Spanish financials slammed... upwards

Withheld, typically, until it could be made to coincide with some other event which might amplify its effect, Moody's has published its prognosis for Spanish financials. Three have been dropped to junk, the same number escaped unscathed and some 20-odd saw themselves lowered to some degree in category. The coincident news, everybody already being aware since last fall that Spanish banks could not withstand a Portuguese debt failure, was the dissolution of this latter country's government as the proposed budget failed to be approved.

Above is, courtesy of Yahoo!, a screenshot of today's action (as of 2 PM) in Ibex 35 banks.

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Sound familiar?

We can't say it better or more concisely, so we hope José Guardia doesn't mind us scooping his entire post from Barcepundit...

SPANIARD JAVI LAVANDEIRA from Tokyo:

[W]estern media is spreading fear and lots, lots of bullshit among our families and friends, because being alarmists brings them advertising money.
Because of this, family and friends are pressuring those of us who stay in Tokyo to leave the city. This is causing trouble for many of us.

To the media:

For fuck’s sake, please stop publishing crap in order to bring more viewers (and therefore, more advertising money) to your publications/programs/whatever. What you’re doing is just taking advantage of this situation in order to try and make some money at the expense of everybody who knows someone in Japan. You’re causing more trouble to us than the earthquake did!

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Couldn't help but notice

We've not been sticking our noses into the matter of home sales in Spain for a couple of months because we couldn't sort out the effect of tax changes on the trend. On the other hand, we can't ignore the graph generated by January's property registry figures.

Made up mostly of sales consummated in November and December (prior to the elimination of the income tax deduction for a principal residence), second hand sales are at their highest since June of 2008, new sales since October and total sales since September of the same year.

We have no comment on whether reaching figures pre-Lehman Brothers means anything of any significance, but it is worth noting that the rescinded tax deduction probably amounted to about 400 euros of annual benefit for most homeowners.

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Mood Swing

Seeing as the buyers that rushed into Spanish debt markets in the wake of Moody's warning on the Spanish state last week are already looking at a 25 basis gain on their investment, attention should now be turned to the list on the left. These are the individual Spanish financial institutions which will be commented upon, en masse, by the ratings agency this Thursday.

Ignoring the idiot fact that most of them no longer exist per se (having amalgamated themselves into larger entities that afford them varying degrees of self-determination within), perhaps this morning's 2 to 5 percent gain in Spanish banking stocks - resulting in a 2 percent increase in the Ibex 35 as virtually all other indexes in the world are negative - can be seen as, well, prescient.

On another front, exactly for how long can we expect FT Alphaville's Tracy Alloway to remain puzzled by all these marvels?

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Moody's yet again

We read in Expansión that the immediate market reaction to Moody's downgrade of Spanish debt was a quick jump in yields followed by a flood of foreign buying of the 5-year, especially. The screengrab from Bloomberg may confirm that.

The last time we singled out that rating agency was about three months ago.





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Qorreo Transforms Itself

A tad busy to be posting much, so just a short note to let readers know that the Spanish news website Qorreo to which this writer periodically contributes has changed its name to Iberosphere - and sports a way more inviting, appealing and informative design.

Ibex Salad readers could do themselves a favour and check it out. The permanent link is at the top of the sidebar.

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