• "One last thing." --Lt. Columbo

WSJ.com source says website host Go Daddy is preparing to file for an IPO.

• Thanks for reading and enjoy your weekend.

I am outta here early like Clare was in "The Bachelor."

I close the week at about 5% net long.

Thanks for reading my diary -- I hope it was value-added.

Enjoy your evening and the weekend.

• Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown.

This clip describes Mr. Market.

• Illustrated.

Below is a great table from Nautilus Capital Research, which shows performance when the S&P 500 is flattish by mid-March (from 1900-present).

S&P 500

Source: Nautilus Capital Research; Bloomberg

View Chart »View in New Window »

• At $525.10.

I just picked up some more Apple (AAPL) at $525.10.

• Perhaps we'll get a rally next week.

It seems as if everyone is either market agnostic or negative after this week.

Makes me wonder if we get a rally next week.

On two different subjects, I mentioned I would post Kyle Bass's appearance on CNBC.

Separately, we have all finally found out who Gary Kaminsky's "guy in Aspen" is; it is Larry Altman, who appeared on "Fast Money: Halfitme Report."

• Every other global market has broken down but the U.S.

As Peter Boockvar remarked earlier, currently every other global market has broken down but the U.S.

Maybe there will be a Crimea reprieve bounce, but after that it might pay to be more cautious.

Look at the divergence in performance, especially recently, between the Russell 2000 and the rest of the world.

Russell 2000



Source: Bloomberg

Germany



Source: Bloomberg

U.K.



Source: Bloomberg

Nikkei



Source: Bloomberg

China



Source: Bloomberg

Korea



Source: Bloomberg

Hong Kong



Source: Bloomberg

• Mute your TV.

A lesson that we should all learn from the crisis in Ukraine is to mute the TV when a "market strategist" begins his analysis with a comparison of the GDP of a region in war with the GDP of some state like Nebraska (sorry, Warren!) in order to somehow de-emphasize the market consequences of that particular crisis.

Lesson learned?

• Run, don't walk, to watch Kerry's speech.

Here is Secretary John Kerry's press conference following his meeting with Sergei Lavrov.

• Run, don't walk, to watch Lavrov's speech.

Here is Sergei Lavrov's speech following his meeting with John Kerry.

Don't speak Russian? Here's the gist of it.

• From CNBC's Scott Wapner.

Very nice shout-out from Judge Wapner on "Fast Money: Halftime Report" on my column on China lending yesterday.

Thanks, Judge.

• Here are his musings at midday.

Midday musings from Sir Arthur Cashin:

Interesting morning minuet.  As stocks turned up so did ten year yields.  That hinted some lessening of tension but no headline followed.

Then stocks and yields turn the other way.  Again, no headlines so far.  Since then, they have reversed one more time.

Atmosphere remains ideal for rumormongers who may blossom late in the session.

Keep your eye on that ten year yield.  Probably more accurate than stocks.

Run rate at 12:00 projects to  600/680 million shares.

• I am now 10% net long.

• The company boasts a market cap of $3.5 billion.

Castlight Health's (CSLT) IPO opens up big. With $13 million in trailing 12-month sales, the company boasts a market cap of $3.5 billion.

As Grandma Koufax used to say, "Dougie, meshuganah is trump" (craziness is threefold in Yiddish).

• Run, don't walk, to watch Kyle Bass on CNBC.

Kyle Bass makes bullish comments on Nationstar (NSM) and General Motors (GM) on CNBC now.

Bass expects GM to trade in the high $40s or even the low $50s in 12 months or so. I agree.

His comments on Nationstar should aid Ocwen (OCN) today.

I will post the video when it is available.

• Under $35.

Safe at any speed: General Motors (GM) is trading better today (ex-dividend) under $35.

• Here is his summary.

Below is a good summary of the week's most important macroeconomic events from The Lindsey Group's Peter Boockvar:

Positives

1)US Initial Jobless Claims totaled 315k, 15k below the estimate and down from 324k last week. It's the lowest read since November and brings the 4 week average to 331k from 337k. Continuing Claims fell to the lowest since December.

2)Due to a fall in wholesale services inflation, February PPI falls .1% headline and .2% core vs the estimate of up .2% and .1% respectively. The y/o/y gains are up a benign .9% and 1.1%. Goods prices, just 1/3 of the newly constituted number, did rise .4% m/o/m in part to a 6.7% m/o/m increase in commodity prices which more so showed up in higher intermediate term goods prices which should lead to a bottoming in the PPI figures looking forward.

3)While many blame the market weakness in Germany due to concerns with gas supplies from Russia, I believe it's more so to the persistent strength in the euro. German exports in January were resilient though, rising 2.2% m/o/m, above the estimate of up 1.5% with the euro averaging 1.362 vs the US$ in the month of January. This comes after a .9% drop in December however and a 1.39 euro today.

