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Europe Goes "Completely Mad" At Suggestion Of Irish Default Demanded By 57% Of Irish Population
Today the myth of a popular, democratic government in Ireland collapsed for good. After an impromptu poll of 500 people nationwide found that a "substantial majority" of the people, or 57%, wants the State to default on debts to bondholder, what it ended up getting was precisely the opposite. Why? "Last night that the Irish delegation
negotiating with the EU-IMF last week raised the issue of default. "The Europeans went completely mad," a senior government source said." Of course, this is a reason for the Europeans not to want an Irish default, not for the Irish. And last time we checked, the Irish government represented its people, not the interests of Brussels. As America showed all too well, we expect every banker in the world to threaten perpetual damnation for Ireland should they decide on doing what is right for its people (and so very wrong for another year of record banker bonuses). Then again, with elections in Ireland imminent, it is almost certain that there will be a massive popular overhaul of the government, and all bets at that point will be off whether the ECB can dictate terms to a brand new, and far more loyal, government. To quote to Independent: "In Dublin, there is barely concealed outrage at the interventions of Ms Merkel
and at the position adopted recently by the European Central Bank, which
precipitated the arrival of the EU-IMF team in Ireland."The ECB f**ked us," one government official in Dublin was reported
yesterday to have said." We wonder how soon before rhetoric finally shifts to action.
More from the Independent:
Asked if they agreed with a proposed €1 reduction of the minimum wage, 66 per cent said no, while 34 per cent said yes. Asked if they supported a proposed cut to child benefit, 60 per cent said no and 40 per cent said yes.
A proposed increase in third-level fees was rejected by 65 per cent and approved by 35 per cent. Asked if they agreed with a proposed reduction in tax relief on private pensions, 59 per cent said no and 41 per cent said yes.
The public was more evenly divided on the issue of broadening the tax net. Asked if they agreed that everybody who earned over €15,300 a year should be included, 52 per cent said no, while 48 per cent said yes. The proposed €100 property tax was rejected by 55 per cent, with 45 per cent in favour.
At this point what happens in Ireland in the grand scheme of things doesn't matter. Tomorrow all eyes will be on Portuguese bond spreads, Tuesday Spain, and Wednesday on Belgium and Italy.
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Just a point of information Crash: pretty much everyone runs a deficit- even China. You do not give your whole country as collateral for a loan at 7.25%. Default will not be fun, but last I checked, Iceland was still there.
Default Ireland. And everyone in the domino conga line.
default reduces the debt to 0 overnight. This also means that they don't have to continue to make payments on the debt (Principal and interest).
Your comment on the pensions is funny as the solution is to essential loot the pensions anyway. As far as the lending of money to buy oil, this may be true for the govt, but not for private companies in ireland. life will go on. there will be hardships either way though.
The situation here is that the quality of life will have to go down either way. The increases in the standard of living that they have seen in recent years wasn't real, but rather due financing the increase in social services. This is unsustainable and will have to go to it natural level. The real question here is whether the Irish should be made into servants for the next x years payoff the indulgance of the last decade.
This is the chief misconception that scares people into being irrational.
There is no need for the principal and cashflow to be zilch. There can be suspensions of coupon for a time. There can be explicit haircuts on principal.
Default is not the end of creditors. It is the price creditors pay for being wrong about credit risk. Creditors need to meet debtors to some extent. Failure to do this results in everyone losing much more.
They also pay 1.5 billion euros to the all holy EU as extortion-er- I mean, membership fees.
If they default, the EU might not want them in, anyway.
Yet it's inevitable. The only question is when to default.
IMO, the answer is now, before signing over the State's assets.
Holding a bunch of Irish paper in your portfolio, are you?
Pity.
running a deficit assumes debt. No Sovereign nation needs to run debt when trading in fiat money. Think about it for a second. Why is the ECB more capable of printing money and loaning it to the Irish government with interest than the Irish government itself? Perhaps if the EU was on a gold standard there would be a need for Ireland to borrow gold from the ECB to operate. But that is not the case. They are borrowing IMAGINARY money!!! It only exists as a function of the EU and as a way for the ECB to charge interest!
Ireland can easily default (like USSR, Argentina or Iceland), print their own currency and seek business deals with foreign companies. There is no need for a sovereign country to borrow fake money.
