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As Seen In Front Of A Russian Currency Exchange Office
And bank dealers thought bid/ask spreads on CDS were wide. Perhaps US banks with sliding revenues should just open a few FX kiosks by the Moscow train station and make up for all that lost income from hundreds of billions in FX-rigging legal settlements?
Currency rates in Moscow's exchange offices now pic.twitter.com/NP9Pu7nuB0
— Alexander Roslyakov (@RoslyakovAP) December 16, 2014
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So where is the woar going to start?
EMPs - right over the continental US
Budapest memorandum, presidential guarantees voided by Russia when they annexed Crimeea. International law is dead, chaos to follow.
gold has passed platinum
Read the sign, it's only "Kacca" they're trading.
That's Goldman Kacca for you.
Where's Boris Alatovkrap?
I'd love to hear his take on all this...
I miss that guy. He was one of the funniest people here.
If he's smart, he's drinking some vodka and shacking up with a hottie right now.
Surely, you've never really believed Boris was Russian, did you?
Of course I do! I have a cousin from Moscow who knows Boris. His name is Ivan Offallitch.
P.S.: I'm not Surely...
He was funny, but he wasn't Russian. I once saw him use the phrase "too much vodka." A (real) Russian knows there's no such thing.
Ivan Offallitch
LOL
But that sounds more like a Serbo-Croatian name.
Yes. And stop calling me Surely.
I thought he was with Shirley?
Budapest memorandum, presidential guarantees voided by Russia when they annexed Crimeea. International law is dead, chaos to follow.
NWO Troll.
Out of work mercenary
No GI Joe w Kung Fu Grip for you!
semperetardis
Semper Fidelis,
Russia did not void the Budapest Memorandum and no international law was broken.
For one thing, the Budapest Memorandum is not a treaty. Paragraph 6: “This Memorandum will become applicable upon signature.” It entails no ratification or adoption procedures. It’s a political commitment, not a legal one (though it cites other legal commitments).
Second, paragraphs 1, 2, and 3, commit the parties to Ukraine’s territorial integrity, and pledge not to threaten force or bring economic pressure to bear, in accordance with the Helsinki Final Act and UN Charter – legal obligations obligatory on all states anyway. It does not create any new legal obligations. It should be noted that the US and NATO have violated these standards many times – in our illegal war against Serbia, to cite one example among many.
Third, the only thing required of the US, UK, and Russia (see Paragraph 4) is to respond in the event “Ukraine should become the victim of an act of aggression or the object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used.” As it happens, no one is using or threatening to use nuclear weapons against Ukraine. (The phrase “in which nuclear weapons are used” may or may not apply to the preceding “an act of aggression,” and therefore could apply to non-nuclear aggression, but still, whatever role Russia played in Crimea was legally justified as Viktor Yanukovich invited Russia to intervene in Ukraine, which he had every right to do as the country’s legitimate president, even if he have been forced out by an illegal, foreign-backed coup d’etat in Kiev.
Fourth, even if paragraph four is invoked, what action are the parties committed to take? In the same paragraph, the signatories: “reaffirm their commitment to seek immediate United Nations Security Council action to provide assistance to Ukraine as a non-nuclear-weapons state and parrty to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons if Ukraine should become the victim of an act of aggression or the object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used”. The only action required or authorized is to refer the matter to the UN Security Council --- which has been debating the Ukraine crisis since it erupted last fall to no discernable effect.
It should be kept in mind that when the US unilaterally abrogated the ABM treaty it said treaties should be respected only as long as its terms correspond to reality at any given time. Well, the Budapest Memorandum is 1) not even a treaty, and 2) ceased to reflect reality the moment the West sought the overthrow of the legally elected non-aligned government of V. F. Yanukovich for the purpose of dragooning Ukraine into NATO – a step that had been rejected by Ukraine’s voters in the previous national election (2010) – and, once in NATO, use Ukraine as a club with which to beat Russia.
FU semperjew
EMPs - right over the continental US
Second try is a charm.
Do we even have the nuclear officer staff to pull it off anymore?
Between cheating on tests and fake poker chips......I somewhat doubt it.
