Member Info for knot

Few trades from yesterday.

10-Apr-25 08:47:38 283.0716 1,131 Unknown* 3,202 O - Not listed on LSE

10-Apr-25 08:47:38 283.0716 -1,129 Unknown* -3,196 O - Listed / Off-Book XLON

10-Apr-25 13:00:46 275.60 7,258 Unknown* 20.00k O - Not listed on LSE

10-Apr-25 13:00:46 275.60 -7,257 Unknown* -20.00k O - Listed 13:00:47 / Off-Book XLON

Others for 11th with 5 shares ? Any particular interest in those trades ?

Source : https://www.londonstockexchange.com/stock/CBG/close-brothers-group-plc/trade-recap

Still no sign of the 1.6m share trade having an influence... strange....

Confused popcorn...munch...munch...

Systematica Investments Limited - reported 0.5% short yesterday as a new entrant to the shorty list. Reported shorts now listed at 5.12%

Adding in the other two that dropped below the 0.5% threashold on the 7th, with around 0.95% on the 7th would then give a rough approximation of around 6% short volume on CBG at the moment. Bear in mind that this is around 9m shares or around £25m in short value.

Todays volume a lowly 333k and that included 130k that went through in the after close auction at 275.8p. Compare todays traded volume with the rough short position of around 9m shares.

Pricing / trading highly correlated with Lloyds, CBG trading better than most of the banks, even with a circa 6% short...

Considering the MILS article the shorts would then be looking to push CBG back out of the FTSE250 again as an exit strategy, however that's maybe a crowded trade now and leaves the game open to be played from the other side as well (long short squeeze). Short term games, so will see how it plays out.

The show goes on, with popcorn popping...munch...munch...

Recission of the full contract would require the car returning in it's original state with the original mileage.

Bribery under a fiduciary requires the disgorgement of the proffit from the dealer. Long established no proffit rule.

Unfair under CCA using Plevin fails the interest rate logic. Must work for 1% and 15% market rate. Barclays.

Declaring fiduciary duty - market chaos and claims for eveything from till sales to double glazing.

"...we doubt that the Supreme Court will rule definitively on perhaps the most important issue, namely remedy." - This leaves the FCA up s... creek without a paddle for a redress scheme and they will then have to look towards the Barclays case. Redress scheme will therefore only be decided around Oct/Nov. That is if Barclays case does not then proceed to the Supreme Court and hello 2026 for the judgement. Good luck with the reputation of the FCA starting a process that they could not actually complete (redress was, I would suggest with a tin foil hat on, fully intended from the start before all the 'research') without cases going through the Supreme Court for a route they knew did not exist when they started.

Interesting article, popping popcorn tastic...munch...munch...

The chart is ok from here, I'm not promoting buying gold.... just to be clear.... just a quick way to the the price in a chart and change the FX rate view on the price (switch between each and compare).

https://www.bullionbypost.co.uk/gold-price/week/ounces/USD/

Look at the chart and the uptrend that is currently in play, then look at the USD / GBP fx rate as well.

If confidence in the dollar is taking a hammering money still has to go somehwere and GBP seems to be benefiting from that lack of confidence in the USD. In the improvind GBP fx case that leads through to lower inflation as a simple perspective, which is a free win for the person from the back office.

That uptrend may well be China protesting at the US aysmetrically. In the monetary scheme of things, a few $bn to send a message is cheap in the long run. The FX interventions in the Yen/USD market is a prime example of such messaging, which in the Yen case was to tell FX traders they will be run over if they go too far too quickly..

If you think China will be 'defeated' as such, work out what you imagine a defeat means and map that out onto oil demand and the subsequent effect on price and impact on shale drilling and the middle east. This impact could be rebalanced with a timely intervention in Iran and the removal of a few mbpd of oil production.... possibly, hence the noises / messaging around Iran at the moment....

Golden popcorn... munch...munch...

Forgot to add... the 1 month chart possibly shows the net effect of that incremental short on CBG or the discount the shorts are providing on the share price at the moment. In my view a temporary dislocation, depending on your available investment window of time. If your in this for the years perspective, pull up the 5 year chart and think, is the current price point sustainable, even after the court ruling, even after £400m (worst case) is paid out. When looking back the movements seem different to all the emotion and noise of events at the time. Bear in mind the more fundamental point that this is also a company that is sitting on a huge reserve that is multiples of the current share price. It's not a company loaded up with debt and huge goodwill and intangibles that make up the net asset value position. This is why my perspective is this is just an investment play of time, Buffet style time transfer.

Buffet of popcorn...hmmm... toffee, butter, plain, salted.... munch...munch....

This is one way to see the relative performance of CBG in the current market :

https://www.google.com/finance/quote/CBG:LON?comparison=LON%3ABARC%2CLON%3ALLOY%2CLON%3ANWG&window=5D

It provides a 5 day chart of banking shares and shows a little more easily if CBG is being traded in line with the other banks (dragged around by an index) or other volumes (long or short) are pushing or pulling the price away separately. Intra day (1D) can show this a little more clearly.

