Underemployment doesn't count as unemployment, remember. Using our current statistics, starving railroad hobos who performed a day's work in each stopover town to get shelter and public relief amenities food would count as employed.
When I buy gold, I trade dollars for gold. So, I'm not just looking at what might happen with gold but also the dollar. A few months from now, I think the dollar will be at least 15% lower against the euro and yen.
Do people who think gold is going to tank also think the dollar will tank? Or are they betting on a strong dollar? One of the biggest factors in the commodity collapse was the stronger dollar. I believe commodities will come back if the dollar collapses.
"At the Pretech Corporation, a concrete manufacturer in Kansas City, Kan., that has not had a layoff in 15 years, part of the rationale is pride. To keep the perfect track record, the company has cut overtime, traded a $5,000 holiday party for an employee-only barbecue lunch"
crispy&cole(Unrated) writes: \tGlod has no real value...except to speculators...You're entitled to your personal view. But a billion people in China and a billion more in India would not agree with you.
Anon - millions of people in this country bought houses they could never afford and now they have been f/c'd...I would never buy an argument based on the actions of the sheeple
Republicans are TRAITORS writes:
Am I the only that realized Madoff's exposure as a Ponzi Scam artist is a microcosm to NASDAQ's exposure as a ponzi sceme?
Republicans are TRAITORS | 12.21.08 - 11:45 pm | #
No...the Naz is still down 70% from its all time high (which it will never see again in my lifetime).
Giving stock options via share buy backs was the biggest scam of all the nasdaq companies
i guess the world's central banks must be the biggest speculators
Anonymous | 12.21.08 - 11:46 pm | #
They certainly are. Now they are betting trillions of dollars of our future labor/productivity on the financial institutions that got us into this mess.
25% unemployed / not looking
25% underemployed (given qualifications and minimum net income to break the poverty barrier)
50% employed and above poverty
So what pops the last bubble (belief in Obamarama and the US Govt. ability to stop deflation)?
C&C,
When I was thinking of the link between Madoff and NASDAQ (he sat on the board), I was thinking of NASDAQ's collapse. I agree, we will NEVER see NASDAQ 5k, again. That's kind of my point. I think a few quality companies got wrapped into a giant NASDAQ ponzi. Those companies are still left. But in 2001, there were a lot of companies that were an illusion, just like investing in Madoff's Ponzi.
You will observe that not just gold but also silver, platinum and palladium are assigned international currency codes.
In this day and age of shameless currency and general market manipulation, why wouldn't people - wealthy or not - choose to allocate a certain portion of their savings in a (more) objective store of value?
Likely that many of them will be armed... Assuming that many of these folks are newly homeless and given gun ownership rates for homeowners...
Also to give some perspective... The federal government is nowhere near as powerful as the US consumer.
$13.4B to GM and Chryco.. well $13.4B / $25K = 536,000 cars... My "back o' the napkin" math says that 500K cars is about the MONTHLY auto sales that we've experienced so far...
So maybe that needs to be a monthly wire transfer...
Cause not a single job is saved unless they actually BUILD those cars...
Gold will be used as an exchange medium again. What will piss people off is the rate of return they'll get for that gold. Investing in highly lucrative barter items will be smarter then buying gold.
The grocery store has no food, the generator has no gas and the flashlight is out of batteries. Sure I will trade with you. 2 ounces of gold will buy you a weeks worth of each. Of course the trade will only happen if the guy with life sustaining commodities actually has a surplus.
We have lived through a time of unprecedented affluence, and we have seen it as normal, and told ourselves we deserved all of it, that we are entitled to what it has given us. But it's over, and it will be no more, nor will it ever return in our lifetimes. If we are to live in a functioning society in the years to come, we will have to share much of our riches, and we will have to find out how to be fulfilled with much less material wealth. If we don't, our societies will collapse, and we will lose that wealth regardless. But looking around me, I see little hope that we will do all these things before it's too late. It you don't volunteer to share, the difference in wealth between you and your own childrens generation will become so glaring that they will come and take it away from you.
What if anything will drive gold to new levels ? mmckinl | 12.22.08 - 12:13 am | #
Fear. PMs move inversely to political & economic instability, which is why it does well in both deflationary and high inflationary times, because those are symptoms of instability.
