Politicians have talked endlessly about the seismic economic and social impacts of the Great Recession, but many continue to ignore its disastrous effects on human healthand have even exacerbated them, by adopting harsh austerity measures and cutting key social programs at a time when constituents need them most. The result, as pioneering public health experts David Stuckler and Sanjay Basu reveal in this provocative book, is that many countries have turned their recessions into veritable epidemics, ruining or extinguishing thousands of lives in a misguided attempt to balance budgets and shore up financial markets. Yet sound alternative policies could instead help improve economies and protect public health at the same time.
In The Body Economic, Stuckler and Basu mine data from around the globe and throughout history to show how government policy becomes a matter of life and death during financial crises. In a series of historical case studies stretching from 1930s America, to Russia and Indonesia in the 1990s, to present-day Greece, Britain, Spain, and the U.S., Stuckler and Basu reveal that political mismanagement of financial crises has resulted in a grim array of human tragedies, from suicides to HIV infections to West Nile Virus and tuberculosis epidemics. Yet people can and do stay healthy, and even get healthier, during downturns. During the Great Depression, U.S. deaths actually plummeted, and today Iceland, Norway, and Japan are happier and healthier than ever, proof that financial shocks do not inevitably wreak havoc on public health.
Full of shocking and counter intuitive revelations and bold policy recommendations,The Body Economic offers an alternative to austerityone that will prevent widespread suffering, both now and in the future.
NOT JUST ARGENTINA:
OTHER NATIONS IN CLIFF EDGE DEBT DOLDRUMS
http://t.co/0bIotS7CPp/s/GPVc _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Banker death toll hits 36 in 2014, what’s coming economically? Full list December 21, 2014 12:43 pm EST
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THERE IS LIKELY MORE TO THIS STORY THAN MEETS THE EYE
BY SHEPARD AMBELLAS
(INTELLIHUB.COM) — As you may already know something is afoot in the financial sector as 36 bankers, financial professionals have mysteriously wound up dead in the past year.
What did they know?
What’s coming?
Here is the full list of dead financial professionals as reported by The Daily Coin:
1) David Bird, 55, long-time reporter for the Wall Street Journal, working at the Dow Jones newsroom
2) Tim Dickenson, a UK-based communications director at Swiss Re AG
3) Trouser William Smith, 58, former senior manager for Deutsche Bank
4) Ryan Henry Crane, age 37, JP Morgan
5) Li Junjie, 33 Hong Kong JP Morgan
6) Gabriel Magee, 39, age JP Morgan employee
7) Mike Dueker, 50, who had worked for Russell Investments
8) Richard Talley, 57, was the founder and CEO of American Title (real estate titles)
9) James Jr. Stuart 70 Former National Bank of Commerce CEO was found dead in Scottsdale, Ariz
10) Jason Alan Salaise, 34-year-old IT Specialist at JPMorgan since 2008
11) Autumn Radtke, 28, CEO of First Meta, a Singapore-based virtual currency trading platform
12) Eddie Reilly, 47, an investment banker, Vertical Group, New York
13) Kenneth Ballando, 28, an investment banker, Capital Levy, New York
14) Joseph A. Giampapa, 55, corporate bankruptcy lawyer, JP Morgan Chase
15) Jan Peter Schmittmann, 57, a former top administrator ANB / AMRO, Laren, Netherlands
16) Juergen Frick, 48, CEO of Bank Frick & Co. AG, Liechtenstein
17) Benoit Philippens, 37, director of BNP Paribas Fortis Bank, Ans, Belgium.
18) … Lydia, 52, banker-Bred Banque Populaire, Paris
19) Andrew Jarzyk, 27, banker, PNC Bank, New York
20) Carlos Six, 61, Head Tax and member CREDAF, Belgium
21) Jan Winkelhuijzen, 75, and Commissioner Fiscalist (former Deloitte), Netherlands.
22) Richard Rockefeller, 66, grandson elite banker John D. Rockefeller, America
23) Mahafarid Amir Khosravi (Amir Mansour Aria), 45, bank owner, businessman and derivatives trader, Iran
24) Lewis Katz, 76, businessman, lawyer and insider in the banking world, America
25) Julian Knott, Director of Global Operations Center JP Morgan, 45, America
26) Richard Gravino, IT Specialist JP Morgan, 49, America
27) Thomas James Schenkman, Managing Director, Global Infrastructure JP Morgan, 42, United States
28) Valtz Nicholas, 39, Managing Director, Goldman Sachs, New York, America
29) Therese Brewer, 50, Managing Director ING Netherlands
30) Tod Robert Edward, 51, vice president of M & T Bank, America
31) Thierry Leyne, 48, an investment banker and owner Anatevka SA, Israel
32) Calogero Gambino, 41, Managing Director, Deutsche Bank, America
33) Shawn D. Miller, 42, Managing Director of Citigroup, New York, America
34) Melissa Millian, 54, senior vice president of MassMutual, America
35) Thieu Leenen, 64, Relationship Manager ABN / AMRO, Eindhoven, Netherlands
36) Geert Tack, 52, Private Banker ING Haaltert, Belgium _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
“According to the US sanctions imposed against Crimea on December 19, 2014, Visa currently cannot provide services and offer their products in the Crimea,” Visa Inc. said in a statement.
“This means that we can no longer issue or accept bank cards in Crimea, and service them in ATMs … As for the time period, these limitations will last until the sanctions are lifted from Crimea. At the moment it is unclear when this will happen; it will depend on the development of the political and diplomatic situation. VISA continues to follow closely the events and will provide you with the information as soon as it appears.”
The expanded U.S. sanctions prohibit doing business in Crimea until Russia surrenders the annexed territory back to the Ukraine. _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Brits could pay 10% tax on assets under new proposal
Quote:
The IMF world bank is proposing a ten per cent wealth tax on all households in the UK and the rest of the Eurozone.
What this would mean is men and women having to pay a levy on the total value of their accumulated assets, including their properties, cash, bank deposits, money funds, and savings in insurance and pension plans.
The amount payable would also depend upon whether they have any businesses, personal trusts, corporate funds, earnings, loans and mortgages.
All of these things are already taxed – so a wealth tax would represent an additional tax on the same assets. In other words, we would be taxed twice.
The IMF, under the leadership of Christine Lagarde says that imposing such a tax would help to correct the levels of debt in developed nations, including the UK and countries across the EU.
This idea is also being pushed by the EU. A paper published by the IMF, says: “Provided the households – or at least some of them – do not believe in the one-off nature of the wealth levy, the “non-believers” anticipate that the debt level can rise again by 20 pp and that fiscal policy would, then, subsequently ensure the reduction of this debt by imposing another wealth levy. The tax rate on wealth applied in this case is high enough such that the debt would be repaid at the expected value.”
The paper therefore recommends that in order for the tax to be effective, it should be introduced unexpectedly and promoted as a one-off tax only.
This is exactly what happened in Cyprus when people woke up to find they were unable to access their money from the banks.
A deal between the EU and euro partners subsequently resulted in every single man and woman paying a 10% ‘tax’ on their savings to bail out the banks.
The news came unexpectedly and was introduced as a ‘one-off’, in much the same way as the IMF is now recommending for other countries across the EU.
Another thing they did was at first the citizens of Cyprus were told they may lose all or most of their money. Everyone then breathed a sigh of relief when the tax turned out to be just ten per cent.
Now, this paper, suggests that perhaps that had been the plan all along. Of course, if people do not lose as much as they are first told they are going to, they are more likely to accept it. The oldest trick in the book – leak news of an even worse scenario, so people will accept whatever you already had in mind, more easily.
In Cyprus, it is important to remember the tax was a 10% tax on savings. A wealth tax would be infinitely greater – as it would also include a tax on your property and other assets.
However, let’s be very clear here. Despite the misleading statements made by other news outlets on this tax, this will NOT just be a tax on the rich. The IMF paper is very clear on that.
The tax will be on ALL households in the Eurozone. There is no discussion whatsoever of reforming the system. Rather than reforming an unsustainable fiat system that simply keeps printing more money with nothing to back it up, the IMF is advising government’s to introduce more taxes. This in itself is an admission that the previous taxes didn’t work.
