The S&P 500 had its worst day since July on Thursday and there was no good catalyst behind the move. We talked about chatter of hedge fund liquidation at the time and those rumors continue to circulate.
MNI is now reporting some chatter that the Swiss National Bank might have been behind the move. The SNB holds 16% of its currency reserves in equities and owns somewhere around $30 billion worth of US equities. There’s talk they be rebalancing into Europe stocks from US stocks.
It’s curious why they would do it as dramatically as it seemed yesterday but it’s also curious that anyone was selling so heavily yesterday. Maybe they just wanted to create some volatility for Mrs Hildebrand to front run.
