Agorism
03-26-2011, 08:38 PM
Bernanke now owns nearly $200 billion more Treasuries than China
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/feds-120-billion-other-assets
Following our latest Fed balance sheet update, where we get another confirmation that for another week the Fed's assets have hit a fresh all time record (Bernanke now owns nearly $200 billion more Treasurys than China), there are two items that we believe deserve far closer scrutiny. The first is the as expected drop in MBS and Agency prepayments, which after seeing an initial surge in activity when rates were low enough to merit prepaying existing mortgages, has now plunged. In fact in the last several weeks the average prepay activity is roughly half of what it was in the September-December period. This is critical as it impacts the amount of debt the Fed can monetize via the QE Lite component of the ongoing monetization procedure. Should this weekly prepayment amount remain constrained, the Fed will have far less of a marginal impact on share prices (which is what POMO ultimately is) then if QE Lite was working at its expected $25-35 billion a month monetization run rate (in addition to the $70-80 billion from QE 2). Yet far more questionable is the recent surge in "Other Federal Reserve Assets" - an observation we have commented on previously, yet which we attributed merely to capitalized accrued interest on the Fed's portfolio. However, following the recent remittance of tens of billions in interest expense from the Fed to the Treasury we now know that is not the case, so we kindly request that the Fed answer the following simple question: just what is the key driver in the growth of this asset category, which in the week ending March 23 hit a fresh all time high of $120.4 billion? In fact, we are rather stunned that nobody before has asked just what "other assets" comprise a line item that is greater than the GDP of about 80% of the world's countries.
Charting the change in the "Other assets" category in time:
...continued
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/feds-120-billion-other-assets
Following our latest Fed balance sheet update, where we get another confirmation that for another week the Fed's assets have hit a fresh all time record (Bernanke now owns nearly $200 billion more Treasurys than China), there are two items that we believe deserve far closer scrutiny. The first is the as expected drop in MBS and Agency prepayments, which after seeing an initial surge in activity when rates were low enough to merit prepaying existing mortgages, has now plunged. In fact in the last several weeks the average prepay activity is roughly half of what it was in the September-December period. This is critical as it impacts the amount of debt the Fed can monetize via the QE Lite component of the ongoing monetization procedure. Should this weekly prepayment amount remain constrained, the Fed will have far less of a marginal impact on share prices (which is what POMO ultimately is) then if QE Lite was working at its expected $25-35 billion a month monetization run rate (in addition to the $70-80 billion from QE 2). Yet far more questionable is the recent surge in "Other Federal Reserve Assets" - an observation we have commented on previously, yet which we attributed merely to capitalized accrued interest on the Fed's portfolio. However, following the recent remittance of tens of billions in interest expense from the Fed to the Treasury we now know that is not the case, so we kindly request that the Fed answer the following simple question: just what is the key driver in the growth of this asset category, which in the week ending March 23 hit a fresh all time high of $120.4 billion? In fact, we are rather stunned that nobody before has asked just what "other assets" comprise a line item that is greater than the GDP of about 80% of the world's countries.
Charting the change in the "Other assets" category in time:
...continued