European bank stocks are officially in bear market territory, now down over 22% from their highs with today's drop closing the index at seven month lows. Financial stocks have played catch down to credit's early warning weakness but still have more room to run. The correlation between financials and sovereigns has been notably broken down in the last few weeks - as it seems an external funding source has saved European sovereign debt (perhaps one that just wants to get away from its vicious cycle-like devaluation and diversify into anything non-JPY-denominated). On the day, Portugal blew wider at the open (+22bps) only to be magnificently bid back to unchanged by the invisible hand. Spain and Italy drifted slightly tighter on the day. Stocks were similarly low range today. Swiss 2Y closed at 3-month lows as EURUSD retraced back from its highs to close practically unchanged from Friday at 1.3000.
Bank stocks are -22% from their highs in Late January. Notice the stability in European sovereign risk (the blue line is a GDP-weighted average of nation spreads)... and its ignorance of the collapse in recent weeks...
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it seems the 'promise' still holds... and the equity-credit arb has almost converged...
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Portugal was sold and bid right back out of the gate; European stocks surged at the open but leaked lower all day...
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Charts: Bloomberg