(BN) Greek Private Investors Are Slow to Commit to Debt Swap, FT Says
(BN) Greek Private Investors Are Slow to Commit to Debt Swap, FT Says This shouldn’t be surprising. The invitation is 167 pages, so even if some institution (European Bank) has no choice but to agree, it will take a couple of days to read the document. Given the number of problems in every other document produced in the […]
My Big Fat Greek Restructuring – The Week Ahead
The situation in Greece should create some big headlines this week. The bond exchange “invitation” is set to expire at 3pm EST on Thursday March 8th. This is the so-called Private Sector Involvement or PSI. Greece has other steps to take during the week, and ultimately the Troika will determine how to proceed with the […]
TBIF – Too Bad It’s Friday
What a strange few days. On Wednesday it looked like LTRO was priced in and QE3 was in doubt. Yesterday, Italian bonds were incredibly strong and even Spain was good. Data didn’t seem to matter, dips were there to be bought. Everyone, bulls and bears, were wondering if the market could go down. If LTRO […]
The Geithner Letter
I do agree with the Amnesia analogy. We see it even in Europe today. Suddenly it’s “crisis over” yet printing money and providing extremely cheap debt to banks hardly seems like a solution. There has already been push back on anything that increases regulatory capital requirements. Now, in this period of calm is the time […]
The Day Italian Bonds Captured The Market
Yesterday’s trading was dominated by the stellar performance of the Italian bond market. The stock market tried to give back some early gains on the back of a disappointing PMI report, but just couldn’t. The Italian bonds in particular, but also Spanish bonds were on fire. There was growing hope that LTRO2 had not been […]
The Bank Of Pete, Or Of Any Tom, Dick, Or Harry
Somehow I feel bitter about this round of LTRO. Something about LTRO2 really strikes me as obscene. The only person who know without a doubt must be foaming at the mouth is Jon Corzine. His trade is not only encouraged by everyone, it is fully supported, and the participants don’t even have to wait for […]
Good Thing Prices Paid Don’t Count As Inflation
Early data was mixed. Hints of inflation and lower than expected spending, but income was up and the jobs data was decent. The consumer comfort index deteriorated, but that is a relatively minor data point. On the other hand, ISM was decidedly weak. Missed by a decent amount, and prices paid jumped even more […]
Market Share, Profitability, Why CDS Isn’t On An Exchange
So, yesterday it was revealed that both Goldman and JPM had about 145 billion of “gross” notional outstanding on CDS related to the PIIGS. That means they each had roughly 145 billion of purchases and sales. They spoke about various netting agreements that makes the real number lower. They also mentioned with collateral and on […]
(BN) Greece Debt Insurance Doesn’t Have to Pay Out, ISDA Says
This is a very good summary of what is going on (and yes, I’m biased because I’m quoted, but it is a good overall summary and describes the situation well). +——————————————————————————+ BFW 03/01 12:39 No Payout on Greece $3.25 Billion Default Swaps, ISDA Says BFW 03/01 11:16 ISDA Starts Meeting to Rule on […]
Unicredit Bonds
Unicredit is trying to sell a slug of its bonds. It looks like this time they are actually trying to sell the bonds, rather than get them guaranteed by the Italian government and pledge them to the ECB. The timing is obviously designed to take advantage of the LTRO money out there. It will be very curious to […]