European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet  signalled on Thursday that the days of 12-month loans to banks will come to an end soon and that will be the start of a gradual exit from unlimited liquidity injections.
“The market, as far as I see, it is not expecting that we will prolong (our) one-year operation, I will say nothing to dispel this present sentiment of the market,” Trichet said in a news conference after the 16-country bloc’s central bank kept rates at 1 percent. “The enhanced credit support … was not for eternity,” he added.

The ECB started the 12-month cash injections to help the ailing banking sector back into form, and banks reacted with joy, snapping up nearly half a trillion euros of cheap money in the first such operation in June.

But Trichet also had soothing words for banks addicted to cheap money. The ECB would keep interbank interest rates well below the main refinancing rate, he said.  But it seems banks will have to learn to play again with each other rather than relying only on the ECB’s largesse.

And before signing off, Trichet also had words of advice for the media.  “This is exactly the same language as we always have utilised. Everybody knows that, so no news there.”

That advice seemed fall on deaf ears, as most media, including Reuters, would make a lot of hay out of his words on 12-month liquidity injections and keep it the centrepiece of their coverage.

MacroScope is pleased to post the following from guest blogger James Carrick.  Carrick is economist at UK fund firm Legal & General Investment Management. He says here old patterns of lending are unlikely to return and that this means slow growth in developed countries.

“Despite £175 billion of quantitative easing, bank lending in the UK remains weak, threatening to restrain the economic recovery and equity market rally. 

Policy makers in the developed world have been working overtime to encourage banks to lend at the ‘normal’ levels experienced during the past decade. However, these “normal” levels are no longer realistic. The factors which contributed to the secular rise in debt over the past decade are now reversing. Populations are ageing, interest rates can’t go any lower and sub-prime lending is over.

As a result, higher levels of savings (where consumers pay down debt) and lower spending will weigh on the pace of the recovery.

This is not to predict a double-dip recession. Instead we are probably in store for a more subdued period of growth next year as households can no longer borrow money they don’t have, and unemployment remains high.

On the flip-side, while consumers in the developed world are still suffering a hangover from the credit-crunch, the debt party in many emerging economies is still in full swing.

This suggests that companies with exposure to the developing world will fare better.”

- Laurence Copeland is a professor of finance at Cardiff University Business School and a co-author of “Verdict on the Crash” published by the Institute of Economic Affairs. The opinions expressed are his own. -

There is so much talk of a new regulatory framework for the financial sector, anyone would think it was an important issue.

Unfortunately, it is almost irrelevant, for the simple reason that, however sophisticated the new regime, experience shows it will be bypassed and/or captured by banks of one kind or another, possibly by novel types of institution invented specially for the purpose.

This is true even in the unlikely event that the whole world – with the possible exception of North Korea – embraces the new regulations and enforces them with vigour.

The only type of intervention which has a hope in hell of success is one based on size. As Mervyn King has said, when a bank is TBTF (Too Big To Fail), it is just too big.

What is needed is breakup along functional (and, where necessary, geographic) lines, separating the boring but essential utility business of deposit-taking and payment-transfer from the exciting risk-taking of investment banking. A once-and-for-all breakup would have to be followed by continual monitoring, to ensure that takeovers and mergers did not breach the size limit and take us back to the TBTF dilemma.

The aim should be straightforward. If banks were cut down to manageable size, the taxpayer’s liability could be limited to deposit insurance alone. Banks could be allowed to fail in the same way as firms in other industries and would no longer be able to hold Governments or central banks to ransom, as they have repeatedly done in the last twenty or thirty years.

Moreover, break-ups would bring other benefits. Without an implicit taxpayer guarantee, there would be more incentive for institutional shareholders to insist on responsible management behaviour and to impose remuneration packages consistent with it. This mechanism of shareholder vigilance, which failed totally in the run-up to the current crisis, in my view offers the best hope for the long term. By their shameful passivity, institutional shareholders must carry a major share of the responsibility for the existing mess, and everything should be done to shame them into activism in future.

Will breaking up the banks eliminate systemic risk altogether? Of course not. But it will mean that the world economy will no longer be hostage to the irresponsible behaviour of a handful of bankers consciously pushing the banking system to the limit, or, as has recently been confirmed in accounts of the demise of Lehman Brothers, indulging in brinkmanship with the authorities.

The difficulty is how to get from here to there. As I said in an earlier blog, we need governments too big to be captured, and it is now plain that they exist neither in Washington nor in London. Predictably, the UK Government has shown no stomach whatever for the fight, even though it effectively owns two of the country‘s largest banks. It is a catastrophic error – one is reminded of the first Gulf War, when, with Saddam Hussein at their mercy, the Allies fell back on technicalities to justify leaving him in power.

