Category Archives: Fed

CNBC: Government in way over their heads as earnings estimates are lowered

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Things have come apart very quickly as government officials have demonstrated they are in this way over their heads.

Especially as it becomes clear the enormous efforts expended to get the TARP passed will do little if anything to address any of the current woes.

Government, including the Fed, has lost what little credibility it may have had.

While they have the ‘silver bullet’ at hand with fiscal policy, they are reluctant to use it due to deficit myths left over from the gold standard that are no longer applicable.

Note earnings growth has moderated but not yet gone negative, ex financials.

Not reported is that core earnings for financials (ex writeoffs) are probably reasonably strong.

Q3 Earnings: Not So Pretty

by Juan Aruego

This earnings season is looking ugly and there hasn’t been much talk about which sectors are bringing the pain.

What’s different this quarter is that expectations for everyone are falling.

Until now, the weakness has been concentrated in banks. But this quarter, the consumer discretionary sector is getting crushed. Estimates have plunged from +15% on July 1st to -9% today.

Other depressing factoids:

  • Four sectors are now expected to see earnings fall. Together they make up 27% of all earnings
  • Only one sector, energy, is looking at growth above seven percent. Oh, for the days when double-digit growth was de rigueur.
  • Can you believe that just three months ago, analysts thought Q3 financials’ earnings would be nearly unchanged from last year? How times have changed.

Amazingly, the ex-financials growth rate is still in the double digits, but it has fallen from 16.7% on July 1st to 11.3% now. As good as that sounds, excluding financials from the overall number is starting to feel a lot like paying attention to core CPI because it’s not as bad as overall CPI… especially since most of the upward drive is coming from the energy sector. Pull out the energy sector and the “growth” consensus plunges to -14.7%.

Here are all the numbers for you earnings wonks out there:

Q3 2008 Earnings Growth Estimates

Sector

Today

July 1st
Consumer Discretionary -9% 15%
Consumer Staples -1% 1%
Energy 53% 58%
Financials -67% -4%
Health Care 6% 8%
Industrials 3% 6%
Materials 5% 11%
Information Technology 7% 12%
Telecomm. Services -5% -4%
Utilities 3% 7%
S&P 500 Overall -4.3% 12.6%
Without Energy Firms -14.7% 4.7%
Without Financials 11.3% 16.7%

 
Special thanks to Thomson Reuters and its earnings gurus for the data to back up this story.


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Re: Fed goes ballistic

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(email exchange)

>   
>   This morning the Fed announced a massive expansion of its dollar liquidity
>   facilities. Three measures were announced: (1) an increase in total TAF
>   auctions from $150 billion to $300 billion, all coming in 84-day funds (2)
>   forward TAF auctions of an additional $150 billion, with the auctions to be
>   conducted in November for funds available for one or two weeks surrounding
>   the year-end and
>   

The TAF would be unlimited, unsecured, and the Fed would set the rate in advance if they had a clear understanding of reserve accounting and monetary operations. It’s about price, not quantity.

>   (3) an increase in the currency swaps with foreign central banks (ECB, BoE,
>   BoC, BoJ, SNB, RBA, and the Scandis) taking the total outstanding from $290
>   billion to $620 billion. In addition, these swap lines were extended through
>   April 30, 2009; previously they were authorized through January 30, 2009.
>   

This is a different matter, and more serious and disturbing- foreign central banks borrowing $ from the Fed to support the $ needs of their local banking systems.

Should those banking systems go down and this program gets large enough it could take down their currencies like any other external debt.


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Bernanke-“Grave”

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Karim writes:

Not a word you often see a Fed Chairman use:

….stabilization of our financial system is an essential precondition for economic recovery. I urge the Congress to act quickly to address the grave threats to financial stability that we currently face.

He outlined the channels in which this impacts the economy in this paragraph:

Ongoing developments in financial markets are directly affecting the broader economy through several channels, most notably by restricting the availability of credit. Mortgage credit terms have tightened significantly and fees have risen, especially for potential borrowers who lack substantial down payments or who have blemished credit histories. Mortgages that are ineligible for credit guarantees by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac–for example, nonconforming jumbo mortgages–cannot be securitized and thus carry much higher interest rates than conforming mortgages. Some lenders have reduced borrowing limits on home equity lines of credit. Households also appear to be having more difficulty of late in obtaining nonmortgage credit. For example, the Federal Reserve’s Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey reported that as of July an increasing proportion of banks had tightened standards for credit card and other consumer loans. In the business sector, through August, the financially strongest firms remained able to issue bonds but bond issuance by speculative-grade firms remained very light. More recently, however, deteriorating financial market conditions have disrupted the commercial paper market and other forms of financing for a wide range of firms, including investment-grade firms. Financing for commercial real estate projects has also tightened very significantly.

