China’s Loan Growth Isn’t Boosting My Confidence In China’s “Green Shoots” Michael Pettis

I wrote in February ( see Number Of The Day "Credit Explosion In China" ) "This almost surreal number is signalling a real panic among the leaders..." & "I wonder what percentage of the loans will default".... There is nothing to add ( except the percentage will be sky high UPDATE: See link about the Beijing housing frenzy)........ ........ The level of panic might explain why protectionism is on the rise.....Good luck to all the investors/experts ( probably 90 percent.... ) that still think China will lead the rest of the world out of the dark....The first link from Michael Pettis is a must read! He provides the best insight on China......

Ich schrieb im Februar ( siehe Number Of The Day "Credit Explosion In China" ) "Diese unheimliche Zahl signalisiert ne echte Panik der chinesischen Führung...." & "Möchte nicht wissen welcher Prozentsatz dieser Ausleihungen in 24 Monaten als notleidend deklariert werden muß......" Nach aktueller Datenlage ist dem wenig hinzuzufügen.... Höchstens die Gewissheit das die Panik noch zugenommen hat und das eine gigantische Zahl dieser Kredite implodieren wird ( Update : Bitte den Link zum Immomarkt in Bepinkg lesen )...Wie groß die Panik zu sein scheint kann man auch am zunehmenden Protektionismus erkennen......Wer noch immer auf China als große Hoffnung der Weltkonjunktur setzen möchte dem wünsche ich viel Glück......Sieht fast so aus als wenn China demnächst einen nicht geringen Teil der $ Reserven für das eigene Bankensystem & die Provinzen benötigt...... Empfehle einmal mehr den Link von Michael Pettis. Habe bisher keinen gefunden der einen besseren Einblick in das chinesische "Innenleben" offenbart. Und das i.d.R Monate bevor andere darüber berichten......

China’s loan growth isn’t boosting my confidence in China’s “green shoots” Michael Pettis!

New loans	2008	2009
January	804	1,600
February	243	1,100
March	286	1,900
April	464	591
May	319	665
June	332	1,200
Half year	2,448	7,056
July	382
August	272
September	378
October	182
November	478
December	772
Total	4,912

China Bank Lending Funneled Into Stocks, News Says Bloomberg

Chinese new bank loans worth about an estimated 1.16 trillion yuan ($170 billion) were invested in the stock market in the first five months of this year, China Business News reported, citing a government economist.

That’s 20 percent of the 5.8 trillion yuan loans banks extended in the period, the Shanghai-based newspaper said.

> By the way the index has now bubbled higher to 3.050....... Update:Bawang International IPO, a Chinese herbal shampoo maker, was 446 times subscribed & Coal trader China Qinfa Group IPO 96 Times Oversubscribed

> Der Index steht aktuell bei 3.050....... Update :Bawang International IPO, a Chinese herbal shampoo maker, was 446 times subscribed & Kohlehändler China Qinfa Group IPO 98-fach überzeichnet

Chinese Banks: "An Accident Waiting to Happen" Naked Capitalism

Note the phrase "able to bear". Fitch's "macro-prudential risk" indicator for China threatens to jump from category 1 (safe) to category 3 (Iceland, et al).

This is a surprise to me but Michael Pettis from Beijing University says China's public debt may be as high as 50pc-70pc of GDP when "correctly counted".


The regime is so hellbent on meeting its growth target of 8pc that it has given banks an implicit guarantee for what Fitch calls a "massive lending spree".

Bank exposure to corporate debt has reached $4,200bn. It is rising at a 30pc rate, even as profits contract at a 35pc rate...

Roll-over risk is rocketing.

China's monetary stimulus since November is arguably more extreme than the post-Lehman printing of the US Federal Reserve, though less obvious to the untrained eye....

Beijing housing bubble growing, says state media Marketwatch

Beijing's property prices are climbing at an unsustainable rate, with residential property in the city center leaping 6.5% in the past week alone, according to a report Friday in the state-run China Daily newspaper.

The report, which cited data from property broker Homelink, said some neighborhoods have seen demand for apartments at four times the number of units available.

"We used to talk about monthly price growth, but recently, it's more about daily change," the report quoted a Homelink broker as saying.

"The bidders have gone irrational. A bubble in Beijing's property market is definitely there," the report quoted Soho founder and Chief Executive Pan Shiyi as saying.

The report said other large cities across China were seeing a similar phenomenon, with industry leaders now worried that the market is priming for a big drop at some point in the future.

> I´ve written earlier about the CRE in Beijing ( see Beijing's Olympic Building Boom Becomes A Bust )....

> Hier ein paar Fakten zum Zustand des gewerblichen Immobiliensektors in Peking ( siehe Beijing's Olympic Building Boom Becomes A Bust )

By Rodman's calculations, 500 million square feet of commercial real estate has been developed in Beijing since 2006, more than all the office space in Manhattan. And that doesn't include huge projects developed by the government.

He says 100 million square feet of office space is vacant -- a 14-year supply if it filled up at the same rate as in the best years, 2004 through '06, when about 7 million square feet a year was leased.

