Portugal

Goldman's just released look at what the end of QE2 would mean should certainly be taken with a grain of salt: after all lately (and in general), the firm's sellside recommendations traditionally are a gateway for its own prop traders to take the other side of what its clients are doing (observe recent performance in WTI). That said, probably the most insightful piece of data is that we now know what the upcoming Greece bankruptcy will be called in polite circles: wait for it - a "liability management exercise." As for the overall impact on rates, Goldman is not surprisingly bearish on rates, and sees the bulk of the upcoming weakness as focused on the 5 Year point. Franceso Garzarelli summarizes his view as follows: "together with our forecast of above-trend growth in coming quarters
and the idea that the compression of bond premium will decay as the
Fed’s balance sheet (organically or voluntarily) shrinks, we think that
short positions in 5-yr Treasuries remain attractive." In other words, Goldman is expecting some flattening in the short end. Does that mean a steepening is inevitable. As for the broader perspective on the curve, Goldman says: "assuming the Fed’s bond holdings passively run off as securities mature, the bond premium should gradually rise. And our macro forecasts are consistent with higher real rates in coming quarters." In other words, another extremely non-committal report from a firm that is rapidly losing its Master of the Universe status. Key highlights below.

We are living in a weak-dollar fantasy and partying like it's Germany in early 1921 as the Gold Bug Speculators celebrate their wise investments as gold crosses 1,500 an ounce - unfortunately, the value of every other Mark-denominated asset was down 50% by the end of the year.

• Obama Fights Back Against S&P Move (FT)
• China Speeds Yuan Push (WSJ)
• BOE Voted 6-3 to Hold Rate as Majority Noted ‘Downside.’ (Bloomberg)
• Apple to ship new iPhone in September (Reuters)
• Singapore Aims To Be Renminbi Hub (FT)
• GM Defying China Slowdown May Reclaim Sales Lead from Toyota (Bloomberg)... or not
• Cameron Dismisses Idea of Brown at IMF (FT)
• Banks Lag S&P as Slower Loan Growth Outweighs Higher Dividends (Bloomberg)
• Syria Government Approves Lifting State of Emergency (Reuters)
• USA: That ratings agency downgrade meeting (BBC)

Gold has breached the $1500 level and reached new record nominal highs at $1,505.65/oz. Since yesterday it has gradually risen in all currencies and is approaching record nominal highs in all major currencies. $2,400/oz is the inflation adjusted (CPI) high of 1980 and given the very uncertain macroeconomic climate of today and concerns about the dollar and all major currencies, arguably even more uncertain than the 1970’s, the real high remains a very viable target. It is important to remember that while gold has risen some 6 times in 11 years ($250 to $1500) it rose by 24 times in 9 years in the 1970’s – from 1971 to January 1980 ($35 to $850). This puts the recent reasonably gradual increase in gold prices in perspective and should give gold bears and top callers pause for thought.

Faced with a large capital funding need in advance of a substantial bond redemption next week, Spain had no choice but to hike rates on today's auction of €3.37 billion in 10 and 13 Year bonds.  Spain auctioned off €2.49 billion in April 2021 bonds at a yield 5.472% vs. Prev. 5.162% (5.5% interest) at a 2.1 bid/cover Prev. 1.81. it also sold €0.885 billion in 2024 bonds yielding a whopping 5.667% vs. 4.26% previously. The jump in yield caused the bid/cover to rise to 2.3 vs. 1.84 before. From Reuters: "Ten-year Spanish yields eased to 5.46 percent after the sale, having risen to around 5.55 percent since late last week -- just 20 basis points shy of the euro lifetime high. The surge in yields had sparked concern that Spain was being dragged back into the crosshairs of investors looking for the next candidate for an international bailout. The auction was seen as a test of whether Madrid was still seen as insulated from Portugal, Greece and Ireland, which have sought help. ""Spain's debt servicing costs have ratcheted higher and, while not yet providing any cause for alarm in terms of their outright levels, arguably have little in the way of headroom before such concerns might begin to take effect," said Rabobank strategist Richard McGuire. Traders said the 5.6 percent level in 10-year Spanish bonds was key, although yields have failed to break above that level on a sustained basis to date. "If that goes it could turn very nasty," one trader said." Elsewhere both Portuguese and Greek 10 Years hits fresh lifetime highs (low prices), printing 9.5% and 14.68%, even as an oblivious euro surged to a fresh 18 month high.

One would think that with the bail-out of Portugal, even more downgrades of Irish government bonds and Greece a Dead Man Walking, the euro would get hammered with this tsunami of gloom & doom news from the European markets. But, on the contrary, the euro is going strong… very strong!

The reason that the 2008 debacle happened was very simple. The derivatives market, the largest, most leveraged market in the world. Today, the notional value of the derivatives sitting on US banks’s balance sheets is in the ballpark of $234 TRILLION. That's 16 times US GDP and more than four times WORLD GDP. Of this $234 trillion, 95% is controlled by just four banks. And they are... the TBTFs.

Things are certainly speeding up, and it is my conclusion that we are not more than a year away from the next major financial and economic disruption. Alas, predictions are tricky, especially about the future (credit: Yogi Berra), but here's why I am convinced that the next big break is drawing near. In order for the financial system to operate, it needs continual debt expansion and servicing. Both are important. If either is missing, then catastrophe can strike at any time. And by 'catastrophe' I mean big institutions and countries transiting from a state of insolvency into outright bankruptcy.

