ECB RELEASES LOAN GUARANTEES. BANKS FLY, MILAN IS THE QUEEN
Piazza Affari flies, Wall Street gallops, and central banks compete to announce good news. While Ben Bernanke also refreshes his reputation as a dove in the Senate, the ECB makes a welcome gift, loosening the guarantees for Frankfurt's loans against the Ans, the first of the "innovative measures" promised by Mario Draghi to fight the credit crunch : the banks, especially the Italian ones, thank you.
Here, in a nutshell, a memorable day:
The Milan Stock Exchange closed the session up 2,3%, the best stock market in Europe. Close behind is Madrid +1,9%. The rise of the other Stock Exchanges was more contained: London rose by 1,2%, Paris +1,3%, Frankfurt +0,8%. Wall Street touches the absolute intraday highs: S&P +0,63%, Dow Jones +0,67%, Nasdaq +0,27%.
The government bond market is improving, also thanks to President Napolitano's lunge in defense of the government: the yield on the 10-year BTP fell to 4,41% from 4,45% this morning and the spread with the Bund is reduced to 290 (-4 basis points). The Spain/Germany spread drops by 5 basis points to 313. The recovery of the spread of Portugal (-10 bps) and Greece (-8 bps) is more pronounced.
The Piazza Affari rally is driven by the banks: Unicredit, up 4,4%,Ubi +5%, a Understanding + 3,6 % MontePaschi+2,4%, They even go into Orbit Bpm +9% e Popular bank +8%. The rise of insurance continues Fondiaria-Leaves +3,3%, on the second day of great increases after the arrest of the former Ligresti shareholders.
Generali + 2,4%. Mediolanum + 3,3% General Bank +3,7%. The leap of Pirelli was impressive, +4%, rewarded by JP Morgan which raised the recommendation on the stock from neutral to overweight, bringing the target price from 9,5 euros to 12 euros. Excellent seat also for other industrialists: Fiat + 2,6% Finmeccanica +2,9% and for Gtech +1,4% and Mediaset+ 3,5%.
New historic high also for Tod’s +2,4%. Among the few negative stocks within the FtseMib index are Telecom Italy -2,2% and Buzzi -3,6%.