When the income tax was first introduced, it was promoted as a one-off, with the usual suggestions that only the very wealthy would have to be concerned by it.
We all know how that turned out. What is worrying, is that this new tax is being introduced in the same way.
The IMF is also proposing that it is taken by force – in other words, you will not realise it is gone, until the money has been deducted from your account. The IMF paper claims this is necessary to prevent people from moving their money or their assets elsewhere.
Furthermore, the IMF also suggested expropriating pension funds. This means that, you can suddenly wake up and find your future is now applied as a contribution to government.
The trick is to get you, the ordinary man and woman, to pay attention to the multimillionaires so that you do not feel the political hand in your wallet.
In effect, this new tax would represent a government raid on the accumulated savings and assets of its citizens.
It means that everything you have worked so hard to gain, could be snatched away at the whim of the government.
The IMF also suggests that this “one-off” tax should be reintroduced at least once every 25 years to ensure the economy stays in good order.
The paper states: “The expected probability-weighted tax rate is calculated as follows. Households expect a wealth levy to be imposed if the debt ratio climbs again by 20 pp. The probability of this occurring is calculated in line with the theory on fiscal limits (see Corsetti et al, 2013). This amounts to an annual probability of 4%. Therefore, this event is expected
to occur around once every 25 years.”
You can find the IMF paper on this HERE.
Other IMF schemes
In June this year, the IMF came up with another scheme. If you bought a two-year bond, in which you are meant to receive all of the money you invested in that bond, plus the total interest payable, when it reaches maturity, here is what they will do: extend the maturity on that bond.
In other words, the two year bond, now becomes a 20 year bond. So you do not get your money for another 20 years.
This means you could buy a 30-day bond in the middle of a crisis and suddenly find under the IMF, that 30 day note is converted to 30 year bond at the same rate.
In other words, they have not ‘defaulted or neglected to pay you, they have simply moved the goal posts around, so you do not in practice, get your money. And you pay more taxes.
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Tags: business & finance, finance, tax
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Tue Oct 13, 2015 10:51 pm Post subject:
GROUP OF 30 GLOBAL CENTRAL BANKS ADMIT QE FAILED AND DID NOTHING FOR ECONOMIES
Published: October 12, 2015
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SOURCE: THE DAILY ECONOMIST
It must be finally getting crunch time for the primary central banks around the world because on Oct. 10, the G30 group of global money printers admitted in a detailed report that the tens of trillions of dollars, euros, yen, and other currencies they have infused into the system has done absolutely nothing for local economies, and instead has accomplished what alternative economists stated would happen from the very beginning…
Create asset bubbles, un-payable debt, and assure that there would be no sustainable growth.
In addition to their ‘coming to Jesus’ moment, which may have occurred in September when the Fed found themselves unable to raise interest rates even a quarter point, the group of central banks are seeking to blame sovereign governments for failing to direct their printed monies where they would be most appropriate, and are deflecting their own failures elsewhere despite the fact that central banks like the Fed and ECB are outside of government controls to begin with.
Central banks worked alongside governments to address the unfolding crises during 2007–09, and their actions were a necessary and appropriate crisis management response. But central bank policies alone should not be expected to deliver sustainable economic growth. Such policies must be complemented by other policy measures implemented by governments.
At present, much remains to be done by governments, parliaments, public authorities, and the private sector to tackle policy, economic, and structural weaknesses that originate outside the control or influence of central banks. In order to contribute to sustainable economic growth, the report presumes that all other actors fulfill their responsibilities.
Central banks alone cannot be relied upon to deliver all the policies necessary to achieve macroeconomic goals. Governments must also act and use the policy-making space provided by conventional and unconventional monetary policy measures. Failure to do so would be a serious error and would risk setting the stage for further economic disturbances and imbalances in the future. – Reuters
Perhaps what is most ironic is that this new report comes just days after former Fed Chairman Ben Bernake sought to accuse U.S. regulators and the Judicial System for not ‘jailing’ bankers after the 2008 credit crisis, and to speak as if he had nothing to do with the results that are now occurring from five years of massive money printing, bubble creation, and zero interest rates.
Central banks have never had the primary purpose of protecting an economy, or judiciously regulating a nation’s money supply. Instead their purpose, going back to their creations over the past 400 years, has been to protect private banks and through the tool of inflation, steal the wealth of a given country and then move on to new fields that are untouched by their locust instincts. And with the U.S., Europe, Japan, and others standing on the precipice of near complete insolvency, the sociopaths within the global central banks are trying their best to deflect their failures onto someone else, and act like the results the world is experiencing was not their fault.
Far from bottoming out
Oil prices falling below $30 a barrel tonight
Glut in market
Combined with slump in real economy
Here we go!! _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.
Jonathan Swift
It is clear to anyone who has studied the financial crisis of 2008 that the private sector’s drive for short-term profit was behind it. More than 84 percent of the sub-prime mortgages in 2006 were issued by private lending. These private firms made nearly 83 percent of the subprime loans to low- and moderate-income borrowers that year. Out of the top 25 subprime lenders in 2006, only one was subject to the usual mortgage laws and regulations. The nonbank underwriters made more than 12 million subprime mortgages with a value of nearly $2 trillion. The lenders who made these were exempt from federal regulations.
Recommended by Forbes
How then could the Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg say the following at a business breakfast in mid-town Manhattan on November 1, 2011?
It was not the banks that created the mortgage crisis. It was, plain and simple, Congress who forced everybody to go and give mortgages to people who were on the cusp. Now, I’m not saying I’m sure that was terrible policy, because a lot of those people who got homes still have them and they wouldn’t have gotten them without that. But they were the ones who pushed Fannie and Freddie to make a bunch of loans that were imprudent, if you will. They were the ones that pushed the banks to loan to everybody. And now we want to go vilify the banks because it’s one target, it’s easy to blame them and Congress certainly isn’t going to blame themselves.”
Barry Ritholtz in the Washington Post calls the notion that the US Congress was behind the financial crisis of 2008 “the Big Lie”. As we have seen in other contexts, if a lie is big enough, people begin to believe it.
Even this morning, November 22, 2011, a seemingly smart guy like Joe Kernan was saying on CNBC’s Squawkbox, “When the losses at Fannie and Freddie reach $200 billion… how can the ‘deniers’ say that Fannie and Freddie were enablers for a lot of the housing crisis. When it gets up to that levels, how can they say that they were only into sub-prime late, and they were only in it a little bit?”
The reason that people can say that is because it is true. The $200 billion was a mere drop in the ocean of derivatives which in 2007 amounted to three times the size of the entire global economy.
When the country’s leaders start promulgating obvious nonsense as the truth, and the Big Lie starts to go viral, then we know that we are laying the groundwork for yet another, even-bigger financial crisis.
The story of the 2008 financial crisis
So let’s recap the basic facts: why did we have a financial crisis in 2008? Barry Ritholtz fills us in on the history with an excellent series of articles in the Washington Post:
In 1998, banks got the green light to gamble: The Glass-Steagall legislation, which separated regular banks and investment banks was repealed in 1998. This allowed banks, whose deposits were guaranteed by the FDIC, i.e. the government, to engage in highly risky business.
Low interest rates fueled an apparent boom: Following the dot-com bust in 2000, the Federal Reserve dropped rates to 1 percent and kept them there for an extended period. This caused a spiral in anything priced in dollars (i.e., oil, gold) or credit (i.e., housing) or liquidity driven (i.e., stocks).
Asset managers sought new ways to make money: Low rates meant asset managers could no longer get decent yields from municipal bonds or Treasurys. Instead, they turned to high-yield mortgage-backed securities.
The credit rating agencies gave their blessing: The credit ratings agencies — Moody’s, S&P and Fitch had placed an AAA rating on these junk securities, claiming they were as safe as U.S. Treasurys.
Fund managers didn’t do their homework: Fund managers relied on the ratings of the credit rating agencies and failed to do adequate due diligence before buying them and did not understand these instruments or the risk involved.
