Credit Market Overview
January 20, 2010
All of the sturm and drang emanating from D.C. these days regarding “Fat Cat Bankers” has proven great camouflage for at least two realities; that Congress is as guilty as any other party for inflating the housing bubble and that those same Fat Cats support burgeoning micro-economies wherever they congregate… »
Credit Market Overview
January 19, 2010
The olive tree is one of the oldest known cultivated trees and records show that it grew first in Asia Minor 6,000 years ago before spreading from Iran, Syria and Palestine to the rest of the Mediterranean. Until 1500 B.C., Greece—particularly Mycenae—was the area most heavily cultivated and with the… »
Credit Market Overview
January 15, 2010
“The hypothesis is not consistent with the way CDS work or with observed behavior in debt markets. Because it could influence future regulatory policy, it is important to analyze both the logic and the evidence in support of and against it”. Those words were spoken by Mr. David Mengle, head… »
Credit Market Overview
January 14, 2010
In 1859 Charles Dickens wrote “A Tale of Two Cities” and for those non-English-Lit majors among us, including yours truly, it was set in London and Paris before and during the French Revolution.
Today we are looking not at two cities but two shippers, FedEx Corp. (FDX) and United Parcel Service (UPS).
Back… »
Credit Market Overview
January 13, 2010
In his 16 years in the Majors, Mark McGuire’s batting average was .263. What is interesting about this number is not Mr. McGuire’s now admitted steroid use; not that it is considered a reasonably good number for a professional baseball player but that just a slightly lower percentage .25 represents the… »
Credit Market Overview
January 12, 2010
With the return on the Merrill Lynch High Yield Master II Index topping 60% for 2009 “It has been, from a historical perspective, the best run the high-yield market has ever had, the risk/reward trade-off was fantastic”, was how Eric Tutterow, MD of high yield corporate finance at Fitch Ratings put… »
Credit Market Overview
January 11, 2010
For many, the resolutions made while suffering through their New Year’s Eve hangover have not been followed since, well, they were made. The market has spent the last two years getting over its hangover only it wasn’t the punch but leverage that inflated the bubble from which we are 26 months… »
Credit Market Overview
January 8, 2010
One down, fifty-one to go! Well, there will be after the bell rings today and with everyone’s eyes on the employment numbers coming out at 8:30 today could be a week in itself.
With all of the emphasis put on the first trading day of the year and the first week and… »
Credit Market Overview
January 7, 2010
In the waning months of 2009 the worsening employment picture garnered more and more of investor’s attention. There was talk of “Stimulus II” and an easily gamed tax credit for hiring new workers. Which, when I say easily gamed, means that even some of the more liberal in Congress could see… »
Credit Market Overview
January 6, 2010
The recent “quickie” bankruptcies of General Motors (MTLQQ) and CIT Group Inc. (CIT) have differentiated themselves from the way such reorganizations used to be handled in that now most if not all of the negotiations occur before the filing. At least for those high profile companies for whom a long sojourn… »