This stastatement is profound and frighteningly true.
vlad will rely on the dynamic nuke algos. russians are great at math.
no no tyler has been touting how putin has been hoarding gold, russia will back the ruble with gold any minute now....any minute now.......all will be well with russia.....
"One Second After"?
Awesome book. Everyone here should go read the introduction on Amazon.
But the Navy commercial said "To get to you they have to get though us". except the military was a no show in september....hmm?
100 nuclear reactors and many cooling fuel pools in the US, no rational actor uses an EMP it kills them as well. Albeit slower but On The Beach applies to an EMP, too destructive. The real reason for stopping non-rational actors having nukes and lift capability.
All Nuclear power plants are hardened structures. They would shut down because it is required when the electrical grid is lost. Without a simultaneous earthquake and sunami along with the emp there would be no adverse effects on the plants themselves. The US is not Japan our reactors are built to different standards and you should learn something about it before spouting opinions.
Hardened structures to EMP, no your wrong, very wrong, the entire electrical grid is vulnerable common knowledge just not to you. You sir are an idiot preaching to someone who obviously knows more than you.. Those plants lose electricity to pumps and they are fucked. Do they have an unlimited supply of diesel on site.. Who cares the wiring in the diesels just cooked off. Workers going to hang out in selfless effort when their homes and families are dark with no water pressure. You go ahead and give it a good long think before you post inane responses.
Yep. Noone fully 'thinks' out this endgame. We saw this with Fuki....electricity cut, diesels down, those babies cook off in a few days. Life on the planet is changed forever. Yep, EMPs are just as bad as MRVs dropped on targets (maybe worse because with the MRVs, some of the material may get consumed in the explosion)....
http://www.whiteoutpress.com/articles/2014/q1/23-us-nuclear-plants-use-s...
Frankly it does not matter even if the backup systems get the rods out of the pile they are hot and stay hot for a long time hence cooling pools with recirculated water. Not reciruculating, the water boils off... All 100 reactors will have selfless crews who will die at their posts, while bucket brigading water into the cooling pools, keep dreaming..
no, the end game is when there is no longer any diesel to run the generators to pump cooling water through the reactor.
and don't even think about suggesting unloading the reactor into the spent fuel pool.
1) there probably isn't room. 2) doesn't change the amount of cooling water needed.
long bike futures
the "woar" has started, and is going on since a while. it's just not a conventional war. those need... a possible profit, somewhere, or someone to pick up the bill, after the war
there has never been a conventional war without a profit motive, somewhere. you make "woar" in order to get "moar"
so forget your cultural imprinting, there won't be a conventional war, and the whole thing counts doubly for a nuclear war, where profits are even scarcer
you wrong, when financial has finished to decimate reel economy and nobody can pay anything, i strongly suggest to wear your bulletproof jacket and hold the 45 acp when you "try" to get some eatable junk outside of your home.
just to say.
nuke is vue d'esprit, after foscils ressources on lands, what remain, land, for ? space and...? food.
nuke a land is not a solution to the problem being the humans on it.
starvation & self destruction is the appropriate path. expect it within 20 years.
I'm talking about conventional wars. I think you are talking about civil wars (and please everyone spare me the "civil/uncivil" quips. It's called a civil war because it involves civilians. Which a conventional, civilized war is supposed to spare)
Don't tell the draft about that citizens part...
He gets touchy.
I'm actually shocked how smoothly and effective that attack on Russia's economy is progressing. It's frightning to witness a major currency being destroyed like that. No Putin fan at all, but this will have severe repercussions on the ordinary people while Obama and Wall Street mimic the innocent. Always considered Putin's move into Crimea a violation of international law, but this is a direct economic attack on Russia and in my opinion it has gone way too far and is a further uneccessary escalation on US' part. It irks me too how a country with a much more ill disciplined household can school a country like Russia in regards to currency. This is much more a demonstration of might than any cruise missile can achieve.
