International Monetary Fund

"It all began with Greece," and as Mark Grant notes today, "somebody, somewhere is going to take a hit." It appears the 'news' is piling up thick and fast in the 'islands' nation. As Reuters reports, Greece did not receive any binding bids for natural gas producer DEPA. This was part of the asset-sale program demanded by the TROIKA, with Hellenic Petroleum's sale later in the year now potentially on hold. The sad truth is that the country cannot pay their bills, cannot pay their pension obligations, cannot fund social services and is just about out of money to even run their government. The reality is; they are bankrupt again and there is no way out without some form of debt forgiveness and more money. Debt forgiveness, alone, will not cut the mustard now by itself and some kind of end game may well be near. That is increasingly reflected in 2012's no-brainer trade as GGBs are now back below 60 and down over 10% from their highs and the Athens Stock Index just entered bear market territory, down 20% from its highs.

The last time we encountered the name Stephane Richard, CEO of France Telecom Orange, he was deflecting poor iPhone sales on frugal customers. While we don't know if French customers have become less frugal in the past two months, we do know that Mr. Richard has bigger problems on his hands than declining top and bottom lines: such as suddenly being embroiled in the Bernard Tapie corruption scandal that previously focused on Christine Lagarde, and which this morning led to the CEO being held for questioning over his role in a 2008 arbitration process that resulted in a large pay-out to businessman Bernard Tapie, a judicial source said. "Richard was at the time head of cabinet to Christine Lagarde, who was finance minister to conservative former president Nicolas Sarkozy before she became head of the International Monetary Fund."

That things in Greece are hopeless and getting worse is an understatement. With unemployment levels off the charts, the pension and retirement systems effectively gone and every able-bodied individual (what little remains of them) moving to the shadow economy which now accounts for 24% of GDP, there are few incentives for people to remain on payrolls, pay taxes and otherwise grow the economy via conventional channels. As a result, instead of an improvement in the economy despite all Greek foreign debt now having been forgiven courtesy of its recent conversion to perpetual Zero Coupons, not even during the depths of the recent economic collapse in late 2011 and early 2012 has the economic collapse been as bad. Kathimerini reports that figures released by ELSTAT on Friday showed GDP at 37.7 billion euros in the period from January to March 2013 – the lowest quarterly GDP since 2000.

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It never ceases to amaze that we vote people into positions. Those people that we have voted in elect in turn (or just go ahead and appoint without an election, making it all look very transparent) other people who are not as important but who will have the possibility of choosing (apparently in an “open, merit-based, and transparent manner”) someone who will be more important than they are, but less important than the first person that is in the voting/appointment chain. 

The topic of the IMF's idiocy - unquestioned here following years and years and years of absolutely horrific forecasts, not to mention charts like this one courtesy of the Troika, of whom the IMF is a proud member  has been widely covered in the past. However, while in the past we have attributed to stupidity all the faults of the Angela Mozilla Christine Lagarde-headed organization, we never had the factual backing to also invoke malice, lies and manipulation. Now, we can.

Talks are still on-going between the IMF and Egypt over future loans worth up to $4.8 billion to get the country back on its feet. Arab aid from the IMF in the entire region has hit the $10 billion mark in the last year alone. But, if there is not action taken pretty soon, Egypt will fall into uncontrollable depths of inflation and unemployment and see unrest increase in the country.

The US currency is shrinking as a percentage of world currency today according to the International Monetary Fund. It’s still in pole position for the moment, but business transactions are showing that companies around the world are today ready and willing to make the move to do business in other currencies.

‘Carry On’ films are a genre in their own right! British humor at its best between 1958 and 1992. Slapstick, innuendo, dirty smirks and cackles. Low-budget too! For those of us that are either too young to have heard anything about them…or for those that live in places where (thankfully) the low-budget series of films all entitled ‘Carry On this’ and ‘Carry On that’ (my favorite must be ‘Carry On Regardless’ (1961)) they are a low-budget series of situational comedy sketches that had absolutely no plot. 

