Five Wall Street Banks Seek to Protect Lucrative OTC Derivatives Market

Gottes Mühlen mahlen langsam, mahlen aber trefflich klein
Ob aus Langmut er sich säumet, bringt mit Schärf' er alles ein*.
Friedrich von Logau

This story about the Wall Street lobby was interesting, particularly since this morning Bill Dudley, friend of Wall Street, Goldman alumnus, and President of the NY Fed, called for the continuing purchase of over a trillion dollars in bad mortgage debt from these banks at above market prices here.

And here the Natinoal Association of Business Economists NABE (the Finanz Freikorps) has recommended that there be no new stimulus packages aimed at the public and consumers, who have had enough. In fact, the government should begin to cut spending on public programs.

But not a word about the subsidy to these money addicts, the banks, who use the opaque derivatives markets to widen the spreads on products, to hoodwink the naive and less sophisticated individuals and small towns.

And so Wall Street once again gathers its forces to persuade (provide many millions in donations and soft bribes) to Congress and the Administration.

Do you get the picture yet?

Bloomberg
Wall Street Stealth Lobby Defends $35 Billion Derivatives Haul
By Christine Harper, Matthew Leising and Shannon Harrington

Aug. 31 (Bloomberg) -- Wall Street is suiting up for a battle to protect one of its richest fiefdoms, the $592 trillion over-the-counter derivatives market that is facing the biggest overhaul since its creation 30 years ago.

Five U.S. commercial banks, including JPMorgan Chase & Co., Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Bank of America Corp., are on track to earn more than $35 billion this year trading unregulated derivatives contracts. At stake is how much of that business they and other dealers will be able to keep.

“Business models of the larger dealers have such a paucity of opportunities for profit that they have to defend the last great frontier for double-digit, even triple-digit returns,” said Christopher Whalen, managing director of Torrance, California-based Institutional Risk Analytics, which analyzes banks for investors.

The Washington fight, conducted mostly behind closed doors, has been overshadowed by the noisy debate over health care. That’s fine with investment bankers, who for years quietly wielded their financial and lobbying clout on Capitol Hill to kill efforts to regulate derivatives. This time could be different. The reason: widespread public and Congressional anger over the role derivatives such as credit-default swaps played in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression...

The five biggest derivatives dealers in the U.S. -- JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley and Citigroup Inc. -- held 95 percent of the $291 trillion in notional derivatives value of the country’s 25 largest bank holding companies at the end of the first quarter, according to a report by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. More than 90 percent of those derivatives were traded over the counter, the OCC data show...

Obama’s plan deals another blow to banks. It aims to discourage them and their customers from using non-standard, or customized, derivatives that can’t be processed by a clearinghouse or traded on an exchange by requiring that parties to such trades hold more capital to protect themselves against losses. The plan would also require they put up more money, known as margin, to insure they make good on the trades. Both changes would impose added costs on banks and some customers...

The Obama proposals don’t go as far as some people have urged. Hedge fund billionaire George Soros and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Vice Chairman Charles Munger are among investors who have called for limits on the use of credit-default swaps. Soros wrote in a March 24 Wall Street Journal column that regulators should ban so-called naked swaps, in which the buyer isn’t protecting an existing investment.

Two days later Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner dismissed such an idea before the House Financial Services Committee, telling members that “my own sense is that banning naked swaps is not necessary and wouldn’t help fundamentally.”

Janet Tavakoli, founder and president of Tavakoli Structured Finance Inc. in Chicago, said in an interview that derivatives have allowed banks to camouflage risk.

“There has been massive widespread abuse of over-the- counter derivatives, which have contributed to transactions that people knew or should have known were overrated and overpriced at the time they came to market,” said Tavakoli, who traded, structured and sold derivatives over more than two decades in the financial industry.

Wall Street is accustomed to getting its way with derivatives legislation. The last major congressional action, in 2000, was designed to exempt over-the-counter derivatives from government oversight...

For Wall Street, the longer it takes to get legislation passed the better. As stock market values and the economy improve, anger at banks is likely to subside...

* "Though the mills of God grind slowly, they grind exceeding fine;
With patience He grinds slowly, with exactness all He finds."

Change Comes to Japan

Most Westerners have not understood the tight grip that the alliance of business and politics has exercised in Japan.

This change in political control in Japan, for the first time in 54 years, has potentially significant implications for the US dollar as a reserve currency.

Change will be slow and deliberate. The new ruling party will not wish to upset the balance of things. But change will occur, and what has been will not, and will no longer be.

Associated Press
Japanese election upends long-ruling party
By Eric Talmadge
Associated Press Writer
August 30, 2009

TOKYO – Japan's ruling party conceded a crushing defeat Sunday after 54 years of nearly unbroken rule as voters were poised to hand the opposition a landslide victory in nationwide elections, driven by economic anxiety and a powerful desire for change.

The left-of-center Democratic Party of Japan was set to win 300 or more of the 480 seats in the lower house of parliament, ousting the Liberal Democrats, who have governed Japan for all but 11 months since 1955, according to exit polls by all major Japanese TV networks.

"These results are very severe," Prime Minister Taro Aso said in a news conference at party headquarters, conceding his party was headed for a big loss. "There has been a deep dissatisfaction with our party."

Aso said he would have to accept responsibility for the results, suggesting that he would resign as party president. Other LDP leaders also said they would step down, though official results were not to be released until early Monday morning.

The loss by the Liberal Democrats — traditionally a pro-business, conservative party — would open the way for the Democratic Party, headed by Yukio Hatoyama, to replace Aso and establish a new Cabinet, possibly within the next few weeks.

The vote was seen as a barometer of frustrations over Japan's worst economic slump since World War II and a loss of confidence in the ruling Liberal Democrats' ability to tackle tough problems such as the rising national debt and rapidly aging population.

The Democrats have embraced a more populist platform, promising handouts for families with children and farmers, a higher minimum wage, and to rebuild the economy.

"The nation is very angry with the ruling party, and we are grateful for their deep support," Hatoyama said after the polls closed. "We will not be arrogant and we will listen to the people."

The Democrats have also said they will seek a more independent relationship with Washington, while forging closer ties with Japan's Asian neighbors, including China. But Hatoyama, who holds a doctorate in engineering from Stanford University, insists he will not seek dramatic change in Japan's foreign policy, saying the U.S.-Japan alliance would "continue to be the cornerstone of Japanese diplomatic policy."

National broadcaster NHK, using projections based on exit polls of roughly 400,000 voters, said the Democratic Party was set to win 300 seats and the Liberal Democrats only about 100 — a third of its strength before the vote.

A Run On the Funds: Majority of Cerberus Investors Want Out -- Now

When investors or depositors ask for the immediate withdrawal of 71% of their money there is only one thing to call it: a run on the bank.

The selling in the markets is still quiet, and overshadowed by some of the visible bubbles in financial assets and rosy headlines. The bank bailouts are working, but only to produce a false Spring to lure in the last of the greater fools.

The economy is not improving fundamentally, the recovery is not sustainable, and the wealthy insiders are increasingly trying to liquidate investment positions to raise cash and diversify their holdings into cash and hard assets.

Risk is once again being spread from the financial sector to the public, which is what Fed Chairman Greenspan had said was one of the objectives of the Fed in their positions on the regulation of complex financial products. We were assured that the markets were sound, no additional regulation was required, the pensions were adequately funded. And finally when disaster struck and the facade fell away, that a generation's ransom was required by the banks, in order to heal themselves and avert disaster.

And then they took the money for themselves.

