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A Continent In Trouble
Via Mark J. Grant, author of Out of the Box,
Europe is in trouble.
The levitation that takes place in the early morning hours in the Euro, the incorrect counting of both assets and liabilities, massive losses hidden in securitizations at many central banks including the ECB and the riskiest of assets lined up and labeled "Risk Free" and the bells of St. Rimney's begin to chime. Unemployment at record levels, countries such as Greece, Portugal, and Cyprus that can't pay their bills without Divine intervention and economies that are rapidly shrinking even with the help of Europe's falsified accounting practices.
Ireland is no better, France, Belgium and the Netherlands are in decline and the money created by the ECB is all that separates the Continent from Depression. The problem is, the glue is cracking, stitches are coming apart at the seams and the fantasy that has been created is now day-after-day being shown to be what it actually is; a tragedy of the first order. Every reasonable game that could be played is now an historical footnote. The new games, such as seizing depositors' money in Cyprus, aren't much fun to play.
Spain is an example here; more than 95% of their pension funds are invested in Spanish sovereign debt but 100% is encroaching and the end is nigh. Ireland is running out of cash again. Portugal is out of cash. Cyprus needs about twice as much in loans as admitted. Greece has run up a bill where every new loan pays back the European banks, pays the interest on their debt while the country sinks slowly into the Mediterranean.
The IMF, once thought to be a stalwart institution, has helped to create the fantasy and they have lied and perjured themselves in a shameless fashion. Not one, not one projection for Europe has been anywhere close to the truth and yet they continue to minimize the damage. The IMF has partnered with the Europe and not only turns a blind eye but admits none of their own deceit and so is an accessory to the larceny both before and after the fact.
The investment of money in Europe is now a risk far greater than present yields can justify. Senior debt, subordinated debt, deposits; anything can now be taxed, confiscated or impounded at the direction of Brussels/Berlin. Nothing is safe!
Every scheme in Europe than can be rigged has been or is being rigged and, in the end, it will only be the fools that are left in this game. It is not the greater fools either but the mandated fools who take directions from Brussels who takes their directions from Berlin.
I cannot emphasize enough the great risk that anyone takes now by investing in anything in Europe. You can ignore liabilities, you can play pretend and not count liabilities but in the end they are still there and the losses must be finally acknowledged.
Gold gave you a head's up. The margin calls in gold quickly infected the equity markets and the margin calls in stocks gave you a second head's up. The playing field is shifting and the days of wine and roses are giving way to the days of vinegar and poison ivy.
You got the warning now please try to retain your head before the guillotine of Europe removes it from your neck.
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And Bernanke and the Obowel movement are backstopping Europe.
We are all going down together
Don't think for a second, however, that it isn't all going down, with or without the "backstopping" of Europe. Minus the backstop, it just goes down more quickly.
No worries, they're backstopped by gold.....if they can find some.
"Spain is an example here; more than 95% of their pension funds are invested in Spanish sovereign debt..."
We will do you one better, Spain. 100% of social security pension funds are invested in U.S sovereign debt.
The new Hayekian critique of Keynesianism to describe the brittleness: "All fucked one and one fucked all." None can leave, but inevitably one will.
Gold is not at the top of the value pyramid. Death is. The West's military and police have never been stronger. No worries, mate.
And just under life/death food, shelter are all things the state can tinker with to get you to forfeit your other wealth. I think they call that feudalism.
That said I was waiting for the new and enlightening information in the article that would jump out of the page among the blatantly obvious statements. That didn't happen.
To me feudalism means that society is completely ruled by the exact same families for generations. And the point of their rule is control and nothing else. Not democracy. Not merit. Not a growing economy. Not betterment of their fellow man. Just simple mindless control.
And the talent level of your leaders is whatever pops out of the royal womb. If its a moron, then you'll suffer a moron. An example of a feudal ruling family would be the Bushes.
As long as the West does not send its military might East where it will be promptly crushed.