Russia, Greece, Turkey, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan expanded their gold reserves for a seventh straight month in April, buying bullion to diversify foreign exchange reserves due to concerns about the dollar and the euro. Russia’s steady increase in its gold reserves saw its holdings, the seventh-largest by country, climb another 8.4 metric tons to 990 tons, taking gains this year to 3.4% after expanding by 8.5% in 2012, International Monetary Fund data show.  Kazakhstan’s reserves grew 2.6 tons to 125.5 tons, taking the increase to 8.9% this year after a 41% expansion in 2012, data on the website showed. Turkey’s holdings rose 18.2 tons to 427.1 tons in April, increasing for a 10th month as it accepted gold in its reserve requirements from commercial banks.  Belarus’s holdings expanded for a seventh month as did Azerbaijan’s. Interestingly, Greece’s gold holdings climbed for a fourth month, according to the IMF data.   This could be a sign of rising economic nationalism in Greece or that the Greek central bank realises that if Greece leaves the euro and is forced back onto the drachma that gold reserves will offer a modicum of protection. Only a modicum, because Greece’s gold reserves remain miniscule especially considering the scale of their debts. 

Just when you thought the R&R debate was finished, it seems Paul Krugman's latest "spectacularly uncivil behavior" pushed Reinhart and Rogoff too far. In what can only be described as the most eruditely worded of "fuck you"s, the pair go on the offensive at Krugman's ongoing tete-a-tete. "You have attacked us in very personal terms, virtually non-stop...  Your characterization of our work and of our policy impact is selective and shallow.  It is deeply misleading about where we stand on the issues.  And we would respectfully submit, your logic and evidence on the policy substance is not nearly as compelling as you imply... That you disagree with our interpretation of the results is your prerogative.  Your thoroughly ignoring the subsequent literature... is troubling.   Perhaps, acknowledging the updated literature on drawbacks to high debt-would inconveniently undermine your attempt to make us a scapegoat for austerity."

It looks like the International Monetary Fund has been jinxed. It’s fated. It’s doomed! The next managing director should start wearing garlic around their neck already or at least burn sage in their office to ward off evil spirits.

Mervyn King gave a speech in Helsinki Finland today just before he takes retirement from the Bank of England in which he said that both austerity and growth were at fault of grossly exaggerated statements to purely political ends:  "This debate has been vastly exaggerated by people who want to make political arguments”. He went on to add that it was a time for common sense.

We feel that now there is a Bermuda Triangle of economics - a space where everything tends to disappear without radar contact, a black hole in which rationality and science is replaced by hope, superstition and nonsense pundits pretending to understand the real drivers of the economy. The Bermuda Triangle in real life runs from Bermuda to Puerto Rico to Miami. The Economic Bermuda Triangle (EBT) one runs from high stock market valuations to high unemployment to low growth/productivity. There is a myth that the sunken Atlantis could be in the middle of this triangle. It has been renamed Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) to make it suit the black hole's main premise of ensuring there is a fancy name for what is essentially the same economic recipe: print and spend money, then wait and pray for better weather. The EBT is getting harder and harder to justify - if for nothing else because the constant reminders of crisis keep us all defensive and non-committed to investing beyond the next quarter. We all naively think we can exit the "risk-on" trade before anyone else. We are due for a new crisis. We have governments and central banks proactively pursuing bubbles. A long time ago, policymakers entered a one-way street where reversing is, if not illegal, then impossible.

A few hours ago, Greek lawmakers approved a reform law to unlock about €8.8 billion of rescue loans from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. The law, which was a condition for further aid installments, passed easily with the solid backing of the three parties comprising Greece's ruling coalition, by 168 to 123 votes. Next, euro zone officials will meet on Monday to approve overdue payment of 2.8 billion euros ($3.65 billion) in rescue loans, finance minister Yannis Stournaras said. Euro zone finmins will then meet on May 13 to release a further 6 billion euro installment, he added. The use of proceeds? To have enough cash to pay salaries and pensions, and of course to pay Mario Draghi for a bond that matures on May 20. The fact that Europe has gotten the green sign to hand over some pocket change to Greece, so Greece can pay for the maturity on Greek bonds by the ECB was the good news (for someone, unclear exactly who). The bad news, for Greece, starts now. As BBC reports, some 15,000 state workers will lose their jobs by the end of next year. Naturally, in light of the recent epic backlash against austerity (or fauxterity as penned previously) whose corpse has already promptly been trampled in Spain, and now in Italy, Greece would like to get back on the gravy train as well. Yet they are being denied, and the result is indignation at what the people rightfully see as B-class European citizen treatment.