Greece

The Greek bankruptcy, pardon, sovereign liability management exercise, pardon reprofiling, is once again front and center in the news this morning, after Moody's had some words of caution about a broad spillover effect in Europe should Greece file. From Reuters: "A Greek debt default would hurt other peripheral euro zone states and could push Portugal and Ireland into junk territory, Moody's said on Tuesday, warning it would classify most forms of restructuring as a default.  "A Greek default would be highly destabilising and would have implications for the creditworthiness of issuers across Europe," Moody's Investors Service's chief credit officer in the region, Alastair Wilson, told Reuters in a telephone interview. "This would result in more highly polarised credit worthiness and ratings among euro zone sovereigns, with the stronger countries retaining very high ratings and the weaker countries struggling to remain in investment grade." And yet a Greek bankruptcy seems increasingly more inevitable after a brand new fissure has now appeared in the government, after the chief opposition, New Democracy, party leader Antonis Samaras said he would oppose the latest round of austerity which, nonetheless, must pass in order for Greece to not run out of funds in 2 months, as we previously reported, and finally set off the dominoes. While the political bickering will likely hit fever pitch, and result in new and increasingly more violent protests in Athens, it is likely that austerity will pass as western banks are licking their chops at acquiring Greek "privatized" assets, at least when it comes to infrastructure and real estate, banks not so much, at below cost prices.

Answer: Much more than you think...

It is now as if Europe is urging Greece to fail. The EU's Olli Rehn, better known as lord protector of Ireland (and now Portugal), for once said the sensible thing when he commented on Greek prospects to privatize €50 billion worth of assets: the latest condition for the country to procure additional bailout funding. In word (or two) - not good. This obviously could be a major issue because as we noted yesterday, the country now suddenly only has 2 months of cash left. So if even the very entity that imposed this condition is saying it is a moot point (something we observed yesterday), then why engage in the exercise at all? And how long before Europe (and whoever heads the IMF at that time) decides to pull the plug entirely...

Today's EUR trading session which begins in about 4 hours, may be rather violent. While on one hand we have bond-negative news out of Spain, the biggest news once again comes out of the Swiss journal NZZ, which citing greek newspaper Kahtimerini, discloses that insolvent Greece has less than two months of cash left, or enough to last it until July 18, unless a new installment in the bailout tranche is approved for the country by the now headless IMF, and the "suddenly" insolvent ECB. Insolvent, because as Spiegel will report in its headline article tomorrow, and as we have noted many times before, the bank is suddenly finding itself lending out money collateralized by now virtually D-rated bonds: something not even Trichet will be able to spin off to the increasingly malevolent media. Per Dow Jones: "Skeleton risks amounting to several hundreds of billions of euros are on the balance sheet of the European Central Bank, magazine Der Spiegel writes in a preview of its edition to be published Monday. Those risks arise because banks, above all from Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain, have provided as collateral asset-backed securities that are unfit for central bank loans as their debt rating is low or non-existent, the magazine says." Alas, the European central bank's dirty laundry is being exposed just as a rift between the bank and Germany: its most solvent backer, is starting to develop. Also from Dow Jones: "German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble cautioned in an interview published Sunday that there shouldn't be a conflict with the European Central Bank over a possible restructuring of Greek debt. "If in the end it should come to an extension of bonds, of course, we need the approval of the IMF and above all of the ECB. Under no circumstances should it come to a conflict with the ECB," Schaeuble told Bild am Sonntag. "I advise all of us to use restraint in public debates about this question." Several ECB officials have rejected a restructuring of Greek debt and have warned of possible catastrophic consequences, while European finance ministers are slowly warming up to the possibility of some kind of restructuring as a last resort." Thus the crunch time for Europe's latest kick the can down the road round, once again centered on a bankrupt Greece, may be coming fast, and this time with a rather furious Germany.

When it comes to the topic of Greece, by now everyone is sick of prevaricating European politicians who even they admit are lying openly to the media, and tired of conflicted investment banks trying to make the situation appear more palatable if only they dress it in some verbally appropriate if totally ridiculous phrase (which just so happens contracts to SLiME). The truth is Greece will fold like a lawn chair: whether it's tomorrow (which would be smartest for everyone involved) or in 1 years, when the bailout money runs out, is irrelevant. The question then is what will happen after the threshold of nevernever land is finally breached, and Kickthecandowntheroad world once again reverts to the ugly confines of reality. Luckily, the Telegraph's Andrew Lilico presents what is arguably the most realistic list of the consequences of crossing the senior bondholder Styx compiled to date.

Another oops:

FITCH DOWNGRADES GREECE TO 'B+'; RATING WATCH NEGATIVE

And here comes the first domino: according to Swiss journal NZZ, the Greek bailout is about to take a turn for the worse. "Norway will first stop all further financial aid payments to the highly indebted Greece. The reason is that Greece does not fulfill its obligations descendants, the Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Store said on Thursday before the Parliament." And with Norway which is a member of the European Economic Area, and actually one of the few solvent and non-basket case European countries saying let the chips fall where they may, it is just the first. Look for every other country currently on the sidelines vis-a-vis Greece (and just as insolvent) to follow suit as the European experiment falls apart.

