Talking-heads and commission-takers have momentum-chased clients' hard-earned money into Europe's 'what works now' markets - on the basis of what has now proved to be entirely fallacious macro- and micro-fundamental improvement (as we noted here [3] and here [4]). But, while "whatever it takes" has smashed bond spreads lower and has blown stock prices higher; most critically, the 'confidence' has seen the EUR rise almost 15% against the USD from its July 2012 "whatever It Takes" lows. The effect of this EUR strength is to collapse earnings growth expectations as European competitiveness is crushed (core or periphery). Of course, bulls can rest assured, as the following chart shows, 2014 is expected to hockey-stock back to record EPS growth (just like 2013 was supposed to?).
[5]
So it would seem, "whetever it takes" now means - jawbone the EUR down whenever we can... (and we wonder what that will do to US earnings as the USD is ramped)...
Source: UBS