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OECD's Dire Credit View
Report Says Worst Isn't Over and Losses May Hit $300 Billion
REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
November 22, 2007

LONDON -- Overall losses caused by the U.S. subprime-mortgage-market crisis could feasibly hit $300 billion, and the broader credit crunch could inflict more damage on equity markets, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said.

"Thus far, equity investors seem to have shrugged off the negative sentiment that prevailed over the summer, but it may be too soon to draw firm conclusions," the OECD said in a report.

"As adjustments have often occurred in waves, and as higher funding costs take typically several months to have their full impact on companies or consumers, it may well be that the recent correction is only a precursor of a more protracted downturn."

Financial institutions and policy makers needed to buy time to ensure an orderly end to the trouble that spilled from the U.S. mortgage sector to financial markets globally in July and August, the report on financial-market trends said.

The OECD said the fund being set up by Citigroup Inc., Bank of America Corp. and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. to pool securities of ailing special-investment vehicles, thus preventing a further fire sale of these asset-backed securities, was a useful mechanism.

The Paris-based forum said the downturn in the U.S. housing market had further to run and would continue to depress mortgage-linked debt held by banks, hedge funds and insurance companies.

"We still have not hit the worst point in resets, delinquencies and ultimate losses on mortgages," the OECD said, adding that some $890 billion of subprime, or poor-credit-quality mortgages will have rates reset in 2008, peaking in March.

The OECD report said a hypothetical 14% loss rate on subprime mortgages being reset in 2008 could deliver an overall $125 billion hit to lenders. Including Alt-A, or "near prime," mortgages, cumulative losses in the $200 billion to $300 billion range "seem feasible," it said.

The financial-sector exposure to these losses lies mainly in holdings of mortgage-backed securities repackaged within complex Collateralized Debt Obligations, or CDOs, variously held by hedge funds, banks and bank-sponsored structured-investment vehicles.

Fonte: Reuters