WISE MONEY

We can all agree that the economic data releases at the moment are confusing and clouded in fog. In the UK, the Nationwide survey last week showed UK house prices declining month on month by 0.9%, today the Halifax Survey reports house price increases of 0.2% from July.

Positive consumer confidence figures were followed by disappointing PMI index figures, with the net result that traders have been left bewildered and slightly uncertain and the markets necessarily choppy.

This morning’s releases are no different, industrial production came in lower than forecast and manufacturing production exactly as predicted, but we saw an almost one cent move upwards in Sterling in the run up to the figures, and are in the midst of a retracement back to where we started.

Conflicting data has also been a theme in the US, with the raft of negative data suddenly reversed with positive ISM & employment figures at the end of last week.

What was becoming a clear picture of a slowing US economy and potential re-entry into recession was suddenly muddled slightly with the apparently positive figures. However, investors remain fearful of the stalling US recovery (and impending QE2) with traditional safe haven currencies like the Swiss Franc and Japanese Yen continuing to perform strongly.

The Yen hit the highest level against the Dollar since 1995 yesterday, as the supposedly psychological key level of 84 was brushed aside easily. This afternoon sees Narayana Kocherlakota of the Federal Reserve speak, along with the release of their beige book & consumer credit statistics.

Euro worries have remerged with the  market’s realising the total uselessness of the eurp bank stress tests, and a unexpected drop in the growth of German Exports.

Back in July, 91 of Europe’s largest banks were required to disclose how much government liability from European countries they held on their balance sheets. Euro regulators said the data showed banks’ total holdings of that debt as of March 31st. At the time, worries about the Banks’ government-debt holdings were fanning fears about the health of Europe’s banking system as a whole.

Release of the bank data was considered the main benefit of the stress tests, which were widely criticized as being lenient overall, but taken as showing that the exposures were not as widespread and extreme as had been feared.

According to an article in today’s Wall Street Journal, “An examination of the banks’ disclosures indicates that some banks didn’t provide as comprehensive a picture of their government-debt holdings as regulators claimed.

Some banks excluded certain bonds, and many reduced the sums to account for “short” positions they held—facts that neither regulators nor most banks disclosed when the test results were published in late July”.

Asian markets, starved of news or data input following the US/Canadian Bank Holiday, seized upon this article and dumped the Euro – especially versus the Yen – on fears that eurozone governments and institutions would accordingly find it difficult to raise new and renew maturing funding with doubts returning over the health of the region’s finance.

The Yen was the favoured recipient on the lack of mention of the strength of the currency in the statement from the Bank of Japan which followed their decision to leave Japanese rates and QE levels on hold.

The Central Bank now seems more confident of strong domestic growth, and the expectation is that lower unemployment and increasing inflationary pressures will prompt the Bank to resume a hike in official rates later this year.

Also this morning, Australia’s Labour Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, finally secured the support of two key Independent MPs which enable her to form a working Government with a majority of 2 over the opposition party.

George Osborne has said that banks must increase lending to businesses rather than boosting bonuses and dividends now that they have weathered the worst of the credit crisis. Britain’s Treasury chief said that banks “have an economic obligation to assist” small and medium-sized businesses.

The statement comes in line with half-year figures released this week that are expected to confirm that the major institutions have returned to profit after two years of turmoil.

Lloyds Banking Group, which is 41% owned by the taxpayer, and the 84% state-owned Royal Bank of Scotland are both expected to post a profit. But Osborne questions the ability of British businesses to raise credit from the banks.

“The danger is that, particularly next year, when there is a huge amount of refinancing required, that the small and medium-sized businesses suffer from a lack of access to working capital,” he said.

Osborne continued that British banks “are in no doubt that the government wants to see reasonable access to credit on reasonable terms in the small to medium-sized business sector.”

The expected bank profits have boosted the recent Cable rally and we are now trading in the 1.58s and well on track to the key 1.60 psychological level.

One in fifth of the 7.66 trillion yuan (1.1 trillion dollars) that Chinese banks lent to local governments is “at serious risk of default”, is the latest potential default risk problem to halt the global recovery. Chinese banks lent vast sums of capital to local Chinese governments for construction projects after Beijing called for nationwide efforts to stimulate the economy.

However, only one quarter of projects financed by the loans have the ability to meet repayments, according to the Century Weekly.

The banking regulators, along with the banks that have the biggest exposure, will carry out detailed discussions with local governments starting in September about how to recoup the loans, the report said.

China has powered out of the global crisis on the back of a stimulus package worth four trillion yuan and the state-backed bank lending, which saw new loans nearly double from the previous year to 9.6 trillion yuan in 2009.

This latest potential default raised concerns in Beijing over a possible new crop of bad loans that could threaten the world’s third-largest economy.

The results of the Eurozone bank stress tests were eventually released on Friday evening showing only 7 of the 91 banks tested were deemed to have failed, and the capital shortfall was estimated at €3.5 bn. Both are very much at the lower end of consensus forecasts, raising questions over the credibility of the tests. Interestingly, a sovereign default or restructuring scenario was not included, as media leaks earlier in the week had suggested.

At the press conference, ECB Governing Council Member Constancio justified this decision by noting that “instruments have been put in place precisely to avoid that scenario”. Nevertheless, as the leaks had suggested, many participating banks voluntarily disclosed their sovereign debt holdings, and this has brought some improved transparency on sovereign debt exposure.

This seems to have averted any euro selling pressures as the single currency continues to trades close to Friday’s 1.29 range against the dollar.

