Submitted by Tyler Durden: Early last week we presented something rather shocking:
a note by Goldman Sachs suggested that as a result of the ECB's QE
failure to push the EUR lower and with bond yields having risen instead
of falling since the launch of the ECB's QE in March, and perhaps due to
a perplexing conflict between the ECB and the Bundesbank when it comes
to debt monetization, a Greek default sparking contagion blowout
risk, not to mention a "seven big figure" tumble in the EURUSD, may be
just what the ECB needs.
On one hand, the Goldman assessment was not surprising: after all the
bank's top trade for 2015 has been that the EUR will go much lower from
current levels so in many ways it was self-serving. But, what's far
more stunning is that Goldman, accurately, assessed the ECB's needs in
light of what is increasingly seen by many as a QE program that is
faltering just 4 months after its launch, and the direct implication was
evident: for all the posturing and bluffing from Greece that it won't
be blackmailed, it may have fallen precisely in a trap set by none other than the ECB. The only hurdle was getting the Greeks to accept the blame for the failure of the negotiations which happened, at least in the perspective of the Eurozone, when Tsipras announced the referendum after midnight on Friday. Merkel herself admitted as much earlier:
- MERKEL SAYS GREECE UNILATERALLY ABANDONED SUCCESSFUL TALKS