STELLA, STELLINA

(pubblicato in data 18/03/2010)

Ve la ricordate ? Stella, stellina, la notte è piccolina, tutti gli animaletti dormono stretti stretti, e anch’io con la mia mamma, adesso vado a nanna. Chissà quante volte ve l’hanno cantata quando eravate dei pargoletti in culla durante la tenera età ! Direi ora di proporre un rifacimento per adeguarla ai tempi che ci attendono: stella, stellina, il peggio si avvicina, la notte è molto scura, ed io ho tanta paura. Le recenti esternazioni di istituzioni e capi di governo in Europa riguardanti la situazione macroeconomica dell’Europa non possono essere lasciate al mero commento quotidiano, ma devono tentare di essere interpretate. Angela Merckel che propone con rigore teutonico e severità britannica l’uscita dall’area Euro per tutti i paesi non allineati ai parametri di Mastricht, Mario Draghi, in qualità di Presidente del Financial Stability Board, che mette in guardia circa la efficacia e durata della cosidetta “ripresina” in atto, e Jean Claude Trichet che dissente aspramente su queste esternazioni. Possiamo noi fidarci di questi “cappellai matti” che negli anni precedenti non hanno saputo prevedere che cosa sarebbe accaduto all’economia europea aprendo le frontiere alle merci “globalizzate” di Cindia e parallelamente dando il via alla fiera della cuccagna facendo prestare denaro a tutti senza tanti complimenti ? Come può un’area geografica (la vecchia Europa) che ha voluto inizialmente ostentare tutta la sua magnificenza puntando sul potenziale manifetturiero interno e su grandi flussi di export avere un futuro industriale ed occupazionale, se ora assistiamo lentamente ad una progressiva opera di deindustrializzazione. Ci hanno sempre osannato la privatizzazione di ogni risorsa nazionale come la strada vincente per il successo e la crescita del PIL, ma adesso ci accorgiamo che tutti i governi europei sono dovuti intervenire per dare ossigeno ad un malato ormai moribondo ed in prossimità di uno stadio terminale. I malati aumentano mese dopo mese, quasi come se ci fosse una epidemia che porta in seguito al contagio finanziario al successivo collasso industriale. Prima era la Grecia a preoccupare, ormai la quarantena si allarga sempre più arrivando a mettere in discussione anche il futuro del Regno Unito, il paese europeo con le famiglie più indebitate. Quest’anno il quadro peggiorerà violentamente durante il secondo semestre facendo emergere situazioni di ingestibilità strutturale anche per la Spagna e l’Italia. Il paese iberico paga pesantemente un modello di sviluppo insostenibile sul medio/lungo termine, incentrato sulla speculazione immobiliare e su un potenziale turistico farlocco. Forse in otto anni riassorbiranno l’invenduto, ammesso che le due grandi banche spagnole non collassino prima e portino il paese al default finanziario. Tuttavia per il vecchio stivale la situazione è molto più tragica: di fatto stiamo svendendo e polverizzando le uniche risorse che rappresentavano il vanto del nostro paese: il potenziale manifatturiero (artigianato e distretti industriali) ed il marchio made in italy, che ormai non ha più alcuna valenza significativa. Entro sette anni perderemo almeno il 40 % della nostra capacità manifatturiera: significa altri milioni di posti di lavoro che si aggiungereanno a quelli attuali, nella speranza che qualcuno si inventi come propore l’assorbimento o il riciclo attraverso altri nuovi settori (e quali sarebbero di grazia ?). Interventi immediati per alleviare il dolore di chi sta morendo ce ne sono: e non ci vuole tanta fantasia per inventarli, basta semplicemente andare a copiare dai paesi che al momento stanno sorprendendo il mondo. Mi riferisco a misure contingenti da attuare quanto prima come la nazionalizzazione del sistema bancario, la tassazione della prostituzione, la detassazione degli utili investiti, l’abbattimento coatto dei costi di rappresentanza popolare (tradotto significa ridurre drasticamente i compensi di chi ci governa, partendo dall’europarlamentare arrivando al consigliere comunale), la difesa integrale del vero prodotto artigianale italiano, non dimenticando infine l'imposizione di dazi doganali per tutti quei prodotti porcheria che invece entrano liberamente in Europa ed in Italia, una minaccia per le nostre aziende oltre che per la nostra salute. Possibile che chi governa il nostro paese non si renda conto di quello che sta accadendo ? Sono forse così assorbiti dalla loro beghe di partito (tanto la destra quanto la sinistra) da non sentire il lamento dell’imprenditore morente, soffocato ormai da un sistema bancario che decide la vita o la morte della piccola impresa ? Forse a tutto questo vi è un’altra lettura ? Forse. Potrebbero sapere infatti benissimo che cosa sta accadendo, proprio perché a qualcuno interessa la morte del moribondo. Chi sarebbe allora questo qualcuno interessato ad un’Italia che si appresterà a fare la fine della Grecia ? Per una volta tanto proviamo a fare dietrologia. Per chi non lo sapesse ancora, l’Italia è il paese più ricco al mondo, ma non per ricchezze depositate nel sottosuolo, quanto per risorse ed attrazioni ubicate nel soprasuolo. Abbazie, musei, teatri, pinacoteche, ville, quadri, statue, parchi e comprensori faunistici, spiagge demaniali ovvero quello che viene volgarmente chiamato il patrimonio artistico e naturalistico. Noi italiani saremo anche quattro volte campioni del mondo al gioco del calcio, ma nella gestione e sfruttamento economico di patrimoni e risorse dobbiamo solo imparare da tutti. Visto che gli italiani non sanno valorizzare e sfruttare economicamente un patrimonio in termini di ricchezza che tutti gli altri ci invidiano, vi possono essere degli operatori e soggetti economici (multinazionali, fondi sovrani, fondi speculativi, famiglie di banchieri) che potrebbero essere interessati ad impossessarsi di queste fenomenali ed inesauribili risorse, acquistandole o rilevandone i diritti di sfruttamento per i prossimi secoli a venire. Se questo vi sembrerà una pazzia ricordate che qualche istituzione autorevole ha recentemente proposto la vendita delle isole greche per risanare la situazione economica proprio della Grecia ! Per cui quando arriverà anche il momento dell’Italia (perché state certi che arriverà) a quel punto verranno proposte come soluzioni quelle solitamente avanzate dal FMI ovvero la privatizzazione delle risorse del paese. Se questa ipotesi vi sembra irrealizzabile, riflettete un momento su chi è stato nominato a gestire il Ministero del Turismo con l’attuale governo e chi invece era stato incaricato di promuoverlo nella precedente legislazione. Stella, stellina, il peggio si avvicina, la notte è molto scura, ed io ho tanta paura.

