September, 2009
Snap news
Breaking pre-market news on Wednesday,
- UK Coal to raise £100m through share placing and open offer – statement.
- Weir Group says Keith Cochrane to succeed Mark Selway as chief executive – statement.
King rules out rapid economic recovery
The pound fell and yields on government bonds sank to record lows on Tuesday after Mervyn King, Bank of England governor, doused hopes of a swift economic rebound and warned households and businesses of a “slow and protracted”
Brussels may force Lloyds to surrender Halifax, Times says
The European Commission has warned Lloyds Banking Group that it may have to split off Halifax as punishment for the billions of pounds of state aid that it has received, the Telegraph Times said. Neelie Kroes,
Citi raises $5bn in bail-out bonds
Citigroup raised $5bn in government-guaranteed bonds on Tuesday under an emergency FDIC facility due to expire in six weeks and which has been abandoned by most of its rivals as market conditions improved.
Anadarko venture discovers new oil frontier
Anadarko, of the US, with partners Woodside, Repsol, and Tullow, the UK-listed oil company, will reveal as early as Wednesday that they have established a new oil frontier that stretches 1,100km along the coast from Ghana to Sierra Leone.
Banks face restrictions on bonuses
Banks will face limits on the total amount they pay their staff in bonuses until they meet more demanding capital requirements, an international body of regulators and central bankers agreed on Tuesday.
Watchdog to set out rules for UK banks ‘living wills’
Plans to force UK banks to prepare “living wills” so they can be dismantled more easily in a crisis have started to be drawn up by the City watchdog, the FT said. Large UK banks will be required to detail what businesses they would sell to raise emergency funds and allow them to wind up their trading books within 60 days of a collapse,
Ocado set for likely IPO with new finance director
Ocado will announce on Wednesday that it is appointing an experienced investment banker as a finance director in the clearest signal yet that the online retailer is gearing up for an initial public offering,
Wells Fargo urges US to boost mortgage market
The US government should help revive the moribund market for big mortgages by getting Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to buy large home loans from banks, the chief executive of the lender Wells Fargo urged in an interview with the FT on Tuesday.
Magna feels the heat over Opel plans
Magna’s plans to take a majority stake in GM’s loss-making European arm Opel triggered a backlash on Tuesday when German carmakers Volkswagen and BMW voiced unease over the deal and warned that they would review links with the Canadian car parts supplier,
Facebook boasts positive cash flow
Facebook says it now has more than 300m users and that its cash flow is positive, two milestones that re-emphasise its position as one of the fastest-growing internet sites, the FT reported. Mark Zuckerberg,
Overnight markets: Up
Asian stocks rose, led by electronics and mining companies, after US retail sales and New York manufacturing reports beat economist estimates and commodity prices advanced, Bloomberg said. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index gained 1.3 per cent to 117.31 as of 11:41 a.m.
[The Stanford Series] A public defender rides to Sir Allen’s rescue
Accused Ponzi schemer and former titan of business and sport Sir Allen Stanford – currently behind bars and awaiting trial on a slew of criminal charges – has been assigned a public defender to represent him.
S&P sees “meaningful financial stress” for Spain’s banks – €96.5bn worth
Rating agency Standard & Poor’s on Tuesday issued a comprehensive and downbeat note on the Spanish banking sector, something of a hot topic here on FT Alphaville.
Below are extracts from the note, any emphasis ours:
CDS report: Tepid US opening dents sentiment in Europe
Markit’s Gavan Nolan wrote this CDS report
European credit indices continued to tighten on Tuesday, though they lost some ground after a tepid US opening. The Markit iTraxx Europe index was trading around 85.5bp,
Hello, is Enibody out there?
Knight Vinke – thy name strikes fear into the hearts of chief executives across the land.
The activist investor, armed with just a minority stake, has in the past jousted with such dragons of corporate waste as Royal Dutch Shell and its British-Dutch dual board structure,
Sectioned structured finance, quote du jour
Reuters has got hold of some of the emails leading up to UBS’s now infamous characterisation of its CDOs as `vomit’. A choice extract:
China: The world’s new local bank
Last Friday, South Africa’s largest lender Standard Bank announced it had signed a $1bn loan facility with four Chinese banks.
On Tuesday, China’s Caijing Magazine offered a little more insight into what actually motivated that move for Standard Bank — which by the way is 20 per cent owned by Industrial and Commercial Bank of China. As they wrote (our emphasis):
Lunch Wrap
On FT Alphaville Tuesday morning,
- Mervyn King’s bank deposit slap down.
- Inflation gestation.
- Day of the Dead – Lehman lives!
- How accounting makes IBs.
- “Nymex gas is a bubble.”
- Roll on,
Inflation gestation
So where’s the deflation which Bank of England governor Mervyn King is so desperate to avoid?
The UK’s rate of inflation is slowing — but it’s certainly not nearing deflation levels. The Consumer Prices Index annual inflation rate was 1.6 per cent in August,
Mervyn King’s bank deposit slap down
Yowch!
Remember the hooplah over UK banks hoarding all that lovely QE money instead of passing it into the banking system? Well, the BoE’s Mervyn King said on Tuesday that he was ready to reduce the rate paid on deposits held at the central bank — a la the Swedish example — to make them lend.
Markets live transcript 15 Sep 2009
Markets live chat transcript for the chat ending at 12:04 on 15 Sep 2009. Participants in this chat were: Neil Hume, FT (NH) Bryce Elder (BE) NH:Good morning NH:and welcome to Markets Live
Schork: “Nymex natgas is a bubble”
There were some very volatile moves higher in Nymex natural gas futures on Monday.For those who might be interpreting those swings as the makings of a genuine bull market, we thought we’d present some of Tuesday’s commentary on the subject.
A radically changed media landscape?
ITV says it welcomes Tuesday’s provisional report from the Competition Commission and its recognition of the case for the reform of Contract Rights Renewal, the very complex mechanism which governs how much the broadcaster can charge advertisers.
[The Lehman Anniversary] Day of the dead – It lives!
OTC Pink-Sheet trading in Lehman Brothers stock continues apace, with the opportunistic and insane swapping of over 68m shares on Monday in preparation for Tuesday’s one year anniversary of the bank’s collapse.
Analysts, don’t bash Poland
Be prepared, analysts. If you bash Poland, you will get a full-scale national slap down.
For example, a recent BNP Paribas note suggesting the country’s bonds may be over-valued on account of a weak fiscal outlook,
How accounting changes can create a world of investment banks
“Accounting changes must be coordinated,” ran headlines on Fed Governor Elizabeth A. Duke’s Monday speech.
In actuality Ms Duke went much further — not only suggesting that the world’s two major accounting bodies,
European government bonds on a roll
Amid signs in Europe of flagging corporate bond issuance, eurozone governments are on a new roll with planned or actual debt issues – not least in Germany, which on Monday issued only its second foreign currency bond since the second world war in an effort to find investors outside Europe.
Party time for CLSA ‘tea ladies’
CLSA, the Asia-focused brokerage arm of Credit Agricole, has had a great year. Just how great, however, has only just become apparent.
As the FT reports on Tuesday, CLSA has scrapped a controversial scheme that slashed staff pay and will compensate staff for the pay cuts made this year.