Credit Suisse

Spanish regional debt currently stands at 13% of GDP and has surged from EUR60bn in 2006 to over EUR140bn currently. As Credit Suisse points out, the top four regions account for the majority of GDP, two-thirds of regional debt, and, with the exception of Madrid, substantially missed their deficit targets. What is more worrisome is the heavily front-loaded nature of the maturing debt with substantial refinancing needs in the next 2 years and this regional debt is split between bonds and loans - with many of the latter from Spanish banks - yet another illustration of the interconnected contagion that is building more rapidly. The growing crisis in refinancing (liquidity and costs) for regional debt developed the idea of Ponzibonos 'Hispabonos' - debt issued by regions but guaranteed by the central government. The conditionality of these guarantees with regard to deficit targets wil be critical but once they are issued, the risk is that the regions are unable to get their finances under control, the Spanish debtload increases, and there is no longer the flexibility for a regional debt restructuring, should one be necessary.

All you need to read and more.

Household net worth has recovered (nominally) around $8.0tn of the $16.4tn lost during the crisis but there has been a regime-shift in terms of the volatility of household net worth since the late 90s. As Credit Suisse notes, this hugely increased and skewed volatility has fueled heightened risk aversion among consumers and retail investors. Just as non-financial corporations are hoarding cash (on the back of their memories of the credit crisis contraction in the money markets), the lesson corporate America will not soon forget is just as resonant with Households as they value liquidity and cash (and safety) much more highly now than ever before.

Two days ago we posted a very damning analysis of why Japan is finally facing the dilemma of either a major Yen devaluation, or, far worse, a long-overdue pop in the Japanese Government Bond (JGB) market. As expected, the conventional wisdom was that there is no danger of a JGB collapse as local households just can't get enough of JGBs following 30 years of straight deflation. As even more expected, conventional wisdom always ends up wrong, and this may be the case now. Bloomberg reports that "Finance Minister Jun Azumi’s efforts to get Japan’s households to increase investment in the nation’s debt are failing as holdings of government bonds fall to a seven-year low." Combing through the Japanese quarterly flow of funds report shows something very disturbing - the last bastion of JGB ownership, Japan's households, have started to shift out of bonds, which are now yielding 0.27% for the retail 5 Year bond, and about 1.00% for the 10 year, and are now putting their money straight into mattresses. "Japanese households owned 3.09 percent of domestic bonds in the final quarter of 2011, a decrease from 3.2 percent in the third quarter and the lowest since 2005, Bank of Japan data released March 23 show." And the worst news for any domestically funded ponzi regime: "Mrs. Watanabe” as many are housewives, have instead increased foreign-currency deposits and cash, according to the BOJ data.  "It’s a case of retail JGBs not having enough yield,” said Naomi Fink, head of Japan strategy at Jefferies Japan Ltd."Households are accumulating cash and using financial investments to diversify into higher yields and JGBs don’t really provide this." ..."Individual investors are holding cash rather than bonds and other financial assets because they are wary of making risky investments, said Hiroaki Muto, a senior economist at Sumitomo Mitsui Asset Management Co. in Tokyo." Needless to say, when even Japanese households have given up, it's game over... for bubbles in both bonds and in "conventional wisdom."

All you need to read and some more.

This would ordinarily qualify for the weekly piece of Friday humor, if only it wasn't too real. Bloomberg reports that everyone's favorite Federal Reserve overseer - JPMorgan Chase - is being sued by a trader who says he accepted a contract from the investment bank because a typographical error made him believe he would be paid 10 times what was actually offered. "Kai Herbert, a Switzerland-based currency trader, is suing JPMorgan for about 580,000 pounds ($920,000), his lawyers said at a trial in London this week. The original contract said Herbert’s annual pay would be 24 million rand ($3.1 million). JPMorgan blamed the mistake on a typographical error and said the figure should have been 2.4 million rand, according to court documents." Ok, so the guy is an idiot and somehow never understood what he was getting paid until after he looked at the contract. What people really want to know is if he pulled an Alex Hope and spent more than his entire post-typo  paycheck on a bottle of champagne at Zurich's douchiest night club. In other news, bankers everywhere are trying to track down their employment contracts to see if they are "owed" far more than they are getting due to confusion between decimal and '000s commas.

For those curious why it is that the TVIX experienced a 50% plunge earlier today, as described here, perhaps the question should be directed to the SEC who may be better suited to answer just who, when and why had advance knowledge of Credit Suisse's announcement, after the close, that it would "reopen issuance of the TVIX." And since this is a rhetorical question, perhaps a better one is why does one participate in a market in which the fine print is always ignored, and is always used against the retail investor. Not that there is anything wrong with that of course - after all caveat emptor. Especially when none other than one of Ben Bernanke's favorite scholars on shadow banking (i.e., forced complexity) Gary Gorton said the following: "Liquidity requires symmetric information, which is easiest to achieve when everyone is ignorant. This determines the design of many securities..." Alas, when it comes to novel instruments such as levered ETFs that work as a closed end mutual fund hybrid, except when they don't, the only one ignorant is you, dear retail investor. Cost to your P&L: 50% in one day. Finally if for some inconceivable reason that doesn't work, just call the Credit Suisse ETN desk at 212 538 7333.

