To paraphrase the police officer who told me my old neighborhood had burned down during the 2017 NorCal fires,  “the markets are no more.”

After the Fed announced it is bailing out junk bonds today,  Wall Street has now morphed into a full-blown  “Soviet Sausage Factory.”

Jay Powell probably had no choice and needed to blunt the blow of another 6 million-plus print of new unemployment claims but isn’t Socialism and state intervention dandy?

We can understand providing support to local and state municipalities,  now strapped with severe cash flow problems as their tax revenues have gone to near zero,  but junk?

You know, like many of the same companies that levered up to buy back shares while shitting all over their employees or, say, the wildcat and shale-oil drillers?   Even Jed Clampett and Ellie May understood Texas Tea is risky business.  Come on, man.

Chapter 11 and debt restructurings are not only the right thing to do but the only thing to do lest we lose an entire generation to stagflation and a zombie economy.  That’s probably the best case unless the economy miraculously snaps back, which assumes the economy was structurally sound before the virus took it out.   We seriously doubt that.

Here’s to hoping the bailouts are just a bridge to a major economic restructuring with the long-needed structural reforms.

Waste Of Time

There’s no sense in wasting time analyzing the markets anymore.

We will sit on cash and gold, hope and pray the virus soon passes, and try and tune out this shit show until the major political dislocation that is surely coming on the other side.

“No One Will Fail”

Just heard a trader on CNBC say, “no one will be allowed to fail…earnings don’t matter…nothing matters.”  Oh. My. God!

Wasn’t it just a few months ago the government was going after the young who were falling behind in their student loan payments?

Example: Judy has weekly disposable pay of $300. Based on the minimum wage calculation, she definitely gets to keep $217.50. The government can then take the lesser of the amount his income exceeds $217.50 ($300 – $217.50 = $82.50) or 15% of his income (15% of $300= $45.00). Since $45.00 is less than $82.50, this is the amount the government can take each week from Judy’s wages. – SLBA

Gosplan Setting Prices Now

Most asset prices are no longer determined by market forces — which has been the case for many for some time — but now set by our new Gosplan along with the local Commissar of Free Money, just like the price of eggs way back in the USSR.

I never ever wanna hear from the self-righteous, ignorant ideologues parading as economists again,

“Free market capitalism is the best path to prosperity to Socialism….blah, fucking blah.”

How twisted and sick is our society that the grocery clerks making $12-15 per hour working on the frontline, risking their lives and getting sick to feed us and the 10 percent now profiting from these government bailouts (88 percent of stocks are owned by the Top 10 percent)?

But, wait for it…their thousand dollar check is in the mail.

Come on, folks, give these people a big, as in Bengie big or a large fraction thereof, tip the next time you’re out.  I have no doubt many of you already do and will continue until this plague passes.

A note from a Bernie Bro,

“In 2016, they told me if I voted for Bernie, the nation would move closer to authoratarianism,  managed trade, MMT, and socialism.  I voted for Bernie and man were they right.”  – Bernie Bro

Happy Maundy Thursday and Pesach.  Stay safe, folks.