Infinite Unknown

-The Entire Economy Is a Ponzi Scheme (ZeroHedge, April 13, 2013):

Bill Gross, Nouriel Roubini, Laurence Kotlikoff, Steve Keen, Michel Chossudovsky, the Wall Street Journal and many others say that our entire economy is a Ponzi scheme.

Former Reagan budget director David Stockman just agreed:

YouTube Added: 10.04.2013

So did a top Russian con artist and mathematician.

Even the New York Times’ business page asked, “Was [the] whole economy a Ponzi scheme?”

In fact – as we’ve noted for 4 years (and here and here) – the banking system is entirely insolvent. And so are most countries. The whole notion of one country bailing out another country is a farce at this point. The whole system is insolvent.

As we noted last year: Continue reading »

Tags: Barack Obama, Bill Gross, Bonds, Debt, EFSF, ESM, EU, Europe, France, Germany, Global News, Government, Greece, Italy, Joseph Stiglitz, Laurence Kotlikoff, Michel Chossudovsky, Nouriel Roubini, Obama administration, Politics, Portugal, Spain, U.S.

Watch the video here:

- ‘This isn’t going to stop with Cyprus’ (RT, March 28, 2013):

The Cyprus liquidity crisis will only lead to violence, Wide Awake News founder Charlie McGrath has told RT. The journalist warns that the Cyprus solution may serve as a model as the wider EU deals with the financial crisis.

RT: The authorities have promised to reopen the banks on Thursday – do you think Cypriots can sigh with relief now?

Charlie McGrath: No, not at all. And let’s examine the word reopen, because they are not really reopening. They are putting on all these capital restrictions on the people of Cyprus, 300 euros is the max withdrawal they can make. They can only take 3,000 maximum amount if you are going to travel. You live in Cyprus and you have relatives that live in the United States and the UK, wherever and you want to send them money – you absolutely cannot.

The so-called establishment media is talking about, there’s been enough time that has passed since the announcement of this deal that they don’t think there’re going to have a bank run but the real reason they don’t think they’re not going to have a bank run is because they are really not opening the banks. They’re going to have all type of guards and police and very limited funds that the people of Cyprus can take. So, I don’t think they should be relieved at all, nor should Europe nor the rest of the world for that manner.

RT: At this point – how do you convince panicked savers across Europe that the EU won’t dig into their accounts, next? Continue reading »

Tags: Banking, Capital Controls, Cyprus, Economy, ESM, EU, Europe, Global News, Government, Jeroen Dijsselbloem, Politics, Society

- Germany’s Rising Anti-Euro Sentiment (ZeroHedge, March 10, 2013):

In recent days, FX desk chatter has been of rising concerns over “Germany’s New Anti-Euro Party.” ‘The Alternative for Germany’ party is set to run in the upcoming parliamentary elections in September with a clear goal: “the dissolution of the EUR in favor of national currencies or smaller currency unions.” It also demands an end to ESM payments. As evidenced by the recent vote in Italy, voting intentions in Europe are not just ultra-left or ultra-right wing anti-European, but increasingly mainstream. “Democracy is eroding. The will of the people regarding (decisions relating to the EUR) is never queried and is not represented in parliament. The government is depriving voters of a voice through disinformation…” Ultimately, as Der Spiegel notes, however, the party’s success will likely have more to do with the state of the common currency as the election approaches. Should the crisis flare up, so too could anti-euro sentiment. That sentiment in Germany now has a political home.

Via Der Spiegel,

Anti-euro political parties in Europe in recent years have so far tended to be either well to the right of center or, as evidenced by the recent vote in Italy, anything but staid. But in Germany, change may be afoot. A new party is forming this spring, intent on abandoning European efforts to prop up the common currency. And its founders are a collection of some of the country’s top economists and academics.

Named Alternative für Deutschland (Alternative for Germany), the group has a clear goal: “the dissolution of the euro in favor of national currencies or smaller currency unions.” The party also demands an end to aid payments and the dismantling of the European Stability Mechanism bailout fund. Continue reading »

Tags: Alternative für Deutschland, ESM, EU, Europe, Germany, Global News, Government, Politics

So Japan will ‘stabilize’ itself by monetizing European debt.

Now that makes perfect sense …

… if one belongs to those Keynesian lunatics.

You can’t make this stuff up!

