Thursday Watch

Evening Headlines 
Bloomberg: 

• Why China's Credit Growth Is So Frightening. (video)

• China Just Made It Easier to Bet Against Its Priciest Stocks. Betting against China’s most expensive stocks just got a whole lot easier. Futures on the small-cap CSI 500 Index started trading on Thursday, giving investors a cheaper way to wager on declines in shares valued at more than twice the level of the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index. The CSI 500 has surged 47 percent this year, versus a 26 percent gain for the Shanghai measure. 

• Lew Urges Greece to Reach Deal With Creditors to Avoid Euro Exit. U.S. Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew urged Greece and its international creditors to reach an agreement on steps that need to be taken to avoid the nation’s exit from the euro and any resulting crisis. “There’s no doubt that if this leads to a crisis such as Greece leaving the euro zone, it will cause an enormous amount of disruption and hardship in Greece,” Lew said in an interview Wednesday. “Even if the contagion risk is much less now than it was, say, in 2012 and earlier, it would not be a good thing in a world economy just recovering from a deep recession to have that kind of uncertainty introduced.”

• Asian Stocks Rebound to 2008 High as Material Shares Lead Gains. Asian stocks rose, with the regional benchmark rebounding to it highest since May 2008, as materials companies and energy producers led gains. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index added 0.7 percent to 153.70 as of 11:08 a.m. in Tokyo.

• Oil’s Rally Seen Reversing Amid Biggest U.S. Glut Since 1930s. Oil’s surge to the highest level of the year may be short-lived as the highest supply in 85 years cushions against a drop in production. West Texas Intermediate crude jumped 5.8 percent Wednesday after the Energy Information Administration said inventories rose at the slowest pace since January. Stockpiles have increased for 14 weeks to the highest level since 1930.

• Rio bond risk rises with BHP(BHP) as iron glut called dumb alarms S&P. Forecasts for the steelmaking material are being slashed amid a ramp up in supply. Bond risk for Rio Tinto Group and BHP Billiton rose the most among Australia’s major investment- grade borrowers amid criticism of their decision to ship more iron ore into a declining global market. Credit-default swaps on Rio Tinto have risen 14 basis points over the past year to 101, while BHP contracts have climbed 10 basis points to 73, the two worst performers in the 25-member iTraxx Australia index, based on CMA data. The miners, along with junk-rated Australian peer Fortescue Metals Group Ltd., were among eight global producers that Standard & Poor’s said this week may have their debt ratings cut.

Wall Street Journal:

• Clinton Foundation to Keep Foreign Donors. Board’s decision to continue accepting funding from some countries could become 2016 campaign issue. The board of the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation has decided to continue accepting donations from foreign governments, primarily from six countries, even though Hillary Clinton is running for president, a summary of the new policy to be released Thursday shows. The rules would permit donations from Australia, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway and the U.K.—countries that support or have supported Clinton Foundation... 

• Faltering Growth Forces China to Rely on Traditional Tools to Prod Economy. Economists question whether infrastructure spending and easier credit will be enough.

• BMW China Dealers Press Auto Maker for More Financial Support. Distributors call on German auto maker to lower sales targets, provide new price incentives. In a fresh rift between BMW AG and its distributors in China, a group of dealers said it would miss sales targets this year unless it gets better financial terms from the German luxury car maker.

• Judge Rules GM Can Keep Its Bankruptcy Shield. Ruling could allow the auto maker to block billions of dollars in legal claims over defective ignition switches.

• Medicare Overpays as Hospital Prices Rise. Soaring bills for sickest patients can throw payment formula out of whack.

• The Fed’s Faulty 1937 Excuse by Christian Broda and Stanley Druckenmiller. Central bankers aren’t likely to observe financial excesses until it’s too late. Policy makers and financial pundits insist that the risk of the Federal Reserve raising rates too early exceeds that of moving too late. The Fed appears to agree. In recent years, the Fed has repeatedly moved its goal posts, seemingly to avoid raising the federal-funds rate from near zero. But is the prevailing consensus correct if emergency...

Fox News:

• Mass movement: US Christians don orange in church to honor ISIS victims. A new campaign sweeping through American churches has worshipers wearing orange - either in their Sunday best or on ribbons - to raise attention to the Christians executed at the hands of ISIS.

MarketWatch.com:

• Rubin sees ‘realistic possibility’ there are bubbles in U.S. markets. There is the possibility that there are already asset bubbles in U.S. financial markets, said former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin on Wednesday. “I don’t have a personal view on whether we now have [market] excesses or not. But it certainly is a realistic possibility when you look at the U.S. stock market, which is near all-time highs, when you look at covenant-light and now non-covenant lending, [and] a vast increase in fixed-income [exchange-traded funds],” Rubin said at a seminar on the sidelines of the International Monetary Fund/World Bank spring meetings.

Zero Hedge:

• The Collapse Of The Petrodollar: Oil Exporters Are Dumping US Assets At A Record Pace. (graph)

• America, Meet Your Brand New Largest Foreign Creditor. (graph)

• The Fed Never Learns - Another Inventory Dump Is Brewing.

