STOCK EXCHANGES ROOT FOR CENTRAL BANKS. THE TREASURY FILL UP: 66% OF THE 2012 FUNDS ALREADY COLLECTED
Asia is no exception. From Tokyo +0,52% to Hong Kong +0,86% passing through Seoul +1,5%, expectations are growing for the decisions of the Fed and Mario Draghi. Wal Street stocks are more cautious, affected by the uncertainty of the unemployment data released on Thursday: the Dow Jones -0,02% and S&P -0,05% almost unchanged, the Nasdaq down -0,41%. It is Barack Obama himself who launches the warning: "I don't think the Europeans will let their single currency fall apart, but to avoid it they must take some decisive steps".
Meanwhile in Europe there is an air of euphoria, perhaps too much euphoria. Piazza Affari gallops, with a 2,8% rise in the FtseMib index.
The other Stock Exchanges were positive but distant: London rose by 1,1%, Paris +1,2%, Frankfurt +1,2%. The Madrid Stock Exchange gained 2,6%.
Greater caution is recorded, to be honest, on sovereign debt. Yesterday evening on the secondary market the ten-year BTP was trading at 5,99%, from 5,91% on Friday evening. The spread with the Bund is at 461 (+9 basis points).
The Bonos also did well: the ten-year yield fell to 6,51% (from 6,65% on Friday) and the spread with the German Bund narrowed by 10 basis points to 515.
The happy note is that yesterday the Treasury archived a successful trio with the placement of over 18 billion bonds between Ctz, BoT and BTp at 5 and 10 years. In this way the 66% target of 2012 funding was achieved. for which even the reopenings reserved for specialists have shown great interest on the part of operators. Even today on the medium-long term rates have come out in sharp decline compared to the last round in June: the 5-year BTP was placed at a rate more than 50 basis points lower, while on the 10-year BTP the rate reduction is over 20 basis points.
This is the climate in which the markets await the decisions that should come from the two main central banks. The Fed will release its view on the health of the US economy at the end of its regular two-day meeting of the Monetary Policy Committee (FOMC) on Wednesday, and many investors are betting on a new stimulus package to lift a labor market that creates fewer jobs than the Fed would like. Meanwhile, Mario Monti's mission has begun: Paris, Helsinki, Madrid.
The Governing Council of the ECB will meet on Thursday where Mario Draghi and his colleagues will have to decide what practical measures to implement to defend the euro and dismantle the perverse mechanism of spreads. The climate, judging from the premises, is more rosy than expected.
"The German government has full confidence in the independence of the ECB," Georg Streiter, Angela Merkel's deputy spokesman, said at the press conference. For the German government, the purchases of government bonds of countries in crisis in the Eurozone by the ECB "are not inadmissible" according to the European treaties in force. But the spokesman did not mention the ESM's intervention in the auctions or the granting of the banking license to the ESM itself, on which the judgment of the Constitutional Court is pending.
IGerman Finance Minister Wolfang Schauble and US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner met today on the North Sea island of Sylt. The two ministers, who had a talk of about an hour, wanted to launch an appeal to politicians to "approve and apply in every way the measures necessary to control the financial and confidence crisis", reads the release again at the end of the interview which lasted about an hour. And they reaffirmed their desire, common to all eurozone countries, to see progress "in the application of a political agenda for the stabilization of the world and Europe" by next autumn.
As always, a rating agency will take care of cooling the mood. S&P's worsened its estimates of Italian GDP for 2012 and 2013, bringing them respectively to -2,1% and -0,4%. The forecasts for the euro area were also revised downwards, attributing the worsening of the continental economic picture above all to the simultaneous reduction of the financial leverage in the public sector, in households and in the banking sector.
In Milan and throughout Europe, meanwhile, the best shares were those of the banks. The European Stoxx index for the sector rose by 3,1% led by Italian banks: Unicredit gained 4,5%, Understanding + 6,6% Mediobanca + 4,9% Ubi +3,6%. Sharp rise of MontePaschi + 6,5%. Popular bank rose 6,3%, despite Bank of America's rating cut which lowered the rating to neutral da buy.
Generali gained 3,7%, Mediolanum +7,8%. New tumble of Fondiaria-Leaves which with a fall of 28% finally reached 1,00 euro, the subscription price of the new shares. Unipol drops by 13% to 2,01 euros.
A2A achieved a rise of 6,9% after the announcement that it will sell the French subsidiary Coriance with a positive effect on the debt of 160 million euros. Among other utilities, Enel rose by 3,4%, Terna + 1,2% Atlantia +4,2%. leap of Iren + 11%. TelecomItalia rose by 2,3%. Sharp rise of Fiat +4,8% with the entire European auto sector (Stoxx +2,3%) on the eve of the board of directors meeting on the quarterly accounts.
Yesterday evening Chrysler announced more than brilliant data. In fact, the US subsidiary of Lingotto closed the second quarter of 2012 with a net profit of 436 million dollars, 141% more than the 181 million of the "adjusted" net profit of the same period of 2011. Industrial debt, in as of June 30, it was down to $432 million from $2,1 billion a year ago and $1,3 billion as of March 31. 630.000 cars were delivered to customers during the quarter, 22% more than a year ago (when
had been 514.000), in line with the objectives for the whole of 2012.
Pirelli gained 3,7%. Well the oil: Eni rose by 1,4%, Tenaris +1,3%. Backtrack by Saipem -1,3% after the quarter's data. Among the mid caps, Maire Tecnimont jumped 12%.
