Economics 02/06/2010: Regional variations in labour markets

While working on a project relating to economic policies in Ireland, I was compiling data on regional variations in various series. Here is a set of interesting graphs detailing the labour force differences across the main regions.

Each data set reflects the latest available QNHS data through Q3 2009 and each is presented in two charts - full history and a snapshot of the crisis dynamics since 2007.

First the unemployment rates
Notice that since time memorial Dublin runs at or below average in terms of unemployment rates. This pattern is no persistently broken, with Dublin unemployment performing remarkably better in this crisis. Also note that the top tier of unemployment black spots in the country also remains relatively resilient over time. This has to put to test any assertion that state policies to deal with longer term unemployment are working.

Take a look at a closer time frame, relating to the current crisis:
You hear a lot about the MNCs and exporting companies holding our line from a total collapse of economy. Well, say the same for Dublin, South-West and Mid-East. Of course, the latter is largely, hmmm, Greater Dublin, really.

The chart above also hints at something more disturbing here. Recall that early rounds of layoffs impacted predominantly construction sector and associated services. Well, look at Midlands and South-East. It does appear that the two regions were experiencing significantly faster rates of jobs losses in the early parts of the crisis than any other region.

One wonders what is the exact distribution of jobs in the country relative to places of residence. This, of course, is a long running question that CSO is refusing to ask on QNHS. What trouble can there be, folks, in asking a recipient to state where they physically work. It would tell us a lot about people's commuting patterns (helping to better plan transport systems) and about where people are actually employed (helping us to better plan associated business services provisions). But no - CSO staunchly refuses to ask. Why? Because the state is most likely unwilling to admit that the National Spatial Strategy and the IDA/EI mandates to produce jobs for regions is failing. Ireland has natural hubs of jobs and jobs creation potential - Greater Dublin area, Cork area, Galway-Limerick area. This is where jobs concentrate and where companies want to be. So how about a challenge to CSO - ask an important question, will you? Have some gumption...

Back to data: labour force participation rates next
What the charts above show is the precipitous decline in labour force participation rates since the peak of H2 2007. And these declines are worrisome, for we normally tend to ascribe the destructive effects of the economic crises to unemployment, forgetting about those who leave the work force altogether. Well - take a look at charts above.

Another disturbing realization on the foot of the above charts is that regions with lowest participation rates also tend to be regions with higher unemployment. This is important because it signals that even in a small country like Ireland, mobility between residential location and work location is still restricted (by distance, lack of proper roads, transport shortages etc). It also suggests that in the long run, areas with higher unemployment tend to become traps for non-participation in labour force. The vicious spiral of being jobless in an area with no jobs creation leads to becoming disillusioned and dropping out of the work force for good.

And this implies higher rates of overall dependency. Remember - these are numbers for able bodied adults. So if we take the rate of unemployed and add to it the rate of those who are not in the labour force, we get a proportion of population that needs someone else to work for them to sustain themselves. Now, a caveat here - of course some of those who are not in labour force are gainfully engaged in work at homes - non-market activities that are productive and include, among other very important ones, like carrying for the elderly or ill, raising children etc. These, however, are not the majority in these numbers. Nor are they likely to be distributed predominantly into higher dependency areas of the country. So conclusions presented below stand:
Predictably, the lowest dependency ratios are in high work regions: Mid-East and Dublin. And although these ratios rose in these two regions through the crisis, they are still well below the national average and leagues below the dependency ratios for the likes of Border and South-East regions. Here's a closer look:
Of course, what these trends mean is that throughout the entire series duration (from 1998) Dublin and Mid-East have acted as a subsidy generating regions for the rest of the country. Someone had to pay for the higher dependency rates in regions that are above country average (since the welfare rates are not varied geographically).

Economics 02/06/2010: Live Register - no longer flatlining

Liver Register numbers are out today, erasing much of the optimism that might have been building up about unemployment figures over the last couple of months. Here are the updated charts:
Unemployment rate is now rising again, reaching 13.7% after staying flat for the last four months at 13.4%. My forecast in January was that we will hit 13.5% in May. I was wrong. Well, not as wrong as some of our 'official' forecasters who were saying that we are turning the corner on unemployment...

Let's put today's news into perspective:
Notice 'missing' bubbles before May? That is because we had no growth in LR figures (they were actually shrinking) in February-April. Since the beginning of the year, mom, LR increased by 5,800 in January, fell by 2,300 in February, rose by 600 in March and contracted by 500 in April. With May increase of 6,600, we now have a net addition to the LR over the first 5 months of the year of 10,200. The Exchequer cost of these will be around €325 million per annum. In fact it will be probably higher as contractions in employment most likely have taken place in higher value added sectors, given that construction sector has virtually no jobs left to lose.

