Lehman Brothers

If you wanted to sum up the just-concluded Casey Research/Sprott Inc. Summit titled Navigating the Politicized Economy, you could say "The situation is hopeless but not serious." More than 20 speakers – many of them world-renowned financial experts and best-selling authors – gathered in Carlsbad, CA, from September 7 to 9 to ascertain exactly how hopeless, and what investors can do to protect themselves.

Meet the man, who many say (most of whom correctly) has been running pretty much everything from deep behind the scenes.

At the end of December 2010, Philipp Bagus (he of the must watch/read 'Tragedy of the Euro') provided a clarifying and succinct rebuttal or Bernanke's belief in the extreme monetary policy path he has embarked upon. Bernanke's latest diatribe, or perhaps legacy-defining, self-aggrandizing CYA comment, reminded us that perhaps we need such clarification once again. Critically, Bagus highlights the real exit-strategy dangers and inflationary impacts of Quantitative Easing (a term he finds repulsive in its' smoke-and-mirrors-laden optics) adding that:

Money printing cannot make society richer; it does not produce more real goods. It has a redistributive effect in favor of those who receive the new money first and to the detriment of those who receive it last. The money injection in a specific part of the economy distorts production. Thus, QE does not bring ease to the economy. To the contrary, QE makes the recession longer and harsher.

Or we might name it after the intentions behind it: "Currency Debasement I," "Bank Bailout I," "Government Bailout II," or simply "Consumer Impoverishment."

September has arrived which means for Europe reality can, mercifully, return. First on the agenda: moments ago the French government suddenly announced the nationalization of troubled mortgage lender Credit Immobilier de France, which is also the country's second lagrest mortgage specialist after an attempt to find a buyer for the company failed. "To allow the CIF group to respect its overall commitments, the state decided to respond favourably to its request to grant it a guarantee," Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici said according to Reuters. What he really meant was that in order to avoid a bank run following the realization that the housing crisis has finally come home, his boss, socialist Hollande, has decided to renege on his core campaign promise, and bail out an "evil, evil" bank. Sadly, while the nationalization was predicted by us long ago, the reality is that the French government waited too long with the sale, which prompted the Moody's downgrade of CIF by 3 notches earlier this week, which in turn was the catalyst that made any delay in the nationalization inevitable. The alternative: fears that one of the key players in the French mortgage house of cards was effectively insolvent would spread like wildfire, leading to disastrous consequences for the banking system. End result: congratulations France: your Fannie/Freddie-Dexia moment has finally arrived, and the score, naturally: bankers 1 - taxpayers 0.

I have to admit, I am pretty sick of writing about Europe, particularly since nothing has changed over there in the last month.

Instead what’s happened is that Mario Draghi issued a borderline ridiculous statement that he somehow will be able to fix the EU’s solvency Crisis.

The actual speech started with a philosophical inquiry comparing the Euro to a bumblebee. I kid you not:

I am reminded that this is the 5-year anniversary of the emergency Fed Discount Rate cut in response to the collapse of Countrywide Financial (CFC) earlier that week.  

Here come the facts!!! Warning, if you get your feelings hurt over hearing the truth, simply move on. You may have a couple of quarters lefft.

Gold’s remonetisation in the international financial and monetary system continues.  LCH.Clearnet, the world's leading independent clearing house, said yesterday that it will accept gold as collateral for margin cover purposes starting in just one week - next Tuesday August 28th. LCH.Clearnet is a clearing house for major international exchanges and platforms, as well as a range of OTC markets. As recently as 9 months ago, figures showed that they clear approximately 50% of the $348 trillion global interest rate swap market and are the second largest clearer of bonds and repos in the world. In addition, they clear a broad range of asset classes including commodities, securities, exchange traded derivatives, CDS, energy and freight. The development follows the same significant policy change from CME Clearing Europe, the London-based clearinghouse of CME Group Inc. (CME), announced last Friday that it planned to accept gold bullion as collateral for margin requirements on over-the-counter commodities derivatives.  It is interesting that both CME and now LCH.Clearnet Group have both decided to allow use of gold as collateral next Tuesday - August 28th. It suggests that there were high level discussions between the world’s leading clearing houses and they both decided to enact the measures next Tuesday.  It is likely that they are concerned about ‘event’ risk, systemic and monetary risk and about a Lehman Brothers style crisis enveloping the massive, opaque and unregulated shadow banking system.

We're doomed, doomed, I tell you. 

Just under two years ago, Meredith Whitney made a much maligned, if very vocal call, that hundreds of US municipalities will file for bankruptcy. She also put a timestamp on the call, which in retrospect was her downfall, because while she will ultimately proven 100% correct about the actual event, the fact that she was off temporally (making it seem like a trading call instead of a fundamental observation) merely had a dilutive impact of the statement. As a result she was initially taken seriously, causing a big hit to the muni market, only to be largely ignored subsequently even following several prominent California bankruptcies. This is all about to change as none other than Warren Buffett has slashed half of his entire municipal exposure, in what the WSJ has dubbed a "red flag" for the municipal-bond market. Perhaps another way of calling it is the second coming of Meredith Whitney's muni call, this time however from an institutionalized permabull.

http://usawatchdog.com - The stock market rallied on news the European debt crisis is on its way t

In simple terms Europe is a HUGE deal for everyone. We’re not talking about some distant region far off in the distance that we will watch go down from our decks. We’re talking about systemic risk on a scale that would make 2008 look tiny in comparison.

And, as expected, it's not happy. The punchline:

The central bank is to become subordinate to finance ministers in crisis-stricken countries. In Draghi's homeland Italy, such a situation was the norm for decades -- and the result was chronic inflation. Now, he is accepting a repeat of history. On the short term, it will create relief in the debt crisis. On the long term, vengeance will be bitter."

Yes, we know it doesn't matter because Ben & Mario have got our backs at whatever multiple is required to levitate the economy market, but as Citi's credit desk points out; despite the constant chatter about EPS beats (despite top-line misses), the trick is that analysts have been dragging down expectations since the earnings-cycle began and so judging 'misses' must be done against a 'frozen' pre-earnings number. If we do this 'fair' approach to considering expectations, the percentage miss in the S&P 500's EPS for Q2 2012 is as bad as the Q2/Q3 2011 Tsunami-driven miss - and the worst we have seen since Lehman Brothers shuffled off this mortal coil. So as usual, be careful what truth you believe and consider just how much more 'hope' is now in this market given this reality.

Independent from Congress … or from the American People?