The Dollar “should” repeat the pullback we saw in April-Sept last year

Outlook

Today we get the Conference Board consumer confidence for Feb, some regional Fed surveys and a slew of Fed speeches, but the big one doesn’t come until after the close—the State of the Union at 9 pm. Note that we also get another Atlanta Fed GDPNow (currently at 3.1%).

Trump has already run off the rails with acts like insulting the Supreme Court and saying he wants to hang six members of Congress for reading a law out loud on TV. Maddow had a hilarious piece on which cabinet member can’t attend in case a bomb drops on the building and one last person needs to take charge—nearly all of the cabinet members are publicly disgraced.

FT columnist Luce summarizes it well: ”Donald Trump’s state of mind is a global risk.”

Forecast

We wrote yesterday that the dollar “should” repeat the pullback we saw in April-Sept last year, if not exactly.The euro did make a drive upward but it failed to hold. Note that MACD still points to a recovery.

Nobody’s talking but we can guess that reluctance to sell the dollar comes from the Iran stand-off and the likelihood of the Fed holding firm, if not hiking. The offset arguing for the dollar retreat is Trump cacophony and confusion on tariffs and ever more evidence he is an out-of-control child. Oh yes, plus the not-so-great economy.

Food for thought

Tonight we have to suffer through Trump’s state of the union address to the Court and Congress. Three things: first, someone is sure to count how many lies he tells, especially about the economy. Bloomberg and others have the list of 12 things he promised, from sending illegals home to gas at $2. He has failed on all of them except the crime rate falling, but it’s not clear he gets any credit for that. USAToday also has a list.

Second, he will not disclose any ideas he may have about Iran, chiefly because he doesn’t have a policy or a plan, and pretends he likes to keep people guessing. He fails to notice that we all know by now that keeping ‘em guessing is just a childish ploy and far from good enough.

Third, polls are showing that up to 60% of respondents disapprove of the way he is handling things, from immigration crackdowns and tariffs to defying courts. That’s the disapproval rating in the Washington Post/ABC/Ipsos poll. We like the Nate Silver version that combines multiple surveys and adjusts for bias, It shows 56% disapprove of Trump. Foreigners, take heart. The American voter was stupid enough to vote him into office, but not so stupid he can’t see Trump botching every single thing.