Unemployment

Et tu, Brute!

Could Sweden or Finland be the scene of the next European financial crisis? It is actually far likelier than most people realize. While the world has been laser-focused on the woes of the heavily-indebted PIIGS nations for the last couple of years, property markets in Northern and Western European countries have been bubbling up to dizzying new heights in a repeat performance of the very property bubbles that caused the global financial crisis in the first place. Nordic and Western European countries such as Norway and Switzerland have attracted strong investment inflows due to their perceived economic safe-haven statuses, serving to further inflate these countries’ preexisting property bubbles that had expanded from the mid-1990s until 2008. With their overheated economies and ballooning property bubbles, today’s safe-haven European countries may very well be tomorrow’s Greeces and Italys.

Overnight sentiment is significantly negative, with stocks, bond yields, risk currencies lower after G-20 over the weekend refused to increase IMF funding. The result is an end to the buoyant market sentiment of recent days which has seen the Dax down 1.2%, bund, UST yields lower, and US futures lower. As many had expected, the G-20 has rebuffed EU leaders' request for more assistance, which in turn has placed the onus on Germany to find a way to resolve its internal conflict vis-a-vis a Greek bailout, ironically as many believe that it is Germany who more than anyone wants Greece out. This happens as the Bundestag votes today on second aid package today; Merkel’s government must decide whether to back plans at this week’s summit to combine EFSF and ESM. In other news, tomorrow the ECB will call for bids for the second 3 Year LTRO tomorrow, with results announced on February 29. And with the ECB's deposit facility at €477 billion, it is rather clear that the banks will park the bulk of new proceeds with the ECB once again, where it will continue to be a negative carry trade, earning 0.25% at a cost of 1.00%. And somehow this is favorable for the European sovereign bond market, which continues to ignore the various layers of subordination it is now working under. We expect the market revulsion to this flaw to be violent when it comes, and will result in a rapid and sudden divergence between the various subordinated tranches of sovereign bonds.

The real world revolves around cash flow. Families across the land understand this basic concept. Cash flows in from wages, investments and these days from the government. Cash flows out for food, gasoline, utilities, cable, cell phones, real estate taxes, income taxes, payroll taxes, clothing, mortgage payments, car payments, insurance payments, medical bills, auto repairs, home repairs, appliances, electronic gadgets, education, alcohol (necessary in this economy) and a countless other everyday expenses. If the outflow exceeds the inflow a family may be able to fund the deficit with credit cards for awhile, but ultimately running a cash flow deficit will result in debt default and loss of your home and assets. Ask the millions of Americans that have experienced this exact outcome since 2008 if you believe this is only a theoretical exercise. The Federal government, Federal Reserve, Wall Street banks, regulatory agencies and commercial real estate debtors have colluded since 2008 to pretend cash flow doesn’t matter. Their plan has been to “extend and pretend”, praying for an economic recovery that would save them from their greedy and foolish risk taking during the 2003 – 2007 Caligula-like debauchery.

Debt default means huge losses for the Wall Street criminal banks. Of course the banksters will just demand another taxpayer bailout from the puppet politicians. This repeat scenario gives new meaning to the term shop until you drop. Extending and pretending can work for awhile as accounting obfuscation, rolling over bad debts, and praying for a revival of the glory days can put off the day of reckoning for a couple years. Ultimately it comes down to cash flow, whether you’re a household, retailer, developer, bank or government. America is running on empty and extending and pretending is coming to an end.

You hear a lot about Kafkaesque stifling bureaucracy in Greece and other struggling European nations, but America's Status Quo is trying its best to destroy small enterprise with taxes and crushing bureaucracy. I am self-employed, and have been for most of my life. When I did take a paid position, it was in other small enterprises or local non-profit organizations. I mention this because there is an unbridgeable divide in any discussion of small business between those who have no experience in entrepreneural enterprise (i.e. they've worked for the government, NGOs/non-profits or Corporate America their entire careers) and those who have. There are all sorts of similar chasms that cannot be crossed and which quickly reveal a surreal disconnect from actual lived reality: for example, the difference between actually playing football--yes, with pads, a muddy field and guys trying to slam you to the ground--and being an armchair quarterback who's never been hit even once, never caught a pass or ever struggled to bring down a faster, bigger player. (And yes, I did play football in high school as a poor dumb skinny kid who mostly warmed the bench for good reason, but I lettered.) At the extreme of this disconnect, we have armchair generals screaming for war who have no experience of combat or war as it is actually experienced. You get the point: it's very easy for well-paid pundits who have never started a single real enterprise or met a single payroll to pontificate about "opportunity" and small business as the engine of growth, blah blah blah. It's also easy for those with no actual experience to reach all sorts of absurd conclusions about how easy it is to turn a small business into great wealth. (No, Bain Capital or other Wall Street outposts of financialization are not "small business.")

Anyone Who Thinks that War Is Good For the Economy Has One Eye Covered ... And Is Only Looking At Half the Picture ...

Greece has been the most pillaged country in Europe this Depression, among other reasons, because no one in any leadership position seems to have learned lessons from the 1930s. Plus, banks have more power now than they did then to call the shots. Despite no signs of the first bailout working – certainly not in growing the Greek economy or helping its population - but not even in being sufficient to cover speculative losses, Euro elites finalized another 130 billion Euro, ($170 billion) bailout today. This is ostensibly to avoid banks’ and credit default swap players’ wrath over the possibility of Greece defaulting on 14.5 billion Euros in bonds. Bailout promoters seem to believe (or pretend) that: bank bailout debt + more bank bailout debt + selling national assets at discount prices + oppressive unemployment = economic health. They fail to grasp that severe austerity hasn’t, and won’t, turn Greece (or any country) around. Banks, of course, just  want to protect their bets and not wait around for Greece to really stabilize for repayment.

