SNB & CHF

  What Determines a Currency’s Value? At the end of March the price of the euro in terms of US dollars closed at 1.1378. This was an increase of 4.7 percent from February when it increased by 0.3 percent. The yearly growth rate of the price of the euro in US dollar terms jumped to 6 percent in March from minus 2.9 percent in February. EUR-USD, 2007 – today,monthly  – click to enlarge. According to most experts currency rates of exchange appear to be moving in response to so many...

The White Queen in Alice in Wonderland (Through the Looking Glass) confesses that when she was younger, she could believe six impossible things before breakfast.  She encourages Alice to do the same.    It appears many in the market are taking the Queen's advice too seriously.   Here is a quick thumbnail sketch of seven of our non-consensus views:   1.  There is not a currency war.  There is a type of arms control agreement in place.   There have been plenty of opportunities for the ECB,...

In an interesting interview with Finanz und Wirtschaft, Bianco Research president Jim Bianco discusses a variety of topics such as negative interest rates turning the entire credit process upside down, bank balance sheets being even more complex and concentrated than before the financial crisis, energy loans being an accident waiting to happen, the markets having veto power over the Fed, and gold having more room to run. * * * Mr. Bianco, negative interest are causing a lot of stir at the...

There are two main forces in the foreign exchange market that are rippling through the capital markets.  The first is the continued weaker dollar tone.  The combination of what appears to be a stagnating US economy (0.5% annualized pace in Q1) and a market that does not believe the Federal Reserve will hike rates in June, and is in fact, judging from the Fed Fund futures strip, skeptical of a single hike this year.   The effect of this US dollar weakness help the commodities and emerging...

You’ll have noticed that the yen and Nikkei were displeased yesterday. Like throw your toys out of the pram because you didn’t get what you wanted displeased. Like one of the worst one day JPY moves in the past decade displeased. What they didn’t get, and what prompted that tantrum, was any auld bit of easing from the Bank of Japan. And here are eight potential reasons why the BoJ disappointed, from SocGen: 1) there is a risk that the market may once again perceive limits to the...

The Inflation Illusion We hear more and more talk about the possibility of imposing negative interest rates in the US. In a recent article former Fed chairman Ben Bernanke asks what tools the Fed has left to support the economy and inter alia discusses the use of negative rates. We first have to define what we mean by negative interest rates. For nominal rates it’s simple. When the interest rate charged goes negative we have negative nominal rates. To get the real rate of interest we have...

The Swiss National Bank has achieved a profit of 5.7 billion CHF in Q1/2016. The total yield on assets per annum was 3.4%.The main contribution comes from gold with price change of 10% in this quarter, hence a total yield of 48%.The total yield on debt was positive with +0.2% thanks to negative interest rates.The deflationary environment let to rising bond prices. Bonds, make up 74% of the SNB portfolio. Here the details of our calculation: Position Total Positionin bn CHF % of Total...

I had the privilege of being interviewed by Anthony Crudele, who is trader at the CME, for the Futures Radio Show.   There was much to discuss.  The FOMC met yesterday.  The market, judging from the Fed funds futures see little chance of a June hike.  Economists think otherwise.  The Bank of Japan surprised many by not changing policy earlier today.  The yen rallied.  It seems counter-intuitive.  The yen rallied when the BOJ surprised at the end of January when it the rate on some...

One can appreciate the frustration in Tokyo. The Bank of Japan surprised the world by adopting negative rates in January and the yen rallied. Today it disappointed many by not easing, and the yen rallied. The BOJ next meetings in mid-June and like this week, the outcome of its meeting will be announced the day after the FOMC meeting. There is some idea that BOJ may be waiting for Abe’s new fiscal package and the G7 meeting Japan hosts next month. The FOMC’s statement yesterday did not...

The Q1/2016 update on the SNB investment strategy and its assets. The Swiss National Bank is a passive conservative investor. As opposed to other investors, the exposure in currencies is as important as the strategic asset allocation according asset classes (bonds, equities, cash, real estate).  The importance of currencies is one reason why the SNB is often called a hedge fund, the second the volatility of gains and losses.The SNB balance sheet looks as follows: In this post we will...