Fitch Ratings estime que l'Etat français n'aura pas besoin d'apporter son concours au renforcement du capital des banques françaises, a déclaré jeudi David Riley, l'un des responsables de la notation des émetteurs souverains de l'agence.
Le mois dernier, Fitch a mis sous surveillance négative la note triple A de la France, estimant que c'est le pays noté AAA de la zone euro le plus exposé à aggravation de la crise de la dette souveraine.
 
Si les banques françaises sont relativement peu exposées à leur dette souveraine nationale, elles l'ont été dans les pays de la zone euro en difficulté, comme l'Italie, la Grèce et l'Espagne.
 
Mais les nouvelles exigences en capital que leur imposent les régulateurs européens dans le cadre de Bâle III et les difficultés de lever des fonds sur les marchés de capitaux les a conduites à alléger leur bilan et à se délester de leurs actifs décotés, dont les titres de dette des pays 'périphériques' de la zone.
 
James Longsdon, co-responsable de la notations des institutions financières chez Fitch, a souligné lors d'une conférence que le marché de la dette senior des banques en zone euro l'année dernière avait été "catastrophique".
Les banques de la zone euro ont eu très largement recours aux liquidités illimitées offertes par la Banque centrale européenne, qu'elles empruntent à 1% et redéposent pour l'essentiel à la même BCE à 0,25%.
 
"Le financement de la BCE leur permet de gagner du temps pour alléger leur bilan", a dit James Longsdon.
Selon Fitch, les banques françaises comptaient, en octobre, pour 17% dans les opérations de financement de la BCE.
"Nous ne croyons pas, et nous ne nous attendons pas à ce que l'Etat français ait besoin d'apporter un soutien en capital aux banques françaises", a dit David Riley.
Lors d'une interview à Reuters, en marge de la conférence, il a réaffirmé que sauf intensification de la crise de la zone euro, Fitch ne changerait pas la note de la France avant 2013 et avant de connaître l'issue des élections présidentielle et législatives et la façon dont évoluent l'économie et les finances publiques du pays.
 
"A court terme, le gouvernement français a pris de nombreuses mesures pour améliorer la crédibilité de ses objectifs" (de réduction des déficits), a-t-il constaté.
"Mais nous pensons toujours qu'ils n'atteindront pas leurs objectifs 2013 et 2014", a-t-il dit, ajoutant que l'endettement sera plus élevé que prévu.
"Je ne crois pas que ce serait un choc pour le marché si la France devait perdre son triple A de Fitch ou d'une des autres agences de notation", a-t-il estimé.
 
Pour lui, si un début de solution de la crise de la zone euro se dessine, alors les inquiétudes entourant la France seraient "dissipées".

[...]
The QE Pump Stops
 
In June 2011, the QE pump which had been keeping commodity and equity markets inflated and correlated stopped, and price levels began to decline. Consumer demand – as opposed to financial demand – for commodities had also been affected not only by high prices, but by reduced demand from developed nations for finished goods. In September 2011, more than $9bn of index fund money pulled out of the markets for the safe haven of T-bills.
 
What happened as a result was that the regular rolling over of oil leases, and the free dollar funding for producers of their oil inventory ceased. So the leased oil returned to the ownership of the producers, while the dollars returned to the ownership of the funds.
 
Since the ‘repurchases’ were no longer occurring, the forward oil price fell below the current price, and this ‘backwardation’ was misinterpreted by market traders and speculators. They believed that the backwardation was – as it usually is - a sign that current demand was high and increasing relative to forward demand, whereas in this false market the current demand is unchanged but the forward demand is decreasing.
 
As in 2008, speculators and traders were again suckered too soon into the market, and this led to profits at their expense to those with asymmetric information, and a ‘pop’ upwards in the price as they were forced to close speculative short positions. My information is that a major oil market trader was successfully able to ‘squeeze’ the Brent/BFOE market on at least two occasions in late 2011 precisely because they were aware of the true situation of inventory ownership, and the rest of the market was not.
 
As an insider puts it……
 
You can’t have proper price discovery when half of the inventory is being sold elsewhere at a different price. On exchange physical doesn’t even exist. Futures are converging to physical, but only the physical which is visible for Platts assessment.
 
….pointing out that transactions in respect of physical ownership of oil do not take place on an exchange, and that there is effectively a ‘two tier’ market. Only a proportion of spot or physical Brent/BFOE transactions therefore actually form the basis of the Platts assessment of the global benchmark oil price.
 
Enter Iran
 
In my view, there is little or no chance of military action against Iran, and having been to Iran five times in recent years, and as recently as two months ago, there is much I could write on this subject.  
 
While financial sanctions have been pretty smart, and increasingly effective so far, the medium and long term effect of the proposed EU oil embargo – which will in fact affect only a pretty minimal and easily accommodated amount of demand which is evaporating anyway – is more apparent than real.  
 
