Lex Dec 17, 2012

Letter from Lex – partygoers’ toolkit

A combination of things one needs to survive the Christmas party season: food, drink and energy

Lex Dec 13, 2012

Banking union – first step

The longer the politicians in Brussels talk, the more the costs rise

Lex Dec 10, 2012

Bank resolution – expensive rules

Plan to deal with failed institutions has three main difficulties

Dec 11, 2012

AIG – way back from the bailout

Four years after the $180bn rescue, the US Treasury has sold the last of its stake

Lex Dec 12, 2012

Buffett buyback – the only bargain

If the sage can’t find mispricings in big-cap stocks other than Berkshire, who can?

  • Greece’s fragile bond rally

    Greece may have an ongoing issue or two, but that didn’t stop its government debt rallying 274 per cent in the second half of last year. Clearly, the driver was the reduced likelihood of it leaving/being kicked out of the eurozone, rather than the (dismal) economics.

    Gabriel Sterne at Exotix says the run was one of the “most astounding sovereign bond rallies of all time”, but that the bonds are now over-bought. The declining possibility of a Grexit, he says, is more than fully priced in (his emphasis):

    Continue reading: Greece’s fragile bond rally
  • The vexatious VIX

    What should we make of this? The CBOE VIX, the barometer of choice for those monitoring market volatility, dropped like a stone between Xmas and New Year. And the trend has continued in the days since…

    Continue reading: The vexatious VIX
  • US Markets Live

    Live markets commentary from FT.com

    Continue reading: US Markets Live