Came up fine for me in private browsing mode, may be worth a try if not tried already.

Its not cheap. Top slice if you have plenty, and if you dont then maybe continue to hold. At these levels its not an efficient hedge for equities.

ProShares Short High Yield (SJB)

Depends which steepener you mean. I pulled up EDH0 vs EDH1. That's at -.56 which is its flattest for the laws 10 years. If you mean the bond curve, I understand your point. If you mean the ED curve we may have to go some way out the curve to play lower for longer. It seems like we have either really scared bond investors this time, or the market positioning was such they couldn't resist the buying. Do I like lower for longer? Yes I do. Do I think its not in the price relative to the absolute level of rates? Not sure. They both seem to be discounting a lot to me. I cant see an obvious free lunch.If anything looks funny its bond gamma. 1m 10y is now at roughly the same level as Aug last year. Up from about 55bps per year to 90 per year. But thats just me. Re IG, well its very easy to see how you could get rather paradoxical effects. Credit deterioration in the BBB or BB- space can actually increase demand for IG, as segmented credit funds try to avoid problems in more vulnerable credit spaces. I will ask JB, but if I was running a credit portfolio I would up head to higher quality and definitely stay away from things like BIZD or CLOs. Don't go into a trade or theatre where you don't know where the exit is. Best of luck

*good money*

Short dated ED options have moved far, so I also consider steepeners as a better way to play hard and fast rate cuts at this point (the chart not having broken out yet). Overall japanification of the yield curve means the potential profits won’t be the same as in previous cycles but there should still be shook money to be made - I hope.

Will reflect to JB but its a very tough question. So many variables its probably better to be responsive to pre-thought out scenarios. So consider the following policy responses. Simultaneous 1) Trump removing all China tariffs. 2) Fed cuts 50bps. The market could well rally 100 S&P points. Will it stay there? Well that would depend on how bad a Covid19 epidemic is in the US, and how much damage it does to S&P earnings. I can easily imagine the worst of all possible worlds. An extended period of infection and a dramatic reduction in social contact associated with the infection. No one going to restaurants, bars, sports games etc. How exactly would you get credit to SMEs that need it? A government guarantee? Maybe? But implementation would be slow. There was some comment from Rajan (ex BoI governor) that comes to mind. Central banks always need to pretend to have a bazooka up their sleeves. Im not sure they really have one this time. Imagine how the market trades the minute they realize the Fed is out of ammo?

Yes we are Amit. The "reports" suggest precious metal selling was caused by margin calls on equities. The likely policy response is only going to to be bullish for precious metals. That said, a stop is a stop. Discipline is the second most important thing in trading - after capital preservation! So we have to honor our stop. But JB is still longer term bullish.

Great questions. I will reflect but here's my two cents while I wait for JBs answer. 1) Add bonds? Well I can see why you might be even more bearish but the implied Fed Funds rate in Dec 2020 is now 68bps. The original recommendation was to buy EDs as a very cheap hedge for overvalued equities. Yes equities are still overvalued but the hedge is no longer cheap and the risk reward of the hedge is no longer asymmetric. Basically its not a good hedge anymore. That doesnt mean you might not like it as a trade. There are very good reasons to think economic activity will go to hell in a handbasket in the US. But I would suggest something like HVG as a more asymmetric risk reward compared with EDs now. On the dollar, there is a case, but I personally would be very interested to see what the market is telling me. Dollar has stopped rallying. It might continue, and especially vs EM. But I spoke to JB about this last night so I can tell you that he is very interested in the weekly TD13 count in EUR/USD. Its also sitting on a multiyear trendline. EUR and the DM before it has a tendency to hit its low or high for the year in Jan or Feb. JB is wondering whether it might be flagging a dollar turn. Two ways such a EUR turn could happen. The "good" way is we get Fed cuts and stocks stabilize - the dollar carry advantage is reduced and EUR gently rallies. The "bad" way is stocks keep dropping, Fed cuts but doesnt solve the problem and the "Dollar exceptionalism" trade unwinds, with the dollar selling off sharply against funding currencies like EUR and CHF but up against EM FX In Gold we hit our stops. I can understand continued bullishness. Im very bullish. The correlation with the number of negatively yielding assets is very strong and very intuitive. And if I were a Chinese investor I would definitely want more gold in my portfolio. But discipline is everything in trading and a stop is a stop. In the longer run I imagine we will look for an opportunity to go long, but the reports suggest that investors were receiving margin calls on their equities and needed to sell gold holdings to de-risk portfolios. Its certainly not the first time I have seen that kind of action. Same arguments pretty much for silver.

Well well - Raoul's latest flash update changes this perspective for sure - certainly on the short term ! Shows we have to stay flexible at all times.

ET _ I meant to type ETH, and this reminds me...RV team, pls allow us to edit these posts ! Thanks for considering this.

i didn’t see the link below. That worked for me on my ipad through safari (copy and paste into address line)

I am travelling also and have the same issue.

but I guess no one will ever read these messages anyway. sad.

Harry, thank you for your reply! Are there any updates to the positioning from Raoul/Julian? Specially regarding "I may just send a one-liner over the next few days." and contingency sell advice.

Time frame? Not really, although I would keep a very close eye on BIZD US because these types of business development corporations should be even more sensitive than HVG to shifts in credit conditions. However when I talked to JB, he noted that the current COVID19 episode, had the potential to do as much short term damage as the mini-recession in 2016, and its at least as bad as the Fed induced equity sell-off at end 2018. Right now HYG is at 86.04. The end 2018 sell-off in equities saw HYG down to a low of 80. The 2016 mini-recession saw HYG bottom at 75. Will ask the question and see if he has specific levels in mind.