24/2/19: Eurozone's Corporate Yields are not quite in a crisis territory... yet...

Euro area high yield corporate credit rates are under pressure to continue moving:

But they are far from being dramatic, even though banking sector margins have now surpassed ex-crises averages:

The problem, however, is what awaits on the horizon. So far, the ECB is planning on hiking rates in the second half of 2019. If it does, with one 25 bps hikes to the end of 2019, we are looking at high yield rates jumping close to a 7 percent mark:

That is a bit more testing than the current above-the-average yields.

24/2/19: Europe of Divergence: Euro and the Crisis Aftermath

A promise of economic convergence was one of the core reasons behind the creation of the Euro. At no time in the Euro area history has this promise been more important than in the years following the series of the 2008-2013 crises, primarily because the crisis has significantly adversely impacted not only the 'new member states' (who may or may not have been on the 'convergence path' prior to the crisis onset), but also the 'old member states' (who were supposed to have been on the convergence path prior to the crisis). The latter group of states is the so-called Euro periphery: Greece, Italy, Spain and Portugal.

So have the Euro delivered convergence for these states since the end of the Euro area crises, starting with 2014? The answer is firmly 'No'.

 The chart above clearly shows that since the onset of the 'recovery', Euro area 8 states (EA12 ex-periphery) averaged a growth rate of just under 2.075 percent per annum. The 'peripheral' states growth rate averaged just 1.623 percent per annum. In simple terms, recovery in the Euro area between 2014 and 2018 has been associated with continued divergence in the EA4 states.

This is hardly surprising, as shown in the chart above. Even during the so-called 'boom' period, peripheral states average growth rates were statistically indistinguishable from those of the EA8. Which implies no meaningful evidence of convergence during the 'good times'. The picture dramatically changed starting with 2009, starting the period of severe divergence between the EA8 and EA4.

In simple terms, the idea that the common currency has been delivering on its core promise of facilitating economic convergence between the rich Euro area states and the less prosperous ones holds no water.

15/2/19: Euro area is sliding toward recession

Based on the latest data through January 2019, Eurozone’s economic problems are getting worse. In 4Q 2018, Euro area posted real GDP growth of just 0,.2% q/q - matching the print for 3Q 2018. Meanwhile, inflation has fallen from 1.7% in December 2018 to 1.6% in January 2018. And Eurocoin - a leading growth indicator for euro area GDP expansion slipped from 0.42 in December 2018 to 0.31 in January 2019. This marked the third consecutive month of decline in Eurocoin, and the steepest fall in 8 months. Worse, July 23016 was the last time Eurocoin was at this level.

Within the last 12 months, Eurozone growth has officially fallen from 0,.7% q/q in 4Q 2017 to 0.2% in 4Q 2018, HICP effectively stayed the same, with inflation at 1.6% in January 2018 agains 1.5% in January 2018. And forward growth indicator has collapsed from 0.95 in January 2018 to 0.31 in January 2019.

Euro area is heading backward when it comes to economic activity, fast.

Germany just narrowly escaped an official recession, with 4Q growth at zero, and 3Q growth at -0.2%

Italy is in official recession, with 3Q 2018 GDP growth of -0.1% followed by 4Q 2018 growth of -0.2%.

Industrial goods production is now down two consecutive months in the Euro area as a whole, with latest print for December 2018 sitting at - 4.2% decline, following a -3.0% y/y fall in November 2018.

Worse, capital goods industrial production - a signal of forward capacity investment, is now down even more sharply: from -4.4% in November 2018 to -5.5% in December 2018.

7/2/19: S&P on Irish Banks Outlook

S&P on Irish banks outlook for 2019, with my comments included: https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/news-insights/trending/wU14cpHw2NfouDi3MnHVQw2.

17/1/19: Eurocoin December 2018 Reading Indicates a Structural Problem in the Euro Area Economy

December 2018 reading for Eurocoin, a lead growth indicator for euro area posted a second consecutive monthly decline, falling from 0.47 in November to 0.42 in December. December reading now puts Eurocoin at its lowest levels since October 2016.