Derivatives were unregulated: Derivatives had become a uniquely unregulated financial instrument. They are exempt from all oversight, counter-party disclosure, exchange listing requirements, state insurance supervision and, most important, reserve requirements. This allowed AIG to write $3 trillion in derivatives while reserving precisely zero dollars against future claims.
The SEC loosened capital requirements: In 2004, the Securities and Exchange Commission changed the leverage rules for just five Wall Street banks. This exemption replaced the 1977 net capitalization rule’s 12-to-1 leverage limit. This allowed unlimited leverage for Goldman Sachs [GS], Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch (now part of Bank of America [BAC]), Lehman Brothers (now defunct) and Bear Stearns (now part of JPMorganChase–[JPM]). These banks ramped leverage to 20-, 30-, even 40-to-1. Extreme leverage left little room for error. By 2008, only two of the five banks had survived, and those two did so with the help of the bailout.
The federal government overrode anti-predatory state laws. In 2004, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency federally preempted state laws regulating mortgage credit and national banks, including anti-predatory lending laws on their books (along with lower defaults and foreclosure rates). Following this change, national lenders sold increasingly risky loan products in those states. Shortly after, their default and foreclosure rates increased markedly.
Compensation schemes encouraged gambling: Wall Street’s compensation system was—and still is—based on short-term performance, all upside and no downside. This creates incentives to take excessive risks. The bonuses are extraordinarily large and they continue–$135 billion in 2010 for the 25 largest institutions and that is after the meltdown.
Wall Street became “creative”: The demand for higher-yielding paper led Wall Street to begin bundling mortgages. The highest yielding were subprime mortgages. This market was dominated by non-bank originators exempt from most regulations.
Private sector lenders fed the demand: These mortgage originators’ lend-to-sell-to-securitizers model had them holding mortgages for a very short period. This allowed them to relax underwriting standards, abdicating traditional lending metrics such as income, credit rating, debt-service history and loan-to-value.
Financial gadgets milked the market: “Innovative” mortgage products were developed to reach more subprime borrowers. These include 2/28 adjustable-rate mortgages, interest-only loans, piggy-bank mortgages (simultaneous underlying mortgage and home-equity lines) and the notorious negative amortization loans (borrower’s indebtedness goes up each month). These mortgages defaulted in vastly disproportionate numbers to traditional 30-year fixed mortgages.
Commercial banks jumped in: To keep up with these newfangled originators, traditional banks jumped into the game. Employees were compensated on the basis loan volume, not quality.
Derivatives exploded uncontrollably: CDOs provided the first “infinite market”; at height of crash, derivatives accounted for 3 times global economy.
The boom and bust went global. Proponents of the Big Lie ignore the worldwide nature of the housing boom and bust. A McKinsey Global Institute report noted “from 2000 through 2007, a remarkable run-up in global home prices occurred.”
Fannie and Freddie jumped in the game late to protect their profits: Nonbank mortgage underwriting exploded from 2001 to 2007, along with the private label securitization market, which eclipsed Fannie and Freddie during the boom. The vast majority of subprime mortgages — the loans at the heart of the global crisis — were underwritten by unregulated private firms. These were lenders who sold the bulk of their mortgages to Wall Street, not to Fannie or Freddie. Indeed, these firms had no deposits, so they were not under the jurisdiction of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp or the Office of Thrift Supervision.
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac market share declined. The relative market share of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac dropped from a high of 57 percent of all new mortgage originations in 2003, down to 37 percent as the bubble was developing in 2005-06. More than 84 percent of the subprime mortgages in 2006 were issued by private lending institutions. The government-sponsored enterprises were concerned with the loss of market share to these private lenders — Fannie and Freddie were chasing profits, not trying to meet low-income lending goals.
It was primarily private lenders who relaxed standards: Private lenders not subject to congressional regulations collapsed lending standards. the GSEs. Conforming mortgages had rules that were less profitable than the newfangled loans. Private securitizers — competitors of Fannie and Freddie — grew from 10 percent of the market in 2002 to nearly 40 percent in 2006. As a percentage of all mortgage-backed securities, private securitization grew from 23 percent in 2003 to 56 percent in 2006.
The driving force behind the crisis was the private sector
Looking at these events it is absurd to suggest, as Bloomberg did, that “Congress forced everybody to go and give mortgages to people who were on the cusp.”
Many actors obviously played a role in this story. Some of the actors were in the public sector and some of them were in the private sector. But the public sector agencies were acting at behest of the private sector. It’s not as though Congress woke up one morning and thought to itself, “Let’s abolish the Glass-Steagall Act!” Or the SEC spontaneously happened to have the bright idea of relaxing capital requirements on the investment banks. Or the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency of its own accord abruptly had the idea of preempting state laws protecting borrowers. These agencies of government were being strenuously lobbied to do the very things that would benefit the financial sector and their managers and traders. And behind it all, was the drive for short-term profits.
Why didn’t anyone say anything?
As one surveys the events in this sorry tale, it is tempting to consider it like a Shakespearean tragedy, and wonder: what if things had happened differently? What would have occurred if someone in the central bank or the supervisory agencies had blown the whistle on the emerging disaster?
The answer is clear: nothing. Nothing would have been different. This is not a speculation. We know it because an interesting new book describes what did happen to the people who did speak out and try to blow the whistle on what was going on. They were ignored or sidelined in the rush for the money.
The book is Masters of Nothing: How the Crash Will Happen Again Unless We Understand Human Nature by Matthew Hancock and Nadhim Zahawi (published in 2011 in the UK by Biteback Publishing and available on pre-order in the US).
In 2004, the book explains, the deputy governor of the Bank of England (the UK central bank), Sir Andrew Large, gave a powerful and eloquent warning about the coming crash at the London School of Economics. The speech was published on the bank’s website but it received no notice. There were no seminars called. No research was commissioned. No newspaper referred to the speech. Sir Andrew continued to make similar speeches and argue for another two years that the system was unsustainable. His speeches infuriated the then Chancellor, Gordon Brown, because they warned of the dangers of excessive borrowing. In January 2006, Sir Andrew gave up: he quietly retired before his term was up.
In 2005, the chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, Raghuram Rajan, made a speech at Jackson Hole Wyoming in front of the world’s most important bankers and financiers, including Alan Greenspan and Larry Summers. He argued that technical change, institutional moves and deregulation had made the financial system unstable. Incentives to make short-term profits were encouraging the taking of risks, which if they materialized would have catastrophic consequences. The speech did not go down well. Among the first to speak was Larry Summers who said the speech was “largely misguided”.
In 2006, Nouriel Roubini issued a similar warning at an IMF gathering of financiers in New York. The audience reaction? Dismissive. Roubini was “non-rigorous” in his arguments. The central bankers “knew what they were doing.”
The drive for short-term profit crushed all opposition in its path, until the inevitable meltdown in 2008.
Why didn’t anyone listen?
On his blog, Barry Ritholtz puts the truth-deniers into three groups:
1) Those suffering from Cognitive Dissonance — the intellectual crisis that occurs when a failed belief system or philosophy is confronted with proof of its implausibility.
2) The Innumerates, the people who truly disrespect a legitimate process of looking at the data and making intelligent assessments. They are mathematical illiterates who embarrassingly revel in their own ignorance.
3) The Political Manipulators, who cynically know what they peddle is nonsense, but nonetheless push the stuff because it is effective. These folks are more committed to their ideology and bonuses than the good of the nation.
He is too polite to mention:
4) The Paid Hacks, who are being paid to hold a certain view. As Upton Sinclair has noted, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.”
Barry Ritholtz concludes: “The denying of reality has been an issue, from Galileo to Columbus to modern times. Reality always triumphs eventually, but there are very real costs to it occurring later versus sooner .”
The social utility of the financial sector
Behind all this is the reality that the massive expansion of the financial sector is not contributing to growing the real economic pie. As Gerald Epstein, an economist at the University of Massachusetts has said: “These types of things don’t add to the pie. They redistribute it—often from taxpayers to banks and other financial institutions.” Yet in the expansion of the GDP, the expansion of the financial sector counts as increase in output. As Tom Friedman writes in the New York Times:
Wall Street, which was originally designed to finance “creative destruction” (the creation of new industries and products to replace old ones), fell into the habit in the last decade of financing too much “destructive creation” (inventing leveraged financial products with no more societal value than betting on whether Lindy’s sold more cheesecake than strudel). When those products blew up, they almost took the whole economy with them.
