Coming To Your Bank Account Soon - THEY Take 10% by 'Law'......

[Jan Klimkowski]

Thus spake Golem XIV:

You might say, So what! Nothing ever happens to the banks when they are found guilty of laundering. How does that count as a nuclear option for Cyprus?' and you'd be right. Nothing ever does happen to the banks. They pay a fine, and then carry on. But what would change everything and strike a cold fear into the heart of Europe, its banks and its ruling class, is if Cyprus decided to do what nobody anywhere has done begin a proper criminal investigation.
And it is the word criminal which would set a fuse burning which if not extinguished WOULD spread a contagion that would threaten Europe's banks and political system.
To understand why, you have to look at the monumentally important ruling in America in the case against HSBC. When the case first broke the headlines were all about the $1.92 billion fine HSBC had agreed to pay. What was made slightly less clear was that there had been an agreement between HSBC and the US Justice Department that HSBC would pay the fine in return for not being found criminally guilty of anything.
HSBC was not criminally prosecuted. They agreed on what is called a Deferred Prosecution Agreement". Which means they were only ever going to pay a fine, agree to improve, try to look sorry and walk away with a No admission of guilt' settlement.
This despite the FACTs that, as Lanny Breuer, Assistant Attorney General for the Department of Justice (DOJ) said, the evidence they had gathered proved,
"…stunning failures of oversight .… The record of dysfunction that prevailed at HSBC for many years was astonishing."
To which U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch a lawyer involved with the case added,
"HSBC's blatant failure to implement proper anti-money laundering controls facilitated the laundering of at least $881 million in drug proceeds through the US financial system…"
Yet HSBC were not guilty of any criminal act, certainly not guilty of Money-laundering. Not only that but even though the case found that,
"…senior bank officials were complicit in the illegal activity."
No senior management was taken to court, no one faced criminal charges, no one went to gaol. Officially no one was guilty of anything more serious than having "turned a blind eye". That was the phrase used.
All of which festered quietly just out of public consciousness. Until Eric Holder, the U.S. Attorney General testified before the U.S. Judiciary Committee in March 2013 and made the astonishing admission,
"I am concerned that the size of some of these institutions becomes so large that it does become difficult for us to prosecute them when we are hit with indications that if you do prosecute, if you do bring a criminal charge, it will have a negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy,"
In other words here was the starkest admission, from the most powerful judiciary in the world, that the big banks are officially above the law. The law will not be applied to them. The U.S. Justice department made clear is that if you criminally prosecute a bank, and find it criminally guilty, the bank would most likely lose its banking license and the many institutions that the bank relies upon to buy its bonds, lend it money and purchase its securities would no longer be able to. They would not be allowed by law to do business with a criminal institution.
So the answer is to allow the institutions to act illegally but not prosecute them. That way everybody can do business with people breaking the law but without the nasty word criminal' being around to stink up the party.
Only poor and ordinary people are Criminals. Rich people have regulatory failures.

And he's absolutely correct.

[Magda Hassan]

And he's absolutely correct.

If I were Cyprus and I was completely looted and going down the gurgler I'd sure be taking some company along with me for the ride in that hand basket to hell.

[Adele Edisen]

It Can Happen Here:
The Confiscation Scheme Planned for US and UK Depositors
By Ellen Brown

Although few depositors realize it, legally the bank owns the depositor's funds
as soon as they are put in the bank. Our money becomes the bank's, and we become
unsecured creditors holding IOUs or promises to pay.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info...e34442.htm [http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001wJc5Kg-Ec...dGn5KIvuX]


It Can Happen Here: The Confiscation Scheme Planned for US and UK Depositors

By Ellen Brown

March 28, 2013 "Information Clearing House" - Confiscating the customer deposits in Cyprus banks, it seems, was not a one-off, desperate idea of a few Eurozone "troika" officials scrambling to salvage their balance sheets. A joint paper by the US Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Bank of England dated December 10, 2012, shows that these plans have been long in the making; that they originated with the G20 Financial Stability Board in Basel, Switzerland (discussed earlier here); and that the result will be to deliver clear title to the banks of depositor funds.