Even as Greek debt hits new and improved daily record highs each and every day, with the Bund spread for 10 years hitting a ridiculous 1,140, the country continues to pretend it has capital markets access. Although in theory it still does. Even with a Greek restructuring now virtually assured, although as the CreditSights note below notes this would be a political suicide event, the country still managed to sell €1.625 billion of 3 month Bills at the stunning rate of 4.10. Reuters reports: "Greece sold more than 1.6 billion of three-month debt on Tuesday, raising funds to roll over 800 million euros ($1.14 billion) of maturing government paper later in the month, with yields rising above 4 percent. It was priced to yield 4.10 percent, up 25 basis points from an auction in February and around the rate of about 4.2 percent Greece pays on its EU/IMF bailout loans." Yet even with the "attractive" yield the Bid To Cover plunged from 5.08 to 3.45, as the only bidders were banks themselves propped up by the ECB and China: according to PDMA foreign investors accounted for 36% of the issue.

Importantly, this inflationary episode, which threatens to last as long as the U.S. does not raise nominal interest rates above present rates of inflation (or, more to the point, real rates above the growth rate of the economy), has serious recessionary consequences, especially when wage and salary costs lag prices. In other words, what is being touted as a constructive element, the fact that labour costs are not showing signs of inflation, is reason to believe that the economy will soon be hit by another wave of retrenchments, as consumers are hit by shrinking real paycheques. Recessionary pressures in the U.S., adumbrated by downward revisions to second-quarter GDP forecasts in recent weeks, are being reinforced by economic weakness in the U.K., which is already undergoing a more severe bout of inflation, and the Eurozone (with the exception of Germany), which is in the grips of extremely high unemployment and negative growth per capita and stifled by excessive debt, rising taxes, and, believe it or not, low money supply growth. Consider, too, that most of the emerging markets are engaged in belated and not always conventional forms of monetary tightening in a desperate but ultimately futile hope of reducing inflationary pressures without disrupting real economic growth, and the resulting mix, you might guess, can only spell global economic trouble.

Things like this don't all happen at once, today just happens to be a day that the S&P happens to mention that we are standing dangerously close to the ledge. Brazil was much smaller than Greece when they defaulted in 1983 and they took the US economy down with them...

So it starts. Where will it end?

Putting its money where its mouth is, Dagong has a long-standing, negative outlook on US debt that doesn’t pull any punches. From its November 2010 report: “In essence the depreciation of the U.S. dollar adopted by the U.S. government indicates that its solvency is on the brink of collapse, therefore it wants to cut its debt through the act of devaluation with the national will; such a move has severely harmed the interests of creditors.” Following suit, S&P stunned financial markets this morning by revising its US outlook to ‘negative’, citing politicians’ inability to address medium-term and long-term challenges. In total contrast, US News and World Report published an article a few days ago entitled Why you should buy U.S. Treasuries,” which amounts to the worst advice I’ve seen in years.

In a very unstunning development which would expose all those Greek and EU proclamations about a solvent Greece for another relentless barrage of lies, it appears that Germany is now resolved to not only restructuring Greece (and with certain Greek bonds trading around 60 the market has effectively thrown in the towel), but has provided a timeframe in which this should occur: "German government sources said on Monday Greece will likely restructure its sovereign debt before the end of summer, putting a time frame to recent speculation that sent the euro to its lowest in two weeks. "Decisive voices within the federal government expect that Greece will not make it through the summer without a restructuring," one high-ranking coalition source told Reuters. "That does not mean that the federal government is striving for (a restructuring) but such a step will probably not be avoidable," he added, echoing views from other coalition sources." Supposedly the thinking in Europe is that banks should have built up a sufficiently large capital buffer to where the permanent impairment of Greek senior debt will not lead to another bank run. The question however is how well has Europe considered any other unpredictable consequences, which by definition, are "unpredictable." Recall that the financial system nearly ended after the Lehman bankruptcy following the freeze in money markets: a side effect that nobody had expected at the time. What will happen this time around when Greece becomes the first "Lehman" in the sovereign realm, and just how many trillions will have to be invested to undo "unforeseen" consequences?

As part of the broadly bipolar risk [ON|OFF] market stampede, Spain probably could have picked a better day to attempt to sell €4.7 billion in bills than just after the weekend when the market realized there is no way out for Greece than default. Alas, it did not, and the result was not pretty. Per Reuters: "Spain paid substantially more to issue 12- and 18-month Treasury bills on Monday compared with last month as uncertainty hovered over a Portuguese bailout and speculation intensified about Greek debt restructuring. The sale was at the low end of the Treasury's target range of 4.5 billion to 5.5 billion euros ($6.51 billion-$7.95 billion) and comes ahead of a closely watched long-term debt auction on Wednesday of bonds maturing in 2021 and 2024." Specifically, the Spanish Treasury was forced to pay 2.77% for its €3.5 billion 12 month Bill, 64 bps more than the 2.128% paid in a comparable auction in March, and making matters worse was a tumble in the bid to cover from 2.4 to 1.6. The weakness was mirrored in the auction of €1.2 billion in 18 month notes, which priced at 3.364%, up 93 bps from last month, with the BTC tumbling from 3.5 to 2.0. And one can wonder what the outcome would have been had the Fed or other central banks not been selling puts on the Spanish curve (because if he is doing it off the balance sheet in the US, there is nothing really preventing Bernanke from taking his curve manipulation tour global). And yes: Spain is next. "Investors are turning their attention to Spain as the next weakest link in the euro zone chain after Portugal said it would seek aid from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund, the third to fall after Ireland and Greece."