EugenioBenetazzo.com

Systematic Fraud and Geithner Knew About It

The Golden Truth 18 marzo 2010
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You'll see that Geithner was unequivocally involved with knowledge about Repo 105, LEHMANGATE. But the real question is, at what point in time did Obama know? And if Obama did not know, then he's unworthy to be President because it means he lacks the political strength, depth and experience demanded by the job (what did he run before being elected?). I believe we are watching another "Watergate" unfold. The difference between then and now is that we may not have political leaders in Congress who are willing to do what's required to make the full truth known. I finally spent some time dissecting exactly what Lehman did and how they got away with what they were doing. Let me say this: If all of Lehman's upper management PLUS the relevant Ernst&Young people PLUS the relevant people at the NY Fed - including Tim Geithner - do not do jail time over this, it's time to either start organizing a revolution or move out of the country. If these guys get away with this without serious legal and financial punishment, it is the clearest indication that our country is no longer held accountable by the Constitution OR Rule of Law in any respect. It means that full-scale mob-style criminality has invaded every aspect of our Banking, Corporate and Government systems, starting at the top with the White House and Congress. Just to summarize briefly and coherently what Lehman did: Lehman engaged in repo transactions which, at the surface appeared to be standard repo maneuvers used by banks to raise short term financing by taking Treasury securities and sending them to a counterparty, who takes the Treasuries as collateral and gives Lehman cash to use on a short term basis - usually overnight to two weeks. Lehman then unwinds the repo by sending the cash plus a little more - representing interest paid on the transaction - back to the lending entity and the lender sends back the Treasury collateral back to Lehman. The transaction is accounted in a way which does not change any aspects of Lehman's balance sheet for accounting, regulatory and financial purposes. What Lehman did is exploit a rule that says if Lehman sends collateral representing 105% of the cash they borrow, under accounting regulations, Lehman can account for the transaction as a "sale of securities" and use the cash taken in to repay other short term debt, making Lehman's balance sheet looking less leveraged - i.e. of much higher quality - to regulators and investors at the end of each quarter. As Lehman approached bankruptcy, it started including risky, worthless securities as part of the "repo" collateral package - toxic assets that Lehman could not get off its balance sheet at any price. Using this type of collateral is unconventional in the extreme and could NEVER be considered a "sale" of securities under any non-fraudulent accounting ruling. NEVER. The Treaury collateral Repo 105 would be okay if it were done once or twice, but Lehman did it repeatedly and systematically every quarter since at least 2007. Anyone with an accounting 101 background from a good school knows that Ernst&Young should have raised a red flag and disallowed the treatment of the transaction as a "sale" the second time Lehman used it. Afterall, doing this once without reversing the transaction could for sure be considered a bona fide sale. Maybe even with the reversal (the unwind of the repo). But to engage in this systematically and serially every quarter would raise an objection over the accounting treatment as "sale" and any accounting firm doing its job properly and ethically would not sign off on the accounting treatment. This is especially true once Lehman started using toxic waste as collateral. Clearly pure manipulative fraud. To think that E&Y did not know any better is to ask us to believe that the E&Y people either are complete idiots or do not know accounting rules. Stupidity and ignorance notwithstanding, we can only conclude this situation was pure nefarious intent to fraud in which E&Y participated. Remember Arthur Anderson/Enron if you think this is not probable. In fact, just this morning, clusterstock.com has posted an article from Andrew Ross Sorkin who says that the SEC and the Federal Reserve Bank of NY (Tim Geithner's NY Fed) were all over Lehman during the heart of the "Repo 105" period (here's the link: Geithner knew about Repo 105).
Almost two years ago to the day, a team of officials from the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York quietly moved into the headquarters of Lehman Brothers. They were provided desks, phones, computers — and access to all of Lehman’s books and records. At any given moment, there were as many as a dozen government officials buzzing around Lehman’s offices. These officials, whose work was kept under wraps at the time, were assigned by Timothy Geithner,then president of the New York Fed, and Christopher Cox, then the S.E.C. chairman, to monitor Lehman in light of the near collapse of Bear Stearns.
What this tells us is that not only are all of the Lehman's upper management AND the E&Y people involved are guilty of direct fraud and corruption, but that everyone from the NY Fed and the SEC who were involved either were complete idiots with respect to basic accounting rules and reguations (and should be fired immediately with no pension benefits) OR that they enabled the fraud to persist by looking the other way. This would include Tim Geithner, who should no longer be given the benefit of using the "I can't recall" or the "I had no idea" defense. He is clearly knee-deep in this. Geithner's motivation to look the other way would be to keep the market from seeing the extent of Lehman's insolvency. PLEASE KEEP IN MIND THAT LEHMAN CEO RICHARD FULD WAS A MEMBER OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS OF THE NY FED AT THIS TIME AND THUS HAD DIRECT INFLUENCE OVER GEITHNER. For starters I would call on Obama to force Geithner to either resign from his Treasury position or outright fire him. Fool us twice - cheating on taxes and getting away with it plus his story about not knowing about AIG/Goldman - shame on us. Fool us again, time to impeach Obama unless he gets rid of Geithner immediately. Source > The Golden Truth
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Link a questo articolo : http://www.effedieffe.com/content/view/9809/183/

Basilea 3 il banco raschia fondo barile

L’Europa, questa finzione politica che nasconde il dominio delle banche, ci è nemica. La Banca Centrale sta rivedendo gli accordi Basilea 1 e Basilea 2 per arrivare ad un più arcigno e vessatorio Basilea 3 nel 2012. Si tratta di accordi internazionali vincolanti per gli istituti di credito dell’Unione che fissano gli indici di capitalizzazione (il denaro stipato nelle casseforti), oltre che criteri patrimoniali per distinguere i clienti in base alla loro “rischiosità” (in soldoni, sono quegli odiosi paletti in ottemperanza dei quali la banca, a cui poniamo si rivolga un giovane che voglia intraprendere un’attività imprenditoriale, rifiuta il finanziamento per mancanza di garanzie sufficienti, e tali non sono mai, a meno che uno non voglia ipotecarsi la casa). L’aggiornamento dell’intesa di Basilea imporrà al sistema bancario italiano pesanti conseguenze: in pratica dovrà rifinanziarsi su vasta scala. I metodi sono due: o far man bassa di capitali (svariati miliardi) non si capisce bene dove e come, vista la stagnazione dovuta alla crisi; oppure dare un ulteriore, drastico taglio agli impieghi, cioè ai quattrini prestati alle imprese. Nel primo come nel secondo caso, un’altra stretta al credito. Cioè l’ennesima spinta alla recessione che ha gettato sul lastrico milioni di famiglie. Significativo, nella sua algida crudeltà, il commento del presidente di Bankitalia, Mario Draghi: *«Basilea 3 richiederà adeguamenti non trascurabili alle banche italiane»*. Un eufemismo per dire che lo strozzinaggio finanziario delle piccole e medie aziende si aggraverà, trascinando con sé altra disoccupazione, altra disperazione, altri lutti. In Francia e Germania, avverte nell’ultimo numero il direttore di Repubblica-Affari&Finanza, Massimo Giannini, i governi stanno correndo ai ripari, presumibilmente mettendo in cantiere fondi statali. Non passa neanche per l’anticamera del cervello, alla sinistra a libro paga di De Benedetti e dei fondi Soros e Carlyle, che la via d’uscita sarebbe farla finita con questa Europa che sigla pezzi di carta col potenziale distruttivo di una guerra civile: lassù, i tecnocrati del capitale superiore a ogni legge e ad ogni popolo; quaggiù, nel mondo reale, i comuni mortali che subiscono decisioni da cui sono esclusi ma di cui patiscono gli effetti fino all’ultima goccia di sudore. E a volte, come per i tristi suicidi di lavoratori e padroncini, anche di sangue. *Alessio Mannino* Ulteriore stretta del credito in arrivo come fanno a chiedere più di così le banche italiane, se non hai reddito fisso manco entri in banca, se chiedi 1 in prestito devi dare 100 in garanzia.. http://www.comedonchisciotte.org/site/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=23178&start=0&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=

Dimostrazioni di massa in Thailandia contro il governo fantoccio

19 marzo 2010 (MoviSol) - L'opposizione all'attuale governo thailandese, sostenuto dai militari e sponsorizzato dai britannici, ha organizzato massicce dimostrazioni pacifiche il 13 marzo. Centinaia di migliaia di "camicie rosse" hanno marciato tra i posti di blocco dell'esercito dispiegato in massa attorno a Bangkok, e il giorno dopo almeno 100.000 di essi hanno partecipato alla manifestazione. Le loro rivendicazioni sono semplici: il governo del Primo ministro Abhisit Vejjajiva deve dimettersi e indire nuove elezioni, perché è illegittimo e ha mantenuto le strutture economiche e politiche illegali imposte alla Thailandia sotto la giunta militare che condusse il golpe contro il Premier Thaksin Shinawatra nel 2006.

