This page has been archived and commenting is disabled.
What If The "Crash" Is As Rigged As Everything Else?
Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog,
Take your pick--here's three good reasons to engineer a "crash" that benefits the few at the expense of the many.
There is an almost touching faith that markets are rigged when they loft higher, but unrigged when they crash. Who's to say this crash isn't rigged? A few things about this "crash" (11% decline from all time highs now qualifies as a "crash") don't pass the sniff test.
Exhibit 1: VIX volatility Index soars to "the world is ending" levels when the S&P 500 drops a relatively modest 11%. The VIX above 50 is historically associated with declines of 20% or more--double the current drop.
When the VIX spiked above 50 in 2008, the market ended up down 57%. Now that's a crash.

Exhibit 2: The VIX soared and the market cratered at the end of options expiration week (OEX), maximizing pain for the majority of punters. Generally speaking, OEX weeks are up. The exceptions are out of the blue lightning bolts such as the collapse of a major investment bank.
Was a modest devaluation in China's yuan really that unexpected, given the yuan's peg to the U.S. dollar which has risen 20% in the past year? Sorry, that doesn't pass the sniff test.

Exhibit 3: When the VIX spiked above 30 in October 2014, signaling panic, the Federal Reserve unleashed the Bullard Put, i.e. the Fed's willingness to unleash stimulus in the form of QE 4. Markets reversed sharply and the VIX collapsed.
Now the VIX tops 50 and the Federal Reserve issues an absurd statement that it doesn't respond to equity markets. Well then what was the Bullard Put in October, 2014? Mere coincidence? Sorry, that doesn't pass the sniff test.
Why would "somebody" engineer a mini-crash and send volatility to "the world is ending" levels? There are a couple of possibilities.
1. The Shock Doctrine. Naomi Klein's landmark study of how manufactured crises are used to justify further consolidation of power, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, provides a blueprint for how financial crises set the stage for policies that extend the power of central and private banks and various state-private sector players.
A soaring VIX and sudden crash certainly softens up the system for the next policy squeeze.
2. A "crash" engineered to set up a buying opportunity for insiders. When easy gains get scarce, what better way to skim a quick 10% than engineer a "crash," scoop up shares dumped by panicked punters and momo-following HFT bots spooked by "the world is ending" VIX spike, and then reverse the "crash" with another round of happy talk?
3. Settling conflicts within the Deep State. I have covered the Deep State for years, in a variety of contexts--for example:
Is the Deep State Fracturing into Disunity? (March 14, 2014)
The Dollar and the Deep State (February 24, 2014)
Surplus Repression and the Self-Defeating Deep State (May 26, 2015)
Without going into details that deserve a separate essay, we can speculate that key power centers with the Deep State have profoundly different views about Imperial priorities.
One nexus of power engineers a trumped-up financial crisis (i.e. a convenient "crash") to force the hand of opposing power centers. As I have speculated here before, the rising U.S. dollar is anathema to Wall Street and its apparatchiks, while a rising USD is the cat's meow to those with a longer and more strategic view of dollar hegemony.
Take your pick--here's three good reasons to engineer a "crash" that benefits the few at the expense of the many.
- 112608 reads
- Printer-friendly version
- Send to friend
- advertisements -


This is w the Fed funds itself - same as the CIA with heroin
So...the crash is also rigged? I have been suspicious of this since two days ago. Market crash would provide a great excuse for the fed for NOT raising the rate. Seems plausible enough for me.
Propaganda 101.
"Just Us" will be able to carpetbag many more assets with essentially free QE-X money with lower prices across the board. Also, the consistent media-driven illusionary cycle of successes then unforeseen failures (which no one could have seen coming - LOL) provides cover for implementation of “Just Us” favorable polices and a tighter police state which would be unpalatable to the herd if the herd was alert and doing well.
Inside information is useless without volatility. The key is to drive volatility in the desired direction and suppress or spin any undesired information reaching the herd.
One consistent trait of “Just Us” meddling in our joke of a free market has been producing and disseminating propaganda designed to facilitate shearing the herd up and shearing the herd down, they do not appear to slaughter (large scale false flags) unless absolutely necessary to achieve their objectives.
The only way to win is not to play their game.
And someone in the know bought VIX 50 calls
"There are no accidents". Sigmund Freud
Not sure why there is a "What If" in the title
Of course the crash is rigged. What are you stupid. The markets are FED and Israeli central bank software now. They intend to buy up all the world's global corporations with freshly printed fiat and then get the military make the populace accept bail-ins. They are banksters. That's what banksters do. They are like child molestors. They won't stop until they are locked up.