Do we want another financial crisis?
The current period of artificially low interest rates mirrors eerily the period ten years ago when Alan Greenspan held down interest rates at very low levels for an extended period of time. It was this that set off the creative juices of the financial sector to find “creative” new ways of getting higher returns. Why should we not expect the financial sector to be dreaming up the successor to sub-prime mortgages and credit-default swaps? What is to stop them? The regulations of the Dodd-Frank are still being written. Efforts to undermine the Volcker Rule are well advanced. Even its original author, Paul Volcker, says it has become unworkable. And now front men like Bloomberg are busily rewriting history to enable the bonuses to continue.
The question is very simple. Do we want to deny reality and go down the same path as we went down in 2008, pursuing short-term profits until we encounter yet another, even-worse financial disaster? Or are we prepared to face up to reality and undergo the phase change involved in refocusing the private sector in general, and the financial sector in particular, on providing genuine value to the economy ahead of short-term profit?
And see also: The Dumbest Idea In The World: Maximizing Shareholder Value
Banker death toll hits 36 in 2014, what’s coming economically? Full list December 21, 2014 12:43 pm EST
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THERE IS LIKELY MORE TO THIS STORY THAN MEETS THE EYE
BY SHEPARD AMBELLAS
(INTELLIHUB.COM) — As you may already know something is afoot in the financial sector as 36 bankers, financial professionals have mysteriously wound up dead in the past year.
What did they know?
What’s coming?
Here is the full list of dead financial professionals as reported by The Daily Coin:
1) David Bird, 55, long-time reporter for the Wall Street Journal, working at the Dow Jones newsroom
2) Tim Dickenson, a UK-based communications director at Swiss Re AG
3) Trouser William Smith, 58, former senior manager for Deutsche Bank
4) Ryan Henry Crane, age 37, JP Morgan
5) Li Junjie, 33 Hong Kong JP Morgan
6) Gabriel Magee, 39, age JP Morgan employee
7) Mike Dueker, 50, who had worked for Russell Investments
8) Richard Talley, 57, was the founder and CEO of American Title (real estate titles)
9) James Jr. Stuart 70 Former National Bank of Commerce CEO was found dead in Scottsdale, Ariz
10) Jason Alan Salaise, 34-year-old IT Specialist at JPMorgan since 2008
11) Autumn Radtke, 28, CEO of First Meta, a Singapore-based virtual currency trading platform
12) Eddie Reilly, 47, an investment banker, Vertical Group, New York
13) Kenneth Ballando, 28, an investment banker, Capital Levy, New York
14) Joseph A. Giampapa, 55, corporate bankruptcy lawyer, JP Morgan Chase
15) Jan Peter Schmittmann, 57, a former top administrator ANB / AMRO, Laren, Netherlands
16) Juergen Frick, 48, CEO of Bank Frick & Co. AG, Liechtenstein
17) Benoit Philippens, 37, director of BNP Paribas Fortis Bank, Ans, Belgium.
18) … Lydia, 52, banker-Bred Banque Populaire, Paris
19) Andrew Jarzyk, 27, banker, PNC Bank, New York
20) Carlos Six, 61, Head Tax and member CREDAF, Belgium
21) Jan Winkelhuijzen, 75, and Commissioner Fiscalist (former Deloitte), Netherlands.
22) Richard Rockefeller, 66, grandson elite banker John D. Rockefeller, America
23) Mahafarid Amir Khosravi (Amir Mansour Aria), 45, bank owner, businessman and derivatives trader, Iran
24) Lewis Katz, 76, businessman, lawyer and insider in the banking world, America
25) Julian Knott, Director of Global Operations Center JP Morgan, 45, America
26) Richard Gravino, IT Specialist JP Morgan, 49, America
27) Thomas James Schenkman, Managing Director, Global Infrastructure JP Morgan, 42, United States
28) Valtz Nicholas, 39, Managing Director, Goldman Sachs, New York, America
29) Therese Brewer, 50, Managing Director ING Netherlands
30) Tod Robert Edward, 51, vice president of M & T Bank, America
31) Thierry Leyne, 48, an investment banker and owner Anatevka SA, Israel
32) Calogero Gambino, 41, Managing Director, Deutsche Bank, America
33) Shawn D. Miller, 42, Managing Director of Citigroup, New York, America
34) Melissa Millian, 54, senior vice president of MassMutual, America
35) Thieu Leenen, 64, Relationship Manager ABN / AMRO, Eindhoven, Netherlands
36) Geert Tack, 52, Private Banker ING Haaltert, Belgium
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Fri Feb 12, 2016 12:58 pm Post subject:
Re The Big Short
The Congress bore some responsibility. They pressured lenders to give loans to minorities who
lacked the financial resources to make adequate down payments and to make monthly payments.
1) They would loan people money for the down payment. I know. I met an illegal alien who said she
could not afford to make the down payment. The loan officer told her not to worry. They would make
the loan big enough to cover the down payment.
2) She was making $10 an hour as a babysitter. Her husband refused to work. But she met the
income requirements and met the federal guidelines for being a minority.
3) I remember Jamie Gorelick who served in the Clinton DOJ. She wrote the paper on the Wall
pf Separation which prevented the DOJ from investigating Bill Clinton. She received a bonus of $27
million for serving on the Fannie Mae board. (Federal National Mortgage Association, FNMA)
She was on the 911 Commission and was top legal counsel for BP after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.
Jonathan Swift
It is clear to anyone who has studied the financial crisis of 2008 that the private sector’s drive for short-term profit was behind it. More than 84 percent of the sub-prime mortgages in 2006 were issued by private lending. These private firms made nearly 83 percent of the subprime loans to low- and moderate-income borrowers that year. Out of the top 25 subprime lenders in 2006, only one was subject to the usual mortgage laws and regulations. The nonbank underwriters made more than 12 million subprime mortgages with a value of nearly $2 trillion. The lenders who made these were exempt from federal regulations.
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How then could the Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg say the following at a business breakfast in mid-town Manhattan on November 1, 2011?
It was not the banks that created the mortgage crisis. It was, plain and simple, Congress who forced everybody to go and give mortgages to people who were on the cusp. Now, I’m not saying I’m sure that was terrible policy, because a lot of those people who got homes still have them and they wouldn’t have gotten them without that. But they were the ones who pushed Fannie and Freddie to make a bunch of loans that were imprudent, if you will. They were the ones that pushed the banks to loan to everybody. And now we want to go vilify the banks because it’s one target, it’s easy to blame them and Congress certainly isn’t going to blame themselves.”
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.
Full Bio
There is only one valid definition of a business purpose: to create a customer.
Peter Drucker, The Practice of Management
“Imagine an NFL coach,” writes Roger Martin, Dean of the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, in his important new book, Fixing the Game, “holding a press conference on Wednesday to announce that he predicts a win by 9 points on Sunday, and that bettors should recognize that the current spread of 6 points is too low. Or picture the team’s quarterback standing up in the postgame press conference and apologizing for having only won by 3 points when the final betting spread was 9 points in his team’s favor. While it’s laughable to imagine coaches or quarterbacks doing so, CEOs are expected to do both of these things.”
Imagine also, to extrapolate Martin’s analogy, that the coach and his top assistants were hugely compensated, not on whether they won games, but rather by whether they covered the point spread. If they beat the point spread, they would receive massive bonuses. But if they missed covering the point spread a couple of times, the salary cap of the team could be cut and key players would have to be released, regardless of whether the team won or lost its games.
Suppose also that in order to manage the expectations implicit in the point spread, the coach had to spend most of his time talking with analysts and sports writers about the prospects of the coming games and “managing” the point spread, instead of actually coaching the team. It would hardly be a surprise that the most esteemed coach in this world would be a coach who met or beat the point spread in forty-six of forty-eight games—a 96 percent hit rate. Looking at these forty-eight games, one would be tempted to conclude: “Surely those scores are being ‘managed’?”
