Markets

As the Q2 winds down, it may be useful to review the recent correlations between some of the major currencies and the US S&P 500. The correlation calculations are conducted on the basis of percentage change of the currency and the…

There has been a net withdrawal from US money market funds and it appears that the funds have moved to strictly US Treasury or US high grade money market funds. Banks appear to be responding by hedging/securing funding through yen swaps. In…

Michael Mauboussin talks to Consuelo Mack about why its getting harder to beat the market and why doing less can actually make you more.

The fact that this withdrawal of liquidity has already begun, though, does make the situation more acute. The question is what to do about it. It seems to me that the present path is not instilling a sense of confidence in investors.

Here’s an interesting note from UBS’ Andy Lees on the background story to the oil market. You may have heard that US President Obama decided to release some of the oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR). This move was bearish for…

The following report by Fitch from Tuesday highlights the cross-Atlantic channel through which credit market volatility could spread. US money markets have significant exposure to the European banking system. The worry is that a Greek…

Yesterday, I indicated that the FOMC has already considered offering unlimited quantitative easing to target specific interest rates during the second round of quantitative easing. I believe the Fed will do this in QE3, and apparently Bill…

In my view, a CDS trigger could be a Lehman-style event, yes. Moreover, only a hard restructuring – meaning principal reduction would actually have any meaningful impact on peripheral CDS or interest rates. So, I expect the euro zone…

If you have fewer players operating wells, then the supply should be lower. It sounds to me like the rush to buy up natural gas acreage has strained balance sheets in a way that will force up prices down the line.

Point for point, I agree with the commentary from Felix Zulauf in this week’s Barron’s mid-year roundtable discussion. For long-time Credit Writedowns readers, you will recognize almost every one of these points from previous posts. It is…