On a personal investment note, I might have a look at some Russian stocks. Gazprom looks appetizing, but those ADRs, 1998 redux and the possibility of further nationalisation, makes any current investment extremely risky.
http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pubs/summary.cfm?q=905
History may not repeat, but it appears to rhyme.
excellent comment, mein schatzi (only a pun, could not resist)
"this is a direct economic attack on Russia" fingerprints? culprits? the basis is the oil price war, so Saudi. but that's not directly related
the main actors of this battle are both FX trading desks and speculators. Both foreign speculators and Russian speculators, among them both oligarchs not wanting to lose too much and what recently some journalists called "that bloated Russian upper-middle class", with the same motive
a market is a market. The CBR wanted to float the Ruble, and the monsters lurking below the surface of that immense ocean that is the USD-based FX market are dragging it down. You can see the tentacles, pardon me, the motives, but at the end "everyone is betting for himself"
Yeah, "direct" is the wrong term. The oil price is the major driver - as you say, and can be seen from the very close correlation between Rubel/$ and oil/$. and we all know there are other factors also working on the oil price currently. Your post describes it best.
Don't cry for Vlad. He saw this coming and tested his SWIFT replacement on Monday. They will soon be settling all transactions through this new system. They will be direct transactions with counterparties and not through the "Reserve / Petro" dollar of the USSA. The $/Ruble pricing only matters if you need this as a trade currency. Soon Russia will not need the $. Most of the deals they have done lately are direct currency exchanges with Eastern trading partners. This direct cash flow and trade will continue. As it gets colder this winter, Europe may have to source their natgas in Rubles as well. The USSA is keeping score on a game that Russia withdrew from a while ago. Sanctions only work when a country has nowhere else to source the prohibited items. Russia is not isolated and they will survive if not thrive.
This is the scariest meme. Will U.S./market overreach kill the petrodollar?
The U.S. MUST make sure this SWIFT replacement fails!
Yes, the whole 'buy when there's blood in the streets' advice is starting to come to mind. Too bad I'd need to liquidate some of my stack to do so.
Typical of the oligachs.
Incinerate the sheeple. We don't want to run out of food.
Will Putin bite? Or will there be a false flag and the warheads fly?
If you are gonna start a nuclear war and annihilate humanity then you don't need false flags or any sort of pretense.
If you're going to shoot, shoot. Don't talk.
December 23, 1913.
An American, not US subject
Looks like a donut shop, mmmmm do-nuts!
Thats the rate in euros.
she used to be tight
Better not go over 99.99 Rubles to the Euro; they've run out of digits on that sign...
Looks like Japan at some point will have it's currency crisis as well.
At some point, all fiat printers will have a currency crisis. All will cower to real money (which I seemed to have lost in a boating accident).
history tells us that fiat printers always have a currency crisis, eventually. but not at the same time
watch how the Dollar is sucking the Ruble dry, and get's stronger by that
Speaking of spreads, what is the real number for the unfunded liabilities of the U.S.S.A. now? How does that compare with total tax "revenues"?
LOL!
usdebtclock.org says $115 trillion - and growing about $250M an hour. Just a drop in the bucket...don't get all huffy on us.
Don't forget to add the 303 Tril of exposure our honorable* US leadership just yolked us with.
*as in dirty rotten traitor swine that deserve to rot in hell
Nabiullina is being set up. There have tons of voices, popular voices, questioning her loyalty recently.
Putin has consistently said the government had no influence whatsoever on the Russian Central Bank, repeatedly saying they are fully independent.
Every move made by the central bank has been carefully tied to Nabiullina in the Russian media.
Today she even had to get on TV to explain HER moves to the Russian public.
Following this appearance, the Kremlin reiterated that the Russia Central Bank acts independently.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elvira_Nabiullina
Excellent post!
and so she is an expendable pawn. as the whole concept of a independent CB in Russia. in balance, subject to victory or failure
Exactly. And since the RCB clearly is Russia's achilles heel (since it is pretty much beholden to the U.S. FED and the IMF), this would be a great opportunity for a crackdown.
Remember Putin in his last speech said they knew who the speculators were... at that moment the camera zoomed in on Nabiullina sitting in the audience.
if she gets sacked by Putin and Glaziev is installed... then things gonna change really fast
I thought she learned the ropes from Kudrin, and wasn't he the financial golden boy until he dissed Medvedev? She seemed somewhat decent, I thought. Anybody have more links about her?
(thanks IR for the wiki link. I wonder about her philosophy, too.)
