European Views: The European Council Decisions - A First Take
1. A common fiscal strategy gradually taking shape
The European Council announced a series of new policy measures for Greece and for the safeguard of financial stability in the Euro area. In earlier notes, we articulated the broader context and the criteria on which we would have assessed these measures. Below we provide our first take, based on the broad information so far available, on the main items. A more in-depth analysis will be possible when technical details become available in coming weeks.
Overall, the package for Greece (large PV transfers on the loans, mobilization of funds to support growth and ongoing technical assistance and oversight) is stronger than expectations, underlying a strong commitment to avoid support the country and avoid what could have been a disruptive unilateral ‘haircut’ at this juncture. Lower funding terms for Ireland and Portugal, to match Greece’s, materially improve the debt sustainability of these countries. Some private sector involvement will be conducted through a set of options financial institutions can voluntarily chose from, including a bond buyback. The IIF has posted a ‘financing offer’ on its website but bonds eligible and term sheet itself will need to be clarified. The ECB has compromised on collateral eligibility for ‘Selective Default’ rating in the case of Greece, apparently in exchange for guarantees from the fiscal authorities.
Appropriately targeted – and carrying high political significance, in our opinion – are the measures introduced to stem contagion: the EFSF can intervene in secondary bond markets and support banks in non-program countries. Both have long been on our ‘wish list’ of ways to tackle the crisis. The fact that the size of the EFSF has not been increased admittedly takes some of the shine away from the announcement, as its financial resources no longer match its enlarged scope. The authorities have already said that bigger capital commitments to the EFSF would be considered if needed, but doing it now would have increased its effectiveness as a deterrent. The ECB is probably now in a more comfortable position to conduct open market operations in the broader Eurozone bond markets if deemed necessary, before the fiscal institutions are finalized.
It would have been naïve to expect technical details to be spelled out at this point, and these will be needed to form judgement, and lead to improvements. Nonetheless, together with implementation uncertainties and risks (including parliamentary approvals), the last night’s announcements will still leave investors cautious to take sovereign spreads in the larger non-AAA issuers much tighter than where they were ahead of the Moody’s downgrade of Portugal. This remains our markets view, as expressed in previous notes, and we await flows from outside the common currency area to realign attractively valued bonds in the likes of Italy and Spain to underlying credit fundamentals. Bond prices in the program countries, instead, should be supported by the cheaper funding terms from new loans, representing a value transfer to existing bondholders.
All in all, the Eurozone has in our opinion taken a step forward towards forms of ex ante risk sharing which are less conditional, and the ECB assigned a central role in deciding when financial stability is threatened and bond purchases are necessary and fiscal responsibilities need to be shared. Together with a deeper governance structure (on which the statement remarks more work remains to be done), and a fairer terms when providing intra EMU financial support, the fiscal architecture of EMU is progressively taking shape. Note that from 2013, and possibly before, government bonds issued in the Euroarea will be issued under homogeneous legal terms, and will include collective action clauses.
In reviewing the main measures, we start with the ones that we believe are most important for the entire area.
2. Stemming contagion
Considering that sovereign tensions had engulfed Spain and Italy heading into the summit, measures to avoid contagion were in our view the main benchmark against which to judge the announcements. We have been surprised positively in this area, although the size of the EFSF may need to be revisited in the future if its greater scope and deterrent function can be put to work in practice.
This tendency to ‘under-size’ otherwise good policy initiatives has been a recurrent feature of European policies (the negative reaction to the EUR240bn effective lending capacity of the EFSF, which subsequently became EUR 440bn, comes to mind). But probably after such a large package for Greece, this was all that could be expected at this point. The mechanics of these policies will need to be articulated at upcoming Eurogroup meetings, starting with one scheduled for next week.
...
3. A big transfer of resources to Greece and program countries
The over-arching narrative fits in the dynamics we have dubbed ‘managed deleveraging’ in our research. An advanced club of countries, with highly interconnected banking systems ‘takes over’ using a joint balance sheet the liabilities of smaller countries in exchange for greater control over its cash flows. A doubling of the funds committed to Greece (now amounting to around 100% of GDP, not including the interest subsidies) and the much more generous terms also granted to Ireland and Portugal represents a sizeable transfer of resources to these countries, which improves their debt sustainability. Technical support and the disbursement of funds earmarked to economic activity go in the same direction. Private sector participation is achieved voluntarily along a set of choices. The ECB has compromised on the SD issue for collateral eligibility.
...
4. A menu of options for voluntary private sector involvement
Part of the package will be supported by Private Sector Involvement, or PSI, as some countries (Germany most vocally) had been asking for. This had been our baseline case since the start of the year. The statement explicitly says that PSI pertains only to Greece, indirectly taking issue with the CRAs’ downgrading of Portugal and Ireland on the basis that PSI would be a pre-condition for further aid. We doubt that the promise that PSI would not be extended is ‘time consistent’ (as readers may recall, the earlier promise was of no PSI at all until 2013). Nonetheless, we do not expect Ireland or Portugal to be in need of additional support.
