Tuesday, May 3, 2011

The Land of "Miracles"


Greece... land of Pythagoras, Plato, Pericles - and more platitudes than you can shake a stick at. 

Nevertheless, here's one more from a Greek bank professional: Greece is the land of miracles.  (I'm certain he didn't quite mean it as a compliment).

To wit, ANYTHING can happen there. Here's a handy comparison from recent history.  
  • First, a current chart of the 5-year CDS (credit default swap) on Greek government bonds (click to enlarge).

 Greek CDS
  •  Second, a chart of what happened in the Greek stockmarket some 10 years ago.
Greek Share Prices 1997-1999

Get my point, via chart comparison?  The place is basically looney-tunes and CANNOT be analyzed or predicted in any rational, by-the-numbers method.  For clues, best dust off the psychotherapy manuals and be prepared for excess, negative AND positive.
  • Third, here's how the share bubble burst after the year 2000. The "miracle" of 1999 turned into dust shortly thereafter.

Now, given the excess of emotional swings apparent above, I wonder what may happen to Greek CDS prices in the not-so-distant future?

6 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. Deleted my comments because I didn't notice the stock market chart was only up to 2003, and it looked to me rather than a crash, as a protracted retracement back to the starting point (which isn't uncommon), and that another move up was to be expected, which did occur in 2004 up to the 2008 crash http://www.tradingeconomics.com/greece/stock-market Now the all important level is around the current 1,400 level. Regards.

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  3. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  4. Hey, Hellasious, have you seen Grantham's latest on peak everything?

    At www.gmo.com

    Meanwhile, silver is crashing. That will keep eyes off Europe for a few days.

    How's Spain doing these days?

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  5. Did someone forget to tell you that parabolic blowoffs in yields don't end well?

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  6. Excess is the name of the game.
    We are moving into very polarizing times.
    We have got tired of the religion of "reason".
    And we are busy throwing the baby out with the bath water.
    The way we always do, no less..
    From one extreme to the other.
    The.. MIRACLE is that you ? we ? EVER believed that the social body was capable of reason...
    Bad move.
    There are people who are more fortunate than others in the belief area.
    There are those who KNOW that they believe, and those.. WHO DON'T KNOW THAT THEY BELIEVE...
    Personally, I prefer to maintain myself, if possible in the camp with those who know they believe..

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