I will especailly remember RBS refinance needs when I recall their "reasearch" about Europe´s peripheral "problems"...Ay, ay, ay. That´s going to be fun!
They will repeat the same bs over and over again, hoping nobody will turn attention to themselves. In 2011 they will "research" that in 2012-2013 portugal will need 50bln, spain 150bln, italy 250bln, belgium, france, etc etc (disclaimer: my figures aren't correct, I don't remember their "research" )
The most brazen aspect is : research from a bank that survived only via massive tax payer "donations"...
Well, it is a fact (not conjecture) that Italy has to deal with arnd â¬360bn worth of redemptions next year. Given it's running a budget deficit worth arnd 3.5% of GDP (all from interest costs), that's about â¬400bn worth of new Italian govt paper to hit the mkt in 2011. I sure hope and pray Italians keep buying this stuff, like they used to.
360bln that's roughly equivalent to one single UK bank alone, like RBS amazing isn't RBS nationalized ? so that debt is actually UK's debt ?
Well, I am not saying RBS is in a great shape or anything (Lloyds is actually a lot worse), but RBS has frenemies in high places (specifically, Swervin' Mervyn will make sure nothing bad happens to them on his watch, until he manages to break them up). Generally, Italian banks look a lot better than UK banks, that's for sure. The sovereign is an entirely different kettle of fish, unfortunately. So here's the final statistic for you: domestic bank senior debt + govt debt as %age of GDP for Italy is 139% (sov 119%, bank snr 20%); for UK it's 120% (sov 77%, bank snr 43%); curiously enough, for Ireland it was 136% (sov 98%, bank snr 38%). Make of this whatever you will.