...
full: http://www.zerohedge.com/article/goldmans-complete-summary-european-council-decisions
1. A common fiscal strategy gradually taking shape
The European Council announced a series of new policy measures for Greece and for the safeguard of financial stability in the Euro area. In earlier notes, we articulated the broader context and the criteria on which we would have assessed these measures. Below we provide our first take, based on the broad information so far available, on the main items. A more in-depth analysis will be possible when technical details become available in coming weeks.
Overall, the package for Greece (large PV transfers on the loans, mobilization of funds to support growth and ongoing technical assistance and oversight) is stronger than expectations, underlying a strong commitment to avoid support the country and avoid what could have been a disruptive unilateral ‘haircut’ at this juncture. Lower funding terms for Ireland and Portugal, to match Greece’s, materially improve the debt sustainability of these countries. Some private sector involvement will be conducted through a set of options financial institutions can voluntarily chose from, including a bond buyback. The IIF has posted a ‘financing offer’ on its website but bonds eligible and term sheet itself will need to be clarified. The ECB has compromised on collateral eligibility for ‘Selective Default’ rating in the case of Greece, apparently in exchange for guarantees from the fiscal authorities.
Appropriately targeted – and carrying high political significance, in our opinion – are the measures introduced to stem contagion: the EFSF can intervene in secondary bond markets and support banks in non-program countries. Both have long been on our ‘wish list’ of ways to tackle the crisis. The fact that the size of the EFSF has not been increased admittedly takes some of the shine away from the announcement, as its financial resources no longer match its enlarged scope. The authorities have already said that bigger capital commitments to the EFSF would be considered if needed, but doing it now would have increased its effectiveness as a deterrent. The ECB is probably now in a more comfortable position to conduct open market operations in the broader Eurozone bond markets if deemed necessary, before the fiscal institutions are finalized.
It would have been naïve to expect technical details to be spelled out at this point, and these will be needed to form judgement, and lead to improvements. Nonetheless, together with implementation uncertainties and risks (including parliamentary approvals), the last night’s announcements will still leave investors cautious to take sovereign spreads in the larger non-AAA issuers much tighter than where they were ahead of the Moody’s downgrade of Portugal. This remains our markets view, as expressed in previous notes, and we await flows from outside the common currency area to realign attractively valued bonds in the likes of Italy and Spain to underlying credit fundamentals. Bond prices in the program countries, instead, should be supported by the cheaper funding terms from new loans, representing a value transfer to existing bondholders.
All in all, the Eurozone has in our opinion taken a step forward towards forms of ex ante risk sharing which are less conditional, and the ECB assigned a central role in deciding when financial stability is threatened and bond purchases are necessary and fiscal responsibilities need to be shared. Together with a deeper governance structure (on which the statement remarks more work remains to be done), and a fairer terms when providing intra EMU financial support, the fiscal architecture of EMU is progressively taking shape. Note that from 2013, and possibly before, government bonds issued in the Euroarea will be issued under homogeneous legal terms, and will include collective action clauses.
In reviewing the main measures, we start with the ones that we believe are most important for the entire area.
2. Stemming contagion
Considering that sovereign tensions had engulfed Spain and Italy heading into the summit, measures to avoid contagion were in our view the main benchmark against which to judge the announcements. We have been surprised positively in this area, although the size of the EFSF may need to be revisited in the future if its greater scope and deterrent function can be put to work in practice.
This tendency to ‘under-size’ otherwise good policy initiatives has been a recurrent feature of European policies (the negative reaction to the EUR240bn effective lending capacity of the EFSF, which subsequently became EUR 440bn, comes to mind). But probably after such a large package for Greece, this was all that could be expected at this point. The mechanics of these policies will need to be articulated at upcoming Eurogroup meetings, starting with one scheduled for next week.
...
3. A big transfer of resources to Greece and program countries
The over-arching narrative fits in the dynamics we have dubbed ‘managed deleveraging’ in our research. An advanced club of countries, with highly interconnected banking systems ‘takes over’ using a joint balance sheet the liabilities of smaller countries in exchange for greater control over its cash flows. A doubling of the funds committed to Greece (now amounting to around 100% of GDP, not including the interest subsidies) and the much more generous terms also granted to Ireland and Portugal represents a sizeable transfer of resources to these countries, which improves their debt sustainability. Technical support and the disbursement of funds earmarked to economic activity go in the same direction. Private sector participation is achieved voluntarily along a set of choices. The ECB has compromised on the SD issue for collateral eligibility.
...
4. A menu of options for voluntary private sector involvement
Part of the package will be supported by Private Sector Involvement, or PSI, as some countries (Germany most vocally) had been asking for. This had been our baseline case since the start of the year. The statement explicitly says that PSI pertains only to Greece, indirectly taking issue with the CRAs’ downgrading of Portugal and Ireland on the basis that PSI would be a pre-condition for further aid. We doubt that the promise that PSI would not be extended is ‘time consistent’ (as readers may recall, the earlier promise was of no PSI at all until 2013). Nonetheless, we do not expect Ireland or Portugal to be in need of additional support.
...
full: http://www.zerohedge.com/article/goldmans-complete-summary-european-council-decisions
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