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Troubles mount for EU bid to re-draw economic government
September 6, 2010--Plans to radically re-draw cross-border economic government across Europe hit a stumbling block on Monday, 10 days from a deadline for concrete action set by European Union leaders.
The fourth meeting of EU president Herman Van Rompuy's "task force," charged with learning the lessons of the global financial crisis and the debt chaos it left in its wake across the eurozone, ended with "too many voices, too may views," in the words of one minister, Slovakia's Ivan Miklos.
"The discussions are stuck, there's a block," admitted a European diplomat after some four hours of talks. "It can't be ruled out that with signs of economic trouble up ahead, certain governments are less inclined than before to toughen budgetary discipline."
An "in-depth discussion on national fiscal frameworks, macro-economic surveillance and sanctions," according to Van Rompuy, resulted in an order for experts to "pursue their work" enabling him to complete his "oral" report to national leaders at a summit on September 16.
Bank levies for bank problems, not hard-up governments: EU
September 6, 2010--Levies on banks across Europe should be designed to avoid costly bills for ordinary taxpayers if debts go bad again in future, and not to prop up short-changed governments, the EU said on Monday.
The drive to force banks to pay a percentage of their income into sector-specific rainy-day funds puts Brussels policymakers on a direct collision course with the British government.
London has already announced that it will levy banks from January next year, but with the proceeds going into general government revenue which can be used to help offset massive cuts in health, education and other services provision amid the fallout from recession.
iShares launches first euro high-yield bond ETF
Fund gives exposure to almost 100 corporate bonds
Intended to improve access to market
September 6, 2010-- iShares, the exchange-traded funds (ETF) operator owned by BlackRock (BLK.N), said on Monday it had launched a fund that will provide investors with easier access to the European high-yield bond market.
The fund, the first of its kind in the world, addresses some of the liquidity issues in a market that has traditionally been hard to access, said BlackRock fixed-income strategist Blanca Koenig.
It will offer exposure to nearly 100 of the most liquid sub- investment-grade corporate bonds.
Flows into high-yield bond funds based in Europe have been strong over the year to end-June, with net sales at 20 billion pounds ($30.7 billion) for the sector as whole, dominated by U.S. and global high-yield products, according to data from Lipper FMI.
NASDAQ OMX Lifts Suspension Of HQ Bank AB As A Trading And Clearing Member
September 4, 2010--Following a request by the liquidator of HQ Bank as well as new information regarding the status of the bank, NASDAQ OMX has decided to lift its suspension of HQ Bank as an equity trading member with NASDAQ OMX Stockholm and NASDAQ OMX Copenhagen as of Monday, September 6, 2010.
The suspension of HQ Bank as a clearing member with NASDAQ OMX Stockholm AB is also revoked as of Monday, September 6, 2010. A decision about HQ Bank's trading membership with NASDAQ OMX Helsinki is expected during the weekend.
DB Global Equity Index & ETF Research: : European Weekly ETP Review: Slowly but steadily, investors return to the market
September 3, 2010--Weekly European ETP Market Roundup
Net Cash flows
The market temperature remained the same as that of the prior week with downward pressure continuing to persist over most of the major European equity indices. The Euro Stoxx 50 index was down 0.6%, the CAC 40 index was down by 1.5%, the DAX index fell by:0.9% and the FTSE 100 was slightly up, by 0.1%. The Euro was up against the US Dollar by 0.4% while the price of gold (USD/oz) continued to rise, up 0.8% for the week that finished on August 27th 2010
Weekly total European ETP inflows totaled €359 million (vs. €509 million inflow in previous week).
Trading remained fairly subdued with no significant change in market mood – as compared to last week - occurring this week. Current weekly cash flows appear elevated from mid-summer lows but they are still well below the weekly averages in more active months.
Equity ETPs experienced inflows of €354 million (vs. €168 million inflow last week). Fixed Income saw net outflows of €299 million (vs. €80 million inflow last week). Commodity ETPs registered inflows of €322 million inflow (vs. €244 million inflow during previous week).
Equity ETF inflows were driven by investment in broad European equity indices (€430 million), while short ETFs (€80 million) and non European developed market benchmarked ETFs (€64 million) experienced outflows.