You will observe that not just gold but also silver, platinum and palladium are assigned international currency codes.
How's that $2200 platinum worked out for you there sport? As a store of value?
An era is over. We have been the last of the affluent, the carefree and the innocent. Not that we're really all that inncoent, mind you, it was all just pretense all the way, many millions of people have died for our affluence. We just never told ourselves their life stories. They will be our stories soon.
Are you now ready to fight in the streets, to protect your family, to share your meal with the hungry? Its not about being a leftie, or a softie, and I certainly am neither. Its about survival. Its about being smart enough to read the world you live in. The model of the nuclear family will die with the affluence. Its never been but an aberration. You will, like your ancestors before you, need your family, your friends, and your neighbors.
What will piss people off is the rate of return they'll get for that gold. Investing in highly lucrative barter items will be smarter then buying gold.
It will be too late to "buy" gold, or any coin then.
If we get to where prices for food and fuel are ounce of gold per week, it's pretty much game over. We'll be seeing mass starvation in the city, and what used to be called "brigandry" in the country. Half would die. At least.
How's that CALPERS retirement plan?
Broward Horne
Did you read about the 103% loss in the real estate portfolio? Turns out they borrowed to leverage the investment.
"How's that $2200 platinum worked out for you there sport? As a store of value?"
I am merely pointing out that PMs have ISO currency codes for those that aren't aware. So does the Zimbabwe dollar. Clearly, the PMs that are heavily used in industry are not doing well in USD terms.
Gold is up modestly YTD in USD though, no small feat this year.
Did you read about the 103% loss in the real estate portfolio? Turns out they borrowed to leverage the investment
Yes, I saw it, I'm not surprised.
Past a certain size, it becomes impossible to earn "above average" returns without playing games because you are, by definition, "average".
I have to admit, I didn't anticipate such a large commodities blowout. I expected PMs to drop in tandem with other things but was hoping they'd drop less than average.
I asked myself what I wanted to trade my dollar wealth for during these times of abundance. The answer was a garage full of items that will keep me and mine alive.
Worse case scenario, which is what you should plan for, tells me a garage full of gold will be worth less and involve actually trading and transporting the new goods I bought with my shiny metal during unrest.
The shiny metal will also be pegged against what in a world gone bad? Will there be a central organization that will set the value of gold?
History says that I'm wrong? Please provide a better argument or links to support the one line proclamation.
Ecuador CDS Settlement 18 December - The International Swaps and Derivatives Association (Isda) is drawing up a settlement protocol for credit default swaps (CDS) based on the sovereign debt of Ecuador, which refused to make a $30.6 million scheduled interest payment last week. \t\t\t\tThe settlement protocol will be Isda's first on a sovereign underlying. Ecuador last defaulted on its debt in 1999, before the development of a liquid CDS market. The payment was originally due a month ago, but Ecuador announced on November 14 that it would delay paying by 30 days while it investigated the legality of the $1.25 billion worth of 2012 bonds. Ecuadorean president Rafael Correa said on December 12 that the debt was "immoral and illegitimate" and that he was prepared to face creditors in court. The 2012 bonds are now trading at 20 cents on the dollar â they dropped from 41.175 to 26.5 when the first payment delay was announced. Ecuador's credit rating was cut to CCCâ from Bâ by Standard & Poor's last month â the agency cut its rating to "selective default" after last week's announcement. On December 15, finance minister Elsa Viteri said the country would also default on its 2015 bonds. Even before taking office in January last year, Correa had suggested a default was possible, saying much of the country's foreign debt was illegitimate. In February 2007 the finance ministry warned it would delay a scheduled payment of $135 million on its 2030 bonds, before reversing itself and making the payment on time two days later. CDS writers face heavy losses as a result of the default, as recovery rates are expected to be low, said Alessandra Alecci, a senior analyst in Moody's sovereign risk group in New York. "We expect negotiations with bondholders to be complicated and drawn out, with bondholder participation in an exchange perhaps limited by the country's solvency and its unclear grounds for default," Alecci said, predicting long negotiations with the country's government over recovery. Unlike the 1999 default, she added, there was no strong economic or fiscal case for the default â Ecuador is an oil exporter with a relatively strong economy and low debt levels.