• High-School-Educated Chinese Speculators Have Learned Well From US Investors.

• NFLX(NFLX) Goes Full Amazon: Burns Record Amount Of Cash But Stock Surges On Jump In International Subscribers.

• Oilpocalypse Wow - Stocks Pop, Dollar Drops As Crude Hits 5-Month Highs. (graph)

• SEC Reaches "Appropriate" Settlement With Freddie Mac Execs Who Will Pay Nothing And Receive No Punishment.

• The Four Chartsmen Of The Recession. (graph)

• The World Has Gone Mad - Fed's Lacker Edition. (graph)

• China's True Economic Growth Rate: 1.6%. (graph)

• Algos Celebrate Virtu's IPO With Massive Euro Stop Smash.

• Artist's Impression Of China's Soft Landing. (graph)

• "Bonds Don't Bring Breakups, Banks Do"; UBS Says Europe Risks Bank Runs On Grexit.

• CLO Volume Hits Record As PE, Wall Street Look To Stay Ahead Of New Rule. (graph)

Business Insider:

• Panera(PNRA) shares rally 11% after the company announces a huge stock buyback plan.

• Over 50% of students in some New York school districts are boycotting Common Core tests.

• Etsy prices its IPO at $16 per share, making it worth $1.78 billion.

• Russian-backed rebels have launched 'massive' attacks six miles from a key Ukrainian city.

Reuters:

• SanDisk(SNDK) forecasts first full-year revenue decline in three years. SanDisk Corp forecast a steeper-than-expected fall in full-year revenue and said it plans to cut jobs to reduce costs, as the data storage products maker struggles to meet demand for its flash-based memory products. The forecast of a revenue decline, which will be its first after two years, came after the company reported its first fall in quarterly revenue, also in two years. Shares of SanDisk, which makes products for cloud computing and datacenters as well as for smartphones and other mobile devices, fell 6 percent in extended trading.

• Fed confident in smooth U.S. rate hike despite questions -Potter. The Federal Reserve is confident it can smoothly lift interest rates when the time comes, though it stands ready to make adjustments on the fly given uncertainty about how investors could react, the Fed official responsible for market operations said on Wednesday.

Financial Times:

• Global property bubble fears mount as prices and yields spike. Fears of a renewed global property bubble are rising as prices and yields hit records last seen before the financial crisis, according to new data. The pricing of real estate around the world had become “increasingly aggressive”, research company MSCI said. This is particularly the case in the US, where investors’ returns from rental income are now lower than before 2008, when a crash in massively overleveraged property triggered an international banking slump.

Telegraph:

• Japan's huge debt pile just got scarier. Japanese government debt will soar to 400pc of GDP within 30 years unless policymakers implement vital reforms, OECD warns.

• World faces 'perfect default storm' when Fed hikes rates - Deutsche Bank. Rising US interest rates could trigger a wave of corporate defaults, interrupting more than a decade of calm in global bond markets.

China Business News:

• China's private jet market hits turbulence from graft crackdown. Growth slows as corruption crackdown deters buyers from ordering luxury items.

Evening Recommendations 
BMO:

• Rated (SBUX) Outperform, target $56. 

Night Trading

• Asian equity indices are -.25% to +.75% on average.

• Asia Ex-Japan Investment Grade CDS Index 105.75 -.25 basis point.

• Asia Pacific Sovereign CDS Index 59.25 +.25 basis point.

• S&P 500 futures +.09%.

• NASDAQ 100 futures +.11%.

Morning Preview Links

Earnings of Note
Company/Estimate

• (ADS)/3.44

• (BLK)/4.51

• (BX)/1.03

• (C)/1.40

• (FCS)/.11

• (GS)/4.27

• (KEY)/.27

• (PM)/1.01

• (PPG)/2.33

• (SHW)/1.44

• (UNH)/1.34

• (AMD)/-.06

• (AXP)/1.36

• (MAT)/-.09

• (SLB)/.92

Economic Releases
8:30 am EST

• Housing Starts for March are estimated to rise to 1040K versus 897K in February.

• Building Permits for March are estimated to fall to 1081K versus 1092K in February.

• Initial Jobless Claims are estimated to fall to 280K versus 281K the prior week.

• Continuing Claims are estimated to rise to 2323K versus 2304K prior.

10:00 am EST

• The Philly Fed Business Outlook for April is estimated to rise to 6.0 versus 5.0 in March.

Upcoming Splits

• None of note

Other Potential Market Movers

• The Fed's Rosengren speaking, Fed's Mester speaking, Fed's Lockhart speaking, European New Car Registrations report, Bloomberg Economic Expectations Index for April, weekly Bloomberg Consumer Comfort Index, weekly EIA natural gas inventory report and the 3D Print Design Show could also impact trading today.

BOTTOM LINE: Asian indices are mostly higher, boosted by commodity and technology shares in the region. I expect US stocks to open mixed and to rally into the afternoon, finishing modestly higher. The Portfolio is 75% net long heading into the day.