Fixed income outflows were very concentrated, both in terms of exposure as well as origin. Most of it (€377 million) occurred in government bond benchmarked ETFs in the French market. Outside this outflow, the European fixed income ETF market was very quiet with largely flat flows.
The majority of commodity inflows were received by ETPs tracking the price of gold (€300 million this week vs €265 million last week). No other commodity ETP sectors received any significant flows for the current week.
New Listings
New product launch activity picked up as Credit Suisse Asset Management listed thirteen new ETF on the Swiss Stock Exchange. The majority of these ETFs track the performance of various MSCI emerging market and Asian indices.
Turnover
On-exchange daily average ETP turnover for this week rose by 2.4%, to €1.73 billion. The rise is the second in as many weeks and is consistent with the moderately elevated cash flow patterns.
Average daily equity ETF turnover rose by 2.3%, reaching €1.25 billion. Fixed Income ETF turnover rose by 7.1%, reaching €218 million. Commodity turnover was down by 0.4%, to €247 million.
Assets Under Management (AUM)
European ETP assets were down 0.5%, finishing the week at €197.8 billion. As flows were positive, the slight AUM fall is mainly attributable to price declines of major equity indices. Year to date, European ETP AUM are up by 16.3%.
Deutsche Börse: Changes in MDAX, SDAX and TecDAX
September 3, 2010--On Friday, Deutsche Börse has decided on changes in its equity indices
Axel Springer AG replaces Bauer AG in MDAX. The Bauer AG share will be
included
in SDAX and replaces Loewe AG.
Moreover, Ströer AG will be included in
SDAX.
ADVA AG Optical Networking will replace MediGene AG in TecDAX.
All changes will take effect on 20 September 2010.
The next equity indices review will be on 3 December 2010.
Consensus achieved on EU financial supervisory framework
September 3, 2010--The Commission, Parliament and Council of Ministers reached political consensus to create new financial authorities to oversee the EU’s banking, insurance and investment sectors.
The creation of a financial framework at the EU level is a means of preventing a future economic crisis like the one that erupted in late 2008, explains internal market commissioner Michel Barnier.
“Financial companies and markets operate mostly at a European level, and we'll now have four solid authorities to monitor macroeconomic financial risks and to supervise financial markets, banks, and insurance companies,” he says.
The EU institutions reached consensus on the creation of a new European Systemic Risk Board (ESRB) and three European Supervision Authorities (ESAs). The ESRB will develop a standard set of indicators to allow uniform ratings of the risk of specific cross-border financial institutions.
UK official holdings of international reserves, August 2010
September 3, 2010--This monthly press notice shows details of movements in August in the UK’s official holdings of
international reserves, which consist of gold, foreign currency assets and International Monetary
Fund assets. These reserves are maintained primarily so that the UK Government’s reserves could
be used to intervene to support Sterling, or the Bank of England’s reserves could be used to
support the Bank’s monetary policy objectives. If such interventions were to occur, then they
would be shown and explained in this release. The Background note at the end of this release
explains more about the reserves, and about these statistics.
In summary this month’s release shows that, in August 2010:
No intervention operations were undertaken.
EU finance regulation shake-up welcomed
September 3, 2010--European governments gave their approval on Friday to an overhaul of the way banks and markets in the region are supervised, which was agreed in principle on Thursday night. However, they warned that new pan-European Union watchdogs would need to exercise their powers cautiously.
In Germany, Leo Dautzenberg, a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s ruling Christian Democratic Union, and one of its finance policy experts in parliament, hailed Thursday night’s agreement on the EU financial supervision package as “closing an important gap in financial market regulation”.
Swiss franc benefits from haven status as doubts spread
September 3, 2010--The Swiss franc hit a record high against the euro and approached parity against the dollar for the first time in nine months this week as worries about the global economic recovery drove haven demand.
The Swiss franc has risen more than 15 per cent against the euro to date this year, with those gains accentuating after the Swiss National Bank in June halted its policy of intervening to stem gains in its currency, saying that the risk of deflation in the Swiss economy had all but disappeared.