"He's mad, that trusts in the tameness of a wolf, a horse's health, a boy's love, or a whore's oath." The Fool, King Lear

And so they have made fools of us all.


Reuters
Cerberus clients overwhelmingly want out
Fri Aug 28, 2009 4:21pm

BOSTON (Reuters) - Cerberus Capital Management has been swamped with redemption requests with the Wall Street Journal reporting that investors are asking to pull out $5.5 billion or 71 percent of assets from its hedge funds.

Cerberus last month tried to entice investors into staying with the firm, but found that its clients overwhelmingly wanted to leave, the newspaper reported.

"We have been surprised by this response," Cerberus chief Stephen Feinberg and co-founder William Richter wrote in a letter delivered to clients late on Thursday, according to the newspaper.

A spokesman for the firm was not immediately available for comment.

The bulk of investors elected to put their money into a fund that will liquidate hard-to-sell assets over time.

The news comes as several prominent hedge fund managers have closed their funds and as investors are less willing to leave their money locked up in potentially risky hedge funds.

Last year, when the average hedge fund lost 19 percent, Partners lost 24.5 percent on investments.

US Equity Markets Look Dangerously Wobbly As Insiders Sell In Record Numbers

"Investors Intelligence's latest survey of advisory services showed an impressive 51% bullish and a meager 19% bearish...the spread hasn't been that wide since November 2007." Alan Abelson, Barrons, Aug. 29, 2009

Next week we move into September, the riskiest month of the year for financial markets, with the federals escalating preparations for a flu pandemic, while Congress considers legislation providing a 'kill switch' on the Internet for President Obama to use in the event of 'an emergency.' There are widespread rumours of a bank holiday lasting one week after a market meltdown begins in the US, during which the banks would be restructured.

Risky times indeed, and those in the best position to know what is happening behind the scenes are hitting the exits in record numbers right now, running to cash, and hard assets and currencies.

As TrimTabs reports in the attached news release, insider selling is reaching record levels, even as more speculators borrow to go long stocks. There are some obvious bubbles already formed in certain insolvent financial stocks like AIG, with disinformation rampant in the Wall Street demimonde.

The Obama Economics and Regulatory Team, in conjunction with the Federal Reserve, have accomplished no serious reform of the fiancial system. They have enabled the type of market inefficiency, soft fraud and price manipulation that is undermining global confidence in the integrity of US markets and financial products. And they have advanced a proposal to consolidate a huge amount of regulatory power under the Federal Reserve, a private banking agency that was at the root of our unfolding financial crisis.

The time has passed when Obama could have pointed to the past mistakes of his predecessors as the fault for our problems. Thanks to Tim Geithner, Barney Frank, and Larry Summers he now owns the financial crisis, and the coverups, policy errors, scandals, conflicts of interest and bailouts that have occurred since he has taken office. His reappointment of Ben Bernanke as Federal Reserve chairman most surely tied a bow on his ownership package for the crisis, which is in danger of becoming his 'financial New Orleans.'

Wall Street insiders and their enablers pig out on public money while the nation suffers. This is not change, this is business as usual.

TrimTabs
Insider Trading and Investor Sentiment Signaling U.S. Stock Market Top

Insider Selling in August Soars to 30.6 Times Insider Buying, Highest Level Since TrimTabs Began Tracking in 2004. NYSE Short Interest Plunges 10.3%, While Margin Debt Spikes 5.9%

SAUSALITO, Calif., Aug. 28 /PRNewswire/ -- TrimTabs Investment Research reported that selling by corporate insiders in August has surged to $6.1 billion, the highest amount since May 2008. The ratio of insider selling to insider buying hit 30.6, the highest level since TrimTabs began tracking the data in 2004.

"The best-informed market participants are sending a clear signal that the party on Wall Street is going to end soon," said Charles Biderman, CEO of TrimTabs.

TrimTabs' data on insider transactions is based on daily filings of Form 4, which corporate officers, directors, and major holders are required to file with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

In a research note, TrimTabs explained that insider activity is not the only sign the rally is about to end. The TrimTabs Demand Index, which tracks 18 fund flow and sentiment indicators, has turned very bearish for the first time since March.

For example, short interest on NYSE stocks plummeted by 10.3% in the second half of July and margin debt on all US listed stocks spiked 5.9% in July, while 51.6% of advisors surveyed by Investors Intelligence are bullish, the highest level since December 2007.

"When corporate insiders are bailing, the shorts are covering and investors are borrowing to buy, it generally pays to be a seller rather than a buyer of stock," said Biderman.

TrimTabs also reports that the actions of U.S. public companies have been bearish. In the past four months, companies have been net sellers of a record $105.2 billion in shares.

"Investors who think the U.S. economy is recovering are going to get a big shock this fall," said Biderman. "Companies and corporate insiders are signaling that the economy is in much worse shape than conventional wisdom believes."

TrimTabs Investment Research is the only independent research service that publishes detailed daily coverage of U.S. stock market liquidity--including mutual fund flows and exchange-traded fund flows--as well as weekly withheld income and employment tax collections. Founded by Charles Biderman, TrimTabs has provided institutional investors with trading strategies since 1990. For more information, please visit www.TrimTabs.com.

Where Are the World's Safest Banks?

The primary functions of the Federal Reserve Bank as a regulator is to maintain the integrity of the US banking system. It is also the responsibility of the Federal Open Market Committee to oversee the management of the United States Money Supply.

In this annual list by Global Finance, not one US bank is in the top 30 of the Safest Fifty Banks in the world.

It was the poor regulation of the banking system, and the reckless management of the money supply, that has brought the US, and by extension of the dollar contagion, a greater part of the world, to the financial crisis which threatens the global economy today.

Would this imply that we should give the Fed the latitude to regulate more elements of the US financial sector, elements with which it has little or no experience and certainly no successful track record?

The US must reform its financial system and restore a balance to its economy. The rest of the world must take strong measures to guard against a potentially disastrous currency crisis should the US fail to successfully reform.


Global Finance
The World's 50 Safest Banks

New York, August 25, 2009 — With bank stability still high on corporate and investor agendas,Global Finance publishes its 18th annual list of the world’s safest banks. After two tumultuous years that saw many of the world’s most respected banks drop out of the top-50 safest banks list, the dust appears to be settling. Those banks that kept an iron grip on their risk exposure before the financial crisis blew up have consistently topped the table and maintain their standing among the top echelon in this year’s ranking.

The Top Banks (until you find a US bank) Are:

1. KFW (Germany)
2. Caisse des Depots et Consignations (CDC) (France)
3. Bank Nederlands Gemeenten (BNG) (Netherlands)
4. Landwirtschaftliche Rentenbank (Germany
5. Zuercher Kantonalbank (Switzerland)
6. Rabobank Group (Netherlands)
7. Landeskreditbank Baden-Wuerttemberg-Foerderbank (Germany)
8. NRW. Bank (Germany)
9. BNP Paribas (France)
10. Royal Bank of Canada (Canada)
11. National Australia Bank (Australia)
12. Commonwealth Bank of Australia (Australia)
13. Banco Santander (Spain)
14. Toronto-Dominion Bank (Canada)
15. Australia & New Zealand Banking Group (Australia)
16. Westpac Banking Corporation (Australia)
17. ASB Bank Limited (New Zealand)
18. HSBC Holdings plc (United Kingdom)
19. Credit Agricole S.A. (France)
20. Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria (BBVA) (Spain)
21. Nordea Bank AB (publ) (Sweden)
22. Scotiabank (Canada)
23. Svenska Handelsbanken (Sweden)
24. DBS Bank (Singapore)
25. Banco Espanol de Credito S.A. (Banesto) (Spain)
26. Caisse centrale Desjardins (Canada)
27. Pohjola Bank (Finland)
28. Deutsche Bank AG (Germany)
29. Intesa Sanpaolo (Italy)
30. Caja de Ahorros y Pensiones de Barcelona (la Caixa) (Spain)
31. Bank of Montreal (Canada)
32. The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation (United States)

You may read the rest of the list, and the method by which safe banks were selected, here.

