"How can I know what I think until I read what I write?" – Henry James


There are a few lone voices willing to utter heresy. I am an avid follower of Ilusion Monetaria, a blog by ex-Bank of Spain economist (and monetarist) Miguel Navascues here.
Dr Navascues calls a spade a spade. He exhorts Spain to break free of EMU oppression immediately. (Ambrose Evans-Pritchard)

domingo, 21 de agosto de 2011

Un Lehman en ciernes? (retuneado)

Parece ser que hay un crujido persistente en el mercado interbancario europeo. Los datos son escasos, pero un banco, no se sabe cuál, pidió financiación a corto en dólares por 500 mm de $, al BCE.
 En realidad se pide a la FED vía BCE. Normalmente, por este canal
-instaurado a raíz de la crisis, por acuerdo FED BCE, para canalizar fondos en $ a bancos europeos y viceversa- se mueven cantidades de 50 mm de $. 500 mm ha despertado las alarmas.  Los spreads, o márgenes para comprar $ por euros a corto están muy negativos en contra del euro, como se ve en la imagen de la derecha, arriba (Nomura); no tanto como en 2008,
pero se han salido de lo normal: la oferta de dólares escasea y las necesidades del (o los) banco(s) europeos son apremiantes (no sabemos si es una o varias entidades).






Banks have many avenues through which to obtain short-term funds, and when one or more of these sources begins to run dry, the others become squeezed further. Not all banks can borrow in the USDLIBOR inter-bank market, specifically foreign banks, and with the fiscal situation in Europe stressed, there has been less and less demand for US investors to hold foreign bank commercial paper (CP). In addition, the US debt ceiling debate has sparked a demand from short-term money managers to hold higher levels of cas …. Both of these factors have combined to cause an unintended tightening part II through the FX basis market as demand for dollar funding has increased – most notably [Tuesday]
Basically with non-US issuers unable to sell to the commercial paper market, they’re increasingly having to turn to the currency swap market for funds. And the so-called FX basis paints a very different picture to the one drawn by simply looking at dollar-denominated Libor. The cost for a holder of euros to borrow dollar funds is about USD Libor plus 63 basis points — up 13bps from Monday.
The post-sovereign crisis high was 67bps reached on May 25 last year, according to Morgan Stanley.
Last May, incidentally, was when the Federal Reserve’s dollar liquidity swaps seen during the financial crisis were reinstated. The swaps programme was extended in June for the European Central Bank.
Last week there was no demand for dollar liquidity swaps from the US central bank, but this week?
En wallstreetpit Bruce Krasting  sugiere que la próxima operación de QE de Bernanke debería ser específica para la zona euro.
En un cuadrito muestra lo mal que están recapitalizados los bancos europeos, comparando Societé Generalle, el buque insignia de la banca francesa, con JP Morgan y Fargo Wells. No pasaría nada en tiempos normales, pero
Under normal circumstances my way of looking at things is irrelevant. It only becomes significant when there are problems. Today we have problems.
 here are monstrous gobs of liquidity in the world. But every day that goes by that liquidity is getting more and more risk adverse. Globally there is about $60 Trillion of funded debt of one form or another. That huge amount has to be rolled over constantly. A very substantial portion of this has maturities of less than six months. It is a“faith based” system. The assumption is that there will always be ample liquidity from the holders of cash to roll over everything without a hiccup. At the moment there is not much faith in that system.
On EU banks, Solvency or Liquidity?   Or BOTH?
En otro blog, Howard Davies nos ilustra más en general sobre que los bancos europeos NO han avanzado nada en reforzar sus líneas de defensa:
 What it shows is that banks in the United States have increased their equity from about 5.5% to about 7.5%, and have reduced their reliance on wholesale funding from 30% to 25%. British banks have made less progress with tangible common equity, rising from just under 3% to a little over 4%, but they have significantly reduced their reliance on wholesale funding, from almost 45% in 2008 to less than 35% now.

By contrast, eurozone banks have almost stood still on both indicators. Their capital has risen a little, but remains below that of banks in the United Kingdom (and well below that of US banks), and they continue to depend on the wholesale markets for almost 45% of their total funding.
That is why continuing uncertainty about the integrity of the eurozone, and the value of its members’ sovereign debt, is proving so damaging to its banks. Will it be possible for them to rollover their market funding in these circumstances? Already, the Greeks and the other countries subject to special measures have been shut out of the wholesale markets, and are reliant almost entirely on the European Central Bank. Might that happen to banks elsewhere? 
En suma, signos de tensión y dificultades para mantener la financiación habitual. La mala estructura dificulta la entrada en el mercado mayorista, que es la fuente habitual de todos los días. Sí, liquidez hay, pero ¿dónde? si nadie la quiere sacar al mercado, es como que no la hay.
Sin embargo, un salvamento in extremis de la FEd al BCE no sería nada popular en USA, donde a Bernanke le tienen marcado el territorio la jauría del Tea Party. Dar dinero a "tontos-del-culo-eurosociatas" es lo último en que está soñando Ron Paul o Perry, o uno de esos.
¿Es el Lehman que se teme en Europa desde hace meses?
En FTAlphaville, se publica esta impresionante imagen en 3D, que muestra cómo el extremo más corto del mercado interbancario europeo se ha "congestionado" en las últimas fechas (pinchen para ver mejor).
Si realmente han dificultades en el corto, es responsabilidad del BCE haberlo previsto y evitado, pero el BCE ha hecho de todo menos atender a las fuentes de inestabilidad, las cuales, por otra parte, él mismo ha fomentado con su irresponsal política, disfrazada de prudencia, de subir los tipos para yugular la inflación momentánea que se iba a disolver sóla, como se ha visto en cuanto se ha enfriado la economía mundial.
Un signo más de que la fuente de problemas es el atolladero EURO, que está influyendo más de lo que quieren reconocer los economistas americanos (que tienen la manía de creerse autosuficientes) en su propio país.
Según  Bruce Krasting en: Eu-banks-solvency-or-liquidity-or-both La semana que viene va a ser (de nuevo) decisiva. Nos puede estallar un Lehman bajo nuestros pies.

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