Analysis Topic: Interest Rates and the Bond Market
The analysis published under this topic are as follows.
Monday, April 28, 2008
US Fed Expected to Cut Interest Rates to 2% on Wednesday / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
By: William_Patalon_III
U.S. Federal Reserve policymakers will likely cut its key interest rate to 2.0% from 2.25% this Wednesday, which would mark the seventh such move since the central bank launched its rate-reduction campaign in mid-September.
But if the central bank does pare short-term interest rates, it's likely to be the last such move in awhile; the Fed will take a break and give its rate cuts a chance to work their way through the U.S. economic system.
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Sunday, April 27, 2008
Bank of England Mortgage Backed Securities Pricing System / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Mick_Phoenix
Welcome to the Weekly Report. This week we look ahead to the new pricing system for Mortgage Backed Securities and Asset Backed Securities created by the Bank of England, developments in bonds and yields and why the Federal Reserve is central to current yield changes. We ask if the credible policies are leading to increased inflation expectations and look for global reaction. We update the long term trend update for the Dow, FTSE and Gold.Read full article... Read full article...
Saturday, April 26, 2008
US Bond Investors Finally Waking Up to the New Reality of Massive Inflation! / Interest-Rates / US Bonds
By: Money_and_Markets
Mike Larson writes: When the nation's most prominent bond investor, the man who is managing the world's largest bond fund, stops believing in U.S. government debt, it's time to stand up and take notice.
Bill Gross, the blackjack player-turned-bond king, whose words alone can spark rallies and selloffs in the $43-trillion bond market, has actually started betting against U.S. Treasury Bonds!
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Friday, April 25, 2008
Government Intervention Distorts Market Prices and Results in Inflation / Interest-Rates / Market Manipulation
By: Peter_Schiff
Those unfamiliar with marketplace dynamics may not recognize how government activity has created price distortions across our economy. But when these chains fail to restrain the market, the underlying forces become easier to see.
Much as government mandated easy credit propelled home prices to bubble levels, similar forces pushed college tuitions up to the stratosphere. Both systems are currently breaking down along similar lines.
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Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Further US Interest Rate Cuts Will Do Far More Harm than Good / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
By: Mike_Whitney
Last week's stock market blowout added more than 4 percent to the Dow Jones Industrials, but it had no affect on Libor rates. Libor rose steadily from Tuesday through Friday signaling more troubles in the banking system. Libor, which means London Interbank-Offered Rate, is the rate that banks charge each other for loans. It has a dramatic effect on nearly area of investment. When the rate soars, as it did last week, it means that the banks are either too weak financially to lend to each other or too worried about the ability of the other bank to repay them. Either way, it puts a crimp in lending. Banks serve as the transmission point for credit to the broader economy via business and consumer loans. When they're bogged down by their own bad investments or when risks increase; rates go up and the whole process slows to a crawl. When banks are unable to extend credit freely, business activity decreases and GDP shrinks. Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
US Fed Takes Money From Main Street to Give to Wall Street / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Ned_W_Schmidt
U.S. Federal Reserve has forgotten the most essential rule. They should first do no harm. In a rush to bailout the bankers from their self inflicted mortgage mess, Federal Reserve has seriously distorted the U.S. monetary system. In this week's graph are plotted the year-to-year dollar change for several Federal Reserve balance sheet items. Read full article... Read full article...
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
LIBOR Interbank Market Stays Frozen Despite Bank of England £50 Billion Bailout / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Nadeem_Walayat
This weeks Bank of England and UK Treasuries unprecedented near 'panic' action to prevent a string of Northern Rock type Bank Busts has so far failed to have any impact on the interbank market. The spread between the official LIBOR rate and the base rate remains at credit crisis extremes.Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, April 21, 2008
US Interest Rates and Bond Yield Spread- The Full Nine Yards / Interest-Rates / US Interest Rates
By: Captain_Hook
The joke this April Fool's Day was on the short sellers with yet another squeeze higher in stocks. Of course this has not been a problem since last summer as stocks have been (and remain) in a bear market. Unfortunately for short sellers this time around however, this bounce will likely be more robust than previous occurrences in that important cyclical influences have now gone positive, which will act as a tail wind for the bulls in fits and starts (choppy price action) right into the second quarter of next year. In this regard yesterday's violent rise was fuelled by hedge funds officially reversing the sell stocks / dollar and buy commodities / precious metals trade for the new quarter, implying they will endeavor to maintain these positions until June. And it just so happens this is when we are looking for a recovery high in stocks this year, sometime in and around mid-June in a possible double top test after an initial spike here in April, normally a seasonally strong month even in weak years. Of course May should provide some excitement to the downside however, which would bring gold / commodities back to life as the dollar ($) is sold once again. Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, April 21, 2008
Bank of England Throws £50 billion of Tax Payers Money at the Banks / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The credit crisis is forcing the Bank of England to morph the Collaterised
Mortgage Backed Securities Market into the Collaterised UK Government Bond Backed Mortgage Market. In effect the Bank of England is swapping 100% guaranteed Government Bonds for illiquid, un-priceable Mortgage backed junk securities. Thus allowing the banks to offer Government Bonds as security on the Interbank Market. Read full article... Read full article...
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Fed Interest Rate Cut Could Spark Bond Market Panic Selling / Interest-Rates / US Bonds
By: Mick_Phoenix
Welcome to the Weekly Report. This week I have to highlight conditions in the bond markets as a priority, we maybe about to endure a bust of quite large proportions. I will also look at some longer term stock market indicators, confirmation that the Bank of England will follow the US and show why the current rally in stocks is due to a visit from an old friend, as readers at Livecharts.co.uk will know only too well.
