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If It Smells Like A Funding Crisis And It Looks Like A Funding Crisis...
Submitted by Nic Lenoir of ICAP
Well, it must be a funding crisis. For all those who have been talking about rate hikes, here is a little reality check: we are on the verge of a full blown funding crisis at the sovereign level and central banks have just only started withdrawing liquidity.
To be sure two factors are at play: the explosion of sovereign CDS's or in other words sovereign credit spreads, and the withdrawing of liquidity.
I have long been convinced sovereign CDS's would be the next stop for the wreck train, but for a while last fall it seemed like we might have a window of recovery, and would have to wait for the roll-over of the business cycle before the market adresses the issue. Greece, however small, provided the spark that ignited the powder keg when the new administration decided to clear its name and reveal the true nature of their government's books and deficit when it took over. It was all downside from there. Greece's ability to keep rolling its debt down the road is pretty much null, despite a lot of the austerity measures committed to. Then of course as we all have learned from recent experience with the banking crisis contagion is quick to arrive, and since most countries are in a precarious fiscal situation the market is not short of ammunition to spread the fire. Let's be clear: if Spain officially only has a debt to GDP ratio roughly equal to 65%, its consumers are massively leveraged, and as a result so are local banks. I hear a lot of people out of Europe saying: "the US is no better, this is ridiculous we are just as solvent as they are". Maybe, but a market is governed by supply and demand and right now no one wants European bonds. As numerous instituations some bigger than other have found out: when you have leverage you are only as solvent as you can roll your debt.
The other factor at play here is the actual funding difficulties we are seeing resurface in the money markets. Remember the ECB has pledged not to renew its 1Y LTOR maturing in June. We expected them to be very pre-emptive and nurse the markets' expectations announcing a ramp up in lower maturities to smooth the liquidity gap. Arrogance being a French natural attribute, Trichet did not really bother with such formalities. At the same time the Fed has slowly been pulling the liquidity rug letting various liquidity programs mature (the federal reserve's balance sheet shrinkage has been covered by none better than our chief economist Lou Crandall for Wrightson ICAP). Risk assets were slow to react in particular US equities (supported by USD strength they were the last to turn this time) but are now catching up. We discussed at length over the past year how the market ramped up every day the Fed injected liquidity in the markets via QE and how the entire advance since the 666 lows was less than the move between noon and the close on QE days over that period! Well now we not only lost our turbo-charged market boost: liquidity should be a drag on equities. FX forwards have showed that USD funding cost has been creeping up and now comes at a premium: the days when European banks are scrambling for liquidity could be back faster than one thinks if one believes the EUR/USD cross-currency basis.
Let's take a step back and look at what the possible solutions are. The first is what Angela Merkel was quoted mentionning as "assisted default within the Eurozone". While I completely agree that defaults are probably inevitable whether it is now or 3 years down the road, it was a calculated political snake move on her part to bring it up publicly like that right on the heels of the Greek bailout and following the European market holiday yesterday. That opens up a door Mr. Almunia didn't know existed ("there is no default in the Eurozone", almost as classic as Trichet hiking in 2008), and also pushes the market down that path. Once you have officials going down that route publicly everybody owning Spanish, Portugese, or any other vulnerable sovereign bonds is feeling a little less upbeat about the Greece-IMF bailout. If that is the road we are following then surely it will be drastically deflationary, the Euro will keep punging and the USD appreciating, taking down EM equities and commodities. Not even Gold is posting a nasty reversal on the day and if the situation is not contained then we are moving to an environment where owning gold is not the answer.
The second is a further string of bailouts. We are not going to get any more help from the Germans, at least certainly not until Saturday because of the upcoming election (was Merkel's statement today part of her own local political strategy?). So that means the IMF a.k.a. uncle Sam is going to have to step up to the plate and shell out some cash. It's a slippery slope, because after Spain comes England, and then Japan, and then the US! The last 3 countries have the possibility to simply devalue their currencies aggressively which Europe can't do as easily. Politicians and central bankers are certainly aware of this and even though sometimes defaulting or cutting massively social programs is what is needed, they will choose the populist way and try to print their way out.