When at First You Don't Succeed ---- Make It Up

This morning the spokesmodels for Wall Street on Bloomberg Television were touting the 'better than expected' unemployment claims figures.

They came in at 'only 570,000.'

Wait a minute. That does not seem right. Have another cup of coffee and look up the figures.

The consensus of expectations was 565,000. The actual was 570,000. That's better?

Betty Liu went on to explain, 'they are better than expected because they fell from the week before.' The prior week's figures were revised from 576,000 to 580,000.

In her defense, she just says what they put in front of her. I wonder if the same can be said for Obama.

We're not in Kansas anymore.

Fed Official: Real US Unemployment Rate is 16%

Dennis Lockhart may be expressing his own views, but the figure of 16% he quotes is nothing more than the Bureau of Labor Statistics "U-6" measure of unemployment.

U-6 Total unemployed, plus all marginally attached workers, plus total employed part time for economic reasons,economic reasons, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all marginally attached workers.

Here is a chart showing the 'official' U3 measure of unemployment and the U6 alternate measure. The chart also includes the unofficial unemployment rate projection done by John Williams of Shadowstats.com.



It appears that Dennis wanted to take this occasion to say that things were SO bad that there is little use in applying any sort of stimulus to the public, although there is plenty of stimulus required for the banks.

Breitbart
Real US unemployment rate at 16 pct: Fed official
Aug 26 02:25 PM US/Eastern

The real US unemployment rate is 16 percent if persons who have dropped out of the labor pool and those working less than they would like are counted, a Federal Reserve official said Wednesday.

"If one considers the people who would like a job but have stopped looking -- so-called discouraged workers -- and those who are working fewer hours than they want, the unemployment rate would move from the official 9.4 percent to 16 percent, said Atlanta Fed chief Dennis Lockhart.

He underscored that he was expressing his own views, which did "do not necessarily reflect those of my colleagues on the Federal Open Market Committee," the policy-setting body of the central bank.

Lockhart pointed out in a speech to a chamber of commerce in Chattanooga, Tennessee that those two categories of people are not taken into account in the Labor Department's monthly report on the unemployment rate. The official July jobless rate was 9.4 percent.

Lockhart, who heads the Atlanta, Georgia, division of the Fed, is the first central bank official to acknowledge the depth of unemployment amid the worst US recession since the Great Depression.

Lockhart said the US economy was improving but "still fragile," and the beginning stages of a sluggish recovery were underway.

"My forecast for a slow recovery implies a protracted period of high unemployment," he said, adding that it would be difficult to stimulate jobs through additional public spending. (How about Bank bailouts and bonsues? Plenty of room to add more, right? - Jesse)

"Further fiscal stimulus has been mentioned, but the full effects of the first stimulus package are not yet clear, and the concern over adding to the federal deficit and the resulting national debt is warranted," he said.

President Barack Obama's administration has resisted calls for more public spending, arguing that the 787-billion-dollar stimulus passed in February needs time to work its way through the economy.

Lockhart noted that construction and manufacturing had been particularly hard hit in the recession that began in December 2007 and predicted some jobs were gone for good.

Prior to the recession, he said, construction and manufacturing combined accounted for slightly more than 15 percent of employment. But during the recession, their job losses made up more than 40 percent of all US job losses.

"In my view, it is unlikely that we will see a return of jobs lost in certain sectors, such as manufacturing," he said. (Yep that's it. Manufacturing is dead, forever. Never to return. - Jesse)

"In a similar vein, the recession has been so deep in construction that a reallocation of workers is likely to happen -- even if not permanent."

Payroll employment has fallen by 6.7 million since the recession began.

'New Deal for Wall Street' Programs Subsidizing Subprime Lenders

Welfare for Wall Street is just another phase of the 'trickle down' approach that seems to be so popular with the financerati.

If "Cash for Clunkers" had involved subsidized loans for cars administered by the banks it would have been touted as the greatest thing since sliced bread by the coporate media and mainstream infomercials, instead of being slammed on a daily basis as a troubled, pointless giveaway program.

So now we have a new "Cash for Criminals" program from the finance friendly folks at the tarnished Treasury and finagling Fed as outlined in the story below, this time for those overpriced housing loans sold to underpaid, over-indebted consumers.

The housing market needs to clear, the losses need to be realized, and the debt must be written down or taken into default by the banks.

The banks do not wish to foreclose because this will force them to start marking down the toxic assets they still hold on their books.

The Obama Administration is doing a fairly good imitation of Japan Inc.


Washington Post
Subprime Lenders Getting U.S. Subsidies, Report Says
By Renae Merle
Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Many of the lenders eligible to receive billions of dollars from the government's massive foreclosure prevention program helped fuel the housing crisis by issuing risky subprime loans, according to a report to be issued Wednesday by the Center for Public Integrity.

Under the $75 billion program, called Making Home Affordable, lenders are eligible for taxpayer subsidies to lower the mortgage payments of distressed borrowers. Of the top 25 participants in the program, at least 21 specialized in servicing or originating subprime loans, according to the center, a nonprofit investigative reporting group funded largely by charitable foundations.

Much "of this money is going directly to the same financial institutions that helped create the sub-prime mortgage mess in the first place," Bill Buzenberg, executive director of the center, said in a statement.

For example, J.P. Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Countrywide, which has been bought by Bank of America, are eligible to receive billions of dollars under the program, according to the report.

The report comes as the Obama administration is prodding lenders to do more to help borrowers. Less than 10 percent of delinquent borrowers eligible for assistance through Make Home Affordable have received help, according to Treasury Department estimates released this month. The administration is aiming to more than double the number of borrowers helped under the program to 500,000 by Nov. 1.

"Mortgage lenders and servicers have been reluctant to participate in foreclosure prevention programs despite their role in creating the subprime debacle. Intense pressure from Congress and the White House hasn't worked, either," the report said. "The stick has not been effective, so the Obama administration is offering a carrot -- billions of dollars in incentive payments to lenders and loan servicers to encourage them to participate..."

Capital Flight: A Plunge in Foreign Capital Inflows Preceded the Break in US Financial Markets

The peak of foreign capital inflows into the US was clearly seen in the second quarter of 2007, just before the crisis in the US that has rocked its banking system and driven it deeply into recession.

Are the two events connected? Had the US become a Ponzi scheme that began to collapse when new investment began to wane, and the growth of returns could not be maintained?

Watch the dollar and the Treasury and Agency Debt auctions for any further signs of capital flight, which is when those net inflows of foreign capital turn negative. And if for some reason the unlikely happens and it gains momentum, the dollar and bonds and stocks can all go lower in unison, and there is no place to hide except perhaps in some foreign currencies and precious metals.

The sad truth is that US collateralized debt packages and their derivatives have become toxic in the minds of the rest of the world, and there is little being done to change that, except an orderly winding down of the bubble, with the remaining assets being divided largely by insiders, and not price discovery and capital allocation mechanisms centered by the 'invisible hand of the markets.'