Americans participating in a recent Gallup poll showed the highest level of confidence in an economic recovery in a year.  Sounds great, but you can’t ignore the nearly 13 million unemployed, the 46 million people on food stamps and the roughly 29% of the country’s homeowners whose mortgages are under water. They would find it hard to subscribe to the poll’s sunny conclusion. On the other hand, there’s no getting away from a bevy of seemingly increasingly favorable economic data, which, more recently, includes falling weekly jobless claims, four consecutive monthly gains in the leading economic indicators, somewhat perkier retail sales and a pickup in housing starts and business permits. Pounding home this cheerful view is the media’s growing drumbeat of increased economic vigor....Confused? How can you not be?

An explicit contagion path chart, since you probably won't get info like this anywhere else... 

• IMF Official: 'Huge' Greek Program Implementation Risks In Next Few Days (WSJ)
• European Banks Take Greek Hit After Deal (Bloomberg)
• Obama Urged to Resist Calls to Use Oil Reserves Amid Iran Risks (Bloomberg)
• Hungary hits at Brussels funds threat (FT)
• Bank Lobby Widened Volcker Rule Before Inciting Foreign Outrage (Bloomberg)
• Germany fights eurozone firewall moves (FT)
• New York Federal Reserve Said to Plan Sale of AIG-Linked Mortgage Bonds (Bloomberg)
• G-20 Asks Europe to Beef Up Funds (WSJ)
• New Push for Reform in China (WSJ)

Somehow out of the blue, the strangely morbid yet delightfully Hollywood-esque story of Greek modern day Robin Hood Vassilis Paleokostas re-emerged today. Which, considering the latest developments out of Greece is probably oddly appropriate: if there is anything the Greek population needs now to finally free itself of its usurping, unelected and banker-appointed technocratic oligarchy, which does nothing but keep selling the nation ever further down the river just so it can use Greece as a passthru funding vehicle to keep Europe's banks solvent, it is many more like Paleokostas. And incidentally, so does the US, when considering the farce the country's "democratic process" has become, where both parties are merely representative agents of the Wall Street banking class (recall who the main funders are of the last three presidential campaigns). It is thus our belief that in keeping with the endless global Onion-esque farce that has gripped the world, Kodos (of Simpsons fame) is a perfect running mate for Paleokostas' presidential campaign - a campaign that is suitable not just for the US, but for any country which is controlled not by democratic checks-and-balances, but by bank issued checks (backed by nothing but electronic "money"). Because the farce will truly be strong with those two. And that, unfortunately, is all that makes any sense in this centrally planned world.

• Obama Administration Said Set to Release Corporate Tax-Rate Plan Today (Bloomberg, WSJ)
• Greece races to meet bail-out demands (FT)
• IAEA ‘disappointed’ in Iran nuclear talks (FT)
• Hilsenrath: Fed Writes Sweeping Rules From Behind Closed Doors (WSJ)
• Fannie-Freddie Plan, Sweden FSA, Trader Suspects, CDO Lawsuit: Compliance (Bloomberg)
• Bank of England’s Bean Says Greek Deal Doesn’t End Disorderly Outcome Risk (Bloomberg)
• Greece Second Bailout Plan an ‘Important Step,’ Treasury’s Brainard Says (Bloomberg)
• Shanghai Eases Home Purchase Restrictions (Bloomberg)

January's hopium catchphrase of the month was that Europe's recession would be "technical" which is simply a euphemism for our Fed's beloved word - "transitory." Based on the just released Euroarea PMI, we can scratch this Euro-accented "transitory" addition to the lexicon, because contrary to expectations that the Euroarea composite PMI would show expansion at 50.5, instead it came out at 49.7 - the manufacturing PMI was 49.0 on Exp of 49.4, while the Services PMI was 49.4, on hopes of expansion at 50.6, which as Reuters notes suggests that firms are still cutting prices to drum up business and reducing workforces to cut costs. This was accompanied by a overnight contraction in China, where the flash manufacturing PMI rose modestly from 48.8, but was again in contraction at 49.7. We would not be surprised if this is merely the sacrifice the weakest lamb in the pack in an attempt to get crude prices lower. So far this has failed to dent WTI much if at all following rapidly escalating Iran tensions. What is curious is that Germany and France continue to do far better than the rest of the Eurozone - just as America has decoupled from Europe, so apparently have Germany and France. This too is surely "sustainable."

• Spiegel: Stop the 130-billion bank transfer! (Spiegel)
• Greece Wins Bailout as Europe Chooses Aid Over Default (Bloomberg)
• Greek pro-bailout parties at all-time low, poll shows (Reuters)
• Eurozone agrees €130bn Greek bail-out (FT)
• Top Banks in EU Rush for Safety (WSJ)
• Medvedev Adviser Says Kudrin Would Be Better Prime Minister (Bloomberg)
• US and Mexico in landmark oil deal (FT)
• McCain calls for US to support Syria rebels (FT)
• Coal Shipments to India Overtaking China on Fuel Shortage (Bloomberg)
• Gillard Shrugs Off Ousting Threat (WSJ)

The BLS better have some tricks up its statistical sleeve.