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Introduction In the opening scene of Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indy trespasses into a sacred temple to retrieve a golden idol statuette. The viewer is led to believe that this ancient artifact has existed for quite some time. It is no surprise that it is…

Introduction Rob McDonough and I coauthored an article in April of 2023 concerning Silicon Valley Bank (https://www.gfmi.com/articles/silicon-valley-bank-interest-rate-and-liquidity-risk-within-asset-liability-management/), their interest rate and liquidity policies, and the reasons for their demise. What has changed since the March banking crisis? Let’s take a look at the current interest rate environment, what challenges may…

Introduction Politicians and pundits have been casting blame and pointing fingers at a variety of sources that contributed to the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), which also resulted in contagion at other financial institutions with similar balance sheet structures. Rather than point blame, it seems like a better idea…

Introduction The late J. Carter Beese Jr., former SEC commissioner, gave a speech in 1993 where he famously said, “Nothing good ever happens to a trade between trade date and settlement date.” Incorporating a riff on Murphy’s Law as it applies to the Lifecycle of Trade (“What can go wrong,…

Overview Municipal securities are an important part of the fixed-income market. While small at $4.2 trillion compared with the U.S. bond market at $52.9 trillion, municipal bonds are a critical financing vehicle for cities, towns, and states. The lion’s share of the municipal financings is for large, long-lived assets such…

Trends in Sustainable Security Issuance The number and total size of new issuance deals in the sustainable (or ESG, or Impact) security space has been consistently growing over the past decade around the globe. Even the COVID pandemic was not sufficient to diminish the need for new capital to fund…

Introduction Lots have been written lately about stagflation. Since I have written an article on “Inflation” (https://www.gfmi.com/articles/everything-you-wanted-to-know-about-inflation-but-were-afraid-to-ask/) and a blog on “Predicting Recessions” (https://www.gfmi.com/the-long-and-short-predicting-recessions/), I thought I would combine them with an update using today’s economic variables. This article assumes you have read both the prior inflation article and the…

Introduction First, we had, and still have, supply chain issues. These challenges have led to shortages of goods and the inevitable consequences of shortages – price increases. Sourcing products from overseas has been a decades long movement commonly referred to as globalization. Specifically, companies have offshored their production, i.e., they…

What is ESG? The acronym “ESG” stands for environmental, social, and governance. More importantly, the term ESG has become synonymous with the concept of “sustainability.” In the capital markets, ESG criteria are a set of standards that should help to assess an organization’s operations evaluate potential investments in securities issued…

Introduction The rock band YES has a song called “Perpetual Change.” Capital markets resemble the title of the song as they are known for innovation and continually adapting to market changes. (And how apropos to have an adjective in our eNews article and a rock and roll song!) Cryptocurrencies and…

Introduction Economically, we are certainly in unchartered territory these days. Recovering from a global pandemic, we now face rising inflation pressures coupled with lackluster economic growth as evidenced by the negative 1.4% growth in the U.S. first quarter GDP. Central Banks worldwide are now dealing with the growing pressures of…

Introduction Cryptocurrency derivatives now make up the majority of the cryptocurrency market. I will be writing a series of articles/blogs on the spot and derivatives markets. This first article will address the cryptocurrency futures markets and, in particular, will give an overview of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) contracts. Cryptocurrency…