United States

Moments ago S&P continued its downgrade cycle, this time taking the axe to the regional banks with the highest energy exposure due to "expectations for higher loan losses." Specifically, its lowered its long-term issuer credit ratings on four U.S. regional banks by one notch: BOK Financial Corp., Comerica Inc., Cullen/Frost  Bankers Inc., and Texas Capital Bancshares. The  outlooks on these banks are negative.

It also revised the outlook on BBVA Compass Bancshares to negative from stable and affirmed the 'BBB+/A-2' issuer  credit ratings.

Michael Ignatieff and Leon Wieseltier make a predictably horrible plea for more military intervention in Syria:

It all started in mid/late 2014, when the first whispers of a Fed rate hike emerged, which in turn led to relentless increase in the value of the US dollar and the plunge in the price of oil and all commodities, unleashing the worst commodity bear market in history.

The immediate implication of these two concurrent events was missed by most, although we wrote about it and previewed the implications in November of that year in "How The Petrodollar Quietly Died, And Nobody Noticed."

Narayana Kocherlakota is a funny guy.

Before abdicating his post at the Minneapolis Fed to former Goldmanite/TARP architect Neel Kashkari, Kocherlakota was the voice of Keynesian “reason” for the FOMC.

Although his pronouncements never measured up to the power of the Bullard, Kocherlakota did call on a number of occasions for MOAR dovishness, noting that if the US economy were to decelerate (which it has), more asset purchases may be warranted.

While the following summary of key recent headlines suggests a broad array of issues leading to the worst start of the year since 2008...

... in broad terms, the biggest worries challenging that bull case in January were twofold: China and commodities, mostly oil. However, over the past week, two new big concerns appear to have emerged. Here, ironically, is Deutsche Bank explaining what these are (for those confused, "tightening in financial conditions in European financial credit" is a euphemism for plunging DB stock among others):