More Wisdoms From Hank Paulson

Almost impossible to track all of his flip flopping and nonsense........But as long as they can still find enough foreign buyers to finance this "brilliant" piece of thinking....... Unfortunately it seems that Bernanke and the Fed has a similar kind of thinking...... Start the helicopters........

Fast unmöglich mit all seine ganzen "Wesiheiten" schrittzuhalten..... Aber solange die USA es immer noch schaffen diese "brilliante" Sichtweise zu finanzieren....... Dummerweise hat Bernanke und die Fed anscheinend eine ähnliche Sichtweise...... Zeit die Helikopter zu starten......


Bertrand Benoit FT - To the German radio presenter, the real news about the measures announced by Washington on Tuesday to jolt banks into lending again was not so much the astronomical costs, but a little-noticed comment in Hank Paulson’s statement.

“Millions of Americans,” croaked the US Treasury secretary, were being denied credit or facing rising credit card rates, “making it more expensive for families to finance everyday purchases”.

The notion that families should finance everyday purchases on credit, the anchor commented, “suggests Washington has still to understand what brought us there in the first place”.

> AMEN!

Showing Stress.....& The Impotent Fed.

I think it is safe to say that the spreads in the auto & credit card segment will spike much higher in the coming quarters.... And this trend will spread around the globe.....

Ich bin mir ziemlich sicher das die Risikoaufschläge besonders im PKW und Kreditkartenbereich in den nächsten Quartalen noch erheblich steigen werden. Und das betrifft dann nicht nur die USA betreffen...... Passend hierzu aus der FAZ Unternehmensanleihen : Dunkle Wolken über spekulativen Werten

Worry About Stretched Firms,Consumers Hits Debt Markets WSJ
A range of corporate bonds and securities backed by consumer loans and mortgages have sagged in recent weeks to levels last seen in March, when worries about a financial crisis hit a high.

This time there is much less panic, but concern is building about the health of businesses and consumers.

The weakness is most visible in the debt of auto makers, retailers and companies in sectors reliant on consumer spending. Bonds issued by some financial institutions are also strained.

While a large-scale credit meltdown looks unlikely now, rising bond yields will make it harder and more expensive for corporations and individuals to finance their businesses, homes, education and day-to-day expenses.

Investors are demanding higher interest rates on most corporate and asset-backed debt. The average junk bond now yields around 8.1 percentage points more than Treasury securities, or 11.5%. That compares with a yield of 11.1% and spread of 8.6 percentage points on March 17, according to data from Merrill Lynch & Co.

Average spreads on bonds backed by auto loans and credit cards are three percentage points and 2.1 percentage points, respectively, close to their highs this spring. .....

Moody's Investors Service recently surveyed 31 companies that distribute gas to households. Of the group, 18 companies said an increasing number of customers were falling behind on their gas bills this year compared to last year

> No surprise to see that banks are once more procyclical in their lending habbits ( Same is happening in Europe WSJ: Euro Banks Tighten Lending Standards via Calculated Risk) ....... Too bad that there is so far no bill/law that allow Bernanke & Paulson to order banks to lend...... But with all the attempts we have seen you can´t even rule this out for the future ........ :-)

> Schon bemerkenswert wie es Banken immer wieder schaffen Ihre Kreditvergabekriterien immer prozyklisch dem Markt anzupassen anstelle in Zeiten des offensichtlichen Exzesses gegenzusteuern ( gleiches passiert auch in Europa Banken geizen mit Krediten FTD ).... Zu dumm das es bisher noch keine gesetzliche Handhabe für Bernanke und Paulson gibt die Banken zu verpflichten mehr zu vereleihen.... Nach allem was bisher aus den USA gekommen ist kann man aber selbst das zukünftig nicht mehr ganz auschließen..... :-)

The Rise of Pawn Shops and Fringe Banking

This is probably one of the very few sectors in the US financial system with a very bright future.....Hat tip to Minyanville for digging this from the FT

Das Geschäft der Pfandleihhäuser dürfte eines der wenigen Sektoren im US Finanzsystem mit glänzenden Zukunftsperspektiven sein.... Dank geht an Minyanville für das ausgraben dieser Geschichte der FT.

US pawnbrokers benefit from hard times FT
Hard times in the US are benefiting pawnbrokers as beleaguered consumers pledge jewels, electronics and other goods in return for loans with interest rates running as high as 300 per cent a year.

Dave Adelman, president of the National Pawnbrokers Association, said the number of loans at US pawn shops had risen 15-20 per cent since October. He attributed the increase to rising fuel prices and deteriorating economic conditions – an assessment echoed by other industry executives.

“Brief and shallow downturns in the economy may benefit our business model,” said Daniel Feehan, chief executive of Cash America, the biggest US pawnbroker chain, with 942 locations. ( Cash America Presentation )

> Probably no coincident that they have entered the UK market in mid 2007....

> Sicher kein Zufall das die Mitte 2007 in den UK Markt eingetreten sind......

Pawnbrokers offer loans in return for personal items. Customers can buy back their property for the value of the loan plus a fee, which works out to an interest rate that can reach 300 per cent on an annualised basis, according to the NPA. If borrowers do not pay off the loan in a given time, the unredeemed item can be sold.

