The lifecos continue to whine about new capital requirements:
International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) set to take effect 2014 “will severely inhibit” the core business of Canadian lifecos, Donald Stewart, chief executive of Sun Life Financial Inc., told the company’s meeting Wednesday.
One of the main problems with IFRS is that it changes the way companies value products such as life insurance policies, potentially forcing companies to hike prices beyond the reach of many Canadians. Mr. Stewart warned this wouldn’t benefit either the industry or the country.
Meanwhile, insurers are also bracing for the impact of new capital rules that are “significantly more onerous” than existing regulations, he said.
The industry is working with the Office of the Superintendent of Financial institutions, the regulator, to try to ensure that the new capital rules are not excessively stringent.
…
The comments echo recent statements made by Don Guloien, chief executive of Manulife Financial Corp. Mr. Guloien told his company’s annual meeting May 5 that new accounting and capital rules constitute one of the single biggest risks that Manulife currently faces.The industry is particularly concerned that the new IFRS accounting rules will make earnings more volatile. That could have a negative impact on capital and on key capital ratios used by the regulator to determine a company’s financial health.
DSK has quit the IMF to pursue other interests.
Here’s a straw in the wind:
Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) now sells 105 books for its Kindle electronic-readers for every 100 printed books.
Sales of the e-books for the Kindle, introduced in 2007, surpassed hardcover titles in July 2010, and overtook paperbacks six months later, the Seattle-based company said today in a statement.
It was a strong day in the Canadian preferred share market, with PerpetualDiscounts gaining 20bp, FixedResets up 5bp and DeemedRetractibles leaping ahead 38bp. The Performance Highlights table told a tale, with nine entries, all DeemedRetractible and mostly insurers – which was also the tilt on the volume table, although not to as large an extent. Volume was comfortably above average.
| 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 | -0.0350 % | 2,455.7 |
| FixedFloater | 0.00 % | 0.00 % | 0 | 0.00 | 0 | -0.0350 % | 3,693.3 |
| Floater | 2.45 % | 2.25 % | 41,884 | 21.64 | 4 | -0.0350 % | 2,651.5 |
| OpRet | 4.87 % | 3.51 % | 61,098 | 1.15 | 9 | 0.1804 % | 2,423.1 |
| SplitShare | 5.24 % | -1.75 % | 56,727 | 0.57 | 6 | -0.0505 % | 2,504.8 |
| Interest-Bearing | 0.00 % | 0.00 % | 0 | 0.00 | 0 | 0.1804 % | 2,215.7 |
| Perpetual-Premium | 5.74 % | 4.88 % | 126,595 | 0.84 | 9 | 0.0551 % | 2,065.8 |
| Perpetual-Discount | 5.49 % | 5.51 % | 120,608 | 14.56 | 15 | 0.2021 % | 2,163.8 |
| FixedReset | 5.15 % | 3.29 % | 195,962 | 2.88 | 57 | 0.0509 % | 2,308.7 |
| Deemed-Retractible | 5.14 % | 4.90 % | 322,437 | 8.11 | 53 | 0.3755 % | 2,134.4 |
| Performance Highlights | |||
| Issue | Index | Change | Notes |
| HSB.PR.C | Deemed-Retractible | 1.00 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2014-07-30 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 25.20 Bid-YTW : 5.09 % |
| SLF.PR.A | Deemed-Retractible | 1.04 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 23.30 Bid-YTW : 5.72 % |
| HSB.PR.D | Deemed-Retractible | 1.06 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 24.85 Bid-YTW : 5.19 % |
| IAG.PR.A | Deemed-Retractible | 1.06 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 22.93 Bid-YTW : 5.76 % |
| SLF.PR.D | Deemed-Retractible | 1.14 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 22.18 Bid-YTW : 6.00 % |
| BMO.PR.K | Deemed-Retractible | 1.14 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2016-12-25 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 25.66 Bid-YTW : 4.72 % |
| GWO.PR.G | Deemed-Retractible | 1.25 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 25.09 Bid-YTW : 5.27 % |
| GWO.PR.H | Deemed-Retractible | 1.37 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 23.67 Bid-YTW : 5.63 % |
| MFC.PR.B | Deemed-Retractible | 1.75 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 22.65 Bid-YTW : 5.83 % |
| Volume Highlights | |||
| Issue | Index | Shares Traded |
Notes |
| SLF.PR.B | Deemed-Retractible | 123,976 | Nesbitt crossed 100,000 at 23.34. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 23.45 Bid-YTW : 5.69 % |
| FTS.PR.E | OpRet | 101,512 | Nesbitt crossed 100,000 at 26.75. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2013-07-01 Maturity Price : 25.75 Evaluated at bid price : 26.75 Bid-YTW : 2.79 % |
| SLF.PR.C | Deemed-Retractible | 86,594 | Nesbitt crossed 25,000 at 22.10; RBC crossed 27,200 at the same price. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 22.16 Bid-YTW : 6.01 % |
| MFC.PR.B | Deemed-Retractible | 67,453 | Desjardins crossed 15,000 at 22.44, then another 40,000 at 22.62. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 22.65 Bid-YTW : 5.83 % |
| CM.PR.M | FixedReset | 65,904 | TD crossed 25,000 at 27.90; Desjardins crossed 31,900 at 28.05. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2014-08-30 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 27.90 Bid-YTW : 2.90 % |
| TRP.PR.C | FixedReset | 59,013 | Scotia crossed two blocks of 25,000 each at 25.70. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2016-02-29 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 25.70 Bid-YTW : 3.80 % |
| There were 41 other index-included issues trading in excess of 10,000 shares. | |||
| Wide Spread Highlights | ||
| Issue | Index | Quote Data and Yield Notes |
| W.PR.H | Perpetual-Discount | Quote: 24.41 – 25.00 Spot Rate : 0.5900 Average : 0.3692 YTW SCENARIO |
| SLF.PR.F | FixedReset | Quote: 27.41 – 27.75 Spot Rate : 0.3400 Average : 0.2392 YTW SCENARIO |
| HSB.PR.C | Deemed-Retractible | Quote: 25.20 – 25.49 Spot Rate : 0.2900 Average : 0.2050 YTW SCENARIO |
| MFC.PR.B | Deemed-Retractible | Quote: 22.65 – 22.98 Spot Rate : 0.3300 Average : 0.2633 YTW SCENARIO |
| MFC.PR.C | Deemed-Retractible | Quote: 22.01 – 22.24 Spot Rate : 0.2300 Average : 0.1647 YTW SCENARIO |
| SLF.PR.E | Deemed-Retractible | Quote: 22.20 – 22.45 Spot Rate : 0.2500 Average : 0.1896 YTW SCENARIO |