Taking a slower snapshot of the LR:
You can clearly see an uptick in the series in May. Given how relatively 'sticky' (trend-driven) LR is, this suggests that we might be heading for a new acceleration.

Next consider average weekly series. These are not seasonally adjusted:
However, taking seasonally adjusted data and extracting monthly series shows that we are firmly above the 'stabilization' line of zero change in the LR mom:
So here you have it - labour markets beg to differ from the Government's official line that 'all indicators point to a recovery'...

Economics 02/06/2010: Central bank data analysis

Latest monthly data from the CB is out and here are a couple of updates on series I've been covering before.

First harmonized competitiveness indicators (EU-wide data update coming soon):
Notice some serious progression on competitiveness front is finally starting to take place. This is good. The trend is also good - strong downward trajectory in the series since November 2009. Accelerating again since March. Data lags should not be this significant, so I will be keeping a watch on earnings data from the CSO.

For all the good news, so far we are still in the zone of low competitiveness, down to March 2006 level and well above the period when Ireland Inc was performing at much stronger rates in the 1990s. Remember, these are real indicators, so price levels changes since the 1990s are factored in already.

Private sector credit. First the totals:
We are back to August 2007 levels and the fall rate is slowing down. Year on year change, subsequently, is flat at -9.3% same as in March. Too early to call it a recovery or even a full stabilization, as seasonality suggests that we might see some trend reversal in the short run. Remember, these are declines on already bottom-hitting 2009!

Next: mortgages.
Levels are down to July 2008 and the rate of decline is -1.6% yoy, compared to -1.4% in March. This, however, can be due to a significant declines in mortgages due to write-offs of defaulting loans. In addition, this deterioration rate might be also masking the fact that pretty much anyone in distress who could have done so has already re-negotiated their mortgages in 2009. Thus, only the really tough cases are still sitting out there.

The data on actual new borrowing is below. At the aggregate levels, there is no turn around in household investment, which, of course, is the main leading indicator of recoveries. Also worrisome is the fact that there is no deleveraging of mortgages debt.

Private sector credit outside mortgages is dynamically virtually identical to the total private sector credit figure reported above. Year-on-year changes seem to be reflective of some seasonal effects, with improved rate of contraction in April. General trend is for flatter rates of decline overall since about January. This means little, however, as we need a term structure decomposition of credit in order to tell if this is really a flattening of the downward trajectory or simply restructuring of non-performing lines of credit.

Now, let's take a look at actual changes in rates and volumes in PS credit. First, new loans:
Notice that both for corporates and households, longer term rates are moving up, while shorter term rates are moving down. This likely reflects banks' and interbank credit markets' expectation for a steepening in the interest rate curve, plus some easing in wholesale cost of credit in March. Also note that mortgage rates for new, and especially for fixed rates, mortgages are rising. Hardly a robust support for the housing market.

On corporate investment side, sizable declines for short term maturity loans - operating capital, and reasonably improving environment for larger investment-suitable loans with longer term fixes.

On volumes side, there is a worrisome increase in all shorter term loans - a sign that both companies and households are reliant increasingly on short bank finance for operational and short-term credit. This might mean two things:

1. These increases might reflect increase in supply against a pinned up demand; or
2. These increases might be consistent with increased cash flow pressure on companies (if non-payment and defaults by clients is rising) and households (if arrears are building up on the side of unemployed and underemployed after the households have gone through their savings and redundancies).

We can't tell which one of these forces is operative here. But it does not look to me like operational demand is rising naturally. Remember, so far we only have strong exports performance across the economy. This means you would expect an increase in trade credits (short-term). Most of trade finance in Ireland is actually not done via Irish banks, but through MNCs-own global arrangements. Apart from exports, it is hard to see where organic demand for short term loans would come from.

An even more interesting picture is emerging when we look at existing clients:
Notice how all of the rates changes (except for 5 year plus maturity corporate loans) are trending up? Are the banks ripping off their existent client base to beef up their margins? Well, lets put these changes side by side:
Notice that the above table comparisons are really only loose approximations. But there is a remarkable regularity with which existent loans holders are being loaded with the almost opposite type of changes in rates charged as compared with new clients.

Economics 1/6/2010: Numbers game at Anglo

Last night, I sat down to run through possible scenarios for the Anglo's 'The Bad and the Ugly' Banks division. You see, something was telling me right off the start that the idea of a 'Good' Bank just doesn't really square off with our knowledge of the bank's operations to date.

