l****z
发帖数: 29846 | 1 雷曼兄弟破产时，风险与资产比是31：1，而今天德国主要银行的风险与资产比是32：1
，这些银行目前持有大量希腊债务
Sovereign Debt Crisis Won't End Until Global Financial Collapse
In the past, there certainly have been governments that have gotten into
trouble with debt, but what we are experiencing now is the first truly
global sovereign debt crisis. There has never been a time in recorded
history when virtually all of the governments of the world were drowning in
debt all at the same time. This sovereign debt crisis is never going to end
until there is a major global financial collapse. There simply is no way to
unwind the colossal web of debt that we have constructed in an orderly
fashion.
Right now, the EU and the IMF have been making "emergency loans" to nations
such as Greece, Ireland and Portugal, but that is only going to buy those
countries a few additional months. Giving more loans to nations that are
already drowning in red ink may "kick the can down the road" for a little
while, but it isn't going to solve anything. Meanwhile, dozens more nations
all over the globe are rapidly approaching a day of reckoning.
All of the bailouts that you are hearing about right now are simply delaying
the pain. The reality is that when the "emergency loans" for Greece stop,
Greece is going to default. Greece is toast; the game is over. You can stick
a fork in Greece because it is done.
One of the big problems for Greece is that since it is part of the euro, it
can't independently print more money. If Greece cannot raise enough euros
internally, it must turn to outside assistance. Unfortunately, at this point
Greece has accumulated such a mammoth debt that it cannot possibly sustain
it. By the end of the year, it is projected that the national debt of Greece
will soar to approximately 166% of GDP.
The financial collapse of Greece is inevitable. If it keeps using the euro -
- or even if it quits using it -- it will collapse. When the rest of Europe
decides that it is tired of propping Greece up, the game will be over. And
at this point, very few people are interested in lending Greece more money.
As I wrote yesterday, many of the nations around the world are only able to
keep going because they are able to borrow huge amounts of money at low
interest rates. Well, nobody wants to lend money to Greece at a low rate of
interest anymore.
Today, the yield on two-year Greek bonds is back over 28 percent.
Fortunately for the rest of the world, Greece is just a very, very small
part of the global economy, but when interest rates start spiking like that
on U.S. or Japanese debt, the entire world's financial system will be thrown
into chaos.
So why is there so much of a focus on Greece right now? There is a real
danger that the panic will start to spread. The other day, Moody's Investors
Service slashed the credit rating on Portuguese government debt by four
notches; that debt is now considered to be "junk." But even more alarming is
that Moody's stated that what is going on in Greece played a role in
reducing the credit rating of Portugal.
The following is a portion of what Moody's had to say when it cut the credit
rating of Portugal by four notches:
Although Portugal’s Ba2 rating indicates a much lower risk of
restructuring than Greece’s Caa1 rating, the EU’s evolving approach to
providing official support is an important factor for Portugal because it
implies a rising risk that private sector participation could become a
precondition for additional rounds of official lending to Portugal in the
future as well. This development is significant not only because it
increases the economic risks facing current investors, but also because it
may discourage new private sector lending going forward and reduce the
likelihood that Portugal will soon be able to regain market access on
sustainable terms.
Basically, Moody's is saying that the terms of the Greek bailout make
Portuguese debt less attractive because Portugal will likely be forced into
a similar bailout at some point. If the EU is not going to fully guarantee
the debt of the member nations, then that debt becomes less attractive to
investors.
The downgrade of Portugal is having all kinds of consequences. The cost of
insuring Portuguese government debt set a new record high on Wednesday, and
yields on Portuguese bonds have gone haywire. If you want to get an idea of
just how badly Portuguese bonds have been crashing, just check out this
chart.
But it is not just Portugal that is having problems. Just recently, Moody's
warned that it may downgrade Italy's Aa2 debt rating at some point within
the next few months. Spain is also on the verge of major problems and
Ireland may need another bailout soon.
Things don't look good. Unfortunately, if the dominoes start to fall the
entire EU is going to go down. Big banks all over Europe are highly exposed
to sovereign debt and they are leveraged to the hilt. It is almost as if we
are looking at a replay of 2008 in many ways.
When Lehman Brothers finally collapsed, it was leveraged 31 to 1. Today,
major German banks are leveraged 32 to 1, and major German banks are
currently holding a tremendous amount of Greek debt. Anyone with half a
brain can see that this is going to end badly.
So how is the European Central Bank responding to this crisis? It's raising
interest rates once again. That certainly is not going to help the PIIGS
much. But Europe is not the only one facing a horrific debt crunch.
In Japan, the national debt is now up to about 226 percent of GDP. So far
the Japanese government has been able to handle a debt load this massive
because the citizens of Japan have been willing to lend the government
gigantic mountains of money at interest rates so low that they are hard to
believe. When that paradigm changes, and it will, Japan is going to be in a
massive amount of trouble. In fact, an article in Forbes has warned that
even a very modest increase in interest rates would cause interest payments
on Japanese government debt to exceed total government revenue by the year
2019.
Of course, the biggest pile of debt sitting out there is the national debt
of the United States. The U.S. is so enslaved to debt that there is
literally no way out under the current system. To say that America is in big
trouble would be a massive understatement.
In fact, the whole world is headed for trouble. Right now, government debt
around the globe continues to soar at an exponential pace. At some point a
wall is going to be hit.
The Wall Street Journal recently quoted Professor Carmen Reinhart as saying
the following about what we are facing:
"These processes are not linear," warns Prof. Reinhart. "You can
increase debt for a while and nothing happens. Then you hit the wall, and —
bang! — what seem to be minor shocks that the markets would shrug off in
other circumstances suddenly become big."
That is the nature of debt bubbles; They keep expanding and expanding until
the day that they inevitably burst.
Governments around the world will issue somewhere in the neighborhood of $5
trillion more debt this year alone. Debt to GDP ratios all over the globe
continue to rise at a frightening pace. Because the world is so
interconnected today, the collapse of even one nation will devastate banks
all over the planet. If even one domino is toppled, there is no telling
where things may end.
The combination of huge amounts of debt and huge amounts of leverage is
incredibly toxic, and that is what we have all over the globe today. Almost
every major nation is drowning in a sea of red ink and almost all of our
major financial institutions are leveraged to the hilt.
There is only one way that the sovereign debt crisis can end: Very, very
badly. I hope you are ready for what is coming. |
|
