Beware of Greeks bearing bonds
| 29-01-2018 | Lionel Pavey |
Over the last year there have been impressive price gains in Greek Government bonds leading to equally impressive falls in yields. Greek 2-year bonds are now yielding 1.35% – down from around 7% at the start of 2017. Similarly, 10-year bonds are now yielding 3.66% – a significant fall since the start of 2017. In fact, the yield on Greek 2-year bonds is now lower than in USA where the current yield is 2.09%. Last week S&P upgraded Greece’s long term credit rating to ‘B’ from ‘B-‘. It would appear that Greece is doing everything right. Right?
Well, looking at it from another perspective it is clear that Greece is not in such a strong shape compared to the USA. Unemployment in USA is 4.1% – Greece is about 5 times higher at 20.6%. Clearly there must be another reason for lower yields in Greece. Athens hopes to issue new bonds in 2018 with tenors of 3, 7 and 10 years. The answer would appear to be the very low to negative yields on German debt. The yield on German 2-year bonds -0.57% and on 10-years 0.63%. As investors search for any positive yield they have been attracted to the Euro countries on the periphery – Greece, Spain etc.
The ECB have regularly said that they think inflation will remain below their target for the foreseeable future. This has encouraged investors to seek out alternative countries that are offering a positive yield. There is almost a 2% yield pick up on Greek paper over Germany. This has proven to be attractive even though Greek debt-to-GDP ratio stands at 190%.
However, EU creditors hold around 80% of existing Greek debt. As they are wary of Greece reverting to the problems seen a few years ago, issuing new bonds could be difficult. With all the promises made in the past to ensure bail-outs for Greece, the rest of the EU will be extra cautious and vigilant – leading to no easing of the current reforms and restrictions that the EU has put in place.
It would seem, therefore, that the market is temporarily out of synch. The market is being distorted by the fact that there is an appreciable yield pick up in EUR (so no FX risk) when looking at Greek bonds versus German bonds. There appears to be no other logical explanation as to why Greek yields are significantly lower than those in USA.
If bond markets turn sour this year, which would you rather hold – Greek or American paper?
Cash Management and Treasury Specialist