So I posited to myself the following question: given Nama transfers and rumored split off of €12-15bn worth of loans into a 'good' bank, can the resulting entity be viable? Like a scientist in a lab, I donned on a white coat (well, really my favorite UofChicago sweatshirt), pulled out a Petri dish (my Excel) and started observing the split of that outright not-so-beautiful and very toxic (to the taxpayers) bacteria, called Anglo...

Here are the results, first in numbers and then in plain English:

Step 1: recall we have pumped €10.3 billion worth of promisory notes into the bank alone. Relying on my yesterday's analysis (see details here), I reproduced the demand that a 'Good' Anglo will generate for funding these promisory notes. Now, a reminder - these numbers (penultimate column) correspond to interest only charge on Anglo from the promisory notes. They exclude principal repayment and other recapitalization funding already in the bank.
Bah, I said, the thing in the Petri dish of mine looks pretty ugly. Ugly as in unable to cover the taxpayers-due interest on capital it receives at the first glance.

Ok, I said to myself, but may be were the new 'Good' bank to grow over time, it will become relatively viable with time? Suppose the 'Good' bank generates no impairments going forward (unrealistic assumption, but suppose it does), suppose that 'Good' Anglo grows its book at 5% (generating no new impairments). Further suppose that there's some value in the 'Bad' bank - so assume 20% of the loans transferred to it perform in the future (an extremely optimistic assumption, but what the h***ll, not much out of line with the general assumptions the Government has been making all through its management of the crisis).

The question I asked then was: with all these rosy assumptions in place, what amount of interest payments annually can Anglo afford?

To compute this, I took several scenarios:

1. I allowed 'Good' Anglo to take €12 or €15 billion in loans on board;
2. I assumed that it generates 2% of the loan book annually (another optimistic assumption - as it corresponds to an efficiently operating bank in terms of costs, book of business and funding costs - all of which are not exactly characteristic of the Anglo)
3. I then assumed three different potential burden levels on interest (recall, no principal) repayment at 30% of the total annual return by the bank, 25% and 20%. Let me explain here that a 30% number is utterly unrealistic, implying that almost a third of the entire operating revenue of the bank will be used to pay interest on a small share of its capital funding. This will, in effect, leave no surplus to pay bonuses (of any kind) and dividends (of any kind) as well as to finance bank's insurance etc. 25% mark is also unrealistic, while 20% is back-breaking for a bank, but can be probably sustained over a couple of years.

Table below shows the results by stating the amount of interest repayment that the bank can generate across both its 'Good' and 'Bad' divisions. Blue-bold numbers mark the first time that the annual interest funding requirement gets met.
All of this is fine, I said to myself next, but before the interest requirement is first met on the annual basis, there are years of the bank not covering the interest bills. These will cumulate.

My next question, therefore was: How soon can the bank break into the 'black' vis-a-vis interest repayment alone?
Table above shows the cumulated interest arrears from the €10.3 billion in promisory notes. It clearly shows that under all scenarios, save one (the most optimistic scenario) the entire Anglo operation cannot be expected to generate enough cash to cover even the portion of its interest bill. In fact, under the more realistic scenario (last two columns), Anglo - 'Bad' and 'Good' combined - will continue to accumulate interest arrears on the taxpayers funds (ex €4 billion in direct capital it received) through 2020.

There is no principal repayment charge in the above, nor is there a chance of receiving anything close to the interest bill, even assuming that we do not roll up interest on the cash we put in. In simple words - the entire Anglo operation is so fundamentally bust, that the taxpayer is likely to never receive even a few cents on the euro of the money we've put into it.

The only thing that grew in my Petri dish was a voracious bacteria capable of hoovering taxpayers money at a speed unimaginable to any other bank.

One wonders if that is what Mr Alan Dukes and our Government mean when they are saying that proceeding with keeping Anglo on a respirator amounts to minimizing the cost to the taxpayers.

Economics 31/05/2010: Anglo's latest cash call

This just in - the Government has decided to give Anglo, yes, that very Anglo which is Ireland's real zombie bank with no prospect - even theoretical one - a fresh capital injection of €2 billion (here). This brings taxpayers' capital injected into the bank to €14.3 billion to-date.

The official information by DofF claims that because the injection comes in a form of a promisory note, payable over 10-15 years, there will be lesser impact on the taxpayers today. However, although the official announcement does not say so, this term structure of payments means that our future deficits will be front loaded (pre-committed to the amount announced today), implying that for Ireland to reach required 3% deficit/GDP limit by 2015, we will have to face an increased funding requirement for Anglo over time.