New Zealand has a similar directive, discussed in my last article here, indicating that this isn't just an emergency measure for troubled Eurozone countries. New Zealand's Voxy reported on March 19th:

The National Government [is] pushing a Cyprus-style solution to bank failure in New Zealand which will see small depositors lose some of their savings to fund big bank bailouts . . . .

Open Bank Resolution (OBR) is Finance Minister Bill English's favoured option dealing with a major bank failure. If a bank fails under OBR, all depositors will have their savings reduced overnight to fund the bank's bail out.

Can They Do That?

Although few depositors realize it, legally the bank owns the depositor's funds as soon as they are put in the bank. Our money becomes the bank's, and we become unsecured creditors holding IOUs or promises to pay. (See here and here.) But until now the bank has been obligated to pay the money back on demand in the form of cash. Under the FDIC-BOE plan, our IOUs will be converted into "bank equity." The bank will get the money and we will get stock in the bank. With any luck we may be able to sell the stock to someone else, but when and at what price? Most people keep a deposit account so they can have ready cash to pay the bills.

The 15-page FDIC-BOE document is called "Resolving Globally Active, Systemically Important, Financial Institutions." It begins by explaining that the 2008 banking crisis has made it clear that some other way besides taxpayer bailouts is needed to maintain "financial stability." Evidently anticipating that the next financial collapse will be on a grander scale than either the taxpayers or Congress is willing to underwrite, the authors state:

An efficient path for returning the sound operations of the G-SIFI to the private sector would be provided by exchanging or converting a sufficient amount of the unsecured debt from the original creditors of the failed company [meaning the depositors] into equity [or stock]. In the U.S., the new equity would become capital in one or more newly formed operating entities. In the U.K., the same approach could be used, or the equity could be used to recapitalize the failing financial company itselfthus, the highest layer of surviving bailed-in creditors would become the owners of the resolved firm. In either country, the new equity holders would take on the corresponding risk of being shareholders in a financial institution.

No exception is indicated for "insured deposits" in the U.S., meaning those under $250,000, the deposits we thought were protected by FDIC insurance. This can hardly be an oversight, since it is the FDIC that is issuing the directive. The FDIC is an insurance company funded by premiums paid by private banks. The directive is called a "resolution process," defined elsewhere as a plan that "would be triggered in the event of the failure of an insurer . . . ." The only mention of "insured deposits" is in connection with existing UK legislation, which the FDIC-BOE directive goes on to say is inadequate, implying that it needs to be modified or overridden.

An Imminent Risk

If our IOUs are converted to bank stock, they will no longer be subject to insurance protection but will be "at risk" and vulnerable to being wiped out, just as the Lehman Brothers shareholders were in 2008. That this dire scenario could actually materialize was underscored by Yves Smith in a March 19th post titled When You Weren't Looking, Democrat Bank Stooges Launch Bills to Permit Bailouts, Deregulate Derivatives. She writes:

In the US, depositors have actually been put in a worse position than Cyprus deposit-holders, at least if they are at the big banks that play in the derivatives casino. The regulators have turned a blind eye as banks use their depositaries to fund derivatives exposures. And as bad as that is, the depositors, unlike their Cypriot confreres, aren't even senior creditors. Remember Lehman? When the investment bank failed, unsecured creditors (and remember, depositors are unsecured creditors) got eight cents on the dollar. One big reason was that derivatives counterparties require collateral for any exposures, meaning they are secured creditors. The 2005 bankruptcy reforms made derivatives counterparties senior to unsecured lenders.

One might wonder why the posting of collateral by a derivative counterparty, at some percentage of full exposure, makes the creditor "secured," while the depositor who puts up 100 cents on the dollar is "unsecured." But moving on Smith writes:

Lehman had only two itty bitty banking subsidiaries, and to my knowledge, was not gathering retail deposits. But as readers may recall, Bank of America moved most of its derivatives from its Merrill Lynch operation [to] its depositary in late 2011.

