Chinese banks defaulted.  They may have been partially motivated by U.S. malfeasance in the capital markets that caused losses in Asia.  The U.S. squandered its credibility andour cover-ups have done nothing to restore it.

Most credit support annex agreements would say that closing out these trades would be an event of default, and then the cross default on all the trades would kick in with the same counterparty. But the credit of the Chinese banks was better than many of their counterparties.  Everyone was forced to renegotiate contracts with the Chinese banks.

From the perspective of the derivatives markets, this is earth shattering.  What would have happened if AIG had done the same thing?  (Hey, Goldman, UBS, and others…you want your collateral?  Well…Stuff It!)

At the end of August 2009, China signaled that state owned oil consumers: Air China, COSCO, and China Eastern could default on money-losing commodities derivatives contracts.

If we had been paying attention, the U.S. should have done everything in its power to correct our mistakes, clean up the mess in our financial system—instead of sweeping it under the carpet—and turned our efforts to maintaining the credibility of the capital markets and the credibility of the dollar.