This requirement must be provisioned today, since the notes work in the following way:

• At any point in time between today and 10-15 years from now, Anglo can waltz into DofF's offices and ask for any share - between 0.00001% and 100% of the amount issued on the promisory note.
• At that moment, the Government will have to come up with cash pronto, which means - no time to issue separate bonds.
• Which implies that the very second Mr Dukes asks for cash, our deficit goes up by that exact amount.

Now, prudentially, we should have set an escrow account and provided for this funding. In practice, as is clear from the DofF release, no provisions will be made. The entire, and I repeat, the entire risk of the drawdown therefore is leveled on the shoulders of taxpayers. The DofF in effect is praying to the forces of fortune that Anglo won't come in with a request for funds tomorrow, and/or that any request will not be for the entire sum of the promisiory note.

Now, let us revert back to the 'bank' called Anglo. The State has now committed €10.3 billion in promisory notes. These carry interest rate of... well, I am not sure... but suppose it is 5% to cover the cost of borrowing for these funds in the market, once the funds are disbursed. Assume that 10% of that (actually below a normal charge for a letter of credit for an insolvent company) is outstanding annually until a drawdown. Make a further assumption: assume that Anglo will draw the entire amount in equal annual installments over 5 years - an assumption that is also extremely conservative.

At 5% per annum, Anglo's liabilities to the taxpayers are:
Let me quickly and briefly explain the last 2 columns above. The penultimate column shows the sum of interest charges (at 5% on drawn funds), plus underwriting charge (at 0.5% for undrawn promisory note funds remaining) that Anglo should be paying over the next 10 years, assuming draw down is evenly spread over 5 years on both tranches. The last column then states the amount of loans that are performing that Anglo needs to have on its books in each year to cover the loans interest, not the principal, but interest, assuming that Anglo uses 0.5% of the loans to cover its interest rate, which would roughly amount to 25-30% of its entire interest income on the loans (note - that is really a severe case of the credit squeeze on a bank, but hey, suppose they manage without breaking the back).

How do I come up with this 25-30% estimate? In a normal year, one can expect a fully efficient bank to make ca 2% of their loans volume in revenue. If it pays 0.5% of that amount to cover costs of promisory note, it will be swallowing 25% of the revenue base.

Now, Anglo is transferring to Nama some €35 bn worth of loans, leaving it with ca €30 billion in remaining loans on its books. Of these, roughly 60% is expected to go into the 'bad' bank - in other words, roughly €18 billion worth of loans won't b performing. This leaves it with roughly 40% of loans or €12 billion on the side available for revenue generation. It needs ca €28 billion to cover the cost of the prmisory notes alone...

Get the picture? Even if you dispute my assumptions and half all the costs of the promisory note carry, you still can't get Anglo balance sheet to cover the cost (not the principal) of what it is borrowing from the taxpayers. This puts into perspective the DofF claim that: "As the Minister stated last March the overriding objective of the Government is to minimise the cost to the taxpayer of the restructuring of Anglo Irish Bank".

Economics 31/05/2010: How much more evidence do we need?

In the spirit of my earlier posts on the matter - here is today's press release from Ryanair. Let me add, uncontroversially, that I fully subscribe to Ryanair view that our travel tax (defacto assigned in the Irish Times op ed to Gurdgiev-Ryanair [campaign against the] tax, but since then spreading to include on the opposition side all main airlines based in Dublin) has been hurting tourism in Ireland, while imposing an arbitrary, unnecessary and unjustifiable burden on ordinary families here.

RYANAIR BELIEVES IRISH GOVT HAS CAUSED OUR TOURISM COLLAPSE AS GROWTH RETURNS TO OTHER EU COUNTRIES

INDEPENDENT REPORT SHOWS THAT ONLY COUNTRIES WITH TOURIST TAXES CONTINUE TO DECLINE

Ryanair, Ireland’s largest airline, today (31^st May) published irrefutable evidence that the Irish Govt is responsible for the collapse in Irish tourism as new (independent) statistics show traffic growth has returned to those EU countries that do not impose tourist taxes. These statistics disprove Minister Dempsey’s claims that the fall in traffic and tourism is ‘an international phenomenon’ and proves that Irish tourism is being devastated by the Govt’s €10 tourist tax.

The RDC Aviation report (attached) highlights that Irish seat capacity (which drives passenger numbers) collapsed by over 140,000 in April and by over 700,000 so far in 2010. Seat capacity continues to decline in Ireland, the UK and France - the only European countries which continue to impose tourist taxes. By contrast, growth has returned to countries which have scrapped tourist taxes (Belgium and Holland) or reduced airport charges, in some cases to zero, (Spain) to stimulate tourism growth.

