Archive - Mar 24, 2013 - Story

The Cyprus 2013, like any other event, can be thought in political and economic terms. Politically, I can see two dimensions. The first dimension belongs to the geopolitical history of the region, with the addition of the recently discovered natural gas reserves - should Russia eventually obtain a bailout of Cyprus (as we write, this does not seem likely) against a pledge on the natural gas reserves or a naval base, a new balance of power will have been drafted in the region, with Israel as the biggest loser. The second political dimension relates exactly to Kreditanstalt and the imposition of direct political conditions upon which the 'bailout' is given. Economically, Cyprus 2013 is worse than the KreditAnstalt and Argentina 2001 crises because it has an element of confiscation and two broken promises that were absent in the latter. If you look at the case of Argentina 2001, you will realize that it was a pretty clean bet - earn 20% p.a. vs. the probability of losing 2/3rds of capital. If you thought that the probability of default of the Argentine government was beyond four years, you would play the bet with a chance of winning it. What are depositors of Euros faced with today? Anything but a clean bet! They don’t know what the expected loss on their capital will be, because it will be decided over a weekend by politicians who don’t even represent them. In light of all this, I can only conclude that anyone still having an unsecured deposit in a Euro zone bank should get his/her head examined!

What does it take for the Spanish "first amendment" journalistic override to kick in? Apparently, in the case of local media leader El Pais, putting up the following in print: "Merkel, como Hitler, ha declarado la guerra al resto del continente, ahora para garantizarse su espacio vital económico." For the Spanish-challeneged this translates as follows: "Merkel, like Hitler, has declared war on the rest of the continent now to secure their economic living space." Ah yes, the touchy verboten topic of German "Lebensraum" - its invocation, and ostensibly the unflattering Merkel comparison (seen so often in Greece) were enough to get the article by Juan Torres López in the Andalusia version of El Pais titled simply enough "Alemania contra Europa" taken down.

With its banks indefinitely closed, and capital controls already in place making it virtually impossible any material cash will leave the local bank branches or certainly the island (especially in direction Moscow), gas stations about to shut down due to lack of cash, next it was the turn of the ATMs. Sure enough, as CNBC's Michelle Caruso-Cabrera reports on the ground from Nicosia, moments ago the nation's second largest, and second most insolvent bank, Laiki Bank, announced that withdrawals are now limited to €100. The picture below from MCC shows as an employee takes down old sign that said previous €260 limit. At this pace, in lieu of some grand bargain, we expect it is only hours before the final limit is imposed: withdrawals now limited to €0.

A few moments ago, no bailout proposal in hand, no parliamentary discussion having taken place, and certainly no votes having been cast, the Eurogroup sat down with Cyprus' president Anastasiades, in order to preserve the "democratic" theatrical facade of European decisionmaking. Here, to keep up appearances that  Cyprus' opinion is even remotely relevant, Europea's unelected leaders will do what they does best - make a closed door decision affecting the lives of millions of people, which ultimately have one purpose: to preserve the crumbling edifice of the Eurozone project (so carefully preserved in the past few months with superglue, scotch tape and empty promises) and of course the jobs and livelihoods of a few unelected EUrocrats. A preview of this elaborate song and dance ritual is below from Kathimerini. It will be next followed by an even more elaborate song and dance from the Eurozone finance ministers, which will then finally go back to Cyprus, where a decision will likely have to be reached ahead of the Asian FX market open, or all that late Friday "Cyprus is saved" enthusiasm will evaporate in a GETCO millisecond.