I am glad Hugh-Smith is making the point that it's all a staged and rigged game. I have known this for 30 years.
All the world is a stage and citizens are only serfs and slaves that own nothing. We're all tenant-in-deed and debtors to the People and their posterity (creditors). And guess what...if you're anywhere in the world today...welcome to the Holy Roman Empire!
It never died and the velvet glove is soon coming off it's iron first. When the Pope arrives next month to announce that the unfunded liabilities will soon be terminated...you'll all see what I am talking about.
https://youtu.be/lAM6FycAyqA
The "Holy Roman Empire" was completely leveled March 10th 2008. Pope Ponzi Climate Change is an international AssClown cheerleader for Cap n' Trade which is the next Ponzi scheme the establishment hopes to generate moar taxation with.
Finally someone gets it.
I thought everybody realized this ...
ZEROHEDGE is run by ROBOTS.
So if you feel that the writing here is a little "stiff and mechanical", well now you know why.
PINCH YOURSELF. Deep inside your heart - you knew this was true!!
I am not a robot. 2 + 3 = 6.....
I think not.
Rigging this crash means nothing more than standing aside from the mass money injections, and letting markets dictate, which means crashing in a smoldering pile of burning trash, just like the economy and balance sheets these stocks should represent.
Plausible...you can short a stock..why not short a market...
4. Never forget that Wall Street makes most of its money off transactions and volume, i.e., large numbers of relatively small profits on short term positions. Major market moves drive volume through the roof, and make it easier for traders to amplify those moves through front running and market manipulation. The head of HFT Firm Virtu admitted on national TV yesterday his company had one of its best and highest volume days ever. In other words, Wall Street thrives most when everyone else is experiencing pain and suffering. Wall Street loves crazy and hates quiet and steady growth, exactly the opposite of what most of their clients want.
The article is so full of bullshit we could fertilise the entire planet with it. A convoluted "logic" of a paranoid mind.
Let me get this straight. The all powerful are engineering a market move and some other all powerful might oppose it.
You cannot have a grand conspiracy where some entity is all powerful and yet vulnerable to another.
Market is crapping out because it is mostly professional players feeding on each other. Most of the retail investors and traders are gone. Most have gotten screwed in 1999 and then 2008. They saw the banks that caused the crisis get rescued instead of going out of business and their executives put in jail.
It's not that complicated. Let the HFT algos fuck themselves.
Whatever this crash was supposed to be, it was sanctioned. There was no evidence at all of the usual propping going into it. If they anted 10%, or if they want more, I don't know. But they were running their playbook by the numbers and there was no attempt by anyone to get in the way.
I don't know sh*t about currencies or the stock market, but a thought I had last night:
With the increased selling of US treasuries by China, perhaps the market was allowed/pushed to descend to create more demand in UST's. (flight to safety as they say).
Is it possible that the FED didn't want to have to buy all of the UST's that China was selling, so some market panic was created?
When you hear of bankster memos that have read on" September 12th in three years you will demand payment and refuse new loans. That way we may become mortgagors in possesion and seize most farms west of the Mississisippi and thousands of farme east of the Missississippi at our own price". Or how all the insider fat cats magically got out of the market just months before it crashed in 1929 you know it is rigged. When the news says billions were lost today in the market crash they really mean billions traded hands as someone sold the top to someone who bought the top just as it starts dropping. Just be glad its not you. I say rigged all the way and don't forget who is responsible for the current world wide economic slow down.... the central bankers!!
It's rigged!
When you hear of bankster memos that have read on" September 12th in three years you will demand payment and refuse new loans. That way we may become mortgagors in possesion and seize most farms west of the Mississisippi and thousands of farms east of the Missississippi at our own price and the farmers shall become tenents as in Briton". Or how all the insider fat cats magically got out of the market just months before it crashed in 1929 you know it is rigged. When the news says billions were lost today in the market crash they really mean billions traded hands as someone sold the top to someone who bought the top just as it starts dropping. Just be glad its not you. I say rigged all the way and don't forget who is responsible for the current world wide economic slow down.... the central bankers!!