Nonostante il nome, la protesta non va confusa con le tipiche "rivoluzioni colorate" di George Soros. Importanti correnti del movimento sono contrarie alle politiche neoliberiste del governo. Esse hanno anche espulso dalla manifestazione un gruppo anarchico chiamato Red Siam, definendolo provocatore.

Il comandante dell'esercito, Anupong Paochinda, sarebbe riluttante a ricorrere all'uso della forza. Tuttavia, secondo Thaksin, il suo vice, Prayuth Chan-ocha, si starebbe preparando ad una repressione. Sembra però difficile che l'esercito seguirebbe gli ordini di sparare sulla folla pacifica. Anzi, alcune decine di alti ufficiali in congedo si sono uniti al partito che appoggia il Premier deposto Thaksin, attualmente guidato dal generale Chavalit Yongchaiyuth, che fu anche Primo ministro nel 1996-97.

La situazione rimane molto tesa. Il gen. Prem Tinsulanonda, capo del Consiglio privato del re, è riconosciuto ampiamente come la figura dietro il golpe e le successive mosse verso una dittatura militare monarchista. Egli si è insediato al quartier generale dell'esercito e sarebbe incline a ordinare movimenti di truppe per conto dei suoi controllori reali (più quelli di Londra che quelli di Bangkok).

Alcune fonti hanno confidato all'EIR che l'ambasciatore britannico Quinton Quayle si è consultato con Prem quasi quotidianamente. Il Premier Abhisit e il suo ministro del Tesoro Korn Chatikavanij sono nati entrambi a Londra e hanno studiato ad Oxford. Korn ha lavorato per SG Warburg e JP Morgan.

http://www.movisol.org/10news055.htm

Comunque vada, saranno guai

Thursday, 18 March, 2010

in Economia & Mercato, Unione Europea

Altro giorno, altro atto della tragedia greca, che sta volgendo rapidamente in farsa. Il premier George Papandreou si è messo in testa, non è chiaro per quale motivo, che il suo paese deve potersi indebitare ad un non meglio identificato “tasso normale” europeo, altrimenti il costo del nuovo indebitamento finirà col rendere vano ogni sforzo di risanamento.

Questa è una mezza verità, nel senso che la seconda parte della proposizione è innegabilmente vera. Il problema sta nella prima parte: per quale motivo un paese che ha delle metriche di debito e (soprattutto) di crescita così disastrate dovrebbe essere premiato dal mercato con un tasso “normale”, ammesso e non concesso di capire che diavolo sia un tasso normale? Questo è il punto della questione, l’unico. La manovra greca è fortemente recessiva, e non potrebbe essere altrimenti. Ma oltre al risanamento serve la crescita, altrimenti il rischio di credito resta e si aggrava, e da quello deriva il costo del debito. Purtroppo, la Grecia non pare disporre né di armi né di munizioni per sostenere la crescita (leggasi competitività), dopo che gli anni della ubriacatura di consumi a credito hanno coinciso (sono correlati, in realtà) con un andamento esplosivo del costo del lavoro per unità di prodotto.

A questo punto, Papandreou segue la sua strategia lunare: non ci servono aiuti, dice alla Ue, ma se non ci date aiuti ci rivolgeremo al Fondo Monetario Internazionale. Ora, poiché i greci minacciano di ricorrere alla stessa struttura a cui, secondo i tedeschi, dovrebbero rivolgersi, resta da capire chi sta bluffando, e su quali basi. L’Ue traccheggia, i tedeschi ripetono ogni giorno, dai più disparati pulpiti, che i paesi che non risanano devono esser espulsi dall’euro (ne resterà uno solo, in quel caso, e forse neppure quello), ed i mercati stanno tornando ad innervosirsi, dopo essersi resi conto che non esiste alcun “piano europeo”, ma solo un astuto (si fa per dire) tentativo di infinocchiare i mercati medesimi, ribattezzato “ambiguità costruttiva” (sic), il cui beneficio si è ormai esaurito, come dimostra anche la ripresa dell’allargamento degli spread sulla Grecia, sia in credit default swap che sul governativo tedesco. Nel frattempo, prosegue la caccia alle streghe della speculazione. Per la serie “quattro passi nel delirio”, è oggi il turno del ministro tedesco delle Finanze, Wolfgang Schaeuble, che ha proposto al Bundestag di utilizzare i servizi segreti per scoprire chi sta cospirando contro la moneta unica europea. Dove si dimostra che il passo dall’euro alla neuro è assai breve. Qualcuno ha fatto presente ai tedeschi che un euro più debole non sarebbe poi così male?

L’economia e i mercati hanno questo, di bello: non si riesce ad ingannarli, se non per brevi periodi. Noi restiamo della nostra opinione: le probabilità che la Grecia vada in default non sono diminuite, anzi. Paradossalmente (ma non troppo), dopo la prima manovra di rientro sono aumentate.

  • Sul tema, leggasi anche Oscar Giannino, che riprende il tema-chiave di queste settimane: i tedeschi che non riescono a capire che un surplus è un deficit visto allo specchio, e che stanno deflazionando l’intera Europa. In questo quadro l’Italia appare la vera vittima della politica economica tedesca, a causa del nostro immobilismo, inteso come assenza di riforme per rilanciare crescita, produttività e competitività. Ma questa non è una notizia.
http://phastidio.net/

What the 1929 crash tells us about stocks today

By Dominic Frisby Mar 18, 2010

Dominic Frisby

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Wall Street & New York Stock Exchange, 1929 © Time Life  Pictures/Getty Images

It's 1929 all over again

I was lucky enough to hear a presentation last week by Tony Plummer of Helmsman Economics on the psychology of market patterns and cycles. Tony has kindly sent me some of his charts. I'm going to look at them in today's Money Morning.

'Those who cannot remember the past,' wrote the Spanish philosopher George Santayana, 'are condemned to repeat it'. Judging by historical patterns, it seems investors are a forgetful bunch.

It really is astonishing how history repeats. Humans just go on making the same mistakes.

On the one hand, it's a shame that we don't seem capable of learning. But on the other, it means that smart investors can take cues from the past to get some idea of what might happen in the future…

People make the same mistakes time after time

Let's start with perhaps the most famous stock chart in history. You've probably seen it many times before in one form or another. It's the Dow Jones index through the boom of the 1920s, the bust of 1929 and the Depression of the '30s.

Fast forward half a century and cross to the other side of the planet – it doesn't make any difference, man goes on making the same mistakes. You can't stop him. The chart below shows the boom and bust of the '80s and '90s in Japan (the red line) superimposed on the Wall Street Crash (the black line).

The side axes are slightly manipulated, with Wall Street measured from 50 to 400 and the Nikkei from 500 to 4,500. But even so, the similarities are quite remarkable. Of particular note is the similarity in the duration of each boom and bust. Even the bear market rallies to 1936 and 1996 correspond.

One major difference is that the panic low in Japan of 1992 was higher than the Dow's in early 1932. Not that it would have felt that way to the Japanese. It's also worth noting that 20 years on, in 2008/09, the Nikkei was sinking to new lows.

That's very different to the Dow's experience. Twenty years after 1930, the highs of 1929 still hadn't been revisited, but the Dow was in a clear uptrend. The Depression was over.


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Why Japan's crash should worry the West

Modern Western policy-makers, take note. Japan's policy of interventionist economics created all sorts of mal-investment, from zombie banks to roads to nowhere. Rather than helping matters, it only delayed the inevitable, dragging out the bear market almost beyond belief.

The 2008/09 lows in the Nikkei at 7,000 (and there's no guarantee it won't go lower still) could have been reached a lot sooner, if only policy makers hadn't intervened to prop up a market which needed flushing out. How much better would it have been for Japan had the authorities just left the market alone?

Now we superimpose the dotcom boom-bust on the Wall Street Crash. The side axes are on slightly different scales again, with the DJIA from 50 to 400 and the Nasdaq from below 1,000 to 6,000. The similarities are again remarkable, right up the secondary crash of 2007/08 and 1936/37.

