We know what’s coming and we are prepared.
🇺🇸📉💸 Regional banks are facing a perfect storm of credit problems, with commercial real estate loans comprising 44% of their portfolios versus just 13% for large banks. Office loan delinquencies have hit 10.4%, approaching 2008 crisis levels, while over $1 trillion in CRE loans must refinance by year-end in a higher-rate environment.
The Fraud Factor
Recent disclosures reveal deeper problems beyond market stress. Zions Bancorporation disclosed $60 million in provisions and $50 million in write-offs related to alleged loan fraud from its California division, while Western Alliance faced similar issues. These incidents echo Jamie Dimon's warning about "more cockroaches" in the credit market, suggesting systematic underwriting problems beyond economic cycles.
The Concentration Risk
Florida Atlantic University analysis found 59 of the 158 largest banks have CRE exposures exceeding 300% of total equity capital. New York Community Bancorp's Flagstar subsidiary shows a particularly dangerous 477% CRE concentration ratio. Many banks are using "extend and pretend" strategies, restructuring loans to avoid immediate write-offs while masking underlying problems.
The Systemic Implications
Studies suggest a 1% increase in non-performing loan ratios can decrease GDP growth by 0.1%, creating vicious cycles where economic weakness worsens credit quality. The concentration of regional bank problems in CRE mirrors historical patterns from the S&L crisis of the 1980s, when similar interest rate and real estate pressures caused widespread failures.
My Take
This analysis confirms that March 2023's regional banking crisis was papered over rather than resolved. The combination of CRE concentration, interest rate pressure, and emerging fraud cases suggests the underlying problems have worsened. When banks resort to extend-and-pretend strategies while facing refinancing walls on $1 trillion in loans, it creates conditions for a more severe crisis than what we saw in 2023. The moral hazard from implicit government backstops has encouraged more risk-taking rather than better management.
🔗 Hedgie
Ukrainian forces have begun training and testing exoskeletons for battlefield use. Soldiers from the 147th Separate Artillery Brigade are using them in the Pokrovsk sector for both logistics and frontline operations. The goal is to reduce physical strain, especially when loading heavy artillery shells into howitzers without automatic loaders. Artillery crews can handle up to 1200 kg of ammunition per day, and early tests show that exoskeletons help them work faster and with less fatigue Above all, by improving the conditions for those soldiers on the front lines who handle such heavy loads, plus the stress of work. Seeking to reduce overall fatigue in the troops
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🇮🇷🇮🇱 - 14 wounded in Iranian missile strike in central Israel, according to Israeli media.
🇬🇧🇮🇶 - A drone struck British Castrol oil warehouses in Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan, causing extensive damage.
🇮🇷🇮🇱 - Iran launched 9 missiles towards Israel this morning alone, with at least 3 of them being cluster missiles.
🇱🇧🇮🇱 - Over the past 12 hours, Hezbollah launched counterattacks in Khiam and Qantara, in the Nabatieh direction, southeast Lebanon. Hezbollah recaptured northern Khiam, with fighting ongoing for the south of the town. Hezbollah units also re-entered Qantara; frontline sources reported clashes in the center of the town last night.
🇱🇧🇮🇱 - 48 IDF soldiers have been wounded in clashes with Hezbollah over the last 24 hours in southern Lebanon, according to the Israeli Army.
🇱🇧🇮🇱 - "The Israeli army is barely catching its breath in southern Lebanon, and its resources are less than in the previous round of fighting," - Haaretz....
🇺🇸 Blue Owl Capital just disclosed that investors tried to pull 40.7% of one fund and 21.9% of another in a single quarter, and both funds gave the same answer, you can only have 5% back, and everyone else waits in line.
This is a bank run, not a normal withdrawal.
Wall Street spent the last decade selling millions of investors on something called semi-liquid private credit, higher yields, steady income and the promise you could get your money back every quarter if you needed it. What they buried in the fine print was what happens when too many people try to leave at the same time.
Analysts who have covered private credit for decades say nothing on this scale has ever been reported before at any major private credit manager.
These funds do not hold stocks you can sell on a Tuesday afternoon, they hold private loans to mid sized companies that cannot be liquidated quickly without destroying the price for every investor still trapped inside.
This product was originally designed for ...
🇺🇸 President Trump wants to switch to war economy in 2027 with massive increase in military spending and massive cuts to healthcare and other domestic agencies
Once a deficit hawk — he said in 2016 that he thought he could balance the budget in five years — Trump ended his first term with $7.8 trillion in added debt. His 2027 proposal is expected to give an update on 10-year deficit projections currently estimated at around $16 trillion.
The GOP's message for the Midterms will be focused on the "need" for a massive defense build up while the Democrats' message will be focused on affordability.
The fiscal 2027 budget will be the first time Trump puts his second-term governing agenda into one comprehensive document — with the numbers to back it up. The budget he released last year lacked detailed line-by-line spending targets and the economic assumptions necessary to project the long-term cost of his proposals.
Investors in US Treasuries will be looking to see if the debt and ...
