Archive for February, 2008

Agency Market

Wednesday, February 6th, 2008

It was a mostly uneventful day in agencies. Spreads are tighter by 1 basis point to 3 basis points with the 2 year sector the best performer.  Paper with maturities of less than a year improved as Libor set down today and allowed some of the backlog there to clear. The agencies ...

Treasury Market and Other Musings

Wednesday, February 6th, 2008

TheTreasury market is experiencing a 5 basis point back up in yields across the curve this morning.  The craven fear which motivated trading yesterday has receded into the background as equities improve and credit markets experience a moment of stability. The major focus for the market over the next 90 minutes is ...

Neither a borrwower nor a lender be

Wednesday, February 6th, 2008

An interesting story fromReuters about the potential pitfalls of lending to lame credits

Agency Paper vs Swaps

Wednesday, February 6th, 2008

Agency paper has significantly underperformed the swaps market over the last several weeks. Agency benchmark paper in the 10 year sector traded Libor +1 yesterday whereas it had traded as rich as Libor -20 three months ago. What factors drives the underperformance of the benchmarks? One friend who makes it his ...

Leveraged Loan Redux

Wednesday, February 6th, 2008

Leveraged Loan market is stable this morning with the LCDX at 92.6 versus the 92.2 of late last evening. The flow names are still in the high 80s with no real improvement.

Overnight Flows in Treasury Market

Wednesday, February 6th, 2008

Some mixed flows overnight in Treasury market. Asian bank seller of 2 years hedge fund buyers of 2 year and 5 year sectors. Central Bank buyers 10 years End user buyer of 10years.

Opening Comments February 06 2008

Wednesday, February 6th, 2008

Prices of Treasury coupon securities are posting marginal gains in overseas trading.  The benchmark 2 year note has barely breached the 1.90 level and sits at 1.899 percent.  I believe that in this cycle it has traded as rich as 1.84 percent when equity markets were melting on Martin Luther ...

In the News February 06, 2008

Wednesday, February 6th, 2008

An FT story on the risk to banks from a downgrade of the monoline insurers. The FT on Super Tuesday result. The New York Times reports on Asian equity market trading. European equities via Reuters.

CMBX Battered

Tuesday, February 5th, 2008

The CMBX Index suffered from assault and battery today with a sharp across the board sell off. The weakness resulted from the general climate of risk aversion as well as from the weakness in the equity markets. The AAA and AA tranches took the worst hit.  Here is a link ...

Agency Market

Tuesday, February 5th, 2008

Agency spreads performed well today but mostly because the market has spent the last several days discounting supply. FNMA priced $3 billion 2 year notes at T+68.5 basis points and the same amount of  5 year notes at T+ 72 basis points. As the market closed the 2 year tranche ...