Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Greece debt buyback

In June this year i received a comment on my OPAP analysis. The commentator expressed that the Greek state could buy back his own debt at a discount of over 80%.
In my reply i dismissed this idea because of a) the lack of money to repurchase and much more important b) the price increases of the bonds since capital market participants would start accumulating Greek government securities themselves.

I haven't changed my opinion, still think its bogus, however according to recent media reports this idea is becoming popular with influential politicians.

Now, after the agreement on further payments for Greece, on part of the deal seems to give Greece time to implement a buyback program.
This article states that the new cash will be used to repurchase bonds. The program is to be completed until December 13 (although i would be careful with Greek time scheduling)
Obviously it finally became clear to all politicians that Greece will not be able to meet its targeted debt levels (how should they?). A further haircut is politically not wished (Merkel ala "saving Greece will cost German tax payer no cent"), so a buyback is the way to go.

Winners: Hedge-Fonds, Speculative Investors making huge gains in short time.
Looser: Greek people and economy not receiving any (or less) aid money; EU still to coward to execute real solutions.

Update 28/11: Greek banks will suffer too since if they accept the buyback, they will take the loss resulting from nominal amount (that is in their books) - buyback offer.
This articel (German) states a range between 30%-35%  as a buyback offer, depending on mark to maturity. The offer is said to be lower than the last quotes on the 23. of November. By then a lot of Hedge Funds already got involved, as on can clearly see in the increasing prices.


/Edit 17.07.2013: Now the 10 bn used in the buyback seem to be missing, funding gap. Frustrating...

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Analyst Recommendation and Stock Performance: Performance Oct (Pt. 03)

Welcome to the third follow up on my little empirical study.

This is the October performance month-to-month (mtm):

  • Total Best 12 Basket                                                380,84        -3,2%      374,61 
  • Total Worst 12 Basket                                             360,51         -4,9%     353,75 
  • DAX 30 Perf Index                                                  7.322,08      0,2%      7335,67
  • Dow Jones Industrial Average Index (Price) (USD)   13.494,61     -1,9%   13232,62  
Perfomance decline in both Baskets stronger than DJIA. DAX stagnated however most shares in the baskets are American listed securities anyway.

In the Best Basket only Lynas Corp took a hit above ./.10% decrease (-15,7%).
However in the Worst Basket centrotherm had a lot of problems, declined again by -48,3%. KPN (-20,3%) and Dendreon (-18%) declined as well. On the bright side First Solar (+11,3%) and Sprint Nextel (+12,7%) increased.
So far it seems like the Worst Basket is more volatile than the counterpart. It sure would be interesting this, however i might add Beta values for the stocks since this should give some guidance as well.

Overall performance since setup (August-Nov):

  • Total Best 12 Basket                                                2,8%
  • Total Worst 12 Basket                                              7,2%
  • DAX 30 Perf Index                                                   8,6%
  • Dow Jones Industrial Average Index (Price) (USD)    2,7%
So overall the worst basket is still stronger, despite its strong decline in value in October.