Confounded Interest – Anthony B. Sanders
Financial Markets And Real Estate
The Emperor is actually China’s Xi Jinping! Causing the Empire Fed Manufacturing index to decline.
Despite the slump in ‘soft’ survey data, analysts expected Empire Fed Manufacturing to bounce back from March’s tumble to one year lows and they were right with the headline index rising from -20.0 to -8.1 (considerably better than the -13.5), but still negative. However, while current conditions jumped, expectations plunged to the lowest since 9/11/.
Its Monday! Typically we see Blue Mondays. But not with the tariff war between China and the US. We are watching a chess match between Trump and China. Dow futures are up 461 points at 9am EST.
I’ve got a whole lot of lovin’ for the markets!
Obama/Biden/Harris/Schumer/Pelosi have let the US be the punks for China. Trump is simply trying to level the playing field and China’s Xie doesn’t like the new equilibrium.
VIX Index fell by 18.7 points yesterday … largest one-day decline in history.
The correlation between stock prices and bond yields has returned to positive territory — hinting at a period of distress in equities and a regime shift in equity and bond markets where recession fears, rather than inflation, may be starting to drive direction of both. The correlation between the two asset classes was positive for the better part of 20 years prior to the pandemic, suggesting equities trended in the direction of yields as inflation mostly coincided with growth. Stocks held a negative correlation to yields throughout most of the 1980s and 1990s, when inflation hurt stocks — and that phenomenon returned for the 2022-24 bear market and recovery period.
Notably, major stock corrections occurred each time the correlation jumped out of its primary regime.
China’s Xi flashes a Hitler salute!
Thunderstruck! The tariff kerfuffle between the Trump Administration and China is causing turbulence in the Treasury market. The 10-year Treasury rate is soaring with China’s counterpunching.
MBS spreads are widening.
Along with volatility.
But corporate spreads are widening more than MBS spreads.
The 10Y-2Y yield curve has risen to the highest level since the early days of “China Joe” Biden.
On a related note, Freddie Mac serious delinquency rates on mortgages is now the highest since the financial crisis.
Mortgage applications decreased 6.2 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending March 14, 2025.
The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 6.2 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 6 percent compared with the previous week. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 0.1 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 1 percent compared with the previous week and was 6 percent higher than the same week one year ago.
The Refinance Index decreased 13 percent from the previous week and was 70 percent higher than the same week one year ago.
Mortgage rates increased for the first time in nine weeks, with the 30-year fixed rate rising to 6.72 percent. This increase in rates led to a decrease in refinance volume. However, purchase application volume inched up to its highest level in six weeks, led by a 3 percent increase in FHA purchase applications. Overall, purchase application volume is up 6 percent compared to last year at this time. Growing inventories of homes on the market and steadier mortgage rates are supporting homebuying activity thus far this spring.
New USDA data reveals a third consecutive week of price declines at supermarkets.
But the media is always willing to blame Trump for anything, including eggs prices.
Velocity of M2 Money is back to where is was when Trump left office the first time.
Eggs versus M2 Money.
Riding the Trump wave of economic optimism!
The US economy is gradually recovering from Bidenomics (government/donor dictated spending). Mortgage applications increased 11.2 percent from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending March 7, 2025.
The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, increased 11.2 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index increased 12 percent compared with the previous week. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 7 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 8 percent compared with the previous week and was 4 percent higher than the same week one year ago.
The Refinance Index increased 16 percent from the previous week and was 90 percent higher than the same week one year ago.
Mortgage rates declined for the sixth consecutive week, with the 30-year fixed rate dropping to 6.67 percent, the lowest level since October 2024. As a result, applications increased over the week and were up 31 percent from a year ago.
Turnover speeds are arisin’!
High housing prices, high commodity prices, high interest rates. All thanks to Biden’s horrible top-down economic policies. Its as is Biden was humming “I’m going to take prices higher” while he was President.
Sales of new single-family houses in January 2025 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 657,000, according to estimates released jointly today by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This is 10.5 percent below the revised December rate of 734,000 and is 1.1 percent below the January 2024 estimate of 664,000.
Housing is simply unaffordable in many parts of the USA and world. Its the same all over the world. except Romania and Finland.
The most unaffordble countries are Portugal, Canada, the USA, Switzerland, and the Czech Republic. The most affordable? Romania, Finland, Italy, and Bulgaria.
For the USA, Hawaii and California are the least affordable while West Virginia and Iowa are the most affordable.
The left has come out in force to attack D.O.G.E. and Elon Musk. Why? First, The Left doesn’t want to upset the candy apple cart (government waste and corruption). Second, the Left wants to pretend that they hate the rich (although George/Alexander Soros are huge donors, not to mention Bill Gates and most of Hollywood elites are billionaires/millionaires). But the saddest act of all are Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. These two clowns had the Social Security data and never looked at it … allegedly.
What would they have found if they had looked at the Social Security books? According to Elon Musk, they would have discovered 20,788,904 people at the age of 100 and above. That is significantly higher that the entire population of Naples Florida at 19,704.
Here is what Elon Musk discovered about people receiving Social Security (and disability payments). Joe and Kamala didnt notice someone that was between 360 and 369 years of age??
The point is that this is a collosal embarrasment. And epic fraud. And even more vexxing is that 394,943,364 are collecting Social Security while the total population of the USA is 334 Million?? That leaves 60 million more people receiving Social Security payments than there are people in the USA!
Don’t tell Elon about candied apples that have replaced government cheese in the Federal government giveaway program for votes! And Cloward/Piven!
Confounded Interest - Anthony B. Sanders 
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