too-big-to-fail Archives - the patient investor

July 11, 2017

New Bailouts Prove ‘Too Big to Fail’ Is Alive and Well | WSJ

By Neel Kashkari:

Three strikeouts in four at bats would be barely acceptable in baseball. For a policy designed to prevent taxpayer bailouts, it’s an undeniable defeat. In the past few weeks, four European bank failures have demonstrated that a signature feature of the postcrisis regulatory regime simply cannot protect the public. There’s no need for more evidence: “bail-in debt” doesn’t prevent bailouts. It’s time to admit this and move to a simpler solution that will work: more common equity.

Bail-in debt was envisioned as an elegant solution to the “too big to fail” problem. When a bank ran into trouble, regulators could trigger a conversion of debt to equity. Bondholders would take the losses. The firm would be recapitalized. Taxpayers would be spared……

The problem is that it rarely works this way in real life. On June 1, the Italian government and European Union agreed to bail out Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena with a €6.6 billion infusion, while protecting some bondholders who should have taken losses. Then on June 24, Italy decided to use public funds to protect bondholders of two more banks, Banca Popolare di Vicenza and Veneto Banca, with up to €17 billion of capital and guarantees. The one recent case in which taxpayers were spared was in Spain, when Banco Popular failed on June 6……

The Minneapolis Fed President has hit the nail on the head. Conversion of bondholders to equity may be legally plausible but psychologically damaging. Similar to money market funds “breaking the buck’, conversion of bondholders to equity in a troubled bank would traumatize markets. Causing widespread panic and damage far in excess of the initial loss. Actions of Italian authorities show how impractical conversion is. Especially when one considers that the affected banks were less than one-tenth the size of behemoths like JPMorgan [JPM].

Banks need to raise more equity capital.

Source: New Bailouts Prove ‘Too Big to Fail’ Is Alive and Well – WSJ

May 15, 2017

At last, some sensible commentary on bank levy | MacroBusiness

From Leith van Onselen:

……The bank levy helps internalise some of the cost of the extraordinary public support that the big banks receive from taxpayers via the Budget’s implicit guarantee (which provides a two-notch improvement in the banks’ credit ratings), the RBA’s Committed Liquidity Facility, the implementation of deposit insurance, and the ability to issue covered bonds. All of these supports have helped significantly lower the banks’ cost of funding and given them the ability to derive super profits.

As noted by Chris Joye on Friday, the 0.06% bank levy is also very ‘cheap’, since it would only recover around one-third of the funding advantage that the big banks receive via taxpayer support:

“If the two notch government support assumption is removed from these bonds, their cost would jump by 0.17 per cent annually to 1.11 per cent above cash based on the current pricing of identical securities. So the majors are actually only paying 35 per cent of the true cost of their too-big-to-fail subsidy…

Requiring banks to pay a price for the implicit too-big-to-fail subsidy is universally regarded as best practice because it minimises the significant moral hazards of having government-backed private sector institutions that can leverage off their artificially low cost of capital to engage in imprudent risk-taking behaviour.”

Again, what better way to internalise some of the cost of the government’s support than extract a modest return to taxpayers via the 6 basis point levy on big bank liabilities?

The Turnbull Government’s unexpected bank levy announcement is the single best thing to come out of the 2017-18 Budget. It deserves widespread support from the community and parliament.

I have my doubts that the new bank levy is a step in the right direction. Most observers would agree that the banks are getting a free ride at the taxpayers expense, but this is not a solution.

Remember that the Commonwealth Treasury is not an insurance fund. And the risk premiums (levy) collected will go to fill a hole in the current budget, not to build up a fund against the future risk of a banking default.

There is no way to avoid it. Australian banks are under-capitalized, with about 6% capital against unweighted risk exposure (leverage ratio). Charging a bank levy does not solve this. Raising (share) capital does.

The levy merely provides the banks with another argument against raising more capital. I would much rather see a levy structured in such a way that it penalizes banks who do not carry sufficient capital, creating an incentive for them to raise further equity.

Neel Kashkari, President of the Minneapolis conducted a study to determine how much capital banks need to carry to avoid relying on taxpayer bailouts. The conclusion was that banks need about 15% capital against (unweighted) risk exposure. Too-big-to-fail banks require slightly more: a leverage ratio of about 18%.