Charts below show dynamics of Eurocoin, set against actual and forecast growth rates in the euro area GDP and  inflation:

Per last chart above, the pick up in inflation, measured by the ECB’s target rate of HICP, from 1.4% at the end of 3Q 2017 to 1.7% in 3Q 2018 has been associated with decreasing growth momentum (Eurocoin falling from 0.67 q/q to 0.48, and growth falling from the recorded 0.7% q/q in 3Q 2017 to 0.2% q/q in 3Q 2018).

With this significant downward pressure on growth happening even before any material monetary tightening by the ECB, Which suggests that euro area growth problem is structural, rather than policy-induced. While QE did boost growth from the crisis period-lows, it failed to provide a sustainable momentum for significantly expanding potential growth. Thus, even a gradual slowdown in monetary easing has been associated with a combination of subdued, but accelerating inflation and falling growth.

27/12/18: Mr. Draghi's Santa: Ending QE, Frankfurt Style

It's Christmas time, and - Merry / Happy Christmas to all reading the blog - Mr. Draghi is intent on delivering a handful of new presents for the kids. Ho-Ho-Ho... folks:

The ECB balancesheet has just hit a new high of 42% of Eurozone GDP, up from 39.7% at the end of 3Q 2018. Although the ECB has announced its termination of new purchases of assets under the QE, starting in January 2019, the bank has continued buying assets in December, and it will continue replacing maturing debt it holds into some years to come.

Despite the decline in the Euro value, expressed in dollar terms, ECB's balancesheet is the largest of the G3 Central Banks, ahead of both the Fed and the BOJ.

Ho-Ho-Ho... folks. The party is still going on, although the guests are too drunk to walk. Meanwhile, global liquidity has been stagnant on-trend since the start of 2015.

And now the white powder of debt is no longer sufficient to prop up the punters off the dance floor:

Ho-Ho-Ho... folks.

9/9/18: The end of the clam before the storm

My article on the shifting landscape for monetary policies: U.S. and Euro area for Sunday Business Post https://www.businesspost.ie/business/end-calm-storm-424321

18/08/18: Euromoney on Italian Banking Risks and Turkey Crisis

Euromoney article on the latent Italian crisis, relative to the ongoing Turkish one: https://www.euromoney.com/article/b19k3zjb7v811r/italian-banks-a-bigger-risk-than-turkey.

21/6/18: Weaker growth signals for the euro area

I have not updated Eurocoin dynamics and euro area growth forecasts for some time now, so here is the latests, from May data:

• Eurocoin, leading growth indicator for the euro area, has fallen significantly from the local high of 0.96 in February (the highest growth forecast since June 2000) to 0.89 in March, followed by continued decline to 0.76 for April and 0.55 in May
• May reading is the lowest since December 2016
• Growth forecasts consistent with Eurocoin dynamics indicate that, assuming revised 1Q growth remains at 0.4 percent, 2Q 2018 growth is likely to come in somewhere in the range of 0.35-0.55 percent

Chart below shows improving outlook for HICP (inflation) over the last 12 months through May 2018, just as the economy beginning to slow down:

On balance, we now have three consecutive months of declining Eurocoin-implied forecasts for euro area growth. It will be interesting to see eurocoin print for June, coming up in about a week, as well as July (coming out prior to the Eurostat growth estimates for 2Q 2018).

15/6/18: Italian High Yield Bonds and Markets Exuberance

Nothing illustrates the state of asset valuations today better than the junk bonds tale from Italy. Here is a prime example from the Fitch ratings note from June 7:

"...longstanding Italian HY issuer and mobile operator WindTre sequentially refinanced crisis-era unsecured notes at 12% coupons into 3% area coupons by January 2018, despite losing cumulative revenue and EBITDA of 30% and 25%, respectively, and re-leveraging from 4x to 6x."

