Quote from m22au:
Commerzbank
RBS
LYG
Quote from Daal:
Did you select them by going through the stress tests and seeing which ones are the most exposed to probable haircuts?
Looking at the tests it doesn't seem that RBS is very exposed. Their main exposure is Italy but if my math is correct, it's not even 20% of their Tier 1 capital
Quote from m22au:
Also RBS and LYG (like CBK) won't get squeezed higher as much as other Eurozone banks if there is some positive news.
Quote from Daal:
Are you sure about that?In my experience that ones that goes down the most tend to squeeze the most(ala FNM FRE), that is unless their existence is under threat
I didn't look at the stress tests in detail bank by bank before but I did this morning. My conclusion is that if you want to make money shorting the banks you will have to have a high confidence in a prediction of haircuts of Portugal, Ireland and Italy and short the banks of THAT country you are making the prediction on. The obviously insolvent banks have mostly gone bust by now
There might be a case of shorting Mafin Popular Bank in the ride to $0. Its not a play I'm a fan of but I know that you like that so you might want to take a look at that
Quote from m22au:
I agree that the ones that go down the most tend to squeeze the most. However RBS and LYG are probably more of a play on the UK rather than Europe. If you look at these two, they squeezed higher on Thursday 27 October with every other bank, but on Friday 28 October they fell quite hard.
My interpretation: people quickly realised that the Greece "news" didn't really change things for RBS and LYG that much because they're not part of the Eurozone.
CBK: marketcap 7.1 billion versus 2.9 billion capital raise mandated. But for all we know it might need more than that in the future if (when) Greek debt gets written down by more than just 50%.
And if Germany does something to "fix" Italy, this would be long-term bearish for CBK, because it would hurt Germany.
Quote from Daal:
But aren't you factoring in that the depressed stock price of CBK already expects some dillution?
I like shorting financials in 2 cases
-A bit after you believe they are peaking(Say Jan 2008)
-When they are going to $0
I'm not a fan of shorting a already depressed financial if I don't think it will go to $0 on liquidity problems