When worried lenders tighten credit, then spending, production, and job creation slow.

Separately, he stated that:

  • Economic activity was ‘decelerating broadly’ and that second half growth would be ‘appreciably below potential’
  • He noted improved housing affordability but also that th
  • He cited the usual ‘over time’ for the economy to improve and that inflation would moderate ‘later this year and next’, with significant uncertainty attached to both forecasts.


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Bernanke

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Karim writes:

Most of testimony explaining actions of recent weeks. Direct comments on economy below. Focus on enabling financial conditions to improve ‘for a protracted period’ means that in Bernanke’s mind that hikes are off the table for a ‘protracted period’ and cuts may be on the table if inflation cooperates.

Notably, stresses in financial markets have been high and have recently intensified significantly. If financial conditions fail to improve for a protracted period, the implications for the broader economy could be quite adverse.

While perhaps manageable in itself, Lehman’s default was combined with the unexpectedly rapid collapse of AIG, which together contributed to the development last week of extraordinarily turbulent conditions in global financial markets. These conditions caused equity prices to fall sharply, the cost of short-term credit–where available–to spike upward, and liquidity to dry up in many markets. Losses at a large money market mutual fund sparked extensive withdrawals from a number of such funds. A marked increase in the demand for safe assets–a flight to quality–sent the yield on Treasury bills down to a few hundredths of a percent. By further reducing asset values and potentially restricting the flow of credit to households and businesses, these developments pose a direct threat to economic growth.


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Treasury plan cont’d

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This is what was submitted:

Treasury fact sheet on asset plan

Treasury will have authority to issue up to $700 billion of Treasury securities to finance the purchase of troubled assets. The purchases are intended to be residential and commercial mortgage-related assets, which may include mortgage-backed securities and whole loans. The Secretary will have the discretion, in consultation with the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, to purchase other assets, as deemed necessary to effectively stabilize financial markets. Removing troubled assets will begin to restore the strength of our financial system so it can again finance economic growth.

While this won’t alter bank capital, bank asset sales shrink balance sheets and ‘make room’ for new lending.

In fact, that was the ‘originate to sell’ model.

This will support output and employment only to the extent it has been constrained by limited capability of banks to lend.

The major effect of having these problematic assets on the books has been in the secondary markets, including interbank lending, which have lesser and only indirect consequence for output and employment.

Supporting the housing agencies ability to lend at lower rates to any credit worthy borrowers directly supports housing and other sectors.

What banks need most is an increase in aggregate demand sufficient enough to increase employment and output.

This proposal for the Treasury to buy bank assists will have little direct effect on aggregate demand.

The timing and scale of any purchases will be at the discretion of Treasury and its agents, subject to this total cap. The price of assets purchases will be established through market mechanisms where possible, such as reverse auctions.

The question of price is problematic.

This is vague as the Treasury doesn’t have clarity on how this might work. It is doubtful that Congress will either. Reverse auctions can result in gross overpricing, which they do not want to happen.

And note the congressional discussion on salary caps for institutions that sell assets to the Treasury – no telling how that will shake out!

The dollar cap will be measured by the purchase price of the assets. The authority to purchase expires two years from date of enactment. Asset and Institutional Eligibility for the Program. To qualify for the program, assets must have been originated or issued on or before September 17, 2008. Participating financial institutions must have significant operations in the U.S., unless the Secretary makes a determination, in consultation with the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, that broader eligibility is necessary to effectively stabilize financial markets.


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U.S. Treasury announces plan to insure money-market holdings

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On Fri, Sep 19, 2008 at 9:44 AM, Scott asks:

These moves HAVE to be bad for the dollar, no?

Not much effect per se.

Immediate effect is higher interest rates/stronger stocks which very near term helps the USD.

But it seems saudis are hiking price which, if it continues, will again send the dollar down.

Also, the Fed showed some concern about exports softening, which they probably attribute to the recent USD strength.

So seems the Fed and Treasury probably don’t want the dollar to get too strong.

Major equity short covering rally in progress.

When it runs its course, the US economy will still be weak and higher crude prices will be problematic as well.


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Bloomberg: Thoughts on Treasury plan

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My take is an RTC type solution only works when the government owns the institutions, so this will probably be different.

I suspect it will be more like Japan, where the government bought a new class of preferred stock in the banks to add capital.

Whatever they will do will cause credit spreads to come in, which will make the assets of AIG far more valuable and probably result in a ‘profit’ for the government.

Unsold Lehman assets will also appreciate.