The USA has 700 bases all over the world, many of them in the East.
Let the "crushing" commence. Er, promptly?
Reliance on electricity for superiority has it's downsides.
Well then, the "East" just has to trip over the power cord.
We are all Keynesians now....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GSXbgfKFWg&sns=em - and when they can't... that's as good as money... those are IOUs.
It has been found 40 years ago: Gold from mercury
The philosopher's stone, the alchemists once sought, now was found by the American chemist Ronald T. Gillespie. Ordinary mercury, according to the report published in the journal "Chemistry" turns -on exposure to arsenic pentafluoride (AsF 5) and liquid sulfur dioxide - turns into a crystalline, golden shiny material. It has the chemical formula Hg2 85AsF6 shows perpendicular lines on X-ray fluoroscopy with and conducts electricity as well as gold.
From "Der Spiegel", 05. Nov. 1973
WARNING:Acute mercury poisoning.
Thank you for giving me a hint, where all the downs originate. But I'm able to learn. So here is an addendum: DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME!
Let the downing commence ;-)
Uh yeah. Arsenic pentaflouride, aside from being a poison, is what is commonly referred to as a "superacid".
So many ways to die here, all for the sake of s shiny substance.
that swap story is old. the levels are now down, down, down. and imho it was used for backstopping US megabanks books in Europe
"The investment of money in Europe is now a risk far greater than present yields can justify"
meanwhile (corporate) Europe invests more than the USD one trillion of (corporate) investments done by the US in Europe
go ahead, flee the guillotine! flee the "socialist hellhole called europe!" harharhar
return to the embrace of honest US megacorps CEOs in honest USD investments!
The money has to go somewhere. But where it goes is now only buys a little time before it disappears.
So, screwed on both sides of the Atlantic? No hope? Try Bernakium - guaranteed to 'pik-u-up'!
Ghordius Maximus +1000
Yeah, once again Mark Grant pushing the "Europe is gonna dieeEEeEE!!!!11!1!" meme, meanwhile:
http://demonocracy.info/infographics/usa/fdic/fdic.html
We have $25 billion dollars of FDIC "insurance" backing $9294 billion in deposits. Kind of blows a hole in the argument that "US banks are much safer", particularly given that the US has $300,000 billion in notional derivatives. One might say "yeah, but the net notional is a tiny fraction of that!"
Well, how tiny? 1% net notional would be $3000 billion (3 trillion). 0.1% net notional would be $300 billion. 0.01% would be $30 billion. All of these amounts are greater than the total FDIC insurance.
What favorite beverage will you be toasting with when the COMEX defaults next week?
I'll have a beer.
Lost all my beer in a terrible boating accident.
Will we NEVER learn?
Goldschlager ... bitchez!
Damn, beat me to it...I'll have a Silver Rum then....
Jack Daniels w/ Tequila chasers
Sam Adams Boston Lager.
"Contemplate the mangled bodies of your countrymen, and then say 'what should be the reward of such sacrifices?' Bid us and our posterity bow the knee, supplicate the friendship and plough, and sow, and reap, to glut the avarice of the men who have let loose on us the dogs of war to riot in our blood and hunt us from the face of the earth? If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom - go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen!" ---Samual Adams, Aug 1st 1776
Superb. We will also be having a few American ales/lagers around here. Possibly Anchor Steam Liberty Ale.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snhiofL2Rh4
Fuck that shit!
I too think there is a lot of real metal leaving the Comex...London too....its all going East...they can see the collapse of the West coming..and want to save themselves from that....they have seen or at least have learned that paper is no good.....so they buy the real metal.....and they are..I think we are all going to be suprised how much they bought this last week or so....with the price drop...India too....
Paper's no good, huh? Maybe not for us little people, but for TPTB it's been 100 years of work-free wealth beyond imagining.
If/when the USD loses world reserve currency status, I wager China will work very hard to make their own brand of fiat the new 'standard'.