Ryanair warned that this downward trend at Irish airports will worsen throughout 2010 as the DAA makes Ireland even more uncompetitive with a 40% increase in the airport charges to pay for its €1.2bn T2 white elephant.

RDC Aviation: Irish Airport Capacity Jan-Apr

Year	Seats
2009	5,021,727
2010	4,321,433
Decline	– 700,294

Ryanair’s Stephen McNamara said:

“The RDC Aviation report shows that those countries, like Ireland, which impose tourist taxes continue to decline and disproves the Dept of Transport’s claims that the continuing record collapse in traffic at Dublin Airport is ‘an international phenomenon’. The Irish Govt’s €10 tourist tax and high charges at the DAA Monopoly have made Dublin an uncompetitive, expensive destination. Growth has returned throughout Europe except in Ireland, the UK and France which are the only major European countries to tax tourists instead of welcoming them.

“Ireland’s traffic and tourism decline will increase when charges at the DAA Monopoly rocket by over 40% in October as the Dept of Transport rewards the DAA for its traffic decline and the €1.2bn white elephant, T2. Unfortunately 2010 will be even worse than 2009 in terms of lost visitors, jobs and tourism revenues in Ireland. It is time to axe this stupid €10 tourist tax and slash the DAA’s high fees”.

Economics 30/05/2010: A gargantuan task ahead

As the Government continues to insist that the worst is over for Ireland Inc, let us consider some headline numbers on the structure of our public spending.

The figures reported below refer to 2008 comparisons, so they omit most of the horrific fall-out from the current economic crisis. as such, these comparisons relate more to the structural imbalances our state is running, not to the recessionary effects. This is worth keeping in mind, for it means that the differences between Ireland and other states reported below, as well as the adjustments required for us to reach sustainable long term equilibrium on spending and taxation sides will have to be put in place no matter what happens to our economy in years to come. It is also worth keeping in mind because the figures reported below underestimate the extent of our post-2008 imbalances compared to other countries that had experienced much less pronounced crisis over 2009.

All data is taken from the publicly available sources - the IMF and CSO - so the Government and our tax-and-spend crowd of Unions-led economists are fully aware of these. Plausible deniability does not apply, therefore, when it comes to our Government pronouncements about its policies and the current position of the Irish economy on international competitiveness scale.

Chart above plots Ireland's position vis-a-vis its peers in the developed world in terms of the overall size of the primary (non-capital) share of public expenditure in the economy. Two facts worth highlighting here:

• Ireland's Government spending as a share of our real economic income (GNP) is the second highest of all countries in the group, and is well in excess of the average for small open market economies (SOME). It is in excess of Germany (Berlin) and well ahead of the US (Boston).
  
• By this metric, Ireland simply does not qualify as a 'market' economy, as domestic private sector accounts here for less than 47% of GNP! In the USSR of the 1980's, private economy (black market) accounted for around 40% of the total GNP. Get the comparison?

Chart above shows that Irish public sector is clearly one of the most lavishly paid one in the entire developed world. In fact, our public sector wages and earnings swallow over 14.4% of our national income, making Ireland's PS workers the 5th highest paid (on aggregate) in the advanced world. The gap between Irish public sector earnings bill and that for the average SOME is a massive 4.47% of our GNP. Roughly speaking Irish public sector wages bill contains a roughly speaking 48% premium relative to the PS counterparts in similar economies around the world. Clearly, even the reductions in overall take home pay imposed on PS in Budgets 2009-2010 has not erased this premium, especially when one recognizes that since 2008 our GNP has contracted almost in line with the decline in PS pay.

Chart above maps Ireland relative to the US (Boston) and Germany (Berlin) to show just how absurd the whole notion of Ireland Inc being positioned between Boston and Berlin is in the real world. In reality, just one parameter - Social Benefits as a share of GDP/GNP - marks our relative position as being between Boston and Berlin. In every other parameter, we are a basket case of excessive public spending and taxation relative to both the US and Germany.

With the above data in mind, what adjustments in the budgetary positions will be required to bring Ireland into the exact position of being between US and Germany to reflect our stated competitive benefit of being an economy that can facilitate trade and investment flows between the two giants - the EU and US?
To restore our competitive balance we need:

• A cut of €23 billion in gross annual primary spending by the state (current expenditure) - some 14.7% of our GNP. Not €3bn as Brian Lenihan is doing, or €3.5bn as An Bord Snip Nua was suggesting. A whooping €23 billion, folks!
• The cut above cannot come from the capital budget side - where most of the cuts so far took place. It has to be cut from the current expenditure. The reason for this is simple - capital spending is one-off item of expenditure and it is associated, in theory, with a net positive return on investment. Current spending is permanent and yields no financial return.
  
