Bubble-nomics: SP and Nasdaq Straining at Resistance And the Remnants of Fear

The SP is trying to break out of the trend and hold it's gains. I would not get in front of this, unless you wish to guarantee an opportunity for an additional short squeeze. Remember, the wiseguys can peek into your collective hand at will, and read your strategy within milliseconds of your executing it. That is why playing short term trends is becoming increasingly difficult for the individual speculator.



It is useful to watch the Nasdaq 100 at key support and resistance levels, as well as the broader indices. The SP futures are generally the 'push' where the flash and sizzle of bull markets occur of late. Buying the futures drags much of the market behind it. But this can only last for so long unless additional 'real' buying steps in.



Formidable retracement. Now the rally must show its mettle and either confirm an economic recovery or the start of a new bubble led by financial assets, or not.



Little pricing in of fear, but the markets remain thin and a bit uneasy.



The Dollar is hanging on to support.

JPMorgan, UBS and Deutsche Bank Charged with Derivatives Fraud

More like international crime families sending out enticing emails trying to lure and trick the unsuspecting than serious financial institutions. This is banking?

Notice that these were operating out of their London units, similar to the AIG derivative scandal that helped to worsen the US financial crisis. The FSA is apparently working hard now to enforce its rules and bring these banks to heel. Contrast that with the SEC in the States which seems reluctant to do anything regarding enforcement, and even when a judge puts them to the task, are able to administer only the mildest of financial chastisement to be passed on to the shareholders.

There is speculation that the US government cannot reform these banks because it is deeply involved in financial transactions of a questionable nature with them itself, ranging from enormous individual campaign contributions to market manipulation in various financial instruments in support of government policy which is otherwise failing badly. The opacity of markets and government bodies like the ESF makes this difficult to assess, but the outrageous size of positions amongst some of the banks, together with the occasional slip in the redacted transcripts is the smoke that indicates more heat beneath the surface than we might imagine.

The US Treasury Secretary himself is recenly implicated in an outrageous accounting fraud perpetrated by Lehman Brothers with the apparent complicit silence of the NY Fed which he was leading at the time.

And yet the Congress seems to be able to do little or nothing, it is so controlled by the monied interests. The Senate has the temerity to propose giving Consumer Protection to this very Fed as it is revealed to be complicit in bank fraud of epic proportions, and a track record of fighting and delaying consumer reforms and sensible regulation of OTC derivatives for years. The Republicans are unashamed of their venality, and the Democrats are seemingly leaderless.

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

Bloomberg
Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan, UBS Are Charged With Derivatives Fraud
By Elisa Martinuzzi and Sonia Sirletti

March 17 (Bloomberg) -- Deutsche Bank AG, JPMorgan Chase & Co., UBS AG and Hypo Real Estate Holding AG’s Depfa Bank Plc unit were charged with fraud linked to the sale of derivatives to the City of Milan.

Judge Simone Luerti scheduled the trial of the four firms, 11 bankers and two former city officials for May 6, Prosecutor Alfredo Robledo said after a hearing in Milan today. The banks allegedly misled the city on swaps that adjusted interest payments on 1.7 billion euros ($2.3 billion) of borrowings.

Prosecutors across Italy are probing banks as local and national government agencies face potential losses of 2.5 billion euros on derivatives, lawyers say. The Milan probe may also affect cases as far away as the U.S., where securities firms have faced charges for price-fixing and bid-rigging in the sale of derivatives to municipalities, though not for fraud, according to former regulator Christopher “Kit” Taylor.

“This case could have repercussions over here if the trial showed deliberate intent,” said Taylor, a former executive director of the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board, the national regulator of the municipal-bond market. “What happened in Europe was the continuation of a pattern in the U.S.”

UBS, JPMorgan and Deutsche Bank officials didn’t have an immediate comment. Officials at Depfa couldn’t immediately be reached.

Robledo alleges the London units of the four banks misled Milan on the economic advantage of a financing package that included the swaps and earned 101 million euros in hidden fees.

He also claims the banks violated U.K. securities rules by failing to inform Milan in writing that for the swap deal the city was a counterparty to the lenders rather than a customer. Banks abiding by the rules of the Financial Services Authority are required to shield customers from conflicts of interest and provide them with clear and fair information that isn’t misleading.

The prosecutor, who seized assets from the banks equal to their share of the alleged profit, is claiming JPMorgan charged about 45 million euros in commissions that were hidden from the municipality, while Deutsche Bank made about 25 million euros, Depfa Bank earned 21 million euros and UBS made 10 million euros, court documents show....

China's Mercantilism: Selling Them the Rope

"The Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them." Vladimir Illyich Lenin

Here is Paul Krugman with a reasonably good explanation of what happens when countries 'manage' their currencies lower. It provides a boost to exports and an impediment to imports. It is not much different than restraints of trade like tariffs and subsidies.

This is not higher math. A few simple price/demand equations with currency exchange factors using high school algebra would suffice to show the power of currency manipulation and a devaluation of 40% as a form of 'competitive advantage.'

Although I am glad that some of the economic sites and economists are willing to discuss this now, and as always respect Paul Krugman for his frankness and learning, the question should be asked, "Where have the American economists been for the past ten years? This is not the first time a major economist has tried to discuss this, and primarily to little effect."

Now that Krugman has made it respectable the more timid are willing to speak, although some of the high profile economic pundits continue to uphold myths and propaganda to support their favorite commercial interests, think tanks, ideologies and honorariums.

It is hard to imagine another modern science that would have tolerated such obvious howlers as economics has recently done, and not only tolerated, but made major tenets and far-reaching public policy out of them. As my crusty statistics professor would say, "economics is sometimes more like marketing than mathematics: self-serving analysis surrounding bullshit assumptions and double-talk."

The Chinese manipulation of their currency was not subtle. China devalued the renminbi significantly in the latter part of the 1990's, and then pegged it to the dollar. It then penetrated the usual safeguards of fair trade laws by obtaining 'favorable' rulings first from Bill Clinton and then from W. Bush.

They ought not to have been granted full trade status until China allowed their currency to float on some prearranged conditions at the very least. One can only speculate on why two US presidents sold them the rope by which to hold the US economy hostage. It is probably nothing more than crony capitalism. As for the economic advisors that surround them, they often have little respect for fair and open markets because they themselves engage in market manipulation to support their policy objectives so much that it becomes a matter of course.

Fair Trade agreements and the WTO are a farce when they permit such dramatic currency manipulation, and this is the direct result of the existing fiat currency regime and a toleration and even encouragement of financial engineering. And globalization is something to always be regulated because of its profound effect on one's domestic markets and public policy. Otherwise the world sinks to the lowest common denominator of the abuses of reckless environmentalism and even slave labor of the worst tyranny for the sake of 'competitiveness.'

Multinational corporations' desires for export revenues and cheap goods do not trump national sovereign preferences for the rights and freedoms of the individual to which a people might commit themselves, and pledge their honor. The natural benefit of unrestrained globalization is a canard similar in nature to the fallacy of naturally efficient markets.

It suited some people to ignore it then because the arrangement provided cheap goods to the US while depressing the domestic manufacturing sector and working class incomes, while boosting the financial sector and masking monetary inflation and asset bubbles. It was a means of empowering and enriching Wall Street at the expense of the productive economy.

Now that China's currency manipulation does not suit them, they are willing to discuss it, since China is not 'playing ball' with the financial engineers and encouraging domestic consumption and adopting Western bankers as their masters.