From a data perspective, the euro had already managed to move higher on Friday morning after stronger than expected German business sentiment data. The German IFO business confidence index recorded its strongest rise for 20 years in July.

The closely watched index rose to 106.2 points from 101.8 in June. Germany’s economy shrank by almost 5% last year, but has been recovering due to strong exports. The result was much better than expected, with most economists having expected a slight fall.

Sterling has just received a welcome boost after the release of positive retail sales figures.Data showed a 0.7% increase month-on-month & 1.3% yoy, the highest monthly figure since April 2008.

The ONS suggested the World Cup boosted consumption of electrical goods, which after England’s performance should see a double whammy when people look to replace the TV’s thrown out of the window after the Germany game.

Bank of England minutes released showed a 7-1 vote in favour on keeping interest rates on hold, with Andrew Sentence, the only dissenter, voting for a rate rise. More interestingly, the minutes showed discussion of an extension to the asset purchase scheme if, as expected, the economic outlook continued to deteriorate.

Sterling continues its recent volatility in light of the comments & also rumour circulating yesterday that the bank has reopened dollar swap lines and low liquidity in the market exaggerates moves.

The Euro continues to tread water ahead of the Stress test results. There is increasing uncertainty around the release of the results, the planned announcement is today at 4.30pm.

Strange that an exercise in reducing uncertainty and restoring credibility is actually having the opposite effect, and that is feeding though to the Euro which now trades lower against both Sterling and the Dollar.

The perceived safe haven of the Swiss Franc has also hit the headlines as the SNB announced a huge FX loss following large bouts of currency intervention earlier in the year. The continuing strength of the Swissy will be a real headache for the central bank as it fights to remain out of a potential deflationary spiral brewing in the Eurozone.

Last night Ben Bernanke, Chairman of the Federal Reserve, delivered his twice yearly report to Congress where he outlined their outlook on the US economy.
Due to the oblique nature of Central Bank parlance, Mr Bernanke’s speech was closely watched for any indication, however vague, that the Fed thinks the economic recovery in the US is not proceeding the pace originally thought.

He duly obliged, saying that the outlook was “unusually uncertain” and stressing again that persistently high unemployment remains a real problem and is likely to remain so for an extended period.

The dovish tone and increasingly cautious outlook naturally led to a reduction in risk appetite and the corresponding sell off in US equities and rise in the Dollar.

Cable had a volatile days trading yesterday, just before 8am we saw a huge Sterling sell, dropping from 1.5290 to 1.5168 in a minute before recovering after reports of a fat finger or algorithmic trading problem at a bank in the Netherlands.

Whatever happened, we are sure someone is seeking alternative employment this morning.

This week is all about the euro and the approaching stress test results which will offer much needed feedback on the health of European banks.
The euro has experienced a significant turn of fortune from its June 4 and half low against the USD gaining over 10 cents to test the 1.30 level.

One reason that the euro has gained is simply that the market was significantly over short in the euro and naturally a lot of these short investors paired their positions leading to a short squeeze higher.

In addition some comfort has come back into the euro approaching Fridays stress test results as comments in the run up from members of the IMF and the ECB have been bullish – we will see!

Recent gains have led to EUR/USD testing the 1.30 level and GBP/EUR falling back into 1.17 territory. The results are due out from 5pm GMT on Friday- good feedback should push EUR/USD over 1.30.

The Euro rose significantly yesterday rising up to 1.2991 against the dollar and breaking, although briefly 1.30, a ten week high.The gains were owed to more weak data from the US where home-builder sentiment fell more than expected in July to the lowest level in over a year and comments from many of the EU countries stating their most important banks had passed the stress tests.

Germany, whose sources said Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank passed the tests look set to see Hypo Real Estate, a small nationalised mortgage lender fail, and it could be the first of many banks who specify in that market.

With the housing market across Europe still struggling, banks who exclusively work in that sector could have overly exposed balance sheets and be the next to require a takeover or even a bailout.

The Euro has also gained massively against Sterling falling well back from the high of 1.2380 3 weeks ago to 1.1750.

The BoE will be releasing the MPC Meeting minutes from the July rate decision tomorrow where we will find out more details to the divide growing in the committee.

We get our first view today at the methodology behind the stress tests currently being applied to European banks to assess their health.The markets reaction will not be instant due to the expected weighty tome of equations and statistics to wade through. However, there is a key point worth noting in advance.

Analysts will be looking for the models to incorporate large haircuts on holdings of Greek bonds, maybe 30 pence in the pound and similar (but not as severe) on other periphery Eurozone countries bonds.

If, as the Financial Times suggests, the haircut in the models is significantly less than 30 per cent, the credibility of the tests and as such the banks they are testing will be completely undermined.

The whole point of these tests is to restore confidence into the banking system so it is vital that the methodology is perceived as credible. We can then wait with baited breath rather than indifference, for the results of the tests on 23rd of July.

The Dollar gave up further ground to Sterling and Euro on the back of the disappointing employment data from the US on Friday.

However, the Forex market is either ignoring or completely in the dark about when Mr Obama will begin to tackle the US budget deficit (I think it may be a combination of both). Currently running at over 9% of GDP, it seems some in the US are unwilling to implement similar austerity measures to those in the UK to tackle the deficit.

And since the US makes up such a large slice of world demand, any budget cuts and the time scale over which they are implemented will have wide reaching implications for its main trading partners, China, The UK and the Eurozone and also for the Dollar over the coming months.

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