In fact these two are so similar, I'll make a prediction for you. Just as the 1937 low on Wall Street was retested in the early 1940s, I believe that the Nasdaq lows of 2008-9 – and with them the lows of the Dow and S&P 500 – will be retested within the next three or four years. But if Western policy-makers continue to follow the Japanese bail-out model, it'll take longer before we get the retest.

... and don't forget China's bubble

Meanwhile, for all the excitement about China saving the global economy, it's forgotten that China's stock market too enjoyed a speculative bubble. It peaked in 2007. Here it is, superimposed on Wall Street. (The side axes are slightly different again: DJIA as always 50 to 400; Shanghai Composite from 1,000 to 7,000)

Again the boom-bust has the same anatomy. The coming years will reveal whether the Chinese stock market will continue to play out like Wall Street in the 1930s. But for now we're on track. China's bounce out of the crash has happened faster than Wall Street in 1929. But we're now at levels where you might expect it to peter out.

Yes, these charts are slightly manipulated on the side axes, but, in terms of duration, the repeating patterns are uncanny. Human psychology doesn't change. Man will go on experiencing greed, fear, and every other emotion that afflicts investors and market traders. It's one reason it pays as an investor to think for yourself, rather than follow the crowd.

So where are we today?

But where do these repeating patterns say we are in the grand scheme of things today? Assuming that the Nasdaq will continue to track the other major indices, such as the FTSE, the Dow and the S&P 500; and assuming that it continues to follow the old Wall Street model above, we can look to Wall Street in the late 1930s for clues. The Nasdaq, just as Wall Street did in 1937/38, has just bounced after its secondary crash. That model suggests – to my surprise, I admit – that there may be a little more upside left in this rally before the market turns and the lows of last year are retested.

Nevertheless I remain of the mind that the economic house has not been properly put in order; nor has the system been flushed out. I would, therefore, argue that though the upward trend is currently our friend, the greater risk is to the downside.

Another well-known cycle also suggests that the lows for the year lie ahead - the four-year presidential cycle. I'll be looking at this – and what it means for stocks in 2010 - in more depth next week.

Our recommended article for today

How small-cap shares beat traditional stocks

Over the last half-century, small-cap stocks outperformed traditional shares by over 3% a year. And recently, small-cap shares led the bounce back from the market crash. Here, Tom Bulford explains the wealth-generating potential of small company shares.

http://www.thedailybell.com/897/Newsweek-US-in-Terminal-Decline.html

Newsweek: US in Terminal Decline

Thursday, March 18, 2010 - by Staff Report

Call it America's Age of Angst. The buzz of negativity seems to be everywhere. DECLINE AND FALL: WHEN THE AMERICAN EMPIRE GOES, IT IS LIKELY TO GO QUICKLY reads the cover headline for British historian Niall Ferguson's article in the current issue of Foreign Affairs. Faced with an unemployment rate near 10 percent, a ballooning deficit, and a grueling partisan battle over health-care reform, both President Barack Obama and his Republican critics in Congress are complaining loudly about the government's inability to get things done. In the meantime, there's a growing sense that others—here, China is always first on the list—are steadily chipping away at America's leadership position in the world. The messages from the White House are somewhat schizophrenic. In his State of the Union Message, Obama expressed frustration about the gridlock in Washington. ... While claiming that he will not accept second place for the United States, he made it sound like that's where the country is heading if it doesn't change course. Vice President Joe Biden, who is dependably blunt, echoed that sentiment, charging that "Washington right now is broken." But in an interview with Washington Post columnist E. J. Dionne, he also lashed out at the "ridiculous" talk of America's decline. "Give me a break," he complained. ... But this time, the anxiety seems like more than a feeling. It is more deeply rooted in concerns about long-term trends, and warning lights are flashing in several places. It's harder now to shrug off the America-in-decline theories than ever before. – Newsweek

Dominant Social Theme: Not much to do but mourn.

Free-Market Analysis: As a newspaper devoted to analyzing dominant social themes, the Daily Bell occasionally turns to Newsweek to mine some of the best promotional presentations available. Newsweek, long affiliated with the Washington Post – the crown jewel of establishment newspapers – never misses the opportunity to offer up elite memes with confident and robust prose. This article, commenting on an article in Foreign Affairs no less (perhaps the journal that stands at the forefront of elite promotional reporting), offers up all the expected talking points and then some. In fact, the idea of the US as a country/empire in terminal decline is itself a dominant social theme, in our opinion.

Why would the Anglo-American power elite want to convince Americans that their country is on the way down? Because the elite is apparently after global consolidation and if Americans are convinced that the US is finished, they may be more amenable to joining forces with, say, Canada and Mexico in a super-state. This sounds strange to some, but remember, please, that the Bush administration, a so-called conservative administration, attempted basically to begin a merger of America and Mexico by legislative means only a few years ago. In Texas, Republican Governor Rick Perry spent a good deal of time in the mid-2000s trying to push forward a trans-continental superhighway between Mexico and Canada that would have cut America in two.

This Newsweek article, in any case, makes plenty of promotional points. It presents the case that America is going down, that nothing much can be done about it, that America's fate is basically the fate of all empires and that in any event, the lifecycle of nations is similar to the lifecycle of, say, trees – they grow to the sky and then eventually they die and tumble to earth. Here's some more from the article:

In his Foreign Affairs article, Ferguson points to two of the most troubling trends. According to one projection by the Congressional Budget Office, America's public debt could skyrocket from 44 percent of GDP before the 2008 financial crisis to 716 percent in 2080. If legislative reforms don't expand the size of government, the CBO dials the projection back to 280 percent. Hardly reassuring either way. As are the projections Ferguson cites about China's GDP overtaking U.S. GDP by either 2027 or 2040, depending on which calculation you choose. And India, he notes, is projected to overtake the U.S. in 2050.

The opinion pages are full of self-flagellation and unflattering comparisons. New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman described walking through Los Angeles International Airport and noticing how shoddy it looks, despite periodic attempts to cover up its aging. "In some ways LAX is us," he wrote. "We are the United States of Deferred Maintenance. China is the People's Republic of Deferred Gratification. They save, invest and build. We spend, borrow and patch."

Even in the high-tech fields where America has traditionally led the way things seem grim—especially regarding government institutions and infrastructure. "The United States is fighting a cyber-war today, and we are losing. It's that simple," warned Mike McConnell, President Bush's director of national intelligence, in The Washington Post. "As the most wired nation on Earth, we offer the most targets of significance, yet our cyber- defenses are woefully lacking."

There's plenty of anecdotal evidence of America's shortening shadow, too. The EastWest Institute, my current employer, holds a Worldwide Security Conference in Brussels every winter. In 2009, almost every session was dominated by speculation about what the Obama administration would do. This year, discussions on major topics like Afghanistan and cybersecurity included mentions of the United States, of course, but frequently the focus was on regional players with little reference to Washington at all. The group seemed simply to understand that Obama is too preoccupied with domestic problems to deliver on his earlier promises of intensive international engagement.

There's even something in the air. Malcolm Beith, a former NEWSWEEK colleague who holds dual British and American citizenship, dropped in on me recently. After a long stint in New York, he spent the last couple of years in Mexico City as the editor of a local English-language newspaper. "New York reminds me much more of London now," he observed. "It seems humbled." Humbled by the financial crisis and, perhaps, and by the sense that it no longer is quite as much the center of the universe as most New Yorkers like to imagine.

Ugh ... The above contains all the logical fallacies we are used to associating with the mainstream press, especially in support of the power elite's dominant social themes.

To begin with there are citations of America's soaring debt. Well who on earth is responsible for it? Average Americans? Not likely. The debt is the result of out-of-control spending by the federal government at the behest of both political parties - and in service of a corrupt ruling class, in our estimation.