There is also a realization that their financial engineering has brought the world to the brink of a global crisis of insolvency and a tremendous blow to authentic capitalism from which it may be difficult to recover. And they are afraid.



Of Bubbles and Busts: Which Way for China?

The Financialization of America and Currency Wars in China

US Making Preparations for a Pre-Emptive Strike on Iran (or Some Other Eastern Destination)

Although one would doubt that the US would 'go it alone,' one has to question whether or not they would act in support of a pre-emptive strike by Israel on Iranian nuclear facilities.

Although this news piece assumes Iran is the target, other easterly destinations come to mind in the vicinity of Afghanistan.

The implications of such a strike on the world financial and commodity markets is obvious, and bears careful watching. I would doubt the US would circumvent a discussion at the United Nations. Even George W had to at least pay lip service to international support prior to his attack on Iraq.

SundayHeraldScotland
Final destination Iran?
By Rob Edwards
14 Mar 2010

Hundreds of powerful US “bunker-buster” bombs are being shipped from California to the British island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean in preparation for a possible attack on Iran.

The Sunday Herald can reveal that the US government signed a contract in January to transport 10 ammunition containers to the island. According to a cargo manifest from the US navy, this included 387 “Blu” bombs used for blasting hardened or underground structures.

Experts say that they are being put in place for an assault on Iran’s controversial nuclear facilities. There has long been speculation that the US military is preparing for such an attack, should diplomacy fail to persuade Iran not to make nuclear weapons.

Although Diego Garcia is part of the British Indian Ocean Territory, it is used by the US as a military base under an agreement made in 1971. The agreement led to 2,000 native islanders being forcibly evicted to the Seychelles and Mauritius.

The Sunday Herald reported in 2007 that stealth bomber hangers on the island were being equipped to take bunker-buster bombs.

Although the story was not confirmed at the time, the new evidence suggests that it was accurate.

Contract details for the shipment to Diego Garcia were posted on an international tenders’ website by the US navy.

A shipping company based in Florida, Superior Maritime Services, will be paid $699,500 to carry many thousands of military items from Concord, California, to Diego Garcia.

Crucially, the cargo includes 195 smart, guided, Blu-110 bombs and 192 massive 2000lb Blu-117 bombs.

“They are gearing up totally for the destruction of Iran,” said Dan Plesch, director of the Centre for International Studies and Diplomacy at the University of London, co-author of a recent study on US preparations for an attack on Iran. “US bombers are ready today to destroy 10,000 targets in Iran in a few hours,” he added.

The preparations were being made by the US military, but it would be up to President Obama to make the final decision. He may decide that it would be better for the US to act instead of Israel, Plesch argued.

“The US is not publicising the scale of these preparations to deter Iran, tending to make confrontation more likely,” he added. “The US ... is using its forces as part of an overall strategy of shaping Iran’s actions.”

According to Ian Davis, director of the new independent thinktank, Nato Watch, the shipment to Diego Garcia is a major concern. “We would urge the US to clarify its intentions for these weapons, and the Foreign Office to clarify its attitude to the use of Diego Garcia for an attack on Iran,” he said.

For Alan Mackinnon, chair of Scottish CND, the revelation was “extremely worrying”. He stated: “It is clear that the US government continues to beat the drums of war over Iran, most recently in the statements of Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton.

“It is depressingly similar to the rhetoric we heard prior to the war in Iraq in 2003.”

The British Ministry of Defence has said in the past that the US government would need permission to use Diego Garcia for offensive action. It has already been used for strikes against Iraq during the 1991 and 2003 Gulf wars.

About 50 British military staff are stationed on the island, with more than 3,200 US personnel. Part of the Chagos Archipelago, it lies about 1,000 miles from the southern coasts of India and Sri Lanka, well placed for missions to Iran.

The US Department of Defence did not respond to a request for a comment.

US and UK Move Closer to Ratings Downgrades - Or Not

There is a spread of glass 'half-empty' and 'half-full' versions of this story in the news today. The Financial Times stresses that the ratings are 'safe' for now and 'well-positioned' while others such as Business Week choose to emphasize the deterioration and potential risk.

Who are Moody's and SP to judge this? Their shocking performance in the subprime and credit markets shows them repeatedly to be little more than carnival barkers and shills, willing to say almost anything for pay. Are they as malleable to political and commercial influence in this as they have shown themselves to be in the recent financial scandals?

And yet, the position of the fiat currencies and the financial engineers does seem to deteriorate to anyone who can look at debt to GDP ratios, debt servicability, and the quality of government statistics. And some currencies are more equal than others, being sustained by holdings in foreign reserves because of the current structure of international finance.

It is unlikely, however, that we will hear about any collapse before it happens from these US-based ratings agencies. Their ratings are triggers for traders however, and could be self-fulfilling, a tool for the currency bears, who use leverage to bring down nations.

The US will seek to stand the Dollar on the heads of Sterling and then the Euro to sustain its head about the rising waters.

Make no mistake about this. Keep an eye on Sterling as the currency wars intensify.

NY Times
Credit Agency Warns U.S. and Others of Risk to Top Rating
By DAVID JOLLY
March 15, 2010

PARIS — The United States, Germany and other major economies have moved “substantially” closer to losing their top-notch credit ratings and can not depend solely on economic growth to save them, a report warned on Monday.

The ratings of the Aaa governments — which also include Britain, France, Spain and the Nordic countries — are currently “stable,” Moody’s Investor Service wrote in the report. But, it added, “their ‘distance-to-downgrade’ has in all cases substantially diminished.”

“Growth alone will not resolve an increasingly complicated debt equation,” Moody’s said. “Preserving debt affordability” — the ratio of interest payments to government revenues — “at levels consistent with Aaa ratings will invariably require fiscal adjustments of a magnitude that, in some cases, will test social cohesion.”

Greece, Portugal and other countries that are already in far worse shape have been rocked by strikes and other protests in recent weeks as they try to adopt tough austerity measures.

Without a stronger recovery, governments could encounter serious trouble in phasing out government support for the economy, Arnaud Marès, the main author of the report, said in a statement. That “could yet make their credit more vulnerable,” he said.

Credit ratings are important because higher-rated governments are typically able to borrow at lower costs. Last May, Moody’s cut Japan’s Aaa rating to Aa2, an acknowledgement of the market’s growing unease with the debt burden of the Asian country...

In the United States, the Obama administration estimates that the deficit will rise to 10.6 percent of gross domestic product in the current fiscal year, the highest since 1946, and federal debt will reach 64 percent of G.D.P. Government expenditures are expected to rise to a postwar high of 25.4 percent of G.D.P.

For now, the U.S. debt remains affordable, Moody’s said, as the ratio of interest payments to revenue fell to 8.7 percent in the current year, after peaking at 10.0 percent two years ago. If that trend were to reverse, the Moody’s analysts said, “there would at some point be downward pressure on the Aaa rating of the federal government.”

In Britain, Moody’s said, the risk is that tax receipts fail to keep pace with forecasts, as the government of Prime Minister Gordon Brown has little room left to maneuver. In that situation, the debt — which the government already predicts will stabilize at around 90 percent of G.D.P. — could balloon, undermining the credit rating.

In comparison to both Britain and the United States, the report noted, households in France and Germany entered the crisis with relatively low indebtedness, and hence have a little more room for maneuver. Yet both countries will find themselves under pressure to maintain financial discipline in the event that growth does not rise substantially...

