Credit Matters

Lloyds Bank has got most of its covered bond and senior funding out of the way already this year — ideal, given the threat of the coronavirus pandemic to both bond markets and the wider economy. But the bank has also been busy optimising its capital stack, which should support its lending just when it is most needed.

How can you follow the biggest economic blockbuster of the decade? Gary Jenkins thinks the sequel should tackle some unfinished business.

Gary Jenkins gets stuck into the least read economics blockbuster of the year, and finds it has much in common with Twin Peaks.

A parent has many roles when it comes to bringing up their children and it is fair to say that the relationship changes with time. Mine are at the age where I am becoming a taxi driver who pays them cash for the privilege of dropping them off somewhere. That doesn’t mean that I don’t still try and teach them valuable life lessons, or as they put it "bore us to death by stating the obvious" and often that means telling little stories to try and subtly illustrate a point.

Gary Jenkins answers the burning question of the last 65m years – why the dinosaurs went extinct, and what humans have to protect us that they didn’t.

The Europeans look set to dominate in the weeks to come, while the US gets pounded. Gary Jenkins wonders if there's really a level playing field for international competition on this level.

European government bonds look pricey, but converging spreads make more sense than ever before. Gary Jenkins casts his mind back to the heady early days of the euro, and a world before bail-outs.

In a world where the NFL can measure every aspect of future sporting skill, how come the capital markets lag so far behind? Gary Jenkins asks how you can value a company when all you have is 10 years of skinny profits and future potential to go on.

It isn’t easy being a central banker. Pressure from international organizations, a sceptical market, and a toolkit that’s running out of tools. Gary Jenkins, returning to his column after a year off watching rugby, ponders the options.

Gary Jenkins is back from Australia and not a moment too soon. It was all getting a bit emotional Down Under.

Remember when hair was big and everyone wanted to be an investment banker? A classic 1980s film takes Gary Jenkins back to his salad days — when people wanted to know what a credit analyst thought.

A $50bn order book can’t be wrong, right? While getting fit in case he gets a last-minute call-up to the Lions tour, Gary Jenkins wonders if investors have been able to separate the credit reality from Apple’s lovely, shiny gadgets.

With so many macro calamities at once, it can be hard to know how to prioritise. But the power of three is compelling, and Gary Jenkins thinks he has identified the ones that need the most attention.

Events in Cyprus have shown that the eurozone is very far from breaking the link between a sovereign and its banks. Gary Jenkins worries that populations are running out of places to put their money.

Eurozone finance ministers took a big gamble with one of the bloc’s smallest members, but the whole affair has Gary Jenkins shaking his head.

There are central banks and there are central banks. The skill, according to Gary Jenkins, is being able to spot which is which.

Gary Jenkins has been reminiscing. The grizzled credit analyst remembers the days of classic schoolboy games, and wonders how today’s heroes of the financial markets might fit in.

A protest meeting has provided Gary Jenkins with the backdrop for an interesting discussion of economic theory. His memory may be playing tricks on him, though, owing to a high speed collision with an unexpected flying object...

Analysis will surely produce more accurate predictions than emotion, writes Gary Jenkins, whether the topic for discussion is politics or investment.

In business, as in life, reputation is everything. Or is it? The Moody’s apparent change of view on a Spanish downgrade makes it harder now to believe anything a rating agency says, argues Gary Jenkins. But he wonders whether that matters anymore.

After all the worry, the world was treated to an awe-inspiring display of European unity last weekend — although inevitably it was Germany that had to save the day. Gary Jenkins wonders if the experience could provide lessons for other crises.

It has been a glorious year of sport, but a less glorious one for the eurozone. Gary Jenkins finds there is one stand-out candidate for any accolades that might be going, but wonders what his legacy might be.

Negotiation skills, economic knowledge and ruthlessness — if the eurozone sovereign debt crisis was played out on a board game, Gary Jenkins reckons he would have all the tools he’d need to win.

The Libor scandal raises scores of questions about the state of the banking industry and its regulatory watchdogs. But above all it has highlighted the futility of any attempt to grasp the full mechanics of complex modern banks. Gary Jenkins reckons the only solution is a total reimagining of what the sector should look like.

After the subprime crisis blew a hole in people’s reliance on credit ratings, the agencies that supply them are regularly vilified. That’s hardly surprising, writes Gary Jenkins, although markets would do well to remember what ratings are intended to show.

Each effort to tackle the European sovereign debt crisis provides more evidence of a rushed attempt to do the bare minimum. Gary Jenkins sees parallels with men’s approach to housework, and wonders if blokes are the reason why the eurozone’s rescue vehicles are about as fit for purpose as his kitchen shelves.

Does it matter how you win or lose at football? Judging by the reaction to Chelsea’s recent victory, it would appear not. But what about banks? Gary Jenkins reckons that the harsh words being heaped on JP Morgan are evidence that people care more about how banks lose money than how much of it they lose.

Analysts have been arguing over the relative merits of growth and austerity since the Eurozone sovereign crisis began. Most politicians, however, have stayed rooted in an austerity consensus. As Gary Jenkins writes, that is now breaking down.

Intrepid analyst Gary Jenkins is on a Star Trek-inspired quest, in search of Spock-like logic behind central bank actions during the various financial crises that have beset the world since 2007. He wonders what will happen when people start to worry that the fixes have done nothing for growth.

As holders of Greek debt make their final decision on whether to sign up to a deal that will lose them a fortune but might just stave off the country’s default, Gary Jenkins mulls over the change in the markets that has seen all the important stuff happen at the end of the week. He finds that nothing is certain but debt and deadlines.

With the second Greek bail-out dominating the week’s events, intrepid analyst Gary Jenkins has stumbled upon a startling document emanating from the Troika – and even more intriguing than the one that has been circulating this week.

Pampered, overpaid and prone to outbursts of emotion — top footballers clearly have nothing in common with those responsible for the smooth running of the Eurozone. But as Gary Jenkins writes, there may be a thing or two that sport might teach the eurocrats.

Gary Jenkins thinks he has discovered a new art form, something that combines the grace of Michelangelo and the surrealism and shock of Picasso and which will hold the fascination of any aficionado of the bond market.

While the eurozone lurches from one crisis of confidence to another, the cliché of what happens in desperate times is holding true. Footballers are being mobilised to steady the bond markets. As Gary Jenkins writes, they probably can’t do much worse than policymakers.

With markets as volatile as they are and political leaders falling like ninepins, it’s easy to get a bit paranoid. S&P’s blunder over its rating of France is the latest combustible element to have been thrown on to the fire. But as Gary Jenkins writes, events might not always be what they seem.

Far from getting better, the eurozone crisis is getting worse with every make-or-break summit. Gary Jenkins finds that the latest plan is nothing more than a wishlist and worries for the future of mankind if a way cannot be found to interest private investors in Spanish and Italian debt.