In a race for downgrades, rating agencies took action targeting the two most burdened countries in the EMU. Moody’s confirmed today a rumor about the downgrade of 16 Spanish banks after having downgraded four Spanish regions, which added more pressure to the the Spanish economy. The increase in risk was reflected by 4-year Spanish Bonos yields, higher at 5.106% against a previous 4.319%. Fitch…

While the news flow emanating from Europe has slowed, proving a temporary respite from risky assets, the pressure on Greek banks is growing. After market chatter and media reports, the ECB confirmed that some Greek banks had turned to the Bank of Greece for Emergency Liquidity Assistance (ELA) pending recapitalization. The recapitalization that was to be finalized ‘soon’, and in theory would…

Yesterday’s European session was a breather for the Euro area as German GDP came in much better than expected at 0.5% q-o-q. The strength of Germany’s numbers pulled EU’s GDP higher to 0.0% against a forecast -0.2%, avoiding a technical recession after last quarter’s -0.3% GDP. Nevertheless, both German and Euro zone economic sentiments were lower, underscoring a fading institutional optimism…