Soros bets against Euro

[Magda Hassan]

I wonder what the chances are that the military will be paid to step in before the election results can be finalised?

[Lauren Johnson]

I wonder what the chances are that the military will be paid to step in before the election results can be finalised?

That would be a Golden Dawn, would it not?

[Magda Hassan]

I wonder what the chances are that the military will be paid to step in before the election results can be finalised?

That would be a Golden Dawn, would it not?

For some but not most I expect

[Magda Hassan]

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Greek euro exit looms as banks crumble

Published: Thursday, May 17, 2012, 13:22 IST
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard | Agency: Daily Telegraph
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[TD]A tsunami of capital flight from Greece is threatening to overwhelm the authorities, forcing the country out of the euro even before fresh elections in June.
Economists warned that the Greek financial system could crumble within a matter of days or weeks unless the European Central Bank steps up support.
President Karolos Papoulias told party leaders that banks had lost €700 million in withdrawals within a day, citing central bank warnings that "great fear" might soon escalate to panic. The leaked details lend credence to claims that capital flight by both savers and firms has reached €4 billion-a-week since the triumph of anti-bailout parties in elections on May 6.
Outflows are becoming unstoppable, not helped by open talk in EU circles of "technical" plans for Greek withdrawal from the eurozone, said Steen Jakobsen from Danske Bank.
"This has a self-fulfilling prophecy built into it and I don't think we can get to June," he said. "The fuse is burning and the only two options now are a controlled explosion, where Germany steps in to ensure an orderly exit, or an uncontrolled explosion."
The growing alarm came as judge Panagiotis Pikrammenos was picked as Greece's caretaker leader until the next vote on June 17. Polls show the Left-wing Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras will be a clear victor.
Tsipras has vowed to tear up the EU-IMF bail-out "Memorandum", exhorting German Chancellor Angela Merkel to "stop playing poker with the lives of people".
The Greek impasse has rattled markets across Europe all week. Yesterday (Wednesday) Spanish lender Bankia was down 11%, while gold tumbled $17 to a 10-month low of $1,540 on dollar strength.
The Greek crisis is replicating the pattern of fixed-exchange ruptures through history. Britain was forced off the Gold Standard in 1931 after pay-cut protests in the navy triggered capital flight.
Greek banks have lost 30% of their deposits since late 2009. The total fell to €171 billion in March.
"The surprise is that there is still so much left," said Simon Ward, from Henderson Global Investors. "I can't believe it will stay much longer."
The ECB is holding the line with an estimated euros 100bn of Emergency Liquidity Assistance (ELA) for lenders, channeled through Greece's central bank. Supplicants must pawn their loan book in exchange.
"The risk is that banks will run out of collateral since these are low quality assets with haircuts of 50% or more," said Ward.
JP Morgan said Greek banks have already exhausted their collateral. A refusal by the ECB to ease rules would amount to expulsion, forcing Greece "to issue its own money."
The ECB said it had stopped routine operations with certain Greek banks with depleted capital buffers, but underscored that they are still able to access the ELA scheme.
There is already a political storm in Germany over "junk collateral", as well as anger over the Bundesbank's €645 billion exposure to Club Med debtors through the ECB's internal "Target2" payments nexus.
Ward said it would be hard to justify to German taxpayers why the Bundesbank should lend more to "austerity-resistant Greeks" so that they can squirrel money abroad.
Julian Callow, from Barclays Capital, said the ECB risks grave contagion if it lets go of Greek banks. "We have reached the point where the ECB needs to come in with massive intervention and outright quantitative easing," he said.
The central banks of Italy and Spain have built up liabilities of €279 billion and euros 284bn, partly reflecting bank withdrawals. This is owed to Germany, Holland, Luxembourg, and Finland.
http://www.dnaindia.com/money/report_gre...le_1690030


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[Jan Klimkowski]

The Greeks figure it out.

So the bankers declare War.

Market Ticker's Karl Denninger chronicles it well:

Ha Ha Ha: Greece Figured It Out!

I like it!

Mr. Tsipras says that, if push comes to shove, Greece can manage on its own. By not paying its debts, the country will have enough cash to pay its workers and retirees, he says. He also proposes cuts in defense spending, cracking down on waste and corruption, and tackling widespread tax evasion by the rich.

"Whatever we do, things will be difficult. But it will also be difficult at the same time for all of Europe because the euro will collapse" if Greece's funding is cut off, says Mr. Tsipras. He adds that both sides should step back "before we reach that point" and find a "European solution."

Now you're screwed Christine Lagarde, Merkel and the various ECB wonks. They figured it out over in Greece.

You have crap cards and Tsipras has a Royal Straight Flush.