Then there is the mention of the Los Angeles airport. Of course it's increasingly shoddy looking. It's owned by the city of LA and both the city and state are broke. There's another reason: the federal government is making air-travel as difficult as possible in pursuit of the mirage of absolute passenger safety, and facilities often reflect the commercial state of the larger businesses that they support. Cities do, too. Take a look at Detroit, where they are considering turning large parts of the municipality into wilds.

There's the meretricious comment by Friedman that the Chinese "save" while Americans "spend." Not so. Left to their own devices, people mostly take care of themselves. They organize community structures to take care of the poor and religious institutions to enforce morality through shame-based mechanisms. There is no difference, in this regard, between Chinese and American people. America is simply at a more advanced stage of decrepitude because its elites have had more time to be destructive.

The article mentions high tech, and then points out that America is no longer a leader here because it is losing the cyber security race. Well, here's hoping that the cyber-security "race" is thoroughly fumbled. Let the Chinese and Russian governments move ahead aggressively with government programs to secure their networks. Soon the people using those networks will find that the security is a poisoned chalice, aimed not at protecting then from overseas enemies but at restricting THEIR access to the Internet. If security is necessary, trust the private sector to find a solution. It would – but that's probably the last thing the US military industrial complex wants the public to realize.

In a recent conference, both "Washington" and Barack Obama received short shrift. Again, Newsweek sees this as a negative, but we don't. For us this is a positive development, certainly from a free-market standpoint. The less meddling the world's number one meddler does, the less wars, regulatory turf fights and other kinds of misery are likely inflicted on innocent parts of the globe. America was founded on the Jeffersonian concept of trading with overseas partners, not interfering militarily or in other ways but those precepts seem to have been discarded.

Basically, the problem with this Newsweek article, like the Foreign Affairs article it is promoting, is that it conflates individual human action with the actions and prestige of the nation state. Like certain talk show hosts and politicians that like to address "America," ("Hey, America, thanks for watching/caring!") the article muddles individual human beings with the real-estate upon which they reside. While an argument can be made for individual culture and idiosyncratic regional identifiers, one wonders at this point how much is truly left in America that is genuine, original and market-based. Much of America, the nation-state, is corporate oriented and so restrained by regulatory democracy that it has been deformed beyond recognition.

Yes, perhaps there is an America beyond what Newsweek describes, but it exists in gray markets beyond the reach of government, in whispered conversations where people gather to question what cannot be spoken out loud anymore – the bloody waste of endless, serial, overseas warfare, the problems with the 9/11 official story, the difficulties with the economy and increasingly worthless fiat money, the lack of jobs, the political corruption and tax gouging, etc.

Conclusion: America needs honest money – gold and silver – and a return to an entrepreneurial culture. Discontinue public schooling and cut the school year back so children can learn skills at home and via community involvement. Pare back government involvement and state media interference so people understand that it is their own human action that builds their futures not government actions. Generally reduce government's heavy hand as much as possible and make it more difficult for the power elite to use the color of government authority to achieve their own mercantilist goals. Then watch the rebirth of America. The empire may fail. But that doesn't mean the average human being has to.

Forward or Crash

Automatic Earth

There may be no better example to express our upcoming reality than the fact that the Bank of England simultaneously 1) begins to roll down quantitative easing measures (by lowering or even halting its government bond purchases), and 2) warns the British population that living standards are about to take a major hit. In the US, the Federal Reserve is about to quit buying up mortgage-backed securities (all $1.25 trillion of which were steeped in insanity, if you ask me, just watch what happens next), but it hasn't issued a similar austerity warning. It’s probably just less politically palatable in America to say these things; and that's the only difference. There are suggestions floating out there that private capital is ready to jump back into the MBS market. Makes you wonder what all that capital has been waiting for. It's impossible from where I'm sitting to be sure what plans, if any, exist to prop up the housing finance markets once the Fed retreats, and there's no way I’d ne surprised to see more of the same -flavor of- insanity. Are we going to see Fannie and Freddie sit on their own securities? Remember, they have a bottomless mandate since Christmas Eve 2009. Will the Federal Home Loan Banks step in? That would certainly add another -and higher- level of insanity to the mix. The reason I use the word insane is that it's been clear from the get-go that home prices supported -only- by taxpayer money are doomed to crumble; the only things achieved by the Fed's $1.25 trillion purchases are a temporary delay in home price plunges, and another giant transfer of bank and lender losses to the state (re: the population). If only for this reason the Fed would do well to warn the American people that hard times are a-coming. Tim Geithner and Christina Romer tried to paint another rosy economic picture in front of the House Appropriations Committee ("there's progress, though it's challenging"), but even their own fellow Democrats don't buy into it anymore. American politics as a system has ceased to function, because the system has gone from representing people to representing money. And that is something that can only go well as long as the people have at least some of that money. Now that they're increasingly shut out, the system shuts down; it's inevitable. Which is why even rating agency Moody's comes with an at first glance curious warning: even the credit raters now predict pitchforks. We've seen tear gas in Athens recently, and that was just a little taste. As you may know, I’m spending some time in France right now, and it's not hard to predict what will happen here if and when the government starts slashing salaries (as it must soon). The French simply won't understand what's happening, and mass protests will be the result, some peaceful, some violent. It’s every democratic politician's ultimate conundrum: if you don’t tell people the truth, they'll turn against you down the line; if you do tell them, they'll turn against you right away. That makes it obvious to figure out which politicians actually do get elected. Where the government is left, it will swing right, and vice versa, in ever more extreme denominations. And yet, it's all just a prologue. There's nothing easier for politicians than to play people against each other, in order to divert -negative- attention away from themselves. And so they will. We have a baby boomer generation that has just about all the money that's left in our societies. Their children, though, have nothing. Except for some hand-outs from their parents (I’m not talking individuals here). Unemployment among young people in many countries is downright scary, often in the 40%-50% range. No jobs, no money, no prospects. In times and places throughout history, this has brought populist dictators to the foreground, and pitchforks and torches into the streets, and there is no reason why it won't now. Today's political power is firmly in the hands of the 40-year and older crowd; they have elected incumbent politicians, and more importantly, they have the money and thus the power. The younger generation has no money and no power, but they also have nothing left to lose. That is a dangerous combination, and how we deal with it will be what decides our futures. Our societies, already barely able to survive current debt and deficit loads, are slowly -though increasingly faster- being eaten up by the monster of unfunded liabilities: healthcare and pensions. Be it the US Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security varieties, or their European and Japanese counterparts, we're looking at ticking explosives counting down the hours, days and years. Down here at the Automatic Earth we've long said that nobody presently under 50 (and planning to retire at 65) will ever see a penny from pensions or government retirement plans (well, perhaps that one penny). The world's pension plans have lost fortunes in the 2008/9 crash, and they will lose more going forward (they're playing double or nothing now to make up the losses). Your private pensions have entered the casino, and they ain’t never coming out again. Government obligations will not be honored, because the younger generation must and will at some time take over, through elections or otherwise, and vote themselves (again, through elections or otherwise) an ever bigger piece of the pie. And the pie will have gotten a lot smaller to boot. If time is money, and money is power, than time will be power too at some point: the young have the final advantage. Most people are far too complacent when it comes to the consequences of a shrinking economic system. Many claim that we can easily downsize to smaller homes and smaller lives, since there's so much we don't really need anyway, that we will move in together and return to "good" conversations, growing our own tomatoes and all that. But that's just not going to happen voluntarily, not on a large and wide scale. The human mind has no reverse. It doesn't even have a steering wheel. We are built for one of two things: go forward or crash. It looks like there's no forward left before a major crash happens first. It also looks like there's not a whole lot of people who realize this.

theautomaticearth.blogspot.com

Carte Blanche for the Banksters

Mike Whitney

The Next Big Bailout "Any Day Now"

Housing is still on the rocks and prices are headed lower. Master illusionist Ben Bernanke has managed to engineer a modest 7-month uptick in sales, but the fairydust is set to wear off later this month when the Fed stops purchasing mortgage-backed securities (MBS). When the program ends, long-term interest rates will creep higher and sales will begin to flag. The objective of Bernanke's $1.25 trillion quantitative easing program was to transfer the banks’ toxic assets onto the Fed's balance sheet. Having achieved that goal, Bernanke will now have to find a way to unload those same assets onto the public. Freddie and Fannie, which have already been used as a government-backed off-balance-sheet dumping ground, appear to be the most likely candidates.

