Archive - Jun 2012

"When it becomes serious, you have to lie", Jean-Claude Juncker

Mariano Rajoy from May 28, or 12 days ago: "No va a haber ningún rescate de la banca española." Or, more conveniently for the America-based readers: "There will be no rescue of Spanish banks." We have finally found the official Jean-Claude Juncker (and of course Tim Geithner) replacement.

On Thursday, it was all Merkel's fault when #StopMerkel took Spain by storm. Well, whatever it was that Merkel was supposed to stop doing now no longer seems to matter in the aftermath of the unprecedented Spanish bailout. And as a result the Spanish public's fury has shifted 180 degrees, and instead of blaming Germany, it now is accusing its own leaders of cowardice. Presenting #RajoyCobarde (or Coward Rajoy).

After two years of denials, we finally have the right answer: Spain IS Greece. Only much bigger (it is also the US, although while the US TARP was $700 billion or 5% of then GDP, the just announced Spanish tarp is 10% of Spanish GDP, so technically Spain is 2x the US). So now that the European bailout has moved from Greece, Ireland and Portugal on to the big one, Spain, here are the key outstanding questions.

The Eurogroup supports the efforts of the Spanish authorities to resolutely address the restructuring of its financial sector and it welcomes their intention to seek financial assistance from euro area Member States to this effect. The Eurogroup has been informed that the Spanish authorities will present a formal request shortly and is willing to respond favourably to such a request....

Spain's economy minister Luis de Guindos will hold a press conference detailing the terms of the bank bailout shortly. It can be watched live, and without translation, at the link below. In summary, the Spanish bank bailout is apparently a loan targeting the FROB, and at rates better than the market. In other words, the cramdown of Spanish bondholders has officially begun.

FTW...

For those curious what the latest and greatest estimate of the Spanish bank bailout, which at last count was €100 billion and growing fast, would look like in US terms, here is a rough and dirty comparison of the scale we are taking about here...

In Bankia’s case all of this culminated in the bank receiving a €19 billion Euro bailout, the largest in Spain’s history. And for certain this amount of money will be increased dramatically: Bankia’s loan book is roughly €200 billion in size (1/5^th the size of Spain’s GDP) and I can assure you a major chunk of this is total and complete garbage. That’s not the problem however. The REAL problem is that Spain itself is broke and doesn’t have the money to prop this bank up…

The wind picked up across the plains, the windmill began to turn and “The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha” rode out once more to do battle. The ever faithful Sancho Panza, not wishing to be left behind, was in attendance and the windmills were now the banks and the regional debt of the country. You see, the Troubadour, Mariano Rajoy, does not wish the country to take any responsibility. It is to be the banks, not to injure the pride of the nation, that are the culprits and the banks, run by the empanada consortium, who are to be blamed. The IMF has released a statement claiming the banks need about $46bn which is the typical posture of the IMF these days; underestimating liabilities and then finding that more money is needed later; which they already knew of course. “Under estimate the liabilities and over estimate the assets” is the mantra sung at the IMF these days at the morning prayers as their credibility is as certain as the stature of the giants fought by Don Quixote. The extra money, suggested in the IMF report to ring wall the banks, is another gust of wind as it is directed to the regional debts of course which no one wants to mention as the faceless Men in Black ride into Madrid to claim their latest victim. The beating of chests can be heard in Andalusia as there is no ESM; it does not yet exist regardless of the panderings of the savants that ride the airwaves. Germany has not even voted on it yet so that that ballyhoo that the ESM is the “Saving Grace” is the stuff and fluff from which nonsense is composed.

“Humiliation,” the French media called Hollande’s defeat.

The European financial ministers' meeting started at 4:00 pm CET. What are they discussing? According to the WSJ, nothing short of "a commitment to provide as much as €100 billion ($125 billion) in support for Spain's ailing banking sector." At least we now know that that Spanish bank trot so widely avoided by the mainstream media was just a little more kinetically-charged than previously expected, because for Spain to actually demand the money, even if implicitly, it means it has a capital shortfall, which can only arise from an outflow of liquidity, as mere real estate impairments do not have any impact on liquidity. So far so good. There is only one problem: Spain has yet to formally request the money! According to newspaper ABC, "Spain wants to convince European partners that IMF shouldn’t participate in aid for country’s banks because of potential stigma. Aim of talks taking place today is to agree legal framework and conditions for a potential rescue, newspaper says." Potential rescue you see: not an actual one. Just because, as we explained patiently to the 5 year old algos out there, Spain will have none of this "conditionality" that would be imposed on it by Germany, and the IMF, should it actually be formally a bail out target. Which of course would also have the unpleasant side effect of pushing its spreads tighter for a few hours, then blowing them out parabolically once carbon-based investors out there realize what has just happened. As for the ultimate question: just where will €1 of money come from in this broke continent, let alone €100 billion... why, better not to bother with details.

Spain is holding out for a better bailout deal. Spanish banks need an estimated  €40 billion but will likely need much more than that.  (see definition of ‘recipriversexcluson’) The ECB wants to lend the money to Spain so that it can then bailout it’s own banks but Spain wants the ECB to lend the money directly to the Spanish banks, in this way the ‘loan’ is not a Spanish sovereign liability but a liability of the banks themselves. The ECB, correctly, perceive that those Spanish banks don’t have an assured future even with a bailout, whereas, the country of Spain is unlikely to disappear from the map of Europe anytime soon, and they have a better chance of getting their money bank from Spain than if they bailed out the banks directly. This issue is at the heart of the negotiations which have taken place over the last week and look set to be concuded by teleconference this afternoon. I’ve written above that it’s the ECB negotiating with Spain but in reality it’s Germany and some other Northern Eurozone countries who are driving the ECB position.

All this wrangling appears rather interesting if you happen to be a Greek trying to decide who to vote for in the upcoming Greek election.

A D.C. report card.

The First Amendment Foundation has moved to intervene in the case of HSBC Bank USA v. Abby Lopez for the limited purpose of opposing closure of judicial records and proceedings.