Posts from Thursday Aug 2 2012

The Closer

| Aug 02 2012 22:24 | Comment |

ROUND UP

Markets were spooked by fresh Eurozone fears today, as the ECB failed to commit to any large-scale sovereign bond purchases. The S&P 500 fell 0.74 per cent. (Bloomberg). Read more

Was Draghi really a disaster?

Joseph joined FT Alphaville way back in March 2010. He likes all the politically and legally fiddly bits of finance. He also likes credit, rates, global macro, tail risk, and all that stuff. (You should email him story ideas. He’ll take anything.)

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| Aug 02 2012 18:05 | Comment |

Convertibility, seniority… “modalities”.

Was it a disaster or not? Anyway here’s the goods: Read more

There be Draghis

Izabella Kaminska joined FT Alphaville in October 2008. Before that she worked as a producer at CNBC, a natural gas reporter at Platts and an associate editor of BP's internal magazine.

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| Aug 02 2012 17:22 | Comment |

Given last week’s declaration that Draghi would do “whatever it takes” to restore the transmission mechanism and Europe with it… what could possibly have led to Thursday’s disappointing ECB action?

Was it that… Read more

A hard day’s Knight

Joseph joined FT Alphaville way back in March 2010. He likes all the politically and legally fiddly bits of finance. He also likes credit, rates, global macro, tail risk, and all that stuff. (You should email him story ideas. He’ll take anything.)

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| Aug 02 2012 14:53 | Comment |

Market cap (at yesterday’s close): $681.5m

Cash (as of 30 June 2012): $365m Read more

Draghi: “Over the coming weeks, we will design the appropriate modalities for such policy measures”

Paul Murphy is the founding editor of FT Alphaville.

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| Aug 02 2012 14:24 | Comment |

In other words, ‘We’ll see you after the holidays.’  Which in chart form looked like this on Thursday…

 Read more

Draghi, live

Paul Murphy is the founding editor of FT Alphaville.

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| Aug 02 2012 12:48 | Comment |

No change from the ECB after its August meeting. Click the pic to watch the ECB presser at 13.30, London time. And/or go here for the live FT.com blog hosted by Ralph Atkins.

 Read more

The (early) Lunch Wrap

Izabella Kaminska joined FT Alphaville in October 2008. Before that she worked as a producer at CNBC, a natural gas reporter at Platts and an associate editor of BP's internal magazine.

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| Aug 02 2012 10:39 | Comment |

Good morning New York,

FT ALPHAVILLE Read more

How do you solve a problem like RBS?

Masa joined the FT in 2009 and has worked on a number of desks across the paper, including Companies, Markets and Comment. She spent much of 2010 in New York covering the US equity markets. But earlier this year she finally saw the light and moved to Alphaville.

She started her career in the investment banking division at Lehman Brothers in the summer of 2007, timing it perfectly with the beginning of the credit crunch.

She studied philosophy, politics and economics at Oxford University.

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| Aug 02 2012 10:38 | Comment |

Almost four years after the Royal Bank of Scotland was part-nationalised, the UK government is still struggling to figure out what to do with it. Until recently the discussion was focused on when and how to sell the state’s 82 per cent stake back to the market. Now the focus is on fully nationalising it. Go figure.

From Thursday’s FT: Read more

Let’s hear from some of the less-vocal ECB-ers

Paul Murphy is the founding editor of FT Alphaville.

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| Aug 02 2012 09:59 | Comment |

Yeah, yeah. We all know the views on bond-buying from the likes of Draghi, Weidmann and Nowotny. But what about other ECB council members?

Ahead of Thursday’s fateful meetings, here’s a rundown, courtesy of Neil Mellor and team at BNY Mellon: Read more

A bearish bullish indicator

Lisa joined FT Alphaville in September 2011 after a tour of duty through the guts of the financial industry, having worked as an analyst at a bank and for a financial data company.

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| Aug 02 2012 09:17 | Comment |

The next time you’re out with friends who don’t work in finance, try explaining to them how an indicator pointing to equity armageddon can be a sign of wonderful things to come…

Maybe buy them a few drinks first though. Read more

Further reading

Lisa joined FT Alphaville in September 2011 after a tour of duty through the guts of the financial industry, having worked as an analyst at a bank and for a financial data company.

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| Aug 02 2012 08:25 | Comment |

Elsewhere on Thursday,

- How not to support our troops. Read more

The 6am Cut London

| Aug 02 2012 05:42 | Comment |

An electronic-trading glitch distorted the trading of nearly 150 US stocks on Wednesday. Although market-maker Knight Capital has admitted to being the source of the problem, it remains unclear exactly what happened (Wall Street Journal). Knight said it was reviewing “a technology issue occurred in the company’s market-making unit” and had advised clients to route their orders away (Financial Times).

The Federal Reserve signalled it will ‘closely monitor’ the economy for signs of deterioration, but did not ease policy further. Dashing hopes that it would signal low rates for a year longer than it currently forecasts, the FOMC stuck to its view that they shall remain near zero ‘until late 2014′ (Financial Times). But the language of close monitoring, and a commitment to ‘provide additional accommodation as needed’, hinted at stronger action further ahead (Wall Street Journal). Or maybe it didn’t (Money Supply). Read more