Market Watch

Kyle Bass - The Social Fabric of Japan Will Tear

Although I have posted several Kyle Bass promoted videos and quips in previous posts , here he is again in the media. Seems like hes getting a little more attention these days as he should…

…Critically, he fears, “the social fabric of Japan will tear,” as with one-third of the nations at retirement age, the fallout from the policies of Abe-Kuroda could cause them to “lose 30-50% of their life savings.” What is perhaps even more concerning, he adds, “you are starting to see the central banks not trust each other.”

At a certain point in time, “nationalist interest takes over the global [G7] kumbaya,”and that is occurring now.

“When your debts are 24-times your government tax revenue, you have a secular decline in population, and all of the things are finally catching up to you, what happens when you have a debt crisis?”

Central Banks believe “Devaluation is ‘supposedly’ the way to freedom”

3:00 – Japan’s tearing social fabric
4:30 – G7 Kumbaya unwind

6:00 – “There is no way out” for Japan – it’s a matter of when not if. And “if there is no way out for them, there is no way out for the rest of us – unless we change the way we operate.”

6:30 – “If there is no consequence to the US profligacy [rates not moving against them] well then they will keep spending.”  –  “Central banks are enabling the spending”

7:15 – “The Modus Operandi of the west is running deficits; and what that has meant in the past is runaway cost-push inflation – and I think that is what we are going to see”

8:00 – “Investors are too complacent” – this is the single-most riskiest time to be complacent in our generation – “investing with the typical endowment model… is not going to work”

9:00 – “The insidious nature of a runaway inflation is that it bankrupts the middle class… the poor stay poor, the middle class (with savings in the banks) get wiped out, the wealthy (with productive assets) do the best”

9:40 – … which leads to social unrest globally – and that is a problem…

Full article can be read HERE

UPDATE:

Some folks around the Asian pacific area are not happy with the BOJ either. Hedge reports….

As the SCMP reports, “Many of China’s top economists are livid at what they view as an effective currency devaluation by Japan and are calling on the People’s Bank of China to retaliate by weakening the yuan to defend itself in what they see as a new currency war.”

These economists, including Tsinghua University professor Li Daokui and ANZ Bank’s Liu Ligang, see Japan’s plan to double its monetary base within two years as “blackmail” and have criticised the Japanese central bank’s decision to open the liquidity floodgates to bump up the economy.

Liu said Japan’s unprecedented easing programme, aimed at ending more than two decades of deflation, was “a monetary blackmail” targeted at other export-driven Asian countries such as China and that the central bank should sell more yuan and buy the US dollar to push down the yuan.

He also called on authorities to guard against a fresh wave of hot money into China’s fragile financial markets, warning that Japan’s move would reignite the so-called carry trade, under which investors borrow in low-interest yen and invest in high- interest markets.

“The massive monetary stimulus by the Japanese central bank could spell doom for other nations in the region,” said Tsinghua’s Li, a former adviser to the People’s Bank of China.

All spot on, and all well-known in advance, but apparently all the brilliant minds in the world forget that trade is a zero-sum game, and that Japan’s current account and trade surplus gain (if any, recall both hit record lows recently) facilitated by a plunging yen, will come at the expense of other very angry exporting nations. This also ignores what happens to Japanese import energy and food prices, already exploding as has been documented here previously. The BOJ’s hope: companies will promptly hike wages to make up for rising staples costs. We hope the central banker often confused with a Yankees pitcher is not holding his breath on that one…

As for countries hating Japan’s guts right now, China may have to wait in line: if there is one country that has to be truly livid at Japan it is South Korea, whose net exports account for nearly 60% of its GDP. So yes: the next currency war salvo will come most likely not from China, which is already caught between a rock and a hard place, but from Seoul, where the perfect storm of a totally nutjob neighbor to the north has emerged just in time for Japan to do everything in its power to crush its economy.

Update:

Ex Soros advisor is a little worried about Japan as well. Looks like Kyle isn’t the only one with this opinion…

How popular will inflation be in Japan? Assuming the BoJ is successful and inflation rates rise, one interesting dynamic will be the political support for ‘super-easy’ monetary policy. The majority of financial household assets sit in deposits, which until now have earned a positive real rate. While long-term inflation expectations move higher, the Yen and equities re-price rapidly but the negative impact on deposit returns from negative real rates will only be felt once inflation has actually started to materialise. This is clearly not an immediate concern as the government’s approval ratings remain high ahead of the Upper House elections this Summer. Still, PM Abe’s policy aim of beating deflation may become less popular at some stage because the implied distributional choices of higher inflation may become clearer for voters. For example, higher inflation would re-distribute real income from (older) savers to (younger) wage earners. But again it is worth thinking about the exact sequencing. By the time inflation in Japan becomes settled in positive territory the Fed may well be on the verge of hiking rates. In essence, any concerns about inflation in Japan and debate about a BoJ policy response will likely arrive at a stage when Fed tightening and JPY carry trades have already become the dominant theme.

In short, yes, Japanese inflation will destabilize the economy, and almost certainly lead to yet another political upheaval, but by then Japan will have served its purpose and injected some $1 trillion into the US stock market, thus supposedly allowing the US economy to become self sustaining. Or not. As to the consequences that the demographically-challenged Japanese population has to face as it suddenly finds itself holding worthless pieces of paper… who cares.

“By expanding the monetary base to 270 trillion yen, the BOJ is making a huge bet which I think it will ultimately lose,” Fujimaki said in an interview in Tokyo on April 11. “Kuroda’s QE announcement is declaring double suicide with the government. The BOJ will have to share the country’s fate and

The volatility in the JGB market as well as the fact that there is large selling represent fear among investors,” Fujimaki said. “They are early signs of a larger selloff and we should continue to monitor the moves in the long-term bonds.”

Fujimaki said he recently bought put options for Japanese government bonds of various maturities, without elaborating. He continues to hold real estate in Japan and options granting the right to sell the yen against the greenback expiring in less than five years. He also holds assets in U.S. dollars and currencies of other developed nations.

“By expanding the monetary base to 270 trillion yen, the BOJ is making a huge bet which I think it will ultimately lose,” Fujimaki said in an interview in Tokyo on April 11. “Kuroda’s QE announcement is declaring double suicide with the government. The BOJ will have to share the country’s fate and default together.”

“Shirakawa did more than enough and he had good reasons to not do any more,” said Fujimaki. “There will be tremendous side effects from monetary stimulus. QE doesn’t work and has no exit.”

“Things may look rosy for now as stocks rise, but should we see hyper-inflation, JGBs will see a huge selloff, leading to a stock market crash,” said Fujimaki, adding that he sold “almost all” of his Japanese stock holdings some time ago.

“Japan’s finance is sinking into the ocean,” Fujimaki said. “There’s no escape from a market crash in the future when you have such enormous debt.”