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Friday, April 18, 2008
Federal Reserve Notes Backed by Worthless Mortgage Bonds- Who Will Bail Out the Fed? / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Andy_Sutton
The silence has been deafening. Since that fateful weekend in the middle of March when they almost lost control, things have been eerily quiet. In fact, today, the DOW finds itself up over 200 points in the face of another $5 Billion in losses at Citigroup. The losses have been spun as positive with most in the financial press saying in essence that we should be happy because it could have been a lot worse. Many have now even boldly called a bottom in the losses stemming from the subprime mortgage crisis. Haven't we heard this before?
Friday, April 18, 2008
LIBOR Sends Another Warning Signal to the Global Financial Markets / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Martin_Hutchinson
The news that the London Interbank Offer Rate (LIBOR) system of setting interest rates is running into trouble was surprising at first glance. It seems some banks are giving phony LIBOR quotations that don't reflect the true rates at which they accept deposits. In the perfect financial system, beloved of regulators and academics, this kind of discrepancy shouldn't happen.
In the real world it does, and I'll explain why.
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Thursday, April 17, 2008
Credit Crisis SCOOP- LIBOR Is Now Irrelevant to Derivatives Pricing / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Rob_Kirby
In the latest Office of the Comptroller of the Currency – Quarterly Derivatives Report [Q4/07], we learn that outstanding notionals for reporting banks declined by 8 Trillion. Furthermore, we are told that the overall decline was “driven by a 9.2 Trillion reduction in interest rate contracts – mostly swaps with maturities of less than one year .” Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Bank of England Prepares to Ramp Up the Money Printing Presses / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Nadeem_Walayat
Gordon Brown having bottled out of an October 2007 election ahead of an economic slump during 2008 and 2009, is now attempting to prepare the ground works for an 2009-2010 election by giving the Bank of England the green light to print as much money as is necessary to enable the UK banks to restart lending to the consumer so as to prevent a multi-year housing bear market with accompanying recession that will ensure his election defeat.Read full article... Read full article...
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Forget the Credit Crisis Headlines, Listen to the Bond Market! / Interest-Rates / US Bonds
By: Clif_Droke
Let's turn our attention to something that isn't often discussed, namely bonds.
I know what some of you are saying already: “But bonds are boring!” Yes, they may well be boring in most instances. But this isn't one of those times. Actually, the message of the bond market is one of the more exciting and optimistic messages being sent anywhere in the financial markets right now and it behooves us to pay close attention to what bonds are saying.
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Monday, April 14, 2008
Central Banks' in Tatters- Facts are Stubborn Things Part II / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Joseph_Russo
The ALADDIN'S lamp of Central Banking coming FULL Circle - If one is inclined toward general agreement with the notion that the pinnacle of power in the world is the power to create money, - then one must hastily conclude that; the government-aligned private organizations of central banking cartels, whom fund all of the worlds imperial centers of power, – must then be held as the absolute mightiest of powers, whom preside at the highest seat of omnipotent influence over a vast array of interconnected relationships across the entire global landscape. Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, April 14, 2008
Greenspan- He Did It His Way (Unfortunately) / Interest-Rates / Market Manipulation
By: Brady_Willett
Greenspan did another media tour last week, this time defending his legacy in the Financial Times , Wall Street Journal , and on CNBC Television . Unfortunately the story from Greenspan was much the same: he reiterated that the financial markets are best left to self-regulate, and that investors around the world (not the Fed) took control of long-term interest rates thus leading to the U.S. housing bubble. Astonishingly, Greenspan added, “I have no regrets on any of the Federal Reserve policies that we initiated back then…' and ‘I don't remember a case when the process by which the decision making at the Federal Reserve failed.' Read full article... Read full article...
Monday, April 14, 2008
Central Banking- Why Fix What Does Not Work? / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Darryl_R_Schoon
Time of the Vulture - In times of expansion, it is to the hare the prizes go. Quick, risk taking, and bold, his qualities are exactly suited to the times. In periods of contraction, the tortoise is favored. Slow and conservative, quick only to retract his vulnerable head and neck, his is the wisest bet when the slow and sure is preferable to the quick and easy.
Every so often, however, there comes a time when neither the hare nor the tortoise is the victor. This is when both the bear and the bull have been vanquished, when the pastures upon which the bull once grazed are long gone and the bear's lair itself lies buried deep beneath the rubble of economic collapse.
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Sunday, April 13, 2008
Bank of England Applies Eggertsson Theory to Interest Rate Cut / Interest-Rates / UK Interest Rates
By: Mick_Phoenix
Welcome to a Weekly Report special, incorporating further discussion of last weeks Occasional Letter.
This week we look at an example of Eggertsson Theory in practise, what really worries the Fed and what is their favourite import, how expectations can be managed, why General Electric are going to struggle and I announce something a little different. A lot to cover and I am pressed for time so let's get on with it.
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Saturday, April 12, 2008
Interbank Market Fails to Respond to UK Interest Rate Cut / Interest-Rates / Credit Crisis 2008
By: Nadeem_Walayat
Following Thursdays UK interest rate cut to 5% from 5.25%, which followed unprecedented action by the Bank of England in providing £15 billion in liquidity to the UK banking system in recent weeks. So far the interbank market has failed to respond to these actions, which saw the 3 Month Libor rate / base rate spread expand to recent credit crunch extremes as illustrated by the below graph.Read full article... Read full article...