Flip, Flop & Fly Friday – Options Expiration Spectacular!

Things were going according to plan (even though the plan was horrifying) and everyone was happy but then Uncle Ben had to screw it up this morning when "The Bernank," speaking in Germany, indicated that the Fed would pull the plug on QE2 if they thought inflation would rise higher than "2 percent or a bit less."
WHA-WHA-WHAT?  Keep in mind that WE are the only country on the planet Earth that is still pretending inflation is under 2% and he's making this speech in China, where inflation is 4.4% so what do you think happened?
Of course, if you can answer that, you are smarter than the Wall Street Journal (but then again, who isn't when it's being run by people like Roger Ailes, who just said of National Public Radio: "They are, of course, Nazis.  They have a kind of Nazi attitude. They are the left wing of Nazism.") who went with the headline: "Dollar Sinks Despite Chinese Rate Rise" because they clearly do not understand the workings of International Monetary Policy, which I would find disturbing if the Wall Street Journal were a trusted source of financial information and not just a right-wing mouthpiece.  As our friend Jon Stewart so aptly pointed out last night, there's a pretty large disconnect between media and reality these days.  [click here for video.]
Fortunately, any indication by The Bernank that the money spigot may one day run dry handily trumps a 0.50 increase in the reserve requirement of Chinese Banks. Bloomberg get's it, with the very succinct headline "Bernanke Steps Up Stimulus Defense, Turns Tables on China."  While Bernanke didn’t identify China in his speech, he took aim at “large, systemically important countries with persistent current-account surpluses.” Bernanke’s comments come a week after leaders of the Group of 20 developed and emerging nations meeting in South Korea failed to agree on a remedy for trade and investment distortions. At the summit, President Obama attacked China’s policy of undervaluing its currency.

China has tied the yuan to the dollar to promote exports that helped produce the fastest gains in gross domestic product of any major economy. China, which surpassed Japan’s GDP to become world No. 2 in the second quarter, recorded 9.6 percent annual growth in the three months through September. It holds about $2.6 trillion in foreign reserves, the most in the world.
German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said on Nov. 5 he was “dumbfounded” at the Fed’s actions, which won’t aid growth and will instead contribute to imbalances by driving down the currency. U.S. monetary policy is creating “grave distortions” and causing “collateral effects” on faster-growing economies such as Brazil, Meirelles said in October.  China’s vice foreign minister, Cui Tiankai, said Nov. 5 “many countries are worried about the impact of the policy,” echoing concern across Asia over the risk of a flood of capital that causes asset bubbles. Economies from Taiwan to Indonesia and Brazil have taken steps to counter inflows of speculative money, and South Korea yesterday said it will back legislation restoring a tax on foreign investment in the nation’s bonds.
None of this is particularly bullish for commodities, which is why we got right on top of this in Member Chat at 5:43, when my note to Members was: "Interesting, Dollar is being taken down while the Bernank speaks. It jumped to 78.55 but now smacked back down to 78.25 and that sent oil from $83 to $82 and back to $83, which makes them a good short play below the 83 line in the futures."  Oil just (8:30) bounced off the $81.50 line and we are not greedy at PSW, especially at $5 per penny, per contract on the oil futures!