Strange game. The only way to win is not to play.
The only way to win is not to play.
And indeed, this quote from the WarGames movie is precisely correct, and exactly on point. To play these stupid bankster tricks is always and inherently self-destructive and STUPID.
And the game played by the gangster central banksters is indeed a WAR (but not a game).
Also, the phrase "easy come, easy go" comes to mind. The bankster predators create the money out of thin air (easy come), and when appropriately fed up people and governments have had enough, the debt goes right back where it came from (easy go).
That should be a new motto for governments and people alike to justify default on fiat, fake, fraud, fiction, fantasy contracts.
Easy come, easy go.
But the central key to this whole scheme is treason. Sell-out politicians taking bribes from foreigners who end up looting the nation. That's what the people with the pitchforks know
Oh, you should work for homeland security... the folks that claim we should be terrified and terrorized at any "horror", no matter how contrived.
To default on the debits means... all the money being paid to service those debts, is now available to provide services. Gee, that sounds exactly like the OPPOSITE of what you said. Sure enough.
True, they would !!!hopefully!!! not be able to borrow further, which would reduce the inflow of funds, but that is healthy! That forces them to balance inflow with outflow, which is simply prudence and responsibility.
DEFAULT --- the wise move.
Kinda looks like 60 years does wipe memories clean when Germany will OWN Europe without firing ONE bullet. Let's see some VIOLENCE NOW because it's only a matter of time......
Germany and Japan can thank George Marshall and the American taxpayer.
hey Crash
And when you back out the interest on debt, just what is the deficit ?
Let me know when you plan on invading Ireland. Talk, pal, is cheap.
This Ponzi is getting heavy and unwieldy.
All of this reeks of EU retribution against Ireland for voting down the Lisbon treaty in 2008
If anything it's probably French animus at our tax rates. Apparently people in France genuinely believe that the 12.5% corp. tax and the IFSC are the sole bases of the Irish economy. That and some of the Irish airs and graces over the last few years before Lehman. Mostly I think it's just the sheer inconvenience and political awkwardness of coming up with a more just solution, though.
And come tell me Sean O'Farrell tell me why you hurry so
Husha buachaill hush and listen and his cheeks were all a glow
I bare orders from the captain get you ready quick and soon
For the pikes must be together by the rising of the moon
And come tell me Sean O'Farrell where the gath'rin is to be
At the old spot by the river quite well known to you and me
One more word for signal token whistle out the marchin' tune
With your pike upon your shoulder by the rising of the moon
By the rising of the moon, by the rising of the moon
With your pike upon your shoulder by the rising of the moon
Out from many a mud wall cabin eyes were watching through the night
Many a manly heart was beating for the blessed warning light
Murmurs rang along the valleys to the banshees lonely croon
And a thousand pikes were flashing by the rising of the moon
By the rising of the moon, by the rising of the moon
And a thousand pikes were flashing by the rising of the moon
All along that singing river that black mass of men was seen
High above their shining weapons flew their own beloved green
Death to every foe and traitor! Whistle out the marching tune
And hurrah, me boys, for freedom, 'tis the rising of the moon
'Tis the rising of the moon, 'tis the rising of the moon
And hurrah, me boys, for freedom, 'tis the rising of the moon
Aye!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIt9P9s0j-4
I find this a hard argument:
"The ECB fucked us"
You fucked you.
Bird flu stikes Italy:
birdflu.jpg
Should have a big Monday with this resolved and retail sales were up substantially over the weekend.
And we have no war games nonsense with N Korea that had everyone on edge. Looks like we kick off with another big gainer tomorrow.
Again, Harry, you are correct and will therefore get junked x 12.
I didn't go long Friday afternoon because I needed a peaceful 4-day weekend; but have 'watched' on this board and others like it, the anxiety of short positions growing and growing.
But at least they were right!
+1
Getting junked means the herd is hostile toward your view (indicating a high probability of it being reality)
OR, getting junked indicates a comment is COMPLETELY divorced from reality!
Check your premises.
don't you mean a half gainer? the water is so far away the dive might just be fatal.
Harry, you are the most optomistic person I think I have ever encountered. Not saying you are incorrect, today anything is possible, just..... maybe I was that positive when I was younger, truly can't remember. Age brings a load of cynicism along with wisdom (hopefully). I am afraid you may be wrong though.
