Most Popular
1. It’s a New Macro, the Gold Market Knows It, But Dead Men Walking Do Not (yet)- Gary_Tanashian
2.Stock Market Presidential Election Cycle Seasonal Trend Analysis - Nadeem_Walayat
3. Bitcoin S&P Pattern - Nadeem_Walayat
4.Nvidia Blow Off Top - Flying High like the Phoenix too Close to the Sun - Nadeem_Walayat
4.U.S. financial market’s “Weimar phase” impact to your fiat and digital assets - Raymond_Matison
5. How to Profit from the Global Warming ClImate Change Mega Death Trend - Part1 - Nadeem_Walayat
7.Bitcoin Gravy Train Trend Forecast 2024 - - Nadeem_Walayat
8.The Bond Trade and Interest Rates - Nadeem_Walayat
9.It’s Easy to Scream Stocks Bubble! - Stephen_McBride
10.Fed’s Next Intertest Rate Move might not align with popular consensus - Richard_Mills
Last 7 days
Stocks, Bitcoin and Crypto Markets Breaking Bad on Donald Trump Pump - 21st Nov 24
Gold Price To Re-Test $2,700 - 21st Nov 24
Stock Market Sentiment Speaks: This Is My Strong Warning To You - 21st Nov 24
Financial Crisis 2025 - This is Going to Shock People! - 21st Nov 24
Dubai Deluge - AI Tech Stocks Earnings Correction Opportunities - 18th Nov 24
Why President Trump Has NO Real Power - Deep State Military Industrial Complex - 8th Nov 24
Social Grant Increases and Serge Belamant Amid South Africa's New Political Landscape - 8th Nov 24
Is Forex Worth It? - 8th Nov 24
Nvidia Numero Uno in Count Down to President Donald Pump Election Victory - 5th Nov 24
Trump or Harris - Who Wins US Presidential Election 2024 Forecast Prediction - 5th Nov 24
Stock Market Brief in Count Down to US Election Result 2024 - 3rd Nov 24
Gold Stocks’ Winter Rally 2024 - 3rd Nov 24
Why Countdown to U.S. Recession is Underway - 3rd Nov 24
Stock Market Trend Forecast to Jan 2025 - 2nd Nov 24
President Donald PUMP Forecast to Win US Presidential Election 2024 - 1st Nov 24
At These Levels, Buying Silver Is Like Getting It At $5 In 2003 - 28th Oct 24
Nvidia Numero Uno Selling Shovels in the AI Gold Rush - 28th Oct 24
The Future of Online Casinos - 28th Oct 24
Panic in the Air As Stock Market Correction Delivers Deep Opps in AI Tech Stocks - 27th Oct 24
Stocks, Bitcoin, Crypto's Counting Down to President Donald Pump! - 27th Oct 24
UK Budget 2024 - What to do Before 30th Oct - Pensions and ISA's - 27th Oct 24
7 Days of Crypto Opportunities Starts NOW - 27th Oct 24
The Power Law in Venture Capital: How Visionary Investors Like Yuri Milner Have Shaped the Future - 27th Oct 24
This Points To Significantly Higher Silver Prices - 27th Oct 24

Market Oracle FREE Newsletter

How to Protect your Wealth by Investing in AI Tech Stocks

Italy on the Brink of a Full Blown Banking Crisis

Stock-Markets / Financial Crisis 2016 Jul 13, 2016 - 06:38 PM GMT

By: Joseph_T_Salerno

Stock-Markets

As several articles over the past few days have indicated (here, here, here and here), Italy is on the brink of a full-blown banking crisis. Bad debts, or "non-performing loans," held by the banking sector total  360 billion euros, which is a remarkable 17 percent of all the outstanding bank loans in Italy and equal to about one-fifth of the annual Italian GDP. It is also many times the level of bad debt held by Italian banks at the peak of the financial crisis in 2008. Since the beginning of 2016, prices of bank stocks have decreased by more than 50%. In the case of Italy's oldest and most troubled bank, Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena, its share price has declined more than 75%. It doesn't help that the Italian economy is struggling mightily to recover from the last financial crisis and is still 8% smaller than it was in 2008 and roughly the same size as it was at the end of the twentieth century.


The Italian government is considering bailing out the banks in defiance of EU rules concerning "bail-ins." These rules require that a bank's creditors, especially bondholders, "take haircuts" before taxpayer funds can be used to "recapitalize" the banks. The Italian government is reluctant to follow these rules because almost half of the banks' junior, or subordinated, bonds, about 31 billion euros worth, have been sold on the retail market to households and individuals rather than to professional investors. In the case of insolvency, the holders of junior bonds are the last of the bank's creditors to be paid.  In its appeal to the EU to suspend its bail-in rules, the Italian government is portraying the retail purchasers of these bonds as small and naive savers. But this does not ring true.  In 2015 the Italian government rescued four small banks. In compliance with EU rules it put the burden of the rescue on bank creditors rather than taxpayers. As a result, 12,500  "small savers" lost a total of 430 million euros on junior bonds. That is an average of 34,500 euros lost per bondholder.  

Let us consider these "small savers" whom the Italian government is so eager to protect.  In 2013, net wealth of the median Italian household was 145,469 euros, including real and financial assets. It is hard to believe that a household which was savvy and disciplined enough to accumulate this amount of net wealth would be so  naive as to rashly invest almost one quarter of it in risky junior bank bonds, especially considering that total bank bonds constituted around 3% of gross household wealth in 2013. The reasonable inference is that subordinated bank bonds are a small part of the diversified portfolios of those households whose net wealth is far in excess of the median, that is, rich and likely politically connected households. This would explain why the Italian government is so hell bent on using taxpayer funds from the get-go to bail out the banks.  

Negotiations between the Italian government and the EU on this issue may soon be rendered pointless, however, if "various unconfirmed rumors of Italian cashless ATMs end up being true." 

Joseph Salerno is academic vice president of the Mises Institute, professor of economics at Pace University, and editor of the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics. He has been interviewed in the Austrian Economics Newsletter and on Mises.org. Send him mail. See Joseph T. Salerno's article archives. Comment on the blog.

© 2016 Copyright Joseph Salerno - All Rights Reserved Disclaimer: The above is a matter of opinion provided for general information purposes only and is not intended as investment advice. Information and analysis above are derived from sources and utilising methods believed to be reliable, but we cannot accept responsibility for any losses you may incur as a result of this analysis. Individuals should consult with their personal financial advisors.


© 2005-2022 http://www.MarketOracle.co.uk - The Market Oracle is a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication.


Post Comment

Only logged in users are allowed to post comments. Register/ Log in