The chart currently shows how Barclays with it's higher US exposure was whipped around. The jup up being amplified by a growth in shorts ahead of the Trump about face, which led to a run up combination of a short squeeze amplification and the decaying return closer to the rest of the banks.

Remove all buy Lloyds and then look at the spike for CBG on the 10th and the shorts exchanging positions around the 8th. This shows that the shorts are not in agreement and nobody really knows how to value CBG other than the index relative position. Yesterdays 1.6m that went through appeares to be a ghost, leaving no signature.. Possibly. Or possibly not...

Charting popcorn...munch...munch...

The comment was in relation to quite early on when I got a little carried away and posed a series of looooong posts, which did not quite land, so to say. Also, be very careful of placing trust in the wrong places, so I would say don't trust what I am saying. Always verify and check against other sources. I'm no expert, otherwise the decimal place on my account would be to the right by a few digits.....

I may be an interim expert on popcorn though.....lol....munch...lol...munch...

The trade actually has two entries, both identical, one second apart. This could have been an error, auto cancelled. Could have been a valid single trade. Could also have been a single trade and the seller was overly stating the offer volume, so the buyer just doubled up. I have seen this happen in a different market when a large volume was placed to act as a cap on the market, however someone came along and took the whole thing out, which was not at all expected. Might leaves the seller with a slight problem if they ended up short as a result. The one second timing makes it curious.

If it's double, it could be very interesting day ahead indeed.

Might be fast popcorn...munch...munch...

Did many people notice the delayed notification of a 1.6m trade that went through at 10:47 for 286p when the market was trading at 276-278p....? If that was the correct timing of the trade relative to the bid and offers in the market at the time, someone paid quite a premium to pickup 1.6m shares or 1.08%. That could be a short closing out, or worst case for the existing shorts is that it was another buyer who stepped in and that imbalance will need to be settled out in the next day or two...

No reported change for yesterday on the shorts, so might be an interesting day ahead...

May well get a delayed rise tomorrow, slow popcorn...munch...munch...

Key question would be why did Trump bail on the tariffs when liquidity in the treasury/dollar markets was breaking down and interest rates were going counter to expectations due to the overall liquidity crunch. If the US system is as all powerful and the Fed has unlimited abilities, why did Trump not go all in ? Or is it that the dynamics of the overall system end up with unintended consequences in time (loss of confidence in the dollar for example) and other parts of the market are heavily leveraged with Treasury exposure. Curious aspect I have been keeping a look out for is some funds appear to be massively overweight Treasuries with leveraged buy's to trim off a small interest rate differential, however like with all market stresses normal correlations break or widen enough to make these books fall appart. Most recent would the the UK pension Truss moment as an example. It's the unintended consequences of a creaking market that give a moment of reflection to those that think they are bigger than the markets as a whole. Just my perception and fragmented understanding, which may well be wrong.

Uncertainty (time) as to when the popcorn pops...munch...munch...

Japan is quite different due to the cultural approach to savings. There is also a different aspect to the situation because the size of the carry trade is large enough to warrant the US taking into acount the stability of that dynamic. When your loan is big enough to cause the bank to think twice. Small loans, different.

"central bank are more powerful than capital markets" - BoE keeping the pound in ERM ? Latin America bailouts, etc. The US is quite different due to the position of the dollar in the monetary system as a whole.

I would agree I am 'over simplifying it' because I'm am only allowed 2,500 odd characters and limited attention spans to go with it :-)

Popcorn FX rates... munch... munch...

With the sharp opening for CBG it looks like the shorts stepped in (or derivative hedging/liquidation), with limited liquidity in the market, which pulled the price down until around 10:14am. Around 275p there appears to be some support and larger (10-44k size) buy volumes hitting with about 70k going through, which appeared to caused the first bounce. Low trade volume liquidity is making the share price seem more like a flag in a light wind. Currently dropping back to test that level again, which appears to be market maker driven (lacking associated trade volume with the pricing move). Personally I think there will be a small increment in the reported shorts for today (reported at tomorrows close) unless they are 'managed' to be less than 0.1% and go unreported for a day or two. My view is that these short positions are searching for seller(s) and possibly creating an added perception of fear to dissuade other buyers from adding. What would be a short sellers exit strategy for CBG other than flushing out long term holders by creating short term pricing fear ?

This really does seem to be a pure game of patience, ideal for a popcorn show... munch... munch..

Only winner in a trade war is inflation....... we all loose.

The market forced the capitulation in the tariffs. Every so often the leaders of countries think they are bigger than the markets and learn the hard way. Trump learnt the Treasury market is the achilles heel for the moment. Does'nt the Fed only 'buy' them in repo, which is temporary and has an interest rate bill taxpayers fund ? That 'buy' impacts government debt, via the interest bill. The Fed does have a hard limit, it's called the credibility of the dollar or inflation if you look at it through a FX lense. Weimar Germany is a case where one country did indeed print close to indefinitely. 3D chess.

