Corruption

"If you play with fire, you get burned," apart from if you are an official in the Argentine government it would appear. Just days after Argentina threw out the Peronists, who have ruled almost non-stop in the three decades since the end of military rule, The Ministry of Finance suffered a mysterious fire in its computer center, catastrophically (and coincidentally) destroying the prior-regime's files. This is not the first time a fire has destroyed government records - or second, or third, or even fourth...

After East Chicago re-elected an accused drug dealer and murderer as councilman, we thought the bar had dropped as low as it gets for the ignorance of an electorate. But, no! Bridgeport, Connecticut residents just took the proverbial biscuit by re-electing Mayor Joseph P. Ganim - who during his last 'reign' was convicted of 16 felonies including racketeering, extortion, and bribery.

• Russia Takes Aim at Turkish Economy Amid Fighter-Jet Spat (WSJ)
• ‘Commercial scale’ oil smuggling into Turkey becomes priority target of anti-ISIS strikes (RT)
• Russia-Turkey Ties Are Headed Into a Deep Freeze (WSJ)
• France signals softer stance on Assad after Russia talks (FT)
• China Calm Shattered as Brokerage Probe Sparks Selloff in Stocks (BBG)
• China Stock Bulls Hit Breaking Point as State Dials Back Support (BBG)
• China's Bond Stresses Mount as Two More Companies Flag Concerns (BBG)

In the wilderness of the New World, the Plymouth Pilgrims had progressed from the false dream of communism to the sound realism of capitalism. This year, at a time of economic uncertainty and growing political paternalism, when we, Americans sit around our dining table with family and friends, we should remember that what we are really celebrating is the birth of free men and free enterprise in that New World of America. The true meaning of Thanksgiving, in other words, is the triumph of Capitalism over the failure of Collectivism in all its forms.

"The future of the company seems very black," notes on trader as the bonds and stocks of Spanish renewbles form Abengoa lives up to its name and files for creditor protection, just as we warned was likely. With the stock crashing 70% to 28c and 4-month bonds trading at just 22c on the dollar, market participants face an almost total loss.. but, as we detailed previously, it is the American taxpayer - who thanks to Ex-Im Bank loans to keep this zombie alive - face losses of $230 million as Spain's Solyndra exposes another symptom of the Oligrachic ignorance of where the money comes from.

Here is a sight that will never be seen in the US: the CEO of the country's largest investment bank arrested and perp walked after accusation we was part of the nation's largest corruption scandal.

These are abuses that no American should tolerate from its government, and yet not only do we tolerate them, but we help to advance them by supporting meaningless elections, allowing ourselves to be divided by partisan politics, and failing to hold the government accountable to abiding by the rule of law, the U.S. Constitution. Mark these words: if we do not push back against the menace of the police state now, if we fail to hold onto the Constitution and our constitutional republic, and if we allow the government to remain the greatest threat to our freedoms, then future Thanksgivings will find us paying the price with tyranny at home and anarchy throughout the world.

Sometimes you just have to stand in awe at the level of corruption and incompetence in government.

The arrests or investigations targeting the finance industry in the aftermath of China’s summer market crash have intensified in recent weeks according to Bloomberg, creating a climate of fear among China’s finance firms and chilling their investment strategies. As one professor of Chinese economy noted, "some in the political leadership sought to find scapegoats to blame" for the market crash which along with massive intervention "created uncertainty and anxiety that can only undermine the effort to make these markets work better."

"The equilibrium, for now, is QE infinity – but political risk could be the breaking point"...

Amid souring bets on Brazil and the general malaise across EM, PIMCO has been dethroned as the king of emerging market bonds. A fund run by Ireland-incorporated Stone Harbor has overtaken PIMCO's EM Local Bond Fund as the world's largest emerging market fixed income fund by AUM as rollercoaster bets on Brazil and the departure of both El-Erian and Gross weighs on investor sentiment.

Is the US about to go Icelandic (or Chinese) on Wall Street executives for their role in packaging bad mortgages in the lead up to the financial crisis? Probably not, but at least we can pretend...

Brazil is expected to increase oil production by 180,000 barrels per day in 2015, hitting 3.04 million barrels per day (mb/d). But 2016 is a different story. Petrobras has been embroiled in a corruption scandal since last year, which has cost the company tens of billions of dollars. Given that Petrobras was already the most indebted oil company in the world, major cut backs in spending were in order. OPEC sees Brazilian oil production plateauing as soon as next year. That is a pretty significant development considering the fact that, not too long ago, Petrobras thought output would continue rising rapidly through the rest of the decade.

"New banknotes were being delivered daily in boxcar loads. In October 1923, banknote circulation amounted to 2,496,822,909,038,000,000 and everyone called for more. It is this last fact that is most telling, that every group believed that the solution was simply more money. They failed to grasp that what was needed was to simply cease all manipulation of the system and let the free market return. Their failure assured that the only possible outcome was the collapse of the system."

The notion of free markets, mechanisms where buyers and sellers can meet to exchange securities or various kinds of goods, in which each participant has access to the same information, is a fallacy. Transparency in trading across global financial markets is a fallacy. Not only are markets rigged by, and for, the biggest players, so is the entire political-financial system.