• The cuts must include at the very least a €9.3bn reduction in the wages and pensions bill in the public sector (5.9% of GNP or almost 44% cut in the total PS wages bill, achievable through both reductions in numbers employed and wages paid and pensions benefits entitlements).
• Social benefits, at least in the long run, actually are in line with us being smack between Boston and Berlin, so no adjustment is needed here in the short term (given further deterioration in the fiscal position in Ireland since 2008, I would actually recommend a temporary cut here. Also, longer term reforms, to change the structure of welfare benefits and state pensions must be enacted, but for the reasons different from the budgetary considerations).
• Instead of raising tax revenue, Irish Government should engage in a dramatic reduction of tax burden on the economy. Generally, total tax take in the Irish economy exceeds the average Boston-Berlin position by 6.5% of GNP, requiring a reduction in overall tax burden of €10.3bn on 2008 numbers.
• This reduction in the tax burden should include a cut in personal income tax, CGT and personal gains/profits taxes of 2.1% of GNP or €3.3bn.

There is absolutely no ground for our Government and policy leaders' claims that Ireland is strongly positioned between the low(er) tax US and high(er) tax Germany as a competitive destination for exports and investment arbitrage. In fact, due to the Government-own policies, fiscal and tax imbalances created in this economy mean that we are, at a macroeconomic level, grossly uncompetitive relative to

• both the EU and the US,
  
• as well as relative to our main competitors world wide - the small open market economies.

Economics 29/05/2010: EBS - taxpayers are on the hook, again

One really has to start worrying about the going-ons at the DofF, the CBFSAI and in the Government. After all, over recent weeks we have been told that:

1. The leadership in this country is finally getting its hand on the pulse of the financial sector and the economy (a tale that emerged back in March when Minister for Finance, the Governor of the CB and the FR made back to back statements concerning the plans for the banking sector stabilization, and subsequently went on to assure the nation that all is now going to be fine);
2. Ireland has turned the corner (we've heard this in its various variants since May 2009);
3. With Nama working overtime, lending is about to be restored across the nation;
4. There are no more nasty surprises (apart from the ever-shifting capital targets in the Anglo);
5. That banks can now sort themselves out and hence there will be no need for a sweeping Guarantee extension comes September;
6. That Ireland is so far ahead of the PIIGS curve, it is reckless and dangerous, and erroneous, to claim otherwise.

Well, as of today we, the taxpayers, own another banking institution - the EBS - which, up until now was regarded as the least sickly of the Irish banks. Per Irish Times report today: "The Government’s move came after the society failed to attract private investors. The State now seems set to invest up to €875 million in total over the next 10 years."

Pardon my French, but what the h***ll is going on in our circles of power? One would naturally expect the Government and the regulators responsible for the banking sector to be in a daily contact with the institution, like EBS, while it is engaged in a major talks with potential buyers. And one would expect the talks to progress over time, with some clear indications as to whether the deal was likely or not. A sudden release of this new information is, therefore,

• either a reflection of the fact that our banking sector authorities did not have a clue as to the progression of the talks - in which case they once again failed to 'keep their hand' on the patient's pulse; or
• they have at the very least did not disclose pertinent information to the markets and the public as to the state of these talks.

Either way, the news that the taxpayers are once again stuck for ca €1 billion in bailout funds (more than the amount of €600mln the Spanish Government had to inject in one of its banks, triggering a massive run on Spanish markets) without any, and I repeat, any public official making the matter public until the deal was done!

Of course, another remarkable thing about the deal is that it comes on foot of Nama being deployed in the market. Last year, myself, Brian Lucey, Peter Mathews, Karl Whelan and others have warned that nationalization of the failing Irish banks was the least costly option for their recapitalization that should be pursued. Nationalization of EBS would have cost no more than €650-800 million and would have led to a 100% ownership of the bank by the State. In return, we could have imposed a speedy reform on the bank's board and management, and actively repaired its balancesheet.

Instead, we have paid countless millions for it through Nama, shelled out almost €1 billion in direct capital commitments, supplied it with a state Guarantee worth well in excess of €200 million in risk-related implicit costs, and still control only 51% of the bank. We are now left with a quasi-state asset that cannot be reformed and is at a risk of being left to linger like a zombie stuck between private markets and the politicos.

One wonders, will anyone, responsible for Nama and the rest of our banks policy ever be held accountable for this waste?

Economics 28/05/2010: Spain's downgrade is a warning for Ireland

In a significant development today, Fitch cut Spain’s credit ratings to AA+ from AAA. This was expected.

