October 26, 2010

UBS is is projecting another massive loss for MFC:

Ongoing low interest rates are making things increasingly difficult for life insurance companies which rely heavily on fixed income investments such as government bonds to cover future policy holder liabilities.

In a note to clients this morning UBS analyst Peter Rozenberg predicted Manulife Financial Corp. will be hardest hit, putting it on track for a loss in the third quarter of $1.48-billion.

CFTC Commissioner Bart Chilton has demonstrated his complete ignorance of the market:

Bart Chilton, a commissioner with the futures regulator, said “mini-flash crashes occur all too often” following a surge in high-frequency trading.

“They don’t cause as much of a disruption as that of May 6, but more than once this year, runaway algos have disrupted markets. By that I mean, cost people money,” Chilton said in prepared remarks for an energy conference in Las Vegas.

“We should explore ways to hold those who set off runaway robotic trades accountable,” he said.

At least one algorithm is know to have disrupted the oil markets this year. Infinium Capital Management said in August it was the company at the center of a six-month probe by CME Group Inc into why a new trading
program malfunctioned, racking up a million-dollar loss in about a second on February 3.

Some might think that Infinium Capital Management was fined a million bucks by the markets – which went directly into the pockets of the not-so-dumb traders – and that that’s accountability enough. But then the regulators wouldn’t have anything to do.

OSFI’s in a little difficulty:

Auditor General Sheila Fraser said in a report that the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI) adequately supervised the banks at present.

“However, the growing volume and complexity of its work is increasing the demands on its human resources,” she wrote, noting an ever larger number of complex financial products.

“This challenge, combined with pressures on training and compensation, could affect the office’s ability to attract and retain qualified staff to maintain its capacity and competency to carry out its supervisory mandate.”

Ms. Fraser said that, as of March 10 this year, 10% of positions on large bank supervisory teams and 12% of jobs on the specialist groups that support the teams were vacant. Half the positions have been open for a year.

She cited OSFI as saying there “was little flexibility to address unexpected events” and said the time taken to dealing with documents resulted in less time available for detecting and analyzing risks.

A good day overall in the Canadian preferred share market on continued strong volume, with PerpetualDiscounts gaining 13bp, while FixedResets lost 2bp.

HIMIPref™ Preferred Indices
These values reflect the December 2008 revision of the HIMIPref™ Indices

Values are provisional and are finalized monthly
Index Mean
Current
Yield
(at bid)
Median
YTW
Median
Average
Trading
Value
Median
Mod Dur
(YTW)
Issues Day’s Perf. Index Value
Ratchet 0.00 % 0.00 % 0 0.00 0 0.1648 % 2,175.9
FixedFloater 0.00 % 0.00 % 0 0.00 0 0.1648 % 3,296.2
Floater 2.88 % 3.19 % 87,838 19.24 3 0.1648 % 2,349.4
OpRet 4.93 % 3.92 % 99,450 0.74 9 0.0260 % 2,364.2
SplitShare 5.83 % -27.07 % 65,989 0.09 2 0.8110 % 2,413.7
Interest-Bearing 0.00 % 0.00 % 0 0.00 0 0.0260 % 2,161.8
Perpetual-Premium 5.69 % 5.03 % 142,440 5.34 19 0.0741 % 2,017.8
Perpetual-Discount 5.41 % 5.42 % 247,947 14.68 58 0.1341 % 2,019.4
FixedReset 5.27 % 3.07 % 338,774 3.24 47 -0.0196 % 2,275.3
Performance Highlights
Issue Index Change Notes
POW.PR.B Perpetual-Discount 1.27 % YTW SCENARIO
Maturity Type : Limit Maturity
Maturity Date : 2040-10-26
Maturity Price : 23.71
Evaluated at bid price : 24.00
Bid-YTW : 5.61 %
BNA.PR.C SplitShare 1.57 % YTW SCENARIO
Maturity Type : Hard Maturity
Maturity Date : 2019-01-10
Maturity Price : 25.00
Evaluated at bid price : 22.69
Bid-YTW : 5.91 %
Volume Highlights
Issue Index Shares
Traded
Notes
CM.PR.A OpRet 181,000 Called for redemption. Desjardins bought 180,500 from Nesbitt at 24.98.
YTW SCENARIO
Maturity Type : Soft Maturity
Maturity Date : 2011-07-30
Maturity Price : 25.00
Evaluated at bid price : 24.97
Bid-YTW : 5.41 %
BNS.PR.P FixedReset 95,415 National crossed 25,000 at 26.51; Nesbitt crossed 50,000 at 26.50.
YTW SCENARIO
Maturity Type : Call
Maturity Date : 2013-05-25
Maturity Price : 25.00
Evaluated at bid price : 26.51
Bid-YTW : 2.46 %
CM.PR.K FixedReset 84,247 RBC crossed 75,000 at 27.21.
YTW SCENARIO
Maturity Type : Call
Maturity Date : 2014-08-30
Maturity Price : 25.00
Evaluated at bid price : 27.17
Bid-YTW : 2.86 %
POW.PR.D Perpetual-Discount 72,425 RBC crossed 46,800 at 23.10.
YTW SCENARIO
Maturity Type : Limit Maturity
Maturity Date : 2040-10-26
Maturity Price : 22.76
Evaluated at bid price : 22.96
Bid-YTW : 5.48 %
TRP.PR.B FixedReset 68,300 YTW SCENARIO
Maturity Type : Limit Maturity
Maturity Date : 2040-10-26
Maturity Price : 24.96
Evaluated at bid price : 25.01
Bid-YTW : 3.30 %
RY.PR.C Perpetual-Discount 66,500 RBC crossed two blocks of 30,000 each, both at 22.41.
YTW SCENARIO
Maturity Type : Limit Maturity
Maturity Date : 2040-10-26
Maturity Price : 22.26
Evaluated at bid price : 22.40
Bid-YTW : 5.13 %
There were 57 other index-included issues trading in excess of 10,000 shares.

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