Week of July 5 2013 – Weekly Recap & The Week Ahead
“When they start running the ‘dogs,’ it’s time to begin looking over your shoulder.” — unknown
1. EU officials ratchets up pressure on Greece — Reuters, EU officials has reportedly warned Greece that it has three days to show it can meet its bailout conditions in order to receive the next €8.1B of its rescue loans. The Troika could refuse to transfer the full amount, or break it up into three monthly payments if Greece fails to impress.
2. Egyptian army removed President Mohamed Mursi — in order to end widespread unrest, Egypt’s army removed President Mursi, suspended the constitution and installed an interim government pending new elections.
3. U.S. to impose stricter rules on large banks –the FDIC will introduce a draft of leverage limits for major banks (XLF) early next week. Banks affected are JPMorgan (JPM), Morgan Stanley (MS), Bank of America (BAC) and Citigroup (C). The regulations are expected to require banks to hold 3-6% of their total assets in capital compared with Basel III requirement of 3%. The Fed also eased rules on mortgates and community banks compared to earlier proposals.
4. Portuguese markets plunge on political turmoil — Portuguese markets have gone into meltdown as an austerity induced political crisis has threatened the government’s existence. Ministers from the CDS-PP, the ruling coalition’s junior partner resigned.
5. US health mandate delayed till 2015 — BBC, the Treasury Department will delay penalties for large employers who fail to provide workers with health insurance after being inundated by questions from firms about the healthcare overhaul. The requirements were initially scheduled to begin when the bulk of the law takes effect next year, but the administration will now wait until 2015 before enforcing mandatory employer and insurer reporting guidelines.
6. Major Asset Classes Final First Half Performance — courtesy of BIG, below is the performance numbers are for the various US-listed ETFs that cover those asset classes in the first half of 2013.
The week ahead — Economic data from Econoday.com:
