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Markets

Markets 26th July 2012

Moody’s grades 17 German banks with negative outlook

Moody’s investors service said Thursday it had changed to negative the outlooks of 17 German banking groups and several subsidiaries. The decision affected their long-term debt and deposit ratings or their long-term guaranteed debt obligations, whose ratings incorporate support from the German government or several German federal states or municipalities. Moody’s explained the update of outlooks was the consequence of German sovereign and sub-sovereign ratings having been graded to negative from…

Markets 26th July 2012

Spanish real estate exposure halves Santander profits

MADRID | Banco Santander announced Thursday a net attributable profit of €1.704 billion in the first half of the year. The figure brings a cut down of about 51% compared with the same period in 2011. The Spanish bank pointed out that the decline is a result of setting aside €1.304 billion for provisions for real estate exposure in Spain of the second quarter ordinary profit of €1.404 billion. As a…

Markets 26th July 2012

Stock markets only dodged adversity

By CaixaBank research team, in Barcelona | Although the first half of the year has ended with a negative balance for most international stock markets, the latest months has been characterised by a relative improvement in indices. The reduction in fears that Greece will leave the euro and the euro area’s assistance in recapitalising Spain’s banking system marked a turning point in the trend for investors’ appetite for risk. Although…

Markets 24th July 2012

Spanish three-month ban on short sales disappoints analysts

Some investors sell shares that they don’t actually hold but borrow under the expectation that prices will fall. If they are right, when they buy back, the stock comes at a cheaper cost than the amount they were paid for those same shares and so sellers can pocket the difference as a profit. A day after the Spanish financial regulator CNMV ruled a full suppression of these short selling practices over…

Markets 24th July 2012

Euro area government debt rose to 88.2% of GDP in first three months of 2012

At the end of the first quarter of 2012, the government debt to GDP ratio in the euro area stood at 88.2%, compared with 87.3% at the end of the fourth quarter of 2011. Eurostat said that in the EU the ratio increased from 82.5% to 83.4%. Compared with the first quarter of 2011, the government debt to GDP ratio rose in both the euro area (from 86.2%) and the EU (from 80.4%). At…

Markets 23rd July 2012

The UK financial reality index sees no recovery yet

LONDON | The slight, although gladly acknowledged, fall in unemployment in the UK caused an improvement of the economic background rate from 63.4 to 65.3. It has been the only positive news released Monday by Alliance Trust, whose UK financial reality index noted a deterioration in households' financial situation during the second quarter of this year. In any case, the number being below 100 signals trouble, and it has been…

Markets 18th July 2012

Production in construction up by 0.1% in euro area

Being a member of the euro club continues offering confusing evidence of providing protection against the global economic downturn. In the construction sector, seasonally adjusted production rose by 0.1% in the euro area while it grew 1.6% in the European Union in May 2012, compared with the previous month. But in April 2012, production had decreased by 3.7% in the common currency region and 6.9% outside it. Compared with May 2011, production in…

Markets 18th July 2012

Spanish exports top euro zone sales to foreign markets

The heaviest economies of the euro zone’s periphery, Italy and Spain, have behaved in a more competitive manner than most sceptics about the laggards of the common currency union would have it. Companies from both Mediterranean countries have increased their presence in markets outside their natural environment, partly forced by a falling domestic demand but due to the strength of production structures and new-found adaptability, too. Here on The Corner,…

Markets 18th July 2012

Issuances slow up in the corporate bond markets under euro pressures

By CaixaBank research team, in Barcelona | The worsening climate in peripheral Europe has affected the corporate bond markets. Whereas, during the previous months, this market stood out for its remarkable ability to resist the adversities of the euro area crisis (from the point of view of issuances and the extent of capital flows), in May investor mood and the issuance of corporate bonds had been fully infected. In addition,…

Markets 17th July 2012

Everything you ever wanted to know about the EFSF/ESM

While waiting for the changes the European rescue fund needs to introduce in order to recapitalise the banking sector directly, especially the Spanish one, JP Morgan’s global equity department has made an interesting answer-question list with the main doubts that everybody could have concerning this instrument. The starting point could be the role of the European Financial Stability Facility /European Stability Mechanism until the last European Summit. Up to that…

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