Fed Dead Redemption! Blackstone’s $69 Billion Real Estate Fund Hits Redemption Limit (Equity REITs DOWN -23.6% In 2022, Mortgage REITs DOWN -28.6%)

As The Federal Reserve continues its assault on inflation by raising their target rate, Blackstone Inc.’s $69 billion real estate fund for wealthy individuals said it will limit redemption requests, one of the most dramatic signs of a pullback at a top profit driver for the firm and a chilling indicator for the property industry.

Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust Inc. has been facing withdrawal requests exceeding its quarterly limit, a major test for the one of the private equity firm’s most ambitious efforts to reach individual investors. The news, in a letter Thursday, sent Blackstone stock falling as much as 10%, the biggest drop since March.

You can see the problem facing commercial real estate. Since December 31, 2021, NAREIT’s all-equity REIT index has fallen -23.6% while NAREIT’s mortgage REIT index has fallen -28.6%. It looks like Blackstone’s Real Estate Income Trust has a decline coming.

If I look at NCREIF’s commercial property index, we can see that The Fed helped boost CRE values. But what will happen if and when The Fed actually shrinks its balance sheet.

I call The Fed’s attempts at cooling inflation “Fed Dead Redemption” since it resulted in redemptions from real estate funds.

Recession Alert! ISM Prices Paid Crashes To Covid Shutdown Levels As Fed Tightens

Warning! Evidence of a US recession is appearing. And with a recession, prices will likely fall due to lack of demand.

Why might inflation be falling? Take a gander at ISM Prices Paid. They just fell to the lowest level since the infamous Covid economic shutdowns of 2020.

M2 Money growth YoY is the lowest in years, but The Fed’s balance sheet remains elevated. But apparently the Covid-related sugar rush has ended.

When Powell Talks, People Listen (S&P 500 Index UP 3% On Powell Message Of Slower Fed Rate Hikes)

Fed Chair Jerome Powell had a message yesterday to investors. His message was … The Fed is going to slow the rate of rate increases. And just like that the S&P 500 index rose 3%.

Here is Jerome Powell investigating Fed rate hikes.

Challenger Job Cuts Hit 416.5% In November As The Fed Deflates The US Economic Tires (PCE Deflator Still High At 5%)

As soon as Bidenflation started soaring with his war on fossil fuels and manic Federal spending, we saw The Federal Reserve starting to remove the excessive monetary stimulus, but Congress didn’t cancel its spending spree.

We ADP jobs report yesterday was ugly (+127k jobs added after +239k jobs added in October). Now we have the Challenger, Gray and Christmas jobs report for Novemeber … and it is terrible. An increase of 416.5% in job cuts.

Today, the US Personal Consumption Expenditures data was released. It shows that the CORE PCE YoY fell to a still high 5%.

If The Fed actually followed any rules other than CNTRL PRINT, we can see that with Core PCE YoY of 5% (or 4.98% to be exact), the Taylor Rule estimate for where The Fed Funds Target rate should be is … 9.78%

Foul Powell on the prowl hinted on The Fed slowing rate increases.

US Adds 127k Jobs In November, Lowest Since August ’21 As Fed Tightens (On The Fed’s Good Ship Follypop!)

ADP’s jobs added in November shows a continued downward trend in private jobs added as The Fed merrily tightens its monetary follicy.

On the good ship Follypop!

104 Days Later! US 10Y-2Y Yield Curve Remains Inverted For 104 Staight Days, Mortgage Rate Falls As Fed Tightens (Ethereum Rises > 4%)

Yes, The US Treasury 10Y-2Y yield curve remains inverted, for the 104th straight day. And Bankrate’s 30-year mortgage rate has dropped -57 basis points since November 3, 2022.

This comes after a gruesome Pending Home Sales and mortgage applications reports today.

At least Ethereum is up over 4% today!

US Pending Home Sales Fall -36.7% YoY In October, MBA Purchase Applications Fall -31.22% YoY As Fed Tightens

The Federal Reserve continues to remove the monetary punch bowl despite the global yield curve inverting and The Fed fighting Bidenflation.

