Friday Dump Complete: Moody's Warns Of Spanish Downgrade, Threatens AAA-Countries In Case Of Grexit......
First we got Spain miraculously announcing late at night local time, but certainly after close of market US time, that the bailout so many algorithms had taken for granted in ramping stocks into the close may not be coming, because, picture this, Germany may have conditions when bailing the broke country's banks out, and Spain is just not cool with that, and now, after the close of FX and futures trading, we get Moody's giving us the warning the after Egan-Jones, S&P, and Fitch, it is now its turn to cut the Spanish A3 rating.
"As Spain moves closer to the need for direct external support from its European partners, the increased risk to the country's creditors may prompt further rating actions. The official estimates of recapitalising Spain's banking system have risen significantly and the country's indirect reliance on European Central Bank (ECB) funding via its banks has been growing. Moody's is assessing the implications of these increased pressures and will take any rating actions necessary to reflect the risk to Spanish government creditors. Moody's rating on Spain is currently A3 with a negative outlook."
Moody's also warns, what everyone has known for about 2 years now, that Italy could be next: "However, Spain's banking problem is largely specific to the country and is not likely to be a major source of contagion to other euro area countries, except for Italy, which likewise has a growing funding reliance on the ECB through its banks." Of course none of this is unexpected. What will be, however, to the market, is when all 3 rating agencies have Spain at BBB+ or below, which will result in a 5% increase in repo haircuts on Spanish Government Bonds, resulting in yet another epic collateral squeeze for the country which already is forced to pledge Spiderman towels to the central bank.....