Credit Storm in Europe
by ilene - May 29th, 2010 1:20 pm
Credit Storm in Europe
By MIKE WHITNEY writing at CounterPunch
Credit market turmoil in the Eurozone has ignited frenzied trading on global markets. On Tuesday, shares tumbled nearly 300 points on the Dow Jones before launching an unconvincing 257-point late-day comeback. Wednesday the mayhem continued; all the major indexes seesawed wildly as positive news on durable goods was nixed by reports on wobbly EU banks. Erratic selling pushed the S&P down to 1,067 while the Dow slipped below 10,000 for the first time since February 7. The rise in Libor (the London Interbank Offered Rate) is increasing volatility, a red flag indicating trouble in interbank lending. Banks are wary of each other’s collateral as Greece and other underwater Club Med members appear to be headed for debt-restructuring. Libor is not yet at pre-Lehman levels, but the rate that banks charge each other for short-term loans has rocketed to a 10-month high. Improving economic data have not eased fears of another meltdown or removed the rot at the heart of the system. The banks are still loaded with loans and assets that are losing value. The credit system is breaking down.
When banks post collateral overnight for short-term loans, the collateral is effectively downgraded, limiting the banks’ access to capital. This is what triggered the financial crisis two years ago, a run on repo. Regulated "depository" institutions now rely on a funding system that operates beyond government oversight, a shadow banking system. The banks exchange collateral, in the form of bundled securities and bonds with institutional investors (aka—"shadow banks"; investment banks, hedge funds, insurers) via repurchase agreements (repo) for short-term loans. The repo market now rivals the traditional banking system in terms of size but lacks the guard rails and stop signs that make the regulated system safe. The system is inherently unstable and crisis-prone as a recently released paper by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY) admits. Moody’s rating agency summarized the paper’s findings like this: the tri-party repo market “will remain a major source of systemic risk, especially given the current market volatility and the fact that the Federal Reserve’s primary dealer emergency lending facilities are no longer in place…… the market remains structurally vulnerable to a repo run…… If cash investors pulled away in a stressed environment, the clearing banks would be faced with a choice (as they were several times in 2008)…
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The Only Thing Decoupling is Investors and their Money
by ilene - May 17th, 2010 8:53 pm
The Reformed Broker Joshua Brown shatters any remaining signs of life in dying Decoupling myth. – Ilene
The Only Thing Decoupling is Investors and their Money
Johnny Cash once ominously sang "you can run on for a long time" before reminding those whom he considered wicked that sooner or later, they’d be cut down.
US stocks were able to ignore the sovereign debt crises of southern Europe…until they weren’t. Now your Staples ($SPLS) and your Akamai Networks ($AKAM) are slaves to the macro once more. The "Decoupling Theory" fails again, just as it did in 2008 when asset prices around the world fell in tandem.
I’m gonna say this one time – Decoupling is a demonstrably false concept in the 21st century global economy. Sure, there are degrees of correlation but there is no decoupling. Everybody around the world owns pieces of everything, regardless of borders, currencies, languages or timezones. The world has been ETF’d, we all reside in a bought-and-sold basket of instruments. China will eventually succumb to its export customers’ malaise just as surely as US and European exporters will ultimately feel the pinch of a China slowdown.
Russia, Australia, Brazil and Canada may be stronger than their ‘customer nations’ because of their vast raw materials but can they really sustain this strength should the ‘customer nations’ begin demanding less raw material from them?
Nothing is decoupled with anything anymore. You may tell yourself that your Abercrombie & Fitch ($ANF) shares have no exposure to Spain or Portugal – but if the market decides to blow itself up over Spain and Portugal, Abercrombie’s gonna get slapped around.
By the way, the same principle is in effect on bounces and rallies. How else to explain the 420 point Dow Jones Industrial Average rally on confirmation of the Euro TARP? How else to explain the fact that every stock was up, European exposure or not?
So the next time you hear Bob Pisani on CNBC emphasize "Europe’s Close", as though the closing of their markets is like the ‘all clear’ signal for US stocks to recover, remember that the macro has reasserted its influence on our market. And this influence doesn’t wane for any market’s closing bell.
Recoupled. Adjust your expectations accordingly.
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Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...
Ilene is editor and affiliate program
coordinator for PSW.