It would be ridiculous to compare the evil of tyranny with the excesses of bankers, but in pure monetary terms the current crisis has already cost several times as much as the two Gulf Wars added together. Yet not only are Western Governments running away from confronting the banks, they appear determined to take on almost anyone else involved in finance. In particular, the EU’s hostility to so-called Alternative Investments (hedge funds and private equity) is, if anything, likely to make institutional investors as a whole even more reluctant to intervene than they were before.

As ever, it seems there is no situation so bad that our endlessly creative politicians cannot make it worse.

Bankers worried about losing their bonuses might be well advised to consider a cost-benefit analysis of the contribution of their public sector colleagues.

Central bankers not only earn much less than their high-flying private sector counterparts, but over the last year have spent almost every second weekend in high-level, save-the-world meetings aimed at clearing up the mess created by Wall St and City banks.     

European Central Bank head Jean-Claude Trichet (who earns a mere 350,000 euros a year ) confessed to a group of student journalists that he spends almost every weekend working.

“My week often consists of seven working days, because we always have international meetings during the weekends,” he was quoted as saying by Germany’s Frankfurter Neue Presse. 

Trichet spent last weekend, for example, at the G20 meeting in London followed by a meeting of central bankers and regulators in Basel to thrash out a new framework for bank regulation.

One of the proposals: supervisors should make sure banks ”limit excessive dividend payments, share buybacks and compensation.”

Five things to think about this week:

GOOD RUN 
-  Stocks have managed to extend their rally but potential hurdles, such as this week's U.S. non-farm payrolls, could prove increasingly hard to leap given valuations -- European stocks are trading at their highest multiples of earnings since May 2008 while the multiple for the S&P is the highest since mid-September 2008. If investors are to boost equity holdings -- which Reuters polls show already back to pre-Lehman levels -- it may require more concrete evidence of economic expansion, rather than just economic stabilisation, and signs that profit margins will be supported by revenue growth, rather than cost cutting. 

BOE - HANGING IN THE BALANCE
- The Bank of England will have to decide this week whether to end its asset-buying programme or extend it. Concern about potential longer-term inflation implications will have to be weighed against the signs of economic weakness still manifest in recent Q2 GDP data. With economists split on the outcome, markets look set for volatility, not least as the MPC's decision is likely to be viewed as a indication of when other central banks could start to halt/unwind their credit easing strategy. 

SQUARING CIRCLES
- The dexterity with which China can manage surging lending and potential price pressures without unsettling markets with any rapid reversal of stimulative policy is increasingly in focus and will have financial market and macroeconomic repercussions well beyond its borders and Asia, as last week showed. Australia, which felt the spillover effect of the China jitters, has its own policy dilemma as the RBA is trying to push back against its currency's appreciation while giving markets another reason to buy A$ by its more upbeat view on the domestic economic outlook. The RBA policy meeting this week will give the central bank a chance to show how it squares this circle. 

INVENTORIES AND EXPORTS 
- Detailed PMI data and UK, Italy industrial output reports will be scanned for signs of whether the inventory decline that accompanied a rise in Japanese industrial output is being seen elsewhere, with the inventory-shipments, inventory-orders ratios remaining firmly in focus as key signals for the outlook for production. The extent to which Asian economic activity is helping trade flows will also be flagged by German and French June trade data (all the more interesting given May exports rose in both countries, despite their differing export specialisations.

LOAN PROVISIONS 
- European banks reporting this week will be closely watched for the extent to which they follow in Deutsche Bank's footsteps by making higher loan loss provisions. The ECB's latest lending survey shows euro zone banks' expect to continue to tighten credit conditions in the coming months, albeit at a slower pace; heftier loan provisions will make this all but guaranteed.

Five things to think about this week: 

RESULTS RUSH 
- The early wave of Q2 earnings last week prevented any major risk shakeout but there are plenty more results this week, including from banking, technology (Apple, Microsoft), and other sectors (Lockheed Martin, Coke, McDonalds). Investors with bullish inclinations will be looking for the VIX to stay subdued after it fell last week to lows last seen in September 2008, especially if more pent up cash is to be released from money market funds. Bears will be thinking that what might be the S&P's best weekly performance since mid-March could be setting the market up to be more sensitive to bad news.