4)Australia reported a stronger than expected jobs report where 47.3k jobs were created in February vs the estimate of up 15k. It's the biggest one month gain since March '12.

5)Central banks in Japan, Indonesia, and South Korea all sit tight and leave rates unchanged as expected. Thailand cuts rates while New Zealand hikes them due to inflation concerns.

Negatives

1)China exports in February fell 18.1% y/o/y, well off the estimate of up 7.5%. But, we must take January and February together because of the lunar new year holiday which brings the Jan/Feb y/o/y drop to 1.6%. If we also take into account the fake and juiced invoices of last year, the y/o/y change was likely higher but at a slower pace than seen in the past few years. Imports did rise 10.1%, above the estimate of 7.6%.

2)China loan growth slowed sharply to 938.7b yuan in February from 2.58t in January which was below the estimate of 1.3t and less than February '13 of 1.07t. The drop off is likely in response to two wealth management products that ran into trouble but got bailed out anyway in addition to policy action to slow credit growth.

3)Combining the January/February timeframe to remove the new year holiday distortion, fixed asset investment, retail sales and industrial production in China all rose less than forecasted. Retail sales rose at the slowest pace since 2005, IP was up at a level last seen in 2009 and FAI was higher by the slowest pace since 2002.

4)Japan's GDP in Q4 was revised down to an annualized gain of just .7%, below the estimate of .9%, vs the initial read of 1% and well below the original estimate in February of 2.8%.

5)Consumer Confidence in Japan in February fell to 38.3 from 40.5, the weakest level since September 2011 as all 4 components fell. In particular, the 'willingness to buy durable goods' fell to the lowest since February 2009 and 'income growth' is just off the lowest since June '11. QE was ramped up in September '12 and Abe took power that December. Wage increases are needed quickly ahead of April tax hike.

6)The February US NFIB small business optimism index was disappointing, falling to 91.4 from 94.1, the weakest since March '13. The NFIB blamed Washington DC for the weakness saying "facing continued unknowns with the healthcare law, the EPA, the minimum wage, tax reform and more, it is no surprise that the Small Business Optimism Index fell, reversing a few months of modest gains." Most components were down m/o/m.

7)While US retail sales in February were a touch better than expected, it comes off a weaker than previously thought January and leads to a slight cut in Q1 GDP forecasts with some estimates below 2% and us around 2%.

8)The preliminary UoM consumer confidence figure for March was 79.9, down from 81.6 in February, below the estimate of 82.0 and the lowest since November. It also remains below the 82+ that we saw last summer before the government shutdown. The components though were mixed as Current Conditions were up while the Outlook fell. One year inflation expectations remained sticky at 3.2%, matching the most since September.

9)February Import Prices rose .9% m/o/m, well above the estimate of up .5% and January was revised up to a gain of .4% from the initial print of up .1%. This m/o/m gain is the greatest in a year and was led by a jump in petro prices. Prices ex food/fuels were flat m/o/m and remain down 1.4% y/o/y.

10)While US Business Inventories rose .4% in January, right in line with expectations, the .9% sales drop sent the inventory to sales ratio to 1.32, the most since October '09. Because of supply chain disruptions, we have to take with a grain of salt for now but can't ignore the sharp inventory build in 2nd half of 2013.

11)Also dated and weather influenced, there were 3.97mm job openings in January, up from 3.91mm in December but expectations were for 4mm and December was revised down from 3.99mm. There was a net 83k jobs created according to this measure (vs 129k in payroll stats) and the quit rate fell to 1.7% from 1.8%, a Yellen favorite stat.

12)With a 5 bps increase in the average 30 yr mortgage rate to 4.52%, refi applications fell 3.1% w/o/w and are down 65% y/o/y. Purchase applications were little changed, falling .5% w/o/w and down 17.5% y/o/y.

13)The euro rips higher again (about 40% of German economy reliant on exports) and touches the highest level since 2011. Notwithstanding Draghi's best attempts to verbal jawbone his currency, another round of LTRO repayments shrinks the ECB balance sheet to also the lowest since 2011.

14)EU industrial production in January unexpectedly fell by .2% vs the estimate of up .5% m/o/m and was a catalyst for further market weakness there but it still saw a y/o/y gain for the 5th straight month after 22 months in a row of declines.

15)Russia stands firm going into the Crimea annexation referendum on Sunday. Question remains of what happens next assuming it is passed, does Putin then decide to negotiate and/or what type of EU and US sanctions are slapped on, of substance or of symbolism?

• Shares are up $1 from the day's low.

ProShares UltraShort 20+ Year Treasury (TBT) rallies $1 from the day's lows.

• He seems to be using the platform as a voice for his educational causes.

Daniel Loeb (@DanielLoeb) joins the Twitter community.