Bernanke's liquidity injections have helped to buoy stock prices and stabilize housing, but the economy is still weak. There's just too much inventory and too few buyers. Now that the Fed is withdrawing its support, matters will only get worse.

Of course, that hasn't stopped the folks at Bloomberg News from cheerleading the "nascent" housing rebound. Here's a clip from Monday's column:

"The U.S. housing market is poised to withstand the removal of government and Federal Reserve stimulus programs and rebound later in the year, contributing to annual economic growth for the first time since 2006. Increases in jobs, credit and affordable homes will help offset the end of the Fed’s purchases of mortgage-backed securities this month and the expiration of a federal homebuyer tax credit in April. ‘The underlying trend is turning positive,’ said Bruce Kasman, chief economist at JPMorgan Chase & Co. in New York."

Just for the record; there have been no "increases in jobs". Unemployment is stuck at 9.7 percent with underemployment checking in at 16.8 percent. There's no chance of housing rebound until payrolls start to rise. Jobless people cannot afford to buy homes.

Also, while it is true that the federal homebuyer tax credit did cause a spike in home purchases its effect has been short-lived and sales are gradually returning to normal. It's generally believed that "cash for clunker-type" programs (like the homebuyer tax credit) merely move demand forward and have no meaningful long-term impact.

So, it's likely that housing prices - particularly on the higher end - will continue to fall until they return to their historic trend. (probably 10 to 15 per cent lower) That means more trouble for the banks which are already using all kinds of accounting flim-flam ("mark-to-fiction") to conceal the wretched condition of their balance sheets. Despite the surge in stock prices, the banks are drowning in the losses from their non-performing loans and toxic assets. At the same time, they're about to get hit by the next wave of Option ARMs and Alt-As resets which will require another $1 trillion in financing.

The Fed has indicated that it's finished helping the banks for the time being. Now it's Treasury's turn. Bernanke will keep the Fed funds rate at zero, but he is not going to expand the Fed's balance sheet anymore. Geithner understands this and is working frantically to put together the next bailout that will reduce the mortgage principal for underwater homeowners. But it's a thorny problem, because many of the borrowers have second liens which could amount to as much as $477 billion. That means that if the Treasury's mortgage-principal reduction plan is enacted; it could wipe out the banks. Here's an excerpt from an article in the Financial Times which explains it all:

"A group of investors in mortgage-backed bonds dubbed the Mortgage Investors Coalition (MIC) recently submitted to Congress a plan to overhaul the refinancing of underwater borrowers by writing down the principal balances of both first and second mortgages. The confederation of insurers, asset managers and hedge funds hope to break a logjam between Washington DC and the four megabanks with the most exposure to writedowns on second lien mortgages, including home equity lines of credit.

"The private sector initiative coincides with House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank’s open letter dated March 4 to the CEOs of the banks in question – Bank of America, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo – urging them to start forgiving principal on the second lien loans they hold.

But the banks are unlikely to take action until they get new accounting guidance from regulators that would ease the impact of such significant principal reductions on their capitalization ratios."

"Accounting guidance"? Either the banks are holding out for a bigger bailout or they want Treasury to approve looser accounting standards to conceal their losses from their shareholders. Either way, it's clear that they're trying to hammer out the best deal possible for themselves regardless of the costs to everyone else.

Financial Times again:

"The four banks in question collectively own more than $4 billion of the $1 trillion in second lien mortgages outstanding. BofA holds $149bn, Citi holds $54 billion, JP Morgan holds $101 billion and Wells Fargo holds $115 billion, according to fourth quarter 2009 10Q filings with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

"As proposed, the MIC’s plan entails haircuts to the first and second lien loans to reduce underwater borrowers’ loan to value ratios to 96.5 per cent of current real estate market prices, according to two sources.

"For the program to work, HAMP would place principal balance forgiveness first in the modification waterfall. The associated second lien would take a principal balance reduction but remain intact through the process - ultimately to be re-subordinated to the first lien, the sources said.

"A systemic program to modify second lien mortgages called 2MP does exist but Treasury has stalled on implementation because the banks that hold them can’t afford it, investors said. The sources all said implementation of the program, called 2MP, would result in ‘catastrophic’ losses for the nation’s four largest banks, which collectively hold more than $400 billion of the $1 trillion in second lien mortgages outstanding." ("Mortgage investors push for banks to write down second liens", Allison Pyburn, Financial Times)

Hold on a minute! Didn't Geithner just run bank "stress tests" last year to prove that the banks could withstand losses on second liens?

Yes. And the banks all passed with flying colors. So, why are the banks whining now about the potential for "catastrophic" losses if the plan goes forward? Either they were lying then or they're lying now; which is it?

According to the Financial Times the banks hold $400 billion in second lien mortgages. But -as Mike Konczal points out-the stress tests projected maximum losses of just "$68 billion. In other words, Geithner rigged the tests so the banks would pass. Now the banks want to have it both ways: They want people to think that they are solvent enough to pass a basic stress test, but they also want to be given another huge chunk of public money to cover their second liens. They want it all, and Geithner's trying to give it to them.

And don't believe the claptrap from Treasury that "they have no plan for mortgage principal reductions.” Baloney! According to the Financial Times:

"Treasury continues to tell investors that any day now they will be out with a final program and they will be signed up.... ‘The party line continues to be they are a week away, two weeks away,’ the hedge fund source said."

So, it's not a question of "if" there will be another bank bailout, but just "how big" that bailout will be. The banks clearly expect the taxpayer to foot the entire bill regardless of who was responsible for the losses.

So, let's summarize:

1-Bank bailout #1-$700 billion TARP which allowed the banks to continue operations after the repo and secondary markets froze-over from the putrid loans the banks were peddling to credulous investors.

2-Bank bailout #2-$1.25 trillion Quantitative Easing program which transferred banks toxic assets onto Fed's balance sheet (soon to be dumped on Fannie and Freddie) while rewarding the perpetrators of the biggest financial crackup in history.

3-Bank bailout #3-$1 trillion (or more) to cover all mortgage cramdowns, second liens, as well as any future liabilities including gym fees, energy drinks, double-tall nonfat mocha's, parking meters etc. ad infinitum. Basically, carte blanche for the banksters.

And as far as the banks taking "haircuts"? Forget about it! Banks don't take "haircuts". It looks bad on their quarterly reports and cuts into their bonuses. Taxpayers take haircuts, not banksters. Besides, that's what Geithner gets paid for-to make sure bigshot tycoons don't have to pay for their mistakes or bother with the niggling details of fleecing the little people.

The next big bailout is on the way. Be prepared.

Mike Whitney lives in Washington state. He can be reached at fergiewhitney@msn.com

www.counterpunch.org

Idaho's plan to downgrade the dollar

Andrew Leonard

A bill to allow citizens to pay their taxes with silver medallions gains support. Goldbugs are watching closely.

With only one state representative dissenting, the Idaho House State Affairs committee voted on Monday to endorse HB 633, a bill that would allow Idaho citizens to pay their state taxes with an official state silver medallion.