I like turtles.
I thought Mitch McConnell's staffers were banned from commenting here?
Word is he and Nancy Pelosi share the same staff.
I believe this is the staff you are referring to.
I let mitch fondle my chicken neck, but he can't use my staff!
LONDON (MarketWatch) — The ruble continued its rout on Tuesday, after the Russian central bank’s surprise interest-rate rise to 17% failed to halt the steep slide in the currency.
The ruble initially rallied after the rate-hike announcement early Tuesday. However, as worries grew that the increase wouldn’t be enough to end the pressure, the Russian currency fell back to trade around an all-time low against the dollar. In midday European trade, the dollar bought 76.13 rubles, compared with 65.60 late on Monday. The pair traded as low as 60.11 earlier in the day, according to FactSet data.
“It’s a currency crisis as of this morning,” said Simon Smith, chief economist at FxPro. “If [the central bank] had done this last week when they raised rates by a 100 basis points they could have instilled some confidence, but the feeling now is that they are chasing events rather than leading events.”
“It’s a perfect storm scenario,” he added, referring to the impact from Western-imposed sanctions, the slide in oil prices and the fact that the economy is still highly dependent on oil revenue. “Without the oil-price fall, we’d probably still be trading around 45-50 rubles to the dollar.”
Oil prices continued to fall on Tuesday, with Brent LCOF5, -2.85% dropping below $60 a barrel for the first time in more than five years and crude oil CLF5, -2.40% declining to $54.21 a barrel.
Bank of Russia Chairwoman Elvira Nabiullina said the ruble is currently undervalued and the rate-hike decision has increased the risk of bets against the currency, speaking in a televised statement on Tuesday.
Elsewhere, the yen strengthened against its rivals, as unease over Russia and the tumbling oil prices steered investors into safe havens. The dollar USDJPY, -1.44% was at ¥115.76, from ¥117.73 late Monday in New York. The euro EURJPY, -0.78% also fell to ¥145.23, from ¥146.34.
While sharply lower oil prices are good news for net energy importers such as Japan, some economies that are heavily reliant on oil revenues, among them Russia, are less than happy about the declines.
The nervousness hitting oil-dependent economies was also seen for the Norwegian krone USDNOK, +1.05% which slid around 5% against the dollar. The greenback bought 7.86 kroner, compared with 7.48 on Monday.
The WSJ Dollar Index BUXX, -0.38% a measure of the dollar against a basket of major currencies, was down 0.40% at 81.81, as the Federal Open Market Committee prepared to kick off its two-day policy meeting.
WARNING Amerikan Patriot is a TRoLLER/paid SHill (check his history)
CAN SOMEONE PLEASE ban him
thank you
The down votes are a kind of "Virtual Ban"...
Yes - 'we communists only want to read/hear good things - never mind reality.'
Listen SickDollar,
Can we trade him in and get goatrider or bangalore back? At least those two had some entertainment value at times.
Bitcoin bitchez!
/sarc
I agree. Amerikan is a fascist troll. Think I read its bs on Yahoo too.
I agree. Amerikan is a fascist troll. Think I read its bs on Yahoo too.
Who's manning Vlad's suicide watch tonight?
Who's manning your backend..... Pol Pots rectal rehydration is coming your way......bamboo style
WARNING Amerikan Patriot is a TRoLLER/paid SHill (check his history)
CAN SOMEONE PLEASE ban him
thank you
i have stopped reading his posts after i made that mistake twice but i don't need anybody making decisions for me what i should or shouldn't read. especially coming from a person begging authorities (tylers in this case) for censorship. fuck off.
IMO, Putin lives in a world of abundance. Russia has a small population, huge energy reserves and lots and lots and lots of land, spans 9 time zones.
Also, he has the popular support of his citizens. Oh yeah, low debt.
Consequently, his world view is quite different from one, that has to satisfy a lot of greedy shareholders/lenders...
I think he just has to wait and watch the west fall under its own weight of greed, corruption and debt.
Ever read, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn? This is a cake walk or them. "Your not a good Russian, unless you've done a tenner..."