Unfortunately the Net Inflow Data is quarterly, and subject to revisions. But we have to note that the spectacularly rally off the bottom in the SP 500, not fully depicted above, is not being matched by a return of foreign capital inflows.

If that inflow does not return, if the median wage of Americans does not increase, if the financial system is not reformed, if the economy is not brought back into balance between the service and manufacturing sectors, exports and imports, then there can be no sustained recovery in the real, productive economy.

The rally in the US markets is based on an extreme series of New Deal for Wall Street programs from the Fed and the Treasury, monetization, and the devaluation of the dollar.

The Man Who Exposed Madoff Cites Government Complicity in Fraud

This is only the tip of the iceberg, but even it may never be seen.

We ask now why the economists and regulators and media said little or nothing while the frauds and bubbles were developing, then.

But what are they saying now, about the new frauds, and injustices, and the blatant manipulation of the markets wherein some traders turn in financial results that are improbable to produce without inside information and breaking the rules?

A few heroes speak out, but most of the intellectual leadership cower in the shadows, asking 'Where is the outrage?' And the media baits the crowd with this or that distraction, and inflames them to think whichever way it pleases.

Here is an audio interview with Harry Markopolos in which he gives his views on the Federal Reserve as a regulator, financial reform, and the 'recovery.' Harry Markopolos Interview with King World News

Let us start here, and now, to demand the change required. Let us begin by auditing the Fed, and refusing to tolerate the granting of more regulatory power to an institution spawned in a deception in 1913, and at the heart of so many of our financial crises ever since. The Creature from Jekyll Island: A Second Look - G. Edward Griffin (2007)

As of yet, nothing has changed. The silence is deafening.


AFP Interviews Harry Markopolos

...In May of 2000, he submitted an 8-page report to the Boston Regional Office of the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) listing red flags and mathematical proof of a major fraud but got no reply. He re-submitted his evidence to the Boston and other SEC offices in 2001, 2005, 2007 and 2008, to no avail. By this time, Markopolos was realizing that Madoff had been operating with protection from the inside.

In late 2008, when the stock market crumbled and investors rushed in to redeem their investments, Madoff ran out of cash, turned himself in to authorities, and pleaded guilty in federal court last March 12th.

Markopolos said that all the members of his team feared for their lives during the long investigation and he for more reason than any of the others because of his visibility. He was the one who was submitting all the complaints each year, and he knew that any leak from the SEC could make him a marked man.

He explained that the “offshore feeder funds” were only one step removed from organized crime. “If organized crime knew that Madoff was stealing their money, he would have been killed. Therefore, if Madoff had ever found out that we had a team tracking him through Europe and North America and that he risked getting exposed, it was a good bet that he would have had several billion reasons to want us silenced first. To compartmentalize the damage, I was the only one who went to the SEC.”

No one there knew Markopolos had an assisting team in the field. But Markopolos has proof that the SEC was culpable, too, and says publicly that he has tremendous anger at the agency and sadness for the victims. He says that there were SEC lawyers who were “in bed with Madoff ” and helped destroy lives.

“Madoff paid people to look the other way,” says Markopolos and reminds us that there is a federal report scheduled to come out by the end of the year. He emphasizes that unless there is a cover-up, “the SEC will cease to exist...”

Next Head of the European Central Bank a Goldman Sachs Alumnus or Buba's Head Boy?

The German patience with the EU is admirable.

And in the States, the patience with the rule of Wall Street and the hagiographic praise of Chairman Ben is ... remarkable.

One might even be tempted to call him 'maestro,' at least until the next bubble collapses.

Central Banking Publications
Weber Aims High
25 August 2009

So far, the front runner to succeed Jean-Claude Trichet as head of the European Central Bank, when his term ends in 2011, has been Mario Draghi, the shrewd current governor of the Banca d'Italia and Goldman Sachs alumnus (don't all boo at once).

But insiders are keeping a close eye on Axel Weber, president of the Bundesbank. If Draghi were to fall under a bus on the Via Nazionale (easily done, by the way), or if he were to give in to the blandishments of those who are urging him to dive into the treacherous waters of Italian politics, then Weber is positioning himself as the clear fall-back choice.

This would not go down well at the Elysée, where the thought of a German running the ECB makes President Sarkozy see red. Yet why not? Isn't it their turn, at last?

The efforts of French diplomats, allied to their enviable higher education and elite training, have ensured that Frenchmen have sat at the top of many of the great official international institutions for far longer than Germans (or indeed Brits). A Frenchman has occupied the post of IMF managing director for a total of 34 years since the founding of the Fund 65 years ago, while a German has been in the job for only four years. A Frenchman has been president of the European Commission for 14 years, while no German has held the post since Walter Hallstein, who retired in 1967. No German has headed up the EBRD in London, while Frenchmen have run it for 15 years. No German has led the OECD, and so on.

It would be understandable if Germans felt it was time to have their own man at the ECB. After all, it is German public opinion that in the end is critical for the long-term success of the euro. If German taxpayers are called on to bailout backsliding countries unable to discipline their economies (like Italy), they would be much more likely to do so with good grace if their own man or woman was seen to be minding the shop. So anybody committed to the success of the euro should be rooting for a German candidate, n'est-ce pas?

Enter politics. To reach the top job at the ECB, Weber needs to be nominated by the chancellor. Angela Merkel is fully expected to win the general election next month, possibly with a greatly increased personal mandate.

Now, observe a curious fact. For an institution known in the past for lambasting governments' deficit spending, the Bundesbank has been remarkably quiescent recently. Its big guns have fallen silent. Indeed, Weber has praised German economic policy. In a recent interview with Die Zeit online, Weber noted that the GDP recovery in the second quarter owed much to the support measures deployed by the government, the support of the state banking sector and the ECB's monetary easing. Meanwhile, Merkel has roundly criticised other central banks, such as the Federal Reserve and the Bank of England, while supporting the Bundesbank. They are both singing from the same hymn sheet.

Meanwhile, Weber has been quietly appointing his own people to several key positions while some Bundesbank board directors of an independent cast of mind appear to be heading for the exit.

The odds are still on Draghi. He is what the Italians call "furbo" – variously translated as smart, cunning or foxy. The French will be cheering him on. But the Italian fox will be on the outlook for a German greyhound coming up on the inside lane.

Saving the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation

If they declare those payments to be on profit after bonuses they may find a groundswell of support on Wall Street. There is nothing like sticking it to the regional banks to consolidate the power of the few.

Look for another program from the Fed/Treasury to 'save FDIC' as part of the overall effort to maintain confidence and prevent a certain armageddon.

American Banking News
FDIC’s Deposit Fund May Need 25% of U.S. Banking Profit in 2010
August 23rd, 2009

With the 80th bank failure occurring in just the first eight months of 2009, the U.S. banking industry’s fee burden from the FDIC is continuing to be pressured as the Deposit Insurance Fund shrinks. Richard Bove, an analyst with Rochdale Securities, told Reuters in a report that the FDIC’s Insurance Fund may need to collect an amount that would equate to about 25 percent of U.S. bank industry pretax income in 2010 to stay afloat.

In the report Bove predicted another 150 to 200 additional U.S. banks failures before the current banking crisis ends. The FDIC will likely use special assessments against banks in order to raise the extra funds needed to secure the Deposit Insurance Fund’s integrity. Bove believes special assessments in 2010 could reach $11 billion in addition to the regular fees banks already pay.

The FDIC last levied a special assessment in the second quarter of five basis points on each FDIC-insured bank’s assets. The assessment is scheduled for collection on September 30.

