Stocks Looking At Losses for the Week as Stimulus Talks Continue to Go Nowhere

To reach positive territory for the week, on Friday, the Dow needs to gain 243 points; the NASDAQ, 166; S&P, 31; and the NYSE Composite, just 24 points.

In the aftermath of Thursday night's presidential debate, stock futures are pointing to a positive open (nothing new there), and headlines are still promoting the idea that the politicians are zeroing in on a stimulus deal.

A stimulus deal has been the dominant, running theme for the past three months. Nothing else seems to matter, indicating the converse of the narrative. Wall Street sees handing out money to individuals and corporations as a positive, but the reality is that if the economy were on sound footing, stimulus would not be needed, such is the paradoxical nature of the market and public perception, usually short-sighted.

President Trump, in a tweet, and also during the debate, put a less-than-enthusiastic spin on current negotiations, saying that there's unlikely to be a deal prior to the election. The president blames House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, for purposely stalling on any deal, her thinking being that denying a stimulus is somehow good for Democrat prospects in the November 3rd voting. Trump believes the tactic will backfire on the Democrats.

As far as the debate is concerned, it's difficult to pick a winner, as both President Trump and former VP Joe Biden had moments of strength and weakness, though the president seemed to be the more confident of the two and able to counter his opponent's arguments. Biden made a number of false claims, such as the US facing another 200,000 COVID deaths by the end of the year, saying Trump was somehow in cahoots with foreign governments when there's absolutely no proof of that, and repeated bleats of "false" or "not true" in response to Trump accusations.

Biden did outright deny receiving money from any foreign government, though the evidence is almost at a point of 100% certainty that he did. The media's continued stonewalling on the explosive stories coming out of the NY Post and elsewhere don't help his case at all. The fact that they are covering for the former VP is probably doing more harm for his campaign than good.

Of particular note on background issues, Russ and Pam Martens' Wall Street on Parade reports that banks - which last week reported generally solid earnings for the third quarter - are not setting aside sufficient amounts for loan loss reserves as they were allowed to under-report expected losses via the CARES Act which gave the banks until December 31, 2020 to opt out of employing the accounting standard, ASU 2016-13, for reporting Current Expected Credit Losses (CECL).

What this means is that some of the largest banks in the country - Well Fargo, Citi, Bank of America, and JP Morgan Chase - are not likely to report sufficient set-asides for the outgrowth of their deferrals, forbearances, and other accounting magic until the first quarter of 2021, or, about the second week of April, 2021, a key time frame to keep back of mind.

This fundamental fakery helps explain why the banks are reporting mostly strong results, but their shares are not appreciating. Rather, bank stocks remain mired closer to the March lows than the August-September highs. Investors simply are not buying into the fake numbers.

Andrew Maguire explains how China is bypassing the London Bullion Market Association (LBMA), which no longer can provide much metal, and buying unrefined gold directly from mines in Africa and South America in the interview below.

At the Close, Thursday, October 21, 2020:
Dow: 28,363.66, +152.84 (+0.54%)
NASDAQ: 11,506.01, +21.31 (+0.19%)
S&P 500: 3,453.49, +17.93 (+0.52%)
NYSE: 13,145.92, +105.79 (+0.81%)