Source: At last, some sensible commentary on bank levy – MacroBusiness

April 17, 2016

The Fed Sends A Frightening Letter To JPM | Zero Hedge

From Pam Martens and Russ Martens via WallStreetOnParade.com:

Yesterday the Federal Reserve released a 19-page letter that it and the FDIC had issued to Jamie Dimon, the Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, on April 12 as a result of its failure to present a credible plan for winding itself down if the bank failed……

At the top of page 11, the Federal regulators reveal that they have “identified a deficiency” in JPMorgan’s wind-down plan which if not properly addressed could “pose serious adverse effects to the financial stability of the United States.”

How could one bank, even one as big and global as JPMorgan Chase, bring down the whole financial stability of the United States? Because, as the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Financial Research (OFR) has explained in detail and plotted in pictures (see below), five big banks in the U.S. have high contagion risk to each other….

….Equally disturbing, the most dangerous area of derivatives, the credit derivatives that blew up AIG and necessitated a $185 billion taxpayer bailout, remain predominately over the counter. According to the latest OCC report, only 16.8 percent of credit derivatives are being centrally cleared. At JPMorgan Chase, more than 80 percent of its credit derivatives are still over-the-counter.

Contagion and derivatives exposure….. two facets of the same problem. To me the question is: why are too-big-to-fail banks allowed to carry such high derivative exposure? Wells fargo (WFC) seems to be the only big bank who is not swimming naked.

Source: The Fed Sends A Frightening Letter To JPMorgan, Corporate Media Yawns | Zero Hedge

November 10, 2014

Global Bank Regulator Calls for Larger Capital Cushions | CFO

Matthew Heller reports that the Financial Stability Board, chaired by BOE Governor Mark Carney, is set to table fresh proposals at the upcoming G20 meeting in Brisbane. The world’s top 30 “systemically important” banks will be required to substantially increase their capacity to absorb losses without requiring a bailout.

The new rules would require global systemically important banks to hold minimum capital of 6% of total assets against losses — twice the provisional leverage ratio required by Basel III rules. In addition, banks would be required to have capital equal to at least 16% and as much as 20% of their risk-weighted assets, such as loans.

Even if the big four banks in Australia are not on the list, they are systemically important from an Australian perspective and should hold similar levels of capital.

July 30, 2014

Shilling: Big Banks Shift to Lower Gear | The Big Picture

Gary Shilling describes how US regulators are getting tough with big banks:

Break-Up

Like unscrambling an egg, it’s hard to envision how big banks with many, many activities could be split up. But, of course, one of the arguments for doing so is they’re too big and too complicated for one CEO to manage. Still, there is the example of the U.K., which plans to separate deposit-taking business from riskier investment banking activities – in effect, recreating Glass-Steagall.

In any event, among others, Phil Purcell believes that “from a shareholder point of view, it’s crystal clear these enterprises are worth more broken up than they are together.” This argument is supported by the reality that Citigroup, Bank of America and Morgan Stanley stocks are all selling below their book value Chart 5. In contrast, most regional banks sell well above book value.

Push Back
Not surprising, current leaders of major banks have pushed back against proposals to break them up. They maintain that at smaller sizes, they would not be able to provide needed financial services. Also, they state, that would put them at a competitive disadvantage to foreign banks that would move onto their turf.

The basic reality, however, is that the CEOs of big banks don’t want to manage commercial spread lenders that take deposits and make loans and also engage in other traditional banking activities like asset management. They want to run growth companies that use leverage as their route to success. Hence, their zeal for off-balance sheet vehicles, proprietary trading, derivative origination and trading, etc. That’s where the big 20% to 30% returns lie – compared to 10% to 15% for spread lending – but so too do the big risks.

Capital Restoration
….the vast majority of banks, big and small, have restored their capital….Nevertheless, the FDIC and Federal Reserve are planning a new “leverage ratio” schedule that would require the eight largest “Systemically Important Banks” to maintain loss-absorbing capital equal to at least 5% of their assets and their FDIC-insured bank subdivisions would have to keep a minimum leverage ratio of 6%. This compares with 3% under the international Basel III schedule. Six of these eight largest banks would need to tie up more capital. Also, regulators may impose additional capital requirements for these “Systemically Important Banks” and more for banks involved in volatile markets for short-term borrowing and lending. The Fed also wants the stricter capital requirements to be met by 2017, two years earlier than the international agreement deadline….

CEO remuneration is largely driven by bank size rather than profitability, so you can expect strong resistance to any move to break up too-big-to-fail banks. Restricting bank involvement in riskier enterprises — as with UK plans to separate deposit-taking business from riskier investment banking activities — may be an easier path to protect taxpayers. Especially when coupled with increased capital requirements to reduce leverage.