> Here comes the definition from "Cash Advance " & "Pawn" via Cash America

> Hier die Definition der Begriffe vie Cash America

Cash America said on Thursday its profits had risen 21 per cent to $26.3m in the fourth quarter, reflecting higher sales of pawned goods and more loans.

Alan Fishbein of the Consumer Federation of America said pawnbrokers and other “fringe” banking operations – such as those making loans against future pay cheques or car titles – had grown as banks had withdrawn from poorer areas. About $48bn in payday loans are made every year and the revenues in the whole fringe banking industry are an estimated $12bn-$15bn, according to Dennis Telzrow, a consumer finance analyst at Stephens, an investment bank.

An estimated 10m US households are thought to be outside the banking system, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. The NPA estimates there are 12,000 to 14,000 pawnbroker shops in the US.

On Manhattan’s 47th Street, the New York block through which about 90 per cent of US diamonds are sourced, some merchants report a sharp uptick in the amount of jewellery being brought in for sale.

“Its real sad – they don’t want to sell,” said Ruben, a 52-year-old street hawker who buys jewellery from passers-by in the diamond district.

“They might have paid $150,000 for a necklace but they will get back $25,000 or $30,000 at most. But it’s either that or lose their house.”

Euroland’s Real Estate and its Importance for the Euroland Economy / Pimco

Matthieu Louanges from Pimco is doing a good job of describing the Eurozone housing market and that there are regions California & Florida would be proud of....... The biggest "froth" is for sure in the UK housing market.

Matthieu Louanges von Pimco gelingt hier wie ich finde eine gute Zusammenfassung des Immobilienmarktes in der Eurozone. Und in der Tat befinden sich einige Länder und Regionen auf Augenhöhe mit Kalifornien & Co....... Für mich der mit Abstand verrückteste Markt ist jedoch nach wie vor der UK Immobilienmarkt.

The bubbles that exist now in housing are in more than two dozen countries.” Alan Greenspan, 2 October 2007

> That´s from the man who once said it is impossible to identify bubbles and especially the US housing bubble and saw a deflation threat with credit growth easy in the double digits....... And that is the same guy that for example, just a year ago, cautiously opined that the “worst [of the housing downturn] may well be over.” Please shut up! Here is what the Case/Shiller futures are predicting for 2011 and the latest news isn´t helping either Foreclosure Filings Soar in 3rd Quarter .......

> Und das vom Mann der noch vor einigen Jahren behauptet hat das es unmöglich ist zu erkennen ob es sich um Blasen handelt. Insbesondere hat er das ganze in den USA nicht kommen sehen. Zudem hat er den Boden für dioe Immobilienkrise für den Herbst 2006 vorhergesagt. Hier ein Blick auf die Housing Futures für das Jahr 2011.Die letzten Meldungen von der Zwangsvollstreckungsfront dürften auch nicht gerade hilfreich sein .... Dafür hat er trotz einem Kreditwachstum was sich bereits im zweistelligen Bereich bewegt hat eine akute Deflationsgefahr erkannt. Das Ende der Geschichte ist bekannt. Schimanski würde wohl sagen "Halt´s Maul!".... :-)

Euroland’s Real Estate and its Importance for the Euroland Economy and ECB Policy

The crisis in the U.S. housing market will – in the view of PIMCO – dominate Fed policy over the next years, and signs for this are already evident. The real estate slowdown has impacted U.S. GDP reports via the negative contribution from the construction sector and we expect that consumption will not escape some significant correction going forward. Will Euroland’s housing market and economy face a similar fate?

Euroland Chasing U.S. Property Prices
More recently, worries about housing markets in other parts of the world have surfaced and with it the fear that the housing slowdown might become a more global phenomenon. The Financial Times of 29 September reported on its front page that “Holiday homes face price fall threat,” stressing the ongoing weakness in the Spanish housing market. As I am French, I am also well placed to report that the doubling of the property prices in France over the last eight years or so has undoubtedly supported consumers’ confidence and their ultimate consumption. I myself enjoyed the wealth effect to some extent (though I don’t own much!) and certainly feel a bit less comfortable now that prices seem to have plateaued and that some house price deflation might seem as unavoidable in my nice city of Les Sables d’Olonne on the French Atlantic coast as in some parts of the United States.

In fact, the real house price appreciation trend in Euroland over the last years has kept up with the U.S. (Chart 1).

How important is and has the real estate market been for the Euroland economy in the last years? Are there signs of weakness yet in the housing market? And, finally, what impact can we expect on consumption and the overall economy, credit growth and European Central Bank (ECB) policy? These are the questions we will address in this piece.

Residential Investment’s Limited Impact
There are different ways through which the real estate market can impact the economy. The obvious one is by looking at the contribution of the construction sector to GDP growth measured by the share of residential investment in GDP as shown in Chart 2. Spain has clearly been benefiting from the boom in the construction sector. The contribution to GDP growth from that part of the economy has been about 1% per year since 1999

In fact, the housing boom in Spain presents some similarities with the post-unification era in Germany, as well as with the most recent developments in the U.S. The share of the construction sector in the Spanish GDP is now higher than it was in Germany at the end of the post-unification real estate boom and much higher than it was at the peak of the U.S. housing cycle in 2005. The impact is less pronounced in other countries.