Its "depositary" is the arm of the bank that takes deposits; and at B of A, that means lots and lots of deposits. The deposits are now subject to being wiped out by a major derivatives loss. How bad could that be? Smith quotes Bloomberg:

. . . Bank of America's holding company . . . held almost $75 trillion of derivatives at the end of June . . . .

That compares with JPMorgan's deposit-taking entity, JPMorgan Chase Bank NA, which contained 99 percent of the New York-based firm's $79 trillion of notional derivatives, the OCC data show.

$75 trillion and $79 trillion in derivatives! These two mega-banks alone hold more in notional derivatives each than the entire global GDP (at $70 trillion). The "notional value" of derivatives is not the same as cash at risk, but according to a cross-post on Smith's site:

By at least one estimate, in 2010 there was a total of $12 trillion in cash tied up (at risk) in derivatives . . . .

$12 trillion is close to the US GDP. Smith goes on:

. . . Remember the effect of the 2005 bankruptcy law revisions: derivatives counterparties are first in line, they get to grab assets first and leave everyone else to scramble for crumbs. . . . Lehman failed over a weekend after JP Morgan grabbed collateral.

But it's even worse than that. During the savings & loan crisis, the FDIC did not have enough in deposit insurance receipts to pay for the Resolution Trust Corporation wind-down vehicle. It had to get more funding from Congress. This move paves the way for another TARP-style shakedown of taxpayers, this time to save depositors.

Perhaps, but Congress has already been burned and is liable to balk a second time. Section 716 of the Dodd-Frank Act specifically prohibits public support for speculative derivatives activities. And in the Eurozone, while the European Stability Mechanism committed Eurozone countries to bail out failed banks, they are apparently having second thoughts there as well. On March 25th, Dutch Finance Minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem, who played a leading role in imposing the deposit confiscation plan on Cyprus, told reporters that it would be the template for any future bank bailouts, and that "the aim is for the ESM never to have to be used."

That explains the need for the FDIC-BOE resolution. If the anticipated enabling legislation is passed, the FDIC will no longer need to protect depositor funds; it can just confiscate them.

Worse Than a Tax

An FDIC confiscation of deposits to recapitalize the banks is far different from a simple tax on taxpayers to pay government expenses. The government's debt is at least arguably the people's debt, since the government is there to provide services for the people. But when the banks get into trouble with their derivative schemes, they are not serving depositors, who are not getting a cut of the profits. Taking depositor funds is simply theft.

What should be done is to raise FDIC insurance premiums and make the banks pay to keep their depositors whole, but premiums are already high; and the FDIC, like other government regulatory agencies, is subject to regulatory capture. Deposit insurance has failed, and so has the private banking system that has depended on it for the trust that makes banking work.

The Cyprus haircut on depositors was called a "wealth tax" and was written off by commentators as "deserved," because much of the money in Cypriot accounts belongs to foreign oligarchs, tax dodgers and money launderers. But if that template is applied in the US, it will be a tax on the poor and middle class. Wealthy Americans don't keep most of their money in bank accounts. They keep it in the stock market, in real estate, in over-the-counter derivatives, in gold and silver, and so forth.

Are you safe, then, if your money is in gold and silver? Apparently not if it's stored in a safety deposit box in the bank. Homeland Security has reportedly told banks that it has authority to seize the contents of safety deposit boxes without a warrant when it's a matter of "national security," which a major bank crisis no doubt will be.

The Swedish Alternative: Nationalize the Banks

Another alternative was considered but rejected by President Obama in 2009: nationalize mega-banks that fail. In a February 2009 article titled "Are Uninsured Bank Depositors in Danger?", Felix Salmon discussed a newsletter by Asia-based investment strategist Christopher Wood, in which Wood wrote:

It is . . . amazing that Obama does not understand the political appeal of the nationalization option. . . . [D]espite this latest setback nationalization of the banks is coming sooner or later because the realities of the situation will demand it. The result will be shareholders wiped out and bondholders forced to take debt-for-equity swaps, if not hopefully depositors.

