CDS

We are still waiting to see the final form of the "Grand Plan" and what novel ways the EFSF guarantees will be applied to save the day. At the risk of sounding incredibly stupid, I have this feeling that Europe didn't actually work on any details until this past week, and Germany is suddenly realizing how bad the details are for them. Is it possible that some politicians got so caught in the moment of "saving Europe" and "fighting the speculators" that they kept promising more and more, without thinking whether they could or should deliver? You would like to think they didn't, but since none of the politicians are detail oriented, most of their contacts at investment banks are high level, former bankers, rather than traders, it is quite possible they didn't realize what they had agreed to. If some new EFSF is created, all of the future bargaining power in Europe will be shifted from France and Germany to PIIS. (it is a shame Ireland wasn't named Shamrock, it would make the acronym so much better).

If there is one word you should get used to today, it is "bloodbath"

A week ago, after we had already correctly predicted the unwind of the Dexia long CDS trade on the way up in advance of the bank's nationalization announcement, we suggested a Belgium-Dexia compression trade, now that the bank is the ward of not only Belgium but France. Quite obviously, the idea is that Dexia may well trade inside of Belgium once Belgium itself is downgraded by not only Moody's but also Fitch and S&P (look at today's blow out in Belgium CDS for an indication) imminently, while Dexia still has the implicit backing of AAA-rated (for now France). Net result: 110 bps in one week, from 452 bps last Friday to 343 bps today. We expect a pick of at least another 150 bps before unwind considerations.

Don't tell the stock and EUR momo squeeze-based melt up, but even as European funding markets continue to be completely snarled up, default risk has taken a big step wider today. As usual, expect the HFTs which now thoroughly control both equity and FX markets, to be the last to get the memo. Most notable: Belgium CDS have just soared to over 300 bps, a 15 bps move wider on the day (and a welcome boost to anyone still holding on the Dexia-Belgium compression trade), and are about to invert.

The European CDS rollercoaster has troughed. And now it goes back up...

Maybe the moment we should be trying to avoid is the one that allows weak institutions to exist. The weak institutions do not provide loans because they are too afraid of losses since they mainly survive by the good grace (and money) from governments at central banks. That is bad enough, but they crowd out new money. Who is going to go after markets where even a sleepy BAC could briefly wake up and crush you before you ever got started. I have heard of some interesting companies out there trying to provide loans to those who need them, but they can’t get any traction. Too Big To Fail aren’t too sleepy to allow potential competitors to grow. Stocks can rally. Lehman Moment can be said 500 times today. Every politician can worry about the impact of triggering CDS. Every banker can claim the world would end if they are made to pay for their bad decisions. In the end, Iceland and Ireland both improved only AFTER they let banks fail. The US, for all the talk about Lehman, is only doing worse than that since it decided banks couldn’t be allowed to fail.

And Belgium and Austria were doing so well there for a few hours...

Anyone looking at a heatmap of European markets today will see a sea of green punctuated by a very red island in the middle. The culprit: Austrian mega bank Erste, which issued an ad hoc and very unexpected press release, in which it warned that losses in its Hungarian and Romanian books would lead to a 14% hit, or €1.1 billion, to tangible book value, something that in itself is not a surprise to anyone (except the stress test). After all, since early 2010, most have known that due to Swiss Franc-based mortgage exposure, Hungary is next to follow in the PIIGS footsteps, and its collapse has so far been delayed due to lower overall public and private sector leverage. What was, however not only a surprise, but a shock, was that Erste disclosed some major losses on its €5.2 billion CDS portfolio, consisting of "EUR 2.4 billion related to financial institution exposures, and EUR 2.8 billion related sovereign exposures". Why is this a surprise? UK-based financial advisory Autonomous explains: "The fact that Erste had a sovereign CDS portfolio which was not marked-to-market has left many investors scratching their heads. As a reminder the EBA stress test data showed Erste to have zero sovereign CDS exposure within its sovereign mix compared to the €2.8bn it now appears to have ‘fessed up’ to (taking a cumulative €460m hit). They also have €2.4bn exposure to banks via writing of CDS. The bulk is non-PIIGS but banks spreads have moved in the same manner as sovereigns (albeit wider and more volatile)." And there you have it: the bogeyman that everyone has been warning about, yet nobody has seen, CDS written (as in sold) in bulk against other sovereigns and other banks which up until now were only mythical, as they, to quote the EBA (which had Dexia as its safest bank) simply did not exist. Oh, they exist all right, and what they do is create a toxic spiral of accentuating losses whenever the risk situation deteriorates, creating positive feedback loops of ever increasing losses until the next Dexia appears... and then the next... and the next. Expect the market to latch on to this dramatic revelation like a rabid pitbull once the hopium high from today's EURUSD short covering squeeze wears off.

Spot the odd 5 Year CDS out (hints included)

To all those who bought Belgium CDS as per our compression trade suggested earlier today, congratulations. Oh and the part in the Moody's announcement where it says that a main driver of the review is "The uncertainty around the impact on the already pressured balance sheet of the government of additional bank support measures which are likely to be needed" means that anyone harboring even the smallest hope that France will be within 100 parsecs of Dexia when the broke bank is nationalized, may be slightly disappointed.

Today, the CDS market is highly efficient. It is both liquid and ringing with endorsement for Morgan Stanley.  It is clear that the credit analysts, who once again are good predictors of the future, have done their homework and decided that Morgan Stanley is safe. What I find "interesting" is that earlier this week, the CDS market was full of manipulative bears who were attacking an otherwise great company, that CDS was extremely illiquid, that you couldn't rely on the pricing, and that spread widening was forcing additional hedging.  Well, the CDS market is still populated by the same people as it was earlier in the week, it is no more or no less liquid.

The bank that was selling Dexia shares to its clients all the way down (Goldman Cuts Dexia From Buy To Neutral On Imminent Restructuring And Winddown) and which has the uncanny ability to align its own trading desk with an event's "outcome", at the expense of clients of course, has just done it again. As of this morning it is actively selling Margin Stanley calls to whoever is still left as a client. From a just released report: "Buy calls for a likely relief rally on earnings; sell short-dated CDS as fear falls." Now... just who are these clients buying calls from and selling CDS to?

After three days of tightening across the board borne out of nothing but hope about hope, it appears that the ghost of insolvent European governments is back, as reality starts coming back.

What do MS CDS and S&P Futures have in common?  Everything AND Nothing. MS CDS and ES (E-mini S&P Futures) are clearly correlated.  As MS CDS tightens, S&P futures rally, and vice versa.  That is pretty clear.  They are also the two most talked about things all day long lately.  That is where the differences become blatantly obvious. I have to admit that I am sick of listening to talk about MS CDS when so much of the conversation addresses issues like volumes, liquidity, transparency, depth, counterparty risk, etc., when all of those issues could be, and should have been, addressed by regulators.  The focus should be on whether or not there is value in MS credit at these prices/spreads not whether the prices/spreads are merely an illusion.  I suspect that if we had all the same transparency that exists for stocks, MS CDS and bond spreads would be exactly the same as they are now, but at least we could be focused on the real problems and issues at MS.

Ladies, this is getting scary. Someone is betting on the endgame for the house of Mack. We, for one, can't wait for this week's H.4.1 release to find out if not who, then how much was borrowed at the Fed's discount window...