Maybe they can't do this without gold... but I bet they start cheating as soon as the world accepts their currency is 'as good as gold', the way we did after Bretton Woods.
Frank: Raymond, where's the fuckin' beer?
Raymond: It's right here Frank. You want me to pour it?
Frank: No, I want you to fuck it! Shit yes, pour the fucking beer!
Bollinger
Only got a single malt in at the moment. Which reminds me, need to go shopping.
Probably a fat J.
Alcohol free champagne fortunately.
I''m glad I will be sober ,and alive to see the end of the paper games.
Everyone needs their wits in full use as this goes down
You are obviously not the real Winston Churchill.
:)
My fav is Bernankium!
Shit, I have a whole menu ready for this moment:
Appetizer:
Boneless chicken wings + PBR
Main course:
Entire Rack of ribs
Chili Cheese fries
Jack 'n coke
Dessert:
Cheesecake + port
Double-bubble-trouble, and no end in sight. I think, I'll get me a beer, what else is a man supposed to do?
one question - when those debt nations default - will they sell their gold to get EUR or will they print more EUR ?
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/04/17/cyprus-gold-sale-idUSL5N0D41K6...
I'd say, they will just print more gold. ;-)
oh, an intelligent question. well, it depends. if a country does a "corralito", then it can use... the EUR as FX reserve instead of selling gold
if it just defaults and stays in the eurozone, it still does not have to sell gold
actually you could see the EUR as a big multi-optional arrangement to improve the "gold retention" of an eurozone country. it's designed this way
but don't listen to me, listen to the pundits that already see thousands of tons of european gold on the market, to the greater glory of the USD
note in the Reuters article:
"...The island nation confirmed last week that a sale of its gold reserves was among the options for its contribution towards the rescue package, but ultimate responsibility rested with the (Cypriot) central bank.
"In the case of the gold, it's the board of the central bank. It's perfectly understandable.. They have the final say," Finance Minister Harris Georgiades said in an interview with Bloomberg TV.
Georgiades did not elaborate on how much gold Cyprus might sell nor at what price.
Asked if the government had the support of the central bank to go ahead with the sale, Georgiades said: "It's something that will be examined soon, I hope."
A central bank spokeswoman said last week the sale of gold reserves was not presently on the board's agenda."
The sale of gold is "not on the agenda" because everyone and their fucked up uncle knows it's already a done deal. They don't need to put it on an agenda.
Greece will soon be the new Atlantis as its economy sinks to levels reminiscent of the Nazi occupation. At least back then the populace was younger and more defiant. Today they are a bunch of sheep too scared to decide their own future.
The Dutch have more leaks in their dykes than fingers to plug them with.
The Germans are the ones that will be in real trouble. Their workers have been under the throttle for over a decade while Germany amasses huge foreign reserves. Her workers will eventually wake up to the fact that they have not shared in any of the euphoria of the last decade while at the same time being served with the bill for the damage in other countries.
You omitted the real reasons for trouble - demographics and a welfare state designed for ever-increasing numbers of workers. All these are hemoraging because they still have a 1950's outlook when populations were growing and the State had only begun to run private lives. Germany loses population annually DESPITE an influx of 150,000 Muslim immigrants - an ominous set of events.
Greece will not "recover" unless you mean returning to her former status as a nice tourist spot without pretensions of high finance. This attitude could also save Spain, Italy and Portugal but no, they elect for a phony "austerity" in which the State's influence has only grown. In Europe, government is essentially the only game in town, utterly subsuming all local activity.
No doubt demographics and the welfare state are unfortunately systemic weaknesses not only in Greece and other Euro countries but also the USA, japan etc.
As you said, Greece needed to stick to what her geography (sun) and natural talents (hospitality) are .....tourism.
But like all Europeans and many other westerners, too many citizens cling to government as it is some inexhaustible breast. In the process the breast will dry out and those that hang from it will wither.
The beast's teats are full of Bernakium.