Suppose moreover that the whole league was rife with scandals of coaches “managing the score”, for instance, by deliberately losing games (“tanking”), players deliberately sacrificing points in order not to exceed the point spread (“point shaving”), “buying” key players on the opposing team or gaining access to their game plan. If this were the situation in the NFL, then everyone would realize that the “real game” of football had become utterly corrupted by the “expectations game” of gambling. Everyone would be calling on the NFL Commissioner to intervene and ban the coaches and players from ever being involved directly or indirectly in any form of gambling on the outcome of games, and get back to playing the game.
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Which is precisely what the NFL Commissioner did in 1962 when some players were found to be involved betting small sums of money on the outcome of games. In that season, Paul Hornung, the Green Bay Packers halfback and the league’s most valuable player (MVP), and Alex Karras, a star defensive tackle for the Detroit Lions, were accused of betting on NFL games, including games in which they played. Pete Rozelle, just a few years into his thirty-year tenure as league commissioner, responded swiftly. Hornung and Karras were suspended for a season. As a result, the “real game” of football in the NFL has remained quite separate from the “expectations game” of gambling. The coaches and players spend all of their time trying to win games, not gaming the games.
The real market vs the expectations market
In today’s paradoxical world of maximizing shareholder value, which Jack Welch himself has called “the dumbest idea in the world”, the situation is the reverse. CEOs and their top managers have massive incentives to focus most of their attentions on the expectations market, rather than the real job of running the company producing real products and services.
The “real market,” Martin explains, is the world in which factories are built, products are designed and produced, real products and services are bought and sold, revenues are earned, expenses are paid, and real dollars of profit show up on the bottom line. That is the world that executives control—at least to some extent.
The expectations market is the world in which shares in companies are traded between investors—in other words, the stock market. In this market, investors assess the real market activities of a company today and, on the basis of that assessment, form expectations as to how the company is likely to perform in the future. The consensus view of all investors and potential investors as to expectations of future performance shapes the stock price of the company.
“What would lead [a CEO],” asks Martin, “to do the hard, long-term work of substantially improving real-market performance when she can choose to work on simply raising expectations instead? Even if she has a performance bonus tied to real-market metrics, the size of that bonus now typically pales in comparison with the size of her stock-based incentives. Expectations are where the money is. And of course, improving real-market performance is the hardest and slowest way to increase expectations from the existing level.”
In fact, a CEO has little choice but to pay careful attention to the expectations market, because if the stock price falls markedly, the application of accounting rules (regulation FASB 142) classify it as a “goodwill impairment”. Auditors may then force the write-down of real assets based on the company’s share price in the expectations market. As a result, executives must concern themselves with managing expectations if they want to avoid write-downs of their capital.
In this world, the best managers are those who meet expectations. “During the heart of the Jack Welch era,” writes Martin, “GE met or beat analysts’ forecasts in forty-six of forty-eight quarters between December 31, 1989, and September 30, 2001—a 96 percent hit rate. Even more impressively, in forty-one of those forty-six quarters, GE hit the analyst forecast to the exact penny—89 percent perfection. And in the remaining seven imperfect quarters, the tolerance was startlingly narrow: four times GE beat the projection by 2 cents, once it beat it by 1 cent, once it missed by 1 cent, and once by 2 cents. Looking at these twelve years of unnatural precision, Jensen asks rhetorically: ‘What is the chance that could happen if earnings were not being “managed’?”’ Martin replies: infinitesimal.
In such a world, it is therefore hardly surprising, says Martin, that the corporate world is plagued by continuing scandals, such as the accounting scandals in 2001-2002 with Enron, WorldCom, Tyco International, Global Crossing, and Adelphia, the options backdating scandals of 2005-2006, and the subprime meltdown of 2007-2008. The recent demise of MF Global Holdings and the related ongoing criminal investigation are further reminders that we have not put these matters behind us.
“It isn’t just about the money for shareholders,” writes Martin, “or even the dubious CEO behavior that our theories encourage. It’s much bigger than that. Our theories of shareholder value maximization and stock-based compensation have the ability to destroy our economy and rot out the core of American capitalism. These theories underpin regulatory fixes instituted after each market bubble and crash. Because the fixes begin from the wrong premise, they will be ineffectual; until we change the theories, future crashes are inevitable.”
“A pervasive emphasis on the expectations market,” writes Martin, “has reduced shareholder value, created misplaced and ill-advised incentives, generated inauthenticity in our executives, and introduced parasitic market players. The moral authority of business diminishes with each passing year, as customers, employees, and average citizens grow increasingly appalled by the behavior of business and the seeming greed of its leaders. At the same time, the period between market meltdowns is shrinking, Capital markets—and the whole of the American capitalist system—hang in the balance.”
How did capitalism get into this mess?
Martin says that the trouble began in 1976 when finance professor Michael Jensen and Dean William Meckling of the Simon School of Business at the University of Rochester published a seemingly innocuous paper in the Journal of Financial Economics entitled “Theory of the Firm: Managerial Behavior, Agency Costs and Ownership Structure.”
The article performed the old academic trick of creating a problem and then proposing a solution to the supposed problem that the article itself had created. The article identified the principal-agent problem as being that the shareholders are the principals of the firm—i.e., they own it and benefit from its prosperity, while the executives are agents who are hired by the principals to work on their behalf.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXvGdlN-VUs _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
The Bank of England's interest rate cut has added to pension problems for British companies Getty Images
Pension deficits at UK firms spiralled by £100bn over the last month as new record low interest rates dragged down expected returns on investments.
Pension funds now own assets worth £710bn less than the amount they will have to pay out to workers on retirement, according to analysis by PwC’s Skyval index.
Worse may be on the horizon if the economy continues to flatline. “With the prospect of further action from the Bank of England to reassure the economy in these uncertain times, the challenging environment for pension funds is likely to endure for several years,” said Raj Mody, PwC’s global head of pensions.
The uncertainty around the economic outlook following Brexit markets wiped billions from the value of UK companies and prompted the Bank of England to lower interest rates to 0.25 per cent in a bid to stimulate the economy.
Interest rates could remain low for the foreseeable future, depressing the returns that investors can expect. But PwC’s analysis found half of pension fund trustees had not protected themselves against such a scenario, meaning the gap could widen further.
“The conditions we’re experiencing now are driven by the market’s expectation of unprecedented lows of long-term interest rates. It is indirectly linked to the base rate – the industry is acclimatising to the idea of lower yields for longer,” Mody said.
To plug the yawning gap, companies are now faced with a stark choice: pump more cash from their businesses into their pension funds, or obtain better returns from their investments.
Mody, who provides pensions advice to companies, suggested the latter: “I suspect pension schemes’ asset strategies haven’t been modernised or updated to allow for these new market conditions – they are probably based on beliefs about economic conditions from years ago.”
“Even six to 12 months ago the prognosis for our economic future was different to what it is now. They need to ask, is this the right structure, is it delivering the right risk-reward profile for the world we’re now in.”
A host of UK firms have been forced to take action to shore up their pension schemes. In January, RBS said it would pump £4.2bn into its fund and last month the Royal Mail said it market conditions and a £700m deficit meant it could no longer afford to offer its defined benefit scheme.
A simple but clear prophesy of what will shortly occur, by Ron Paul. _________________ 'And he (the devil) said to him: To thee will I give all this power, and the glory of them; for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them'. Luke IV 5-7.
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Thu Nov 03, 2016 12:06 pm Post subject: Banksters will smash up UK economy on 2017 Article 50 Brexit
Banksters will 'smash up' UK economy on 2017 Article 50 Brexit
Well that 'smash up' quote is just me actually but it's pretty accurate
More and more 'insiders' like Shell's Vince Cable and Tony Blair's dodgy dossier author/war criminal Alasdair Campbell are saying in a recent radio interview off the back of his latest book that: 'the Brexit vote was a catastrophic decision' he predicts the 'pound will plunge after Article 50 is triggered'.
ie. When they send the article 50 letter, make the British economy scream, all out economic warfare, let them have it!
