Risk Mood Turns Sour After Italian Banks Unicredit And Intesa Sanpaolo Suspended Following Plunge

by Tyler Durden

There has been a decidedly bearish turn to risk sentiment in Europe, where the EURUSD briefly touched over 1.43 just under two hours ago, only to see virtually all the gains from the Greece "bailout acceptance" non-news wiped out, and dipping by over 100 pips in the span of a little over an hour. The reason for this dramatic change in mood is attributed to a trading halt in Italian banks UniCredit and Intesa Sanpaolo both of which tumbled by 8% earlier before being halted.

Among the reasons for the plunge cited by traders are rumors for a cap increase for UniCredit due to risk of not passing the stress test. There is also speculation that there was a major selling program advertised by Goldman several minute before the Moody's headlines of putting Italian banks on downgrade review. Attached is Reuters take. Bottom line - Europe is so jittery that no matter how the Greek hole is plugged, the law of connected vessels merely will mean that vigilantes will next focus their attention to one of the next two dominoes: Spain and Italy.

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