Looking at France, the contribution of the construction sector to GDP growth has been about 0.2% in the last years while, in Germany, it has even been negative until 2004. Since then, residential investment has stopped being a drag to German GDP growth, which in itself can be seen as a positive.

Transactions and Wealth Effect Drive Consumption
Another way of looking at the importance of the real estate market, particularly housing, is through the consumption effect, which consists of two factors: the number of transactions and the wealth effect. When people buy apartments or houses, they tend to buy more furniture, TVs, etc: This is the transactions effect. When people see the prices of their homes go up, they feel wealthier, have better credit scores and tend to consume more: This is the wealth effect.

From the late 1990s until 2004, both the number of transactions and prices – as shown in Chart 3 – accelerated, especially in France and Spain.

The wealth effect is particularly evident in Chart 4. When we look at 2003 consumption growth in a large group of countries worldwide and regress the growth rate with the level of house price appreciation, we see a strong correlation. Germany and Japan, for example, had no price appreciation and no real consumption growth. On the other hand, Spain and France had strong price appreciation and stronger consumption.

So far, we have seen in this installment of the European Perspectives that since the beginning of this century the share of residential investment has increased in Euroland, particularly in Spain, and that price appreciation in Euroland supported consumption, especially in Spain and France. What we haven’t considered yet is that the boom in housing resulted also in an acceleration of credit growth for home purchases (Chart 5).
We know the ingredients from the finance side that fueled credit growth and thus the housing markets in Europe: low interest rates in the European Monetary Union (EMU) (thanks to the convergence of the national bond curves down to the German yields), innovation in the mortgage markets (with the creation, for example, of new 50-year mortgages) and the exporting of the UK housing bubble into other European regions (through the surge in demand for holiday homes).
We would add that the real estate market tends to act on momentum with increasing prices boosting the demand for real estate as those who are planning a purchase tend to accelerate their decision and as increasing prices make a real estate investment look more attractive for the cohort of pro-cyclical minded investors. On the flip-side, housing slowdowns tend to take a long time to reverse, and this is why the current signs of weakness are particularly alarming.

First Signs of Weakness in Euroland Housing
Currently, there are at least three signs of a weakening in the Euroland housing market: Price appreciation is slowing while mortgage growth and housing permits are indicating a sharp correction in construction activity in the coming months.

Price growth has been slowing for about a year. In France and Spain, the slowdown in price appreciation is remarkable (Chart 3). In fact, the last numbers released by FNAIM (the French federation of real estate agents) indicate some deflation in the French housing market in the last months, with a decline in the prices of apartments of 1.7% over the quarter to September 2007. After multiple rate hikes by the ECB, higher mortgage rates are starting to impact borrowers. In addition, prices have reached levels that made it increasingly difficult for people earning non-investment bank salaries to purchase anything in cities like Paris or Barcelona (the average price per square meter in the centre of Paris is now exceeding 7,000 euros).

Moreover, mortgage growth, as measured by the loans made to households for property purchases, has slowed remarkably since the middle of 2006 (as shown in Chart 5) under the influence of higher mortgage rates, lower affordability and probably a less favorable outlook for housing. What is similarly remarkable – and supports our previous intuition that housing and consumption are well linked – is that consumer credit growth declined simultaneously (Chart 5). The growth rate of credit to households has been slowing overall, which might indicate some weakness to come in Euroland consumption.

This is, of course, an important consideration for the ECB. This development should make the central bank less worried about the pace of credit growth than before, even though broad-based monetary growth remains quite strong due to other factors like the attractiveness of monetary assets in the context of a flat yield curve.

> Too bad that the ECB didn´t care on the escalating way up........

> Nur dumm das die EZB auf dem Weg als die Sache jahrelang eskaliert ist tatenlos zugesehen hat.....

Housing permits in Euroland are now slumping in line with the bearish developments described above. This is particularly the case in Spain, where the number of housing permits is falling by an annualized rate of about 40% (Chart 6). But permits are also falling at the entire euro area level, as the composite shows.

In addition, anecdotal evidence suggests a decline in the number of transactions in countries like Spain and France, but unfortunately, there appears to be no hard data depicting these series (if anybody knows of such a data series, please let me know!).

When summing it up, the story sounds very much like in the U.S. at first sight: Prices are not rising anymore or are even falling, mortgage growth is declining and housing permits indicate a stronger slowdown to come in the contribution of residential investments to GDP growth. However, a Euroland-wide price depreciation does not appear to be a reasonable scenario given the differences between the countries in the euro zone.

Slowing GDP and Credit Growth
The development outlined above suggest that euro area GDP will most likely suffer from negative impacts through construction sector growth as well as deteriorating consumption outlooks in the countries that had enjoyed housing booms. Spain appears particularly at risk, with a GDP growth rate that could fall from a 3.5% pace to 2.5% if the construction sector would stabilize and everything else remained equal (which would not be the case given the negative externalities in terms of consumption as previously noted). France is also at risk but the consumption effect will dominate, based on a decline in the number of transactions, as well as stabilizing, if not falling, prices. From an average of 2.4% household consumption growth per annum, consumption in France has already dropped to a level of 1.7%. However, the countries most affected by the housing and construction slowdown only contribute about 35% to euro area GDP, thus mitigating the impact on the euro zone average. Still, even countries like Germany are experiencing a slowdown in construction, as illustrated by the decline in housing permits.

