The global credit crisis has hit Asia with a vengeance for the first time, triggering a massive flight to safety as investors across the region pull out of risky assets. Yields on three-month deposits in China and Korea have plummeted to near 1pc in a spectacular fall over recent days, caused by panic withdrawls from money market funds and credit derivatives.........It is unclear what prompted this latest "heart attack" in the credit system, though rumours abound that Asian banks have yet to own up to their share of the expected $400bn to $500bn losses from the US mortgage debacle.
Stock markets were battered across the region. The Hang Seng index in Hong Kong fell 4.15pc, while Tokyo's Nikkei slumped to the lowest level in a year and a half, dragged down by the shares of the 'Seven Samurai' exporters.
Asian jitters set off fresh turmoil on Europe's credit markets. The iTraxx index measuring default insurance on bank and insurance bonds hit an all-time high of 63.5.
"The whole financial market is in turmoil with
Bund-Swap-Spreads going through the roof," said Andrew Guy, director of ADG Capital Management.
Marcus Schuler, director of credit marketing at Deutsche Bank, said
spreads on low-grade European bonds had been jumping ten basis points a day for the last week. "There's been risk aversion across the board," he said.
In a rare move, the European Covered Bond Council said it was
suspending trading of mortgage-linked bonds in the inter-bank-market owing to the "undue over-acceleration in the widening of spreads".
Abbey National today cancelled its sale of covered bonds, the third company to withdraw an issue this week.
Charles Dumas, chief strategist for Lombard Street Research, said credit woes had led to an alarming spike in the 'Ted spread' between commercial Libor and US Treasury bills, now near 150 basis points. "Libor is at a premium to T-bills not matched the great crash in 1987," he said.
Mr Redecker BNP Paribas said the flight from risk has led to a sudden unwinding of the $1,200bn yen "carry trade" as hedge funds and Japanese investors close risky positions. The yen has snapped back violently from yen118 to yen108 against the dollar since early October, with similar moves against other Anglo-Saxon currencies.
"We're seeing a liquidation of the carry trade. For years it created liquidity for global equities in an upward spiral, but this has now turned into a downward spiral. Base metal prices are falling, which tells us that Asia may not be as strong as we thought," he said.Copper prices fell 6.4 percent in Shanghai today......
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