This thesis works as long as there is gold in the goose. But then, we all know what happened next, don't we
It was rigged in order to create a bid for the US Treasuries that were being sold by the Chinese and Russians, as well and Norway, South Africa, Saudia Arabia, UAE and other OPEC's. If this had been a real crash, the 10 year would've gone to 1.50%, instead it barely budged.
the Deep Throat State maybe, i recogonize that the business cycle and the political cycle are now synonymous. last crash 2008 election year with no incumbent, 2016, as well, the fireworks started a little early, because of Trump. they're not certain what he will do. Bush Clinton Okay, the media even went so far as to resurrect Bush when his numbers flagged in Iowa by surrpetiously claiming he was still the second choice of the GOP. then they gave him a free (advertising costs) interview to get out his views, which are just so much silly putty, you can make anything you want of them and believe me the oligarchs will. remember W, he pretended to be a real conservative, he was the Manchurian president. he loved the chicoms. Jeb loves hispanic immigrants so he is probably the closest to Obama, and maybe less of hawk than HC. its all for show until the big boys place their bets. then we can all go back to our bull market financially engineered CNBC viagara money hardon that lasts then years, before we have an itsy bitsy correction that is signalled to just about everyone.
If it goes up - it's the Jew and he's hurting us.
If it goes down - it's the Jew and he's hurting us.
On the other hand it is to some point engineered. Powerful people have got to know by now that game over in USA is coming. They're kicking the can but surely they are aware that there will be the last kick at some point. Considering that interest rates and money creation are rigged... well this is a direct result so it is "engineered". Though the engineers would much rather put the collapse as far as possible. They're very well placed now and they very well can end up hanging below street lamps if the transition from collapse goes south. With zero legitimacy even a bunker with private bodygourds might not be enough, with bodygourds quickly turning and than splitting the loot between themselves.
The only way to win is not to play. --Joshua
Crash? So far all the markets have done is hiccup a few times. When the S&P is down in the 600's and the Dow is back about 6500, then you can start talking about "the crash", until then it's just another trading day on Planet More.
Of course the "crash" is rigged/engineered - everything in the financial world is these days!! Does the Dow ending on 15,666 yesterday provide a more blatant signal (keep in mind the fuckers'/TPTB obsession with numerology)?? I am surprised that Hugh-Smith wasted his time, and ours, on this "analysis".
Amen, it is business as usual for the bastards.
15,666.44
2015 and Obummer is the 44th president of the good ole USA.
Rigged 'n Pigged... Lord - better make that 'Lloyd'- knows!
The Dow is now down 250 from its opening high. Looks like STFR (sell the fucking rally).
Shake Shack (SHAK) is my favorite bubble stock to watch.
High in late May, 96.75; today, 45.12. Down more than 50%.
So, my question is, do you want fries with that half burger?
Portion control, peeps. It's what's for dinner.
The rise and fall in the share price of SHAK was not rigged. It was merely market dynamics at work, shearing the sheep, one fatass at a time.
No crash....no QE
no QE = interest increase
Interest increase = housing equity collapse, mortgage fraud collapse, consumer credit fraud collapse
Remember the feds are still sitting on trillions in ad loans
i think it was bob selvidge and his underground horse racing newsletter when asked "are the horse races rigged?. he said no, but they are choreographed.." Mcluhan said, the stock market crashes after certain articles are planted in the newspaper, the articles are a sort of code, like fedspeak. the problem with this selloff is that its too pat, its a false favorite for the bears, rallies being bitchslapped down. this selloff is for the suckers, the real selloff might come later after they rescue this market with a bit of jawboning and a pledge of liquidity. the real underlying problem when the government owns the stock market is who owns the government, and the phrase president Trump is giving the oligarchs a headache.
I am with Dr. Gloom Boom and Doom. He says that global growth will go to zero. But the CB's will keep printing at ZIRP and the world will still be sloshing with money. The markets will bungee jump off the bridge but the rubber band will hold (not sure about head injuries though to CB members).
As long as people haven't hit their credit limit on their one hundred credit cards and they can still roll and make the monthly payments, why worry?
Marc Faber ?@gloomboomdoom 52m minutes ago
From Yahoo Finance.
http://yhoo.it/1LyVKRV
Attributed to Thomas Jefferson, but not confirmed:
"If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their Fathers conquered...I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies... The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs."
Whether an authentic Thomas Jefferson quote or not, it makes little difference. It is a historically assembled quote and certainly applies to the current situation.
Yes, and duh ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFpx7Q8SAiw
Probably not a "what if." This is all designed to make sure that QE (the biggest moneymaker for the .01% the world has ever seen) never ends, ever.
Check out the controlled decline from 17000. Its obviously on purpose.
As I have speculated here before, the rising U.S. dollar is anathema to Wall Street and its apparatchiks, while a rising USD is the cat's meow to those with a longer and more strategic view of dollar hegemony
Will someone check my thinking on this?