More comments below:

Paulson, Bernanke Push New Plan to Cleanse Books

by Alison Vekshin and Dawn Kopecki

Government Options
Options that U.S. officials are considering include establishing an $800 billion fund to purchase so-called failed assets

I see this as problematic as above and as below.

and a separate $400 billion pool at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. to insure investors in money-market funds, said two people briefed by congressional staff. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the plans may change.

This puts money funds on par with insured bank deposits. Seems no need for both.

Instead, better to remove the $100,000 cap on bank deposit insurance to allow large investors use bank deposits safely. There is no economic reason for the low cap in any case.

Another possibility is using Fannie and Freddie, the federally chartered mortgage-finance companies seized by the government last week, to buy assets, one of the people said.

That’s already in place. They already have treasury funding to buy mortgages.

“We will try to put a bill together and do it fairly quickly,” House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat, said after the meeting. “We are not in a position to give you any specifics right now” on the proposals, he said when asked about the potential cost.

The likelihood of the government taking on yet more devalued assets, after the seizures of Fannie, Freddie and AIG and the earlier assumption by the Fed of $29 billion of Bear Stearns Cos. investments, may spur concern about its own balance sheet.

We need to get past this concern about government solvency. It’s simply not an operational issue.

Debt Concern
The Treasury has pledged to buy up to $200 billion of Fannie and Freddie stock to keep them solvent, while the Fed agreed Sept. 16 to an $85 billion bridge loan to AIG. The Treasury also plans to buy $5 billion of mortgage-backed debt this month under an emergency program.

“It sounds like there’s going to be a giant dumpster for illiquid assets,” said Mirko Mikelic, senior portfolio manager at Fifth Third Asset Management in Grand Rapids, Michigan, which oversees $22 billion in assets. “It brings up the more troubling question of whether the U.S. government is big enough to take on this whole problem, relative” to the size of the American economy, he said.

This is ridiculous and part of the problem that got us to this point.


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NYT: Treasury bills program

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>   
>   On Thu, Sep 18, 2008 at 4:21 PM, Eric Tymoigne wrote:
>   
>   One former FOMC member at least gets it (From the NYT) (well, at least if you
>   replace “can create money” by “can create reserve”):
>   

I’ve heard him before, and he definately doesn’t quite get it. See my comments below:

September 18, 2008, 3:15 pm

Will Government Bailouts Lead to Inflation?

by Catherine Rampell

A reader asks about inflation concerns, and finds a divided response from our panel:

I’m worried about how much the government is intervening. It appears that the last remaining weapon the government will have is printing more money. Is hyperinflation a real concern down the road? — Geoffrey Bell

The question is about hyperinflation.

From Bob McTeer of the National Center for Policy Analysis:

All the offsets do is to alter the resulting interest rate. The offsets have nothing to do with inflation. Fed operations are about pricing, not about inflation per se. The only connection Fed policy has regarding inflation is the further effect of the interest rate they select. It has nothing to do with quantity.

The Fed’s ability to lend is limitless because it can create money.

All Fed lending is ‘creating money’ (changing a number in a member bank’s reserve account).

So it’s not that it’s limitless because it ‘can’ ‘create money,’ it’s limitless because it always/only does ‘create money’.

Its ability to offset the lending is limited by its portfolio. Hence, its request to the Treasury to sell some extra Treasury bills. — Bob McTeer

Yes, and this is a self imposed constraint put on by government.

Functionally and operationally, a treasury security is nothing more than a credit balance in a security account.

Current law doesn’t allow the Fed to take funds into a securities account of its own creation.

This is one of many self-imposed constraints by government that are contributing to ‘the problem’.

warren


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Fed increasing $ vs fx swap lines to ECB and others

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This is an extension of credit to those CBs which functionally allows them to borrow (and thereby also get ‘short’) USD, presumably to fund their local USD needs for their institutions short USD, and presumably to cover losses on their USD financial assets and to finance the remaining balances.

The ECB has no USD to fund its member banks, and is not inclined to sell euros and buy USD as, at a minimum, a matter of ideology.

This is not a good sign for the eurozone banking system solvency, though the size is modest, at least for now.


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Equity prices dropping to takeover levels

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A while back I wrote about how shareholders were at risk of management selling them up the river with dilutive converts and the like.

But if a someone buys all the shares in a takeover they don’t have that risk.

Therefore, I concluded, equities would get cheap enough for a massive round of takeovers.

Now a different risk has presented itself. Seems when the Fed or the Treasury decides to step in and help they take 79.9% of the equity.

So when the stock of a too-big-to-fail prospect starts going down, the incentives are in place for it going down further/faster as the risk of government intervention increases.

Lower prices make takeovers even more attractive.

Once they get going, look for record takeover volume.


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