  The potential risks were obviously very mispriced at the beginning of 2008, are they mispriced again?  While likely not as off as they were at the beginning of 2008 we still think that there are a lot more real and potential risks then the market is currently pricing in. (Click on chart to enlarge)

SP500 VIX

What about foreign markets?  How do investors perceive the potential risks abroad?  Well if the VDAX is any gauge then investors see a rosy future in Europe as well.  Again maybe there are no big risks and maybe the EU is rock solid.  Then again maybe not.  With the complete lack of liquidity that businesses have had over the past several months in the EU it is really surprising that the VDAX is back to pre-crisis levels. (Click on chart to enlarge)

German DAX VIX

What about other asset classes?  What are investors saying about potential risks?  Using the MOVE Index which measures the range in which Treasury yields are expected to move over the next 12-months we can see that even here investors are becoming increasingly complacent.  What happened to the runaway inflation that we keep hearing is right around the corner?  Right now the market is saying that we will be in a 130 basis point range for the next 12-months. In The Macro Trader weekly newsletter we are long the TLT 20+ Year Treasury ETF and are expecting a bigger move then is currently implied via the MOVE index. (Click on chart to enlarge)

MOVE Index

Even in the currency markets we are seeing extreme complacency.  Apparently investors the world over are back to selling dollars in exchange for anything.  While the USD has its issues other currencies do to.  Right now the currency markets are not participating in the Keynes beauty pageant where you are trying to pick the girl that you think the judges will think is the beautiful.  No, with the current state of the global economy we are in the least ugly pig contest where we are only trying to find the least ugly.  That being said investors do not appear to see a lot of volatility any time soon. (Click on chart to enlarge)

JPM G-7 VIX

Even the emerging market currency volatility index is showing complacency. What happened to the banking issues in Eastern Europe? Apparently they vanished, or at least that is what it seems as though the market is telling us.  (Click on chart to enlarge)

JPM Emerging Market FX VIX

Even commodities markets are pricing in realtively low risk. While the price history of the Crude Oil and Gold volatility indexes does not go back as far as we would like, you can get a feel for what is happening as both indexes are dropping at a very steady rate.  Do investors really think that volatility will stay that low?  What happened to the oil spike if demand comes back?  And what happens if gold breaks $1000 on fears of hyper inflation?  (Click on charts to enlarge)

Crude Oil VIX

Gold VIX

Another excellent tool to evaluate the blind risk taking happening right now in the stock market is the JunkDEX invented by Bill Luby over at VIX and More.  By taking an equal weighting of junk stocks AIG, FNM, C, CIT, and BAC you can see how crazy or composed investors are acting. While we have seen, and actually use, an index of high momentum stocks we had never thought of making an index that tracks junk stocks to gauge investors risk appetite.

As you can see in the chart of the JunkDEX below the junk led the market off the bottom and then lagged until the last month when the index shot up +157.36% in a little over a month.  While it has pulled back over the last two days we are still in awe that investors are dumb enough to buy this junk at these prices. (Click on chart to enlarge)

VIX and More JunkDEX* vs SP500

After looking at all of this we need to ask ourselves if the rewards outweigh the risk to stay long?  Or if we should be flat or short.  In case you have not guessed we currently think that the risk reward is pointing to the downside.

Looking at the QQQQ we have a setup with a solid risk to reward situation. As you can see in the chart below the QQQQ has rallied back to its 50% retracement level, its 200-week moving average, and its downtrend line extending from October 2007.  While it could of course rally higher we like the risk reward enough to have put on a modest short position in our weekly Macro Trader newsletter. (Click on chart to enlarge)

QQQQ-NASDAQ 100 ETF

While not quite as nice of a setup as the NASDAQ 100, the SP500 also looks like a solid risk reward trade to the short side.  As you can see in the chart below of the SPY-SP500 ETF it has rallied up to the upper Bollinger Band and has already started to come back in.  We are looking for a move back to at least the $95-96 area. (Click on chart to enlarge)

SPY SP500 ETF

Obviously anything can happen.  The market could go up every day for the next year, or it could go down every day, but our job as traders is to look for the best risk to reward scenarios that we can find and place trades on probable scenarios and right now we think the most likely scenario is for the market to at least have a pullback if not a correction back towards its 200-day moving average.  Of course if this happens we will see the volatility indexes tick upwards to more realistic levels given our current economic environment.