When the FDIC released its final statement detailed the second quarter assessment it projected that the Deposit Insurance Fund would remain low, but positive through 2009 and begin to rise in 2010. However, FDIC Chairman Blair Sheila Blair said in that same statement an additional assessment may be required as early as the fourth quarter of 2009.

The Deposit Insurance Fund ended the first quarter of the year with a balance of roughly $13 billion. Since that time the FDIC has had to digest several large bank failures, such as Colonial BancGroup, which cost the fund about $4 billion.

The Deposit Insurance Fund holds a fraction of the $52 billion it had just a year ago, raising the odds of an upcoming special assessment to near certainty.

As seen recently on americanbankingnews.com, the FDIC is exploring its options for brining in investors to buy-up failed banks, thus easing the burden on the insurance fund. Investment from private equity firms has been the showcased proposal so far. The FDIC is set to vote August 26 on a relaxed set of guidelines that would entice private equity firms to invest in failed banks.

Henry Kaufman: The Road to Financial Reformation

Henry Kaufman is giving a very interesting interview with Kathleen Hays regarding his new book, "The Road to Financial Reformation."

Henry Kaufman Interview Regarding Financial Reform - Bloomberg Television 24 August

Or here on Youtube Henry Kaufman Interview Aug 24

Henry will also be presenting his ideas at a public lecture at the Museum of American Finance in NYC on September 22.

Sept. 22 Kaufman Lecture

Our financial crisis: What happened? How did we get here? What needs to be done?

Dr. Henry Kaufman — an esteemed economist and statesman — is one of the most preeminent financial figures of the day, with a history of success from the 1980s, when his firm, Salomon Brothers, ruled the bond markets.

In The Road to Financial Reformation, Dr. Kaufman, who has spent a lifetime entrenched in the world of finance, provides an insightful account of the history and impact of post-World War II financial markets on the economy-what happened, how we got to where we are today, and what needs to be done. Drawing on his vast breadth of knowledge and experience, Kaufman reveals the mistakes that got us into this debacle, the consequences — as they have not been fully realized — and how to put our derailed economy back on track. This book details Dr. Kaufman’s warnings and concerns expressed repeatedly throughout the last quarter century, and shows that what he predicted came to pass.

With his breadth of knowledge and experience, Kaufman details that this crisis was foreseeable (he saw it coming), and how we created this history-making financial crisis. He also explains the consequences still to come, and presents solutions on how we can recover and reform the markets.

Why Is the Fed Creating Excess Reserves in the Banking System and Paying Interest on Them?

There have been some interesting side discussions at various venues including Naked Capitalism about the recent essay which I had posted titled When At First You Don't Succeed, Bring in the Reserves.

Let me clarify some points.

Yes, banking reserves in the US are a function of the Fed's Balance Sheet, by definition, because they are in the narrowest sense merely an accounting function, an entry on the books of the Fed reflecting actions undertaken by the Fed.

With purpose, I put the formal definitions of Reserve Bank Credit and Reserve Balances at the bottom of each chart. I had hoped this would make that point clear.

The essence of the essay was to point out the enormous increase in bank reserves which the Fed has created through their "New Deal for Wall Street" style banking programs. Because of this, the Fed has created a new function by which it pays interest on banking reserves, which to my knowledge it has never done before.

It is a new function at the Fed, and it does serve a important purpose. The purpose is to place a 'floor' under interest rates, in the face of a surfeit of liquidity which the Fed has created, and which shows up in the Adjusted Monetary Base, the Reserve Bank Credit figures, and so forth.

Now, some people have taken issue with my bringing the notion of excess Reserves to your attention for a variety of reasons. Even the mighty NY Fed has written a paper which attempts to defuse the notion that the excess reserves are indicative of anything that might be impeding lending.

Let me be clear about this.

The excess reserves are absolutely indicative of the Fed's having added substantial amounts of liquidity to the financial system. If the Fed were not paying interest on reserves, this liquidity would crush their target interest rates, since the banks are loath to hold reserves that are not generating some return. This is what they do, generate a return on capital. Capital has a price, even if it is an opportunity cost.

By establishing a floor, the Fed is setting a more blatant artificial level for interest rates, moreso than merely tinkering with drains and adds to the system. They are offering a riskless rate of return, and crowding out other competing requests for capital. Not necessarily a bad thing, but a reality of what they are doing.

What would happen if the Fed raised the interest rate it pays on reserves to let's say, twenty percent?

Economic activity in the US would grind to a halt, as banks placed every available dollar idly with the Fed's program, eschewing all other deals, liquidating assets if necessary, to place capital where it would receive the highest risk adjusted return. In essence, the Fed would 'crowd out' all other transactions that offered a lower risk adjusted return.

What if the Fed subsequently lowered the interest rate from twenty percent to zero? It would then enable more lending from the banks, as they sought to deploy their capital at higher risk adjusted rates.

There are some by the way that claim the excess reserves are so high because there is no demand for loans. This is a point of view only supported by those who a) have no understanding of finance and b) are seeking to support an extremely odd and mistaken view of the economy which seeks to justify their bets on a serious deflation.

There is always a demand for loans as long as there is economic activity; what varies is the price! Money is not particularly inelastic; that is, there is a rather high threshold at which people say, "I have too much!" It is rather a question of price, relative to return. Make the opportunity cost high enough and they will come (or be fired).

I hereby assert that I will borrow ALL funds the Fed might loan to me with no collateral at zero interest, and gladly so, as long as the short term US Treasury bills are paying more than 25 basis points interest. I reserve the right to defer on this offer if the Fed should make the policy error of hyperinflation a reality.

I hate to make points like this in the extreme with distorted examples, but sometimes it is what it requires to pierce through obfuscation to common sense.

So to summarize, what is the Fed likely to do if economic activity falters?

They are likely to lower interest rates paid on excess reserves closer to zero. They could even charge a 'haircut' on excess reserves which would highly motivate the banks.

These are all things which have been discussed before, often in the context of consumers! In fact, it is well known among bankers that as the Fed lowers interest rates money flows out of lower paying instruments like bank deposits and money markets, and into higher paying instruments that might be deemed too risky at high rates of riskless return. Such higher paying instruments are known as "stocks" and "corporate bonds." As former central banker Wayne Angell gleefully chortled in 2004, the Fed can indeed drive the public out of their savings and money market funds and into the equity markets by manipulating interest rates.

Does the Fed always 'create' excess reserves? It may be more correct to ask, does the Fed always create money, since excess reserves are an accounting function.

No. Banking reserves normally lag the creation of money, which is accomplished by lending, either from banks or more recently by neo-banks like Fannie, Freddie, GMAC, GE and so forth.

But at a time when economic activity is contracting, and the credit markets were seizing, the Fed took the lead in money creation by "monetizing" various types of debt. And they are going to enormous pains to maintain 'confidence' in the system and in particular the US dollar and debt. But we may ask, at what point does the confidence game become a con game? I would submit that it is when the Fed and Treasury purposely intervene in markets, beyond their normal interest rate targeting, and statistics and spread disinformation to manage perception.

There are other ways in which the Fed might address the failure of the productive economy to 'pick up the ball and run with it.' But most, if not all, of them involve the monetization of something, which is what happens when the Fed (and US Treasury) are taking the lead in money creation and not the productive economy.

Deflationists do not want to hear this, and central bankers do not wish you to know this, but it is the major factor in a fiat currency that it can be created literally 'out of nothing.'

This is why we have said long ago, and repeated since, that the limiting factor on the Fed's ability to create money is the value of the US Dollar and the sovereign debt.