As for the Nordic countries, the agency said the region entered the crisis in relatively good shape, and their credit ratings appeared to be well protected.

About That Seemingly Irrational Need for Bonuses...

Psychopath: A person with an antisocial personality disorder, manifested in aggressive, perverted, criminal, or amoral behavior without empathy or remorse.

He would sell his mother for an eighth.

He would betray his most solemn promise on a whim.

He was a law unto himself, forcing others to serve his needs.

He would grab society's tit and suck it dry.

He would grasp and tear until he showed them all.

He was beyond good and evil--- He was an American hero.

"Our hypothesis was that psychopathic traits are also linked to dysfunction in dopamine reward circuitry," Buckholtz said. "Consistent with what we thought, we found people with high levels of psychopathic traits had almost four times the amount of dopamine released in response to amphetamine."

In the second portion of the experiment, the research subjects were told they would receive a monetary reward for completing a simple task. Their brains were scanned with fMRI while they were performing the task. The researchers found in those individuals with elevated psychopathic traits the dopamine reward area of the brain, the nucleus accumbens, was much more active while they were anticipating the monetary reward than in the other volunteers.

"It may be that because of these exaggerated dopamine responses, once they focus on the chance to get a reward, psychopaths are unable to alter their attention until they get what they're after," Buckholtz said. Added Zald, "It's not just that they don't appreciate the potential threat, but that the anticipation or motivation for reward overwhelms those concerns."

Psychopaths' Brains Wired to Seek Rewards No Matter the Consequences

So let's give deregulation and the efficient markets hypothesis another chance to really maximize the damage.

An entire society built around white punks on dopamine, trapped in the infantile stage of development, allocating resources for the many, the arbiters of utility and worth, from Wall Street to the Congress: this is what America has become.

SP, NDX and US Dollar Daily Charts

The SP 500 is pushing up against the resistance associated with the long term trend of the rally. It will likely take several attempts to try and push through it.



Notice how cleanly the rally in tech has sliced higher to upwards resistance. A failure at resistance would confirm a 'normal' stock trend, leaving the rally intact but correcting the excess.

If there is going to be a breakout it will likely lead the way, and the entire pattern of the last six months or so can be considered a consolidation in what is likely to become an inflationary financial asset bubble.



The dollar is holding its primary trendline despite the recent sideways chop. This could be consolidation as there is more room to the upside of .83. However, this would seem to require a breakdown in stocks if normal patterns are to continue. If stocks break up and out in what is likely to be a financial asset bubble, then the dollar will be sacrificd to the incipient monetary inflation, even before it appears in the money supply figures.

NY Fed Implicated in the Accounting Fraud at Lehman

Quite a bombshell from Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism tonight.

I wonder if the US mainstream media will ignore and dismiss it as they did the exclusion of the Wall Street banks from European debt sales in response to their fraudulent CDO sales. Is there a 'reverse gear' on the Voice of America?

In response, let's see if Chris Dodd puts the Consumer Protection section of the financial reform legislation under the control of a private organization,the Fed, which is owned by the institutions it is supposed to be regulating, and which is now implicated in the failure and fraud that helped to trigger the recent financial crisis.

The senior Republicans on the committee have insisted that it be. Originally Senator Dodd seemed to be going along with that in the spirit of bipartisan support for the monied interests and the financial lobbyists. That would be the perfect Orwellian twist to an increasingly surreal decline in the observance of the Constitution and the rule of law.

And then of course there is Turbo Tim, knee deep again in messy conflicts of interest and crony capitalism. The "CEO defense" claiming attention deficit disorder and blissful aloofness is in fashion among highly paid US executives. Considering Mr. Geithner's record, even in the execution of his own tax returns, the incompetence defense might be plausible. But it then calls into question the judgement of the person who subsequently appointed Tim to be the head of the most powerful financial organization on earth, the US Treasury.

Call the New Yorker. Time for another media PR blitz, but this one is for the Chief.

Naked Capitalism
NY Fed Under Geithner Implicated in Lehman Accounting Fraud

Quite a few observers, including this blogger, have been stunned and frustrated at the refusal to investigate what was almost certain accounting fraud at Lehman. Despite the bankruptcy administrator’s effort to blame the gaping hole in Lehman’s balance sheet on its disorderly collapse, the idea that the firm, which was by its own accounts solvent, would suddenly spring a roughly $130+ billion hole in its $660 balance sheet, is simply implausible on its face. Indeed, it was such common knowledge in the Lehman flailing about period that Lehman’s accounts were such that Hank Paulson’s recent book mentions repeatedly that Lehman’s valuations were phony as if it were no big deal.

Well, it is folks, as a newly-released examiner’s report by Anton Valukas in connection with the Lehman bankruptcy makes clear. The unraveling isn’t merely implicating Fuld and his recent succession of CFOs, or its accounting firm, Ernst & Young, as might be expected. It also emerges that the NY Fed, and thus Timothy Geithner, were at a minimum massively derelict in the performance of their duties, and may well be culpable in aiding and abetting Lehman in accounting fraud and Sarbox violations.

We need to demand an immediate release of the e-mails, phone records, and meeting notes from the NY Fed and key Lehman principals regarding the NY Fed’s review of Lehman’s solvency. If, as things appear now, Lehman was allowed by the Fed’s inaction to remain in business, when the Fed should have insisted on a wind-down (and the failed Barclay’s said this was not infeasible: even an orderly bankruptcy would have been preferable, as Harvey Miller, who handled the Lehman BK filing has made clear; a good bank/bad bank structure, with a Fed backstop of the bad bank, would have been an option if the Fed’s justification for inaction was systemic risk), the NY Fed at a minimum helped perpetuate a fraud on investors and counter parties.

This pattern further suggests the Fed, which by its charter is tasked to promote the safety and soundness of the banking system, instead, via its collusion with Lehman management, operated to protect particular actors to the detriment of the public at large.

And most important, it says that the NY Fed, and likely Geithner himself, undermined, perhaps even violated, laws designed to protect investors and markets. If so, he is not fit to be Treasury secretary or hold any office related to financial supervision and should resign immediately...

Read the rest of the story here.

Feldstein: Worry About the Dollar, Not the Euro: Keep an Eye on Sterling

Here is Marty Feldstein's view of the economic fundamentals in the euro and dollar portion of the forex markets.

Fundamentals mean little in the short term for trading purposes, at least in my own judgement. However, it does look as though the euro/dollar cross is a bit overdone. If that is correct, then it is likely that this correction in the precious metals should be almost done as well. But we will have to see what happens. The markets are shallow and edgy, almost wobbly. In a liquidation everything gets sold on the short term. Selling and buying on the margins makes price, no matter what size the market. Such it is with most auction markets disconnected from rational valuation.

On the fundamentals, however, Feldstein makes some good points. The problem with Europe is that it is sitting on the fence with its union, and the Greek debt crisis merely highlights their weakness which are largely structural. What is the EU likely to become.

As for the US, its day is fading, and it is in the grip of financial interests that will wring the last drop of vitality out of it given their way.

There are several roads to losing weight. One is to engage in healthy exercise and a good diet. The other way is starvation either through deprivation or disease. In both instances one 'loses weight.' The modern day Liquidationists favor starvation, for the other guys, not themselves. The modern day Keynesianians seem to wish to indulge in overeating with a change in diet to be left for another day.