Either way there is so much you can run but you cannot hide when the deflationary ghosts come to haunt an economy with an aging population and massive global overcapacity. Some believe we can get an air-conditioned house and an SUV to every family in Asia and Africa if they experience the same credit boom we have over the past 30 years and delay the time bomb, but I don't think it is a possibility as they do not have the economic and banking infrastructure to achieve it. China is trying to have a fast forward bubble and blow up in 15 years twice as big as we have in 50. I am frankly scared of what will happen when that ponzi scheme comes to an end. For more on our economic views and the deflation prospects I attached the powerpoint of a presentation I gave recently to an investor panel.
I expect the Fed to step in if markets don't settle and re-open the currency swaps channel with other central banks as the USD liquidity squeeze intensifies. Central banks like that of Venezuela or Angola which issued bonds in USD much to our outrage last year should be left out to hang dry as it is the only way they will learn their lessons. Until the money markets are not showing signs of compressing fundind premiums all around and the USD squeeze is not halted, expect equities and commodities to suffer greatly with the major liquid sovereign bond markets as only safe heaven. If it gets to where even these aren't safe, we are afraid that your cash will be safest placed under your mattress. After all we did not deleverage our economy after the 2008 crisis, banks are still holding most of the assets that put them in trouble in the first place, so basically we have done nothing but taking distress to the sovereign stage. It is time to face the structural problems of our economy as we will not be able to go on another run like that from 1982 to 2007 boosted by +280% in the debt to GDP ratio.
We remain convinced USD bulls (short EURUSD core remains the best trade for 2010) against almost every cross out there (exception can be made for JPY though it has not shown traditional risk aversion or correlation to US Bonds of late so watch for the decoupling as a sign of a deterioration of the Japanese sovereign bond market). Until the liquidity situation is resolved we would also be cautious with gold as it has posted a nasty reversal today on the last resistance 1,185/1,187 (c=a since the lows) we had highlighted before the run towards new highs. Once default fears are batted away with the liquidity bat then not doubt the Gold bullish trend will return.
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Upset? Naw, he is wondering which school I teach at while refusing to believe I am a graduate of the ninth grade and an enlisted disabled war vet since only the grand poo pah's of the ivory tower are supposed to be able to understand this.... Greenspan will tell ya.
It's not purely mathematical, is my point. In 2008 the banking crisis was at least a definable and fairly quantifiable issue. That's what CBs are for. This time around with a sovereign funding crisis the problem is way less transparent, manageable and quantifiable. As we learned with Greece there's lots we don't know. There's also a huge interdependence factor with banks and other sovereigns.
And then we have the political dimension. Big black swans swimming with little black swans, all of them carnivorous. C Bankers won't be able to hand down the law so easily, won't be able to ringfence the problems like they could when it was just private banks and Wall Street.
Big black swans swimming with little black swans, all of them carnivorous.
Damn funny stuff!! On par with this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mV1LWhNpTJU
what i find hilarious is that lots of countries, including ze Germans, rushed to issue dollar debt, right at dollars lows.
That was my signal to get long dollar.
If things keep going, madhedgefundtrader's trade of the century, shorting Treasuries, will be a smoking black hole.
Bernanke: The only thing that matters is being the last fiat standing.
+1
Yes, there can only be one!
Corollary -- don't bet on the complete abandonment of fiat just yet. Just fewer choices.
true enough ned
Pure comedy. How in the hell can you have a funding crisis with helicopter ben bailing out anyone and everyone?
Heard on C(crook) NBC:
Jim Cramer to Bill Gross: What do you think is going to happen, Sir ?
haven't you heard? helicopter ben is on spring break. qe is suspended. tentatively.
Whirlpool
The oil slick?
"where is the PPT?"
market manipulation 101:
nobody can fight the tape.
nobody.
