The Economist

Indeed, one has to wonder… just how does a €100 billion bailout solve Spain’s banking woes when its Prime Minister was suggesting the real damage is more to the tune of €500 billion in a text message to his Finance Minister??? Indeed, if Rajoy’s text is even remotely truthful, then we can assume that Spain’s real capitalization needs are multiples of the €100 billion bailout… something that the EU media is picking up on already. As one example, JP Morgan believes that when all is said and done Spanish banks could be looking at €350 BILLION in capital needs.

For your definitive documented "X is not Y" atlasing needs.

As Many Have Predicted for Years

All you need to read.

... Ten days later the discovery process is complete: Bankia is now the biggest bank failure in Spain's history.

European stock futures saw a jump higher at the cash equity open as the Eurostoxx broke through yesterday’s high of 2160. Comments from the Italian PM from late yesterday, who said that the majority of ministers are in favour of Euro bonds was noted but the move was largely technically driven with stops tripped on the ascent. In reaction to this the European bond yield spreads in the 10yr part of the curve tightened aggressively with OAT’s outperforming once again edging back toward the psychological 100bps level. Meanwhile in the FX market the USD weakened in early trade on the renewed risk appetite which bolstered the gains in EUR/USD alongside touted option defence by a Swiss name at the 1.2500 level. Commodity linked currencies such as the AUD was the main benefactor of a moderate move higher in crude futures and precious metals but has been capped so far by offers at 0.9800. Into the North American open prices have pared, with European equities in the cash and futures both slipping into the red, excepting the DAX. A distinctly light calendar from the US with only the May final Michigan report due, coupled with an early closure in the Treasury pit today, ahead of the Memorial day holiday, means that volumes will likely decline into the latter stages of the US session today.

All you need to read.

The standard Keynesian narrative that "Households and countries are not spending because they can’t borrow the funds to do so, and the best way to revive growth, the argument goes, is to find ways to get the money flowing again." is not working. In fact, former IMF Director Raghuram Rajan points out, today’s economic troubles are not simply the result of inadequate demand but the result, equally, of a distorted supply side as technology and foreign competition means that "advanced economies were losing their ability to grow by making useful things." Detailing his view of the mistakes of the Keynesian dream, Rajan notes "The growth that these countries engineered, with its dependence on borrowing, proved unsustainable.", and critically his conclusion that the industrial countries have a choice. They can act as if all is well except that their consumers are in a funk and so what John Maynard Keynes called “animal spirits” must be revived through stimulus measures. Or they can treat the crisis as a wake-up call and move to fix all that has been papered over in the last few decades and thus put themselves in a better position to take advantage of coming opportunities.

Two years after bringing us the beginning of the end in Acropolis Now, the Economist has closed the loop with the end of the end courtesy of "The Greek Run."

In the 60 years since Chinese Nationalists retreated to Taiwan, the tiny island country has transformed itself quite differently from the mainland China.

When we presented the latest chart of the Bundesbank's record TARGET2 imbalance last night we had one simple message: we hope Germany is prepared for the rout its central bank will soon experience once the Eurozone's members start dropping like flies. Today it appears that Germany has decided to go with the flow, and in what Spiegel classifies as a "turning point in monetary policy" notes that Germany, in an abrupt shift to its Weimar-impacted history, is getting ready to embrace inflation. What this likely means is that the ECB is about to set off on its most aggressive monetization experiment ever, which also explains why all of Europe is trading diggy limit up this morning: it is not on the latest batch of horrible news - it is on the return of speculation that the ECB is, with the Bundesbank's blessing, baaaack.

Fraud ... What Fraud?

In 2006, Michael Pettis (one of the best known on-the-ground academic-and-practitioner experts on China) started making a number of predictions based on what he thought was the necessary and logical development of China’s growth model. Some of these predictions seemed fairly outlandish, especially to China analysts – Chinese and foreign – who had very little knowledge of economic history or other developing countries, but many of them so far have turned out quite well. As more and more analysts are beginning to understand the constraints of the Chinese growth model he thought it might be useful to list some of these predictions to get a sense of what might be still to come. Hold on to your hard-landing hats.

While it might have slipped your notice, today was a holiday in most of the world as it celebrates May-Day. In Europe, The Economist notes, this day typically 'belongs' to 'international workers' of the world, and has been associated with left-wing anti-government protest. This year even more so as extreme political parties are on the rise and austerity seems to have no end in sight - but most of all because of the broad-based high-levels of unemployment. Outside of Greece (and perhaps the UK), violent confrontations have so far been rare in the wake of the financial crisis but tensions are mounting (notably in Spain) and as the following graphic shows - with Spain now the 12th nation in Europe to fall into recession - the dramatically bad changes in unemployment and GDP since the crisis began (especially among the youth) suggest more angst is to come as the political compact is pushed to its limits.

In perhaps the most courageous (and now must-read) speech ever given inside the New York Fed's shallowed hallowed walls, Economic Policy Journal's Robert Wenzel delivered the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth to the monetary priesthood. Gracious from the start, Wenzel takes the Keynesian clap-trappers to task on almost every nonsensical and oblivious decision they have made in recent years. "My views, I suspect, differ from beginning to end... I stand here confused as to how you see the world so differently than I do. I simply do not understand most of the thinking that goes on here at the Fed and I do not understand how this thinking can go on when in my view it smacks up against reality." And further..."I scratch my head that somehow your conclusions about unemployment are so different than mine and that you call for the printing of money to boost 'demand'. A call, I add, that since the founding of the Federal Reserve has resulted in an increase of the money supply by 12,230%." But his closing was tremendous: "Let’s have one good meal here. Let’s make it a feast. Then I ask you, I plead with you, I beg you all, walk out of here with me, never to come back. It’s the moral and ethical thing to do. Nothing good goes on in this place. Let’s lock the doors and leave the building to the spiders, moths and four-legged rats."