On whether depositors could indeed be forced to become equity holders, Salmon commented:

It's worth remembering that depositors are unsecured creditors of any bank; usually, indeed, they're by far the largest class of unsecured creditors.

President Obama acknowledged that bank nationalization had worked in Sweden, and that the course pursued by the US Fed had not worked in Japan, which wound up instead in a "lost decade." But Obama opted for the Japanese approach because, according to Ed Harrison, "Americans will not tolerate nationalization."

But that was four years ago. When Americans realize that the alternative is to have their ready cash transformed into "bank stock" of questionable marketability, moving failed mega-banks into the public sector may start to have more appeal.
____________

Ellen Brown is an attorney, chairman of the Public Banking Institute, and the author of eleven books, including Web of Debt: The Shocking Truth About Our Money System and How We Can Break Free. Her websites are webofdebt.com and ellenbrown.com. For details of the June 2013 Public Banking Institute conference in San Rafael, California, see here.

Adele

[David Guyatt]

I found it more than interesting, according to one report or another, that during the Cypriot bank closure period, Cypriot bank branches in the UK and Greece remained open and operating - thus allowing a large volume of Russian money to scamper away scott free. I suspect this was the quid pro quo agreed between Brussels and Moscow.

What was left was Cypriot deposits, hence, I suppose, the estimated haircut between 30-40% (but could be higher) for those who haven't been wiped put altogether.

The wealthy get free and clear, the poorer and middle classes get to take the hit.

Ain't it always so.

Anyway, the main point in posting on this subject is to raise the question whether all this haircut business is simply a covert wealth transfer mechanism, so that the majority are impoverished to a lesser or greater degree, while the immensely rich/elite get wealthier and their essential wealth transfer and holding mechanisms (banks) are made whole?

Just a thought.

[Peter Lemkin]

The wealthy get free and clear, the poorer and middle classes get to take the hit.

Ain't it always so.

Anyway, the main point in posting on this subject is to raise the question whether all this haircut business is simply a covert wealth transfer mechanism, so that the majority are impoverished to a lesser or greater degree, while the immensely rich/elite get wealthier and their essential wealth transfer and holding mechanisms (banks) are made whole?

Just a thought.

Seems to be the way 'things' are 'set up'......come to think of it, seems to be the way things have been set up the last many thousands of years [with minor push-backs, usually temporary, by the poor and middle-classes]. Welcome to neo-feudalism.


[and welcome back]

[David Guyatt]

Welcome to neo-feudalism.


[and welcome back]

Where would we be without it eh. Bless.

And thanks, Pete.

[Lauren Johnson]

David,

In your response to Danny Jarman in the Joseph P. Farrell thread, you say:

Elsewhere on this forum I have attempted - poorly - to show a link between Crowley's OTO and his "Master Lam" as being the template of so called Grey aliens - as well as advanced Nazi technology being the physical blueprint for the whole "Flying Saucer" story. The two bounce and reverberate off each other. They also form part of the bigger picture of the ultra right-wing, neo-nazi, fascist underground, that also connect to Gladio/Stay Behind units et al.

Would you go so far as to make deep connections to those making things happen with regard to Cyprus, etc? Peter sometimes refers to a very deep political Grand Unification Theory (GUT). Cultural destabilization would seem to be a precursor to a something New.

[Jan Klimkowski]

What a surprise!

Not every bank depositer was treated equally..

