Euro Crisis Calls for a Mix of Solutions
By STEPHEN FIDLER
Thursday, May 24, 2012
As the euro crisis intensifies amid mounting anxieties about a possible Greek departure from the common currency, the clamor grows for initiatives that will decisively shift expectations in the financial markets. The proposed initiatives are of two types: those that harness the power of the European Central Bank, the single institution capable of acting decisively, and those calling for greater burden-sharing by euro-zone governments.
But as the crisis moves closer to its conclusion, it looks increasingly like the two forces will have to be combined to be effective.
The deliberations at Wednesday night's European Union summit suggest most options to increase government burden-sharing are a long way from fruition. That includes the proposal that has received the most attention: euro bonds, in which the euro zone would collectively assume some or all of the debts of individual governments. Even if Germany, Finland and Austria dropped their objections today—a development of which there was little sign on Wednesday night—constitutional changes and other interim steps would mean the first euro bond couldn't be issued for years.
Some analysts say a more explicit signal that the euro zone is heading toward euro bonds, and a road map laying out how, might help bolster confidence, but even most proponents don't see them as a crisis-fighting tool.
After the summit, Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European Council, said he would report to the next European summit in late June on "the main building blocks" and on "a working method" to achieve a deeper economic union among euro-zone members. The statement was, said Mujtaba Rahman, an analyst at Eurasia Group in New York, "a creative way of signaling nothing of substance is likely to emerge in June."
Resistance is also strong to other initiatives to combine the euro-zone efforts to share the burden. Talk of a euro-wide deposit-guarantee plan as a way to prevent runs on banks in weak economies has been batted down by Germany. There is a practical issue, too: How effective would euro-zone bank guarantees be for countries at risk of leaving the currency bloc?
"There's a question about whether a euro-zone deposit-guarantee scheme would work to build depositor confidence in a country that might leave the euro zone," said Justin Knight, European interest-rate strategist for UBS in London.
Mr. Rahman suggests Wednesday's summit shows governments are still hoping the ECB will dig them out of a hole. "It is still all about the ECB," he said.
But the ECB's main policy "bazookas" have flaws that may undermine their ability to settle the crisis. It could further flood three-year money into banks, through an extension of its Long-Term Refinancing Operations. But while most analysts consider the fund injections in December and February as essential to resolving a crisis of confidence in banks, the benefit to the bond markets of beleaguered governments such as Spain and Italy was short-lived.
There is another obstacle to expanding this program, Mr. Knight points out. To get loans from the central bank, banks need to pledge assets as guarantees. And their pool of eligible assets has shrunk significantly. "Banks in the periphery are running out of eligible collateral. This is where the real shortage is," he said.
The ECB can keep lowering the eligibility requirements, but that further concentrates risk on the central bank. Beyond that, the LTRO has also spurred banks in weak economies to buy the bonds of their own governments, intensifying the links between weak banks and weak governments that have been a source of investor anxieties.
The other ECB "bazooka" would be to reactivate purchases of government bonds of Spain and Italy. Many officials say privately that they believe the ECB will do this in a crunch. But there is a big drawback arising from the debt restructuring Greece concluded in March.
The ECB is a major owner of Greek government bonds and refused to take losses as part of the debt restructuring, a position that subordinated the claims of private investors in Greek government bonds. That step makes ECB purchases of bonds of Spain and Italy more hazardous. If the ECB steps in to buy significant quantities of these bonds in an effort to calm markets, officials and analysts say private investors may well pull out. The reason: They fear subordination in the event of a restructuring.
The huge size of government financing requirements in Spain and Italy suggests that keeping private investors in the markets, even if the ECB intervenes, is critical. This could be done, say some officials involved in the discussions, if the euro-zone governments gave an explicit indemnity to the ECB to cover any losses it suffered because of its bond purchases. (Governments ultimately would suffer losses anyway because they would receive reduced ECB profit distributions or would have to recapitalize the institution. Nonetheless, the explicit indemnity would make the transfers more transparent.)
The other approach is for the euro zone's new bailout fund coming into existence in July—the European Stability Mechanism—to become a bank and be able to borrow from the ECB. That fund could buy bonds in the primary and secondary bond markets, alongside the private sector. As a creditor, it would explicitly rank alongside private investors with no seniority. Some European officials think this is the tidiest solution and one that could be enacted relatively rapidly.