April 13, 2014

Disturbing trends with financial crises

From the Economist:

Five devastating slumps—starting with America’s first crash, in 1792, and ending with the world’s biggest, in 1929—highlight two big trends in financial evolution. The first is that institutions that enhance people’s economic lives, such as central banks, deposit insurance and stock exchanges, are not the products of careful design in calm times, but are cobbled together at the bottom of financial cliffs. Often what starts out as a post-crisis sticking plaster becomes a permanent feature of the system. If history is any guide, decisions taken now will reverberate for decades.

This makes the second trend more troubling. The response to a crisis follows a familiar pattern. It starts with blame. New parts of the financial system are vilified: a new type of bank, investor or asset is identified as the culprit and is then banned or regulated out of existence. It ends by entrenching public backing for private markets: other parts of finance deemed essential are given more state support. It is an approach that seems sensible and reassuring. But it is corrosive. Walter Bagehot, editor of this newspaper between 1860 and 1877, argued that financial panics occur when the “blind capital” of the public floods into unwise speculative investments. Yet well-intentioned reforms have made this problem worse.

…..To solve this problem means putting risk back into the private sector. That will require tough choices. Removing the subsidies banks enjoy will make their debt more expensive, meaning equity holders will lose out on dividends and the cost of credit could rise. Cutting excessive deposit insurance means credulous investors who put their nest-eggs into dodgy banks could see big losses…..

Read more at Financial crises | The Economist.

November 11, 2013

Ending Too Big to Fail | The Big Picture

From an address by William C. Dudley, President of the NY Fed, to the Global Economic Policy Forum, November 8, 2013:

There is evidence of deep-seated cultural and ethical failures at many large financial institutions. Whether this is due to size and complexity, bad incentives or some other issues is difficult to judge, but it is another critical problem that needs to be addressed. Tough enforcement and high penalties will certainly help focus management’s attention on this issue. But I am also hopeful that ending too big to fail and shifting the emphasis to longer-term sustainability will encourage the needed cultural shift necessary to restore public trust in the industry.

Dudley calls for increased capital requirements to reduce the risk of failure as well as more robust procedures to reduce the impact of a single large failure:

The major initiative here is the single point of entry framework for resolution proposed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. Under this framework, if a financial firm is to be resolved under Title II of the Dodd-Frank Act, the FDIC will place the top tier bank holding company into receivership and its assets will be transferred to a bridge holding company. The equity holders will be wiped out and sufficient long-term unsecured debt will be converted into equity in the new bridge company to cover any remaining losses and to ensure that the new entity is well capitalized and deemed creditworthy. Subsidiaries would continue to operate, which should limit the incentives for customers to run. By assigning losses to shareholders and unsecured creditors of the holding company and transferring sound operating subsidiaries to a new solvent entity, such a “top-down” resolution strategy should ensure continuity with respect to any critical services performed by the firm’s subsidiaries and this should help limit the magnitude of any negative externalities.

September 22, 2013

Emperors of Banking Have No Clothes | Bloomberg

The too-big-to-fail problem for banks is greater today than it was in 2008. Since then, the largest U.S. banks have become much larger. On March 31, 2012, the debt of JPMorgan Chase was valued at $2.13 trillion and that of Bank of America Corp. at $1.95 trillion, more than three times the debt of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. The debt of the five largest U.S. banks totals about $8 trillion. These figures would be even larger under European accounting rules.

By Anat Admati & Martin Hellwig

August 19, 2013

Bloated business of banking | The Australian

Adam Creighton discusses the likelihood of taxpayers being asked to bail out too-big-to-fail banks.

In Australia that probability is now 100 per cent. Standard & Poor’s, a ratings agency, gives Australia’s biggest four banks a AA rating explicitly because taxpayers will provide “extraordinary support” to their creditors in any crisis, an implicit guarantee worth more than one-quarter of the four’s annual profits.

Since 1995, the big four Australian banks’ assets, reflecting a global trend, have ballooned from 94 per cent of Australia’s national income to $2.86 trillion, or 190 per cent.

July 10, 2013

Making banks hold more capital is not going to wreck the economy

Mark Gongloff quotes Anat Admati and Martin Hellwig of the Max Planck Institute, authors of the recent book The Bankers’ New Clothes: What’s Wrong With Banking And What To Do About It, from their point-by-point rebuttal of bankers arguments that they should not be required to hold more capital:

“Many banks, including most of the large banks in the United States, are not even using all the funding they obtain from depositors to make loans,” Admati and Hellwig write. “If banks do not make loans, therefore, the problem is not a lack of funds nor an inability to raise more funds for profitable loans, but rather the banks’ choices to focus on other investments instead.”