*Our JunkDEX differs a bit from the one you can see at VIX and More.  After looking into it we found that  we built the index by simulating a $1000 investment in the index and in the SPY and Bill built it by normalizing the index starting value so we have slightly different values.  But don’t worry as the chart looks essentially the same and shows the same investor insanity.

Happy Trading,

Dave@TheMacroTrader.com

Disclaimer-In The Macro Trader newsletter as well as our accounts we are currently short some QQQQ-NASDAQ 100 ETF and long some TLT 20+ Year Treasury ETF.

If you’re getting value out of our posts, you can do us a favor by linking to us and mentioning The Macro Trader to friends and co-workers. Here’s the link information for this article:
Title: Volatility Indexes, Risk Appetite, Mispriced Risk, And Where We Think We Are Headed
URL: http://www.themacrotrader.com/2009/09/02/mispriced-risk-macro-trader

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In our last post we discussed our views on deflation and how it will  be around  longer then most investors think.  Most people are stuck on the idea that hyper inflation is just around the corner and that you must be buying gold, most other commodities, and Asian stocks and at the same time short the US Dollar, Japanese Yen, US Treasuries, and US stocks.  Eventually this may be the right stance, but for now we think, along with the market, that it is the wrong view for the short and medium term.

The main issue stems from the idea that because the government has printed a gazillion dollars that we MUST have hyper inflation tomorrow.  The reality is that until that money is actually in circulation it will not cause inflation.  If you look at the financial situation of most banks it is obvious that not only are they not lending, but they are still so weak that they can’t lend.  Until they have rebuilt their balance sheets they will remain weak and unable to do any large scale lending on anything but bad terms.

Add to this the fact that consumers are saving more and more and you have massive debt deflation.  Consumers that are employed are paying down debt while the unemployed are unable to go into much more debt as credit card companies have curtailed their lending and the housing ATM is shut down.

As the global financial markets continue to deflate we have a few trends that are benefiting from this.  One that we have already covered is that of going long US Treasury bonds.  Another trend that we have shared with our subscribers is that of going long the Japanese Yen.  Long viewed as the funding currency for the carry trade , over the past 18 months the Yen has changed course and is now a safe haven currency.  Every time that investors have fled risky assets such as stocks and corporate debt then have flocked to the Yen.  As investors increasingly realize that the current threat is continued deflation and not inflation we think that they will gravitate out of stocks and into Treasury bonds and the Yen.

In the chart below (click to enlarge) you can see that since 1998 the Yen had been consolidating until breaking out back in March of 2008 as the financial crisis accelerated with the demise of Bear Stearns.  This breakout later pulled back before breaking out again and making a large move lower.

Japanese Yen 15-Year Weekly

As you can see in this chart (click to enlarge) the last two pullbacks have found support at the 50% retracement levels.  While we don’t think that Fibonacci levels have some mystical power, we do use them to find opportunities to buy pullbacks in a trend.

Japanese Yen 3-Year Weekly With Retracements

Finally as you can see in this daily chart of the last year (click to enlarge) you can see that we finally have broken out of an almost year long consolidation.  While not a perfect triangle it obviously contracted more and more until finally breaking out over the last few days.

Japanese Yen 1-Year Daily Chart

Looking at the 15-year long term chart of the Yen we are expecting a move up to 114 and would not be surprised to see it make new highs at 120 in the coming months (If you are looking at the USD/JPY cross the levels would be 88 and 80).  Although anyone who is a macro trader is no doubt aware of this move we have found that most equity investors skip over currencies and fixed income themes, thinking that they have nothing to do with them.  The reality is that the currency and fixed income markets can give great signals for when risk is high or low and should be followed by all investors.

Happy Trading,

The Macro Trader

Dave@TheMacroTrader.com

If you’re getting value out of our posts, you can do us a favor by linking to us and mentioning The Macro Trader to friends and co-workers. Here’s the link information for this article:
Title: Debt Deflation and the Japanese Yen
URL: http://www.themacrotrader.com/2009/07/09/debt-deflation-and-the-japanese-yen/

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In our ETF based newsletter, the carry trade is one of the strategies that we employ.  For those unfamiliar with the carry trade, you are essentially trading the interest rate differentials of different countries.  You short a low-yielding currency and go  long a higher-yielding currency.