Give this a thought, folks:

1. We expect rates to rise in the future on foot of ECB unwinding its QE, the Fed hiking rates and monetary conditions everywhere around the world getting 'gently' tighter;
2. Euro is set to weaken in the longer run on foot of Fed-ECB policies mismatch;
3. WindTre issues replacement debt, increasing its leverage risk by 50%, as its revenue falls almost by a thirds and its EBITDA falls by a quarter;
4. WindTre operates in the market that is highly exposed to political risks and in an economy that is posting downward revisions to growth forecasts.

And the investors are piling into the company bonds, cutting the cost of debt carry for the operator from 12 percent to 3 percent. 

Per FT (https://www.ft.com/content/31c635f4-64df-11e8-a39d-4df188287fff): "Lending to corporates rose 1.2 per cent in the year to February 2018, according to the Bank of Italy, and the average interest rate on new loans was 1.5 per cent — a historic low."

Say big, collective "Thanks!" to the folks at ECB, who worked hard to bring us this gem of a market, so skewed out of reality, one wonders what it will take for markets regulators to see build up of systemic risks.

4/6/18: Italy is a TBTF/TBTS Problem for ECB

In my previous post, I talked about the Too-Big-To-Fail Euro state, #Italy - a country with massive debt baggage that is systemic in nature.

Here is Project Syndicate view from Carmen Reinhart: https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/italy-sovereign-debt-restructuring-by-carmen-reinhart-2018-05.

An interesting graph, charting a combination of the official Government debt and Target 2 deficits accumulated by Italy:

Quote: "With many investors pulling out of Italian assets, capital flight in the more recent data is bound to show up as an even bigger Target2 hole. This debt, unlike pre-1999, pre-euro Italian debt, cannot be inflated away. In this regard, it is much like emerging markets’ dollar-denominated debts: it is either repaid or restructured."

The problem, of course, is the ECB position, as mentioned in my article linked above. It is more than a reputational issue. Restructuring central bank liabilities is easy and relatively painless when it comes to a one-off event within a large system, like the ECB. So no issue with simply ignoring these imbalances from the monetary policy perspective. However, the ECB is a creature of German comfort, and this makes any restructuring (or ignoring) of the Target 2 imbalances a tricky issue for ECB's ability to continue accumulating them vis-a-vis all other debtor states of the euro area. Should a new crisis emerge, the ECB needs stable (non-imploding) Target 2 balance sheet to continue making an argument for sustaining debtor nations. This means not ignoring Italian problem.

Here is the picture mapping out the problem:

Source: http://sdw.ecb.europa.eu/servlet/desis?node=1000004859

Reinhart warns, in my opinion correctly, "In the mildest of scenarios, only Italy’s official debt – held by other governments or international organizations – would be restructured, somewhat limiting the disruptions to financial markets. Yet restructuring official debt may not prove sufficient. Unlike Greece (post-2010), where official creditors held the lion’s share of the debt stock, domestic residents hold most of Italy’s public debt. This places a premium on a strategy that minimizes capital flight (which probably cannot be avoided altogether)."

In other words, as I noted years ago, Italy is a 'Too-Big-To-Fail' and a 'Too-Big-To-Save' or TBTF/TBTS problem for the euro area.

4/6/18: Italy's Problem is Europe's Problem

My article on Italian (and Spanish and Dutsche Bank) mess in Sunday Business Post: https://www.businesspost.ie/business/italys-problem-europes-problem-417945.

Unedited version of the article here:

This fortnight has been a real roller-coaster for the European markets and politics. Only two weeks ago, I wrote about the problems of rising political populism in Italy and Spain as the signals of a broader trend across the block’s member states. This week, in Spain a no confidence motion in Mariano Rajoy’s rule played a side show to Rome’s drama.

The timeline of events in Italy provides the background to this week’s lessons.

