30th Apr - From Austerity to Growth

So now the incoming Mr Hollande is sugared with talks of increasing the European Investment Bank's capital, in order to promote growth instead of austerity. This sounds very political to me, as new 100 billion at an institutional bank account will hardly make any difference in the current environment. They should really just concentrate on solving the Spanish problem. 

30th Apr - US Open Briefings

Seems the European focus will shift after the Sunday's elections to the June EU summit. Good question what will happen to Spain meanwhile. I guess the plans to recapitalize the banks via ESM are still under construction. Perhaps with some bond buying by the ECB and light auction loads the muddle-through strategy could continue for some weeks or even months now. But Spanish pain is still inevitable.

30th Apr - Morning Briefings: Eve of Mayday

Here are the regular morning briefings and somewhat unusually for me some article links as well. Today and tomorrow are big holidays in my country, and I am off to see some friends – not sure if there will be US open & close posts today.

During the weekend I posted the following:

29th Apr - Weekender: Off-Topic – not related to finance or markets

29th Apr - Weekender: Trading & Research  - views, quant stuff, people, education

29th Apr - Weekender: Euro Crisis

29th Apr - Weekly Support  - weekly reviews and previews

28th Apr - Credit Guest: Mutiny on the Euro Bounty...  focus on Europe

28th Apr - Best of The Week  best from my last week’s posts

29th Apr - Weekender: Off-Topic

Definitely not anything relating to euro crisis or derivatives. Have some fun, relax, get new ideas.

29th Apr - Weekender: Trading & Research

Here are the less-timely articles from the past week or so. I have combined the Economics-links to this post - except most ones on Europe, which appear in the previous post. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions!  

29th Apr - Weekender: Euro Crisis

Very, very interesting week coming up. Spain got downgraded just before the weekend. Mayday holidays in Europe. Large dedicated sections on Spain and the austerity debate.

You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions!  

29th Apr - Weekly Support

Here are the links to the weekly roundups, reviews and also previews of the beginning week. I will update this post as new stuff comes online. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions!   

28th Apr - Credit Guest: Mutiny on the Euro Bounty

A credt guest post by Macronomics, enjoy. The usual weekend posts coming up next. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions.

28th Apr - Best of The Week

Interesting week, after the first round of the French elections, Dutch government fell and Spain looks ready for a bailout program. Major television channel in Finland played a document on the TARGET2 imbalances, and the people have woken up to the euro crisis, realizing that even a ‘core’ surplus country is exposed to the crisis fallout. UK’s economy is again in a recession while the macro numbers from US and continental Europe have also proved disappointing. IMF’s fund raising caused no visible market movement. ECB released its annual report and financial integration reports, and some of the major trends now are:

27th Apr - Fight or Flight?

I think the real question to be asked now is will there be capital flight first, followed by capital controls - or the other way around. Anyways, here are the regular links for the US open and select readings from the web. The usual weekend posts coming up later. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions.

Quote of The Day:

Mortgages get paid in good times and in bad.  Anyone raising this problem as one of the issues for the Spanish financial system is saying something stupid. – Banco Santander CEO responding to JP Morgan’s note that mortgage arrears will surge as unemployment rises

27th Apr - Morning Briefings

I had a very, very long post last night, with my quick comments on where I think the euro train is going, please see the Spanish Baby Steps. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions.

26th Apr - Spanish Baby Steps

Two big ticket items: Spain downgraded and rumors from a good source, already denied by the ‘crats, about a plan to recapitalize the weak banks with the ESM. Hmmm…connecting the dots makes it obvious that the Spanish banks will be recapitalized so that they would survive the real estate disaster. If the banks were healthy, they could support the Spanish government for some time, with a little help from the ECB.

26th Apr - US Open Briefings

Just the regulars for the US opening (late posting)

26th Apr - Morning Briefings

Here are the regular morning links, will update this as soon as articles come online. Please see last night’s Germany losing friends left and right for the Fed’s meeting and my speculations on the state of the euro crisis. Next post after US close - no US open post today.  You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions.

