2011

EuroStoxx 600 is down over 1%, EZ bond yields mostly higher after Spanish and French bond auctions. Financial market stress (banking and credit) continues to intensify amid lack of progress on debt crisis. UK October retail sales saw…

Monetary union was not a good idea, even in the best of circumstances. Time to abandon the failed experiment?

The yen and the Swiss franc were seen as safe haven currencies during the tumultuous crisis in Europe. The Swiss National Bank has effectively and apparently cheaply took the franc out of the game. This may have increased some speculative…

The following numbers come from a recent article in Die Welt on the backlash in Europe against the ratings agencies.

The following is the text of the recent ratings action taken by Moody's on twelve German state-owned banks.

Former bank of England central banker and present Citigroup Chief Economist Willem Buiter spoke to Tom Keene this morning on Bloomberg Radio. His view is similar to mine, that Europe must act now to avoid a default. He believes we could…

We have a good friend with money tied up in the MF Global debacle. As of November 1st, he had close to $100K in his “segregated” futures account with no open positions. He says the MF Global website is shut down and the phones don’t…

This phrase 'lender of last resort' has been bandied around by people who, it seems to me, have no idea what lender of last resort actually means, to be perfectly honest. It is very clear from its origin that lender of last resort by a…

And just two days after I reported on the starve-the-beast strategy that’s forcing the SEC to pursue Mickey-Mouse settlements with the big banks, we learn of plans to handicap the Commodities and Futures Trading Commission in a similar…

The well known eurosceptic Nigel Farage is having a field day over the sovereign debt crisis in the euro zone. Farage says that the EU lacks democratic legitimacy, a complaint heard ever more often during this crisis. He goes further,…