The country has been governed by a lame-duck executive since mid-2016. Fed up with Rome’s gridlock, in March 2018 general election, Italians endorsed a parliament split between the populist-Left M5S and the far-Right group of parties led by the League. Month and a half of League-M5S negotiations have produced a shared policies platform, replete with radical proposals for reshaping country’s Byzantine tax and social welfare systems. The platform also contained highly controversial proposals to force the ECB to write down EUR250 billion worth of Government debt, a plan for restructuring fiscal rules to allow the country to run larger fiscal deficits, and a call for immigration system reforms.

On Monday, the President of the Italian Republic, Sergio Mattarella, a loyal Euro supporter, vetoed the League-M5S candidate for the economy ministry, Eurosceptic Paolo Savona. The result was resignation of the League-M5S Prime Minister-designate, Giuseppe Conte, and a threat of an appointment of the unpopular technocrat, Carlo Cottarelli, an ex-IMF economist nicknamed Mr. Scissors for his staunch support for austerity, as a caretaker Prime Minister. By Thursday night, Conte was back in the saddle, with a new coalition Government agreed and set to be sworn in on Friday.

Crisis avoided? Not so fast.

Risk Blow Out

The markets followed the political turns and twists of the drama. On Tuesday, Italian bonds posted their worst daily performance in over 20 years. The spike in the 2-year bond yield was spectacular, going from 0.3 percent on Monday morning to 2.73 percent on Tuesday, before slipping back to 1.26 percent on Thursday. The 10-year Italian bond yield leaped from 2.37 percent to 3.18 percent within the first two days, falling to 2.84 percent a day after.

Source: FT

To put these bond yields’ movements into perspective, at the week’s peak yields, the cost of funding Italian EUR2.256 trillion mountain of Government debt would have risen by EUR45 billion per annum - more than the forecast deficit increases under the reforms proposed in the League-M5S programme.

Thus, despite the immediate crisis yielding to the new Coalition, a heavy cloud of uncertainty still hangs over the Euro area’s third largest member state. Should the new Government fail to deliver on a unified platform built by an inherently unstable coalition, the new election will be on offer. This will likely turn into a plebiscite on Italy’s membership in the Euro. And it will also raise a specter of another markets meltdown.


The Italian Contagion Problem

The lessons from this week’s spike in political uncertainty are three-fold. All are bad for Italy and for the entire euro area. Firstly, after years of QE-induced amnesia, the investment markets are now ready to force huge volatility and rapid risk-repricing into sovereign bonds valuations. Secondly, despite all the talk in Brussels and Rome about the robustness of post-2011 reforms, the Italian economy remains stagnant, incapable of withstanding any significant uptick in the historically-low borrowing costs that prevailed over recent years, with its financial system still vulnerable to shocks. Thirdly, the feared contagion from Italy to the rest of the Eurozone is not a distant echo of the crises past, but a very present danger.

Italy’s debt mountain is the powder keg, ready to explode. The IMF forecasts from April this year envision Italian debt-to-GDP ratio dropping from 131.5 percent at the end of 2017 to 116.6 percent in 2023. However, should the average cost of debt rise just 200 basis points on IMF’s central scenario, hitting 4 percent, the debt ratio is set to rise to 137 percent. This Wednesday bond auction achieved a gross yield of 3 percent on 10-year bonds. In other words, Italy’s fiscal and economic dynamics are unsustainable under a combination of higher risk premia, and the ECB monetary policy normalisation. The risk of the former was playing out this week and will remain in place into 2019. The latter is expected to start around November-December and accelerate thereafter.

With the government crisis unfolding, the probability of Italy leaving the Euro within 12 months, measured by Sentix Italexit index jumped from 3.6 percent at the end of the last week to 12.3 percent this Tuesday before moderating to 11 percent at the end of Thursday. This puts at risk not only Italian Government bonds, but the private sector debt as well, amounting to close to EUR2 trillion. A rise in the cost of this debt, in line with Government debt risk scenarios, will literally sink economy into a recession.

