STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Thursday, 28 June 2012

[Demeter]

25. Draghi May Enter Twilight Zone Where Fed Fears to Tread

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-06-26/draghi-may-enter-twilight-zone-where-bernanke-fears-to-tread.html

European Central Bank President Mario Draghi is contemplating taking interest rates into a twilight zone shunned by the Federal Reserve.

While cutting ECB rates may boost confidence, stimulate lending and foster growth, it could also involve reducing the bank’s deposit rate to zero or even lower. Once an obstacle for policy makers because it risks hurting the money markets they’re trying to revive, cutting the deposit rate from 0.25 percent is no longer a taboo, two euro-area central bank officials said on June 15.

“The European recession is worsening, the ECB has to do more,” said Julian Callow, chief European economist at Barclays Capital in London, who forecasts rates will be cut at the ECB’s next policy meeting on July 5. “A negative deposit rate is something they need to consider but taking it to zero as a first step is more likely.”

Should Draghi elect to cut the deposit rate to zero or lower, he’ll be entering territory few policy makers have dared to venture. Sweden’s Riksbank in July 2009 became the world’s first central bank to charge financial institutions for the money they deposited with it overnight. The Fed rejected cutting its deposit rate from 0.25 percent last year. With Europe’s debt crisis damping inflation pressures and curbing growth, the ECB may feel the benefits outweigh the negatives...

I NEVER REALIZED MONEY MARKET FUNDS WERE PART OF THE "SHADOW BANKING SYSTEM". PERHAPS SOMETHING ABOUT THE WAY THEY OPERATE HAS CHANGED?