Yes, he is investing in REAL infra-stucture and forming REAL, mutually benificial relationships with trading partners, z.b. China, India, Turkey...
amerikan patriot, havent you been following zh and those pics of vlad and the gold bars? shirley vlad has enough to back the ruble instead of allowing his currency to get pummeled...after all what idiot would SELL gold to prop up paper.......any day now....any day
http://www.kitco.com/news/2014-12-12/Is-Russia-Selling-Its-Gold-Reserves...
Powerball sign.
Pakistan: Taliban claim attack on military school, at least 125 dead including 84 children
What the Western bankers have done is 'introduce' Vlad to the warfare in the paper markets. He is seeing that even a 6.5% rate increase can be rendered temporarily meaningless. I fear that he will do what Russians have always done -- learn from the attacker -- then respond a hundred-fold back to destroy the attacker. We may have introduced Russia to the effectiveness of paper market warfare at a time that the US markets are perched high upon a very unstable base.
To attack you have to have and effective weapon.
Russia does not have the economic might to attack anyone.
You may not like it but it is fact.
Pulling the enemy in before smashig them down seems to be Russian favorite tactics.
They are also renown for self-sacifice and patience.
I'm sure the Nazis felt really confident in 1942.
Is that like firing your torpedos in your sub with the torpedo doors are closed?
Or when a natural gas pipeline has a sudden dip in pressure due to a leak, turning the gas up even higher causing a huge explosion killing 200 + people?
Or banning children's books like "My Book of Bible Stories" as subversive?
You can't "turn up the gas up even higher". Gas pipelines don't work that way.
So you written three things that are bullshit.
My Book of Bible Stories is classic brainwash material and the Kursk had a torpedo sized entry hole in its forward section.
Drink Kool-aid much?
10 bowls of GMO cornflakes with 12tablespoons of suger is more effective than koolaid...
Not sure this latest salvo is an introduction. We manipulated markets in the 1980s against the Soviets and again in 2008 as "punishment" when Russia trounced Georgia that August. As long as we can add infinite zeroes to our bank statements, we will manipulate the markets against any whippersnapper who thinks he can stand up for himself. Russia should be used to this by now.
F-U-C-K-I-N-G "A"!!!!!
Middle Digit to Uncle "Shlomo" in Washington, London, Tel Aviv and Riyadh!
Well that spread would be expected when your currency trades +7% and -7% within a few hours.
The Russian New Year count down
german MP critic of russia - DEAD.
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's land! Enough said.
off topic:
Leaked Emails Show Chinese Regime Employs 500,000 Internet Trollshttp://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/1142634-leaked-emails-show-chinese-regim...
Just in America?
thanks for posting that link, seems that those trolls get 50 cents/or one half of one Yuan per post.
called the fifty cent army
OT:some essays that may have gone unnoticed
a read for financial historians
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2014/12/15/change-stymied-paul-craig-rob...
on the abuse of deposit insurance and taxpayer backing
http://davidstockmanscontracorner.com/memo-to-citigroup-ceo-micheal-corb...
re: PCR article:
The United States has devolved to the point where truth has becomed an enemy of the state and of the forces that control the state. Those who lie for the state and the interest groups that control the state are rewarded. Those who tell the truth are punished.
One country at a time, we re-learn about gold.
If Russia has enough Gold for a Gold Standard, how would that fail to halt the Ruble's fall?
Ruble is falling because (in order of impact):
1) Oil is down + Forex manipulation.
2) Russian Politics (seizures, and threats of capital seizure) triggered non-Ruble capital flight.
3) Sanctions.
I arrived at the heirarchy of effect by charting the Ruble's value over time against the implementation of each condition...
If Russia had the gold to halt Ruble's fall, why wouldn't they announce it?
If Russia had the gold to implement a gold-backed Ruble, why wouldn't they announce it?
It appears you forgot the main reason the ruble is falling: the concerted effort by Western Banks, including Central banks, to punish Russia and depreciate its currency.
A gold backed currency, whether dollar or ruble. does not exist unless that currency is redeemable for gold.
If you have devised a gold backed currency scheme that does not involve 'redemption for gold', I'd love hear it. Really.
LOL at "kacca."
Looks like 99.99 is the bottom due to technical limitations ;)