Thanks for that. Looking at the price action in the last few days / weeks, the banks I am looking at as short candidates are: SocGen Credit Agricole BNP Paribas Deutsche Bank Intesa Sanpaolo Despite the potential for a substantial Spanish property price decline, the Spanish banks look relatively stronger than French, German and Italian banks. Apart from the 3 French banks mentioned above, are you particularly bearish on any specific companies?
I think you are probably right about the relative strength of the Spanish banks -- certainly vis a vis France & Germany. Because of the short-selling ban in Europe I just went short EWQ & EWG. I should have probably just shorted the DAX futures but the overnight margin is very expensive. I checked out Intesa Sanpaolo SpA (ISP.MI) and it has definitely performed better than the other Banks you mentioned: http://chart.finance.yahoo.com/z?s=...BNP.PA,ACA.PA,DB&a=v&p=s&lang=en-US®ion=US http://chart.finance.yahoo.com/z?s=...BNP.PA,ACA.PA,DB&a=v&p=s&lang=en-US®ion=US Obviously the worst is still Societe Generale SA.
Haven't read this in full yet - an article about how SocGen is effectively locked out of the equity markets for now: "The Ugly Truth About SocGen's Problems" http://www.businessinsider.com/socgen-frederic-oudea-new-york-2011-9
Is it just me or the businessinsider/clusterstock website is extremely slow and shoots up CPU usage to 100%?
I'm using Chrome and everytime I go to that site and open a few tabs there my computer gets really slow
I think this is worse than 2008. I agree that in the short term "if the politicos over there get their act together" we could see a short term rally. Problem is if the ECB decides to bail these pigs out they will only be compounding the euro crisis. As the saying goes don't put good money into bad. Technically the ECB can go insolvent if things continue to deteriorate vis a vis the french and german banks. If that happens then the ECB could just print its way out of the mess, but the downside to that will be the trashing of the euro and possibly more downgrades. The increasingly bleak macro picture will only compound the EU debt issues. If you are really sure that this is all just panic without substance then go long some french banks and see what happens in the following days, weeks, months.
I was talking about the situation in August, 'this is 2008' bottom has hold up quite well since them. From here it could get much worse
With the benefit of hindsight, this thread could / should have been named "Insolvent French banks" thread. Some *interesting* headlines coming through in the last 24 hours: "China Pulls The Rug From Under Europe, Halts French Bank Transactions, Makes Good On Trade War Ultimatum" http://www.zerohedge.com/news/china...k-transactions-makes-good-trade-war-ultimatum http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/20/idUSB9E7K102K20110920 and the Siemens story: "The Corporate Bank Run Has Started: Siemens Pulls â¬500 Million From A French Bank, Redeposits Direct With ECB" http://www.zerohedge.com/news/shocker-siemens-pulls-€500-million-french-bank-redeposits-direct-ecb "Siemens shelters up to â¬6bn at ECB" http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/dca4cc08-e096-11e0-bd01-00144feabdc0.html
Following the news of the Greece referendum, European bank stocks are hurting. Leading the decline is SocGen, down 14%. SocGen has been asked to raise 3.3 billion EUR in new capital. www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=3341654#post3341654 Credit Agricole down 11% BNP Paribas 10% Commerzbank 8% Deutsche Bank 8% RBS 7% Lloyds 6% Barclays 8%