The Housing Crisis and Washington's political and ineffective response

Today, one of the Treasury boys actually said that, "... the nature of the housing crisis has changed over the past year...". This shows how completely clueless they are at Treasury and the Fed (or more likely, how politics rules over economic common sense). The housing crisis exists today for the same reason it existed two years ago: the value of housing has fallen such that too many homeowners have lost a substantial portion of their net worth the fall of their homes' values such that they now have no equity or negative equity in their homes. Compounding this loss of net worth is their losses suffered in the securities markets.The negative effect of this situation is compounded by the high real unemployment which approaches 20%. Thus, while we have an over supply of homes, we also have a dramatic undersupply of equity available to buy a home. Compounding this, it is virtually impossible to get a mortgage in excess of $730,000, and many homes in the US are at values in excess of $1 million. Sadly, while Washington has "saved" the banking system, they have not even scratched the surface of the housing crisis, and political posturing which includes statements like another one made today, "...only $50 billion of TARP went to housing...", only serve to scare the heck out of any semi-informed individual. My reference here is to the various Treasury maneuvers that have moved some 90% of US home mortgages to the GSE's who now have an unlimited pen from the Treasury and who have used it to dramatically increase the proportion of sub-prime loans on their books in the past two years. So in fact, Washington's total response to the housing crisis in the past two years has been enormous, but political and ineffective.

Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Banks and Fear

We had predicted that the fear of default by Dubai's various property companies on $26 billion would prove to be unfounded, and now Dubai has shown us to be correct. Dubai new proposal offers what must be viewed as a very lender-friendly deal on the Dubai World and Nakheel debt. Dubai now offers to convert its $10.1 billion debt claims on Dubai World and Nakheel into equity, thus subordinating its claim to other creditors. In addition, Dubai will inject $9.5 billion of fresh capital of which $3.8 billion will come from its own resources and $5.7 billion from a loan from Abu Dhabi. This can only mean that Abu Dhabi approves of and supports this newest proposal. Going even further (in the right direction) Dubai says that if the lenders approve the deal, then holders of Nakheel's Sukuk bonds (2010 & 2011 maturities) will be paid in full and on time. All of this goes to the point that UAE is not interested in having anything derail its plans, not a small part of which have Dubai as the new "Beirut" for European and Gulf residents and an important financial and business center for the region.

The Euro, Greece, the Dollar and a Global Portfolio Investment Management

Ok, first of all, I appreciate the restraint, but the Euro is in major trouble, and its "salvation" is probably even worse. As soon as Greece "clears", Spain, Portugal or one of the others will tank. So its a dollar world for the long-short term. Actually, I think its probably be a dollar world for the long-long term: you're a portfolio manager for a multi-billion investment fund/pension whatever, you decide that the U.S. economy is fucked-who wants to be in Treasuries? So you take your lowest risk portion of your portfolio and put it in. Oh,oh, where do you put it? (thinking going on here) In short, if you actually believe in a doomsday scenario, or anything like it, you want to have your U.S. position. Trading is trading, but portfolio managers of global invested multi-billion funds need to preserve capital over the long term, so don't get caught too short. Hard U.S. assets, low leverage.
Charles Cecil
Opin Partners, LLC

Virtually all players in the CRE industry, securities and banking sectors agree that we need the CMBS market to return to functionality as soon as possible (even the politicians want this).

The CMBS market cannot recover its value to the world until the uncertainties that now exist are cleared up, and litigation between the parties is the most certain way to achieve this. Factors that are pushing for a litigation between Special Servicers and CMBS bond holders of different seniority (tranches) include steadily increasing mortgage loan delinquencies that show no sign of lessening, the huge dollar volume of CMBS loans ($770 billion) , PSA agreements that put Special Servicers in an untenable position with respect to conflicts of interest that they are supposed to ignore (read as in "law suit"), B piece owners who are also Special Servicers who have an obligation to THEIR investors and will be inclined to argue that obligation as superior to that owed other more senior bond holders, Senior bondholders who believe that their position is being injured by delays in foreclosure and sale that may benefit the Special Servicer and/or B bond holders and the always murky question of what liability the Special Servicer may have to mezzanine lenders who argue that the actions of the Special Servicer that benefit the Special Servicer are damaging to the mezzanine lender.

The sooner these issues are cleaned up, the sooner we can see the revival of the CMBS market and the CRE market that relys on it for liquidity, now more than ever.

China is selling down US Treasuries exposure?