Paper ponzi pulp fiction king USD of the hill! One nation under fraud and heaped upon an illusion of world wide foaming paper debt based currencysustainability. Timber! Massive forest cut down world wide to feed the paper ponzi pulp fiction machine!! Can't see the forests through the trees? Look again! There are no trees!! Vaporized! Consumed by natural tools of destruction forged from within paper ponzi finance! Fighting to pump more fiat currency into the financial trees of monetary life; all the while poisoning the roots by lies heaped upon the values of pragmatic, self sufficient, fiscal responsibility!! Spending your way to prosperity is like trying to freeze ice cubes on the suns surface!! Return to honest money gold/silver!!
Money is bits on computer storage disks.
Consuming electricity.
Exactly. How can you have a funding crisis with ICBM Ben bailing "everyone" out? Or more to point, MBS's??? I mean he didn't declare "the program" dead but a few weeks ago--and what do we find out? "Crack-head" Ben is back buying the smack. So clearly "don't be the dollar bull"--but "don't be the Treasury bear" either. This guy "knows what he's doing" in his own way. Can't say I agree with the "spending program"--but the funding program is full steam ahead! This catatrophe in Europe is beyond anyone's ability to predict or understand. Clearly they're forcefully dollarized--and Lord knows I'd be more than just on strike if that's the "euro" solution. Of course that's why it's called a "crisis." Only Morgan Stanley came out publicly to say "we're shorting this euro thing"--indeed, the Goldman rumor of shorting Greece has already been blown away as a hilarious falsehood once it made the cover of the NY Times. The irony of course is Goldman went long Greece just before it blew up. Obviously we've move well beyond "green shoots" to full blown "animal spirits." If you're working for "USA Inc." you better "fire up that chain saw" because "we've got a massacre to start."
Only Morgan Stanley came out publicly to say "we're shorting this euro thing"...
It matters not to the banks which way they bet. If they win they keep it, if they lose they pawn it off on the fed.
Where is that dipstick hairywanger when ya need him. I need a good laugh!
‘(25) SELECTION OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE FEDERAL RESERVE BANK OF NEW YORK- Notwithstanding any other provision of this section, after the date of enactment of the Restoring American Financial Stability Act of 2010, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York shall be appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, for terms of 5 years.
‘(26) LIMITATION ON ELIGIBILITY TO VOTE FOR OR SERVE AS A FEDERAL RESERVE BANK DIRECTOR- Notwithstanding any other provision of this section, after the date of enactment of the Restoring American Financial Stability Act of 2010, no company, or subsidiary or affiliate of a company that is supervised by the Board, may vote for members of the board of directors of a Federal reserve bank, and no past or current officer, director, or employee of such company, or subsidiary or affiliate of such company, may serve as a member of the board of directors of a Federal reserve bank.’.
Classic Liesman on Fake Money ..."Europe is not a macro event...."
That was pretty amazing. How that clueless twit keeps a job is beyone me. It must have been a clause in the GE Credit debt guarantee deal. keep Obama's man on the microphone and they get financed at those special guaranteed rates. They need to keep him from doing anything more than the obvious cheerleading.
The flip side of a "lack of restraint" is DISASTER - always was, always will.
You have to be skeptical of any analysis that contains the two contradictory statements:
"we are moving to an environment where owning gold is not the answer"
and
"The last 3 countries have the possibility to simply devalue their currencies aggressively"
Gold got smacked down by the bullion banks just as it has at any other time in the past when it threatened to be a run away train. Start thinking in terms of physical instead of paper. Paper gold will be worth about the same as paper money when this house of cards finally collapses.........ZERO.
Gold is not the answer my arse!!!!!!
Here's proof that OUR domestic funding CRISIS has already been revealed (in all of its hideous ponzi glory) to one President Obama.
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/05/obama-administration-ramps-up-opposition-to-fed-audit-provision.php
He is willing to go against the will of the people (including a majority of Democrats) to protect the Federal Reserve from an audit. God, I hope he gets a chance to veto the bill. I double-dog-dare him....
+1
He wouldn't care, his peoples will be cared for while he smiles at the cameras and say the veto is necessary to maintain the independence of a government agency with private shareholders. I wonder when Obama will openly sell private shares in DOD & Justice? Bodie Obama.
assumption,
IF you think Obama gives ONE turd about the American people, this economy, or anything except Socialism, keep dreaming.