Related info:

- Japan: Presenting Shinzo Abe’s ‘Super-Secret’ Devaluation Plan – Double-Down

- Japanese Ministry of Finance To Japanese Bondholders: YOU’RE SCREWED!!!

- Bank Of Japan Increases Asset Purchases By Y10 Trillion, Total Program Now Y80 Trillion, Total Debt Still Y1 Quadrillion

- Japan to Buy ESM Bonds Using FX Reserves to Help Weaken Yen (Bloomberg, Jan 8, 2013):

Japan will buy bonds issued by the European Stability Mechanism and euro-denominated sovereign debt, a strategy that Finance Minister Taro Aso said will help weaken the yen and support Europe.

The transactions will be funded by Japan’s foreign exchange reserves, Aso told reporters today at a briefing in Tokyo. The purchase amount is undecided, he said.

“The financial stability of Europe will help the stability of foreign exchange rates, including the yen,” Aso said. “From this perspective, Japan plans to buy ESM bonds.”

Continue reading »

Tags: Bonds, Collapse, Debt, Economy, ESM, Europe, Global News, Government, Japan, Politics, Quantitative Easing

- The Latest Greek “Bailout” In A Nutshell: AAA-Rated Euro Countries To Fund Massive Hedge Fund Profits (ZeroHedge, Nov 21, 2012):

With constantly changing variables in what will be the fourth and not final Greek bailout, it has been relatively difficult to pinpoint just what the “fulcrum security” is in the ongoing restructuring that is not really a cramdown bankruptcy but kinda, sorta is, and more importantly where the money will come from. A big issue that Europe has discovered with a two and a half year delay (pointed out here first, but anyone with capacity for rational thought could have grasped it at the time), is that Greece has hit the inflection point where without more, and substantial, debt forgiveness it is unviable entity, and will certainly not hike the Troika’s hard line target of 120% debt/GDP by 2020. In other words, Greece can no longer layer more debt to pay down debt. Continue reading »

Tags: Bailout, Bonds, Collapse, Debt, ECB, Economy, EFSF, ESM, EU, Europe, Germany, Global News, Government, Greece, Politics, Society

- Kyle Bass: Fallacies Such As MMT Are “Leading The Sheep To Slaughter” And “We Believe War Is Inevitable” (ZeroHedge, Nov 17, 2012):

Below are some of the key highlights from Kyle Bass’ latest, and as usual, must read letter:

On central banks and the final round of global monetary debasement:

Central bankers are feverishly attempting to create their own new world: a utopia in which debts are never restructured, and there are no consequences for fiscal profligacy, i.e. no atonement for prior sins. They have created Potemkin villages on a Jurassic scale. The sum total of the volatility they are attempting to suppress will be less than the eventual volatility encountered when their schemes stop working. Most refer to comments like this as heresy against the orthodoxy of economic thought. We have a hard time understanding how the current situation ends any way other than a massive loss of wealth and purchasing power through default, inflation or both. Continue reading »

Tags: Barack Obama, Ben Bernanke, Bonds, Collapse, Debt, Dollar, Economy, EFSF, ESM, EU, Europe, Fed, Federal Reserve, Global News, Government, Hedge Funds, Japan, Keynesianism, Kyle Bass, Obama administration, OMT, Politics, Quantitative Easing, Society, U.S., War

- Friday Humor: The ECB Explains What A Ponzi Scheme Is; Awkward Silence Follows (ZeroHedge, Nov 2, 2012):

From the ECB’s Virtual Currency Schemes, aka the “Bash Bitcoin Boondoggle” (p. 27):

A Ponzi scheme is an investment fraud that involves the payment of purported returns to existing investors from funds contributed by new investors. Ponzi scheme organizers often solicit new investors by promising to invest funds in opportunities claimed to generate high returns with little or no risk. In many Ponzi schemes, the fraudsters focus on attracting new money to make promised payments to earlier-stage investors and to use for personal expenses, instead of engaging in any legitimate investment activity

Considering that this elucidation comes from the very same entity that launched the SMP, LTRO, OMT, EFSF, ESM, oh, and of course, TARGET2, and whose head said to not short the EUR as there is “no risk” whatsoever in holding said currency, one would expect that this definition is absolutely spot on…

* * *

And as an added bonus, here is the part in which the ECB appears to be so worried about BitCoin taking over as legitimate “legal tender” from the EUR (which the ECB’s Coeure said two days ago is as “solid and longlasting as a diamond”) it dedicated an entire report to bash the recently conceived electronic currency: Continue reading »

Tags: Central Bank, ECB, Economy, EFSF, ESM, EU, Europe, Global News, LTRO, OMT, SMP

Stuttgart (the capital of Baden-Wuerttemberg) who has been run by Merkel’s CDU for decades has just voted for a Green Party mayor.