What was unexpected and new in this development is the expressed reason for the cut.

Per reports, "Fitch said Spain’s deleveraging of record-high levels of household and corporate debt and growing levels of government debt would drag on economic growth." (Globe & Mail)

This puts pressure not only on the euro and European equities, but also on the rest of the PIIGS' sovereign bonds. Ireland clearly stands out in this crowd.

As I have shown here and more importantly - here, Ireland is by far the most indebted economy in the developed world. While it is true that a large proportion of our total external debt accrues to IFSC, even adjusting for that

• Our General Government Debt held externally is the fifth highest in the developed world;
• Our External Banks Debt is the highest in the world;
• Our Private Sector Debt (Total Debt ex Banks & Government) is the highest in the world; and
• Our Total External Debt is the highest in the world.

In addition, per IMF (see here) our budgetary position is one of the weakest in the world, including for the horizon through 2015 (here).

“The downgrade reflects Fitch’s assessment that the process of adjustment to a lower level of private sector and external indebtedness will materially reduce the rate of growth of the Spanish economy over the medium-term,” Fitch’s analyst Brian Coulton said in a statement.

Fitch said "Spain’s current government debt would likely reach 78 per cent of gross domestic product by 2013 from under 40 per cent before the start of the global financial crisis in 2007." Irish debt is projected to reach 94% of GDP by 2015 (IMF) or 122% of GNP - the real measure of our income. If we factor in the cost of Nama and banks, Irish Government debt will reach 122% of GDP by 2015.

This puts into perspective the real scope for public spending cuts we must enact in this and next year's Budgets. The Government aim to reduce spending by a miserly €3 billion in each year through 2012 will not do the job here. We will have to do at least 2.5 times that much to get our house in order.

Economics 28/05/2010: Welfare fun in the Credit Unions land

There are three things one must wonder about when it comes to the Credit Unions in Ireland:

1. Why aren't we hearing more about the going-ons in these fine credit institutions that play a significant role in this economy? After all, credit unions have assets of ca €14.5bn per end of 2009 figures. €6.8bn of this is in loans and €7.3bn in investments. And they act as, in effect, second tier lenders (correcting per a tip from a reader: not in terms of quality of borrowers but in terms of types of loans), with most loans going to unsecured lending on cars, home improvements, personal spending, etc. Could they have miraculously escaped the fate of the banks in the current crisis? Highly unlikely.
   
2. Why do we have a separate regulatory regime for these organizations, if their basic business model is virtually identical to prudentially justified banking?
   

Well, folks - in the land of endless quangoes (aka, Ireland) we have a financial regulator and a separate credit union regulator. The latter, James O Brien, now reportedly wants new additional provisions to be made by the 20 unions (out of 414 - a whooping 5%) operating in Ireland that face “serious solvency issues”. Oops. That was a sudden one. In effect, back in 2008 the Irish League of Credit Unions (yeah, I know, sounds like a Klingon gathering) issued annual report full of concerns for the Credit Unions' state of health on their investment side. Then there was a report into the impairments charges. Which promptly followed by a dramatic decline in the surprise spot inspections of the Credit Unions - the only real tool for assessing just how bad the loan books might be.

Now, we are being told that there are Credit Unions out there which have 'serious solvency issues' - or translated into common language 'might be trading in insolvent conditions'.
Apparently, arrears levels in the Irish credit unions rose from 6% in 2008 to 13.5% in 2009. The Credit Unions Klingon-styled response to this was to lobby Brian Lenihan to allow them continue lending for holidays in the sun to households, some of which can easily be on the verge of running into trouble with the banks. You see, credit unions provide credit after the banks provide secured loans to the punters (again, correcting per a tip from a reader: this does not mean that credit unions lend to a less worthy client than the banks, it means that they supply lower priority - in household budget terms - and largely unsecured loans. Neither does it mean that credit unions provide loans to people who were turned down by the banks. However, it is known that credit unions did provide top up loans for house purchasers who have exceeded mortgage allocation and borrowed to either supply a deposit or cover closing costs on property from the credit unions).

Credit unions do so by taking deposits from the same punters in exchange for the promise of a dividend - an annual payment that is there to replicate deposit rates paid by the banks. Alas, when a company runs into red, unless the company is AIB, the normal practice is to withhold the dividend and use the company earnings to replenish capital base. The credit union movement in Ireland disagrees, arguing that a dividends withdrawal for funding of higher reserves and offsetting losses on loans would damage their 'competitiveness' vis-a-vis the banks.