If you're really that serious, you should be on 200 acres south of Chillicothe. The land is flat and farmable, and the glacial aquifer has industrial size reserves, huge, and untapped.
Republicans are TRAITORS writes:
If only we could get Bernanke, Paulson, Bush, Palosi, Feinstein, Boxer, Frank and Christopher Cox to take an unpaid vacation.
Republicans are TRAITORS | 12.21.08 - 11:43 pm |
RaT=Repukes=Akubi=Akira=Labdog=ProjectScobyDo= every other insane sockpuppet you can imagine.
mp, go figure, I've found that smart people are seldom happy people. It's far too easy for smart people to recognize how screwed up the World really is I suppose...
Past a certain size, it becomes impossible to earn "above average" returns without playing games because you are, by definition, "average".
I have to admit, I didn't anticipate such a large commodities blowout. I expected PMs to drop in tandem with other things but was hoping they'd drop less than average."
It is startling how similar events are playing out so far to the crash pre GD 1.0. Stock market crash, commodities blowout, recession, protectionism followed by bond-market dislocation and ending in depression.
London Bank who posts on his own blog (former junior central banker) posited that we would get a deflationary period followed by bond-market dislocation followed by hyper-inflationary depression.
London Bank who posts on his own blog (former junior central banker) posited that we would get a deflationary period followed by bond-market dislocation followed by hyper-inflationary depression. Pissed Off In California | 12.22.08 - 12:30 am | #
Yeah, that's iTulip's KaPOOM Theory, and my general idea of how things will pan out.
... But still the economic chaos continued. In 1795 the printing presses were working flat out and the number of assignats doubled from 7,000 to 14,000 only to double towards the end of the year to 45,000 â all these figures in millions of course. But it could not last, and at the end of 1795 a new constitution was adopted and a new government formed â the Directory. And early in 1796 the new government did what all new governments do in such circumstances, it issued new currency. The machinery, plates and paper for printing assignats were destroyed and a new paper notes were issued called the Mandat, to replace assignats at 30 to 1. ...
Totally emblematic of your backward thinking. Gold is the one thing that doesn't require a central organization to set it's value.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.22.08 - 12:29 am | #
You win. How can I argue against that irrefutable logic? I will immediately buy gold, the real physical stuff that seems to be lacking. What? I need to wait up to 8 weeks for delivery? I can buy paper that says I own gold? Just as good? Great!
I can go to Costco and load up on staples that will keep me alive and provide an easily bartered item or I can buy a piece of metal. Really? Buy what you will as will I.
Outside of an end of civilization scenario, if you think any standing body politic is gonna allow you to trade gold for goods and services...I'm not sure where we can go from here.
As far as PMs having currency codes, what does that signify i/r/t "value"?
That possession implies title and so therefore it has a value as a means of exchange? Well naturally, but I hope you're not using that to support an argument of gold's "enduring" value".
I mean, how many "good suits" can I buy in a "mad max" world.
For anon above, if you want to hold gold as an exchange for another currency, why not just buy the desired currency?
I'm not trying to be provocative, buy whatever you like, but, if you're gonna trade for some good or service in some first world economy, you're gonna have to translate your gold into the coin of that realm.
If you think we're at the end of our civil society, only a surplus of essentials will make gold have any value as a means of exchange in any case.
But, as I said, it's still a marginally free country and you are welcome to buy whatever you like at whatever price in whatever quantity.
I was just seeking rich's reasoning for 5000 years of constant "value".
I have to admit, I didn't anticipate such a large commodities blowout. I expected PMs to drop in tandem with other things but was hoping they'd drop less than average.
Broward Horne
Look at nickel and platinum at 4 year lows. Both parabolic up and down. That's just hard to understand even in a mildly deflationary environment. Hard to believe mint issued nickel coins were recently worth nearly that much for their base metal content.
"Gold is the one thing that doesn't require a central organization to set it's value."
True - it just takes someone else that thinks gold is valuable. And it's obviously valuable because...because...wait, why is gold valuable?
And besides that, in a world dominated by gold, just fast forward to the part about who has all the weapons and most of the gold. Square one, I think it's called.