The news comes just a month after a South Carolina legislator introduced a bill seeking to ban Federal currency altogether, and replace the upstart greenback with gold or silver coins. A half-dozen other states have considered similar legislation, reports the Tenth Amendment Center. But there's a key difference between the Idaho plan and the bills proposed in other states, most of which fall somewhere on a spectrum ranging from Tea Party rage to Ron Paul goldbug-ism. (The South Carolina bill, for example, claims that "the State is experiencing an economic crisis of severe magnitude caused in large part by the unconstitutional substitution of Federal Reserve Notes for silver and gold coin as legal tender in this State.")

In contrast, the sponsor of the Idaho bill, Republican Phil Hart, seems to be marshalling wide support by crafting legislation that is straight out industrial policy aimed at boosting Idaho's silver industry. The text of the bill is quite clear.

The intent of this act is to use the abundant silver resources of the state of Idaho to create a means whereby the people of Idaho can pay their taxes to the state using silver mined from the ground of Idaho, processed in Idaho and finally minted into a medallion in Idaho. It is the intent of the Legislature to create mining jobs in Idaho while giving the people of Idaho a means to store their wealth in a precious metal that is immune from the effects of inflation while complying with the mandates of our federal Constitution.

The Idaho bill therefore incorporates tax incentives for silver processors located in Idaho.

From The Idaho Reporter:

That, Hart believes, could bring hundreds, if not thousands of jobs to the state. In conjunction with the creation of the medallion, Hart's bill would also try to lure silver processing companies to Idaho, and in particular, north Idaho, which, according to Hart, was once called "the silver capital of the world." The bill would give companies that come to Idaho to process silver for the medallion a 10-year exemption from income taxes, as well as property taxes. The exemption would be open for 20 years and would sunset after that period of time.

Hart believes one of the advantages of silver is that it would resist inflationary pressure better than paper money. But since states aren't allowed to mint their own money, the value of the silver medallion will have to fluctuate according to market forces. In just the last ten years, the value of an ounce of silver has zig-zagged between four and twenty dollars.

www.salon.com

Geithner other Treasury Officials Demand Secrecy at Public Briefing

Mac Slavo

Tim Geithner and other Treasury Department officials held a meeting for reporters and bloggers recently, but under one primary condition: the officials could not be quoted by media, but they could be paraphrased, but only if the official being paraphrased was not noted.

Bob Chapman writes:

Presently the Fed is fighting and pulling out all stops to halt legislation to audit the Federal Reserve, a private corporation, which has managed our monetary policy since 1913, under the Federal Reserve Act. On Monday the Treasury held a media conference for financial reporters and bloggers in which the Fed was discussed. The meeting had some very strange conditions. Mr. Geithner, Mr. Krueger and Mr. Sperling could be paraphrased but not quoted and what was paraphrased could not be connected to a specific official. Again, the element of secrecy to protect the guilty. One blogger said, "Did they get the ground rules from Al Qaeda?" The meeting was a travesty. How can government officials demand secrecy in public briefings? It is no wonder that 90% of the public and 317 members of Congress want more Treasury transparency and an audit and investigation of the Fed. This is the same gang run by Geithner and Bernanke that are currently running the gold suppression scheme. When you have a criminal cabal involved you have no transparency. That is why the audit of the Fed is so important. Such an exercise would expose exactly what both have been doing in the markets. The Fed and Treasury have lied for years about what they have been up too in behalf of their Illuminist friends. It is not only about the actions of the President's Working Group on Financial Markets, but the funding of Watergate, Saddam Hussein, who they supposedly conveniently hung, the countries that secretly received loans, how much, who got them and what was the collateral? Were currency swaps with foreign control banks used to strengthen the dollar by the Fed and for those foreign control banks to purchase Treasury and Agency paper? How about all the inside information funneled to Wall Street and banking for almost a century from both the Fed and Treasury? Their lies are legion. They both are manipulating every market in the world 24/7 and the American people want it stopped. We also want an audit of America's gold and the testing of the gold bars held. There is much we want to know, so we can save our country and our freedom.

This must be the transparency President Obama spoke about during his election run.

We hope for transparency at the Fed and Treasury and support any Congressional bills that may enact such laws.

However, we would suggest that if the Federal Reserve were to open their books for the world to see we could have a serious problem.

In fact, if the world were to find out what The Fed has been doing behind closed doors over the last several decades we could see a collapse of our entire financial, economic and political systems - we're talking TEOTWAWKI.

What if all our gold reserves are gone? What about the trillions in toxic assets? Credit swaps and currency manipulation?

In the unlikely event that a full transparency bill passes Congress, we suggest to our readers that they be prepared for the worst.

We're not convinced that any of the criminals in the higher echelons of decision making in our government institutions will ever see the inside of a prison cell, though we maintain hope.

Our entire system has been corrupted by scoundrels and sociopaths, so don't be surprised what we find on the other side.

It's isn't going to be pretty and every American is going to pay the price.

www.shtfplan.com

The Boredom Before the Storm (Time to Buy Volatility)

John Rubino

As eventful as the past few months have been (what with Greece, California, Illinois, Iran, the Lehman Brothers revelations, U.S./China trade friction, and record deficits just about everywhere), you'd think the financial markets would be agitated, to put it mildly. Instead, just about everything is range-bound, and the things that aren't, like U.S. stocks, are trending slowly, reassuringly, higher. This has taken the VIX, the main measure of fear (i.e. volatility) in the options market down to levels last seen before the 2008 crash.

Here's how today's Wall Street Journal puts it:

For the Dow, the Quietest 6-Day Streak

The U.S. Federal Reserve announced, as expected, that it would keep its key lending rate at virtually 0.00%.

Across stocks, bonds and commodities, the big swings of just a few weeks ago have evaporated, leaving markets to muddle between small gains and losses for most of March.

To date, there have been two days this month when the Dow Jones Industrial Average swung more than 100 points during the day. Even the Federal Reserve policy meeting on Tuesday couldn't incite much interest: The Dow did extend its winning streak to six sessions, but rose a modest 43.83 points, closing at 10685.98-adding just 133.46 points or 1.26% during the run.

Compare the calmness with February, which produced triple-digit intraday moves on 14 of 19 trading days, or January, which saw them on 11 of 19. The first four months of last year saw moves of more than 100 points every day.

The VIX index, a gauge of volatility, has dropped 9.3% this month and at 17.7 is a quarter of where it was a year ago. The Merrill Lynch Move index tracking Treasury options volatility last week hit its lowest level since July 2007. And crude-oil volatility is down to 33 from 40 on Feb. 5 and above 90 at the heart of the crisis.

While a calmer market may make for calmer investors, it is bad news for traders for whom big swings spell profit potential. "What you have now is a combination of people not having to do anything and people not knowing what they want to do," said Mike Shea, managing partner at brokerage firm Direct Access Partners.

The difference between now and February: Fears of a default by Greece have subsided and investors have become more sanguine about the economy. That might be boring-and unprofitable-for some, but it also may be a lull ahead of another move up for stocks, some traders said.

After February's turmoil, many aggressive sellers are tapped out, said Cleve Rueckert, a technical research analyst at Birinyi Associates.

"We're more in a place where the market is comfortable with prices," Mr. Rueckert said. "We're looking for stocks to coast moderately higher."

What does this mean? It means money managers are bored and complacent. They've been burned by betting on continued volatility of one kind or another, so they're pulling back and - as they generally do - extrapolating the recent past into the indefinite future.

This in turn means that all hell is about to break loose. Rising stocks and stable gold, oil, and interest rates are an impossible combination in a world with big and growing imbalances. Continued growth fueled by government borrowing and bailouts will send interest rates and gold up. A return to hard times (due to a housing downturn, California default, or failed debt auction?) will send stocks down. Something has to give in a big way. And when something has to happen, it eventually does.