25th Apr - Germany losing friends left and right

The media in Finland has finally woken up to the TARGET2 balances and the fact that the euro crisis is definitely not over. This is either a surprisingly well-planned action to prepare the voters for the coming Spanish losses and/or a closer fiscal union. Or it might be that they simply are good journalists. As Finland is soon the only remaining AAA-rated country, together with Germany, any rhetoric signaling a possible policy shift should be watched very carefully.

25th Apr - Bernanke's Babble

Markets waiting for the FOMC details, bad macro numbers confirming that decoupling was illusionary, as expected. Of major interest are the latest bank lending figures from the ECB that now include data on national level. Surely someone will soon write about those, but expect no surprises. We kind of already know which countries are in trouble, and mirroring that, which countries are also in trouble, as they have receivables from the crisis-torn periphery.

25th Apr - Credit Guest: The Charge of the Light Euro Brigade

 Another good credit post from Macronomics. The 'war' in Europe is definitely not over.

25th Apr - Morning Briefings

I had some very strong views in last night’s post You Better Read This. Also the linked articles were of exceptionally high quality. I strongly suggest you take a look. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions.

Here are the regular morning links:

24th Apr - You Better Read This

SocGen's view on euro - source: FT

Okay, we again live in interesting times. On one hand we have the TBTF & TBTS Spain (too big to fail or save). We have the balanced budget agreement that has been and is broken by almost every country – and only three countries have ratified it. We have French elections, and Hollande, the poll favourite, has promised to break the pact and plenty of other things as well.

The austerity pact is dead, and this means more debt. More debt means higher chance of further bailouts. The bailout mechanisms have not been funded, so they would have to be funded at a point when some countries are unable to even access financing.

24th Apr - US Open

Just the regular links for the US open. Article linkfest coming after US close

24th Apr - Morning Briefings

The morning briefings! You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions.

Updated suggestions: what to call Hollande & Merkel: Merklande, Hollkel, Homer, Merde. Drop me a line with your suggestions. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook.

23rd Apr - Merklande? Hollkel? Homer?

If Merkel's and Sarkozy's duopoly was called 'Merkozy', what would you call Merkel and Hollande? 

1. Merklande
2. Hollkel
3. Homer

Drop me a line with your suggestions. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook.

23rd Apr - IMF hangover

Here are the regular US open article links and updates on Netherlands, France and Fed's coming meeting.

23rd Apr - Morning Briefings

Here are today's morning briefings. What you might have missed:

Best of The Week from my earlier posts
Weekly Support roundups, reviews and also previews

Weekender: France & IMF French election and IMF meeting

Weekender: Euro Crisis Holland, PIIGS, monetary policy etc.

Weekender: Trading & Economics assets, players, news, research

Weekender: Off-Topics definitely not finance

22nd Apr - Weekender: Off-Topics

Just some random off-topic links that I've seen during the last couple of days

22nd Apr - Weekender: Trading & Economics

I've changed the focus of the Trading & Economics-post a bit - less journal articles and hard-core quant stuff, more ideas and practical stuff. Hope you like my new approach.

22nd Apr - Weekender: Euro Crisis

Plenty of articles for the weekend. Political unrest and a good chance of a credit rating cut in Holland. Germany is having domestic political issues due to its support to periphery - as one article here puts it, perhaps austerity in periphery is the price that has to be paid to keep the German purse strings loose. The papers presented in the Pricenton seminar show that the eurocrats know the banks will have to be recapitalized, just as the IMF has recommended.

22nd Apr - Weekender: France & IMF

Recapitalizing the recapitaliser - or how European countries give money to IMF so that it would save European countries. French elections - playing both the right and the left side simultaneously and promising everything without proper plans. If I were you, I would only read the summaries on France, but for the IMF stuff... I am not sure! The amounts were as expected, but no sign of where and how the money would be used. At least it is outside the politicians' and eurocrats' control.