As Italian Government bonds spreads shot up, other European markets started feeling the pain. Based on the data from Deutsche Bank Research, at the start of 2018, foreign banks, non-bank investors and official sector, including the Euro system, held ca 48 percent of the Italian Government debt.  In Spain and Portugal, this number was closer to 65 percent. In other words, the risk of falling bonds prices is both material and broadly distributed across the European financial system for all ‘peripheral’ Euro states.

Source: DB Research

As a part of its quantitative easing program, the ECB has purchased some EUR250 billion worth of Italian bonds. A significant uptick in risk of Italy’s default on these bonds will put political pressure on ECB. Going forward, Frankfurt will face greater political uncertainty in dealing with the future financial and fiscal crises.

Research from the Bank for International Settlements puts Italian banks’ holdings of Government bonds at roughly EUR 450 billion. Ten largest Italian banks have sovereign-debt exposures that exceed their Tier-1 capital. As the value of these bonds plunges, the solvency risks rise too. Not surprisingly, over the last two weeks, shares of the large Italian banks fell 10-20 percent. These declines in equity prices, in turn, are driving solvency risks even higher.

Beyond the Italian banks, French financial institutions held some EUR44 billion worth of Italian bonds, while Spanish banks were exposed to EUR29 billion, according to the European Banking Authority.

The second order effects of the Italian risk contagion play through the other ‘peripheral’ euro area bonds. As events of this week unfolded, in line with Italy, Spain, Portugal and Greece have experienced relatively sharp drops in their bonds values. All three are also subject to elevated political uncertainty at home, made more robust by the Italian crisis.

Thus, if the Italian government bond yields head up, banks’ balance sheets risks mount through both, direct exposures to the Italian Government bonds, and indirect effects from Italian contagion on the broader government debt markets, as well as to the private sector lending.

At the end of this week, all indication are that the Italian contagion crisis is receding. The new risk triggers are shifting out into late 2018 and early 2019. The uneasy coalition between two populist moments, the M5S and the League, is unlikely to survive the onslaught of voter dissatisfaction with the state of the economy and continued immigration crisis. At the same time, the coalition will be facing a highly skeptical EU, hell-bent on assuring that M5S-League Government does not achieve much progress on its reforms. All in, the new Government has between six and twelve months to run before we see a new election looming on the horizon.

The Italian crisis might be easing, but it is not going away any time soon. Neither the Spanish one. Oh, and with a major credit downgrade from the Standard & Poor’s and the U.S. Fed, here goes the systemic behemoth of European finance, the Deutsche Bank.

21/5/18: Italian Sovereign Risks Are Blowing Up

As I noted in my comment to ECR / Euromoney and in my article for Sunday Business Post (see links here: http://trueeconomics.blogspot.com/2018/05/21518-risk-experts-take-flight-over.html and http://trueeconomics.blogspot.com/2018/05/21528-trouble-is-brewing-in-euro.html), the ongoing process of Government formation in Italy represents a fallout from the substantial VUCA events arising from the recent elections, and as such warrants a significant (albeit delayed) repricing of country sovereign risks. This process is now underway:

Source: Holger Zschaepitz @Schuldensuehner

Per chart above, Italy's 10 year bonds risk premium over Germany jumped to 181 bps on markets concerns with respect to fiscal dynamics implied by the new Government formation. This, however, is just a minor side show compared to the VUCA environment created by the broader dynamics of political populism and opportunism. And in this respect, Italy is just another European country exposed to these risks. In fact, as the latest data from the Timbro's Authoritarian Populism Index, Europe-wide, political populism is on the rise:

21/5/28: Trouble is brewing in the Euro paradise

My article for the Sunday Business Post on the continued risk/VUCA from politics of populism to the Euro area reforms and stability: https://www.businesspost.ie/business/trouble-brewing-euro-paradise-416876.