Both solutions would need agreement from the ECB and most euro-zone governments. And that would be likely only in extremis, since both would entail the ostensibly forbidden central-bank finance of governments and raise questions of moral hazard, potentially discouraging beneficiary governments from pushing ahead with economic overhauls
By STEPHEN FIDLER
Thursday, May 24, 2012
As the euro crisis intensifies amid mounting anxieties about a possible Greek departure from the common currency, the clamor grows for initiatives that will decisively shift expectations in the financial markets. The proposed initiatives are of two types: those that harness the power of the European Central Bank, the single institution capable of acting decisively, and those calling for greater burden-sharing by euro-zone governments.
But as the crisis moves closer to its conclusion, it looks increasingly like the two forces will have to be combined to be effective.
The deliberations at Wednesday night's European Union summit suggest most options to increase government burden-sharing are a long way from fruition. That includes the proposal that has received the most attention: euro bonds, in which the euro zone would collectively assume some or all of the debts of individual governments. Even if Germany, Finland and Austria dropped their objections today—a development of which there was little sign on Wednesday night—constitutional changes and other interim steps would mean the first euro bond couldn't be issued for years.
Some analysts say a more explicit signal that the euro zone is heading toward euro bonds, and a road map laying out how, might help bolster confidence, but even most proponents don't see them as a crisis-fighting tool.
After the summit, Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European Council, said he would report to the next European summit in late June on "the main building blocks" and on "a working method" to achieve a deeper economic union among euro-zone members. The statement was, said Mujtaba Rahman, an analyst at Eurasia Group in New York, "a creative way of signaling nothing of substance is likely to emerge in June."
Resistance is also strong to other initiatives to combine the euro-zone efforts to share the burden. Talk of a euro-wide deposit-guarantee plan as a way to prevent runs on banks in weak economies has been batted down by Germany. There is a practical issue, too: How effective would euro-zone bank guarantees be for countries at risk of leaving the currency bloc?
"There's a question about whether a euro-zone deposit-guarantee scheme would work to build depositor confidence in a country that might leave the euro zone," said Justin Knight, European interest-rate strategist for UBS in London.
Mr. Rahman suggests Wednesday's summit shows governments are still hoping the ECB will dig them out of a hole. "It is still all about the ECB," he said.
But the ECB's main policy "bazookas" have flaws that may undermine their ability to settle the crisis. It could further flood three-year money into banks, through an extension of its Long-Term Refinancing Operations. But while most analysts consider the fund injections in December and February as essential to resolving a crisis of confidence in banks, the benefit to the bond markets of beleaguered governments such as Spain and Italy was short-lived.
There is another obstacle to expanding this program, Mr. Knight points out. To get loans from the central bank, banks need to pledge assets as guarantees. And their pool of eligible assets has shrunk significantly. "Banks in the periphery are running out of eligible collateral. This is where the real shortage is," he said.
The ECB can keep lowering the eligibility requirements, but that further concentrates risk on the central bank. Beyond that, the LTRO has also spurred banks in weak economies to buy the bonds of their own governments, intensifying the links between weak banks and weak governments that have been a source of investor anxieties.
The other ECB "bazooka" would be to reactivate purchases of government bonds of Spain and Italy. Many officials say privately that they believe the ECB will do this in a crunch. But there is a big drawback arising from the debt restructuring Greece concluded in March.
The ECB is a major owner of Greek government bonds and refused to take losses as part of the debt restructuring, a position that subordinated the claims of private investors in Greek government bonds. That step makes ECB purchases of bonds of Spain and Italy more hazardous. If the ECB steps in to buy significant quantities of these bonds in an effort to calm markets, officials and analysts say private investors may well pull out. The reason: They fear subordination in the event of a restructuring.
The huge size of government financing requirements in Spain and Italy suggests that keeping private investors in the markets, even if the ECB intervenes, is critical. This could be done, say some officials involved in the discussions, if the euro-zone governments gave an explicit indemnity to the ECB to cover any losses it suffered because of its bond purchases. (Governments ultimately would suffer losses anyway because they would receive reduced ECB profit distributions or would have to recapitalize the institution. Nonetheless, the explicit indemnity would make the transfers more transparent.)
The other approach is for the euro zone's new bailout fund coming into existence in July—the European Stability Mechanism—to become a bank and be able to borrow from the ECB. That fund could buy bonds in the primary and secondary bond markets, alongside the private sector. As a creditor, it would explicitly rank alongside private investors with no seniority. Some European officials think this is the tidiest solution and one that could be enacted relatively rapidly.
Both solutions would need agreement from the ECB and most euro-zone governments. And that would be likely only in extremis, since both would entail the ostensibly forbidden central-bank finance of governments and raise questions of moral hazard, potentially discouraging beneficiary governments from pushing ahead with economic overhauls