BANKS - IS THE BEST PAST? 
-  It is hard to see how bank results this week can top the boost which Goldman and JPM gave stocks last week. More of a mixed bag is likely with the U.S. slate including Bank of New York Mellon, Morgan Stanley, Wells Fargo, Capital One, and American Express while Credit Suisse will be the first major European bank to report. Defaults and delinquencies will be in focus for banks more exposed to the retail sector -- both for what it means for their outlook and for what it bodes for household solvency and spending. 

DRILLING DOWN 
-  The breakdown of company results this week (ABB, Texas Instruments, Caterpillar, DuPont, Boeing, 3M) will show the extent to which the inventory rebuilding story, which has helped lift world equities almost 40 percent from their March lows, can offer more sustainable support to stocks in the weeks and months ahead. Earnings this week will be closely scanned to see how inventories are stacking up verus orders. How deeply firms are cutting into costs to defend profit margins, as well as their business investment plans, will be key for unemployment and other macroeconomic data.

FLASH IN THE PAN? 
- Flash PMIs will show whether the positive surprise of the German orders and output data was a flash in the pan for the euro zone, and whether Chinese growth is generating orders in key euro zone countries. British Q2 GDP -- the first out of any G7 country -- will show the relative strengths and weaknesses of domestic demand, exports and inventory components and it will be particularly interesting in the UK's case to see just how supportive sterling's past slide has proved for net trade. 

QE STEER 
-  Minutes from the Bank of England's last policy meeting and congressional testimony from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke should give a clearer steer on where quantitative easing programmes are heading. Key questions investors want answered are why the BoE deferred making a firm decision on whether to extend QE beyond August, and whether the Fed will increase its bond purchases. Government bond markets will be particularly sensitive and signs that central bank appetite for buying government debt is cooling -- perhaps because of concern over long-term inflation -- could trigger heavy selling, particularly in an climate of strong U.S. bank earnings and rebounding equities.

Five things to think about this week

TUSSLE FOR DIRECTION
- The tussle between bullish and bearish inclinations -- with bears gaining a bit of ground so far this month -- is being played out over both earnings and economic data. Alcoa got the U.S. earnings season off to a good start but a heavier results week lies ahead and could toss some banana skins into the market's path. Key financials, technology bellwethers (IBM, Google, Intel), as well as big names like GE, Nokia, Johnson and Johnson will offer more food for thought for those looking past the simple defensive versus cyclical split to choices between early cylicals, such as consumer discretionaries, and late cyclicals, such as industrials, based on the short-term earnings momentum. Macroeconomic data will need to confirm the picture painted by last week's unexpectedly German strong orders and production figures to give bulls the upper hand.

FINANCIAL FOCUS
- The heavy financial results slate (Goldman, JP Morgan, Bank of America, Citi) will show the extent to which balance sheets are being cleansed of toxic assets and the health of, and outlook for margins, trading revenues, etc. The relative performance of the firms reporting could put the spotlight on the split between investment banking and retail exposure. In Europe, Swedbank's results will be watched for Baltic exposure while clarity is still being sought on what banks plan to do with the large chunk of ECB one-year money which they continue to park back at the ECB in the form of overnight deposits.

JAPANESE DILEMMA
- The BOJ's policy meeting poses thorny questions on quantitative easing (QE), with the policy debate complicated by sharp gains in the yen. The yen has risen as much as 10.5 percent in three months against the dollar and is nearing the 90 threshold which is viewed by the foreign exchanges as the point at which the Japanese authorities start ratcheting up the rhetoric. Further sustained yen gains will fuel market debate about the fallout for carry trades and for exporters -- and by extension economic activity.

HOOKED ON QE
- The sharp jump in yields in gilts, euro zone debt, and Treasuries seen after the Bank of England deferred any decision on expanding its QE programme gave a good indication of how bond markets could react when central banks flag that the QE taps will finally be turned off for good. Implementation of exit strategies may be some way off and producer and consumer price data from both sides of the Atlantic this week are likely to be subdued. However, base effects from the oil price peaks of 2008 are expected to fade in the coming months, leaving a less supportive inflation backdrop.

CHINA
- The FX reserve debate was aired by the highest-ranking Chinese politician to date at L'Aquila summit and U.S. TICs data this week should keep the reserve holdings issue on the boil. Attention is also on Chinese domestic/trade policy following violence in Xinjiang and strains in relations with Australia over Rio Tinto staff detention. Any escalation in either could prompt investors to review the potential for regional outperformance.

Ministers and bankers meeting at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development's annual gathering in London tomorrow and Saturday have a sorry mess to scrutinise.