The good news for the ECB should be the decelerating growth rate in credit to households. Interestingly, in the September ECB press conference, Jean-Claude Trichet spent a long time explaining that several factors are causing broad money growth to rise. He particularly mentioned the flattening of the yield curve, which has increased the attractiveness of monetary assets relative to less liquid, longer-maturity instruments (which should not be too worrisome for the ECB) and the growth of loans to non-financial companies. The recent re-pricing of risks in the credit markets and the ongoing liquidity crisis in Euroland might make these contributions to monetary growth particularly vulnerable in the next months. This should please the ECB.

To sum it up, Euroland enjoyed strong real estate markets over the last years with some similarities to the U.S. when it comes to price appreciation or the contribution of residential investment to GDP growth in some countries. Euroland is now suffering from a significant slowdown in housing, which is most likely going to impact consumption negatively and slow down credit growth to households. In fact, some of these effects are already visible and contributed to the recent downward revisions of GDP growth forecasts for 2008 by most market participants. Ultimately, the housing market developments in Euroland support the case for an ECB on hold for now.

> In the meantime the cpi is climbing to levels we havn´t seen since the ECB is in charge and is sharply higher than their official 2% percent target.... Thank god they are vigilant..... No wonder more and more peoople are daydreamimg how the Bundesbank have handled this mess

> In der Zwischenzeit bewegt sich die Konsumentenpreisinflation auf Höhen die wir seitdem die EZB das Ruder übernommen hat nicht gesehen haben...Zum Glück wird ja täglich betont das sie sehr wachsam sind.......Es wundert mich nicht das sich immer mehr Leute fragen wie eine unabhängige Bundesbank diese Situation gehandhabt hätte.

Credit Excess / Baltics

Wow! We have a clear winner in the category "easy credit". beforeThe the following charts and data are just breathtaking. .....The credit explosion explains why the Baltic Real Estate market is so "frothy".

Anschnallen! Wir haben den eindeutigen Gewinner in Sachen "Easy Credit" gefunden. . Die nachfolgenden Charts und Daten verschlagen einen aber wirklich den Atem....... Das erklärt natürlich auch diesen Bericht über den baltischen Immobilienmarkt.


Banking Risks Rise in Eastern Europe
Credit to the private sector has expanded at a fast clip in central and eastern Europe during the past decade, outpacing most other regions of the world.

Rapid credit growth (see Chart 1) reflects a number of factors:

• low levels of financial development and pent-up demand pressures following decades of socialist economic management;

• good macroeconomic discipline and membership in the European Union (EU), which lowered country risk premiums; and

• improved access to foreign capital following the entry of foreign banks and the opening of capital accounts.

Assessing the risks
Rapid credit growth has brought important benefits, helping channel domestic and foreign savings to households and investors and supporting financial sector development and economic growth in the region. But the brisk expansion of credit is raising concerns about macroeconomic and prudential risks (that is to say, whether banks remain sound).

Quantifying these risks is a challenge because countries in central and eastern Europe have not gone through a full credit cycle yet, and financial soundness indicators tend to improve in the upward phase of the credit cycle.

But experience in industrial and emerging market countries suggests that credit booms can be associated with unsustainable domestic demand booms, overheating, and asset price bubbles. Financial sector difficulties also cannot be ruled out—for example, loan losses may occur during a deep recession or following a large exchange rate depreciation if loans are denominated in foreign currency.

> from Baltic blues / Economist

How significant these risks are in central and eastern Europe and what role public policy should play in containing them are key questions facing policymakers.

Banking risks on the rise
On the surface, rapid credit growth in central and eastern Europe does not appear to have weakened banks. (It remains to be seen how the current turmoil in financial markets will affect banks in the region, but so far there have been no signs of a major fallout.) However, the reason financial soundness indicators are not yet pointing to a deterioration in credit quality could be that they are based on systemwide statistics rather than reflecting assessments of data from individual banks and there is a lag before bank data become publicly available.

Our analysis suggests that the granting of credit is becoming increasingly divorced from bank soundness—all banks, including weak ones, seem to be expanding at an equally rapid pace. This suggests that prudential risks are on the rise.

Our findings underscore the importance of forward-looking and risk-based supervision to keep the risks associated with rapid credit growth at manageable levels while maximizing the benefits of credit for financial development and economic growth.

In particular, supervisors need to give more attention to weaker banks that are growing rapidly. This would also be consistent with the risk-based approach to supervision that central and eastern European countries are moving to as they implement the new capital adequacy accord, known as Basel II.

Increased prudential risks are most apparent in the fastest-growing credit markets. These markets include lending to households, foreign currency-denominated or indexed lending, and lending in the three Baltic countries, where weaker banks are expanding at a faster rate than sounder banks (see Chart 2). A stronger policy response is thus warranted in each of these markets. Such a response may involve, for example, higher capital requirements and tighter loan classification and provisioning rules, differentiated on a bank-by-bank basis

But experience in industrial and emerging market countries suggests that credit booms can be associated with unsustainable domestic demand booms, overheating, and asset price bubbles. Financial sector difficulties also cannot be ruled out—for example, loan losses may occur during a deep recession or following a large exchange rate depreciation if loans are denominated in foreign currency.

