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Thoughts From The Divide: Collateral Damage – May 31 2024 – MI2 Partners

BY JON WEBB
If this week’s title sends a small shiver down your spine, you may be in the Real Estate/lending business. Sadly, there doesn’t appear to be any quick or easy cures, which is perhaps unsurprising as the hits keep coming. Bank OZK is the latest example, getting slammed after a Citi analyst noted “substantial concerns” over the company’s “largest individual loan… and Life Science construction lending in general”. Some might think the residential side is also showing some cracks, with pending home sales slumping to the “lowest level since the start of the pandemic”, and with an increasing number of listings opting to cut prices. The latter metric might itself be muted by the number of listings getting pulled… Cheery stuff! Read more →

Thoughts From the Divide:  Subjest to Change

BY JON WEBB
As the saying goes, “needs must when the devil drives”. We have no problem understanding the Fed’s decision to announce (at 7pm last night) that the details of the BTFP program needed to be altered. The problem was the overly juicy arbitrage, whereby banks could use the BTFP window to flip cash from the Fed into the RRP and pocket the not-insubstantial difference. We were impressed by the chutzpah involved in arbitraging two Fed facilities! Read more →

C8 Hedge – Currency Compass – Election Special – November 2024

BY JON WEBB
The strong USD bias worked well for our FX models last month, with our dynamic hedge adding over 1% outperformance for EURUSD and GBPUSD, and over 3% for USDJPY.  We note, however, that our models have now moved to neutral for the USD against the EUR and GBP, though still look for higher USDJPY.  Reducing FX risk may well be sensible given the closeness of the US Presidential election, and doubts about the accuracy of polls. Though, as we note overleaf, late momentum now marginally favours Harris. Read more →
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