Bank of International Settlements White Paper: Global Credit Issued in Dollars http://www.bis.org/publ/work483.pdf
Basically what I took away from reading the white paper is that some big picture thinkers that want to see dollar hegemony prevail flooded the globe with cheap dollar credit. If and when the FED really does raise rates, it functions as a margin call and will create a very large tail whip. You can see where if private firms within a given foreign nation look like they are going to collapse b/c of such a margin call, the foreign nation state may be presented with the choice between let the firm fail (a hit to their GDP and they will likely stand by only to watch as US firms step in and buy them up for pennies on the debt) or bail it out (increased public debt denominated in dollars - likely for generations to come). For the foreign nation state - it is a bad choice either way. For proponents of the existing U$D paradigm - it is a win / win either way.
Conversely, with China debasing they are forcing EMs to continue to debase to stay out in front of China. That this potentially creates a dollar crisis orchestrated by China (with Russia and Iran in the mix) in which the question may finally be called: Just exactly what does back the US Dollar, and given the gross violation of Bretton Woods – why is it still the WRC? What happens if significant portions of world can't (refuses) to pay you back?
No one listens. No one wishes to learn from the past. No one cares. (Except ZHers)
"This [Federal Reserve Act] establishes the most gigantic trust on earth. When the President [Wilson} signs this bill, the invisible government of the monetary power will be legalized.. ..the worst legislative crime of the ages is perpetrated by this banking and currency bill." -- Charles A. Lindbergh, Sr. , 1913
"From now on, depressions will be scientifically created." -- Congressman Charles A. Lindbergh Sr. , 1913)
"The financial system has been turned over to the Federal Reserve Board. That Board administers the finance system by authority of a purely profiteering group. The system is Private, conducted for the sole purpose of obtaining the greatest possible profits from the use of other people's money" -- Charles A. Lindbergh Sr., 1923
Mark my words. There can be no market rebound until a Kardashian balances a champagne glass on her ass. Again.
In the words of one of the self-anointed political oligarchs, “What Difference Does It Make?”
This is just another of those inconvenient truths the blind masses of sheeple chose to ignore.
For anyone who has studied actual history, not the heavily propagandized crap pushed in all the establish pseudo educational establishments, you will find nothing has changed. The brainless masses continue to allow their abuse by the elites with only a smattering of whimpering and dissent.
The French had the right idea with their revolution and the use if the guillotine. Except for their failure to complete the cleansing by stopping it’s use far too soon.
Want to see what scares the oligarchs, just look at their reaction to the Russian communist revolution. Once they realized the masses will organize and exterminate those who continue to uselessly toss away their lives for nothing more that satisfying their inflated egos, they understood the ways of the past must change.
And here we have arrived at the greatest legalized wealth confiscation in history. And the sheeple just continue to bleep their discontent while marching in lockstep over the cliffs of apathy.
It is always rigged.
We just small fish
It is always rigged.
We just small fish
why am i not surprised! even our life is rigged
Exhibit 1: VIX volatility Index soars to "the world is ending" levels when the S&P 500 drops a relatively modest 11%. The VIX above 50 is historically associated with declines of 20% or more--double the current drop.
When the VIX spiked above 50 in 2008, the market ended up down 57%. Now that's a crash.
But look at the speed of this 11% decline compared to how long it took for the 57% decline. Don't you think an 11% decline in a couple days is more serious than a 57% decline over a year an a quarter. Do you really think this is over?
Why did WTC7 fall down?
They are rigged to shit. Its a set up with no place to hide. China unloading its Ts means its getting close.
Its a giant swindle to grab most everything. Understand that the Fed always knew the true value of this fiat is 0.
The real crash? When the Fed pulls out the rug. Rehypothocated margine calls will suck up everything in the banks. How they will take the rest Im not sure. But they will try.
People are always rigging things and we don't know it.
Like the FED with all it's many programs and no Transparency.
Who gets the FED TAF Loans from Auction Facility: BWM
Bayerische Motoren Werke AG,Bayerische Motoren Werke AG*,,,,,
Ticker,BMW GY Equity,,,,,
Includes Loans to:,"BMW Bank of North America, Bayerische Motoren Werke AG and BMW Bank of North America",,,,,
Identified in Fed Documents as:,"BMW BK OF N AMER, Bayerische Motoren Werke AG and BMW BK OF N AMER",,,,,
Capital Raised From Home Governments,,,,,,
Programs,"TAF, CPFF, DW",,,,,
Country,Germany,,,,,
Industry,Auto Manufacturing,,,,,
"Average Daily Balance
From 8/1/2007 to 4/30/2010",$735.53 ,,,,,
Peak Amount of Debt,"$4,269.30 ",,,,,
Peak Date,4/2/2009,,,,,
-
And in Germany a Teen Finds a bar of gold:
"Gold from the Nazi era was once said to have been dumped in the lake, which is on the border with Austria.