UPDATE: TVIX has now perfectly recoupled with its underlying index (TVIXIV) after a week of HTB dislocation.

With the double-levered long Vol ETF TVIX down 30% in the face of a falling equity market and rising VIX, reality appears to have been suspended. The crushing divide seems driven by the fact that Credit Suisse halted share creation forcing the ETF to behave more like a closed-end fund and with its massive premium to NAV (thanks to extreme hard-to-borrow-ness), this compression makes some 'technical' sense. While the Vol ETFs are designed to track VIX futures not spot, we remain skeptical of these instruments (or the options on them in their wonderfully compound manner) and although CS has said this cessation of share creation is temporary, it definitely brings up significant operational risks for anyone considering trading these vol plays. The TVIX premium to NAV was huge at over 80% as it became hard-to-borrow and with today's action that premium is cut in half (and we assume NAV will rise given the pop in risk).

When it comes to rescuing an insolvent country, continent, or entire financial system, at the end of the day it is a simple question of maths: is "doing it" cheaper than the alternative. Recall that the IIF was heaping fire and brimstone on bondholders and threatening the world with $1+ trillion in losses if bondholders did not comply. That nobody has any clue just what said costs, and opportunity costs, are, does not matter: the status quo must be preserved at all costs. And the status quo is one of avoiding private losses at the expense of taxpayer capital. Enter Credit Suisse with its back of the envelope analysis of the cost of not bailing out Europe's insolvent PIIGS, and the (taxpayer) cost to "save" them.

Deals from last week tell me that we are are again in a credit bubble.

As recent entrants in the gold market watched paralyzed in fear as gold tumbled by over $100 on the last FOMC day, on the idiotic notion that Ben Bernanke will no longer ease (oh we will, only after Iran is glassified, and not before Obama is confident he has the election down pat), resulting in pervasive sell stop orders getting hit, others were buying. Which others? The same ones whose only response to a downtick in the market is to proceed with more CTRL+P: the central banks. FT reports that the recent drop in gold has triggered large purchases of bullion by central banks in recent weeks. "The buying activity highlights the trend among central banks in emerging economies to buy gold, even as some western investors are losing patience with the metal. Gold prices have dropped 13.8 per cent from a nominal record high of $1,920 a troy ounce reached in September, and on Friday were trading at $1,655.60." Well, as we said a few days ago, "In conclusion we wish to say - thank you Chairman for the firesale in physical precious metals. We, and certainly China, thank you from the bottom of our hearts." Once again, we were more or less correct. And since past is prologue, we now expect any day to see a headline from the PBOC informing the world that the bank has quietly added a few hundred tons of the yellow metal since the last such public announcement in 2009: a catalyst which will quickly send it over recent record highs.

The Fed is not a “dealer” giving “hits” of monetary morphine to an “addict”… the Fed has permitted cancerous beliefs to spread throughout the financial system. And the end result is going to be the same as that of a patient who ignores cancer and simply acts as though everything is fine. That patient is now past the point of no return. There can be no return to health. Instead the system will eventually collapse and then be replaced by a new one.

So Greece has been saved – is that right? Well according to ISDA (the International Swaps and Derivatives Association) a “Restructuring Credit Event has occurred with respect to the Hellenic Republic” which in the vernacular means the Greeks are bust; tell us something we don’t know! The importance of this statement is that credit default swaps (CDS) on Greek debt are now triggered and holders will have their losses made good. There were any number of scurrilous rumours that ISDA would not declare a credit event to preclude their illustrious members from paying out, but when the net downside of $3 billion needs to be shared out amongst the likes of Barclays, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, UBS, BNP Paribas and Societe Generale, then a quick whip round in the bar after close of business and the jobs a good’un.

All you need to read.

The biggest sovereign debt restructuring in history is now, well, history. The headlines are finally come in:

• GREECE ISSUES STATEMENT ON DEBT SWAP
• GREECE COMPLETES DEBT SWAP
• GREECE SAYS EU172 BLN OF BONDS TENDERED IN SWAP
• GREECE GETS TENDERS, CONSENTS FROM HOLDERS OF 85.8%
• GREECE SAYS 69% OF NON-GREEK LAW BONDHOLDERS PARTICIPATED

We learn that €152 of the €177 billion in Greek law bonds have tendered, which is 85.8%. This means that €25 billion in Greek law bonds have not - these are the hedge funds that could not be Steven Rattnered into participating, and will now sue Greece for par recoveries.This is also the number that ISDA will look at today to determine if, in conjunction with the CAC, means a credit event has occurred. And yes, the CACs are coming, as is the Credit Event finding:

• GREECE SAYS WILL AMEND TERMS OF GREEK LAW BONDS FOR ALL HOLDERS