• CHINA’S PBOC STARTS 500B YUAN SLF TODAY, SINA.COM SAYS
• PBOC PROVIDES 500B YUAN LIQUIDITY TO CHINA’S TOP 5 BANKS: SINA
• PBOC PROVIDES 100B YUAN TO EACH BANK TODAY, TOMORROW WITH DURATION OF 3 MONTHS: SINA

Will the PBOC’s Short-term Lending Facility (SLF) evolve into China’s version of QE? While investor attention has been fixated on China’s deteriorating PMI reports and fears of a widening credit crisis, China’s central bank is operating behind the scenes to prevent a wide-scale financial panic. On Monday, January 20th, 2014, when the Shanghai Composite Index (SHCOMP, CNY 2,033) fell below 2,000 on its way to a six-month low and interest rates jumped, the central bank intervened by adding over 255 billion yuan ($42 billion) to the financial system. In addition to a regular 75 billion yuan of 7-day reverse repos, the central bank  provided supplemental liquidity amounting to 180 billion yuan of 21-day reverse repos, which was seen as an obvious attempt to alleviate liquidity shortages during the Chinese New Year. However, it is worth noting that this was the PBOC’s first use of 21-day contracts since 2005, according to Bloomberg. Small and medium-sized banks were major beneficiaries of this SLF, as the PBOC allowed such institutions in ten provinces to tap its SLF for the first time on a trial basis. A 120 billion yuan quota has been set aside for the trial SLF, according to two local traders.

The central bank also said it will inject further cash into the banking system at regularly-scheduled open market operations. This is a very rare occurrence, as it is almost unprecedented for the central bank to openly declare its intention to inject or withdraw funds at regularly-scheduled open market operations. Usually, these operations only come to light after the fact.

The SLF was created as a brand new monetary tool for the central bank in early 2013 and was designed to enable commercial banks to borrow from the central bank for one to three months. Since its creation, however, the SLF program has been used with increasing frequency by the central bank.

The latest SLF is remarkable for two reasons: First, as mentioned earlier, this SLF was expanded to allow provincial-level small- and medium-sized banks, for the first time, to tap liquidity from the central bank.  As local financial institutions are usually both the major issuers and holders of local government debt, the expansion of the SLF to include local financial institutions opens a new channel for liquidity to flow from the central bank to local governments. This may suggest that the central bank, which is now on high alert for systemic risk, is willing to share some of the burden of local government, though on a very selective and non-regular basis.

The second key reason is embodied in the following central bank announcement: “[we will] explore the function of the SLF in setting the upper band of the market interest rates.” In other words, in the event that interest rates spike higher due to a systemic crisis, the central bank can intervene, via the SLF, to bring rates back down if it so desires. In addition, the PBOC did not disclose any set cap on the SLF, implying that unlimited liquidity could be provided as long as the market’s rate spike exceeds the bands set by the PBOC.

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Most important, the SLF appears to represent the PBOC’s strategy to avert China’s widely-publicized local government debt and banking-system problems. It is  worth noting that even though local government debt amounts to 30% of GDP and is growing at an alarming rate, China’s central government is relatively underleveraged, with a debt-to-GDP ratio of only 23%, which is significantly lower than the emerging-market average. Therefore, Beijing has considerable unused borrowing capacity to share some of the debt burden taken on by local governments, which would have the additional positive impact of lowering borrowing costs for those governments.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-16/china-launches-cny500-billion-stealth-qe

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On November 30th, voters in Switzerland will head to the polls to vote in a referendum on gold. On the ballot is a measure to prohibit the Swiss National Bank (SNB) from further gold sales, to repatriate Swiss-owned gold to Switzerland, and to mandate …

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In response to sanctions, Russia is seeking non-USD trade deals, most notably with China.  How will non-USD transactions impact the Forex market?  Already, US based intellectuals are calling for an end to the Dollar Hegemony:

Note that as long as the dollar is the reserve currency, America’s trade deficit can worsen even when we’re not directly in on the trade. Suppose South Korea runs a surplus with Brazil. By storing its surplus export revenues in Treasury bonds, South Korea nudges up the relative value of the dollar against our competitors’ currencies, and our trade deficit increases, even though the original transaction had nothing to do with the United States.

This isn’t just a matter of one academic writing one article. Mr. Austin’s analysis builds off work by the economist Michael Pettis and, notably, by the former Federal Reserve chairman Ben S. Bernanke.

Russia and China are agreeing to settle more trade in Rubles and Yuan.  From Reuters:

(Reuters) – Russia and China pledged on Tuesday to settle more bilateral trade in rouble and yuan and to enhance cooperation between banks, Russia’s First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov said, as Moscow seeks to cushion the effects of Western economic sanctions.  Shuvalov told reporters in Beijing that he had agreed an economic cooperation pact with China’s Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli that included boosting use of the rouble and yuan for trade transactions.  The pact also lets Russian banks set up accounts with Chinese banks, and makes provisions for Russian companies to seek loans from Chinese firms.  “We are not going to break old contracts, most of which were denominated in dollars,” Shuvalov said through an interpreter.  “But, we’re going to encourage companies from the two countries to settle more in localcurrencies, to avoid using a currency from a third country.”

China has an explosive Forex market, and is negotiating swap arrangements with other central banks.  Retail demand for Forex in China is also exploding.   Although the US Forex market is not developed as in Europe, Asia, and the UK, the USD has been the global reserve currency since World War 2.  How will new players such as Russia and China impact the Forex market, and values of other currencies?  Certainly, they will not take the same view as the US.

The free-floating Forex system we have today was in fact created by the US (Nixon Shock) but since no standards were ever established, now it’s an unknown unknown how the BRICs will evolve the Forex market, but certainly it will be changed forever.  And certainly we can expect extreme volatility in the years ahead, even on the majors.

Argentina, which defaulted on its debt in July, will receive the first tranche of a multi-billion dollar currency swap operation with China’s central bank before the end of this year, the South American country’s La Nacion newspaper reported on Sunday.

The swap will allow Argentina to bolster its foreign reserves or pay for Chinese imports with the yuan currency at a time weak export revenues and an ailing currency have put the Latin American nation’s foreign reserves under intense pressure.

La Nacion said Argentina would receive yuan worth $1 billion by the end of 2014, the first payment of a loan worth a total $11 billion signed by Argentina’s President Cristina Fernandez and her Chinese counterpart in July.

People’s Bank of China Governor Zhou Xiaochuan expressed his support for Argentina in its legal fight against holdout bondholders

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-07/de-dollarization-continues-china-argentina-agree-currency-swap-will-trade-yuan  

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At today’s meeting the Governing Council of the ECB took the following monetary policy decisions:

• The interest rate on the main refinancing operations of the Eurosystem will be decreased by 10 basis points to 0.05%, starting from the operation to be settled on 10 September 2014.
• The interest rate on the marginal lending facility will be decreased by 10 basis points to 0.30%, with effect from 10 September 2014.
• The interest rate on the deposit facility will be decreased by 10 basis points to -0.20%, with effect from 10 September 2014.

The President of the ECB will comment on the considerations underlying these decisions at a press conference starting at 2.30 p.m. CET today.