links for 2010-05-10

The 39 energy producers and equipment makers in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index have traded at an average 19.1 times earnings in 2010, compared with 17.8 for the index. The last times they had higher valuations in 1994, 1999 and 2002, the benchmark gauge for U.S. stocks surged an average of 22 percent in the next year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

In response to the re-emergence of strains in U.S. dollar short-term funding markets in Europe, the Bank of Canada, the Bank of England, the European Central Bank, the Federal Reserve, and the Swiss National Bank are announcing the re-establishment of temporary U.S. dollar liquidity swap facilities. These facilities are designed to help improve liquidity conditions in U.S. dollar funding markets and to prevent the spread of strains to other markets and financial centres. The Bank of Japan will be considering similar measures soon. Central banks will continue to work together closely as needed to address pressures in funding markets.

So the ECB commitment is Paulson’s bazooka redux. And we all know how well that worked.

The Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) decided on several measures to address the severe tensions in certain market segments which are hampering the monetary policy transmission mechanism and thereby the effective conduct of monetary policy oriented towards price stability in the medium term. The measures will not affect the stance of monetary policy.