Swiss National Bank

Having urged "don't panic" just 4 short months ago, it appears Nigeria just did just that as the global dollar short squeeze forces the eight-month-old government of President Muhammadu Buhari to beg The World Bank and African Development Bank for $3.5bn in emergency loans to help fund a $15bn deficit in a budget heavy on public spending amid collapsing oil revenues. Just as we warned in December, the dollar shortage has arrived, perhaps now is time to panic after all.

The last time FX brokers, still hurting from the Swiss National Bank's revaluation shocker from last January which forced brand names such as FXCM to seek an urgent bailout, scramble to hike margins was in late June just ahead of the Greek "event risk" weekend, when  numerous brokers either hiked margins on EUR positions or went to "close only" mode due to "uncertainty surrounding the Greek debt negotiations... that could lead to high volatility on the market."

To some it is the independent and impartial Swiss National Bank; to others it is the world's biggest hedge fund with $584 billion in assets or about the same as the Swiss GDP, whose former chief suddenly resigned in 2012 following a family FX trading scandal.

Whatever it is, the SNB had an abysmal year: first and foremost it was its terrible bet on maintaining a EURCHF floor which imploded almost exactly a year ago, when the bank was forced to scrap its attempts to keep the Swiss Franc weak, in the process suffering tens of billions in losses.