Methinks this also applies to somewhere 5,000 miles from Greece.
Hiding in the hills with beans'n'bullets is not "deciding your own future". Get off your asses and push for secession before your mountain hideout is just a tiny islet above another sunken Atlantis.
Divide and Conquer, bitchez!!
Essentially - secede from the US Govt - everything else is good except for those MF'ers! - and a few hundred rotten banksters.
"The Dutch have more leaks in their dykes than fingers to plug them with."
Sounds like somebody's wet dream.
3 million cars sold on a Continent of 400 million. That's one number I trust.
Berlin gets its orders from the Illuminati. Dead ducks in the water. Finito. There will never be a NWO and they know it. Thanks be to God. And the Galcatic Federation!
The world is too big for any group to take over. How stupid do you have to be to even try?
The market is broken. There is no physical silver to be found anywhere around and the price continues to plummet. The banksters are acting in full day light and in full impunity.
There ain't no curtain anymore ...
I agree that there is no curtain anymore and I have upticked you, but the problem is that the stupid audience is facing the wrong way and fails to see the crooks, liars, cheats and psychopaths playing the lead roles on the stage.
You are probably right. Nonetheless I think it's not the fault of the audience. They have been trained like animals to act that way. It's hard to break normalcy-bias.
APMEX has supply if you want to pay their premiums. About $6 on an ASE...
The expected divergence between the prices of paper and physical seem to be happening.
I've been hearing about the inevitable, imminent collapse of the world banking system since before 2008, but it looks as though this scheme can go on indefinitely, or until they reach their endgame of absolute world domination. The banksters control everything: they have all the money, the government, the media, the big companies, and the universities. We got a lot of websites but relatively little audience and even less understanding.
so get busy and spread the word.
Agreed. There are those who do and those who dont.
Pick a side and actually do something besides bitch about your 2nd Amendment being trampled.
There are those of us who are not just Bitching about the 2A.
I sent 200 letters on my own to the senate out of my own pocket.
I convinced my Rifle Club to send out 2,500 letters. I printed them and they paid all postage.
I attended a Protest Rally for the first time and have another 2 marked as days off on my calendar.
I Joined the JPFO and NYSRPA. I am an NRA Life member.
Not all of us just Bitch.
Sorry Carbonator, I upvoted you and somehow it gave 3 upvotes and one down. Don't want
anyone thinking a troll whacked you. What you've done is commendable.
I can remember as a kid (a zillion years ago) when joining the nra was considered a good thing. It was a way of learning gun safety and becoming certified - the reason my dad signed me up. I got the certificate but hated hunting - LOL.
How being a NRA life member is gonna change something?
It is precisely that they control everything that they are losing control. All those things that are run corruptly require continual payoffs, and they are running out of other people to provide the payoffs. In short, they cannot keep taking money without the supply running dry, or the supply being rendered worthless by inflation.
The best laid schemes of mice and men....
Your typical bank is a highly levered, unstable system, the only way they can be stabilised is through a central bank.
The Bank of England has been around for 400 years. Yeah, it can go on for a long time. From the time the GBP was created, it has dropped to about 0.5% of it's original value.
What central banks do is turn bank failure into inflation.
Banksters? I'd say the organizations you mentioned are controlled by the communists.
Rome was not built in a day nor did it collapse in a day. Just look at the gradual slide and ask yourself whether anything they have done in the last 5 years is anything more than propping.
Sort of like around here, just pick your country and substitute the name of a state, California. Illinois, New York, New Jersey, et al, take your pick.
The huge and mostly only difference?
Alt P bitchezz.
Philadelphia gonna go bankrupt
Here's what makes no sense. Europeans, Japanese, those in CA, NY, IL can plainly see that the status quo does not work and yet they support it with a religious fervor. IL still thinks prosperity comes from sellilng bonds to pay the interest on bonds that it sold to pay interest on other bonds. CA ignores the flight of the productive sector and insists higher taxes on the remaining idiots is the solution. Europe ignores a rapidly declining work force trying to support an ever-increasing retiree group. Japan is debasing their currency trying to get folks to buy increasingly expensive things.