He got in, ONE agenda, bring this bitch DOWN.
November 1, 2009 – January 31, 2010
IMF credit is extended to its members in both foreign exchange and SDRs. Credit extended in foreign exchange is financed from the quota resources made available to the IMF by members, and essentially involves a transfer of foreign exchange from creditor members to borrowing members. These transfers reduce the available quota resources from creditors and increase their positions with the IMF by the same amount. Members receive a market-related return on their creditor positions with the IMF.
When extending credit in SDRs, the IMF transfers reserve assets directly to borrowing members by drawing on the IMF's own holdings of SDRs in the General Resources Account. The SDRs are placed in the SDR accounts of borrowing members with the IMF; the member can either maintain or convert them into foreign exchange. The amount of SDRs available for these transactions is generally limited, because the IMF normally seeks to maintain part of its usable resources in the form of SDRs—its most liquid asset.
By the same token, the repayment and servicing of IMF credit results in the receipt of both foreign exchange and SDRs from borrowing members. In this case, the SDRs received by the IMF are added to its holdings in the General Resources Account, while the foreign exchange is passed on to IMF creditor members, reducing their creditor positions with the IMF.The members that participate in the financing of IMF transactions in foreign exchange are selected by the Executive Board. The selection is based on each member's financial capacity, and takes into account key macroeconomic and financial indicators (see box).
The amounts transferred and received by these members are managed to ensure that their creditor positions in the IMF remain broadly even in relation to their quota, the key measure of each member's rights and obligations in the IMF. This is achieved in the framework of an indicative quarterly plan for financial transactions.1
http://www.imf.org/external/np/tre/ftp/2010/050110.htm
Financing of IMF Transactions in the General Resources AccountUnder Financial Transactions Plan
November 1, 2009 – January 31, 2010 (In millions of SDRs
United States
*** (37,149.3) *** *** (28,596.5) *** *** (529.7) *** *** (1,757.4) *** *** (29,824.3) *** *** (7,326.0) *** *** (19.7%) ***+1
JW
Thank you for taking the time lately to format your posts into a more readable form. It makes your often good analysis much easier to read and understand.
Thank you again.
No junking for this great post. Thanks
Give me a fractional international reserve dead head fed goon tanking system and I will move the world to monetary destruction!! Mission accomplished!!
Once they settle the argument: Who holds the Reserve Currency status, the US or EU; how will they settle the same problem when China stakes its claim?
Is it wrong to talk about "hedging" on Zero Hedge? Am I allowed to hedge? Well, I went and hedged.
There's something "implody" about the recent actions in the world financial markets. I was not at all amused to see silver fail, again, the close above the 18-19 US Dollar per ounce zone of resistance, and, collapse almost a full US Dollar per ounce today.
Given that I just took delivery of another bucket full of Silver Maple Leafs, I thought it prudent to try to hedge my physical position in precious metals with some out of the money puts in SLV.
If some weird dollar spike, commodity and stock collapse occurs within the next ten weeks or so I can make quite a tidy sum with these puts, or others I may add to it. Silver seems like a particularly good way to hedge given its volatility.
Given the correlation of all assets classes you just have to pick out the one more likely to implode more if there's going to be some deflationary imploding going on. With options you're paying an insurance premium relative to the time and volatility.
Where do you buy your Silver Maple Leafs, if you don't mind me asking?
I've bought from:
http://www.tulving.com/
They've got Silver Maples in stock at $1.84 above spot.
AND
http://www.golddealer.ca/
Both very reliable.
Thanks. I have been thinking about buying some Canadien Silver coins, and I never have before.
I also was thinking about opening an canadien bank account over the internet, and converting some USD eventually.
I'm not sure how easy it is for Americans (I assume you are) to open a bank account in Canada. If you have any issues, you can open an account at Saxobank (www.saxobank.com) and keep your money in the UK, Singapore, etc etc in any currency, trade currencies, and trade spot gold and silver. They offer options trading as well. They've got a great trading platform and allow trading on margin with huge leverage ratios which can be quite dangerous, especially on days like today. At a minimum, it would allow you to keep funds outside the US in a currency other than USDs.
