Tariffs
Index CDS trading nearly doubles as tariffs spook market
Turnover ebbed in single-name contracts as iTraxx and CDX volumes climbed rapidly last week
Treasury selloff challenges back-office systems, data feeds
FIS and Trading Technologies suffered downtime during peak activity
Bowman won’t commit to stress-testing the tariff shock
Nominated Fed vice-chair stonewalls calls to run ad hoc scenario similar to 2020 Covid test
Market whipsaw spurs calls to rethink buy-side stress-testing
Risk Live Boston: Morgan Stanley and BlackRock urge rethink of scenario assumptions and top-down factor models
MSU endowment beats peers by ‘not minding that it hurts’
CIO Philip Zecher rides out tariff storm with long-term view; singles out ‘Mag 3’ tech stocks
Bond rout puts pressure on UST holdings at US banks
Banks leaned heavily on mark-to-market Treasuries before April’s sell-off
FX liquidity ‘worse than Covid’ amid tariff volatility, dealers say
Available liquidity for single clips dropped to as low as $20 million ahead of tariff pause
US tariffs spur rush to European dividend futures
Turnover hits €3.5bn in three days as traders brace for fallout on corporate balance sheets
Deutsche’s Americas CRO on risk-taking in choppy markets
Risk Live Boston: Risk managers must stay alive to sudden market moves, but volatility can also bring opportunity, says Jonathan Hummel
The end of the world, or an artificial crisis?
Bimodal tariff threat leaves investors grappling with uncertainty
OCC’s equity-based IM hit record 91% heading into 2025
CCP’s margin base leant further into equities ahead of market turmoil
Trump tariffs turn swap spreads into ‘pain trade’
Hedge funds bet big on Treasuries to outperform swaps. The opposite happened.
Tariff turbulence piles pressure on banks’ VAR models
Backtesting breaches start to mount, but too early to tell if regulatory intervention needed
US banks held record $78bn in equity collateral before market crash
Stocks made up 11% of dealers’ OTC derivatives collateral at end-2024 – highest ever reported
Hedging playbook goes ‘out the window’ as Trump tariffs slam markets
Dispersion, put spreads and VKOs paid off as stocks plunged, but outlook remains wildly uncertain
Tariffs volatility prompts rush to re-hedge EUR/USD options books
Banks left scrambling to buy vol as spot surged beyond expectations
Credit markets brace for Trump tariffs fallout
Traders have largely shrugged off the threat of global trade wars, but worries remain about economic weakness
Hedge funds flock to hybrids to trade macro uncertainty
Firms repurpose structure made popular by Trump trades last year
FX traders revel in March Madness
Chaotic Trump policies finally bring diversity to flows – to the delight of market-makers
Asia hours surge complicates FX options market-making
Late tariff announcements in US trigger hedging headaches during less-liquid Asia sessions
CCP models vulnerable to Trump risk
Volatility of ‘will he, won’t he’ tariff strategy could confound clearing house risk models
Trump’s tariff threats stress London gold market
Cost of funding customer positions has shot up 10,000% as deliverable supplies shift to New York
AI and Trump tariffs spur hyped-up dispersion trade
Popular vol strategy pays off in January despite highest entry costs on record
Tariff news ‘ping pong’ gives FX options desks a headache
Dealers say Trump’s shifting deadlines sparked weekend trading rush and made it hard to monetise flows