Bad overall for popcorn... munch... munch....

Yup... certainly going to be interesting. Will be listening to this tomorrow at the open :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WaV2x8GXj0 Johnny Cash - Ring of Fire.... lol. burn, burn, burn.

My guesses... Close 300p. Brutal day for shorts would be a circa 330p close. Short squeeze massacre, limit breach cascade 360p. Shorts doubling up 280p shouting at the wind.

Popcorn (tax delayed) at the ready for a real show....munch...munch...

No change on the shorts yesterday. Still 4.6% reported (approx 5.57% inc last reported sub 0.5% on 7th).

CBG tracking banking sector moves, so nothing else seems to be going on. Some days up, some days down.

Popcorn tax....munch...munch....

QT may well be negative for asset prices if you put over valued stocks with bubble territory PE ratio's into the asset basket. Excess liquidity always creates bubbles. The aspect around QT and liquidity for China is that if China were to become a forced seller of Treasuries they would not have access to the repo market to counter a liquidity squeeze as such, nor have any way to maintin price support. The repo would provide (again) liquidity to US institutions primarily, so focusing the benefits again in the US. It's one asymetric position in the tariff battle.

Another aspect is that Trump is basically trying to force tax reductions globally and for certain reasons this is being spun as bad, bad, bad. If anyone came out and just said tax reductions globally within a month, how would the market react ?

That's my broken understanding as to how I think a tiny part of the financial plumbing can work. Repo being where Treasuries are swapped for cash via the Fed, which may well be on the cards (again) if liquidity worsens. I still don't fully understand how the whole system works, so just my perspective and ramblings.

The current correction seems to be running out of broad steam and is seemingly starting to be more focused, with the whipsaw of recent wispers making the shorts way more cautious realising that one comment and the market moves 5%. Uncertainty can work both ways.

CBG is trading mainly inline with the rest of the banks and decorrelating only with other larger buyer seller input, which helps show up relevant activity. That additional visibility is slowly revealing more about the short positions, to which I'm happy to sit back and watch the volatility. End of the day, markets move on and forget yesterday. In the interim it makes for an interesting learning opportunity. And more popcorn...munch...munch...

"at the moment the Fed is shrinking its balance sheet" - Which part of that don't you understand ? Also, the equivalent process in the UK, etc.

When QE occured it was not permanent, however inflation reacted as if it was. The unwind is deflationary, counter to the inflationary perspective of tariffs. Depends on how you look at money. MMT magic, Keynesian, Quantity of Money, etc. One theory is that QT could be accelerated if inflation became a problem, providing the liquidity squeeze does not cause other effects. Pushing China to ditch it's treasuries in a tariff battle could provide such liquidity. It's all 3D chess or just sitting for too long with a tin foil hat on...

My view of money is popcorn, one pop and it's done...munch...munch...

Maybe, maybe not. You have to look past the headlines, which are driven with extra fear on top. Perceptions in the moment always appear far worse than what they actually turn out to be.

One aspect to consider, for example, is the remaining massive overhang of QE that is still supporting the market, even with reverse QE ongoing. That's still a massive multi tn overhang to the upside/support. If that was not there then we would be close (but not that near) to a 2009 type feel to the market.

On the flip side, CBG is effectively cash positive, so even in the worst case it will fare better than most.

Relaxed popcorn situation ahead...munch...munch...

Well, two of the shorts reduced yesterday (7th) with Citaled at 0.46% (was 0.55% on 4th) and Squarepoint at 0.49% (was 0.54% on 3rd) and both now under the reporting theashold for future reductions..... Curious they both appeared to close on on the market drop, using the overall bearish market to exit. That would say to me they are not confident the price is going lower on it's own accord and took the opportunity to close out on the fall. They may have continued to close today, hence the rise. With two fewer reportable shorts the reported short is 4.62% and taking into account the last reported short levels of the two above it brings the last known reported overall short to 5.57%. Still quite crowded and seems reasonable two bailed out some yesterday and may well have continued today.

Overall still quite a squeezy feel.

Popcorn munching day...munch...munch....

Yup, shorts up to 5.71% now, which given today's performance I do wonder what the shorts are thinking. Citadel at 0.55% (new above 0.5%) and WorldQuant upped to 1.1% (was 1.02%) both on Friday. This is starting to feel like it's going to get very, very, very, interesting given the twitchy jump to 285p (whole market related - not just CBG) with the main aspect that the relative jump for CBG was higher. The run up last week was only capped and reversed by adding new short volume, which may well only work for so long. tick, tick, tick....

If the shorts have a view on the court ruling they are far too early to be positioning for that given how far out the judgement is and the interlink with Barclays case potentially (CoA then SC appeal) pushing a final resolution into 2026.

Making sure the popcorn is stacked and ready for interesting times... munch... munch...