Political Fallout Begins: Former Cyprus President Named In Loan Write-Offs Leading To Banking Insolvency

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 03/30/2013 14:09 -0400 Zero Hedge


A few days ago, when news hit that Cyprus has begun investigating who the people were who had managed to pull cash out of nation's insolvent banks, both during the capital control "blackout" period and previously, we asked "how much longer will the rule of law remain in Cyprus once full blown class warfare is unleashed, and the 99% are generously handed the list of the 1% who were "informed" enough to pull their money from the flaming sovereign equivalent of Bernie Madoff, while every other uninsured depositor is facing losses of up to 80%, and soon 100%?" We may get the answer much sooner than expected, as the first iteration of this list: one naming the beneficiaries of millions of loans written off by the now insolvent Cyprus banks and therefore indirectly responsible for the "impairment" of the banks' depositors, was released yesterday by Greece's daily Ethnos newspaper. But what virtually assures substantial political fallout is that among the people listed is Cyprus' former president, George Vassiliou.

Kathimerini summarized the situation as follows:

A list of Cypriot companies and politicians that allegedly had millions of euros in loans written off by the three Cypriot lenders at a center of an unprecedented banking crisis on the Mediterranean island has been forward to Cyprus's parliamentary ethics committee after its publication in Greece's daily Ethnos newspaper.



According to the revelations, Bank of Cyprus, Cyprus Popular Bank (Laiki) and Hellenic Bank -- which were earlier this week acquired by Greece's Piraeus Bank -- has forgiven companies, MPs and local authority officials millions of euros in loans over the past five years. The list reportedly features the names of politicians from all Cypriot parties except Social Democracy (EDEK) and the Social Ecology Movement (KKO).

Readers may or may not be shocked to learn that corruption and cronyism, in broad terms, was alive and well in Cyprus in the months and years leading to the failure of the local banking system with its publicly elected politicians at the very forefront:

According to Ethnos, Bank of Cyprus wrote off the 2.8-million-euro loan of a hotel with ties to the communist-rooted Progressive Party (AKEL) and forgave significant portions of many other loans. For instance a national labor union is said to have been forgiven 193,000 euros of a 554,000-euro loan. An unnamed company was forgiven 110,000 euros from a 1.83-million-euro loan, a prominent deputy of the centrist Democratic Rally (DISY) party saw 101,000 euros of a 168,000-euro loan written off and a company owned by the brother of a former minister of the conservative Democratic Party (DIKO) had 1.28 million euros of a 1.59-million-euro loan written off.

The list refers to several other MPs and the mayor of large city who allegedly had significant portions of their loans forgiven by Bank of Cyprus. Companies linked to a member of the bank's board, to the daughter-in-law of a DIKO deputy and several others also appear to have been offered significant loan relief by the Bank of Cyprus.



As for Laiki Bank, it is said to have written off several loans taken out by MPs of AKEL and DISY. The bank also appears to have written off 5.8 million US dollars in debt from a company whose majority shareholder is said to be a well-known Cypriot politician. The ex wife of a senior ministry official and a company owned by a local ambassador also appear to have been facilitated.

Today, as the fallout avalanche from the release of the list begins to accelerate, we get even more information courtesy of Cyprus-Mail, which names none other than a company majority-owned by the former president, as being a direct beneficiary of the broke banks' depositor-funded generosity:

The government yesterday reaffirmed its intention to fully investigate the banking sector, as a list surfaced with names of current and former state officials who allegedly had their loans written off by banks.



The list, published in Greece, contains the names of former and current MPs as well as other prominent individuals, including former president George Vassiliou. According to the report, Vassiliou held a 51 per cent stake in a company that agreed to have $5.8 million written off.

And now that Cyprus is broke and facing a depression it is probably a good time to do some serious Monday Morning quater-bailouting:

The government said the matter would be investigated as part of a wider probe into what caused the collapse of the island's economy and banking system.



Three former Supreme Court judges were appointed on Thursday to look into the debacle.



Their mandate includes the investigation of the "the events and decisions relating to the provision or write off or reduction of loans or the removal of guarantees or banks affording other concessions, in Cyprus and abroad."