Now he may be lying, but if he's not he knows that he can pay the workers and retirees -- if he walks on the debt payments.

This means he holds the trump hand. He can operate internally and tell you all to stuff it. And assuming he's telling the truth and really has run the numbers, the ECB, Merkel and the rest of the Eurozone is stuffed on trying to force anything down Greece's throat.

He also wants to nationalize the banking system. Now, if he goes further and forces a "One Dollar of Capital" standard for all banks inside Greece, then the game-playing stops but so does the systemic risk -- inside Greece.

Now what's left for the rest of Europe? They've got a problem -- a big problem. By nationalizing the banking system he flushes the private parties that would otherwise play "hand grenade" with the economy and government.

This doesn't mean that Syriza won't screw it up, of course. He might.

But it leaves the door open to solve the problem and stabilize the banking and monetary system in Greece going forward.

It's about damn time.

There is No Escape from the Bankers:

Trichet Declares War

This is an open declaration of war folks:

Europe could strengthen its monetary union by giving European politicians the power to declare a sovereign state bankrupt and take over its fiscal policy, the former head of the European Central Bank said on Thursday in unveiling a bold proposal to salvage the euro.

That's an open declaration of war and should be responded to in kind.

There is no power superior to that of the budget within a nation. None.

If other nations and firms don't like a government's expression of their sovereign power in the form of their budget they have the right to refuse to lend to it. But there is no claim one can make on a sovereign's budget on a forcible basis -- that is functionally identical to an invasion.

Trichet has just invited a shooting war in Europe, and I predict that if this sort of meme spreads he's going to get exactly that.

[Jan Klimkowski]

The IMF, through Christine Lagarde who increasingly resembles a Bond S&M villain in drag, has told the Greek people to eat shit and like it.

Turn that Shock Therapy dial up a couple more notches.

The Greek people must suffer for the sins of international market capitalism, and concentrate solely on repaying the bankers whilst their schools and hospitals collapse.

It's payback time: don't expect sympathy Lagarde to Greeks

Take responsibility and stop trying to avoid taxes, International Monetary Fund chief tells Athens

Larry Elliott and Decca Aitkenhead

guardian.co.uk, Friday 25 May 2012 20.04 BST
The International Monetary Fund has ratcheted up the pressure on crisis-hit Greece after its managing director, Christine Lagarde, said she has more sympathy for children deprived of decent schooling in sub-Saharan Africa than for many of those facing poverty in Athens.

In an uncompromising interview with the Guardian, Lagarde insists it is payback time for Greece and makes it clear that the IMF has no intention of softening the terms of the country's austerity package.

Using some of the bluntest language of the two-and-a-half-year debt crisis, she says Greek parents have to take responsibility if their children are being affected by spending cuts. "Parents have to pay their tax," she says.

Greece, which has seen its economy shrink by a fifth since the recession began, has been told to cut wages, pensions and public spending in return for financial help from the IMF, the European Union and the European Central Bank.

Asked whether she is able to block out of her mind the mothers unable to get access to midwives or patients unable to obtain life-saving drugs, Lagarde replies: "I think more of the little kids from a school in a little village in Niger who get teaching two hours a day, sharing one chair for three of them, and who are very keen to get an education. I have them in my mind all the time. Because I think they need even more help than the people in Athens."

Lagarde, predicting that the debt crisis has yet to run its course, adds: "Do you know what? As far as Athens is concerned, I also think about all those people who are trying to escape tax all the time. All these people in Greece who are trying to escape tax." She says she thinks "equally" about Greeks deprived of public services and Greek citizens not paying their tax.

"I think they should also help themselves collectively." Asked how, she replies: "By all paying their tax."

Asked if she is essentially saying to the Greeks and others in Europe that they have had a nice time and it is now payback time, she responds: "That's right."

Here's Market Ticker's Denninger's response to Lagarde's threats:

Christine LaGarde, The Troika, And Greece


I wouldn't travel to Greece if I was Ms. LaGarde; she might find herself on the receiving end of the sort of animosity she has displayed for the Greek people.....

"I think they should also help themselves collectively," Ms Lagarde said.

She added: "I think more of the little kids from a school in a little village in Niger who get teaching two hours a day, sharing one chair for three of them, and who are very keen to get an education. I have them in my mind all the time.

"Because I think they need even more help than the people in Athens."

And when asked if she was saying to the Greeks and other European nations that they had had a nice time and it was now payback time, Ms Lagarde responded: "That's right."

She also reiterated that the IMF had no intention of softening the terms of Greece's austerity package.

I agree -- they should help themselves.