How significant these risks are in central and eastern Europe and what role public policy should play in containing them are key questions facing policymakers.

Banking risks on the rise
Our analysis suggests that the granting of credit is becoming increasingly divorced from bank soundness—all banks, including weak ones, seem to be expanding at an equally rapid pace. This suggests that prudential risks are on the rise.

Increased prudential risks are most apparent in the fastest-growing credit markets. These markets include lending to households, foreign currency-denominated or indexed lending, and lending in the three Baltic countries, where weaker banks are expanding at a faster rate than sounder banks (see Chart 2). A stronger policy response is thus warranted in each of these markets. Such a response may involve, for example, higher capital requirements and tighter loan classification and provisioning rules, differentiated on a bank-by-bank basis

Bank Data Reveals Stretched System / Minyanville

I´m pretty sure that the endgame will hit the "experts" with surprise and will shock the markets in the future at least for one week until the Fed steps in....... ;-)

Nach meinen Erfahrungen dürfte das Ende vom Lied mal wieder alle "Experten" überraschen und die Märkte in ferner Zukunft für maximal eine Woche in einen Schockzustand versetzen bis die Fed zur Rettung eilt....... ;-)

" Well, I´d better go now. I´m almost at the wall..."

Thanks to The New Yorker

Minyan Peter / Bank Data Reveals Stretched System
On Friday, several pieces of key bank data were reported by the Federal Reserve:

First, for August, non-mortgage consumer debt rose at an annual rate of 5.9%, up from 4.7% in July. The bulk of the increase came from revolving debt, principally credit cards, which rose at 8.1% versus 7.5% in July.

To frame the revolving credit figure, here is some historical data:

Year	Annual Growth Rate
2003	2.3%
2004	3.8%
2005	3.1%
2006	6.3%
June 2007	7.1%
July 2007	7.5%
August 2007	8.1%

That credit card debt growth is accelerating at a time when retail sales growth is slowing suggests that more consumers are turning to their cards to finance their basic monthly cash flow. As I have said previously, it appears that the credit card banks have become the consumer lender of last resort. How long this can continue, particularly with the slowdown in personal income growth, (from 0.9% monthly income growth in January to 0.3% in August) remains to be seen.

Second, the weekly report on system-wide bank balance sheets showed a surprising $100 bln increase in bank assets for the week following the Fed Funds rate cut. I, and others, had expected to see a decline in bank balance sheet assets, figuring that the rate cut would have paved the way for banks to move some more liquid loans or securities off their balance sheets and into the secondary market. That this did not happen suggests that either corporate borrowers are hoarding liquidity by drawing down credit lines or the secondary markets have not fully responded to the rate decline. At the same time, system-wide net assets (a proxy for capital) showed a $15 bln decline for the week.

For the record, since May, when it peaked, net assets (again, a proxy for capital) for large U.S. banks has dropped by $55 bln - or 7% (from $740 bln to $685 bln), while over the same period, total assets for large banks has grown by $228 bln - or 4% (from $5.607 trln to $5.835 trln). Furthermore, substantially all of this growth was funded through non-deposit debt sources.

To return large bank capital ratios to their peak May levels would require either an $85 bln increase to capital or a $640 bln reduction in assets.

While the “all clear” whistle may have blown for the stock market, the growth in system-wide bank balance sheets, particularly credit card balances, coupled with a meaningful decline in large bank capital levels indicates to me that our banking system is being stretched.

Earnings Quality And Credit Cards

Minyanville Peter has done a great job of digging into numbers at Target. It looks like credit card lenders have in essence become the consumer lenders of last resort and on top of this Target (and others) are getting creative ( I assume this is nothing new) in putting aside lower loss provisions to make their latest number. But why should they act in a different way than lots of banks.....? This move in the face of the coming recession is very shortsighted and underpins my view that the earnings quality ( not only in the US) is often "subprime". This doesn´t make the market more attractive......

Minyanville Peter hat Ihr wirklich einen tollen Job gemacht und hat sich stellvertretend für etliche Firmen die genauen Daten des Target ( nach Wal Mart die Nummer 2 in den USA) Ergebnisses angesehen. Und die zeigen zwei wenig erbauliche Trands. Zuerst bleibt festzuhalten das die Kreditkarte nach Wegfall der Immobilienrefinanzierung und anderer Kreditmöglichkeiten mehr denn je der letzte Strohhalm für den bis über beide Ohren in Schwierigkeiten US Konsumenten ist. Zum anderen wird einmal mehr deutlich wie "kreativ" (sicher nichts neues) die Firmen werden müssen um Ihre letzten Quartalszahlen zu "treffen". Immerhin haben die ja in etlichen Banken erstklassige Vorbilder (bloß das es dort um Mrd geht....). Und das ganze im Angesicht der kommenden Rezession. Sieht für mich doch extrem kurzsichtig, fahrlässig und auch offensichtlich aus. Das Pendel wird dafür in den kommenden Jahren umso stärker zurückschlagen. Einmal mehr ein Beleg für meine These das die Gewinnqualität (nicht nur in den USA) oftmals "subprime" ist. Das macht die schon jetzt nicht billigen Märkte nicht gerade attraktiver......