He seems, thus far, to be using the platform as a voice for his educational causes.

• I am very large in the short bond trade/investment now.

Repeating for emphasis: I am very large in the short bond trade/investment now.

• So the shares are now higher on the day.

Remember General Motors (GM) is ex-dividend $0.30 today, so the shares are now higher on the day.

• My initial conclusion is positive.

I have done quite a lot of work on government-sponsored agencies Fannie Mae (FNMA) and Freddie Mac (FMCC).

While I haven't yet bitten on them, my initial conclusion is positive.

Hopefully, I will detail that analysis, which is a bit complicated, next week.

• On weakness.

I added to my ProShares UltraShort 20+ Year Treasury (TBT) long on weakness.

• And I am taking them off my Best Ideas list.

I covered my MetLife (MET) short at $51.64 and my Lincoln National (LNC) short at $50.53.

And I am taking them off my Best Ideas list.

• At $236.

I am taking in some of my Tesla (TSLA) short now at $236.

• Profit margins are about to mean-regress.

General Mills (GIS) warns.

I remain of the view that the consensus forecast for 2014 S&P earnings of $120 a share is pie in the sky.

Profit margins are about to mean-regress.

• Here is the firm's take.

Goldman Sachs on today's PPI release:

Headline producer prices fell 0.1% (vs. consensus +0.2%) and core producer prices fell 0.2% (vs. consensus +0.1%) in February. Both series were weighed down by a 0.3% drop in final demand services, which was mainly due to the final demand trade services category (-1.0%). This category represents an indirect measure of margins received by wholesalers and retailers, and is noted by BLS as one of the most volatile categories of the report. There was a particularly large drop in apparel retail margins (-8.1%) which may have been weather related. The special aggregate core PPI less trade services rose 0.1%, in line with consensus expectations for core. Over the past twelve months, headline PPI increased 0.9% and core PPI increased 1.1%, representing little by way of pipeline inflationary pressure.

• The market will be characterized by a great deal of volatility.

As I have mentioned, the likely market course is uncertain.

But it is likely the market setting will be "newsy" and characterized by a great deal of volatility.

Keep cash reserves high by historic standards, and be opportunistic in your trading.

Don't be concentrated; diversity is your ticket in a period of uncertainty.

If I am correct about the market's direction (lower), there will be numerous investment opportunities that develop.

Wait for your right pitch.

• Here are his comments.

Mark J. Grant talks Crimea this morning:

"It's not the people who vote that count. It's the people who count the votes."

-- Joseph Stalin

I would imagine that we will never know the reality of any vote on the Crimea joining Russia. We will be given numbers. We will be told that it was a landslide. Russia will claim that the vote is proof positive that the people in the Crimea want to join them. Yet the real tally will have been decided in Moscow, signed off on by Putin and then engineered by the Crimean Russians who now control the province and are running the referendum. It doesn't take a moment's look into the Wizard's crystal ball to predict the outcome of the Crimean referendum. Democracy is always so convenient for those in power when handled in this manner.

At least one good thing will come of all of this. The Russians will get to move all of those armored personnel carriers and tanks off Russian soil and let them exercise in the Crimea. It is always so much more fun to use live ammo when in another country.

"You can get much further with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone."

-- Al Capone 

Putin, who has received his parliament's permission to use the Russian military in the Ukraine, has warned that he reserves the right to "use all means" to protect the ethnic Russians in the Ukraine from violent nationalists, even though there have been no signs of any violent nationalists. CNN, the BBC and even Reuters have looked for them but can't find a single one. Putin says they are there and much of his strategy is based upon this Russian folktale.

Well, the Irish have their leprechauns and I suppose the Russians can have their "violent nationalists" though I have never heard of the Irish moving their tanks around to sort out where the leprechauns might be hiding.  I would bet that the "violent nationalists" will next be found in the eastern part of the Ukraine and then in Kiev.

Yesterday Vladimir Putin said, "It's foremost Ukraine's internal crisis, but, regrettably, we have been drawn into these events. We can't ignore the developments around Ukraine, Crimea and everything related to that uneasy problem, which, I want to underline, has emerged through no fault of ours."

You may recall the other notorious political personage named Vladimir. He was Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia (1431-1476) and also known as "Vlad the Impaler." He was a member of the House of Drăculești. There was a certain character based upon this fellow who was popularized by Bram Stoker. You may recall his name, Count Dracula.

Yet maybe, just maybe, the Count did not die. Maybe he has reappeared in Russia in the clever disguise of the Russian President. It is not to be Romania this time but the Ukraine who may fall under his spell as his "violent nationalists" wander around in the countryside outside of Kiev while we all watch in horror and stare at the "children of the night."

"Listen to them, the children of the night. What music they make!"

-- Count Dracula

• Here are his morning musings.

