10Y Italian bonds (BTPs) ended the day at their second-widest closing spread to Bunds ever (at 533bps). Only November 9th saw a wider closing print and of course we saw margin hikes at LCH CC&G. 10Y yields are at 7.16%, their highest since just after Thanksgiving but we do note that 2Y yields have stabilized at around 5.00% yields (having peaked near 8% during thin Thanksgiving trading). It seems apparent that perhaps traders front-running LTRO's impact have compressed the 2s10s term structure but much clearer to us is Mr. Market's obvious desire for more money-printing now as BTPs are pushed to unsustainable levels once again - and the banking-to-sovereign vicious circle transmission of insolvency cranks up.
BTPs underperformed today as most European sovereigns were leaking wider into the close...
leaving BTPs almost as bad as they have ever been in 10Y spreads (upper pane) and yields (middle pane).
All of this in the context of a consistently increasing SMP by the ECB in the last three weeks...
Charts: Bloomberg