Ignoring HFT robots in the market(s) doesn't make you optimistic, it makes you a denier-of-reality!
Retail sales didn't even climb despite $1.5 trillion in deficit spending this year. North Korea put missiles on launchpads today. Europe's willingness to pour $100 billion into the Irish black hole is confirmation that all european bank and sovereign debt is worth far less than 100 cents on the dollar.
I'm not smart enough to have an MBA, but I'm fairly confident that if trillions in senior/sovereign debt is worth less than par, the value of equity must decline substantially.
You don't need an education to know that the economy at large is not the stock market. The stock market leads the economy, as they say. No point looking in the rear view mirror for trading advice.
You probably haven't worked with many a MBA. Maybe it used to mean something, but these days an MBA is just a masters of bullshit and arrogance.
Monday's Double POMO won't hurt.
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/your-one-stop-guide-frontrunning-monday...
Yes, the double POMO should be a nice boost as well. People are giddy coming out of the weekend with nothing terrible happening.
I've been reading all your posts. I want to know who real Harry is? I've eliminated almost all possibilities and I came to conclusion that you are either:
1. graduate from special school who somehow found his way to this site, it demands some intellect, you know POMO's, interest rate and some terminology from financial and political sphere. It had to be Special Course Of Finances For Underprivileged
or
2. (my favorite) you just have fun giving all posters here some workout.
Don't really mean to join the "Harry Bashers" ZH club, but you're really out on a limb with this one, aren't you Harry!
Brian, Ben, and Tim's double POMO wouldn't have anything to do with your call would it now... oh I forgot, it's really the huge bump in retail sales over the weekend (is that you Mr. Liesman?). The truth, is a "massive" 0.5% increase over last year (one of the worst on record), but of course we'll only see the (meaningless) 15% increase in web buying for the day in the CNBS sound bites.
Good warmup for tomorrow though Steve (sorry 'bout that... Harry)!
That's funny Harry. The newspaper I picked up this morning says that black Friday sales numbers were lackluster.
Are you comparing the sales at the beginning of the holiday shopping season to the weeks before? If so, that's like noting a dramatic drop in fireworks sales in the second week of July compared to those of the first week.
it all comes back to the North Koreans and the Chinese.
Should just bomb the slapheads and their inbreed cousins off the planet.
Would make for some good carnage TV at least.
Default - Go for it,end the madness.
There is a place between outright default and having some loss on senior bank bonds. It is called burden sharing. The Irish people are carrying all of the load now and foreign banks and investors none of it.
I think we've just had a real world stress test of the European banking system and it has utterly failed it thus the ECB's insistance that no haircuts or even minor trims be given Irish bank debt.
What, are these investors children, they can't assess risk but take at face value everything a bank or government tells them? They deserve to be bankrupted if thats how they invest. Oh maybe the invested on the basis that sovereign defaults will be avoided because the IMF EU ECB mafia will guarantee a bailout.
You invest, the company goes bankrupt....too bad you lose.
Please default, Ireland... and everyone else.
Defaulting has 2 huge benefits.
First, all the money being spent to pay lenders stupid and corrupt enough to lend money to a government will be available for services.
Second, government will need to balance spending with income, because few will be willing to lend them money after the default. At least I hope so! :-o
Any Opposition politician a threat to the agreed bailout will be assassinated, simple as that. The IMF ECB EU mafia will protect their owners money and interest.
Ireland had the whip hand in this. The ECB IMF where petrified of their going bankrupt and the immediate melt down of the system if Ireland decided on bankruptcy. So what did they do with this strong bargaining position? Nothing. They rolled over like owned dogs and gave it all away.
Ireland could have set their own terms. They failed their people, and deliberately so. These politians must be owned. Check their bank balances in 5 years time.
As far as I can tell, ALL politicians have become predators upon the people who elect them. Elected by the masses, controlled by the predators-that-be.
The opposition will run and win on renegeing on the budget (if one passes) and reneging on the pledges to back up the banks.
This will scare the s*** out of the world and we will see major tumoil and unintended consequences like never imagined before.
Everything has to start someplace and Ireland just may be that place.
Exactly. And if the new leaders get "assassinated," the EU/IMF crowd had better find another world to live in.
