"Over the past month we have been closely documenting a major funding squeeze
in the all important shadow economy - the "synthetic liquidity" conduit which
far more than traditional sources of cash, has become all important for proper
bank functioning over the past decade. Courtesy of adverse development in
Europe, one by one various components of this unregulated funding scheme have
become frozen necessitating the first of many central bank interventions on
November 30 to provide liquidity to global banks, primarily to offset such
shadow conduits as locked up commercial paper, repo and money markets.
Logically, as noted over a week ago, European banks scrambled to obtain cheap
dollars by borrowing
over $50 billion from the Fed, and plug dollar shortfalls. Yet as all band
aid measures designed to offset a broken liquidity equilibrium fail eventually,
it was only a matter of time before we saw a direct bail out by the Fed of one
or more banks in the aftermath of the November 30 global "bail out." Sure
enough, we have our first clue that "something" happened in the week ending
Wednesday December 14 that involved an upgrade of the Fed's indirect (and thus
untargeted) bailout of global banks, to a focused, and
very much targeted rescue of one (or more) banks. And with some
additional diligence, it may be possible to narrow down the date of an actual
bank bailout: Tuesday, December 13.
Exhibit A - Reserve Bank Credit
Two years ago, when discussing the transition of the world to one coordinated, centrally-planned regime we said that the only financial statement of any importance, updated weekly, is the Fed's H.4.1, or the "Factors Affecting Reserve Balances" which traces that flow of "last resort" cash from the Fed to the various organization that make up the reserve bank, primary dealer, and various other financial entities under the Fed's Lender of Last Resort umbrella. Simply said, anything abnormal in this weekly report of "flow and stock" (a simplistic distinction where the Fed is far more focused on what the absolute level of reserve numbers is, whereas Zero Hedge and the market believe it is the "flow", or marginal change, that determines, artificially, asset prices) would confirm our speculations that the Fed has stepped into into its now traditional role of bailing out the world.
The first thing that caught our attention was the all important total reserve bank credit - the most important big picture metric announced by the Fed on a weekly basis. As the chart below shows, after having plateaued with the End of QE2, and remaining stable during the duration of the "sterilized" Operation Twist (as it should), in the week ended December 14, total reserve credit soared by a whopping $81 billion or the most since May 27, 2009 when the Fed was actively undergoing the early stages of QE1 damage control.
So what was the reason for this huge jump in reserve credit? Two things - on one hand we had the already long-ago telegraphed increase in Fed liquidity swap lines by over $50 billion, or from $2.3 to $54.3 billion to be exact. However that does not explain the remainder. So where did the other $30 billion in credit expansion come from?
Exhibit B - The Plot Thickens: First Net MBS Bulk Purchase Since QE1
It appears that in addition to reverting to such an "old school" QE1 global bailout mechanism as FX swap lines, the Fed also did something it had not done in a long time, or since QE1 to be exact: it bought a boatload of Mortgage Backed Securities, an act it last engaged in on a net basis back on August 11, 2010, which in turn was a delayed settlement of an earlier purchase. As a reminder, the Fed's balance sheet settles any MBS purchases on the mid-month update so while the big spikes in the chart below between January and July 2010 are indicative of broad MBS purchases by the Fed under the auspices of QE1, when it was out purchasing a total of $1.25 trillion in MBS in hopes of lowering mortgage rates and stimulating housing, and thus employment (something it failed at miserably), in the mid-month week just ended, the Fed bought, and settled concurrently, an unprecedented $31 billion in MBS.
Obviously $31 billion jump in settled MBS purchases is notable considering the pattern of previous MBS net flows since August 2010. But under what auspices did the Fed go ahead and buy this whopping amount of Mortgage debt? And why?..."
at http://www.zerohedge.com/news/did-fed-quietly-bail-out-bank-tuesday
Exhibit A - Reserve Bank Credit
Two years ago, when discussing the transition of the world to one coordinated, centrally-planned regime we said that the only financial statement of any importance, updated weekly, is the Fed's H.4.1, or the "Factors Affecting Reserve Balances" which traces that flow of "last resort" cash from the Fed to the various organization that make up the reserve bank, primary dealer, and various other financial entities under the Fed's Lender of Last Resort umbrella. Simply said, anything abnormal in this weekly report of "flow and stock" (a simplistic distinction where the Fed is far more focused on what the absolute level of reserve numbers is, whereas Zero Hedge and the market believe it is the "flow", or marginal change, that determines, artificially, asset prices) would confirm our speculations that the Fed has stepped into into its now traditional role of bailing out the world.
The first thing that caught our attention was the all important total reserve bank credit - the most important big picture metric announced by the Fed on a weekly basis. As the chart below shows, after having plateaued with the End of QE2, and remaining stable during the duration of the "sterilized" Operation Twist (as it should), in the week ended December 14, total reserve credit soared by a whopping $81 billion or the most since May 27, 2009 when the Fed was actively undergoing the early stages of QE1 damage control.
So what was the reason for this huge jump in reserve credit? Two things - on one hand we had the already long-ago telegraphed increase in Fed liquidity swap lines by over $50 billion, or from $2.3 to $54.3 billion to be exact. However that does not explain the remainder. So where did the other $30 billion in credit expansion come from?
Exhibit B - The Plot Thickens: First Net MBS Bulk Purchase Since QE1
It appears that in addition to reverting to such an "old school" QE1 global bailout mechanism as FX swap lines, the Fed also did something it had not done in a long time, or since QE1 to be exact: it bought a boatload of Mortgage Backed Securities, an act it last engaged in on a net basis back on August 11, 2010, which in turn was a delayed settlement of an earlier purchase. As a reminder, the Fed's balance sheet settles any MBS purchases on the mid-month update so while the big spikes in the chart below between January and July 2010 are indicative of broad MBS purchases by the Fed under the auspices of QE1, when it was out purchasing a total of $1.25 trillion in MBS in hopes of lowering mortgage rates and stimulating housing, and thus employment (something it failed at miserably), in the mid-month week just ended, the Fed bought, and settled concurrently, an unprecedented $31 billion in MBS.
Obviously $31 billion jump in settled MBS purchases is notable considering the pattern of previous MBS net flows since August 2010. But under what auspices did the Fed go ahead and buy this whopping amount of Mortgage debt? And why?..."
at http://www.zerohedge.com/news/did-fed-quietly-bail-out-bank-tuesday