Thanks again.
As a relative newbie to PMs, why do you buy name-brand coins (eg, Maple Leafs) instead of rounds or bars? What do legal tender coins have which the rounds or bars don't, since the face value of the coin is far outstripped by the value of the metal content? Any thoughts you (or others) could share would be much appreciated.
B.E.
I look at it as recognition value and people seem to be willing to pay a premium for something that is official. I've bought Silver Eagles, Maples, and Viennas and after thinking along the lines that you now are, I bought some silver rounds. If the shit hits the fan and people are actually using 1 oz silver coins for trade, then I suspect that the government minted coins would carry an even higher premium although both should appreciate relatively commensurately. The counterfeit factor may be an issue when asking someone to accept a silver round although any of the government issued coins could easily be counterfeited as well.
Yep! Ditto silverisking!! Not if the san hits the fhit; but when!! Paper ponzi finance always meets the wall!! Truth is self evident and fiat currency is not a store of monetary value. Never has been, never will be for the limited time fane stream media may have us believe it so!! 40 year cycle for USD ends as all paper ponzi fiat currency do; worthless!! Our US reserve currency is backed and guranteed by nothing but gov goon dead head thin air promises which they have so cordially passed off to we the people!! Parasites that the goons are!! Nothing but pig men hangin pork smoked to taste and leaving us all as citizens in the out house, bulldozed over the precipice the viper squids created, when all fiat currency reaches it's intrinsic value; zeroooooooooooo!!!
Mix it up and have some fun! Just make sure there ain't no tungsten, you know, don't be a Knox.
Quite the contrary. Weakness in Euro gives the Fed cover to print even more dollars.
Since when is the FED a gov't agency?
Since the banksters bought the government, that's when.
George Carlin - The American Dream
http://www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/1044358/
It's called the American Dream because you'd have to be asleep to believe it.
RIP George.
"The American Dream; because you have to be asleep to believe it."
Classic!
It's not.
Allen Greenspan when asked about the relationship of The Federal Reserve and the President:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QkmLnNEvdU
It's not a government agency officially, and also whenever it's convenient. Conversely, it is sometimes a government agency, again, whenever it's convenient. The Fed reaps all the benefits of both states of being, with none of the drawbacks of either.
And despite its official status as a non-government agency, just last year none other than Ben Bernanke himself stated in a Congressional hearing that the Fed is indeed a government agency. Probably because it was convenient at the time.
fed policy has been to releverage the financial system. if things drop and you get margin calls all will fall. in theory not treasuries if the gain? the same applies to gold. the gold is bought or borrowed on leverage, other assets drop, sold becuase of margin calls, etc. if treasuries are on margin same bit. it doesn't matter the asset class if it is leveraged. remember there were all these stupid intrest arbitrage hedg funds that blew up because of margin so munis etc got hit.
yep. if u just fill the HOLES, will there be inflation or just reflation in the holes?
European Debt 2010 = Subprime Debt 2007.
PIIGS are the equivalent of the Bear, Wamu, Merrill, Wachovia....and the structure of the EU makes the PIIGS easy targets of shorts and bond vigilantes, just like the weak financial firms in 2007
But this is worse, no one has the will or the wealth to bail out half of Europe.
The Battle Hymn of the Republic
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kR7HPQM0Jgg
Here's a great little diddy I heard at lunch today. Definitely worth a listen.
Bet Against the American Dream
http://vimeo.com/10815824
Excellent questions. I don't think of myself as an expert, but I'll answer your questions as best I can.
Someone from a site like this pointed me to the American Precious Metals Exchange (APMEX, at apmex.com). I've been very satisfied with their service. They offer a wide variety of mint issued bullion coins in silver, and gold, as well as Canada's palladium coin, and a few platinum coins.