18/5/18: Euro area current accounts 1980-2017

What happened to the Euro area current accounts since the introduction of the Euro?

Periodically, I update my charts on the Euro effects on the external balances of the EA-12, the original economies of the Euro area. Here are the updates:

Considering first cumulated current account balances over 1980-2017 period, the chart below aggregates the EA12 into two sub-groups:

• The 'periphery' defined as a group composed of Italy, Greece, Spain and Portugal
• The 'core' group composed of the remaining EA12 countries

The chart shows several interesting facts

1. Current account deficits in the 'peripheral' states predate the introduction of the Euro
2. Since the introduction of the Euro through 2013 there was a consistent increase in the current account deficits amongst the 'periphery' states, with acceleration in deficits staring exactly at the point of the introduction of the Euro
3. Current account deficits in the Euro area 'peripheral' states were rapidly accelerating into 2009
4. Since 2014, current account deficits in the 'peripheral' states have been drawn down, at a moderate rate, as consistent with the internal deleveraging of these economies
5. Meanwhile, the introduction of the Euro accelerated accumulation of current account surpluses within the 'core' group of EA12
6. The rate of current account surpluses acceleration increased dramatically around 2004 and then again starting with 2009

In terms of external balances, the creation of the Euro area clearly resulted in compounding pre-Euro era existent structural imbalances in the EA12 economies.

Meanwhile, there is no discernible impact of the Euro on supporting growth in trade within the Euro area (here, we use changing countries composition of the Eurozone):

  As per above chart:

• From 2000 and prior to 2014, Eurozone performance in terms of growth rates in exports of goods and services largely underperformed other advanced economies (ex-G7) and was in line with G7 performance
• Before 2000, Eurozone was broadly in line with both the G7 and other advanced economies in terms of growth rates in exports of goods and services
• Lastly, starting with 2014, the Euro area has been outperforming both the G7 and other advanced economies in terms of growth in exports of goods and services - a development that is more consistent with the fallout from the twin Global Financial Crisis (2007-2009) and the Euro Area Sovereign Debt Crisis (2011-2013), as the process of internal devaluation forced a number of Eurozone countries into more aggressive exporting

On the net, there remains no current account-linked evidence to support an argument that the creation of the Euro has been a net positive for the Eurozone member states in terms of improving their external balances and exports flows. On the other hand, there is little evidence that the Euro has hindered trade flows growth rates, whilst there is strong evidence to claim that the Euro has exacerbated current account imbalances between the 'core' and the 'periphery' states.

15/5/18: Beware of the Myth of Europe's Renaissance

My article for last Sunday's Business Post on why the Euro area growth Renaissance is more of a fizzle than a sizzle, and what Ireland needs to do to decouple from the Go Slow Europe: https://www.businesspost.ie/business/beware-myth-europes-renaissance-416318. Hint: not an Irexit... and not more Tax Avoidance Boxes...

12/5/18: Monetary Activism at ECB: A Chart of Failure

A simple chart, a great observation by Holger Zschaepitz @Schuldensuehner: "Chart of failure: #Eurozone core inflation has plunged to 0.7% despite #ECB balance sheet at record high. If ECB permanently fails to hit its #inflation target, it's time to rethink target. By the way, there is inflation in stocks, bonds, real estate not measured in official CPI."

The story of ECB racing away from the Fed and even BoJ in pursuit of the inflation Nirvana:

Which brings us to a bigger question: with ECB at play, what is there to brag about when it comes to Europe's latest growth "renaissance"? Read my article in the Business Post tomorrow... 

5/2/18: Italy Smacks into VUCA Wall

VUCA wins. In Italy.

Italian elections results are coming in and several key VUCA components are now clearly at play in Europe's third largest economy: https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2018/mar/05/italian-elections-2018-full-results-renzi-berlusconi.

Now, what does this mean?