You can make money in two ways.  You earn the “carry” if the currencies remain very stable, and neither move.  You can also make money in this trade by being correct in the direction.  For instance if you are short the Japanese Yen and long the Australian dollar, then you can also make money if the Australian dollar goes up, and the Yen goes down.

As an example of how to earn the carry, lets look at the Japanese Yen versus the Australian Dollar.  The Yen has been the carry trade vehicle of choice for much of the past decade because Japan has consistently had extremely low interest rates.  Australia, on the other hand, has had relatively high rates over the last decade.

To construct the differential for this trade, take one rate and subtract the other rate. In the chart below, we plot the difference between the AUD and the Yen since the beginning of 2007.  As you can see, at one point the carry was as high as 7.34, but it has since declined to 2.69.  If you had been long the AUD and short the Yen, you would have earned this interest rate differential the whole time.

AUD-JPY Interest Rate Differential

Of course as we already mentioned, in order to make money on the carry trade, your long must outperform or stay flat relative to your short position in order to make money since a big directional move against you will wipe away any gains that you would be making solely off the carry.

There have been several academic studies as well as real world trading results that show that volatility is the biggest risk that the carry trade faces.  Over the years, most studies were stuck using the SP500 VIX as a proxy for global financial market volatility.  While it correlates quite well, there are now some far better options to help track and manage risk in the currency markets.  We at The Macro Trader use the JP Morgan G-7 VIX index for our carry trading model as it correlates extremely well to the volatility in the DBV-Currency Harvest Trust ETF.

What we first found in the academic literature, later confirmed by our own testing and used successfully in our trading, was that when volatility in the currency markets is flat or declining, the carry trade works very well.  On the other hand, when currency volatility is high, the carry trade typically is a money loser because the directional aspect of the trade overwhelms the carry, giving you a loss.

We look at the JP Morgan G-7 VIX using two different charts.  The first one is a reversion to the mean chart where plot the VIX data, the historic mean, then one and two standard deviations above and below the mean.  When volatility is high and then falls below one standard deviation, we start looking to enter the carry trade and when it get above the one standard deviation line we would sell if not already stopped out.  On the downside, we look to sell when volatility declines too much since it represents excessive complacency and usually is a sign of higher volatility ahead.

JP Morgan G-7 VIX

The other way that we like to look at the currency VIX is to invert it on a chart alongside the DBV. As you can see in the below chart, not only was equity volatility declining, but DBV managed to base for a few months before climbing higher and then consolidating at its 200-day moving average.  Finally today it was able to break out to the upside.

DBV and JPM G-7 VIX

Finally we have the DBV itself.  As you can see in the chart below, not only was equity volatility declining, but DBV managed to base for a few months before climbing higher and then consolidating at its 200-day moving average.  Finally today it broke out to the upside.

DBV-Carry Trade ETF

Hopefully you see how volatility is bad for a lazy trade like the carry trade where you trying to get paid for sitting.  If volatility climbs above 1 standard deviation above its mean we will look to tighten our stops as the odds of a downside move increase significantly.

DBV-G-10 Currency Harvest Fund is an ETF that goes long the three highest yielding currencies of the G-10 and shorts the three lowest yielding currencies on a 2x levered basis.  While investors can go into the spot and futures FX markets and put on the same trade the DBV is a very simple way to gain exposure to positive carry in the currency markets.

Happy Trading,

Dave@TheMacroTrader.com

http://TheMacroTrader.com

Disclaimer-We currently hold positions in the DBV-G10 Currency Harvest Fund and FXA-Australian Dollar ETF.

If you’re getting value out of our posts, you can do us a favor by linking to us and mentioning The Macro Trader to friends and co-workers. Here’s the link information for this article:
Title: The Carry Trade And Volatility
URL: http://www.themacrotrader.com/2009/06/01/the-carry-trade-and-volatility/

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The classic version of the carry trade in the currency markets involves going long the three highest yielding currencies and going short the three lowest yielding currencies in the G10 nations.  The same principle can be applied to any two currencies.  Simply go long the higher yielding against the lower yielding.  When you do this you will earn the interest rate differential.  If X nations short term rates are at 8% and Y nations rates are 2% then you can make 6% on the “carry” on the interest rate differential.  When you apply a bit of leverage you can earn quite a bit more.