21st Apr - Weekly Support

Here are the links to the weekly roundups, reviews and also previews of the beginning week. I will update this post as new stuff comes online. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions!   

21st Apr - Best of The Week

Here are the past week's best articles, picked from my earlier posts. Of special interest are the IMF links because of the weekend's meetings. The usual Weekender posts and the Weekly Support are coming up tomorrow. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions! 

20th Apr - US open

Just the US open regulars:

20th Apr - Morning Briefings

After seeing these morning briefings, you might want to check yesterday's US close linkfest Final Calls and US open post Spanish Success?. You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions! 

19th Apr - Final Calls

Interesting rumors that instead of the usual %/GDP share of 10-15bn, Switzerland could provide a lot more funds for IMF to help backstop the euro area. Also China is seen contributing a lot. In exchange, the CHF peg will be accepted by all and the Chinese will not be bothered for a while for their undervalued currency.

I believe the leaders know that Spain is on the brink here, and they are planning their response accordingly. Instead of a decisive action during the weekend, we will hear about the IMF's additional resources and announcements of promises of further action if needed. As before, they know that the threats of rate cuts and LTRO/SMP. are more effective than the actual events.

19th Apr - Spanish Success?

Plenty of quality reads, interesting studies. If you haven't done it already, you might want to register for Financial Times' Alphaville Long Room - plenty of sell-side research is posted there. 

My idea for the day: in case Spain or any other part of the European crisis gets out of hands (Netherlands and France downgrade rumors would be good triggers as well), I guess there will be more speculative and safe haven flows to Switzerland. The central bank of S. has defended the 1.20-level for some time now, with some very shrewd ways (like selling volatility and thus destroying CHF call option holders). 

19th Apr - Morning Briefings

Here are today's morning briefings, for yesterday's US close regulars and article links see IMF: Great Expectations and for even more see US open regulars and articles in Blame Canada. 

You can get update notifications by following MoreLiver on Twitter or Facebook. Contact me with any questions or suggestions! 

18th Apr - IMF: Great Expectations

Correlations again picking up

Source: WSJ/Barclays

Couple of days to go before another big pow-wow to end the crisis. IMF fund raising going smoothly, more room to lower rates in euroland according to IMF and growth is expected to pick up, again according to IMF. These are the bullish drivers. As far as I can tell, all the bullish elements seem to have the three-letter acronym attached to them. My best guess is that the next week will not be pretty. 

18th Apr - Blame Canada

Where is Knight Rider when you need him?

Where is Knight Rider when you need him? It begins to look probable that Spain will get a bank bailout from the EFSF. IMF will not (or at least should not) touch a case where the debts have not yet been restructured or given a good haircut. The accumulated debts through Target2 and LTRO are simply too large for the ECB to take care of, and politically it is much easier to make a case for a bailout than recapping the Eurosystem.

18th Apr - Morning Briefings

The morning briefings are here. For US close regular links and articles, see last night's Rally on what?, for a list of names to follow, see Twitter List and for even more articles see yesterday's US market open linkfest Dam the Flows?

 

17th Apr - Rally on what?

Mystery rally day - on what reasons? Buying ahead of the weekend, already discounting SMP, LTRO3 or EFSF money to Spanish banks? Practically all the news were negative, even Italy is postponing the budget balancing. Could the catalyst be that the IMF's just released outlook mentioned that the ECB has room to lower rates further?

Twitter List

Here is a collection of Twitter handles to follow. I have not blindly copy-pasted the ones I follow - all of these tweet and retweet more than just announcements that their latest blog post is out.

I intend to update this page. If you think you should (not) be included here, contact me.