By the bank's own (revised) forecasts, its region of central and eastern Europe will contract by over 5 percent this year. Many countries in eastern Europe took too much advantage of western banks' lending spree, and businesses and households are struggling to pay back foreign currency loans.

Falling commodity prices have hit countries like Russia and Kazakhstan, and a burst consumer credit bubble is risking double-digit contraction in the Baltic states and Ukraine.

The bank's 61 country members together with the European Union and its development bank the European Investment Bank will be discussing how to cope with the crisis and manage any recovery.

They will be looking at whether to continue giving help to several EU member countries which were due to stop receiving EBRD funds next year. Some countries may also be asking for an increase in the EBRD's capital from its current 20 billion euros, to cope with the crisis.

The EBRD operates in 30 countries, mainly in the former communist bloc, and most recently Turkey. Those countries may be wondering if the bank could have done more to help them through the crisis, and seek more help now.

Five things to think about this week:

REBOUND
- The global stock market has lost some of its spring, although it still managed a seventh straight  week of gains last week. A serious pullback has yet to be seen and the VIX is managing to hold fairly close to the sub-40 lows. Faced with a deluge of earnings, investors are picking their way through a mass of mixed earnings news and forecasts and displaying a more symmetric reaction to good/bad news than in past months.

STRESSES
- The U.S. financial stress testing timeline will put the focus back on the health of financials. Results, which are expected to point out banks' varying ability to cope with a severe recession, are due out on May 4 and the financial industry is already flagging the risks of failing to spell out what would happen to the weaker links in the chain. Stress test results and any rumours or leaks before publication could prompt volatility.

DATA FLOW
- The release of advance Q1 U.S. GDP will offer investors a clearer sense of whether worst is in the past and could point way to what might feed any eventual "green shoots" of recovery. In the euro zone, national and regional sentiment indicators will point the way to firms' and consumers' mood at the start of Q2.

MONETARY POLICY
- Central bank meetings will be held in the U.S., Japan, and New Zealand. RBNZ is the only one of three with room to cut rates and there is some speculation that a more aggressive gesture could be on the cards to rein in markets, which are pricing in New Zealand rate hikes for next year. With the ECB due to outline any "unconventional" policy steps it might take on May 7, investors will scrutinise ECB officials' comments for insight on what the consensus is building around.

FISCAL SPILLOVERS
- Fiscal stimulus in China looks to be filtering through to the real economy rather faster than in the developed world, prompting banks to upgrading China growth forecasts and investors to assess whether there will be a knock-on beneficial effect for commodity-producing emerging markets, which had suffered disproportionately due to the slump in global demand. Such a spillover effect is expected to especially benefit the Russian and Brazilian markets which have already rebounded.

(Reuter photo: Fayaz Kabli)

Five things to think about this week:

EARNINGS DELUGE
-- A heavy U.S. earnings week looms and the European reporting calendar is picking up. While more banks and financials will be reporting (e.g. Bank of America, Bank of New York Mellon, Credit Suisse and a trading update due from Barclays), results will start flowing from a wider range of sectors in both the U.S. and Europe (ranging from Apple and IBM to Glaxo SmithKline, Du Pont, Coca Cola). Health of the broader economy on display.

MACRO SIGNALS
-- The more mixed signals that earnings send, the more investors are likely to look to macro and other indicators as a cross-check of whether the stock market rebound is sustainable and whether the economy is anywhere near an inflexion point. Flash PMIs and Ifo for April will give an early indication of how economic activity was faring as Q2 got underway. Trade data from Japan is also due for release.

FISCAL HELP
 -- The UK budget on April 22 is expected to issue grim forecasts and extend a helping hand to some sectors, such as autos. The fiscal presentation will keep the spotlight on the limited room for budgetary manoeuvre in Britain and elsewhere with past bailouts and support measures leaving tough decisions to be made on public spending, taxes, etc.

G7-IMF
-- The G7 finance ministers' meeting in Washington comes soon after G20 earlier this month and therefore is unlikely to pull any rabbits out of hats. Moreover, there appears to be a less obvious need to spotlight FX given subsiding implied vols for major FX rates and the U.S. Treasury statement that China is not manipulating FX. Markets are looking for followthrough on G20 pledges.

EMERGING OPPORTUNITY
 -- Emerging markets have proved resilient in the earnings season, withstanding occasional down days on major indices and most recently drawing support from nascent signs that the Chinese economy has put its worst quarter behind it. Investors' willingness to look anew at the safer parts of the emerging universe is prompting some sovereigns to use this window of opportunity to launch eurobonds or look into doing so.