As with any trade there are risks involved with the carry trade. One of the greatest risks to the carry trade is volatility.  When volatility rises the return from the carry trade declines. In the chart below we have a chart of the DBV which is an ETF that goes long the three highest yielding currencies from the G10 nations and short the three lowest yielding currencies as well as the JP Morgan G7 VIX (we inverted the G7 VIX).  It is obvious that as volatility increases the returns from the carry trade decline.

One idea that we shared with subscribers in our latest issue was to go long the DBV in anticipation of a decrease in volatility. As you can see in the chart volatility has been declining the last few weeks. Based on this and other factors we like this as a short term trade.

Happy Trading,
The Macro Trader

P.S. If you would like to receive our new FREE course “Macro Trading 101″ put your e-mail in the box below.

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Nothing really changed this week in our Equity Risk Index.  We are still only 12.50% bullish which of course means that we are very bearish.  When the index is this bearish we basically step aside or go short.  Right now there are some relative yield and sentiment indicators that are slightly bullish but not one model that we follow is actually on a buy signal.

We will continue to update our Equity Risk Index each week on the site.  Among our many proprietary tools that we use at The Macro Trader  we also have risk indexes for fixed income, precious metals, and currency markets.  If you have any questions feel free to e-mail us.  If you want to get the risk index as well as our other posts in your RSS reader just click on the RSS button on the right hand side of the page.  And of course if you have any questions regarding the newsletter simply shoot us an e-mail.

Happy Trading,

The Macro Trader

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Previously we have written about our active-beta strategies and how we are applying them to equities and fixed income. We also mentioned how we were working on a solution to systematically take advantage of the carry trade. After a lot of research we have finally devised an acceptable method to capture returns while at the same time minimizing drawdowns.

In the initial stages of research we did a lot of search and came across a few good and several bad ideas. One of the most insightful things we read came from Macro Man . He wrote where he uses a volatility filter to tell him when it is a good time to be involved in the G-10 carry trade. After further research we found it to be true that the best time for the carry trade is when things are fairly stable and volatility is low or declining and the worst time is when it is high or rising. This of course makes sense since the majority of this strategy revolves around trying to capture interest rate differentials from high yielding currencies versus the low yielding currencies. When excessive volatility comes into the market many participants will start to unwind their leveraged positions and in so doing they can wipe out a lot of gains from the carry. Using a volatility filter helps to sort out the high, moderate, and low risk times. For the most part we want to be involved in the moderate and low risk times and step aside in the high risk times.

Of course volatility is not the only risk to the carry trade. Anytime a central bank decides to change rates the carry will change and depending on what they do you can make or lose money. Also if a few large market participants quickly unwind positions you can get hit before the filter is triggered. What we have attempted to do is to simply eliminate a regularly occurring risk and improve our risk-adjusted returns by avoiding that risk.

Some investors new to currency trading might be wondering what is the carry trade? It is when you go long a high yielding currency and go short a low yielding currency. The G-10 carry trade is simply to go long the three highest yielders and go short the three lowest yielding currencies. Right now for instance you would be long the New Zealand Loonie, Australian Dollar, and the Norwegian Krone. You would go long these against the Japanese Yen, US Dollar, and Canadian Dollar. In a currency account you can put these on and then decide how much leverage you want to use. If you are new to currency trading and/or are constrained in your trading instruments you can just buy the DBV-Deutsche Bank G10 Currency Harvest ETF. It does exactly this strategy and applies 2X leverage. Since TheMacroTrader.com trades ETF’s we use the DBV to take advantage of the carry trade.

Happy Trading,

The Macro Trader

P.S. If you would like to receive our new FREE course “Macro Trading 101″ put your e-mail in the box below.

P.P.S. If you like what you read here please join our RSS feed and consider subscribing to our newsletter. The Macro Trader newsletter is a weekly newsletter with actionable research.

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