Italy

  • 12 Aug 2011 at 5:22 PM

Italy To Fix Economy By Cutting Back On Five-Day Weekends

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The Italian government announced spending cuts and tax increases, including 5% and 10% surtaxes on income above €90,000 and €150,000 respectively, to address concerns about Italy’s budget deficits. The tax increases are rough and all but they have nothing on this:

Additional measures include a rule ensuring that non-religious public holidays, such as the June 2 anniversary of the founding of the Italian Republic, are celebrated on a Sunday to increase the number of working days in a year.

Very harsh. Even the Germans have weekday public holidays (er, one).

Fortunately, cooler heads have prevailed, and now it seems that the Italian government won’t be increasing the number of work days. They just want you to try to show up on those days.  Continue reading »

  • 03 Aug 2011 at 3:14 PM

Italian Politicians Unhappy That Berlusconi Speech Did Not Break Into Bunga-Bunga Party On The Floor Of Parliament

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With the Italian 10-year bond trading almost 400bps wide of German rates, stocks down 1.5%, and new doubts about the EU’s ability to respond to the spreading credit crisis, Silvio Berlusconi took to the floor of parliament to defend his country’s credit and was criticized for not keeping it lively enough:

Commenting on the speech, a strong critic of Mr Berlusconi within the government, who asked not to be identified, acknowledged it was “boring” but said the prime minister was right to point to the lack of confidence in the eurozone as the root cause of Italy’s current problems on the markets.

Because of course Berlusconi said that Italy has “solid economic fundamentals,” which should reassure everyone, and that the problem is market misinterpretation rather than budget or debt problems. But not everyone agrees that Italy’s crisis is all in the minds of short sellers and CDS buyers: Continue reading »

  • 13 Jul 2011 at 10:15 AM

Just to Be Clear: Italy Not Banning Short Selling, Just Asking Really Nicely

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Not satisfied with taking down the names of everyone shorting Italian stocks so it could give them disappointed looks and ask them if they feel good about themselves for making Nonna cry over her lost pension, Italian securities regulator Consob has started using a little “moral suasion” to get their buddies to cut them off.
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  • 11 Jul 2011 at 3:53 PM

Unlike Lehman, Bear, AIG, Greece, Ireland, Iceland … Italy Has No Problems a Little Short-Sale Ban Can’t Fix

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Here at Dealbreaker we love short sale bans. Nothing inspires confidence in an asset so much as a government telling you that you can’t sell it, especially when the government in question is taking time out from a busy schedule of bunga bunga parties to give a firm but loving hand to the equity markets.

So we were excited to see that, as the Italian equity and government bond markets melt down, politicians and regulators are sharpening their knives to come after the evil speculators who must be behind the drop. Italy is now requiring anyone who is net short more than 0.2% of the shares of an Italian listed company to disclose their position to regulators, with an updating requirement for changes of 0.1% or more, from now until September 9. More excitingly, there is already talk of banning naked shorts, regular shorts, sovereign CDS, etc. followed. Barry Ritholtz succinctly explains the reasoning:

In a classic act of misdirection, Italy is ordering short sellers to disclose their positions, because after all, the entire European credit crisis was caused by analysts who identified over valued stocks.

Continue reading »