fire sale

For now the "next great trade" is not looking that good, mainly because there have been no fire sales.

Despite the fire sales, the regulators found that Europe's biggest banks still faced a substantial capital shortfall.

It has created many lending programmes since August 2007 to help banks finance holdings of illiquid assets and so avoid fire sales.

Many have done so: fire sales of seized homes have weighed heavily on prices.

This should mean firms that report marked-to-market losses are not immediately forced into capital raising or fire-sales of assets.

Even a small rise in interest rates would hurt borrowers, increase bad debts and perhaps even spur fire-sales of homes.

Much of the buying last month stemmed from fire sales of foreclosed homes.

In 2008, falling markets caused a vicious circle of debt defaults and fire sales by investors, pushing asset prices down even further.

Those fire sales drive down prices which, in turn, prompts more investors to reduce risk.

There is growing concern that smaller developers may have problems raising money to complete building works, which could trigger fire sales.

To prevent fire sales, perhaps a third of funds have restricted client withdrawals.

To prevent fire-sales, some funds ended up locking in investors against their wishes.