On the mortgage front, mortgage applications decreased 0.8 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending November 25, 2022. This week’s results include an adjustment for the observance of the Thanksgiving holiday.

The Refinance Index decreased 13 percent from the previous week and was 86 percent lower than the same week one year ago. The unadjusted Purchase Index decreased 31 percent compared with the previous week and was 41 percent lower than the same week one year ago.

On the housing front, US pending home sales fell for a fifth month in October as demand continued to sag under the weight of high mortgage rates.

The National Association of Realtors index of contract signings to purchase previously owned homes decreased 4.6% last month, according to data released Wednesday. And fell -36.7% YoY.

All together now. Look at pending home sales YoY and mortgage purchase applications SA compared with M2 Money YoY.

Is this part of The Great Reset??

World Yield Curve Inverts For First Time Since At Least 2000 (US Yield Curve Has Been Inverted For 107 Straight Days) Drums Along The Potomac??

Do I hear Drums Along The Potomac or East River??

The hawkish drumbeat from central bankers is raising fears of a downturn, with global bonds joining US peers in signaling a recession, as a gauge measuring the worldwide yield curve inverted for the first time in at least two decades.

The US Treasury 10Y-2Y yield curve, on the other hand, has been inverted for 107 straight months.

And in Europe, 10-year sovereign yields are dropping like a paralyzed falcon.

The world and US yield curves are pointing to trouble. And drums along the Potomac (DC) and East River (NYC).

Trabucco Road? US Consumer Credit Outstanding SOARS As Inflation Soars And Personal Savings Collapses (Cryptos Rally As Jim Cramer And ARK’s Cathie Wood Buy The Dip!)

Wasting away again in Biden’s inflationville.

During the Covid crisis of 2020 (red box). consumer credit declined and households were saving. But following the end of US Covid economic shutdowns, we saw inflation soaring to 40-year highs as Biden declared war on fossil fuels and a Pelsoi-led Congress went on an epic spending spree. But with soaring inflation, came a decline in personal savings and soaring consumer credit outstanding in an attempt to cope with Bidenflation.

Meanwhile, in the crypto universe, CNBC’s Jim Cramer and ARK’s Cathie Wood are going big for cryptos. With Wood buying Bitcoin and Cramer touting Coinbase.

Hmmm.

But at least Litecoin and the others are up today. Likely because Cramer and Wood are touting cryptos with “buy the dip!” strategy.

And on the Sam Bankman-Fried fiasco front, I am watching the deflection of wrongdoing from SBF to his girlfriend and now the co-CEO of Alameda Research, Sam Trabucco.

Bloomberg: He has a degree from MIT and cut his teeth as a trader at Susquehanna International Group. Yet the former co-head of Alameda Research made it clear that poker and black-jack tables were where he honed the gambler’s instincts he applied to cryptocurrency trading.

“I may or may not be banned from 3 casinos for this,” Sam Trabucco once tweeted about counting cards at black jack tables.

Trabucco Road?

Inflation Nation! Producer Price Index (PPI) Final Demand At 8% YoY In October (Cryptos Rallying On Isolation Of FTX)

The US is an inflation nation.

Today, the PPI Final Demand YoY index printed for October was it was still agonizingly high at 8% YoY (The Fed likes to see 2% for inflation).

True, PPI Final Demand YoY is down from its recent peak of 11.7% YoY in March. But notice that M2 Money YoY (liquidity) has collapsed following the Covid surge (green line).

Then I have this update on Sam Bankman-Fried of FTX and Alameda Research notoriety.

As Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire imploded last week, costing him effectively all of his $15.6 billion fortune, other digital-asset billionaires sought to make clear that their steep losses in 2022 wouldn’t be similarly fatal.

Cameron Winklevoss, 41, who along with his twin brother Tyler founded cryptocurrency exchange Gemini, posted an 11-part series of tweets emphasizing that Gemini “has no exposure to FTT tokens or Alameda and no material exposure to FTX,” referring to Bankman-Fried’s trading house and crypto exchange.

And despite Spam Bankman-Fried’s disaster for his investors like Tom Brady, Steph Curry and the Democrat party, the crytpo market has done some recovery with most cryptos this morning.