I am now of the opinion that the US will have to go back to fighting deflation soon and that Q/E (probably in a different form) will be needed. Massive inflationary impacts look to be delayed (for now): Whilst I am happy to accept that Bernanke may have delayed or stopped a deep depression for now and that he has made a lot of Wall St. guys very rich, the whole idea of the Q/E programme was supposed to be, if we are to believe him, to create growth and set the economy back on a sustainable growth path, reduce unemployment and cure the housing problem by getting banks to lend and the consumer spending. Mate, you failed! Unemployment is still at 9% (and a lot more if you look at the real stats), the participation rate is falling and the amount on food stamps is over 4mln! Housing is spiralling lower again as prices continue to fall and banks, whilst having their balance sheets ballooned by free money still sit on hidden toxic waste from the sub-prime issue and refuse to lend at competitive rates.

Last week I used the analogy of a shotgun wedding to describe how the bailout was being forced upon the Greek people. Maybe, after the events of this weekend, I wasn’t being harsh enough in my choice of analogy. As I continue to digest the news and various opinions, I still reach the same conclusion. Default or restructuring is the most logical outcome and should occur sooner than later. I believe that the image of the IMF has been tainted and it will make it more difficult for the Greek people to accept a deal from them, unless the terms are incredibly favorable. I’ve also listed several of the arguments most commonly used to encourage Greece to delay restructuring, and point out the flaws in each of them.

The most memorable scene from the movie Boiler Room is when the character of Ben Afleck tells the room full of wannabe brokers to "Act As If" (and in the tangent regarding male genitalia, the head of the IMF would have been wise to take the advice instead of opening his fly and disproving it). Who would have thought that a few short years later, it would be none other than insolvent countries taking this advice: specifically, America acting as if it wasn't insolvent, and Greece acting as if it was beyond saving. The irony, as William Buckler observes in his latest edition of the Privateer, is that while US debt continues to trade (if no longer be accepted) as the "Rock of Gibraltar" and Greek paper is trading with a certainty of bankruptcy, it is Greece that has taken proactive steps in taxing and spending policy, while the US has merely retrenched its profligate ways, and while much political theater takes place, nothing ever really changes. For some of the more perverse consequences of this bizarro world inversion, read below.

Most have played the childhood game of Snakes and Ladders (albeit in less volatile, margin hike-free, and sovereign-solvent times). Few, however, have appreciated just how applicable this game is to a rapidly deteriorating, game theoretical balance currently sustained in Europe at the expense of hundreds of millions of middle-class taxpayers. Here is JP Morgan's Michael Cembalest explaining how one can simplify all the highly complicated political and financial machinations vis-a-vis Greece can be reduced to a simple board game. And, speaking of snakes, or in this case anacondas, perhaps just as notable is the envisaged relationship between Greece, as the pray, and Europe, as a constrictor snake, gradually engulfing the small, and recently quite militant country. For those familiar with the debtors prisons of the middle ages, it appears that the van Rompuy institution has finally managed to recreate one under a regime of globalist "democracy."

On the one year anniversary of its first bailout, things in Europe's basket case are getting much worse once again. Even as senior EU and IMF inspectors arrived in Athens on Wednesday to press Greece to shore up its finances, workers walked off the job to protest against austerity-induced recession, culminating in a 24 hour strike which sees both airports and journalists taking a break from hard work. Oddly ironic this: the "bankers" arrive to make austerity even more aggressive (so there is more value left over to senior bondholders when the bankruptcy commences), just as the country experiences a deja vu moment of strikers on one side and teargas lobbing policemen on the other. Those who wish to follow the protests live, which so far the mainstream media has refused to show, can do so here.

Goldman on Greece: "We do not see a ‘haircut’ as a viable solution, particularly at this juncture, for a number of reasons: 1. The risk of potential financial ramifications (‘domino effects’) seem too large; 2. the level of debt that is sustainable will be guesswork until growth has stabilized and a primary surplus achieved; 3. the incentives for pursuing adjustment (in Greece and elsewhere) may wane if the debt stock is aggressively reduced; 4. finally, private-sector funding is unlikely to flow back at sustainable levels any earlier than under the current approach of conditional financial support....We still do not expect to see sovereign liability management exercises in Ireland and Portugal. Bonds in these two sovereigns will, however, likely remain subject to higher volatility, reflecting decisions taken on Greece in coming weeks, in addition to local events (e.g., the Portuguese elections, approval of the support package, etc.)."

This morning the news wires are filled with the now usual contradictory, and full of lies propaganda about a Greece imminent [restructuring|golden age]. Since very likely all are wrong, we will focus on what appear to be the most credible ones: we will start with the Dow Jones story which has been official refuted by Greece, thus giving its extra validity. As Reuters reports: "News agency Dow Jones, citing a senior Greek government official, reported that Athens expects to receive a new aid package totalling nearly 60 billion euros . Greece denied it was discussing a new package..."It's certainly positive for peripheral sentiment and is assisting in the unwinding of some yesterday's safe-haven flows into Bunds," said Rabobank rate strategist Richard McGuire. Senior euro zone policymakers acknowledged on Monday that Athens will need a second bailout package soon to avert a disorderly overhaul of its debt obligations but rating agencies said more drastic measures may be necessary." Of course, this news comes out strategically and just in time for Greece to auction off a fresh 26-week T-Bill for €1.625 BN at a new record yield of 4.88% (compared to 4.80%) before an an even lower bid to cover of 3.58 vs. 3.81 previously. One can only imagine what a flop the auction would have been without the latest rumor (and even China appears to have given up on Greece: "Foreign take up in Greek 6-month T-Bill sale 34.2% vs. Prev. 41%, according to debt agency chief.") Bottom line as some trader summarized it: "It's very difficult to trade as there are so many conflicting headlines about a restructuring being the only way forward or not. Something will have to give." Exactly - here is a hint: a restructuring, in the city square, with a Molotov Cocktail... and damn soon.