The gospel according to Peter Boockvar:

While US stocks hit the 'do over' button yesterday putting the S&P 500 just back to flat on the year, the year to date country advance decline line continues to weaken this morning with most markets down. I know the A/D line is used for individual companies in analyzing the breadth of specific market indices but in light of the major macro influences so far this year, I think it's worth looking at US market action compared to the rest of the world. Granted, it's only measuring 2 ½ months of activity but the news now impacting markets (China slowdown, Russian bravado, strong euro, weather infested US slowdown, Fed taper continuing, emerging market tremors, etc...) have been the main 2014 focus. Of 12 of the biggest Asian stock markets, 7 are down (including the important ones such as Japan, China, Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore and Australia) for the year with 5 higher. In Europe, in 18 of the biggest markets, 12 are down, 6 are up (most of peripheral Europe). In Latin America (including Mexico), of the 5 biggest markets, all 5 are lower year to date. Canada is up 4.6% year to date. Bottom line, this says nothing about where markets go from here but at least puts the US market outperformance relative to the rest of the world so far in 2014 into perspective. That said, with about half of S&P 500 earnings sourced overseas, the US stock market can only decouple from others for so long. On the flip side, earnings and stock market performance can detach for periods of time so my analysis is certainly nothing scientific for the short term. Lastly, of the factors affecting global markets I listed above, I believe the Fed taper, which seems the least paid attention to right now, will be the most relevant and the biggest headwind in 2014.

There was no follow thru today in the US$ vs the euro after Draghi did his best yesterday to halt the persistent rise in the euro when he said the FX rate is "becoming increasingly relevant in our assessment of price stability." The lack of a move is due in part because he hoped for only his words to work magic to lower the euro when he said forward guidance should be the tool to tighten the real interest rates spread with the euro area and the rest of the world which would in turn lower the euro. His problem is that words are not stopping the European banking system from continuing to pay back LTRO borrowed money which is in turn shrinking the ECB balance sheet. As of today, the amount outstanding for both LTRO programs are down by 32% y/o/y and the ECB balance sheet is the smallest it's been since September 2011. It's going to take more than words from Draghi.

In the US, PPI and UoM Confidence are the two data points out today. The CRB index has come off its multi yr highs over the past week led by industrial metals and WTI but it's still up 11% off its January low.

• The impact will be transitory.

Similar to many of the previous international crises, the Ukraine situation will likely pass, should not dent worldwide economic growth and will not be a material risk to the capital markets.

While Russia has clearly violated international law (raising the ire of the world community) and the Ukraine/Russia issue is a near-term challenge to risk assets (and our relationship with Russia), below is a list of reasons why the impact will be transitory:

• Crimea has already been annexed by Russia. Sunday's referendum will give formal approval to something already done. (Note: Russia has always thought of Crimea as part of Russia. Thus annexation is not seen by Russians as an expansionary move but rather to defend access to the port on the Black Sea).
• Any sanctions (asset freezing, visa restrictions, etc.) by Europe or the U.S. against Russia is toothless.
• Russia is not likely to annex other parts of the Ukraine, as the country is financially unstable and Russia can't afford to prop up the rest of Ukraine. Moreover, a further incursion into other parts of the Ukraine would bring more substantive sanctions.
• The referendum could be ratified on Sunday, but Russia might effect a "soft annexation" that permits Crimea integration with Kiev.

• Yesterday's flight to safety provided an opportunity to meaningfully raise short bond exposure.

If one believes that second-quarter U.S. real GDP growth will rebound from the weather-induced weakness of the first quarter, the single best investment over the next few months might be found in shorting the U.S. bond market.

As I outlined in my Kellogg School (Northwestern University) lecture two years ago and again in my Value Investing Congress presentation a few weeks later, the yield on the 10-year U.S. note (currently at 2.65%) typically trades at 80% and 100% of nominal U.S. GDP growth (real growth plus inflation).

If we assume optimistically that the domestic economy achieves 3% real GDP growth in second quarter 2014 and then add 1.5% inflation to that, nominal GDP growth could be trending at approximately 4.5% in the coming months. At 80% of the 4.5% growth, the normalized 10-year yield would be 3.6% (nearly 100 basis points above the current yield). At 100% of the 4.5% growth the normalized, 10-year yield would be 4.5% (185 basis points above the current yield).

If we assume less optimistically that the domestic economy achieves only 2.5% real GDP growth in second quarter 2014 and add 1.5% inflation, nominal GDP growth could still be trending at about 4% in the second quarter. At 80% of the 4% growth, the normalized 10-year yield would be 3.2%, and at 100% of the 4% growth, the yield on the 10-year note would be 4% -- both still comfortably above current yields.

Yesterday's flight to safety (and drop in yields) provided me with an opportunity to meaningfully raise my short bond exposure.