For that matter tens of millions of Americans do not save a dime during their lifetime but expect the same lifestyle with the help of bankrupt retirement and medical systema. Perhaps aliens insiduously implanted a dumb pill years ago and they will take over without firing a shot.
Sort of like around here, just pick your country and substitute the name of your favorite state, California. Illinois, New York, New Jersey, et al, take your pick.
The huge and mostly only difference?
Alt P bitchezz.
Evidently you can save these things twice.
Savers will be mercilessly punished. Has the Bernank taught you nothing?!? Blasphemer! All Hail the mighty Bernank and President Kardashian!
The levitation that takes place in the early morning hours in the Euro, the incorrect counting of both assets and liabilities, massive losses hidden in securitizations at many central banks including the ECB and the riskiest of assets lined up and labeled "Risk Free" and the bells of St. Rimney's begin to chime. Unemployment at record levels, countries such as Greece, Portugal, and Cyprus that can't pay their bills without Divine intervention and economies that are rapidly shrinking even with the help of Europe's falsified accounting practices.
Thought I was reading about the US Finacial sytem?
Twenty employees of a company in Germany have been hospitalised in case sandwiches they were given as a gift turn out to have been poisoned.
The suspicious sandwiches were left on the doorstep of a company near the northwestern town of Vechta on Tuesday with a note saying they were a present.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/free-sandwiches-may-contained-rat-poison-114106...
Very sick people out there...never eat a "free" anything handed to you.....never!
Ironically in German the word "gift" means poison.
http://dict.leo.org/#/search=gift&searchLoc=0&resultOrder=basic&multiwor...
I know Vechta, middle of nowhere not far from Oldenburg. What a weird notion to eat something left on the site. Really odd. Must be more to this story
If those countries can hold onto their gold long enough they will be able to pay out all their debts twice over.
yeah...
to but their buget goals are always above the inflation rate so their debt will rise accordingly.
The gold will only serve them when they drop the euro and start a new currency.
That's why the banks want their gold so they're stuck into the euro.
So what? The structure is the problem. Even if every nation in Europe was debt-free tomorrow, cradle to grave care for their rapidly aging population (along with a rapid decline in workers) would soon return us to the same situation. Europe wanted it all - the good life with all the benefits, power and prestiege. When trouble started they raise taxes, then radically slashed defense spending then began printing money. The EU is only the latest attempt at a solution that is destined to fail.
'Radically' slashing their 'defense' spending is about the only thing they did do right.
Up to a point. I am a Libertarian but recognize that there are lots of bad guys out there whose idea of discourse includes more than commenting on a web site. There is a world of difference between self-defense and empire building. The converse is true. There is a world of difference between self-defense and gutting yourself so that you are unable to stop slaughter within your own borders.
Defense is not a worry as long as everyone follows the rules. Unfortunately, Europe has demonstrated that mutual understanding and following rules are the exception historically.
As long as people bussy digging the big hole it's all okay... it's the fact that they're already digging 5 miles below sea level and the pumps are already running at a 100% capacity...
What's that? The emperor has no clothes you say? Good lord, wherever did he leave them???
WOW someone pass me the Dramamine! This Bernank roller coaster is a doozie!
Print more $$ or sell us your gold at a cheap.
We would......but we can't seem to find it.
But CNBC says this is bullish and so does KRUGMAN!!!!
Someone was in desperate need of gold at 8:30 this morning.
$20 gold boner?
I love those.
Tick, tock, tick, tock...
THE CRIMEX IS A ROCKIN N A ROLLIN!
US$1 now buys a bigger ounce of gold.
But the converse of that is that more gold is needed to settle a fixed amount of debt.
So the poor old Cypriots, who already thought they had it bad, have now got it worse because their gold will now pay off less debt than they thought.
