Archive - Jan 2015 - Story

"Socialists/Communists try desperately to paint capitalism as the benefit of the greedy rich. People see the bankers as manipulating government but this is not inherent in capitalism, that is the corruption that infects all republics. A republic always devolves into an oligarchy, which is not freedom and is not capitalism."

While talking heads and TV personalities reassure the investing public that low oil prices are "unambiguously awesome" for everyone, it seems the cracks in this narrative are starting to show. From falling wages, surging job cuts, plunging rig counts, and crashing capex, it's becoming a lot harder to 'pretend' that everything's fine. One wonders, when the companies themselves are slashing workweeks and cutting rig counts, when will 'investors' believe... perhaps now that Lynn Helms, Director of the North Dakota Department of Mineral Resources explains to the House Appropriations Committee that at least half of its shale regions are already below breakeven.

Just 13 short months ago - two months before then President Yanukovich was ousted - Russia lent Ukraine $3 billion (by buying their Eurobonds). As Reuters reports, the terms of that loan included a condition that Ukraine's total state debt should not exceed 60% of its GDP. As of last month, based on Moody's estimates, Ukraine has violated that condition with a debt-to-GDP of 72% (and will likely rise to 85% of GDP in 2015).. and so, according to Russian finance minister Anton Siluanov, "Russia has the right to demand early return of this loan." With European aid 'contingent on major reforms' and possibly taking up to 1 year, this leaves the good old IMF (i.e. the US and European taxpayer) to bridge Ukraine's 'gap' and ironically bailout Russia.

After four-and-a-half years, we wound up back where we started.

... things like a 50%+ drop in oil prices happen. Which at some point will lead more people to wonder what the real numbers are. For emerging nations, those numbers will not be pretty for 2015. They’re going to feel like they’re being thrown right back into the Stone Age. And they’re not going to like that one bit, and look for ways to express their frustration. Volatility is not just on the rise in the world of finance. It also is in the real world that finance fails to reflect. At some point, the two will meet again, and Wall Street will mirror Main Street. It will make neither any happier. But it’ll be honest.

Why would the government want to punish people that are just trying to work hard, become more self-sufficient and take care of their families? If you use alternative methods to heat your home, or if you are not connected to the utility grid, or if you collect rainwater on your property, or if you believe that parents should have the ultimate say when it comes to health decisions for their children, you could become a target for overzealous government enforcers.

With three dead hostage-takers (and a female accomplice - Hayat Boumeddienne - still at large), four hostages dead, and four more severely wounded, France remains in shock at the events of the last few days. Here are the moments when the sieges ended...

"By adopting these resolutions, Congress can make 2015 the year America begins reversing the long, slow slide toward authoritarianism, empire, national bankruptcy, and economic decline..."

The pen is mightier than the sword... (and the totalitarian government and its propagandizing media outlets)...

For those of you not familiar with the giant con, it is the idea that our economy is growing when, in fact, it hasn’t had growth in decades with the exception of the late 1990?s.  The giant con is entirely a function of debt. The cost to the working class of falsify economic growth is beyond redemption.  In the end, the path is set and there is no escaping from the debt trap in which we snagged ourselves.  And so we bide our time until the weight of exponentially increasing debt collapses in on us.  But then we rebuild.

If it looks like a war, acts like a war and smells like a war, it may just be a war. The US has been waging economic, financial, trade, political and even kinetic war-by-proxy against Russia. The only question is why?

The short answer is in parts of Seattle, Charlotte, Phoenix, Atlanta, Tampa, Cincinnati, Raleigh, N.C., Houston, Denver, Columbus, Ohio, Sarasota-Bradenton, Fla., Raleigh, N.C., Chicago, and Winston-Salem, N.C. Among the 2,490 zip codes nationwide with at least one single family purchase by the top four institutional investors between January 2012 and October 2014, the top 50 zip codes with the highest percentage of purchases by the four largest institutional investors were in those metro areas. “The institutional investors kick-started the housing recovery by buying homes in bulk at the lowest point and holding them as rentals,” said Chris Pollinger, senior vice president of sales at First Team Real Estate, covering the Southern California market. Los Angeles County was among the top 10 for most purchases by institutional investors over the past three years, with 6,152. “As the market continues to climb, we expect these investors to start to sell off their inventory to capture the gains made in the past couple of years.”

As we recently noted, The Prison State of America is alive and well as our prison-industrial complex, which holds 2.3 million prisoners, or 25 percent of the world’s prison population, makes money by keeping prisons full. While the statistics are mind-boggling, we thought it particularly ironic that on the day when President Obama officially launched his "free community-college for all" plan, that we point out there are more jails than colleges in America... and here's where they live...

Because nothing says "recovery" like the record-breaking surges in sales of Rolls-Royce luxury vehicles juxtaposed by the highest level of auto loan delinquency since the 2008 crisis peak...

A month ago we discussed the influx of 'foreigners' to help the Ukraine government 'manage' the country. As UA Today reports, foreign appointments have become a key part of Ukraine's mission to reform its economy and crack down on corruption (and ensure American interests are taken care of?) and now boats 3 non-Ukrainian cabinet members. And now a 4th non-Ukrainian - Estonian Jaanika Merilo - will step up to the plate 'tasked with bringing more foreign investment into Ukraine and improving the country's business climate'. We suspect she will have some success...