In this week's Off The Cuff podcast, Chris and Mish Shedlock discuss:
- Remember Volatility? It's Baack…
- And a tremendous amount of losses may follow soon
- Rising Interest Rates
- The long party of cheap credit is ending fast
- The Middle Class Is Becoming The Working Poor
- Fewer and fewer are able to save for the future
- Unpacking The State Of The Union
- One key question: "Where's all that money going to come from?"
Suddenly, volatility is rearing it's snarling head everywhere. The US dollar has plunged. Interest rates are marching higher than they have in many years. Cryptocurrency prices have been more than cut in half from their early January highs. Now, even stocks are beginning to wobble…
For years now, one of the most crowded and "easy" trades for making profit has been to short volatility. Trillions are still in play on that bet. With volatility now rising, that bet increasingly risks suddenly becoming a bad one — which would unleash a tremendous volume of losses across the financial markets.
As Mish warns:
There's a huge number of hedge funds that were sold this short-VIX product.
Their philosophy is, "Well, if it rises, we're just going to short more." I'm waiting for that to blow up. Some of these hedge funds and pension plans will actually get carted out on the table.
by kugscheese