It is thought soldiers loaded heavy boxes with the precious metal and dropped them into the water in a bid to stop it being looted by Allied Forces.
But experts have since claimed the gold bar does not bear the correct markings to have been from the era.
It is not known whether the gold will be returned to the finder.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3195356/Teenager-swimming-German...
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
There are too few retail participants for it to crash. Central banks, machines and pension funds guarantee that it is UNCRASHABLE. It can go on forever and ever. If the Fed is forced to buy all equities, along with all the toxic mortgages, it will simply OWN AMERICA. Not saying that was the plan all along, but....
Good work, Charlie.
Here are my three little thingies about your three thingies.
1) In the olden days, when you were just a wee lad, occasionally the crooks used to drive down the price of a single stock so they could accumulate it at a lower price, the stock of a company with a patent on something like a Xerox machine. I'm not sure. It may have been called "a shake out."
2) if markets are rigged, and prices of the components of the markets are rigged, and most of the buying is rigged and most of the selling is rigged, what good are charts? They only tell you what you already know: IT'S RIGGED.
3) Here at zh we also do political stuff. For example, indeed, if the crash is rigged, the riggers would be dirty, rotten scoundrels.
But what if Obama, Xi and Putin have already agreed to divide up the world a la '1984'? And right now they're getting their ducks in a row.
That makes your 'rigged crash' theory look like tiddlywinks, no?
Why would "somebody" engineer a mini-crash and send volatility to "the world is ending" levels?
4. Because the Fed can't ever raise interest rates again withour crashing the system. They just happen to be having their annual meeting
this week in Jackson WY too BTW... So they now have another excuse to kick the can further on down the road. They'll come up with something
else come December...
Stock market moves like the one which began on Friday are always related to the credit markets. The tell here is to ask yourself: what happened to perciptate this move?
Central Banks were aware that China needed to devalue, and their equity markets had been halted two weeks back, and were essentially in free-fall. So China needed to drop their rates and de-value. In addition, we found out the TIC Data showed that China has been raising liquidity. In order to sell US Treasuries they take back Cash $US. That drives up the US $, and in fact, we have been seeing this for weeks also. But the BIG Question IS.....
Who bought the treasuries?
Answer.... when the stock market crashed on Friday, the result is a glut of treasuries were dumped on the private market for the consumption of the investors looking for a safe haven. The evidence here is that UST yields didn't fall nearly enough to warrant the equity market decline. Our Fed has been providing adequate cover for them by all but conceding no rate hike in Sept. Also, there was no flight to gold... hence the USTs were where all the money went. Lastly, nothing has changed with regards to US economics. Durable goods were pretty decent today, for instance.
Wells Fargo Chief Strategist basically confirmed this hypothesis on BBerg 20 minutes ago.
Anecdotal evidence: The Israeli sheckel is getting killed, giving credence towards a new currency regime that doesnt like them - nor currency speculators that crash countries--ie. Malaysia, Zimbabwe, UK. etc.
My bet is that they WILL INDEED HIKE in Sept. Unless China devalues/dumps USTs even more... in which case they will let that all flush-- like they're doing now, but come back in Oct or Jan.
Makes perfect sense. All we know for sure is the fuel eventually runs out and the beast has nothing but its own tail to eat. Meanwhile the carnage continues for main-street.
yes it's all rigged, if you don't know if, what used to be a market, is going to go up or down that day, you have a gambling addiction.
the one commenter is correct, it's going to go on forever, the tbtf's are going to loan, as their doing now to the auto business, to keep credit moving, knowing full well. tax-payers will have to pick-up 50% of the bad credit loans
it's a world of ground-hog days, just as 2005-2006-2007-2008- give credit to people who can't or won't pay off mortage, 2015 it's credit for cars, 2016 it will be college tuitions, it's all backed by the tax- payer,
those rare few billioaires that closed their hedge-funds gave their customers back their money, were the smartest people around,
they understood even billionaries can't beat unregulated the unaccoutable BIS's trillionaire cb's, in an unregulated market,
There's no question: if the market is rigged every gain & loss is rigged