The government said it would handle the matter with full transparency and would not hesitate to hold anyone accountable as long as any improprieties were substantiated.

Sure enough, in order to avoid being held "accountable" the explanations have begun. Enter the former president:

Former president Vassillou said his stake in the company, which was operated by his former son-in-law, was acquired after he provided guarantees against its large obligations.



The company, ERE (Middle East) Ltd owed Laiki $23,988,542 and €1,081,672, including interest, the former president said in a written statement.



The amounts had been also guaranteed by four other people who eventually refused to honour their obligations and were taken to court.



Vassiliou said that despite his share being much smaller, he agreed to pay Laiki $21 million and settle the debt.



Based on the agreement, Vassiliou paid $15 million while the balance was going to be settled in two instalments of €3 million in 2012 and 2014.



"In return, Laiki was to relieve me of the old interest, something that is a usual and long-standing practice," Vassiliou said.



Because the 2012 instalment was linked to the return of a guarantee as soon as a still pending -- project was completed in Qatar, it had been agreed for the payment to be pushed back until then, Vassiliou said.



The former president said he would wait for the findings of the attorney-general.

Other politicians have decided that the best defense is a strong offense:

DISY MP Prodromos Prodromou, whose name was also on the list, said he was suing the media outlets responsible, and the Central Bank of Cyprus.



Prodromou denied ever having a loan written off, saying the case in question concerned a forgery on his bank account.



"The person responsible for the forgery was brought before court and convicted," Prodromou said. "The bank recognised part of the responsibility for the charges through forgery and agreed to share the loss."



AKEL-linked trade union PEO was also included in the list over a €3.0 million loan.

Needless to say, everyone else on the list is also coming up with a bevy of excuses:

Former DISY MP Sofoklis Hadjiyiannis said his case concerned interest and other charges that were added on illegally after he settled his debt to the bank.



AKEL MP Nicos Katsourides was also caught up in the affair after he was linked with a company that allegedly had a debt written off. Katsourides said neither he nor any family member had any relation with the company's share structure although his son had been employed by the outfit at some point in the past.



Katsourides said he had contacted the attorney-general and asked him to hand the list over to the investigating commission looking into the economic debacle.



DISY MP Soteris Sampson also denied the allegations, saying he would make public his bank transactions as soon as they were provided by the bank.



Former agriculture minister Timis Efthymiou said his obligations to the Bank of Cyprus stemming from him being a shareholder in a company "have been met by paying off a loan within the framework of a legal settlement with the bank in 2008."

And so on. What the common theme here is that the very same Members of Parliament who were so vocal in rejecting the insured depositors' impairment just to save their skins from a public mutiny (but so quick to sacrifice the wealthier citizens and small and medium corporations to a haircut that may be as deposit large as 100%), did everything in their power to avoid a vote on the final bank "resolution" which effectively handed over the country's sovereignty into the hands of the Troika and its liquidators, but not before they themselves were among the key beneficiaries of the impairments on the banking system's asset side.

It is these bad assets and impaired losses, as well as investing money in Greek bonds, and other worthless "assets", that ultimately ended up forcing the restructuring of the bank and the cram up of the liability side up to and including the unsecured loans known as deposits.

Perhaps if the Cypriot public wants to find a scapegoat to its troubles, it should focus its anger not only at the Russian Oligarchs and the Troika, but to those who were most complicit in betraying the public's trust: the same politicians who were elected to protect their citizens and the country's constitution (flagrantly abused as per yesterday's revelations), including the very president of the nation. That is, of course, if the local apathetic population has not been zombified too much to even care about why billions in wealth was just confiscated from it. Because if that is indeed the case, they, and everyone else who just sits idly by and does nothing as the global banking syndicate appropriates ever more middle-class wealth, deserves everything coming their way.

