Just how vulnerable are banks to further contagion and crisis? With inflation still running loose, central banks still set to hike, while consumer and corporate pressures mount, the banking crisis may only just have started.
The “rescue” of Credit Suisse, thereby averting a European banking crisis, is getting less comment than the nixing of its $17.5 bln of CoCo Bonds. I’ve been warning about CoCos since 2011. Finally I got something right!
Credit Suisse is in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Confidence in the bank is zero. The Swiss National Bank has provided a backstop, but a sale looks likely of the bank that just can’t get it right.
There are lessons from the public humiliation of Kwasi Kwarteng for governments and corporates around the globe. If we are going to address the looming economic crises – then governments, central banks and financial instutions need to be on the same page.
Markets were shaken but unstirred by the collapse of Greensill and the Archegos unwind trades. Credit Suisse is the ultimate loser of the two scandals – reputationally damaged and holed below the water line. The bank is paying the price of years of flawed management, poor risk awareness. and its self-belief it was still a Tier 1 global player. Its’ challenge is to avoid becoming the Deutsche Bank of Switzerland – which it will struggle to do without a radical and unlikely shakeout.
As Greensill and Archegos roil markets and cause losses, they beg the question – who is next? Why is 2021 turning into the year the scams are unravelling? Will leverage on leverage trigger wider implosion or will it be something else, like liquidity?
The collapse of Greensill involved a predicable cast of unwise enablers, but it should serve as a warning to the growing number of Alternative Asset buyers on the dangers of complex deals which promise much but deliver less. Due diligence is critical in the highly illiquid alternatives sector.