Minyan Mailbag: A Bird's-Eye View of the Credit Conundrum
Finally, no one is talking about it yet, but I think the market will soon begin to realize that the credit card lenders have in essence become the consumer lenders of last resort.

As consumers have been shut out of the mortgage and home equity world, the last available credit is plastic. One statistic that I have found very troubling is the degree to which credit card balance growth is running ahead of retail sales growth - a key sign that the consumer is stretched.

In normal times, you would expect aggregate credit card balance growth to run about in line with GDP and retail sales growth. This year it is running almost 2.5 times that. Clearly consumers are using their cards for far more than purchases. And my guess is that for many Americans their credit cards have become the latest, but potentially last, source of financing available.
Because of the oversized credit card balance growth, however, I think the market is missing what is really happening within card issuer portfolios – particularly loss and delinquency data. Today, no one seems to be very concerned about the increases in reported losses and delinquencies. However, when you start to normalize these statistics for the enormous balance growth we’ve seen, the increases in both are quite dramatic.
To put this all together, take Target’s (TGT) latest financial results and you can see the numbers for real. First, credit card balance growth was up 14% year-on-year - almost 1.5 times Target sales growth of 9.5%. Second, thanks to this balance growth, reported year-on-year delinquency ratios are up only a little bit (60+ days delinquencies of 3.5% versus 3.4% a year ago), but the dollars of delinquent accounts are up almost 18% - to $242 mln from $205 mln – and, as an aside, “late fees and other revenue” are up more than 36% year-on-year.

Digging even deeper, you come away with more unanswered questions. First, annualized net write-offs for the quarter were up 17% - 5.4% of loans versus 4.6% during the year ago quarter. But behind that, masked by 14% balance growth, there is a 32% increase in the dollars charged off.

Further, and to me more troubling, Target dropped its loan loss allowance from 8.3% of loans at the end of July 2006 ($501 mln) to 7.4% at the end of July 2007 ($509 mln). Had Target kept its provision at 8.3% of loans, the incremental cost would have been over $64 mln or almost 40% of the pre-tax quarterly earnings of Target’s credit card business.

Alternatively, had Target kept its provision at the same 1.8 times net charge-offs as last year (an 8.3% allowance on 4.6% in net write-offs), the required ending provision would have been over 9.7% of loans - at an incremental cost to the company of almost $144 mln – all but eliminating earnings from the credit card operation for the quarter. Put simply, when measured in dollars (rather than percentages of balances) Target’s nearly flat year-on-year loan loss allowance does not synch with the increase in loan balances, delinquencies, charge-offs, and late fees.

Number of the Day.....Late Debt Payments

The numbers for the 2nd quarter should be even worse........Click on the headline to read more.

Die Zahlen für das 2. Quartal sollten noch schlechter ausfallen......Klickt auf die Überschrift um mehr zu lesen.

More Americans fall behind on debt payments

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- More Americans fell behind on their debt payments in the first quarter than at any time since the 2001 recession, despite fewer delinquencies on credit-card debts, the American Bankers Association reported Tuesday.

Delinquencies of all types of consumer loans rose to 2.42% in the first quarter from 2.23% in the fourth quarter, led by higher rates of late payments for real-estate loans. It's the highest delinquency rate for the bankers' composite delinquency index since the second quarter of 2001.
Delinquencies on home-equity loans rose to 2.15% from 1.92%. Delinquencies on property-improvement loans rose to 1.61% from 1.29%. Mobile-home loans saw their rate of delinquencies rise to 2.94% from 2.82%.

>But here comes the "bright" spot with potential for a good "spin doctor" :-)

>Aber hier kommt die "gute" Nachricht. Sollte genügen um den Spindoctor damit zu beauftragen :-)

Delinquencies of credit-card debts fell to 4.41% of all accounts from 4.56% in the fourth quarter

Liquidity Slowing? / Paul Kasriel

i think we can eliminate the questionsmark.......

Meiner Meinung nach kann man das Fragezeichen bereits jetzt weglassen.....
It sure is with regard to how much U.S commercial banks are providing of late. Adjusted by the CPI, the year-over-year change in U.S. total bank credit (loans and investments) hit a recent peak of about 9% in October 2006. As of May, that year-over-change had slowed to about 4.8% (see Chart). As mortgage defaults continue to rise and regulators issue new more restrictive mortgage lending "guidelines," bank credit growth is likely to slow still more.

And goodness knows what will happen if a few of the private equity loan deals sour.

>AMEN!

Couple Learn the High Price of Easy Credit / NYT

debt everywhere..... this example illustrates what many families are experiencing. and with a recession under way..........

schulden so weit das auge...ich denke diese familie steht stellvertretend für viele in den usa. und das alles im auge einer kommenden rezession.......

this sums it up :-)

Snl_dontbuystuff
Hochgeladen von shosterman

here another debt statistic / hier noch ne schuldenstatistik

In 1980 it took $1 of new debt to create $1 of GDP (debt levels were much lower and capital usage was much tighter so new credit found its way into production), whereas today it takes $7 to $8 of new debt to create $1 of GDP.