These days, you should be able to buy US or Canadian gold bullion coins (Eagles or Maple Leafs, respectively) for about $40-60 US Dollars over the spot price of metal. You'll pay more for a Chinese Panda, or an Australian Kangaroo. Austrian Philharmonics are very cool, and command perhaps the smallest premium to spot, for whatever reason.
Personally, I don't like American Eagles as bullion pieces, because they are only 90% gold and 10% copper (22 carat). The American Buffalo, first issued in 2006, is the first 24 carat US minted gold coin, and can be had for a little bit more premium (maybe $60-80 over spot).
Just about every country seems to make silver one ounce coins, and the American Eagles are beautiful, carrying the obverse of the old "Walking Liberty half dollars" issued in the early half of the 20th century before the Franklin halves came out.
I happen to like Canadian bullion coins for their look, quality and purity. The Royal Canadian Mint takes enormous pride in their work, and if you ever check out their web site they sell a wide variety of beautiful collector coins. If you like collecting, the mintages are often very small.
The silver Maple Leafs are .9999 pure silver, brilliant and shiny, and carry a face value of $5 Canadian (puts a floor under the value, lol). They come in "mint tubes" of 25, or so-called monster boxes from the mint of 500. One cannot buy directly from this or any other mint, one buys from registered dealers such as AMPEX. Prices have ranged from as low as about 80 cents over spot to as much as $2.50 over spot depending on how fast the prices are moving and the supply/demand situation.
I always favor mint issued coins because of their beauty, guaranteed purity, and I would suspect their ease of use in case of a collapse in the fiat money scheme. With "silver rounds" you're paying for something that's supposed to be silver, but, who knows? People who buy bars of silver or gold or platinum should get assay certificates with them, but even then a buyer may want to do an assay for himself.
With the gold Maple Leafs, they are a lovely .9999 pure gold, with a face value of $50 Canadian. Personally, I never liked the look of the American Buffalo nickel or gold coin. The American Eagle gold coin features the obverse from the old Saint Gaudens gold coin. It's a beauty, but I'm turned off by the 22 carat composition.
The Chinese Pandas are a nice .999 pure gold coin, and mintage is limited, so if the Chinese ever got into coin collecting, values could skyrocket. However, China is notorious for counterfeiting, so I'm not keen on Chinese coins in general except for a few token pieces. The silver Pandas are really beautiful coins.
Platinum coins live in a very expensive world. I've dabbled in these coins, and have tried to collect a few of the rarer US issued ones, termed Libertys, for the obverse that features the Statue of Liberty. Expect to pay at least $200 r spot for a US 1 oz platinum coin. The US mint stopped production of bullion platinum coins in 2009, but did issue about 8000 collector proof coins. Canada still issues a one ounce platinum and palladium maple leaf.
To me, its worth it to pay a premium over spot for the guarenteed purity of the coin, as well as the potential collector premium.
I've had good luck buying coins at auction too from Heritage and eBay. With both sites I only buy coins that have been "slabbed" (encased in tamper proof holders, graded, and catalogued by the two top grading companies, NGC and PGCS). On eBay I only deal with sellers with massively positive feedback.
I use Heritage to pick up old gold coins, as it is a auction site for collectors. I might use eBay to grab more recent coins I may have missed, such as the 2008 burnished gold and platinum Eagles, which had very low mintages.
As far as bars of silver or gold go, like the tungsten conspiracy people say, how do you really know what it's made of? I'd rather lug around a bunch of mint produced bullion coins that are easily authenticated by coin grading services that keep records of each coin submitted.
The final contortions of the 10 year price chart will be as ugly as when the Titanic's stern rose high into the air first, not the final horror of the night mind you, and then the ship split in two and sunk....
This is a good analogy....
How did we get here? There never were enough condoms in the world, or so Malthus said in a roundabout way.
Though it was not the intent, the machinations of Clinton et al to put a owner occupied home around every pot that had a chicken in it, was what allowed the world to operate just a touch longer with far too many people in it, and as Mako reminds us, with a system built on an equation that doesn't work.