There has to be a second round of voting though, because he didn’t get enough of the votes during the first ballot.

The biggest sign on the first pic reads: Stop World War 3!

The people are continuosly chanting: “GET LOST!”

Stuttgart should be a HOME-RUN for Merkel’s party, but Baden-Wuerttemberghas been taken over by the Green Party.

Now watch this!!!

- After Starting Riots In Greece, Merkel Booed In Germany Next (ZeroHedge, Oct 13, 2012):

What does an iron chancellor have to do to be loved these days? After scrambling 7,000 members of the Greek police force out of an early prepaid retirement for her brief, still inexplicable 6 hour visit to Athens last Tuesday, which caused the now usual Syntagma square rioting, Merkel next took the stage in a rainy Stuttgart, in a show of support for the local mayor candidate Sebastian Turner, which promptly devolved into 14 minutes of continuous booing.Watch below.

More pictures from the same rally, where people apparently were not too keen on WWIII:

Continue reading »

Tags: Angela Merkel, Bailout, CDU, ESM, Germany, Global News, Government, Greece, Politics, Society, U.S.

German TRAITOR Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble is in favor of leveraging the ESM. Here, during his 70th birthday celebrations last week.

- Up to Two Trillion: Europe Plans to Leverage Euro-Zone Bailout Fund (Spiegel, Sep 24, 2012):

Officially, the ESM permanent euro-zone bailout fund is worth 500 billion euros. That, though, might not be enough, which is why euro-zone governments are now planning to introduce levers that could mobilize up to 2trillion euros, SPIEGEL has learned. Finland, though, is skeptical of the idea.

With the launch of the permanent common-currency bailout fund, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), just around the corner, euro-zone member states are looking into ways to leverage the €500 billion ($647 billion) available to the fund, SPIEGEL has learned. But with Finland still concerned about the leveraging plans, it is unlikely that they will be initially included when the ESM is launched on Oct. 8.

The plan envisions the continuation of leverage instruments currently in use in the temporary euro bailout fund, the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF). Should they be applied to the ESM, the permanent fund could be able to mobilize up to €2 trillion instead of the €500 billion lending capacity it currently has — a size that would make it easier to provide emergency aid to countries as large as Spain and Italy, for example.

Google translation (Original article in German down below.):

- Quadrupling of the euro rescue fund: ESM should be leveraged to two trillion euros (Focus, Sep 24, 2012):

The euro countries prepare before one allegedly leverage the ESM permanent bailout fund. To save even large countries like Spain and Italy, as opposed to its planned 500 billion euros will be available two trillion euros.

Whether to increase the financial cushion reported the news magazine “Der Spiegel” on Monday. Model for the leverage of aid accordingly, the provisions of the predecessor fund EFSF. There are two tools in which the bailout fund with public money can only take on the most risky parts. The rest of the money will come from private investors, which must go into limited risk. However, the concept was the EFSF not apply because there are no private investors found.

Continue reading »

Tags: Bailout, Economy, EFSF, ESM, EU, Germany, Global News, Government, Italy, Politics, Society, Spain

- Draghi’s Coup D’Etat And Why OMT Is Illegal (ZeroHedge, Sep 22, 2012):

According to Mario Draghi, OMT, or Outright Monetary Transactions, is a program of conditional bond buying targeted at specific countries to restore the perception of the euro’s irreversibility and stability, and repair a broken monetary policy transmission mechanism.  Once launched, OMT has no ex ante limits, it is within the ECB’s price stability mandate, and it can be halted or interrupted based on achievement of its objectives or non-compliance with conditions imposed upon the targeted national government.

I would posit that OMT is much more than what the party line states.  Here are some alternative interpretations for your consideration.  I challenge you to refute the logic of any of them. Continue reading »

Tags: Angela Merkel, Bonds, Debt, ECB, Economy, ESM, EU, Europe, Germany, Global News, Government, Italy, Mario Draghi, OMT, Politics, Spain