There is, of course, one major issue with the Unions operations - in effect, absent restoration of the proper functional business banking in this country, Credit Unions are now becoming more actively involved in small businesses operating capital management. This is a risky undertaking for all parties involved and we do not have much data on the matter. Small businesses - sole proprietorships in particular - can blend business cash flow management with personal banking, inducing risk spill-overs from business side to household finances. Increasing reserves requirements on Credit Unions will be likely to put the boot into this, rather atavistic, practice, made necessary by the lack of functional business financing in the core banking sector.


But one must be concerned about the end game here. If the regulator were to listen to the unions, what alternative ways can be found to cover the losses then? None other than a direct injection of cash from the taxpayers. So here we have it - welfare junkies in Ireland have reached a new high. We are being indirectly told that Credit Unions should be allowed to pay dividends out by keeping reserves low, even as they face mounting losses. Surely the taxpayers can provide a cover for these, should the trading environment continue to deteriorate into the future. Happy times, folks!

Economics 28/05/2010: Euro area leading indicators

I have not updated my forecasts for the euro zone growth in some time now, and it is on the 'to do' list. However, as predicted, euro area leading indicator from Eurocoin came in today at a disappointing 0.55% down from 0.67% a month ago and marking a second consecutive monthly decline. The indicator hit 0.79% in March 2010, marking a 3-year high.
This time around, declines in the indicator were driven by the adverse movements in the stock markets valuations. However, decline is absolutely in line with PMIs, despite the industrial production indicator showing sustained growth. Also worryingly, consumer confidence remains below waterline and is trending down again:Exports are on a tear up, rising at a faster rate in May relative to April. This might be the good news for overall growth, but it is clear that domestic investment and demand sides are still recessionary. Of course, there's a popular theory out there - in Brussels, and even here at home in Dublin - that exports will lift us out of the recession. If you think so - look no further than Japan. Japan has managed to maintain booming export activity, amidst shrinking overall economy for two decades now.

Economics 27/05/2010: Mortgages arrears

RTE reports on the CB data on mortgage arrears, stating that:
"New figures from the Central Bank show a 13% increase in the number of mortgages [90-days or more] in arrears [relative to December 2009]. However, the figures also show a fall in the number of legal actions taken by financial institutions to enforce outstanding mortgage debt."

At the end of Q1 2010, over 4% of all private residential mortgage accounts in Ireland were in arrears - the total of over 32,000 of 791,000 mortgages worth €118bn. Median duration of arrears was in excess of 180 days.

"The Central Bank notes a drop of 4.8% in the number of arrears cases in which legal proceedings have been issued. There are just over 3,000 such cases. During the first quarter of this year, 91 properties were repossessed by banks, 26 on foot of court orders and 65 by voluntary agreement of the borrowers or by abandonment. At the end of March mortgage lenders held 456 repossessed residential properties."

The issues not raised by either the CB or RTE are:

1. Have the banks willingness to pursue cases in court been impacted in any way by Nama operations? Nama is a political entity, with potential to influence banks internal decisions.
2. With median duration of mortgages arrears of 180 days, can we expect the number of cases heard in courts to dramatically accelerate in H1 2011?
3. Mortgages reported in arrears do not include mortgages where lender and borrower have renegotiated mortgage covenants, avoiding arrears by switching to interest-only mortgages and/or changing maturity profile of the mortgage, and/or extending a payment holiday.
   
4. What is the median/average size of the mortgage in arrears. It is likely that mortgages currently under stress are larger and cover properties with much more significant extent of the negative equity.
5. What is the sensitivity of arrears to interest rate changes. The statistical eagles in the CB - we do have some there, right? - can easily compute the sensitivity of mortgages default to changes in retail interest rates. All they need for this is longer-run data on mortgages defaults, retail rates, macroeconomic parameters, housing prices etc. Shouldn't take much of time or effort for the CB to get this useful estimate. We can then see just how damaging the ongoing increases in mortgage rates by the banks will be to this society and economy.
   

In effect, we are only seeing the tip of an iceberg here.

Now, one interesting revelation that comes on the foot of these figures is the spread of mortgage debt burden in the country. 791,000 mortgages are outstanding, involving on average more roughly 2 individuals, majority of whom are in employment. This implies that mortgages debt cover in the workforce accounts for roughly 1,580,000 individuals, or 73% of the entire labor force.

Another thing - with 73% of working (or able to work in theory) households already carrying a mortgage (or two), and defaults on mortgages rising 13% per quarter, I guess two natural questions to ask are:

• In the short run: What stabilization in the property markets can one discern here?
• In the long run: what hope can the Government have to collect any sort of serious wealth tax, when most of our wealth has been tied up in, by now, largely devalued property?