The American economic system cries out for meaningful reform. Deficit spending without reform is futile, the road to addiction. But no government led structural repair efforts is the sure road to stagnation and a zombie-like existence such as has been seen in Japan, or even worse, a third world status and regional fragmentation.

My own bellwether is the UK. I believe quite strongly that Britain will reach its crisis before the US. And it may provide a proper warning, but all things considered, it may be too late. While there are many good signs in the financial reform regime from regulators aghast at the mindless venality that has brought the country to the brink of ruin, there is still the matter of the current political leadership, and its failure to engage with the issues in meaningful ways.

Addendum: Europe's Banks Brace for UK Debt Crisis

Bloomberg
Feldstein Says Euro’s Fall Due to ‘Panic’ Over Greece
By Steve Matthews and Sara Eisen

March 11 (Bloomberg) -- Harvard University Professor Martin Feldstein said the euro’s 4.6 percent decline against the dollar this year has been “panic selling” stemming from the financial crisis in Greece.

“The euro is weakening despite their better trade balance,” Feldstein, an economist, said in a Bloomberg Television interview broadcast today. “This is a kind of an irrational or panic selling where people are just saying, ‘I don’t know what is going on, I am just going to step to the sidelines and not leave money in euros.’”

Greek officials are trying to convince investors they can reduce the nation’s budget deficit, which at 12.7 percent of gross domestic product was the European Union’s largest in 2009. The government last week announced spending cuts and tax increases totaling 4.8 billion euros ($6.5 billion), the third round of austerity measures this year...

“What’s happening with the euro is an overreaction,” Feldstein said. “There’s, in my judgment, no real reason why the euro should have sold off, overall. After all, Germany is not at risk. France is not at risk.”

Feldstein, who warned in 1997 that European monetary union would spark greater political conflict, said “enormous fiscal deficits” projected over the next decade may mean the U.S. dollar may not maintain its current value.

Draw Funds

“Europe doesn’t have the need to draw in funds from the rest of the world in the way that the United States does,” he said.

“If I wanted to be nervous about the future of a currency over the next, say, five years, there is more reason to worry given the size of the U.S. budget deficits and given the size, even more importantly, of our trade and current account deficits,” he said.

The Congressional Budget Office projects President Barack Obama’s spending proposals would produce a record $1.5 trillion budget deficit this year and a $1.3 trillion deficit in 2011.

Concern over the possibility of U.S. tax increases to deal with the rising government debt may be depressing confidence, investment and household consumption, Feldstein said.

“It is a very negative impact, both on the economy in the long run and, through confidence, on what happens in the short run,” he said.

Feldstein, a former president of the National Bureau of Economic Research, is a member of the NBER’s Business Cycle Dating Committee, the panel charged with determining when U.S. recessions begin and end. He served as chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers during the Reagan administration.

The Case Against the Fed from a US Senator

If you read through this letter from US Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH), who is also the chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Economic Policy, you will get a grasp of how badly the Fed has mishandled its responsibilities over the past ten years at least.

I thought the Senator was far too kind and reserved in his criticism. Yes, the Fed did focus on inflation. Unfortunately the definition of inflation which they used was inappropriate, since it did not include the obvious asset bubbles which were created by the Fed's own monetary policies.

In addition, the Fed not only neglected its role in consumer protection, it took an activist opposition to the regulation of new financial instruments such as derivatives that has created a position that even today leaves the US in a financially precarious position.

This is particularly galling when one hears of the schemes being concocted by the bank friendly Senators, Dodd, Corker and Shelby, to move more of the weak banking reforms into the Fed, which is itself a private institution owned by these very banks that it will regulate.

This is not the appropriate level of financial reform that the American people deserve. And if you notice to whom Senator Sherrod is addressing his concerns, you will understand my lack of enthusiasm or any change or improvement in this sorry state of affairs.

March 10, 2010

The Honorable Timothy Geithner
Secretary, United States Department of the Treasury
1500 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20220

The Honorable Lawrence Summers
Director, National Economic Council
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20500


Dear Secretary Geithner and Director Summers,

I write to you today to express my concern about the vacancies at the Federal Reserve, both on the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) and soon in the Vice Chairman's office. This is the financial equivalent of leaving open vacancies on the United States Supreme Court, and it is essential that we fill these positions.

As Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee's Subcommittee on Economic Policy, with jurisdiction over the Federal Reserve System's monetary policy functions, I am acutely aware of the importance of monetary policy at the Fed.

Both the full Banking Committee and the Economic Policy Subcommittee have examined the causes of the financial crisis and the resulting effects on lending, access to credit, and employment. The evidence presented to the Committee about the role that Fed policy decisions played in the financial crisis and the economic downturn has led me to conclude that the Fed's monetary policy has focused almost entirely on controlling inflation rather than maximizing employment and that the Fed has too often put banks' soundness ahead of its other responsibilities.

In light of this experience, there are several other important qualifications that I would urge you to consider in selecting the new Vice Chairman and new members of the FOMC:

1. Recognition of the causes of the financial crisis before it occurred.

Many economic experts, including some at the Federal Reserve, failed to anticipate the impending economic crisis. However, there were exceptional people who sounded alarms about the rapidly inflating housing bubble, the proliferation of subprime lending, and the packaging, selling, and investing in toxic financial products by Wall Street. Unfortunately, regulators, including the Fed, ignored or attempted to discredit many of these courageous individuals, rather than heeding their warnings. We need economic policy makers who possess the foresight to identify harmful economic trends, the courage to speak out about the necessity of addressing these practices before they inflict lasting damage to our economy, and the wisdom to listen even if their views are challenged.


2. Demonstrated dedication to protecting consumers and maximizing employment.

For years, the Federal Reserve's monetary policy has maintained an almost single-minded focus on inflation. This has been detrimental to the Fed's other core missions, particularly maximizing employment and protecting consumers. The results of this fixation speak for themselves. The national unemployment rate is more than double the Fed's statutorily mandated 4 percent unemployment target. The Fed also failed to act on repeated warnings about predatory mortgage lending and credit card abuses. Consumer protection experience is particularly important if the new consumer protection entity were to be housed at the Fed. Our economy will benefit from renewed attention to all of the Fed's priorities.


3. Commitment to releasing e-mails related to the Fed's involvement in the AIG bailout.

A growing number of experts - including economists, academics, and former regulators - have called upon the Federal Reserve to release all e-mails, internal accounting documents, and financial models related to AIG's collapse. The American taxpayers now hold the majority of AIG shares, and they have a right to know how their money is being spent. Providing greater detail about the AIG bailout is particularly important because that episode continues to taint the Fed's reputation. Focusing on candidates committed to full transparency related to this particular economic event would help to restore the Fed's stature and credibility in the eyes of many Americans.

The American public has lost a great deal of confidence in the Federal Reserve. Selecting a Vice Chair and FOMC members with the above qualifications will send the message that the Federal Reserve has learned from the financial crisis, and that the Fed's weaknesses are being addressed with more than just cosmetic changes.

I would be happy to discuss specific candidates with you at your convenience. Thank you for considering my views, and I look forward to working with you to address these vacancies at the Fed.

Sincerely,
Sherrod Brown
United States Senator

h/t to the Huffington Post for the letter

Investors Who Lost In Madoff and Stanford Schemes Want Government to "Make Them Whole"

These are, by and large, relatively well-to-do people who were considered 'qualified investors,' or ought to have been. They were able to place large sums of money in obviously risky investments seeking abnormally high rates of return, which they did receive for many years.