They should start by placing all the bonds they issued and which LaGarde's IMF, along with the other banksters, lent upon into the paper shredder and send the bits to the ECB and LaGarde via FedEx. After all every one of these institutions was part and parcel of increasing credit into their economy at a greater rate than GDP, and thus was fully aware they were effectively counterfeiting Euros into the Greek economy.

That this action was legal doesn't change the moral depravity of the act, nor does it excuse those who committed it from the consequences.

The consequence, incidentally, is that you lose your money as you don't get repaid, and the bogus nature of your claimed "asset valuations" and lack of capital behind your positions is exposed.

This detonates your firm (and maybe your central bank too.) Awwwww... cry me a river.

None of this changes the fact that Greece cannot spend more in its government than it taxes. That has to change, and it has to change right now.

But it is manifestly unjust, and should be corrected through whatever means are necessary, that only the Greeks should bear that consequence while the banksters who knew damn well what they were doing get away with being willing and active co-conspirators.

This nonsense will not stop until someone stands up to these jackals and points out that they're not going to get paid as the lender was fully aware they were emitting unbacked credit into the system with no mathematical possibility of repayment. That is, they were willingly and intentionally promulgating a Ponzi Scheme.

The other nations in Europe should likewise erect the middle finger, simultaneously having the necessary debate with their citizens over the services that they want government to provide and implement the tax structure necessary to do so.

Greece, in a word, needs to reply quite simply "No" and make clear that it is explicitly authorizing its citizens and military to resist by whatever means are appropriate and necessary should any part of the "Troika", or any bank associated with same, attempt to tamper with the nation's internal affairs.

Enough is enough.

[Magda Hassan]

Spoken like the true psychopath she is.

[Magda Hassan]

George Soros explains to Reuters' Chrystia Freeland how German Chancellor Angela Merkel's actions in 2008 could lead to the disintegration of the European Union. Consequently, a disorderly default of European sovereignties may lead to a global financial meltdown worse than 2008. He explains his analysis here.

[Jan Klimkowski]

What a self-serving and/or deluded old fool Soros is.

This was the softest of soft interviews. If you ever want to know what the TV term "noddy" to describe an editing cutaway of the interviewer looks like, there are several prime examples in this technically shoddy piece of tomfoolery.

The currency speculator Soros maintains that the debt burden is manageable as long as economies grow, and that there is enough money in the banking system.

I call BULLSHIT.

There is far more debt in the system than can ever be repaid, most of it recklessly created by the essentially unregulated global market system that Soros represents.

The currency speculators, and the hedge funds, and the banks, and the capitalist vultures continue their feeding frenzy whilst ordinary people lose their jobs, their homes and their ability to put food on the family table.

[Magda Hassan]

Lloyd's of London preparing for euro collapse

The chief executive of the multi-billion pound Lloyd's of London has publicly admitted that the world's leading insurance market is prepared for a collapse in the single currency and has reduced

A spokesman for Euler Hermes, Bettina Sattler, told Bloomberg: "The outcome of the new elections in June remains highly uncertain. Consequently, the situation is further deteriorating. The risk of Greece exiting the eurozone has been revived.
"In light of the recent developments, Euler Hermes will most probably have to switch to a more prudent approach. [We have] maintained a high level of cover for [our] customers until today. But now we are confronted with a changing situation."
Lloyd's fears are likely to be shared by a number of European businesses, which are watching developments in Greece.
On Saturday, Juergen Fitschen, co-chief executive of Deutsche Bank, described Greece as a "failed state" run by corrupt politicians.
"I'm quite worried about Europe," Mr Ward said in one of the first admissions by a major UK business leader of the scale of the crisis that would be prompted by a eurozone collapse.
"With all the concerns around the eurozone at the moment, we've got to be careful doing business in Europe and there are a lot of question marks over writing business in the future in euros.
"I don't think that if Greece exited the euro it would lead to the collapse of the eurozone, but what we need to do is prepare for that eventuality."
Mr Ward says Lloyd's had been working hard on contingency planning and had the capability to switch settlement of European underwriting from euros to other currencies.
"We've got multi-currency functionality and we would switch to multi-currency settlement if the Greeks abandoned the euro and started using the drachma again," he said.
Lloyd's has de-risked its asset portfolio in recent years, with investments split equally into cash, corporate bonds and government bonds, mostly in the US, UK, Canada and Australia. "We have de-risked the asset portfolio as much as possible," he said.
The contingency planning comes as German politicians piled the pressure on Greece ahead of elections on June 17.
A conservative member of German chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet said today Germany would not "pour money into a bottomless pit".
On Sunday, Swiss central bank chief Thomas Jordan admitted his country is drawing up an action plan in the event of the euro's collapse.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/finan...lapse.html