As long as there is debt which can be monetized, then the Fed can monetize it and create money 'out of nothing.' For now they are acting with some reestraint, and channeling that money primarily to their cronies in the banking system, still able to mask the effects of their monetary inflation. CFTC Moves to Rein In Small Investors From Commodity ETFs

But the time is coming when they will not. And as they did when they demanded $700 billion in bailout money, the financiers will once again make the Administration and the Congress an offer which they think that 'we' cannot refuse, if only because the Congress will not listen if we tell them what we wish them to do, again.

The banks must be restrained, and the financial system reformed, and the economy brought back into productive balance, before their can be a sustained recovery.

When At First You Don't Succeed, Bring In the Reserves

Someone asked why Bernanke seemed so positive about the US recovery, and what he would do if his prediction turned out to be incorrect.

The first answer is rather straightforward. He is 'jawboning' or trying to increase confidence in the system to motivate businesses to spend and consumers to buy. The Fed can only set the playing field, but the players have to be confident enough to take the field. We think he is underestimating the neglect that the American consumer has taken over the last twenty years in terms of their overall poor condition (real income), and the disrepair of their equipment (household balance sheets), not to mention the rocks and snares and pitfalls remaining on the field from the gangs of New York and the economic royalists.

But let's assume Bernanke's first major gambit does falter. What is he likely to do next?

Beranke's Fed does have a printing press, and he has been using it as we all know. Here is a chart showing the expansion of the credit side of the Fed's Balance Sheet. This is from the top line labeled "Reserve Bank Credit" from the weekly H.41 report which is becoming more popularly followed these days. If one adds the Feds gold holdings, currency in circulation, and Special Drawing Rights, we get the Total Factors Supplying Reserve Funds.

http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/h41/Current/



So what would Ben do for "Plan B?" Would he merely add more programs, expand the Fed's Credit Items even more aggressively?

There was an important function added to the Fed's bag of tricks during this crisis that has not received sufficient attention perhaps: their ability to pay interest on reserve funds on deposit with the Fed from the Member Banks.

As can be seen from this next chart, this amount is now substantial running close to a trillion dollars. A portion of this would be characterized as 'excess reserves.' The Fed should be able to motivate banks to use these reserve by adjusting the riskless interest rates they pay.

This was a much desired tool by the monetarist Fed because it enabled them to expand their Balance Sheet and add a significant amount of credit to the banks system immediately, but to keep 'a bit of a leash' on the downstream effects of this liquidity even after it was deployed.

As the Fed's interest rate remains sufficiently high, the reserves, especially the excess reserves, remain in the banking system, and are not deployed actively as loans and inflationary additions to the financial system.

The Fed issues an H3 report, Aggregate Reserves of Depository Institutions and the Monetary Base. In their latest report, they characterize $708.5 Billion of these reserves as 'Excess Reserves.'

So, what we might expect to see is the Fed, as the banking system stabilizes after perhaps some new programs and credit facilities, begin to slowly unleash these excess reserves by reducing the interest to the Member Banks, which would lower the bar and motivate them to engage in more commercial loan activity.

We think one problem is that the banks have more options than merely keeping their excess capital at the Fed or loaning it out to private companies.

Certainly Goldman Sachs has shown that it can defy all the odds and make millions each day by aggressively playing the equity, bond and credit markets. It is also more likely that banks would be inclined to invest their excess capital through acquisitions of other banks, which might represent a moral hazard in creating fewer, and more "too large to fail" institutions.

Therefore we might see the first serious moves towards financial reform before the Fed begins to really unleash the liquidity which they have created in the banking system.

There is of course also their monetization of Treasury Debt, to support the stimulus programs being run from the fiscal side of the US financial apparatus. That would be included in the expansion of their Balance Sheet, and we would expect that to continue on at the very least indirectly, if not overtly on the Fed's balance sheet.

An Aside on the Gold Stock of the Fed

By the way, one method the Fed might use to immediately expand its Balance Sheet would be to recognize that their gold stock is significantly undervalued.

In the H.41 Report, the Fed shows a credit of $11 billion dollars in Gold Stock held primarily in New York, Chicago, Atlanta, and San Francisco, with lesser amounts at each of the Regional Banks. This gold is part of the collateral against the Federal Reserve Notes in circulation, and has been valued at an official rate of $42.22 per troy ounce for many years.

1. Gold held "under earmark" at Federal Reserve Banks for foreign and international accounts is not included in the gold stock of the United States; see table 3.13, line 3. Gold stock is valued at $42.22 per fine troy ounce

By calculation the Fed has 261,511,132 fine troy ounces on its books. If the Fed revalued their gold stock at a more reasonable market price of let's say $1000 per ounce, then this would immediately add $261 billion to the Fed's Balance Sheet IF the gold is really held by the Fed without encumbrances.

One has to wonder why the Fed has never taken the revaluation on its Balance Sheet for gold since the value of $42.22 is so clearly an historic artifact. They perform much more market based calculations for the Special Drawing Rights and their Foreign Exchange holdings. One certainly does not need to sell the gold in order to monetize it, since that has already been accomplished, albeit at a much lower rate.

One can only wonder.

Federal Reserve H3.1.2 US Reserve Assets

SP Futures Hourly Chart at Noon

The "W bottom" worked, and equities blew through the Pivot this morning on 'better than expected' housing starts, and a general consensus among the financial spokesmen that the recession is over, although with risks to the downside if stimulus and more importantly monetary support from the Fed, is withdrawn from the financial system too quickly.

Today is option expiration in August. Our high confidence target of 1021 has been met on the chart. Now the market must prove that it can consolidate and move higher.

Our view is that the recession is not over, and that the Fed and Treasury have merely papered over the substantial problems that remain, while alleviating the short term credit crunch issues with absolutely massive injections of liquidity directly into the banks.

Having said all that, stocks can rise without regard to any fundamentals for some time if there is enough will and capital to make it happen. Treasury and the Fed wish this badly because rising stocks will quickly make people forget their mistakes and uneven policy reactions.

Can they do it? We will see. The result *should* be another financial asset bubble at best, a lingering zombie economy very likely at worst.

Should they fail, probably off an exogenous event which can absorb the blame, then the market will fold like an old accordion because there is little commitment underneath it, only paper.

Why the Austrian, Keynesian, Marxist, Monetarist, and Neo-Liberal Economists Are All Wrong

US Personal Income has taken its worst annual decline since 1950.

This is why it is an improbable fantasy to think that the consumer will be able to pull this economy out of recession using the normal 'print and trickle down' approach. In the 1950's the solution was huge public works projects like the Interstate Highway System and of course the Korean War.

Until the median wage improves relative to the cost of living, there will be no recovery. And by cost of living we do not mean the chimerical US Consumer Price Index.

The classic Austrian prescription is to allow prices to decline until the median wage becomes adequate. Given the risk of a deflationary wage-price spiral, which is desired by no one except for the cash rich, the political risks of such an approach are enormous.

On paper it is obvious that a market can 'clear' at a variety of levels, if wages and prices are allowed to move freely. After all, if profits are diminished, income can obviously be diminished by a proportional amount, and nothing has really changed in terms of viable consumption.

The Supply side idealists (cash rich bosses, Austrians, neo-liberal, monetarist, and deflationist theorists) would like to see this happen at a lower level through a deflationary spiral. The Keynesians and neo-classicals wish to see it driven through the Demand side, with higher wages rising to meet the demands of profit in an inflationary expansion. Both believe that market forces alone can achieve this equilibrium. Across both groups runs a sub-category of statism vs. individualism.