While there would undoubtedly be a short term price rise – cheered on by the usual suspects – in the medium and long term the embargo will act to reduce oil prices. This is because Iran will necessarily have to sell oil at below market price to China and others, and since the market is over-supplied, particularly in Europe, this will undercut market prices generally.
 
Mexico has routinely hedged oil production for years, and Qatar – who are very shrewd operators – began to do the same in November 2011 since they expect the price to fall this year. In the short term the Iran ‘crisis’ is in my view being hyped for all it is worth to entice yet more unwary speculators into the oil market so that other producers may sell their production forward at high prices while they last before the inevitable and imminent collapse.  
 
Current Position
 
If you believe the investment banks – who all have oil funds to sell to the credulous – Far Eastern demand is holding up, supplies are tight, and stocks are low, so prices are set to rise to maybe $120 or above in 2012, even in the absence of fisticuffs involving Iran.
 
I take a different view. I see real demand – as opposed to financial demand and stock-piling, such as in the copper market – declining in 2012 as the financial crisis continues at best, and deepens at worst, particularly in the EU. Stocks are low because bank financing of stock is disappearing as banks retrench, and it makes no sense for traders to hold stocks if forward prices are lower than today’s price.
 
As for supplies, US crude oil production is probably higher, and consumption lower, than widely appreciated. Elsewhere, there is plenty of oil available now that much of the Dark Inventory has been liquidated, and this liquidation was probably why in November 2011 we saw the highest Saudi monthly deliveries in 30 years.
 
Finally, we see North Sea oil being shipped – for the first time since 2008 – half way around the world to find Far East buyers. We also see Petroplus, a major independent Swiss refiner, crippled by inflated crude oil prices, and shutting down three refineries because demand for its products has disappeared, and it can no longer finance crude oil purchases now that banks have pulled its credit lines.
 
In my world, refineries closed due to reduced demand for their products imply a reduction in demand for crude oil: but not, apparently, on the Planet Hype of investment banks with funds to sell.
 
History does not repeat itself, but it does rhyme, and my forecast is that the crude oil price will fall dramatically during the first half of 2012, possibly as low as $45 to $55 per barrel.  
 
Then What?
 
As the price collapses we will see producer nations generally and OPEC in particular once again going into panic mode, and genuinely cutting production. We will also see the next great regulatory scandal where a legion of risk-averse retail investors who have lost most or all of their investment will not be pleased to hear that they were warned on Page 5, paragraph (b); clause (iv) of their customer agreement that markets could go down as well as up.
 
At this point, I hope and expect that consumer and producer nations might finally get their heads together and agree that whereas the former seeks a stable low price, and the latter a stable high price, they actually have an interest – even if intermediaries do not – in agreeing a formula for a stable fair price.
 
We can’t solve 21st century problems with 20th century solutions and I shall address the subject of a resilient global energy market architecture in my next post.

Le déficit pourrait être sous 5,7%, selon Baroin-Lefigaro.fr

PARIS, 12 janvier (Reuters) - Le déficit public de la France pourrait "se rapprocher" de 5,5% du produit intérieur brut (PIB) pour 2011, soit moins que l'objectif de 5,7% visé par le gouvernement, selon le ministre de l'Economie François Baroin, dont les propos sont rapportés par le site Lefigaro.fr.

"A l'issue d'un entretien ce jeudi soir avec son homologue allemand Wolfgang Schäuble, le ministre de l'Economie François Baroin a confié que la cible de déficit public de 5,7 du PIB pour 2011 serait atteinte", apprend-on dans cet article, qui ne cite pas de sources.

Selon le site d'information, le ministre a précisé que le déficit public pourrait "peut-être se rapprocher de 5,5%".

Le chiffre définitif du déficit public sera publié dans les jours à venir.

Le Président américain Barack Obama a informé officiellement le Congrès de la nécessité de revoir à la hausse le plafond de la dette fédérale, à hauteur de 1.200 Milliards de dollars. Le Congrès dispose désormais de 15 jours pour s'opposer à cette proposition.

Rappelons que, selon les données du Département américain au Trésor au 10 janvier 2012, la dette publique des Etats-Unis totalise environ 15.236 Mds$.

Les USA auraient ainsi atteint le plafond d'endettement depuis un peu plus d'une semaine, utilisant désormais le Fonds de Stabilisation des Echanges pour combler les manques.

D'après l'International Business Times, un vote du Congrès sur le sujet pourrait avoir lieu dès le 17 janvier. Le plafond de 15.200 Mds$ aurait été touché dès le 4 janvier dernier...

The AMF disclosed yesterday that Technip’s CEO, Thierry Pilenko, sold for €17m worth of TEC shares.
 
€10m from the sale of shares / €7m from the exercise of stock options.  
 
http://www.amf-france.org/inetbdif [...] 71&txtsch=
 
http://www.amf-france.org/inetbdif [...] 70&txtsch=