This note was originally published at 8am on January 19, 2011. INVESTOR and RISK MANAGER SUBSCRIBERS have access to the EARLY LOOK (published by 8am every trading day) and PORTFOLIO IDEAS in real-time.
“The Constitution was designed to govern the government, not the people.”
-Steve Hanke
In a concisely written piece of Complex Simplicity, Steve Hanke penned this quote in a paper I was reading yesterday titled “Reagonomics Goes Global.” Hanke is a professor of applied economics at Johns Hopkins University and a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute. I interviewed him while I was running a radio show for Bloomberg Radio last year and have been reading his work ever since. He gets government math.
The white paper featured different opinions from different authors and I think Hanke’s chapter, titled “Lessons from America’s Founding Fathers and US Experience” is well worth taking the time to read. Hanke takes a crack at differentiating the definitions of American style democracy and liberty. He also highlights Alexander Hamilton’s original US fiscal convictions:
“The United States was born in a sea of debt. A majority of the public favored a debt default . Alexander Hamilton, acting as Washington’s Secretary of the Treasury, was firmly against default. As a matter of principle, he argued that the sanctity of contracts was the foundation of all morality. And as a practical matter, Hamilton argued that good government depended on its ability to fulfill its promises.” (Reagonomics Goes Global, page 8)
I call this to your attention this morning because it draws a historical bridge between THE most important US Economic question that’s on my mind right now (can the US Dollar Index hold its newfound intermediate term TREND line of support at $78.66?) and what I am going to talk about on our Q1 Macro Theme call this morning under the umbrella of a theme called American Sacrifice (email sales@hedgeye.com if you’d like access to the call and/or the slide presentation).
Duration matters. That’s why I try my best to make sure my team is Duration Agnostic when considering risk, probability, and uncertainty. That’s why we have developed our TRADE, TREND, and TAIL model. It’s not perfect, but at least it’s an evolution of legacy Wall Street research and risk management processes gone bad. What the US stock market is doing in the immediate-term is not the most important long-term US Economic factor that’s on my mind.
Seeing the stock market going up every day isn’t the solution to this structural mess (stock market fans should remember that 1/3 of this country (102 MILLION Americans) have ZERO moneys in a retirement account and 1/2 of Americans have $2,000 or less). Neither is inflation – that’s a policy. What I think we ultimately need is a strong currency, balance sheet, and handshake that the world can trust again. If we have those, the jobs will come.
We can hope and pray that the new Republican leadership can be depended upon to “fulfill its promises” of spending cuts, but we must remember that hope is not an investment process and trusting a conflicted and compromised politician better have some serious prayer attached to the exercise. The foundations of morality matter (repaying your debts) to a lot of people in this country. So does protecting whatever integrity remains of her currency.
It’s time.
So, let’s roll with that this morning and figure out whether the intermediate-term strengthening of America’s currency (US Dollar Index is up for 8 out of the last 11 weeks since the midterms) is a leading indicator to a long-term TREND of American Sacrifice and fiscal sobriety.
Governing the Government on Global Macroeconomic risk management matters sounds like both a painful and herculean task – but I think it’s achievable.
Here’s what we need to execute:
- A Real-Time Accountability Mechanism (Twitter – check)
- An Analytically Competent and Independent Research Firm With Real American Clients Who Care (Hedgeye and The Buy Side – check)
- Freedom of Speech and email forwarding (iPhones, Crackberries, etc – check)
The messaging is out there folks. The People have already voted. Americans want spending, deficit, and debt cuts – and this is our last chance to Govern the Government so that we get all three of those things no matter what the intermediate-term American Sacrifice.
By “last chance”, I’m not trying to be dramatic either. With the upcoming debt ceiling and deficit/debt commission debates, this is it - for the US Dollar, America’s balance sheet, and her handshake with the world as its fiduciary of the world’s reserve currency that is…
I am a Canadian-American, so I have no allegiances to any person, politician, or party on this matter. If the US Dollar starts to break down again, sustainably, below my $78.66 TREND line, I will sell it faster than you can say Thunder Bay Bear.
Another debauchery of the US Dollar will equate to $120 oil, global food inflation riots, and plenty of other unintended consequences that I, for one, have no patience seeing my firm and family endure under the willfully blind veil of no one could have seen this coming.
My immediate-term support and resistance lines for the SP500 are now 1280 and 1298, respectively.
Best of luck out there today,
KM
Keith R. McCullough
Chief Executive Officer