I been calling this the Argentinification for many years now.
Just see Menem and De La Rua for all you need to know. They signed all the deals to make the nation of Argentina owned, and in several cases got CAUGHT with the suitcase with the money in it.
Where have all the Andrew Jacksons gone? You are a den of vipers and thieves. I intend to rout you out, and by the grace of the Eternal God, I will rout you out. It is to be regretted that the rich and powerful too often bend the acts of government to their own selfish purposes.
This guy was a true american patriot, like those before him. The love of money is the root of all evil.
So What Does a "Completely Mad" Euro-Trash Bankster Look Like Anyway?
Colonel Klink?
Yeah, I was kind of waiting for a banzay graphic on this one. ;-)
No, not Klink, he is way too stupid and not devious enough (Irish bankster). How about General der Infanterie Albert Hans "Hansy" Burkhalter?
Looks like it's time for another Boondock Saints sequel. Perhaps they travel back across the pond to Dublin, with a side trip to Brussels.
Harry "Hangin' Pork" Wanger:) What is your definition of SUBSTANTIAL? Are we talking "green shoots" again? That's so '09ish. There's an apocalypse coming and I'm truly afraid you might be blind-sided. As in collateral damage. Keep dreamin dude.
POLL: If Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain (or some country) totally defaulted on their debt, and wrote a foolproof "no government debt/deficits/borrowing" clause into their constitution, would you consider moving there, or investing in business there?
A: yes
B: no
The Greeks of antiquity had a method of legislating new law:
"Anyone wishing to propose a new law had to do so while standing on a public
platform with a rope around their neck. If the law was passed, the rope was
removed. If the law was voted down, the platform was removed."
That's not nearly severe enough!
For example, politicians today would simply propose a law that gives everyone voting on his law a big fat payment at the expense of everyone else. With the rampant stupidity and immorality present today, all such laws would pass, and we'd end up with exactly what we have today.
This post is dead on. The Irish taxpayers signed up for services based on the tax they pay. When the government triples the debt overnight by guaranteeing banks' debts no amount of rationale is going to make the taxpayer feel better.
The integration of banks into the day to day lives and costs of the average Joe (Mick) is a recipe for disaster. TBTF has not gone away. This bailout merely prolongs the agony.
Guys this is a win win situation. Either they will start rioting monday when they wake up from their drunken stuppor or if they dont maybe people wont be bragging about being a 1/3 Irish or other rediculous drivel around st patty's day.
If I read it right, I am probably caught in the same trap as the Irish bondholders who stand to get defaulted on.
You know, it's frustrating. You go to work and try to make a living, saving whatever's left over because that's the responsible thing to do. Meanwhile everyone from the MSM to ZH is screaming that Americans overconsume and don't save, while the big business parties howl about SS/MC being unsustainable and how we should all save for our own retirement a 2nd, 3rd, or 4th time.
But it's not like saving ever makes sense, is it? Interest rates for savers have been in the toilet for the last five years, in total disconnect from how high rates for borrowers have soared. When do you put money in this environment? Put it in stocks, you get killed by fraud. Put it into a business, you get taxed/regulated/feed to death. Put it in a bank, you lose to inflation. Put it in gold, it's still a risk in a manipulated market.
So, alot of people just spend it all on stuff and let someone else worry about eventual default. The especially stupid (like me) go into savings bonds because they have to do something with the money. And when the default hits, it won't be corporate holders of treasury bonds that get killed, it'll be the millions of Americans with stacks of I bonds.
Man, do I feel dumb for waiting until I could afford an HDTV to buy one...
"And last time we checked, the Irish government represented its people, not the interests of Brussels."
That's where you're dead wrong. Just as in the US, "representation" is simply a facade for oligarchical control.
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The continued health of a democratic state requires the interplay of three factors: [1] the covert processes of realpolitik wherein the electorate is consigned the role of rubber-stamping either of two fungible candidates offered up by the owners of the system; [2] reinforcement of the fantasy that voters have some real-world influence over the selection of their political rulers; and [3] the illusion that the winning candidate is the one who is really running the government... The owners of the political establishment fear nothing so much as a populace that sees through the racket being perpetrated upon them; an awareness that might give rise to thoughts that would call into question the entire scheme. -- Butler Shaffer