YPSILANTI, Mich. — On a recent evening, Christine Moellering, 40, sorted through the plastic laundry basket where she keeps the family bills, statements and coupons.

“The Sears one is 32.24 percent,” Ms. Moellering said, reading a credit card statement with a balance of $5,955, including $155 in monthly finance charges. The high interest rate took her by surprise. “That’s nice,” she said sarcastically.

Ms. Moellering, and her husband, Mark, 39, earn average salaries for their age (together about $66,000 a year), live in an average-priced home and have an average cost of living. But like many other households these days, they have found that their day-to-day economic life has come to depend not just on how much they earn or spend, but also on how well they shuffle what they owe among a broad array of credit cards, home equity loans and other lines of credit.
Americans spent one in seven of their take-home dollars on debt payments last year, up from one in nine in 1980.


thanks to http://www.itulip.com/

>that is despite low fed funds rates interest rates compared to the double digits in 1980.....

>und das obwohl die zinssätze der fed deutlich unter den zweistelligen aus dem jahre 1980 liegen.....

Behind closed doors, the decisions families like the Moellerings make about their debt — when to pay it off, when to shuffle it to lower-interest sources and when to let it revolve and build — can determine how much their salaries are worth....

Their credit card debt came to $22,228, including $380 in monthly finance charges. Interest varied from 12.1 percent to 32.24 percent. The Moellerings also have a mortgage of $93,000 and a home equity loan balance of $68,574, at 8 percent interest. ......

Just a generation ago, financial profiles like the Moellerings’ would have been unusual. But changes in federal regulations since the 1980s, along with consolidation in the banking industry and changed consumer attitudes toward borrowing and saving, have made credit more widespread, more heavily marketed and more confusing, with offers of more credit — at low rates — extending to even the least reliable risk. In 2006, the industry mailed out nearly 8 billion credit card offers, up from 3.5 billion in 2000.

Credit card debt, less than $8 billion in 1968 (in current dollars), now exceeds $880 billion, more than tripling since 1988, adjusting for inflation, according to the Federal Reserve Bank. Penalty fees alone cost consumers $17.1 billion in 2006 — up from $12.8 billion in 2003, adjusted for inflation, according to R. K. Hammer, a bank card advisory firm. In part because of the debt burden, the consumer savings rate fell below zero percent in 2005 and has stayed there.

..... Mr. McBride said, as home values have increased and interest rates have dropped, home equity loans have enabled families to carry more debt — to buy more things — at lower cost.......

thanks to http://calculatedrisk.blogspot.com/

For the Moellerings, juggling balances and interest rates has enabled them to pay for things they could not otherwise afford, like their 2004 wedding and house renovation, or to eat out occasionally, when “we’ve both had a bad day at work,” Mr. Moellering said. He earns $36,000 a year as a software applications designer.

As foster parents of two children they also receive about $1,200 a month in reimbursement from the State Department of Human Services, which goes toward “food, general living and ballet lessons,” Ms. Moellering said.

When the Moellerings pay a bill late or exceed their credit limit, interest rates have shot up, increasing the monthly cost of transactions and heaping penalty fees on top.

The bills in Ms. Moellering’s basket described an uneven track record of managing balances and interest rates.


On March 27, Mr. Moellering used a debit card rather than a credit card to make nine purchases, ranging from $5.38 to $48, hoping to avoid finance charges. But he miscalculated their checking account balance. Each purchase incurred an overdraft charge of $32, or a total of $288 in penalties, more than the $221.82 cost of the purchases. (After some pleading, the bank, National City, forgave four of the charges, leaving the Moellerings with $160 in penalties, plus interest on both the fees and the principal.)

When the couple met through Yahoo personal ads in 2003, they did not discuss debt. She wrote that she liked snow; he said he looked like Babe Ruth. She had about $6,000 in credit card debt at the time, mostly from paying for books and living expenses after a return to college. She used credit cards rather than applying for lower-interest student loans. “I never tried to get student loans,” Ms. Moellering said. “I was working full time and taking care of my sick mom and trying to go to school, so I never had time, so I just ad hoc’d.”

Their debt escalated when they decided to get married. They paid for rings, a reception, a honeymoon and a new bathroom — about $50,000 in a seven-month stretch.

“In such a short period of time, there’s no way to do it other than credit card debt,” Mr. Moellering said.

He paid for some of the expenses through a home equity loan, and paid contractors with promotional checks that came with low interest for the first year. When money gets low, the Moellerings skip paying credit card companies rather than miss a mortgage payment.

“And if the cat gets sick or something, then suddenly we’re trying to figure out, what kind of card can we use to pay this $500 vet bill,” he said.

In the last two years they have managed to cut their credit card debt by $20,000, Ms. Moellering said, and have built a savings of about $5,000, thanks to a Christmas gift from a relative. Ms. Moellering contributes to her retirement account at work. Both say they could manage better if they only had the time.