Word: aaas
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...expected, investors will have to repay the government loans with interest. But if the bonds go bust, investors are off the hook, after losing the small down payment they made on the original loan. To limit taxpayer losses, the government is going to make loans only against bonds rated AAA, the highest rank...
...that's what causes the problem. Every securitization deal creates some AAA-rated bonds and some lower-quality debts. In a typical credit-card securitization, as much as 15% of the bonds created will have ratings lower than AAA. And the government plan does nothing to help banks get those riskier bonds off their books. Worse, TALF might actually discourage investors who would normally be interested in these higher-yielding bonds from buying them...
That's because TALF significantly sweetens the returns that can be earned from buying the AAA-rated bonds. Take a typical auto-loan bond. A top-rated auto ABS bond pays a dividend these days of about 3.5%, or a return of $3.5 million on an investment of $100 million, as long as the bond doesn't go into default. That's actually not a terrible yield right now. Just ask anyone with a savings account. (See 5 reasons for economic optimism...
...There were green lights everywhere, but not enough momentum to turn on the afterburners that keep traders moving into the market. That last ingredient showed up when GE (GE) disclosed that S&P had cut its coveted AAA rating to AA+. Some expected the downgrade to be worse or that S&P would indicate it saw more bad news coming for the large conglomerate. That did not happen. So, the news was "better than expected" and whatever gravity had been holding stocks down disappeared. The news about GE shows how perverse the market has become and also serves...
...Ratings run as such: [AAA > AA > A > BBB > junk > subprime...