And the Germans who want their gold back must also be feeling a bit sore because it has not got the same magnitiude of value they thought it had to meet some of those enormous and growing liabilities. Unless they drive down the Euro in step.
In short, there must be a lot of people out there who don't like this fall in the price of gold.
Cypriots would be foolish to sell their gold to pay off debts. It is the only thing of value they have left. They would be better off going their own way with their own currency...
Which is exactly the reason it will be gone in short order. You think those creditors want a promise to pay from the Cypriots? They ain't stupid.
The Portuguese will lose theirs as will the Spanish and all the rest and they still will be brokes peons only then they will own no gold too.
Imagine if they had to pay for their own military, instead of having US bases all over protecting them. The US is subsidizing the nearly non-existent Euro militaries.
We don't want your bases . Yanks go home. The Brits though have a special relationship as well as the London Banksters.
We don't want your bases . Yanks go home.
We? Who the fuck is we?
You using the royal we, or you got a mouse in your pocket or what?
And yet Germany considers it a threat when the US considers leaving.
...Imagine if they had to pay for their own military, instead of having US bases all over protecting them.
Protecting them from what, exactly?
The US has these bases everywhere to prop up the USD as the world's reserve currency. We'll know that whole ponzi is coming to an end when the boys start coming home.
Though a very persuasive argument, Kyle Bass owns the space --> "qualitative perceptions of investors" - This and only this changes the game & when you play the game to its natural end if investors pull the plug they lose all....INCLUDING PERCEPTION, therefore, with no legitimate 'winning' proposition the fantasy continues....Viva La Ponzi
Great wake up call for the MUPPETS who still believe a recovery is possible.
Bernanke has exposed his desperation these last few days by so blatantly manipulating the gold market - and now the masses have seen him for what he is - a incompetent moron who tells lie after lie after lie.
This has also exposed to a great many people what a total SHAM the global economy is. The veil has been lifted and the hideous disease ridden bitch is there for all to see now.
Only a complete idiot could now peer into those eyes and still see beauty.
I do sense the end game is coming - and on one hand I embrace it because the stress of knowing what is coming has been tremendous - but of course on the other hand I fear what it will bring.
Am I correct in my expectations that this will be like no collapse known in the history of man? That it will bring brutal and endless starvation - and that it is likely that a totalitarian nightmare awaits us?
Will my family's pile of gold and small farm in the tropics protect us?
I am wondering if Bernanke's run at gold was an attempt to force people out to rebuild supplies of PM - if so it has not worked - even more people are demanding PM.
Is this the End Game?
KA FUCKING BOOM!
Europe Car Sales Heading for 20-Year Low on German Slidehttp://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-17/europe-car-sales-plunge-10-as-g...
There is no recovery and will be no recovery until there are gianormous write offs.
'
'
'Why did this sell-off of gold suddenly happen?
Somebody sold 400 million oz. Why?
I am inclined to believe it was a contrived take-down to move the muppets out of an alternative store of wealth. Notice how Bitcoin was taken down last week, too?
What are you thinking if you're a BRIC muppet and have seen what happens to them and their deposits? Run to the bank and pull them out and/or change them into an alternative store of wealth.
Remember! The EU is working up a wealth tax, so just buying stuff ain't gonna work either.
TPTB know this is how the muppets are thinking and need it stopped.
And if you don't think TPTB are sitting there, like terrorists laughing as the 1st bomb went off, while people scramble for cover (buying the gold at cheaper prices) and are waiting for the right moment to detonate the second bomb, where all the people ran to for cover, (another take down of the gold price) to end the credibility of gold as an alternative store of wealth, all-the-while the CBs are buying up the gold at these prices, well, I'd like another explanation.
This is about the EU problem and China. Both are looking to back their currencies with gold.
What really bothers me about this off-my-meds explanation, is it just sounds so right.
It's what I'd do.
•?•
V-V