Rachael Pells Education Correspondent Wednesday 2 November 2016324 comments
Sir Vince Cable challenged former Chancellor Gordon Brown over his economic policies and correctly predicted the economic crash Getty
The British economy “will turn nasty” and could fall into recession as a result of Brexit, former Business Secretary Sir Vince Cable has said.
Recent economic growth and reassurances over sterling value may have led Britain into a false sense of calm, but living standards are being cut and longer-term problems are imminent, he warned.
“The two ways that economics are going to turn nasty are because devaluation – which may well grow - cuts peoples incomes,” he told The Independent. “They’re paying more for their food and their petrol, and that’s going to hit people next year particularly.
“The second is that businesses have just stopped investing, and that feeds through into potential recession and stores up long-term problems.
“Part of the problem is that George Osborne went round with this ‘Armageddon’ that the world was going to collapse and it hasn’t. So people think there’s no problem but there is.”
Speaking ahead of his return to the further education sector, the former Business, Innovation and Skills Secretary called for a review of government spending in education in particular.
Working with the National Union of Students, he will lead a new research project, Students Shaping Further Education, into how major reforms to the sector will affect current and future students across the UK.
The review will consider all aspects of the industry, including funding cuts to apprenticeships – which he says could ultimately affect productivity and add a further blow the economy.
“One of the problems with Brexit is that it’s sucking the energy out of the Government,” he said. “The really big thing about the UK is productivity if we take our eyes off that that’s bad.”
“It is a little bit like the Peanuts cartoon, where he walks off the cliff but is still peddling furiously, and hasn’t actually dropped. The economy is a little bit like that at the moment.”
“The economy looks alright in sterling terms but if you translate it into dollar terms, it is a lot smaller than it was and people are not aware of that, and people are going to feel it in the next few years.”
In the years before the global economic crisis, Sir Vince warned openly of the dangerous market banks were creating with easy lending and challenged the then-Chancellor, Gordon Brown, on his policies.
In November 2003, he said: “Is not the brutal truth that the growth of the British economy is sustained by consumer spending pinned against record levels of personal debt, which is secured, if at all, against house prices that the Bank of England describes as well above equilibrium level?”
Experts this week warned that sterling is likely to plunge to a new record low once procedures to leave the EU begin.
City of London banksImage copyrightAFP
Large banks are getting ready to relocate out of the UK early next year over fears around Brexit, the British Bankers' Association (BBA) has warned.
Writing in The Observer, its boss Anthony Browne also says smaller banks could move operations overseas by 2017.
"Their hands are quivering over the relocate button," he wrote. Most banks had backed the UK remaining in the EU.
Mr Browne also said the current "public and political debate at the moment is taking us in the wrong direction."
His comments build upon those he made at the BBA annual conference last week, when he said banks had already "set up project teams to work out what operations they need to move by when, and how best to do it".
'Legal right'
"Banking is probably more affected by Brexit than any other sector of the economy, both in the degree of impact and the scale of the implications," he told the newspaper.
"It is the UK's biggest export industry by far and is more internationally mobile than most. But it also gets its rules and legal rights to serve its customers cross-border from the EU."
Analysis: Joe Lynam, BBC Business correspondent
One of the perks of Europe's Single Market - which also currently includes the UK, Norway and EU countries such as the Netherlands - is "passporting". Passporting allows banks and insurance companies to sell their services anywhere in the single market without having to establish a base in every country in Europe.
But single market membership comes with conditions: freedom of movement of goods, services, capital and (crucially) people. Theresa May has already said she intends to restrict the free movement of people from the EU after Brexit, while EU leaders have meanwhile said the four freedoms are indivisible ie non-negotiable. _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Since Donald Trump’s victory on election night we have seen the worst bond crash in 15 years. Global bond investors have seen trillions of dollars of wealth wiped out since November 8th, and analysts are warning of another tough week ahead. The general consensus in the investing community is that a Trump administration will mean much higher inflation, and as a result investors are already starting to demand higher interest rates. Unfortunately for all of us, history has shown that higher interest rates always cause an economic slowdown. And this makes perfect sense, because economic activity naturally slows down when it becomes more expensive to borrow money. The Obama administration had already set up the next president for a major recession anyway, but now this bond crash threatens to bring it on sooner rather than later.
For those that are not familiar with the bond market, when yields go up bond prices go down. And when bond prices go down, that is bad news for economic growth.
So we generally don’t want yields to go up.
Unfortunately, yields have been absolutely soaring over the past couple of weeks, and the yield on 10-year Treasury notes has now jumped “one full percentage point since July”…
The 10-year Treasury yield jumped to 2.36% in late trading on Friday, the highest since December 2015, up 66 basis point since the election, and up one full percentage point since July!
The 10-year yield is at a critical juncture. In terms of reality, the first thing that might happen is a rate increase by the Fed in December, after a year of flip-flopping. A slew of post-election pronouncements by Fed heads – including Yellen’s “relatively soon” – have pushed the odds of a rate hike to 98%.
As I noted the other day, so many things in our financial system are tied to yields on U.S. Treasury notes. Just look at what is happening to mortgages. As Wolf Richter has noted, the average rate on 30-year mortgages is shooting into the stratosphere…
The carnage in bonds has consequences. The average interest rate of the a conforming 30-year fixed mortgage as of Friday was quoted at 4.125% for top credit scores. That’s up about 0.5 percentage point from just before the election, according to Mortgage News Daily. It put the month “on a short list of 4 worst months in more than a decade.”
If mortgage rates continue to shoot higher, there will be another housing crash.
Rates on auto loans, credit cards and student loans will also be affected. Throughout our economic system it will become much more costly to borrow money, and that will inevitably slow down the overall economy.
Why bond investors are so on edge these days is because of statements such as this one from Steve Bannon…
In a nascent administration that seems, at best, random in its beliefs, Bannon can seem to be not just a focused voice, but almost a messianic one:
“Like [Andrew] Jackson’s populism, we’re going to build an entirely new political movement,” he says. “It’s everything related to jobs. The conservatives are going to go crazy. I’m the guy pushing a trillion-dollar infrastructure plan. With negative interest rates throughout the world, it’s the greatest opportunity to rebuild everything. Ship yards, iron works, get them all jacked up. We’re just going to throw it up against the wall and see if it sticks. It will be as exciting as the 1930s, greater than the Reagan revolution — conservatives, plus populists, in an economic nationalist movement.”
Steve Bannon is going to be one of the most influential voices in the new Trump administration, and he is absolutely determined to get this “trillion dollar infrastructure plan” through Congress.
And that is going to mean a lot more borrowing and a lot more spending for a government that is already on pace to add 2.4 trillion dollars to the national debt this fiscal year.
Sadly, all of this comes at a time when the U.S. economy is already starting to show significant signs of slowing down. It is being projected that we will see a sixth straight decline in year-over-year earnings for the S&P 500, and industrial production has now contracted for 14 months in a row.
The truth is that the economy has been barely treading water for quite some time now, and it isn’t going to take much to push us over the edge. The following comes from Lance Roberts…
With an economy running at below 2%, consumers already heavily indebted, wage growth weak for the bulk of American’s, there is not a lot of wiggle room for policy mistakes.
Combine weak economics with higher interest rates, which negatively impacts consumption, and a stronger dollar, which weighs on exports, and you have a real potential of a recession occurring sooner rather than later.
Yes, the stock market soared immediately following Trump’s election, but it wasn’t because economic conditions actually improved.
If you look at history, a stock market crash almost always follows a major bond crash. So if bond prices keep declining rapidly that is going to be a very ominous sign for stock traders.
And history has also shown us that no bull market can survive a major recession. If the economy suffers a major downturn early in the Trump administration, it is inevitable that stock prices will follow.
The waning days of the Obama administration have set us up perfectly for higher interest rates, a major recession and a giant stock market crash.
Of course any problems that occur after January 20th, 2017 will be blamed on Trump, but the truth is that Obama will be far more responsible for what happens than Trump will be.
Right now so many people have been lulled into a sense of complacency because Donald Trump won the election.
That is an enormous mistake.
A shaking has already begun in the financial world, and this shaking could easily become an avalanche.
Now is not a time to party. Rather, it is time to batten down the hatches and to prepare for very rough seas ahead.
