Tuesday, 11 March 2008 05:00

I warned about this earlier...

The rest of the world (Europe, Asia, and to a lesser extent northern Africa) will be following behind the US quite shortly. We are not in this by ourselves. As a matter of fact, I think we will be pulling out of it before some of them, particularly China and the EU/UK.

From Bloomberg :

Asian Corporate Bond Risk Surges as Credit-Loss Concerns Deepen

By Laura Cochrane and Patricia Kuo

March 11 (Bloomberg) -- The cost to protect corporate bonds in the Asia-Pacific from default surged to the highest since the gauges started on concerns banks, securities firms and hedge funds face deepening credit market losses.

Credit-default swaps on the subordinated bonds of Macquarie Group Ltd. increased 60 basis points to 435 basis points and contracts tied to the non-senior debt of St George Bank Ltd. rose about 28 basis points to 300 basis points, both at records, according to Citigroup Inc. Asia's benchmark indexes reached records after U.S. and European gauges climbed yesterday.

``The market is very, very scary,'' said Andre Rattanavan, a Hong Kong-based credit trader at BNP Paribas SA. ``It gives us new fear, new shocks and new levels everyday.''

One or more of four main indexes in Asia have set records on about half of the trading days this year and the Australian benchmark has more than doubled since Jan. 16 as financial firms globally disclosed almost $190 billion of losses and writedowns from the U.S. subprime mortgage collapse. Funding costs have surged as banks raise interest rates and hedge funds have been forced to sell more than $5 billion in holdings.

Last modified on Tuesday, 11 March 2008 05:00