Julian Robertson wrote a piece in 2004 or so where he voiced discomfort that the entire growth of the world, developing world included, was being financed by the "equity" taken out of US residential housing. China, a nation that had its best days end 2300-2500 years ago (the almost concurrent introduction of Buddhism and Confucianism---in which the answers to its disappearance lay), needed somebody to buy its t-shirts and carnival prizes, lest it remain forever in the wasteland wrought of Mao's "great" ideas and two plus millennia of warlordship. The American Consumer, already having learned from Reagan and spent his savings/max'd his credit cards, could now drink from the Holy Grail of home equity, buy whatever any group of Third World worker drones could produce, and pretend everyone on Earth has a purpose.
When the consumer could no longer dip into what was not really there, we took the Last Great Step and shifted the burden to the Rumpelstiltskins of the world (Central Bankers) and had them try to print their way out of the inevitable.
The Chinese like to say that every journey begins with a single step. Well, every journey also ends with one last step. We've taken ours.
The game is up. The music has stopped and there are no chairs remaining (nor cliches). The last hope for more credit and more debt has lost its credibility.
I expect at least one last call to the faithful. Call it International QE II if you wish. Within the next few weeks we will see an emergency meeting of some (Guns of) August body like the G20 or IMF, after which a wondrous and glorious plan will be announced whereby all nations will contribute to a massive fund to be used to bail out whomever needs it, which is to say everyone. In essence, we'll be taking the patient, sticking a needle in his right arm, and giving him a blood transfusion via his left arm.
If the masses buy it, we'll buy some time, but not much. That moment, if it even comes, will give the prudent one last chance to prepare for what lies ahead, which is war, famine, disease and destruction on a level we have never even imagined.
Mako is right.
China did not have its best days 2300 years ago. Actually, until the invasion by the British, China topped the world in many fields.
The whole piece made me laugh.
Somehow, I feel that a part of the crowd is reveling in the idea they might be superior to the others, the zombies, the Joe Six-Pack, when actually, that part might already be out of the game.
US'move to China was not done as a favour but a necessity.
One tenet keeping together the US is the idea that 'hard-working' people get an access to a version of a given good.
A hard working low level person has access to a low level car, etc... up to the top.
This could not be given without finding exterior countries to provide the said goods.
Internally, the US is unable to achieve.
The house stuff is easy to understand. One tenet of the US society is that a 'hard working' person's life is to be rewarded by a house.
The mass building of houses is just one side of mass production. Anyone (in power or not) assessing the sustainability of mass production might come to the conclusion that building houses will get less easy in a near future.
At the extreme, a market with a low number of new construction and where houses owners either inherited their house or bought an old house.
Better to reach that turn with lets say 70 pc of population owning a house rather than 45pc. If people are interested in internal stability that is.
I disagree. I say best years in the relative sense. China was almost totally absent during the period from the Renaissance up until about 1995, and its leadership role in various fields began to slip away during the time frame I noted as Athens, Rome and then Byzantine rose. They also tend to give themselves far too much credit for their "5000 year history" , etc., though I suspect some of that is postering to compensate for their recent (500 years) absence. There is another group with a longer history and, pound for pound, a staggering degree of accomplishment in all human endeavors, though I won't mention them by name as it tends to bring out an undesirable crowd.
I do not think the remainder of your post makes much sense, though I suspect your native tongue is not English and something is lost in the translation.
Well said. It saved me the time to respond to this clown's post.
Greece , England , France , people need guns and ammo.... 2 guns in every house... power to the people.... !
Greece , England , France , people need guns and ammo.... 2 guns in every house... power to the people.... !
Always good to see ZH running Citi and Wells ads on the site, kind of really enforces credibility of the site yes?
But hey, tyler/ZH, go make a fucking buck...it's not that anyone notices those CONFLICTING fucking ads, now do we?
I am not Chumba Bumba Numba Rotumba
-100 today on ZH credibility...lovely. good job.
.
I have some abortion, drug company, and porn sponsors you can use also if you want...go for it. Make a fucking buck while you can.
Go ahead everyone flame me on, or tell tyler to stop being a hypocrit!
I am not Chumba Bumba Numba Rotumba or anyone else...
.