BBUS, page-4617

Hey you have a point but what we have to really understand is the depth of economic damage the shutdown has caused. We are talking TENS of trillions worth of productivity, jobs, profits, growth, impaired, lost.

Printing $4 trillion will do nothing inflationary. If they printed it under normal circumstances then sure but given the unforeseen economic damage that has been initiated the Fed can print another $5T to no effect. It won't even touch the sides.

There is a massive gap that needs filling. The linear thinking of many people is that money printing = inflation by default. Believe it or not there is actually a shortage of physical US dollars at the moment. 80% of physical USD notes are held and hoarded outside of the US. This money is being hoarded as the rest of the world is facing serious uncertainty with the majority of countries at the brink of default. People only see hope in the US dollar vs their own currencies. This money is not out in circulation in the economy.

Just to repair the economic damage created to date the Fed will likely need to print near $20 trillion or more and that is just to fill the holes. Forget about inflation. This is just to get back to normal. Every single job that was created since the 2008 GFC has now been lost and then some. This is why I think this bull trap rally is just an over reaction. Jerome Powell shows his charming self on TV and says hey, we got you guys, it's gonna be ok and the gullible retailers rush in to buy Facebook and Amazon because those are the companies they use and 'understand'. (look up stats on retail vs institutional money in the markets atm).

In my view we are witnessing a truly historic point in time where we have just seen the entire world shut down for months. All of it. All economic activity halted and brought to zero. You don't just continue as normal when it is all over as if it never happened. The underlying economic reality that will follow can not simply be repaired by money from the Fed. It can be perceived to be held up for about 5 minutes or so but not repaired or solved.

For mine - in the near future I see an abrupt end of this bull trap and initial run into US gov bonds. Yes that means the markets will further (and deeper) correct to finish this epic downward cycle. And I'm not just saying this, like many others on this thread I've placed my money where my mouth is.

After the crash completely plays out I do agree that at some point within the next few years or even earlier, we will see US markets decouple from reality and take off to astronomical levels. But not because of Fed printing, but because of capital flows into US private assets from around the world as overall confidence in government debt is lost around the world. The amount of gov borrowing in emerging markets has been insane and you watch for countries starting to default on their obligations and fall like dominos. No government bond will be safe and the only place to park big money would be in US equities as they are a double play on the USD. At that point I think we will see DOW 50-75,000+ or more, completely decoupled from any economic metrics - simply as the least risky place to park money. P/E ratio and all those metrics will be irrelevant as it will all be about parking capital, nothing more, nothing less.

For now I believe this crash needs to fully play out in full.. I don't believe that 'this time is different'