The notion that the government should retroactively cover their losses, even indirectly, by taxing the public is obviously repugnant.

What about the many who have lost, on a percentage basis, equally if not more devastating amounts of their retirement savings in the tech, housing and credit bubbles? Their only fault is that they lack the political connections and high powered lawyers to make the case for them to the Congress, and the influence to get their way from pliable Congressmen.

I feel mightily sorry for anyone who has lost money in these fraudulent markets. I spend quite a bit of my personal time trying to warn people about the snares and pitfalls that are allowed to continue in the US financial markets even today. And there are many of them. Consumer Protection is not a priority in Washington.

A better case might be made to sue the Wall Street exchanges, the private self-regulators, and the auditors and ratings agencies for gross negligence in allowing these frauds to continue for so many years. Prosecutions for fraud and corruption across a much wider circle of enablers is generally what is done. It was done in the 1930's and it was done after the Savings and Loan Scandal.

But that will not happen. The financial sector is contributing far too much to the politicians in Washington, and too many powerful politicians are beholden to them, despite what smooth words that might pass their lips in public.

To take the losses of wealthier investors from hedge funds and other high risk investments having no productive benefit or socially redeeming value, and socialize them to the many is almost unbelievable.

And the backing of Senators Richard Shelby and Bob Corker for this is just another sign of the disgraceful corruption and patronage to a select few that infests the Finance Committee in the Senate. These are the Senators on the Finance Committe, among others, who are blocking and weakening financial reform. What hypocrites!

"These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert to fleece the people, and now that they have got into a quarrel with themselves, we are called upon to appropriate the people's money to settle the quarrel." Abraham Lincoln, speech to Illinois legislature, Jan. 1837

BusinessWeek
Madoff Victims Join Stanford Investors to Lobby for Payback
By Robert Schmidt and Jesse Westbrook
March 10, 2010, 12:16 AM EST

March 10 (Bloomberg) -- Victims of Bernard Madoff and accused Ponzi schemer R. Allen Stanford are banding together to lobby Congress for a law that could require Wall Street firms to pay billions of dollars to cover some of the losses they suffered.

As the groups’ leaders walked the Capitol halls separately over the past several months, they learned how to find the Senate’s Dirksen Office Building and to call their proposal “revenue neutral,” meaning no cost to taxpayers.

They also gleaned another lesson: The broader the geographic base of support, the better the chance of legislative success. The result is a coalition of the Democratic-backed, East Coast, and mostly Jewish investors defrauded by Madoff, with the Republican-backed, largely Christian, Sunbelt residents victimized by Stanford. The disparate groups now find themselves bound by a common notion: They’ve been cheated, and they want the government to make them whole....

The lobbying initiative “gives new meaning to the word chutzpah,” said James Cox, a professor at Duke University School of Law. “This is just a tax increase. It’s levied on banks but customers end up paying.” Until recently, the two groups were going at it alone, and not winning much support except from lawmakers in their regions.

Shaw’s Stanford group had backing from Richard Shelby of Alabama, the senior Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, and other panel Republicans like Bob Corker of Tennessee, David Vitter of Louisiana and Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, said Shaw, who also works part-time as a spokeswoman at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

“These are very Christian” people, Shaw said, referring to the Stanford victims. A lot of members were marketed the Stanford securities “at church...”

And Here Come Those Treasury Auctions

The US equity markets are holding on to the rumour-inspired gains from yesterday, as commodities are hit and the longer end of the bonds slump a bit.

"There is also the matter of the 3, 10, and 30 year Treasury auctions this week. The dollar is often dressed up for the occasion. If not with the fundamentals, then by weakening the 'competition' to make it look prettier than them. If the US stock market cannot move up or hold its ground while the Treasury conducts even modestly successful Treasury auctions, then this is a cautionary indication that Wall Street and the Fed are moving capital in a circle of manipulation to attempt to maintain the illusion of growth, in the manner of a Ponzi scheme." US Dollar Charts Still Technically Strong March 8, 2010

CNN Money
Treasurys dip ahead of auction
By Annalyn Censky
March 10, 2010: 12:12 PM ET

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Treasurys traded lower Wednesday morning ahead of a government auction of $21 billion in 10-year notes.

What prices are doing: In mid-day trading, the benchmark 10-year note fell 10/32 to 99-3/32 and its yield rose to 3.741%. Bond prices and yields move in opposite directions.

What's moving the market: After strong demand in the government's $40 billion auction of 3-year notes Tuesday, analysts expect Wednesday's auction of 10-year notes to be well received, but with slightly less demand. Longer term debt like the 10-year note and 30-year bond traditionally see slightly lower demand in auctions, because of their inherent greater risk.

The auctions include a $13 billion offering in 30-year bonds on Thursday...

Propaganda Campaign Attempts to Mask the Economic Risks and Reality

The propaganda campaign by the US government is trying to mask the fact that the economic recovery plan is failing and that America is rapidly losing confidence in Team Obama.

You cannot have a sustained recovery without changing the underlying conditions that caused the failure in the first place.

In addition to the media blitz dissected by Yves Smith in the essay excerpted below, I have never seen such a load of rubbish being put forward with regard to the markets in US financial assets and commodities, and I have seen quite a bit in the last twenty years. In particular, the campaigns against gold and silver in particular are heavy-handed, obvious, and reaching the point of hysteria.

The shorts are trapped, hopelessly trapped, and unable to deliver on their massive short positions. They are only able to manipulate the price in short term bursts, and continue to dig themselves deeper as the world demand continues to drain them.

Whoever heard of a bubble in which the major money center banks are so perilously short it? A bubble requires a broad participation and belief, and the encouragement of the market makers. And now a statement from an "SEC official" that there is a gold bubble. This, from the very people who allegedly could not see the tech, housing and credit bubbles until they fell on top of them.

And of course there are the funds and the wealthy, who mouth the same party line while lining their portfolios with huge positions and personal holdings.

Various exigencies can compel the big players to make statements swearing gold and silver are no good, no store of value against all the evidence of history. But the fact remains that the US dollar reserve currency regime is falling apart, tumbling like the humpty-dumpty construct that it is. And the status quo is shitting their collective pants about it, and the likely backlash from the public when their deceptions are exposed.

Don't expect the Ancien Régime fiancier to fall easily, quietly, or quickly. But it will change; change is the only inevitability. And we all suspect what will remain standing when the dust settles. All this noise seems more like haggling over a larger quantity for a better price, and a clearer path to the exit.

Naked Capitalism
The Empire Continues to Strike Back: Team Obama Propaganda Campaign Reaches a Fever Pitch
By Yves Smith

I’ve seldom seen so much rubbish written by people who ought to know better in a single day. Many able people have heaped the scorn and incredulity on three articles, one a piece on Rahm Emanuel slotted to run in the Sunday New York Times Magazine, another an artfully packed laudatory piece on Timothy Geithner by John Cassidy in the New Yorker and a more even handed looking one (I stress “looking”) in the Atlantic.

Ed Harrison has skillfully shredded parsed the Geithner pieces . Simon Johnson thrashed the New Yorker story. A key paragraph below:

"The main feature of the plan, of course, was – following the stress tests – to communicate effectively that there was a government guarantee behind every major bank or quasi-bank in the United States. Of course this works in the short-term – investors like such guarantees. But there’s a good reason we usually don’t guarantee all financial institutions – or act happy when other countries do the same. Unconditional bailouts lead to trouble, encouraging reckless risk-taking and undermining responsible governance. You can’t run any form of reasonable market system when some big players hold “get out of bankruptcy free” cards."