Unfortunately both groups are wrong.

Both approaches require an ideal, almost frictionless, objectively rational, and honest economy in order to succeed. The Keynesians have a bit of an edge in this, because it is easier to control inflation than deflation in a fiat regime, and the natural growth of inflation tends to satiate the impulse to greed. They don't care if they can buy more as long as they can say they HAVE more. People tend to be irrational, and there is a percentage of the population that is irrationally greedy and obsessively rapacious. People are not naturally 'good.'

The greatest flaw in the many studies that come from each of the schools to prove their point is the brutal way in which they flatten the reality of the markets and make assumptions to allow their equations and analysis to 'work.' They spend most of their energy showing while the 'other school' is a group of ignorant fools, doomed to ignominious failure, in an atmosphere reminiscent of a university departmental meeting.

This has quietly scandalized those from other scientific disciplines who review the work of many of the leading economists. Benoit Mandelbrot was poking enormous holes in the work of the leading economists long before Nassim Taleb made it more widely known. The ugly truth is that economics is a science in the way that medicine was a profession while it still used leeches to balance a person's vapours. Yes, some are always better than others, and certainly more entertaining, but they all tended to kill their patients.

The most intractable part of the current financial crisis, and the ongoing problem of the US economy is the huge tax which is levied on the American public by its corporations, primarily in the financial and health care sectors, and a political system based on lobbyists and their campaign contributions.

There are hidden taxes and impediments to 'free trade' at every turn. The ugly truth is that capitalism-in-practice hates free markets, always seeking to overturn the rules and impose oligopoly if not outright monopoly through barriers to entry, manipulation of the political process, distortion of regulation, predatory pricing, brute force, and the usual slate of anti-trust practices.

Some of these 'hidden taxes' are the bonuses on Wall Street which require an increasing percentage of the financial 'action.' The credit cards fees and penalties levied by banks to support profits in a contracting economy. The Sales General & Administrative portion of the Income Statements of the pharmaceutical industry which only American consumers seem willing to pay. A health care system which is a monument to overspending, outrageous pricing, and greed.

The notion that "if only government would not regulate markets at all everything would be fine" is a variation of Rousseau's romantic notion of the noble savage which no one believes except those who wish to continue to act like savages, and those who get no closer to the real work of an economy than their textbooks. Economic Darwinism works primarily to the advantage of the sharks. Anyone who believes that 'no regulations' works well has never driven on a modern highway at peak periods.

Yes, a certain portion of the population are adult, and generally good and fair. But there is a percentage of the population that is not. And since the 1980's they have been encouraged by the culture of relativism and greed to 'express themselves' and so they have, with a vengeance.

Discussion rarely proceeds very far because of the dialectical nature of American thought. Both extremes are wrong, but they seem to content to merely bash each other, pointing out their errors, while repeating the same mistakes over and again.

The engineering of the economy has become married to the engineering of the political dialogue by the corporate media and their political parties. "The engineering of consent is the very essence of the democratic process, the freedom to persuade and suggest." Edward L. Bernays 1947

The condition of the American economy is strikingly similar to the Soviet state economy of the last two decades of the 20th century. People are trying to sustain a system "as is" that is based on bad assumptions, unworkable constructions, conflicting objectives, and a flagging empire laced heavily with elitist fraud and corruption. The primary difference is that the US has a bigger gun and its hand is in more people's pockets with the dollar as the world's reserve currency. But the comparison seems to indicate that the economy must indeed fail first, before genuine change can begin, because the familiar ideology and practices must clearly fail before they can recede sufficiently to make room for new ways and reforms.

A new school of Economics will rise out of the ashes of the failure of the American economy as happened after the Great Depression. Let us hope that it is better than what we have today.

In the short term, what does all this mean?

There is NO system that will work without substantial, continuing effort, and continual adaptation and commitment to a certain set of goals that are more about 'ends' than ideological process.

Because our system has been abused for so long, and is so distorted and imbalanced and dominated by a relatively few organizations beholden to a self-serving status quo, reform is not an afterthought, it is the sine qua non.

It means that until the banks are restrained, and the financial system is reformed, and balance is restored, there can be no sustained recovery.

SP Futures Hourly Chart at 10:45 AM

The dynamic on the chart is the short term potential double bottom "W" and the developing intermediate H&S distribution top.

A pullback of 4% with a move to a higher high is supportive of the 'new bull market' scenario and we would expect the media cheerleaders and paid market strategists to hit the pom poms hard if the Street can make this happen.

Volumes are light enough. But we also sense a growing cynicism and distrust of the US financial markets in traders and investors. There is a recognition that the game is rigged, and the 'house' is skimming a larger piece of the daily liquidity thanks to government money and new technology.

This 'skim' may destroy a game while enriching the house, as all seasoned casino operators know. It is not clear to us that the Wall Street crowd can practice this sort of longer term restraint.

The Chief Economists

But do they care?

China Makes Biggest Cut in US Treasury Assets Since 2000

China dumps US Treasuries the most aggressively in a decade. Now THAT's a change you can believe in.

One has to wonder how long the UK, Japan and the US can keep supporting each other's crony capitalist oligopolies.

China Daily
China cuts US Treasury holdings in June
2009-08-18

NEW YORK: China reduced its holdings of US Treasury debt in June by the biggest margin in nearly nine years, according to a US Treasury Department report issued on Monday.

China cut its net holdings by 3.1 percent to $776.4 billion in June from $801.5 billion in May, the report says. This is also the first large-scale reduction of US Treasury debt by China so far this year.

However, its June holdings were still larger than April's $763.5 billion and $767.9 billion in March, according to the statistics of the Treasury Department.

Reuters data show the drop in China's Treasury holdings in June was the biggest percentage reduction since a 4.2 percent cut in October 2000.

On the other hand, Japan, the second-largest holder of US Treasury securities, increased its holdings to $711.8 billion in June from $677.2 billion in May.

The United Kingdom, the third largest holder, also increased its holdings to $214 billion in June from $163.8 billion, a surge of 30.6 percent.

SP Futures Hourly Chart at 1 PM

The US equity markets have bounced back to key resistance on a much great than expected drawdown in oil inventories.

The trade today seems very technical (ie short squeeze by the 100 million dollar men) and lacking in conviction.

Let's see how the markets deal with this and then trade accordingly. Volumes remain light, and may do so until September. However, if anything 'happens' this market may flop as convincingly as Obama's "change" platform.

The Gathering Storm: Stay Defensive

"...market is ahead of reality...worry about things particularly going into Ramadan on the 22nd (of August)...there are things gathering around here (the NYSE) that are kind of esoteric, but we could perhaps see historic trading over the next eight weeks...potentially a very exciting period." Art Cashin, 18 Aug 2009

Larry Summers, Tim Geithner, and Ben Bernanke have managed, once again, to place the economy on the edge of a chasm by pandering to Wall Street, which has a narcissistic short-term obsession with stuffing its pockets at any risk or cost, while the corporate media distracts the public with an outrageous parade of disinformation, delusion, and distraction.

The world markets are entering a period of high risk and volatility. No one knows for certain what will come. Professional traders are preparing for it by managing their risks. We are as well.

The Great American Bank Robbery

If you suspected that fraud, corruption, incompetence, and coverups at the highest levels are at the heart of our current financial crisis, you're right.

"...ideology enabled criminality and political failure led to economic crisis as Wall Street bought Capitol Hill..."