[David Guyatt]

David,

In your response to Danny Jarman in the Joseph P. Farrell thread, you say:

Elsewhere on this forum I have attempted - poorly - to show a link between Crowley's OTO and his "Master Lam" as being the template of so called Grey aliens - as well as advanced Nazi technology being the physical blueprint for the whole "Flying Saucer" story. The two bounce and reverberate off each other. They also form part of the bigger picture of the ultra right-wing, neo-nazi, fascist underground, that also connect to Gladio/Stay Behind units et al.

Would you go so far as to make deep connections to those making things happen with regard to Cyprus, etc? Peter sometimes refers to a very deep political Grand Unification Theory (GUT). Cultural destabilization would seem to be a precursor to a something New.

That's a difficult one for an old Geezer like me, Lauren. Especially on a Saturday night. But I'll give it a shot.

Here goes.

I suppose one way of answering it is that the Eurozone is a quite old idea. It dates back to WWII and the post Nazi era, where there was a plan to have a United States of Europe. Nazi Germany got beaten, as we all know, but for 9 months prior to their capitulation they prepared their escape with all their assets and plunder. This was all set up in a meeting in Strasbourg in August 1944, once it became chillingly clear to the Nazi elite that the Normandy Day landing were irreversible and the end was coming. The meeting was held in the Hotel Maison Rouge, and is sometimes known as the Red House meeting. Martin Borman was the driving force behind this. The wealth of Germany fled across the entire world. The best source for this asset flight programme is Paul Manning's "Martin Borman; Nazi in Exile".

By 1955, when Germany was once more declared a sovereign state again, the assets began flooding back to the Homeland. William Stevenson in his book "The Borman Brotherhood", recounts a meeting he had with Hjelmar (Horace Greeley) Schacht, in what was then called Djakarta, circa 1960s. Schacht was once an enthusiastic supporter of Hitler and the President of the Reichsbank, and Minister of Economics under Hitler. He later had misgivings and ended up in Ravensbruck and the Flossenburg and finally Dachau. Obviously he survived. During the interview he gave Stevenson, he stated that war was a mistake and that the Brothers now saw that the future was control of money and finance (I don't have the exact quote to hand, so this is simply my "memory slippage" recall of what he said). The intention was very clear, anyway.

Let's not forget the planned repatriation of plundered assets after 1955 - these included besides monetary assets, weapons blueprints and numerous other very, very advanced Nazi technological advances that the Allies were stunned by. It was, in financial terms, a vast booty.

Let's also jump backwards a bit, and then forwards.

The Treaty setting up what is now the European Union was the European Coal and Steel Community, signed in 1951 - a treaty between France and Germany, with a view to other European nations joining it as and when they could. And they all did, of course. The Treaty expired in 2002. Job done.

As Michael Caine used to say "not many people know that".

But the actual genesis for a United States of Europe dates back to the late 1890's. It was a plan outlined by "The Group", better known as the Rhodes-Milner Kintergarden. This group ran England at the time, through elected representatives who owed their allegiance to it. They were the real and actual power behind Parliament and the throne.

Oddly enough, sons (or at least one son - memory faded a bit here) of leading inner Kintergarden members became members of the pro-Nazi Right Club that supported Hitler prior to WWII, and were later outlawed by Churchill. Such were the luminaries who were members that the membership list of this club remained classified until after 2000 (exact date you'll have to Google).

I did quite a lot of research on The Group many years ago. It was fascinating. Their vision and scope was simply enormous. I'm a boring old fart these days, but I used to read a factual book and, yes, actually pore over the footnotes. One of those books I pored over was Carroll Quigley's "The Anglo-American Establishment: From Rhodes to Cliveden". It is an important book (as is his other: Tragedy & Hope), but dense, Very dense. Somewhere in the footnotes Quigley repeats a comment made by a Rhodes insider (whose name I should know, but now forget) which stated that the plan was to "absorb the wealth of the world".

Students from around the British Commonwealth and America were invited to become Rhodes Scholars at Oxford, a system that continues to this day. Think Bill Clinton, for example. Think also politics and banking (Milner was a director and leading light of the now long gone Midland Bank, for example)

Now for more Michael Caine...

