Alf Profile picture
Jan 25 7 tweets 2 min read
New trade!

Long Chinese equities, in particular Chinese Real Estate (ETF: CHIR).

Entry: 12.04
Stop: 9.63
First Target: 15.65

Sized conservatively given low liquidity and decent volatility, but targeting big upside (+30%).

A short thread on the rationale.
1/6
China has opened the credit taps again, and they have the unique possibility to direct credit when they want and where they want it.

The actions taken by the PBOC but most importantly the guidance given by officials towards state-owned banks to stop the bleeding are key.

2/6
The deleveraging in Chinese real estate has been huge, and it has tracked the large '20-21 fall in the credit impulse

Now, the first concrete signs for a turn in credit impulse are there

And the first outlet for this newly created Chinese credit is Chinese assets

3/6
Also, the Chinese Politburo meeting will take place in late 2022 and Xi has zero incentives to get there with the private sector in full bleeding mode.

Even in China, incentive schemes are important.

The recent policy actions speak for themselves, imho.

4/6
As a reminder, every trade on my global macro book is sized to lose max 2% of my remaining capital

The size is adjusted according to the volatility of the asset, and targets/stops are set asymmetrically to skew the odds my way

When wrong, I stop out
Transparency above all

5/6
Yesterday, I published a short update on the macro drivers behind the YTD moves and all the trades I am running in my global macro portfolio on my free newsletter The Macro Compass.

Come & check it out, so you can tease me when I get stopped out! 😀

themacrocompass.substack.com/p/market-erupt…

6/6
As my friend @MrBlonde_macro is correctly pointing out, in case you are looking for a more liquid proxy to get exposure to Chinese Real Estate then KHYB ETF works well.

It's credit rather than equity, but its exposure to Chinese Real Estate & Co is pretty big.

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Alf

Alf Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @MacroAlf

Jan 26
This is the most hawkish Powell I can remember since late 2018.

There are major implications for asset classes across the board: let's go through it with a short thread.

Ah, and few trade updates!

1/8
The synopsis of the press conference:

Journalist *asks whatever type of question*

Powell *I don't care, I'm gonna tighten*

You name it: growth scares? LFPR being weak? yield curve being very flat? risk assets and financial conditions wobbling?

Zero f*cks given by Jpow.

2/8
He did nothing to remove the most disruptive tail of the distribution of future outcomes.

Asked about 50 bps hike? Didn't deny it.
Asked about hiking at every meeting? Didn't deny it.

So, here is what the market is now pricing by Dec 2022.

Almost 5 (!) hikes as base case.

3/8 Image
Read 8 tweets
Jan 23
New trade!

Short Oil (CL1 future)

Entry: 85.1
First target: 72.4 (15%)
Stop loss: 93.6 (10%)

- Real demand & inflation to disappoint against what's discounted
- Long oil crowded as hell
- Decent backwardation given the macro framework

A short thread.

1/6
Real demand and growth are likely to disappoint from here, in my opinion.

Here are earnings lagged by 12m against credit impulse.

For reference, consensus expectations for Q1-Q2 for S&P500 YoY earnings are +5-6% versus same quarters last year.

2/6
Inflationary pressures are likely to fade away too, and much more quickly than what consensus and breakevens are pricing in here (2022 YoY inflation priced at 3-4%, I expect <2%).

3/6
Read 7 tweets
Jan 22
A short thread on how to fast-track your career in Finance.

I became the Head of a $20 bn Investment Portfolio at 27y old - how the hell did I manage that?

Well, at least 50% was luck

The rest, a mix of hard and soft skills (latter: often overlooked, but super important).

1/5
Hard skills count, a lot.

In my experience, it's all about curiosity and dedication really.

If you don't love what you do and you don't work hard, then leave it.

Getting a bit of math & coding helps, but the drive to learn more every day is the key.

2/5
Soft skills count much more.
In order:

- Communication: you can be the smartest guy in the room, but if nobody understands you...forget it.

- Networking: really, speak to people!

- Diplomacy: there is so much politics in a large corporation. Learn how to handle that.

3/5
Read 5 tweets
Jan 21
A revealing macro chart: total economy debt as % of GDP.

Many “rich” and “frugal” countries in here, too: surprised?

You shouldn’t be: instead of using public debt, they chose to lever up the private sector.

A short thread on credit (=money) creation and myths around it.

1/7
Our system encourages credit creation.

As the long-term driver of economic growth stagnate & we have a keen interest in growing fast&now, we use credit.

Credit creation is the process of real money printing: the private sector gets more net worth out of thin air.

2/7
Credit creation can end up on the govt balance sheet (public debt) or on the private sector balance sheet (private debt)

Mainstream financial commentators focus 99.9% of their time discussing public debt and ignore private debt - Italy is indebted, Denmark is not

Bulls**t

3/7
Read 7 tweets
Jan 20
Risk management 101: a short thread.

To be a successful investor, you have to skew the odds in your favor.

Yes, the odds.

I AM wrong plenty of times, everybody is.

Be humble, or the market will humble you anyway.

1/5
That’s why I talk about odds.

The magic formula is:

YE P&L = (P&L generated on winning trades) - (P&L hit on losing trades).

The golden trick is to find trades whose payoff limits the P&L hit if you are wrong, and delivers a large P&L gain if you are right.

2/5
I call those skewed risk/reward trades: if you win 50% (or sometimes even less) of those, you are ensured to make money at year-end.

Easier said than done though: if you only buy call options (limited downside, plenty of upside) you are not 100% guaranteed to make money.

3/5
Read 5 tweets
Jan 15
Big flows move markets.

The biggest flows in fixed income come from the so-called “real money”: pension funds, bank treasuries etc.

Let me explain when they go big.
To get there, you have to understand their incentive scheme.

A hugely important thread.

1/7
You might think real money buys or sell big sizes of bonds when they have strong conviction on the next move in yields.

Absolutely not.

CIOs and PMs there are not paid more if they generate alpha, but they can be fired if they mess up: incentive schemes matter.

A lot.

2/7
Instead, they go big for two main reasons.

A) Regulation forces them to
B) They have some market risk to (un)hedge

Notice how in both cases they have their a*s covered.

Nobody can blame you for sticking to regulation or saying “it was a hedge” if you bleed P&L.

3/7
Read 7 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!

:(