China is selling down US Treasuries exposure?
Charles Cecil
Opin Partners, LLC

- China's real position is best seen through the sum of their "visible" actions and HK
and UK actions: net position is increased, especially if viewed on a six month
average or over the post-crisis period.
- My sources in major continental banks are looking for the Euro to stabilize around 114
- China definitely needs the US to remain stable and will do whatever it can to prevent
a dollar flight. I mean, who else have they got that they
can actually rely on politically and economically (to the extent that we want to
separate the two!).
- So, $3 trillion or if you like, $7 trillion of US T is maturing in the near term, it
is useful here to think like a portfolio manager for a major
institutional investor: am I seriously suggesting that I am going to move my exposure
from US T to say... what? I mean, I have to balance
my risk globally right? If I move out of US T, I have to look at the country risk
weighting and what the implication for the globe's economies
if the US really does experience a major blow out. Net, net, I have to conclude that
apart from hard ownership (with very low leverage) of
commodity resources (and I don't mean through publicly traded securities), I want the
US exposure as the US remains the most vibrant
hothouse for creating wealth without political risk. Really, how many of you global
portfolio managers would be ready to move your
exposure from US T to the big growth engines of India, Brazil or China? No, you are
going to reallocate from some less appetizing
countries such as Russia, Italy, Spain or UK (oh wait, what's happening to
currencies?)

U.S. Sovereign Default? Looks Like They've Solved the Social Security Problem

I have not heard "Social Security" since the day before the Presidential election so I guess Obama & team must have figured out how to fund the obligations. Well, maybe not, they've been awfully busy with the Iraq and Afganistan wars, Iran, the banks, housing, unemployment, education, health care, losing Senate and House seats, managing awkward press about relationships with Goldman Sachs and its past and present senior members, allegations of strong-arm tactics associated with bailouts and questions of inappropriate management of significant information regarding the Merrill Lynch-Bank of America deal, China's new found power, and a few other things. Consider the impact of all of the above on the U.S.' "ability to pay" when we are faced with a relatively slow growth economy and bruised consumers-can we just raise taxes to pay for all this? Probably not enough without killing the goose altogether. Then, the inflatorama is not as perfect a solution as many would like us to think as ultimately there is a limit to the money printing solution. So, it is worth noting that today, one of the bond credit rating agencies raised a flag about the U.S.' bond rating.

Remember the Tishman Archstone Deal?

The largest acquisition in the history of the multifamily REIT market was Tishman & Lehman's $22.2 billion acquisition of Archstone’s multifamily portfolio of 359 communities (more than 87,600 units) which was completed in mid 2007. When the CMBS market tanked as they were trying to close the deal, the buyers scrambled to put together financing. The solution came with Fannie purchased a $7.1 billion credit facility, its largest credit facility to date. Freddie bought two pools of loans totaling $1.8 billion, the largest pools it had ever done. The Irvine Co. bought a 90 percent interest in 15 of the communities, which brought in another estimated $1.4 billion, and the company also made an equity investment. Lehman had $2.4 billion of equity in this deal on its books when it collapsed. In 2008 Archstone lenders injected $500 million+ to prevent a default. Given that nationally, rents have fallen 10%+ since the deal closed, vacancy has increased from 5.5% to 8%, and CAP rates have increased 250 bpts+, the Archstone owners' equity is almost certainly gone and the debt is probably underwater.

Looks Like The WHite House Needs A Sacrifice

I may be getting really cynical, but it sounds like they are about to feed Geithner to the wolves:
Breaking News: "The New York Federal Reserve is being investigated by Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general overseeing the troubled assets relief programme, over its disclosure of documents relating to the bail-out of AIG and its counterparties.
In a statement submitted to the House oversight committee, Mr Barofsky said his team is examining whether the New York Fed improperly withheld information about the AIG bail-out from the Securities and Exchange Commission and his office."

I am on record as to the inappropriateness of Geithner as TresSec, but it now looks like political expediency may do what conscience could not.

Outrageous Bonus, Unfair Compensation

Change is definitely in order when it comes to the design of C suite compensation packages. However, rigorous thinking and careful writing is required lest we make this issue as silly as the administration has succeeded in making it sound. The investment of education and time, combination of special talents and dedication that it takes to join the C suite (or in fact get anywhere near it), merit high compensation. So greed may or may not play a factor in a particular case, but in general, the executives that manage and run the major for-profit business organizations, have risen to the top by merit, and thus merit considerable "reward". However, it is reasonable to say that the most senior managers should be held to the same measure as their reports: performance. So, while it may be really upsetting to see this one or that group making enormous amounts of money, it is not necessarily true that it is wrong or unfair. In any case, the root of this problem lies in the reward for short term performance that is integrated into the institutional money managers' compensation/career progress. Having said all of this, the use of taxpayers' funds/National debt to enable financial institutions to reap outsize rewards is not acceptable, and so the lightning that these firms have drawn for large payouts from huge performance, is well deserved. But, let's agree that it is our public servants who made this possible, so we the people should direct our anger and disgust at them.