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While the trend has been your friend in US equities for the last few months; the trend in US Macro data has also been consistent - but negative over the last few weeks. Today, for the first time in almost five months (thanks to misses on existing homes and the Richmond Fed) the US Macro index turned negative. In the past this has marked the start of the market's realization that things are not just dipping but are cycling lower. This is also the weakest 'macro' start to a year since the crisis began - and seasonally is prone to become worse not better from here. It seems, however, that the only reality that is required for any prognosticator or commission-taker is that of nominal stock prices (as self-confirming bias creating data) - just as it was in late-2007.