Doubts about the solidity of French banks send the prices of credit default swaps linked to the country flying, those on debt as well as those on credit institutions. The former even reach the record figure of 176 basis points. Which, translated into real terms, implies that 10 dollars are needed to insure 175 million of the five-year state debt. Swap derivatives on banks are no less, and record new all-time highs, even going beyond the peaks reached during the early stages of the financial crisis.
The CDS on Société Générale, in particular, exceeded the levels of the end of 2008, when it was worth 150 basis points, and even surpassed the 200 basis points achieved in May 2010, now settling at 335. Things are not better at Bnp Paribas, whose CDS reach 237,6 bps, well beyond the range of 100-150 within which they had remained until now. The only ones that didn't make the news were the credit default swaps on Natixis, which rose to 192,7 basis points. In this case, in fact, it is not a record: after the Lehman crash in 2008, levels between 300 and 350 basis points had been reached. According to rumors circulating in the last few hours an Asian bank would have cut credit lines to the main French institutions.