All of the things that so many experts warned were coming may have been delayed slightly, but without a doubt they are still on the way.
So get prepared while you still can, because time is running out.
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Tue May 02, 2017 11:27 am Post subject:
MPs demand SFO inquiry into Lloyds Bank
A group of MPs has demanded that the Serious Fraud Office investigate Lloyds Bank and the West of England-based property consultants, Alder King who are accused of 'stealing' clients property after 2008 by hiking interest rates and providing false valuations.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-bristol-34634148/mps-demand-sf o-inquiry-into-lloyds-bank
TonyGosling wrote:
Today Lloyds deliver bent set of accounts to stock market, parliament and public alike.
Lloyds Bank claims a £415m pre-tax profit – but the numbers don’t add up
Lloyds Banking Group plunged into the red in the second half of last year as it upgraded technology to the “most significant operational risk” facing the bank in the wake of January’s outage that interfered with credit and debit card payments.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/lloyds-slumps-into-the -red-in-the-second-half-9125992.html
The bank trumpeted a statutory pre-tax profit of £415m – the first since its 2008 bail out – and said it encouraged people “to look at the year as a whole”, as the chief executive Antonio Horta-Osorio took a £1.7m bonus and declared the state-backed bank ready for privatisation.
But Ian Gordon, banking analyst at Investec, said breaking the year into quarters revealed a starkly different picture, made up of “a large one-off-driven profit in quarter one, nothing in quarter two, and heavy losses in quarters three and four”.
He said: “This simple fact has seemingly been obscured by spin over the past two quarters (or through use of year-to-date numbers conveniently repeating the Q1).
“Today you can’t ignore the reality: attributable profit in half one, 2013, was £1,560m… Attributable loss in half two, 2013, was £2,398m, so attributable loss for the year of £838m.”
Attributable profit is what is left for shareholders after provisions such as that for PPI compensation, other write-offs and tax are factored in.
These numbers put a different gloss on the results to that preferred by Lloyds. It steered reporters to the bank’s £2.9bn “underlying profit” at the first half, which reached £6.2bn by the end of the year.
But critics of this number point out that provisions to cover various scandals and regulatory issues are becoming so regular that they shouldn’t just be stripped out as “one-offs” as many banks prefer to do.
The “real” numbers, after including all costs, also throw a new light on Mr Horta-Osorio’s bonus, which he said was merited by the bank’s “performance” and on the 8 per cent overall hike in staff bonuses to £395m.
David Hillman, a spokesperson for the Robin Hood Tax group, which campaigns for a tax on banks’ financial transactions, said: “It’s disgraceful that a bailed-out bank gets fined billions for ripping off its customers, but still pays out lottery-sized sums to its top staff. In what other industry would this be allowed to happen?”
Andrew Tyrie, the chairman of the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards, gave a more measured response but he noted that the transition to “normality” at Lloyds had “taken longer than many expected”.
“It will only be complete once Lloyds has been fully returned to private sector ownership and is clear of the legacy of past misconduct.”
Future returns to the private sector of the Government’s stake – still at 33 per cent – could be complicated by further IT issues. Lloyds made IT the “most significant” operational risk in the most recent figures.
Last month’s glitch hit transactions made by ATMs and debit cards issued by Halifax, Lloyds, Bank of Scotland and TSB. The latter is due to be spun off.
It was caused by the failure of two out of seven computer servers. Lloyds has more than 30 million customers, and is by far the biggest UK retail bank.
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Sat Dec 15, 2018 3:30 am Post subject:
Preparing to smash EU economy.
Deliberately caused by this of course
The ending of QE by Mario Draghi is not going well
IMF warns storm clouds gathering for global economy
https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-imf-economy-lipton/imf-warns-storm-c louds-gathering-for-global-economy-idUKKBN1OA0SG
One of the International Monetary Fund’s top officials warned on Tuesday that storm clouds were gathering over the global economy and that governments and central banks might not be well- equipped to cope.
A new survey shows that business growth in the eurozone has hit a four-year low in December amid concerns about a global trade war and the recent violent anti-government protests in France.
The survey, conducted by data firm IHS Markit, showed Friday that the composite eurozone PMI fell to 51.3 points from 52.7 points in November. However, a reading above 50 points indicates business is still growing.
According to IHS Markit, new business inflows almost stalled, job creation slipped to a two-year low and business optimism deteriorated.
"An undercurrent of slowing economic growth was exacerbated by protests in France and ongoing weak demand for autos," said the firm.
The IHS Markit's survey for France indicated that business in the country has flipped into reverse, with the index plunging to 49.3 in December from 54.2 in November.
Thousands of demonstrators wearing yellow vests have been gathering in major French cities since November 17 to initially protest President Emmanuel Macron’s controversial fuel tax hike — which he later dropped — and the high costs of living in France.
French authorities earlier said more than 1,700 protesters had been arrested and that 200 people, including 17 police forces, had been injured in confrontations during the protests.
Read more:
Police heavily deployed to contain protests across France
Over 1,000 arrests as 'Yellow Vests' protests continue
France in flames as 'yellow vests' hit streets despite Macron concessions
"While some of the slowdown reflected disruptions to business and travel arising from the 'yellow vest' protests in France, the weaker picture also reflects growing evidence that the underlying rate of economic growth has slowed across the euro area as a whole," IHS Markit's Chief Business Economist Chris Williamson said.
"Companies are worried about the global economic and political climate, with trade wars and Brexit adding to increased political tensions within the euro area," he added.
Williamson noted that the data point to a weak economic expansion of 0.3 percent in the final quarter of 2018 for the eurozone.
He said data in December alone indicate that GDP growth is slowing to a 0.1 percent rate and forward-looking information, including orders and sentiment, show demand growth is stalling
The survey results come a day after the European Central Bank announced that it would halt its €2.6tn stimulus program in January despite concerns that the eurozone is poised to slow down over the next couple of years.
Mario Draghi, the ECB boss, warned that rising uncertainty had forced the bank to downgrade its outlook for the currency bloc next year and the effects would continue to be felt in 2020.
European Central Bank chief Mario Draghi
The European Central Bank has confirmed it is ending its huge net asset purchase programme to stimulate the eurozone economy this month.
The ECB has stopped its bond-buying scheme, worth €30bn a month, despite a recent slowdown in the bloc's recovery.
The move, first announced in June, is a big step towards unwinding the policies brought in to stabilise the eurozone in the wake of the financial crisis.
The ECB said it was keeping its main interest rate on hold at zero per cent.
The ECB began its asset purchase programme in 2015, years after the UK and US took similar action to shore up their economies.
It has so far pumped more than two trillion euros into the bloc's economy, while maintaining ultra-low interest rates.
The bank argues this has countered deflation and staved off a deeper economic crisis, but it has long signalled it would gradually wind the programme down.
BBC graph
Analysis
Dharshini David, economics correspondent
It's official: the ECB has confirmed it will cease its crisis bail-out programme, quantitative easing. It was last of the major central banks to embark on the scheme of pumping funds into the economy via bonds in 2009.
Since then it has injected more than €2tn, intended to be used by financial institutions to boost credit, and so demand across the economy.
Before the financial crisis, QE had been largely untried. Its potential impact was unknown - and is still unclear. In the UK, the Bank of England estimates that funds played a very significant role in boosting activity.
However, there is evidence that a large part of the funds were concentrated in the assets held by the wealthiest - from property to shares - boosting their value.
QE was a controversial project, not least with European politicians. And it is for political, rather than economic, reasons that it's been ceased: growth across the eurozone is lukewarm.
The ECB isn't removing its support altogether; it will reinvest existing QE money once bonds mature.
But economists question if the ECB may soon have to take further action to stimulate growth and, with interest rates at rock bottom, what shape that will take.
TonyGosling wrote:
Preparing to smash EU economy.
Deliberately caused by this of course
The ending of QE by Mario Draghi is not going well
IMF warns storm clouds gathering for global economy
https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-imf-economy-lipton/imf-warns-storm-c louds-gathering-for-global-economy-idUKKBN1OA0SG
One of the International Monetary Fund’s top officials warned on Tuesday that storm clouds were gathering over the global economy and that governments and central banks might not be well- equipped to cope.