The Great American Bank Robbery
Video - Lecture
By William K. Black

1. Why do we have repeated, intensifying economic crises?
2. What can white collar criminology add to our understanding of what's going wrong?

SP Futures Hourly Chart 9:45 AM with the SP Weekly Chart

So far this is merely a pullback from a consolidation, and a likely distribution top in the making as insiders continue to take profits on their ponzi pump in US equities.

We signalled 'defensive' last week, and that the risk reward in the market was dangerous, and we exited or hedged all longs. Time to Get Defensive

Now we wait to see if this is just a pullback from a consolidation, with a subsequent rally to new highs, or a break in the market slightly ahead of our forecast target. We have been looking for a 3% pullback first, and then a rally to the final high for the year.

The obvious level to watch is the neckline.

Bear in mind that these 100 million dollar men on Wall Street make their pay by taking investors, and the economy, for rides up and down in stocks, commodities, and just about any other market they can push using the leverage of their taxpayer supported funds.



The SP Weekly Chart show that a rally back to 1014 on the cash market represents an approximate 38.2% rally from the bottom. This number is one of the key fibonacci numbers watched by traders. The next stop higher would be 50%.

More Than 150 Publicly Traded US Banks Are In Serious Trouble

This analysis by Bloomberg is based on some fairly modest economic assumptions. Most of the banks in question are state and regional banks that have not enjoyed the largesse of the Fed and Treasury like the free-spending, Wall Street money center banks, who are sharply curbing lending and raising rates on credit cards and other revolving debt aggressively even for customers with excellent credit and no history of non-payment.

As you might suspect, even the worst of the banks with large percentages of non-performing loans all claim to be 'well capitalized' by regulatory standards.

If as indicated more of the smaller banks fail, we will be left with a few, larger, more potentially lethal financial institutions.

The Obama Administration policy decisions, particularly the programs and reserves decision enabled in October 2008, appear to be favoring Wall Street heavily, monetizing debt for the Primary Dealers and the Wall Street market players, while choking off the consumer and the state and regional banks.

Policy decisions have impact, especially when they have the weight of the Federal Reserve, the Treasury, the Congress, and a powerful President behind them. The question becomes are they the right policy decisions? How were they crafted?

Regretfully, most of them were done behind closed doors, with little public discussion or scrutiny, crafted by an army of lobbyists, campaign donors, and crony capitalists galore.


Bloomberg
Toxic Loans Topping 5% May Push 150 Banks to Point of No Return
By Ari Levy

Aug. 14 (Bloomberg) -- More than 150 publicly traded U.S. lenders own nonperforming loans that equal 5 percent or more of their holdings, a level that former regulators say can wipe out a bank’s equity and threaten its survival.

The number of banks exceeding the threshold more than doubled in the year through June, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, as real estate and credit-card defaults surged. Almost 300 reported 3 percent or more of their loans were nonperforming, a term for commercial and consumer debt that has stopped collecting interest or will no longer be paid in full.

The biggest banks with nonperforming loans of at least 5 percent include Wisconsin’s Marshall & Ilsley Corp. and Georgia’s Synovus Financial Corp., according to Bloomberg data. Among those exceeding 10 percent, the biggest in the 50 U.S. states was Michigan’s Flagstar Bancorp. All said in second- quarter filings they’re “well-capitalized” by regulatory standards, which means they’re considered financially sound.

“At a 3 percent level, I’d be concerned that there’s some underlying issue, and if they’re at 5 percent, chances are regulators have them classified as being in unsafe and unsound condition,” said Walter Mix, former commissioner of the California Department of Financial Institutions, and now a managing director of consulting firm LECG in Los Angeles. He wasn’t commenting on any specific banks.

Missed payments by consumers, builders and small businesses pushed 72 lenders into failure this year, the most since 1992. More collapses may lie ahead as the recession causes increased defaults and swells the confidential U.S. list of “problem banks,” which stood at 305 in the first quarter.

Cash DrainNonperforming loans can eat into a company’s earnings and deplete cash, leaving banks below the minimum capital levels required by regulators.... “This is a fairly widespread issue for the larger community banks and some regional banks across the country,” said Mix of LECG, where William Isaac, former head of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., is chairman of the global financial services unit.

Ratios above 5 percent don’t always lead to failures because banks keep capital cushions and set aside reserves to absorb bad loans. Banks with higher ratios of equity to total assets can better withstand such losses, said Jim Barth, a former chief economist at the Office of Thrift Supervision. Marshall & Ilsley and Synovus said they’ve been getting bad loans off their books by selling them...

‘Off the Charts’

“These numbers are off the charts,” said Blake Howells, an analyst at Becker Capital Management in Portland, Oregon, referring to the nonperforming loan levels at companies he follows. Banks are losing the “ability to try and earn their way through the cycle,” said Howells, who previously spent 13 years at Minneapolis-based U.S. Bancorp....

Will the US Consumer Make it a Merry Christmas?

Only if they want to hit those maxed out 24% APR credit cards just one more time.

US Credit Card Trap - Jennifer Barry

The Next Wave of the Financial Crisis Is Coming (And Why)

These excerpts from the most recent TARP Congressional Oversight Panel Report make the risks in the US financial system abundantly clear.

Do you think that the Congress has the will and the ability to act on their recommendation, with the men currently in positions of power on the key Committees? Do you believe that the Obama Administration is capable of reforming itself and effecting genuine change with so many Wall Street denizens forming their policy?

"In order to advance a full recovery in the economy, there must be greater transparency, accountability, and clarity, from both the government and banks, about the scope of the troubled asset problem."

We are persuaded that the government is waiting for the next wave of failures, or some exogenous event of catastrophic proportion, to provide their rationale to take new aggressive action.

But while the financial oligarchy is in control of the men in power, we doubt that these will be the right steps for the majority of Americans, the US economy, and its debt holders.

"There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to the one who is striking at the root."
Henry David Thoreau

Congressional Oversight Panel - August 11 Report - The Continued Risk of Troubled Assets

"...But, it is likely that an overwhelming portion of the troubled assets from last October remain on bank balance sheets today.

If the troubled assets held by banks prove to be worth less than their balance sheets currently indicate, the banks may be required to raise more capital. If the losses are severe enough, some financial institutions may be forced to cease operations. This means that the future performance of the economy and the performance of the underlying loans, as well as the method of valuation of the assets, are critical to the continued operation of the banks.

...If the economy worsens, especially if unemployment remains elevated or if the commercial real estate market collapses, then defaults will rise and the troubled assets will continue to deteriorate in value. Banks will incur further losses on their troubled assets. The financial system will remain vulnerable to the crisis conditions that TARP was meant to fix.

...Part of the financial crisis was triggered by uncertainty about the value of banks' loan and securities portfolios. Changing accounting standards helped the banks temporarily by allowing them greater leeway in describing their assets, but it did not change the underlying problem. In order to advance a full recovery in the economy, there must be greater transparency, accountability, and clarity, from both the government and banks, about the scope of the troubled asset problem. Treasury and relevant government agencies should work together to move financial institutions toward sufficient disclosure of the terms and volume of troubled assets on institutions‟ books so that markets can function more effectively. Finally, as noted above, Treasury must keep in mind the particular challenges facing small banks.

This crisis was years in the making, and it won‟t be resolved overnight. But we are now ten months into TARP, and troubled assets remain a substantial danger to the
financial system.

...Nonetheless, financial stability remains at risk if the underlying problem of troubled assets remains unresolved."

The banks must be restrained, and the financial system reformed, and the economy brought back into balance, before there can be any sustained recovery.

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