Monday is where we’re going to see a truer-look at “where the bodies are buried” and a more accurate “price discovery” process than what we’re seeing today (as we’re washing out all the delta one flows which are dwarfing client trading)…lots of discipline being displayed thus far, with low turnovers and folks not chasing.
FTSE (UKX, benchmark equities index) is an absolute CHAMP right, trading -8.7% within the first 10 minutes of the open before clawing-back to all but -1.9% at ‘highs.’ Wrap your head around this: week-to-date, UKX is up over 2.8%! What’s the driver of today’s massive rally? People are getting their arms around the impact of this extraordinarily weak Sterling as a backdoor stimulus for exporters (ironic the power of what a departure from the EU can do vs what x # of kagillions of QE purchases couldn’t get done) and the inevitable rate cut from the BoE.
What I have to continue keeping one eyeball on is SX7E (EU banks index); the thing cannot get off mat. And if that can’t get off the mat, peripheries (and their sovereign debt) won’t either, as we re-enter the EU-crisis-era “Doom Loop” where widening sovereign spreads drag down the banks who are stuffed to the gills with them….vicious cycle, what else is new. FWIW, as I write and we’ve had this massive bounce in equities, Italian stocks (FTSEMIB) are back at their lows. This will likely be the next “hot zone” as we begin playing EU existential dominos (Spanish elections Sunday too).