So either today or very soon, the boredom will end and it will be time to go long volatility again.

dollarcollapse.com

Dal turbo-capitalismo al turbo-disordine

Verso la risorgenza delle contraddizioni interimperialistiche? di Moreno Pasquinelli Le due catastrofiche guerre mondiali ebbero come causa le “contraddizioni”, o meglio gli antagonismi “tra i briganti imperialistici”. Posta in palio: “il bottino della rapina ai danni dei popoli coloniali e semicoloniali”. L’esito della seconda guerra stravolse le consolidate dinamiche geo-politiche mondiali. L’emersione dell’URSS come grande potenza, la quale veniva accompagnata all’avanzata dei movimenti antimperialisti e operai su scala internazionale, costrinse le potenze imperialistiche, vincenti e perdenti, a mettere da parte i dissidi e fare causa comune per non soccombere. Continuare a combattersi era oramai un lusso che i “briganti” non potevano più permettersi. Avrebbero fatto la fine dei polli di Renzo.
Bretton Woods, il Piano Marshall, la fondazione della NATO. Avveniva un mutamento colossale della dialettica imperialistica. Si chiudeva la fase storica segnata dal peso centrale del conflitto interimperialistico, iniziava quella del connubio o sodalizio pan-imperialistico. Ma la Santa Alleanza non poteva che registrare la nuova gerarchia. Gli Stati Uniti erano il primus inter pares o, per essere categorici, erano la potenza super-imperialistica al cui cospetto gli alleati europei e giapponese agivano, non senza soffrirne, come meri sub-imperialismi. 1989-91. Il crollo dell’URSS e il suo smembramento, lo scioglimento del Comecon e del Patto di Varsavia erano la spettacolare conferma a posteriori della correttezza della “svolta strategica unionista” post-bellica. L’URSS è stata battuta grazie al passaggio dalla discordia inter-imperialistica all’unità pan-imperialistica e che questa unità si fosse consolidata sotto l’indiscussa supremazia americana. Ma questa storica vittoria sfociò in un parto gemellare che diede vita a due entità destinate ad entrare in rotta di collisione: il delirio di onnipotenza del super-imperialismo da una parte e, dall’altra, l’ambizione delle altre potenze imperialistiche ad emanciparsi dalla loro sudditanza o signoraggio. Il grande “balzo in avanti” (ma all’insegna del capitalismo) della Cina, le straordinarie difficoltà scontrate dall’espansionismo americano, ed infine il sopraggiungere della crisi storico-sistemica hanno prodotto serie e profonde fratture nella Santa Alleanza sorta dopo la guerra e riacceso la contesa, che sembrava sopita per sempre, interimperialistica. I fattori di discordia tra i “briganti”, in linea di tendenza, stanno prendendo il sopravvento su quella della concordia frontista. Il trentennio d’oro del turbo-capitalismo segnato dalla assoluta supremazia del capitalismo-finanziario-casinò rischia di degenerare in un generale turbo-disordine. Privi di una minaccia mortale davanti alla quale fare fronte comune e colpiti dalla crisi economica, i “briganti” hanno iniziato a bisticciare. Lo si può vedere dalle schermaglie crescenti di questi mesi, dalle divergenze sul come fare fronte alla crisi e sul come eventualmente venirne fuori. Nessuna cosiddetta “exit strategy” è neutrale, ognuna implica una scelta geopolitica-economica strategica, una determinata configurazione delle relazioni internazionali, ovvero una differente gerarchia e attribuzione di rango. Prendiamo ad esempio, notizia di questi giorni, lo scontro in atto sulle regole da introdurre nei mercati finanziari che, come detto, non sono più solo un’epifenomeno metafisico dell’economia “reale”, ma l’universo sistemico nel quale le diverse economie fisiche orbitano come satelliti attorno al sole gassoso della finanza speculativa. Un solco profondo divide gli europei continentali dagli USA e dalla loro filiale londinese. La UE vorrebbe approntare una direttiva sugli hedge fund, ovvero porre sotto controllo, se non proprio fare piazza pulita, quantomeno dei Credit default swap. L’asse transatlantico è entrato in fibrillazione. Gli inglesi, che per decenni si sono ingrassati grazie alla speculazione finanziaria, non ne vogliono sapere, nemmeno di regolare e porre sotto controllo politico il gioco d’azzardo dei derivati. Il Segretario al tesoro USA Timoty Geithner, che solo pochi mesi fa, sull’onda del big change obamiano tuonava fuoco e fiamme contro le grandi banche d’affari e i derivati, che «…non hanno eliminato il rischio. Non hanno posto fine alla tendenza dei mercati a crisi di follia e di panico. Non hanno eliminato la possibilità di fallimento di un qualunque grosso intermediario finanziario. E non hanno isolato il sistema finanziario dagli effetti di tale fallimento» (Vedi: L. Wolfe, «Collapse of carry trade would blow out financial system», Executive Intelligence Review, 10 marzo 2006); oggi, in pieno dietrofront, si erge a difensore degli hedge fund anglosassoni e accusa la UE, francesi in testa, di protezionismo, e di voler danneggiare gli interessi nordamericani. Questo accade mentre Moody’s fa aleggiare la minaccia di downgrading sul debito, niente di meno, che degli Usa e del Regno Unito. Altro che governance globale! siamo agli albori di un global clash. Nel frattempo il Congresso americano sta spingendo Obama a condannare come “manipolatore di valute” Wen Jiabao, il quale ha risposto ovviamente picche alla richiesta di apprezzare il Renminbi, la qual cosa sarebbe effettivamente un harakiri dal punto di vista cinese, mentre la Casa Bianca non fa alcun passo verso la richiesta cinese di mettere ordine nel suo disastrato sistema finanziario e bancario (che fa coppia con quella europea di mettere fine al capitalismo-casinò dei derivati). La crisi incrina anche l’asse carolingio su cui fa perno l’Unione europea. Lo si vede nelle rimostranze francesi verso i tedeschi, accusati di dopare il loro export a danno degli altri soci europei. Ma le tensioni franco-tedesche in seno all’Eurogruppo si stanno facendo serie sull’’idea tedesca della costituzione di un Fondo Monetario Europeo (FME), temuta da Parigi perché nasconde la possibilità di far uscire dall’euro i meno virtuosi, ciò pur di mantenere l’egemonia del Marco sotto mentite spoglie (Euro). E qui veniamo al dissenso nell’approccio alla gravissima crisi greca. Dopo mesi di incontri e roboanti proclami, resta che una soluzione europea concordata non viene fuori. Nessuna traccia del “Piano di salvataggio”. Anzi! resta che il soccorso europeo ad Atene se ci sarà, verrà solo se Papandreu venisse bloccato o travolto dalla protesta popolare e non riuscisse a promuovere nuove misure d’austerità (poiché è chiaro che quelle adottate sono solo un antipasto: la Grecia tra rimborsi di titoli di stato in scadenza, interessi sul debito e deficit deve raccogliere circa 55 miliardi di euro pari al 20% del Pil). Non tutti sono d’accordo con la Merkel, che è disposta a sacrificare la Grecia sull’altare dell’egemonia e degli interessi tedeschi. Curiosa la posizione tedesca. La Germania non è solo il primo paese esportatore in Grecia, è anche il primo detentore dei titoli di Atene, ovvero il primo a perdere in caso di default del paese balcanico. Malgrado questo la Merkel, che sostiene Papandreu come la corda l’impiccato, dice di essere disposta ad aiutare Atene solo a patto che l’eventuale prestito (20 o 50 milioni?) sia erogato da tutti i 27 Stati membri della Ue o, come minimo, dalla cerchia ristretta dei membri dell'Eurogruppo (e che il tasso d’interesse applicato alla Grecia… sia congruo). Tra i diversi effetti della sopraggiunta crisi c’è dunque la fine della fase in cui le potenze imperialistiche andavano d’amore e d’accordo sotto l’ombrello della supremazia americana. E la qual cosa non produce una spinta centripeta in Europa ma, ben al contrario, centrifuga. Dal turbo-capitalismo stiamo entrando nella fase agitata del turbo-disordine.