Italian Parliament:
234 seats for M5S
122 seats for Lega
105 seats for PDs
96 seats for FI

Italian Senate:
115 seats for M5S
55 seats for Lega
53 seats for FI
50 seats for PD

M5S - the 'Five Star Movement' has consolidated and expanded its launching position of 2013, despite virtually all analysts declaring the party to be 'falling' in support, especially after 2017 local elections. Welcome to the world of VUCA, where the more 'accomplished' the analyst, the less accurate are her/his predictions, because our traditional analytical tools miss the C & A bits of VUCA (complexity & ambiguity).

Renzi & mainstream politics have lost. His PDs are decimated. They have only themselves to blame: centre-left ideology is of nil distinction from centre and centre-right these days. Not only in Italy, but elsewhere too: just observe the U.S. Democrats sparing with the U.S. Republicans on virtually everything, save actual policies. The squabbling that the lack of ideological core implies is intense within the centre-left in Italy. Just as it is intense elsewhere (e.g. the U.S., where the centre-left's only differentiation from the centre-right is who to blame for the country problems, save blaming themselves).

Centre-right (Berlusconi) failed to capture anyone's hearts and minds, so the Lega Nord has taken its votes. Which makes Lega a major winner in the election: the party went from its cyclical low of 4 percent in 2013 election to its historical peak of around 18 percent in this election. The change of leadership in 2013 (to Salvini) has paid off.

Key takeaway from all of this is that in the modern, highly volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous political environment, writing off populist parties at the extreme o political spectrum is a dangerous game. We think of these parties as being driven to successes and subsequent failures by individual personalities of their leaders. That does not appear to be the case. Complexity overrides trends.

Meanwhile, in Brussels, power-fixing mode was on. As reported in the Guardian: "The [EU] commission’s chief spokesman, Margaritis Schinas, told reporters its president, Jean-Claude Juncker, wanted to see a “stable government in Italy” and “regarding the potential impact and so on and so forth... ‘Keep calm and carry on’”. In other words, get Renzi back by all possible means and do not challenge centrism. That is just another manifestation of VUCA for you: the ossified elites dependent on status quo ante will only recognise VUCA effects after they drive the system to a point of no return.

16/12/17: Dancing towards the end of QE

My article on the Super Thursday: monetary policy decisions by ECB, the Fed, PBOC, Norges Bank, SNB et al for Sunday Business Post:
https://www.businesspost.ie/opinion/dancing-towards-end-qe-405054.

21/11/17: ECB loads up on pre-Christmas sales of junk

Holger Zschaepitz @Schuldensuehner posted earlier today the latest data on ECB’s balance sheet. Despite focusing its attention on unwinding the QE in the medium term future, Frankfurt continues to ramp up its purchases of euro area debt. Amidst booming euro area economic growth, total assets held by the ECB rose by another €24.1 billion in October, hitting a fresh life-time high of €4.4119 trillion.

Thus, currently, ECB balance sheet amounts to 40.9% of Eurozone GDP. The ‘market economy’ of neoliberal euro area is now increasingly looking more and more like some sort of a corporatist paradise. On top of ECB holdings, euro area government expenditures this year are running at around 47.47% of GDP, accord to the IMF, while Government debt levels are at 87.37% of GDP. General government net borrowing stands at 1.276% of GDP, while, thanks to the ECB buying up government debt, primary net balance is in surplus of 0.589% of GDP.

Meanwhile, based on UBS analysis, the ECB is increasingly resorting to buying up ‘bad’ corporate debt. So far, the ECB has swallowed some 255 issues of BB-rated and non-rated corporate bonds, with Frankfurt’s largest corporate debt exposures rated at BBB+. AA to A-rated bonds count 339 issues, with mode at A- (148 issues).

It would be interesting to see the breakdown by volume and issuer names, as ECB’s corporate debt purchasing programme is hardly a very transparent undertaking.

All in, there is absolutely no doubt that Frankfurt is heavily subsidising both sovereign and corporate debt markets in Europe, largely irrespective of risks and adverse incentives such subsidies may carry.