Is 6% The Point Of No Return?
With Italian 10 year bonds crossing the 6% yield threshold, it is worth seeing how other bonds behaved. For Greece, the chart starts on September 4th, 2009, and it first crossed the 6% threshold in the week of January 15th, 2010. For Ireland, the graph starts on May 7th, 2010 (right before the original bailout) […]
(BN) *EU MAY MONITOR CURRENT ACCOUNT, 9 OTHER ECONOMIC INDICATORS
Ahhh, problem fixed, thank goodness we are in good hands. All I can think is “a day late, and a dollar short”. Rehn and Juncker are getting more funny than Renn and Stimpy. We were supposed to have a plan in place by now. I am sure their “draft” proposal has a lot more than […]
(BUS) *JEFFERIES REDUCES GROSS HOLDINGS OF SOVEREIGN DEBT OF PIIGS
They seem to be doing everything right and showing that they will do what it takes to keep their customers. They reported their positions over the weekend (I looked at them Saturday). They seemed in line with a “market making” book – at least one that Volcker hadn’t got his hands on. The “gross notionals” […]
European Summary
Greece Some new government is in the works. It will say and do whatever it can to get the next tranche of IMF/EU money. Somehow this is being cheered as good news. The reality is far worse. Greek banks issued over €6 billion of government guaranteed debt. Who in their right mind would buy Greek […]
You Can’t Spell Tooth Faeries Without EFSF
Well, actually you really can’t, but I guess that is my point. We have been reacting so much to headlines there has been no focus on details. Even the political farce in Greece drew attention away from the real problems. If anyone had told me that by the end of the G-20 meeting all we […]
MS vs JEF
MS vs JEF. They had performed in line for quite a while. JEF earnings miss hurt them and they didn’t rally but recently entered their own personal h*ll as they were dragged down for looking or sounding or seeming too much like MF. I don’t think they are MF. I still don’t love financials as I believe the European crisis […]
(BN) *JEFFERIES DISCLOSES POSITIONS IN GIIPS COUNTRIES
I think this is an impressive development. Probably a one time thing, but should be good and can let people get comfortable with their exposures. I have been looking at the charts of JEF vs MS, there could be a bit of room to run here if they aren’t penalized for being “MF-like”. More importantly, […]
To Me, This Is The Bond To Watch: 2-Year Italian Bonds
To me, this is the bond to watch: 2-year Italian bonds. We can look at the 10-year bond, and the 5-year, and those are ideally where Italy should be funding, but the fallback is always to take roll risk and move down the curve. 5.4% for 2 year money is scary. It starts taking the already bad strategy of […]
Time To Schedule The Next Summit?
The G20 meeting is almost over and it looks likely to end with some indications that the IMF will put more money into Europe is some form and that all the leaders will pledge to continue to work together to resolve the debt crisis. Since resolve doesn’t involve letting Greece default and remain in the […]
Well, At Least I Understood One Thing Today
The trading in JEF actually at least made some sense. There was a story about a big potential exposure to Europe. Given what happened to MF global (going from 3.55 to 0.28 in just over a week), you could understand why investors were nervous. Jefferies is in the same size bracket as MF Global (small […]