Comment and Analysis in Friday’s FT,
Dear Lucy: Listening to ‘cooing’ colleagues
The FT’s ‘agony aunt’ answers a desperate reader: “Several times a day my colleague telephones his wife and his taciturn manner is replaced by a sickly cooing. ‘Hello, honey pie,’ he says in a baby voice. It is driving me so demented that every time he picks up the phone I find myself tensing up. Can you recommend anything?”
Gillian Tett: The human factor and banking’s abstract models
This decade, financiers have invented so many brilliantly clever mathematical tools to repackage risk that the industry has slipped, almost unthinkingly, into an assumption that “credit” is a collection of abstract equations, invincible even when human common sense raises an alert.
Global equities (1): Online Q&A — shelter from the storm?
After the worst first half in more than a decade, equity investors are bracing for further losses. Does the second half hold as much pain as the first? And where are investors likely to find shelter? Post questions to Patrick Legland, global head of equities at SocGen, who will answer in an online discussion Monday. Post questions at ask@ft.com or click on the link above.
Global equities (2): Lex: Don’t run from the bear
When confronted by a bear, the advice is never to turn and run. Equity investors may, though, be looking for the nearest tree to climb. In the anatomy of this bear, however, the cycle of earnings downgrades has barely begun. with a tough earnings season ahead, those already startled should prepare for a grislier beast to come.
Global equities (3): UK Daily View, video: Whither European equities?
The FT’s Rachel Morarjee discusses the outlook for European equities and why hopes for a rebound in March may be wide of the mark.
The Short View, video: The rise and rise of the ECB
The one safe prediction on Thursday was volatility, writes John Authers. So it proved. Some assumptions that traders had held, however, may have been disproved. Clearly the most important event was the press conference by Jean-Claude Trichet of the ECB which boosted the euro and left Wall Street with the nasty thought that the dollar now seems to rely on the words of the ECB. Text version here.
View of the Day: Prospects for the yen carry trade
A surge in interest from Japanese retail investors in selling the low-yielding yen increases the danger of a sharp rally in the currency, says Junya Tanase, at JPMorgan.
News analysis: CDS flaws exposed by tough conditions
Credit derivatives were hailed as one of the most impressive innovations in the pre-credit crunch world, writes the FT’s David Oakley. But this year, as the markets came under increasing strain, liquidity in the credit default swaps markets began to dry up too, raising doubts over their value as an indicator of risk and funding costs.