Not many people know that German students were also part of the Rhodes scholarship programme. Anglo-Saxons you see. There was a period during WWI when the Hun, for fairly obvious reasons, were excluded. Then permitted again once the blood has washed away. And then permanently excluded on the outbreak of WWII.

So, to recap. Rhodes scholars were drawn from the British Commonwealth (Canada, Australia, New Zealand - used to include South Africa, Rhodesia etc too), the USA and Germany.

What is now happening in the Eurozone, haircuts and planned haircuts arises from a directive (I understand) from the Bank for International Settlements. It would make absolute sense too.

Go check Google on the BIS and the Nazis.

Then go and read the 14-20 really important pages (on the BIS) in an otherwise very dense and heavy tomb of 1200 pages in Quigley's "Tragedy & Hope" - a book that got Quigley shunned for the rest of his life. He was, you see, allowed special access to The Group's secret archives, as he was thought by "them" to be "one of them". He blew the whistle instead.

My guess is that the "wealth of the world" is about to be "absorbed". Finally.

One hundred years is nothing for these people. It's a lineage thing, moving on down from father to son.

Hope this helps a bit.

Now back to the the bottle of Burgundy. Those French vintners, eh - bless 'em, I'm going to leave them something in my Will.

There's a massive stack of empty bottles out the back. They can have the little buggers back...

[David Guyatt]

It never changes.

The News this morning is that the haircut for Bank of Cyprus depositors holding E100k or more, could now be as high as 60%, and depositors at Laiki, could be shorn for even more.

A report by Greek media says that the three Cypriot bank forgave millions in loans to Cypriot politicians during the height of the crisis.

BBC News:

Bank of Cyprus big depositors could lose up to 60%

Bank of Cyprus depositors with more than 100,000 euros (£84,300; $128,200) could lose up to 60% of their savings as part of an EU-IMF bailout restructuring move, officials say.


The central bank says 37.5% of holdings over 100,000 euros will become shares.


Up to 22.5% will go into a fund attracting no interest and may be subject to further write-offs.


The other 40% will attract interest - but this will not be paid unless the bank performs well.


It was known that the wealthiest savers at the Bank of Cyprus would take a large hit from the bailout deal - but not to this extent, the BBC's Mark Lowen reports.


Cypriot officials have also said that big depositors at Laiki - the country's second largest bank - could face an even tougher "haircut". However, no details have been released.


The officials say that Laiki will eventually be absorbed into the Bank of Cyprus.


The fear is that once the unprecedented capital controls - which are in place for an indefinite time - are lifted, the wealthiest will rush to move their deposits abroad, our correspondent says.


He adds that the larger than expected loss could also have devastating consequences for large depositors such as schools and universities. And it could spread fear in other indebted eurozone countries that Cyprus might set a precedent.


'Loans written off'
Cyprus needs to raise 5.8bn euros to qualify for the bailout, and has become the first eurozone member country to bring in capital controls to prevent a torrent of money leaving the island and credit institutions collapsing.


The original 10bn-euro bailout deal was agreed in Brussels earlier this month. It placed a one-off tax on all customers of Cypriot banks, starting at 6.75% for the smallest deposits.


But this led to mass protests across Cyprus, and the deal was later voted down by the country's parliament. MPs later backed a revised deal.


Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades has said the financial situation has been "contained" following the deal.


He has also stressed that Cyprus has no intention of leaving the euro, stressing that "in no way will we experiment with the future of our country".


By Friday, banks had returned to their normal working hours and there were no longer reports of big queues.


In a separate development, Cyprus launched an investigation after Greek media published the names of politicians who allegedly had loans forgiven by three Cypriot banks at the height of the crisis.


The Bank of Cyprus, Laiki and Hellenic Bank apparently wrote off loans of millions of euros to companies, local authorities, and politicians from some of the island's biggest parties.


The list has now been handed to the ethics committee of the Cypriot parliament.