A new survey shows that business growth in the eurozone has hit a four-year low in December amid concerns about a global trade war and the recent violent anti-government protests in France.
The survey, conducted by data firm IHS Markit, showed Friday that the composite eurozone PMI fell to 51.3 points from 52.7 points in November. However, a reading above 50 points indicates business is still growing.
According to IHS Markit, new business inflows almost stalled, job creation slipped to a two-year low and business optimism deteriorated.
"An undercurrent of slowing economic growth was exacerbated by protests in France and ongoing weak demand for autos," said the firm.
The IHS Markit's survey for France indicated that business in the country has flipped into reverse, with the index plunging to 49.3 in December from 54.2 in November.
..................
The survey results come a day after the European Central Bank announced that it would halt its €2.6tn stimulus program in January despite concerns that the eurozone is poised to slow down over the next couple of years.
Mario Draghi, the ECB boss, warned that rising uncertainty had forced the bank to downgrade its outlook for the currency bloc next year and the effects would continue to be felt in 2020.
Draghi added that growth would be limited to 1.7 percent in 2019, “owing to the persistence of uncertainties related to geopolitical factors, the threat of protectionism, vulnerabilities in emerging markets and financial market volatility.”
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Tue Aug 20, 2019 11:49 pm Post subject:
ECB admits way European banks work is ‘corrupt’ – MILLIONS of contracts need changing THE European Central Bank (ECB) and other leading financial institutions have been warned they face huge “uncertainty and confusion” in the economy as markets brace itself for a major overhaul.
THE European Central Bank (ECB) and other leading financial institutions have been warned they face huge “uncertainty and confusion” in the economy as markets brace itself for a major overhaul.
By LUKE HAWKER
PUBLISHED: 19:05, Tue, Aug 20, 2019 | UPDATED: 19:33, Tue, Aug 20, 2019
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ECB conference: Mario Draghi discusses policy stance
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Markets in Europe are set for a major change as the ECB prepares to alter the way finances are calculated across the continent. The current key interest benchmark, the euro overnight index average (EONIA), which is used price more than €24tn of derivatives, loans and bonds, will be replaced in less than two months, the Financial Times reports. The EONIA is the current overnight benchmark rate for the euro - the largest single currency in the world.
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The rate is used for many financial contracts including mortgages, bank overdrafts, and other more complex financial transactions.
Businesses, banks and other organisations also use benchmark rate to value items on their balance sheets.
The benchmark is most commonly used to calculate the rate at which banks can lend and borrow money.
European Central Bank
The European Central Bank (ECB) headquarters in Frankfurt (Image: GETTY)
However the method will be phased out from October 2 by a new benchmark called the €STR (euro short-term rate).
The €STR is designed to reflect how much a bank must pay when borrowing money overnight from various financial counterparties without providing collateral.
The new method will be implemented to provide a wider scope than EONIA - which only looks at trades between banks.
The ECB has been under pressure to replace the EONIA following a series of market manipulation scandals.
ECB
The ECB has been under pressure to replace the EONIA (Image: GETTY)
READ MORE: ECB sets up ‘strong’ stimulus package to boost Euro economy
Meanwhile, the body for advising the ECB has warned of “complacency among market participants” ahead of the change.
Steven van Rijswijk, the head of the steering group head and chief risk officer at Dutch bank ING, told the Financial Times: “I am worried about complacency among market participants, especially as regards the change in the timing of the publication of Eonia, which takes place already on October 2 and creates very significant operational challenges.”
Mr van Rijswijk also highlighted millions of financial documents will also need to be altered.
President of the European Central Bank Mario Draghi
President of the European Central Bank Mario Draghi (Image: GETTY)
He added: “Millions of contracts need to be changed.
"We can't trust you not to use the period of an election campaign to drive our country off a no-deal cliff edge that will crash our economy, destroy jobs and industries, cause shortages of medicine and food and endanger peace in Northern Ireland.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-49998384 _________________ --
'Suppression of truth, human spirit and the holy chord of justice never works long-term. Something the suppressors never get.' David Southwell
http://aangirfan.blogspot.com http://aanirfan.blogspot.com
Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
Fed Takes on Role of World’s Central Bank by Pumping Out Dollars
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(Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve is acting as central banker to the world by seeking to provide the global financial system with the dollar liquidity it needs to avoid seizing up.
In its latest measure to combat the economic fallout from the coronarvirus pandemic, the Fed said Tuesday it was establishing a temporary repurchase agreement facility to allow foreign central banks to swap any Treasury securities they hold for cash. That’s yet another step beyond the actions it took in the 2008 financial crisis.
“To the Federal Reserve’s credit, it is playing the role of central banker to the world rather than denying it and trying to ward it off,” said former Fed official Ted Truman, who is now a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington.
The Fed is trying to prevent a liquidity squeeze amid a worldwide rush into dollars, as the virus wreaks havoc on a global economy that is heavily dependent on the greenback as its linchpin.
“A lot of borrowing and commerce and investing is done in dollars,” Julia Coronado, founding partner of MacroPolicy Perspectives in New York and a former Fed economist, said in an interview on Bloomberg Radio. “When you have a dollar crunch, it can turn a recession or contraction in activity into a financial crisis very quickly because the dollar shortage can trigger defaults and deleveraging.”
Emerging-market borrowers are especially at risk. Encouraged by low U.S. interest rates, they’ve loaded up on a dollar-denominated debt in recent years. They now face a squeeze as their exports plummet due to economic shutdowns worldwide to combat the coronavirus contagion.
A significantly stronger dollar can also hurt the U.S. by tightening financial conditions and making American exports more expensive on world markets.
Strains Remain
Investors rushed for the currency this month, pushing the premium paid to swap funding exposure from euros into the dollar to multiyear highs. While the shortage of dollars has since eased, strains remain in emerging markets.
Unlike the currency swap lines the Fed already has in place with selected central banks -- and which it employed in the financial crisis -- the new repo facility will be open to most foreign central banks and foreign monetary authorities with an account at the New York Fed.
“Almost every country that holds dollars has an account at the Federal Reserve,” Truman said. “My guess is that $5 trillion is held there.”
The New York Fed says it has over 200 account holders, with the vast majority held by foreign central banks and monetary authorities.
The new facility though does lack something the currency swaps provide. While it allows foreign central banks to liquefy their holdings of Treasuries and obtain dollars, it does not add to their reserves. Rather, it just changes their composition.
Krishna Guha, head of central bank strategy at Evercore ISI, said the the repo program should help smaller emerging markets that need to raise dollars to intervene to prevent freefalls in their currencies.
Selling Pressure
It should also lead to less forced selling of Treasuries by those foreign central banks and thus support the Fed’s efforts to restore some semblance of order to the U.S. government debt market, he said in a note to clients.
The Fed nodded to that reasoning in its statement announcing the new program. The facility “reduces the need for central banks to sell their Treasury securities outright and into illiquid markets,” helping stabilize trading in the world’s most secure and important asset, it said.
There are some doubts though about how widely the program will be used. The Fed is charging 25 basis points over the interest rate on excess reserves -- currently 0.1% -- to buy back U.S. Treasuries. It is hard to know which monetary authorities would opt for the program rather than first trying to sell at market without the extra cost.
The Fed is having to take on the mantle of world central banker because of the dollar’s dominant role in the world economy and the critical importance of the Treasury debt market to the global financial system.
The way they are playing this, for success, will require that the foolhardy public make it happen.. 30 Pieces of Silver generally does the trick, take from this pot and you release the criminal and forsake the man...
_________________ KEEP IT REAL
The government will borrow £180 billion from the markets in the next three months to fight the economic collapse caused by the shutdown, providing the first official indication of the cost of the pandemic.
Combined with a record debt issuance of £45 billion this month, the government now plans to raise £225 billion in the first four months of the financial year alone. In the budget of March 11 it had expected to raise £156 billion for 2020-21.
The Treasury’s fundraising plans suggest that it expects the cost of the pandemic to come to about £165 billion. That figure could be higher if the outbreak causes the lockdown to be extended for longer than is hoped.
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