"But the investment bank had information it didn’t share with the stock buyers: The basket of shares it was selling, comprised of eight or so names including Baidu and Tencent Music, was merely the opening salvo of an unprecedented wave of tens of billions of dollars in sales"
"Morgan Stanley was the biggest holder of the top ten stocks traded by Archegos at the end of 2020 with about $18 billion in positions overall. Credit Suisse was the second most exposed with about $10 billion, these sources noted....
... That means that Morgan Stanley could’ve faced roughly $10 billion in losses had it not acted quickly. “I think it was an ‘oh s---’ moment where Morgan was looking at potentially $10 billion in losses on their book alone, and they had to move risk fast."
“It was a gigantic clusterf--- of five different banks trying to unwind billions of dollars at risk at the same time, not talking to each other, trading at wherever prices were advantageous to themselves,” one industry source said."
"Morgan Stanley largely exited its Archegos positions by Friday, March 26 with the exception of one holding: 45 million shares of ViacomCBS, which it shopped to clients on Sunday, according to the people....
... The bank’s delayed disposal of Viacom shares has sparked questions and speculation that it held onto the stock because it wanted a secondary offering run by Morgan Stanley the week before to close."
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