Banking expert Chris Whalen was so disturbed by the numerous distortions in the New Yorker piece that he had already fired off a long letter to the editor by the time I pinged him, with these starting paragraphs:

"Jack Cassidy tells us that “Timothy Geithner’s financial plan is working—and making him very unpopular.” Unfortunately this is completely wrong. Cassidy’s comment just illustrates why the New Yorker has fallen into such obscurity, namely because it is more Vanity Fair than its vivacious sibling and unable to perform critical journalism.

In fact, the banking system is continuing to sink under bad loans and even worse securities losses. Telling the public that the banks are “fixed” is irresponsible. Unfortunately this false perception is widespread, including among major media such as CNBC and also with a number of my clients in the hedge fund world."

...Yves here. The reason that people who can discern clearly what is afoot are so deeply disturbed is simple, and all the comments touch on it. The campaign to defend Geithner and Emanuel, both architects of the administration’s finance friendly policies has gone beyond what most people would see as spin into such an aggressive effort to manipulate popular perceptions that it is not a stretch to call it propaganda.

This strategy, of relying on propaganda to mask their true intent, has become inevitable, given the strategic corner the Obama Adminstration has painted itself in. And this campaign has become increasingly desperate as the inconsistency between the Adminsitration’s “product positioning” and observable reality become increasingly evident...

Read the rest of this thoughtful and informative piece and its many associated links and references can be read here.

Lord have mercy on us, for what we have done, and what we ought to have done but did not,
and from what we may yet deserve to reap from our misuse and debasement of your bounty.

Wall Street Excluded from European Government Bond Sales

The Ugly American is a novel that was published in 1958, and was later made into a movie starring Marlon Brando. It tells the story how America was losing the hearts and minds of the people in Asia after its heroic performance in the Second World War by the predatory business practices and exploitation of US multinationals. The book was a bit of a scandal, coming on the heels of Nixon's visit to South America where he was spat upon by angry mobs.

At the time people talked about the way in which US corporations were alienating the developing world (we called it 'third world' then), and how it would create a generation of political difficulties for the US around the world. This was an initial wake up call to the American public, which was lost and forgotten in the fervor of the Go-Go Sixties. What was good for General Bullmoose was good for the USA. Or so we all thought.

Regrettably, once again US corporations, the Wall Street banks, are busy alienating the world against America's interests through their unethical and shockingly predatory business practices. It will be interesting if Asia and South America pick up this theme of banning the Wall Street banks on ethical considerations from doing certain types of business in their regions.

It would be even more significant if US financial assets were to no longer find a place with foreign investors, based on a perception of their somewhat fraudulent taint from the CDO ratings scandals. Little or no reform has yet occurred. Who will then expect anything to have changed?

The imbalances, flaws and conflicts of interest in the US financial markets are a genuine shame, and may yet cripple the economy once again. And the unwillingness of the reform President to do anything about it is even more shocking still. What is he thinking?

Congressman Alan Grayson (D-Fla) recently said , "There is a growing feeling on the part of Democrats that the president is getting bad advice from people who have sold out to Wall Street."

I think far too many people would agree whole-heartedly with him.


Guardian UK
Europe bars Wall Street banks from government bond sales
By Elena Moya
Monday 8 March 2010 21.36 GMT

European countries are blocking Wall Street banks from lucrative deals to sell government debt worth hundreds of billions of euros in retaliation for their role in the credit crunch.

For the first time in five years, no big US investment bank appears among the top nine sovereign bond bookrunners in Europe, according to Dealogic data compiled for the Guardian. Only Morgan Stanley ranks at number 10.

Goldman Sachs doesn't make the table. Goldman made it to number five last year and in 2006, and number eight in 2007, the data shows. JP Morgan was in the top ten last year and in 2007 and 2006 but doesn't appear this year.

"Governments do not have the confidence that the excessive risk-taking culture of the big Wall Street banks has changed and they still cannot be trusted to put the stability of the financial system before profit," said Arlene McCarthy, vice chair of the European parliament's economic and monetary affairs committee. "It is no surprise therefore that governments are reluctant to do business with banks that have failed to learn the lesson of the crisis. The banks need to acknowledge the mistakes that were made and behave in an ethical way to regain the trust and confidence of governments."

European sovereign bond league tables are now dominated by European banks such as Barclays Capital, Deutsche Bank, and Société Générale, the Dealogic table shows. Their business model is usually seen as more relationship-based, while US investment banks have traditionally been focused on immediate deal-making. (A euphemism for customer face-ripping - Jesse)

Being left out of government bond sales means missing out on one of the top fee-earning opportunities this year, given the relative drought in mergers and acquisitions and stock market flotations. Western European governments need to raise an estimated half a trillion dollars this year to refinance debts and pay for bank bailouts and rising unemployment....

Investment banks insist their business areas are separated by confidentiality walls, but countries have been furious about some of their trades appearing to conflict – either on their own books, or on behalf of clients.

Goldman Sachs said its overall position in the European sovereign bond market had improved this quarter once US dollar denominated deals were included. It said its own data showed it ranked fourth in European sovereign bond sales this year...

"The power of big investment banks was a factor in the banking crisis, and it's up to regulators and customers to stand up to them, and not picking them is one of the ways," Augar said...

The EU is also trying to curb US financial power by creating its own monetary fund – a replica of the Washington-based IMF. The need of a European fund has emerged during the Greek crisis, as European politicians have insisted financial troubles should be resolved at home.

US Equities Showing Signs of an "Exhaustion Top" Amidst Rumours, Hype, and Shenanigans

The US stock market seems to be getting rather tired after what can only be described as a remarkable rally on light volumes and program trading.

The market is trying to rise here, with announcements like the Cisco backbone router for carriers and the AIG unit sales being hyped incessantly on financial media. The hype over the Cisco backbone router today is almost embarrassing. The anchors on Bloomberg keep saying that the router can download entire movies in 4 seconds, which is a lot faster than the 10 minutes it takes today. To anyone who knows anything about how networks are provisioned this is a howler of the first order, to say the least. For the consumer, the network is only as fast as the last mile.

It has also been reported by Adam Johnson on Bloomberg television that J.P. Morgan, a major broker dealer, stopped lending shares in AIG and Citi today "on rumours that the US government might ban short selling in stocks in which it has a financial interest." This squeezed the shorts and helped give an artificial boost to financial stocks over all. The company has since stopped this self-imposed ban on loaning shares and stocks are falling off their highs.

Needless to say, the SEC is unlikely to investigate this, or advise market makers not to start arbitrarily constraining the supply of stock based on market rumours, especially when they might be trading these same stocks for their own proprietary portfolios. They ought not be able to institute ad hoc bans on buying or selling by manipulating the supply.

Perhaps another leg up, after some consolidation, but this market is now very vulnerable to a reversal. The volumes are light on the rallies, and tend to increase quite a bit on the declines. Today the volume was a little better, in a consolidation perhaps, or a simple distribution. .

As we reported last week, the cash levels in the mutual funds are near record lows. Stocks do not typically rally unless there is large scale buying. All well and good, but until selling volumes show up, the market can continue to drift higher, especially with the support of the monetary magicians and the Wall Street wiseguys.