If you are new to Twitter, I suggest you check couple of the names, and begin to follow those you like. Pretty soon Twitter will start suggesting similar tweeters and you will see retweets by the names you follow. In no time at all, you are following 100+ names. At that point it would be wise to create lists (divide the tweeters into separate lists based on asset class/topic etc) and start using an application like Tweetdeck instead of the terrible webpage.

Oh yes, I am on Twitter, Facebook, email and paper.li.

17th Apr - Dam the Flows?

Today's regular briefings for the US market opening and a host of again very pessimistic writings on the euro crisis. There are some hidden gems here, so read the summaries. Richard Koo, the interest rate guru at Nomura is already calling for restrictions on capital movement.

17th Apr - Morning Briefings

Tuesday's morning briefings, good luck to all. For article links, please see my yesterday's posts Negative, Sir! and Beginning of The End.

16th Apr - Negative, Sir!

Crisis-on: safe haven and Europe again correlate negatively.

Here are the Monday evening’s links. You can keep in touch with "MoreLiver" through Twitter, Facebook, email and paper.li.

Here’s what I posted during the weekend: Euro Crisis + Other, Economics, Weekender: Trading & Off-Topics, Weekly Support, Best of the Week

16th Apr - Beginning of The End

Spanish CDS trading above 500, and looks like the Spanish 10-year yield will close above 6% as well. It is going to be an interesting week. You can keep in touch with "MoreLiver" through Twitter, Facebook, email, paper.li, and here’s what I posted during the weekend:

Weekender: Euro Crisis + Other

Weekender: Economics  

Weekender: Trading & Off-Topics

Weekly Support 
Best of the Week

16th Apr - Morning Briefings

Here are the Monday’s morning briefings. You can keep in touch with "MoreLiver" through Twitter, Facebook, email, paper.li, and here’s what I posted during the weekend:

15th Apr - Weekender: Trading & Off-Topics

Weekender reads: trading- and research-related articles, followed by strictly off-topics.

15th Apr - Weekender: Economics

Very nice events, lectures and thoughts on this week's economics special - enjoy!

15th Apr - Weekender: Euro Crisis + Other

Commentary is very pessimistic. Basically the Spanish CDS hit an all-time-high last Friday, while the yields were more subdued because of SMP threat from the ECB - or even bond purchases from the EFSF.  IMF and G20-meetings next week are the key - I stick to my views from last Thursday: My Theory: Good Cop on Spain, Bad Cop on...  

14th April - Weekly Support

Here are the links to the weekly roundups, reviews and also previews of the beginning week. Usual weekend posts coming up on Sunday. To sum up, next week will be all about Spain, G20 agreeing on IMF's additional support to EZ and the US corporate earnings and macro numbers.

14th April - Best of the week

Here are the best picks from my past week's articles. Spain, euro's future and global debt were the main talk of the week. Regular weekend posts coming up later. You can follow me on Twitter, Facebook, email, paper.li.

 

13th Apr - Spanish CDS vs. bond

All quiet on the Western front. Notice how the unmanipulated Spanish government bond CDS price is near all-time-highs. MoreLiver is on Twitter, Facebook, email, paper.li.

13th Apr - Morning Briefings

Friday the 13th and not much to expect. For my latest euroconspiracy theory and article links, see last night's My Theory: Good Cop on Spain, Bad Cop on... and follow MoreLiver on Twitter, Facebook, email, paper.li. Next post before US open.

News roundup – Between The Hedges

News roundup – The Trader

Emerging London Headlines – beyondbrics / FT

The 6am Cut London – alphaville / FT

Press digests by Reuters: FT, WSJ, NYT

12th Apr - My Theory: Good Cop on Spain, Bad Cop on...

One week to go until G20 and IMF meetings. It is assumed they try to do something, or at least play the announcement game. There is some speculation on QE3 and even LTRO3, though ECB is at the moment very reluctant. The SMP threat is still there, and if the Spanish yields trade above 6%, expect a further statement and then at least a minor SMP action. What are they trying to accomplish?