Ford, Caterpillar Fire Up Dim Sum Market
Two blue-chip U.S. companies are raising money in the offshore yuan market this week, signaling a pick-up in deal activity in the dim sum bond market.
Singapore Got It Covered
Singapore could be the next market in Asia to allow covered bond issuance.
Cliff Dive
From Michael Krieger: Chart of the Federal Surplus/Deficit. A picture is worth a thousand words. USA! USA! Have a great weekend. Baaaah. (Image: Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis)
Southeast Asia’s Debt Boom
Southeast Asia is having a record year in debt issuance amid a rush of corporate tapping bond markets and renewed investor interest in the region’s sovereign debt.
Fixed
“Don’t fight the Fed – bet on it.” - Lee Quaintance and Paul Brodsky of QB Asset Management. In December last year, the poet Alice Oswald withdrew from the TS Eliot poetry prize on the grounds that the prize was...
All Over Again
(Image: source) Call me cynic, but it's hard to see this as a good thing: "Junk ETFs Draw Most Cash on Record as High-Yield Hunt Speeds Up" (Bloomberg) Exchange-traded funds for speculative-grade bonds are drawing the biggest inflows on record...
Why MMT is like an autostereogram
We’ve discussed MMT’s recent foray into the mainstream, and the confusion it has consequently courted.But that’s the funny thing about the theory. It is naturally...
The Great Repression
“No government has ever commanded the resources at the disposal of our ungodly Leviathan, which consumes about 25% of the product of the world’s richest country. It is driven by a voracious alliance of government’s own employees, and those who...
On Track…to a Train Wreck
(Image: source) For the bulls, yesterday's news of a much higher-than-anticipated jump in consumer borrowing is yet more proof that the recovery is on track: "U.S. Consumer Credit Climbed by $19.3B in Dec." (Bloomberg) Consumer borrowing in the U.S. rose...
Living off immoral earnings
“The reality.. is that banks.. support a thick layer of second tier executives, as well as legions of pen-pushing, meeting-loving, middle- and back-office workers who are paid multiples of their worth and contribution, especially compared with other industries.” - Financial...
A Tad Unsettled
Suddenly, global credit markets are looking, shall we say, a tad unsettled... I wonder if we're (finally) beginning to see bond markets pricing in the post-financial-crisis orgy of fiscal recklessness (not to mention the tsunami of refinancing-related supply)? If so,...
No Solution
In "On Borrowed Time," Barron's columnist Randall Forsyth further undermines the notion that persistent public profligacy can solve our problems: Heavy debt loads slow the U.S. economy now and pose threat to the future. Can a stimulant become a depressant?...