Don't get in front, wait for it. But start getting defensive if you have not done so already.

The Ides of March are on the 15th.

Are Traders Demanding US Credit Default Swaps Payable in Gold?

If another author had said this I might not pay it so much attention. Lately some have been given over to a tabloid approach to overstatement and sensational headlines to attract attention. This is a strong temptation as the blogosphere expands, similar to the development and evolution of newspapers as a popular medium in Victorian London for example.

But as you know, I have a great deal of respect and admiration for Janet Tavakoli and her knowledge in this area. If she is seeing a new demand for Credit Default Swaps on the US payable in gold I would credit it since this is her area of expertise and industry connections, but would ask for some particulars, which I have done. This would match up with some things I have heard from other sources, and desire to continue to put the puzzle pieces together without traveling false trails. For now it remains all opaque, speculation, and rumour.

It does make sense, of course, to price a US default in something other than dollars. The question that comes to mind though, is not the suggested method of payment, but the nature and quality of the counter-party who could stand reliably behind such a claim without it being a fraudulent contract by its very nature.

If the US should default, what major financial institutions will be in a position to have written and then uphold the terms of these CDS, payable in anything at all? Surely only a sovereign bank like the US Fed, the Treasury, or the IMF, or some other central bank could be so capable. But what possible motivation could a non-profit-seeking official institution have in writing CDS on a US sovereign default? Perhaps more likely a private bank or GSE, with the buyers thinking it has some sovereign guarantees that would be upheld in extremis.

Truly, remember AIG? It was insolvent when payment was demanded, and acted improperly in paying collateral to Goldman ahead of its inevitable insolvency, and then receiving the support of the Treasury to pay obligations in full, above all others. It ought to have been placed in a receivership and its assets allocated with the previously disposed collateral clawed back. This kind of private arrangement between parties involving the sovereign wealth of nations may be indicative of things to come. The recent example of Iceland comes to mind.

I agree with her that credit default swaps should be curtailed. Indeed, I would tend to severely limit the trading of most if not all naked derivatives and stock sales by requiring capital requirements near 100 percent and secured by good collateral.

But I think the gold aspect of this may be overdone. The US has more gold than any other individual country, and still values it cheaply at a sub-fifty dollar historical price on its books. If a counterparty fails, it will fail, and a settlement will be arranged. The issue of course, is if some encumbrance of the gold in the US has already been accomplished through unfortunate leases to bullion banks who will not be able to return it.

Indeed this horse may already be 'out of the barn' as some evidence indicates that a few banks like JPM are already short more gold and silver than they can possibly deliver under the conditions of the contract without selective default to paper if demanded by their counter-parties.

If there is any sort of government guarantee, it will be payable in dollars, unless some private arrangement is made for the benefit of the recipient. For example, if a bullion bank is caught short of gold, and requires it to avoid a default and 'systemic risk.' The rationale will be to pay the debt in full so as to avoid a collapse, even though there was no guarantee involved. If we did not have such a recent historical example of AIG I would say that such an abuse of the Treasury for the benefit of a few for placing the system at risk was not possible. And yet here we are.

There is another possibility, based only on speculation as far as I can determine, that a major purchaser of US debt is now demanding it be backstopped against ratings downgrades in gold payable CDS. Until now I have given this little credibility. How can such a thing be arranged in secrecy and maintained as such? How could a private bank, even a money center, write such a swap in good faith?

You see, to my knowledge no private corporation has the right to engage in contracts that encumber the US gold reserves, not the Fed nor the Banks, and not even the President or Treasury alone. Only the Congress, with the knowledge of the people, may allocate and distribute such a sovereign asset. If swaps and contracts and leases are being made on the US gold reserves, the people then are the subjects of a monumental theft and fraud. And if the US is writing or guaranteeing CDS in gold, then most likely it is doing so as a means of rescuing those who have already gone hopelessly short the gold market, and need to arrange a 'back-door' bailout.

So the rule at hand would be the epigram of the famous trader, Daniel Drew:

"He who sells what isn't his'n
Must buy it back, or go to prison."

Unless they have good friends at the Fed or the Treasury, or in positions of power in the exchanges perhaps. But does anyone believe that the American people would stand again for another bailout of the very same banks that it has bailed out previously? I would hope that there would not be a Reykjavík on the Potomac in my lifetime.

In short, if the existence of CDS on the default or downgrade of US sovereign debt payable in gold bullion be true, who would be in a position to stand behind these Credit Default Swaps with any reliability, and what buyer would be in a position to make such a demand of a credible source?

The US most likely will resist the banning of credit derivatives because it is in the hands of the Banks, and such derivatives are the source of enormous profits. Further, such a ban might cause the existing bulk of derivatives to fall in value, destabilizing the financial system. Nothing could be more obvious, at least for now. So this situation will continue most likely until it falters, and the entire system is once again placed at risk. But these markets are so opaque, and the intentions of government in them even less apparent, that one can only watch and wonder.

At some point the Banks may seek to make the people yet another offer they cannot refuse. And America will choose. But first I think, the UK will reach this point.

Huffington Post
Washington Must Ban U.S. Credit Derivatives as Traders Demand Gold
By Janet Tavakoli
March 8, 2010

...Remember AIG? When prices moved against AIG on its credit default swap contracts, AIG owed cash (collateral) to its trading partners. AIG paid billions of dollars and owed billions more when U.S. taxpayers bailed it out in September 2008.

U.S. credit default swaps currently trade in euros. After all, if the U.S. defaults, who will want payment in devalued U.S. dollars? The euro recently weakened relative to the dollar, and market participants are calling for contracts that require payment in gold. If they get their way, speculators on the winning side of a price move will demand collateral paid in gold.

The market can create an unlimited number of these contracts very rapidly. The U.S. wouldn't have to ever default to trigger a major disruption in the gold market. Spreads (or prices) on the credit default swaps could simply move based on "news," and demand for gold would soar.

If this speculation drives up the price of gold, and the available gold supply becomes limited, are you willing to post your children as collateral? I am pushing the point so that we put a stop to this before it is too late."

Net Asset Value of Certain Precious Metal Funds and Trusts

US Dollar Charts Still Technically Strong

The US Dollar Daily Chart is showing a continuation pattern, indicating the likelihood that its rally has more room to the upside. This implies more troubles for the Euro, the Pound, and the Yen if in fact the dollar can break out from this formation. There is some probability of failure, but not so great as continuation of the trend higher.

There is also the matter of the 3, 10, and 30 year Treasury auctions this week. The dollar is often dressed up for the occasion. If not with the fundamentals, then by weakening the 'competition' to make it look prettier than them.

If the US stock market cannot move up or hold its ground while the Treasury conducts even modestly successful Treasury auctions, then this is a cautionary indication that Wall Street and the Fed are moving capital in a circle of manipulation to attempt to maintain the illusion of growth, in the manner of a Ponzi scheme.



The Dollar rally is obviously consolidating its recent overbought condition, and has more room to the upside if the trend continues. Keep in mind that the fundamentals work slowly and on the long trends. In the shorter timeframes the price is just a trade, more subject to emotions and fluctuations. Do not try and fight the ticker if you are a trader. If you are a long term investor, then you can ignore what at the end of the day will turn out to be noise. But there are some imperative requirements to do so regarding your cash levels and leverage.

Iceland Voters Reject Bank Bailouts in Crushing Electoral Defeat; Neo-Liberalism In Context

"Voters rejected the bill because ordinary people, farmers and fishermen, taxpayers, doctors, nurses, teachers, are being asked to shoulder through their taxes a burden that was created by irresponsible greedy bankers."

"Is there any reason why the American people should be taxed to guarantee the debts of banks, any more than they should be taxed to guarantee the debts of other institutions, including merchants, the industries, and the mills of the country?" Senator Carter Glass (D-Va), author of the Banking Act of 1933 and of Glass-Steagall

It is interesting that the government of Iceland had already declared the vote of the people as 'obsolete.' One has to wonder when the voters will declare their current government and their representatives as obsolete. One would give the government credit for at least allowing a vote on a referendum, but to then disregard and circumvent it through political devices is seems like a base hypocrisy.

Iceland is a victim of the neo-liberal economic deregulation of the 1990's, in which a few bankers can buy the government, and rack up enormous profits for themselves in Ponzi like leverage, and then attempt to socialize the debt back to the people when their schemes collapse.

Neo-Liberalism is a system of economic thought embracing the efficient markets hypothesis, the inherent good of deregulation and the natural impediment of government regulation, the necessity of free trade and globalization, the supremacy of the corporation over the individual person in the social economy, and supply side economics. It most likely favors a one world currency and consolidation of production into large corporate combinations or 'trusts' under the principle of laissez-faire.

Neo-liberalism may degenerate into crony capitalism, or even corporatism, as its theoretical idealism of perfect rationalism and virtue falters against the reality of human behaviour. In times of financial crisis, for example, neo-liberalism ironically turns to centralized economic planning by allegedly private banks which appropriate public funds and the power of the monetary license to socialize private debts, and, in a strikingly Orwellian twist, eviscerate the discipline of the markets and the individual to preserve their freedom, and the well being of the private corporations. Although now largely repudiated, neo-liberalism has strong roots in the public consciousness, and its adherents hold considerable power in Western governments and among the 'freshwater school' of American economics.

What makes neo-liberalism and neo-conservatism 'neo' or new is their attitude towards the relationship of the individual to the state. Both tend to denigrate and diminish the condition and rights of the inividual as compared to the consideration of the corporate system or the centralized command state.

In the States, the Congress and the President have just ignored the massive protests against their own bank bailouts. The US was able to cloak its own debt assumptions through accounting frauds, claiming that the bailouts were repaid by the banks. The bailouts are wrapped in AIG, Fannie and Freddie, and the Federal Reserve. This is the advantage of owning the currency, the IMF and ratings agencies. And of course your media.

Although Europeans and the markets are looking at the 'PIGS' for the next serious default as the economic hitmen are moving from Iceland to Greece, the real test of globalization in financial markets and the dominant control of the private banks will come in the UK, a sovereign people too proud and strong to go down into feudal servitude and the rule of tyrants easily. Or at least one would hope.

The Relationship of the Condition and Rights of the Individual to the Organized State




Bloomberg
Iceland Rejects Icesave Depositors Bill in Referendum
By Omar R. Valdimarsso

March 7 (Bloomberg) -- Icelanders rejected by a massive majority a bill that would saddle each citizen with $16,400 of debt in protest at U.K. and Dutch demands that they cover losses triggered by the failure of a private bank.

Ninety-three percent voted against the so-called Icesave bill, according to preliminary results on national broadcaster RUV. Final results will be published today.

The bill would have obliged the island to take on $5.3 billion, or 45 percent of last year’s economic output, in loans from the U.K. and the Netherlands to compensate the two countries for depositor losses stemming from the collapse of Landsbanki Islands hf more than a year ago. The island’s political leaders say they’ve already moved on to talks over a new accord.

“The government’s survival doesn’t rest with this Icesave vote,” Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir told RUV after the preliminary count was announced. “The government coalition remains solid,” Finance Minister Steingrimur Sigfusson told RUV.

Failure to reach an agreement on the bill has left Iceland’s International Monetary Fund-led loan in limbo and prompted Fitch Ratings to cut its credit grade to junk. Moody’s Investors Service and Standard & Poor’s have signaled they may follow suit if no settlement is reached.

‘Obsolete’

Iceland’s leaders are trying to negotiate a new deal with the U.K. and the Dutch that focuses on the interest rate payable on the loan, making the bill in yesterday’s vote “obsolete,” Sigurdardottir said on March 4.

Dutch Finance Minister Jan Kees de Jager in a statement posted on the Internet last night said he is “disappointed” the agreement hasn’t yet come into effect. The U.K. was “obviously disappointed,” while “not surprised,” said a Treasury official who declined to be identified in line with departmental policy.

Iceland’s government pointed to “steady progress toward a settlement” in the past three weeks in a statement.

“The British and Dutch Governments have indicated a willingness to accept a solution that will entail a significantly lower cost for Iceland than that envisaged in the prior agreement,” the statement said.

The U.K. and Netherlands have offered an interest rate of the London Interbank Offered Rate plus 2.75 percentage points, according to the U.K. Treasury official. That’s the same as the rate for the loan from the Nordic countries that the Icelandic Government accepted in July 2009. The new offer also gave relief on the first two years of interest for the loan, amounting to 450 million euros.

‘Ordinary People’

The three governments have declared their intention to continue the talks, the Iceland statement said.

Voters rejected the bill because “ordinary people, farmers and fishermen, taxpayers, doctors, nurses, teachers, are being asked to shoulder through their taxes a burden that was created by irresponsible greedy bankers,” said President Olafur R. Grimsson, whose rejection of the bill resulted in the plebiscite, in a Bloomberg Television interview on March 5.

The Icesave deal passed through parliament with a 33 to 30 vote majority. Grimsson blocked it after receiving a petition from a quarter of the population urging him to do so. The government has said it’s determined any new deal must have broader political backing to avoid meeting a similar fate.

Icelanders used the referendum to express their outrage at being asked to take on the obligations of bankers who allowed the island’s financial system to create a debt burden more than 10 times the size of the economy.

Protests

The nation’s three biggest banks, which were placed under state control in October 2008, had enjoyed a decade of market freedoms following the government’s privatizations through the end of the 1990s and the beginning of this decade.

Protesters have gathered every week, with regular numbers swelling to about 2,000, according to police estimates. The last time the island saw demonstrations on a similar scale was before the government of former Prime Minister Geir Haarde was toppled.

Icelanders have thrown red paint over house facades and cars of key employees at the failed banks, Kaupthing Bank hf, Landsbanki and Glitnir Bank hf, to vent their anger. The government has appointed a special commission to investigate financial malpractice and has identified more than 20 cases that will result in prosecution.

Economic Impact

The island’s economy shrank an annual 9.1 percent in the fourth quarter of last year, the statistics office said on March 5, and contracted 6.5 percent in 2009 as a whole.

Household debt with major credit institutions has doubled in the past five years and reached about 1.8 trillion kronur ($14 billion) in 2009, compared with the island’s $12 billion gross domestic product, according to the central bank.

Icelanders, the world’s fifth-richest per capita as recently as 2007, ended 2009 18 percent poorer and will see their disposable incomes decline a further 10 percent this year, the central bank estimates.

Grimsson, who has described his decision to put the depositor bill to a referendum as the “pinnacle of democracy,” says he’s not concerned about the economic fallout of his decision.

“The referendum has drawn back the curtain and people see on the stage the matter in a new perspective,” he said in an interview. “That has strengthened our position and our cause.”