I can go to Costco and load up on staples that will keep me alive and provide an easily bartered item or I can buy a piece of metal. Jacked | 12.22.08 - 12:34 am | #
You made the point yourself -- if the person you want to barter with doesn't want anything you have, you're screwed... unless you have gold. It's the one thing that usually can be traded for anything else.
It's literally impossible for you to have and indefinitely store (let alone defend) everything you could possibly need.
Gold is insurance, as is 200 lbs of rice and beans.
Gold, however, is a lot more portable than rice, and it doesn't rot or get eaten by rats and mice and insects. it doesn't get full of algae like diesel.
If we get to a situation where where rice and beans are valuable barter items, small denom silver coins will be extremely useful as a portable store of wealth.
Well, yes, gold has played out close to what I expected... so far. What I like about gold versus paper is that I think the downside for gold is limited to perhaps 50% of current price but I think U.S. paper could go to zero under the right circumstance.
I grew up in Montana on a ranch with farmland for feed grains. If I can find another way to make a living I will always abstain from ever facing the many challenges and never ending workday encompassed by that choice.
You see a farmer or rancher show them respect. They earn it every single day.
Farmers and ranchers are no more deserving of respect than anyone else. If a farmer or a rancher is an asshole to me, I'm going to laugh in their face.
I used to be a Reconnaissance Marine (2d Recon Bn). Maybe you and everyone else should show me some respect for going to Kuwait and putting my ass in the line of fire so you farmers and ranchers can drive your F150s and John Deeres. I think I deserve it.
It's always been really odd to me how those deprecating the value of gold seem to own most of it. So many guns for something so worthless. Doesn't compute.
Chill Bear 2d Recon writes: It's always been really odd to me how those deprecating the value of gold seem to own most of it. So many guns for something so worthless. Doesn't compute.
I understand your point. If I had so many resources I could actually afford to hedge my future I would buy some gold.
The gold market seems to be even more manipulated then the securities market.
I always think about being in the desert with a 100 lbs of gold and no water. A Bedouin wanders by and I offer to trade a lb of gold for half his water. The Bedouin has just enough water to make it to the next oasis. Does he risk his life for the gold, make a counteroffer for more gold, or shake his head in wonderment and put some distance between him and the crazy, soon to be dead guy? How you answer the question decides what you see as a store of value.
"For anon above, if you want to hold gold as an exchange for another currency, why not just buy the desired currency?"
What I find interesting about gold is just that.. It is one of the few "currencies" that is liquid just about anywhere in the world. The USD has just about always been perceived as both a store of value and a medium of exchange. The medium of exchange function is a given, I don't think that will change. It's the store of value function that's being called into question lately, and evidently not just by me. Why not diversify, if just a little?
Brothers in arms âGun control in Detroit is racist to begin with. You heard of Dr. Sweet?" he asks, referring to the case of Ossian Sweet, a black physician who, with his family, was tried and eventually acquitted for shooting into a mob that attacked their home when they moved into an all-white neighborhood in 1925. Soon after, the state passed stringent gun-control laws, known as Public Act 372 of 1927. Laney sees those laws aimed squarely at blacks, a reaction to the verdict. âAfter the Sweet case, the Michigan Legislature said we couldn't allow black people to have guns, and that's how Michigan gun laws come about."
âGun control is race control," he adds. âIt has been that way to keep blacks in servitude."
You are not the only veteran here. My apologies if I showed disrespect in sharing my opinion. I wish you well and hope both of our viewpoints are validated in whatever may come.
Outside of an end of civilization scenario, if you think any standing body politic is gonna allow you to trade gold for goods and services...I'm not sure where we can go from here. hong konger | 12.22.08 - 12:36 am | #
You can trade gold for goods & services now; it's just not the "preferred" mde.
I do not expect a Mad Max world, although it's not entirely out of the question. However, I do expect a currency collapse. Even if you never have need to actually trade physical gold for goods or services, it's a great means of transferring wealth between currency regimes.
Example 1: Dollar fails, replaced by "Amero" (for argument's sake). FRN's (and anything denominated in same) are worthless, but gold can be exchanged for Ameros equal in value to the FRN's at the time it was originally purchased.
Example 2: Dollar "devalued" by 90%. FRN's are now worth 10% of their prior value, but $100 in pre-devaluation FRNs is now worth $1000.
Both circumstances have occurred countless times throughout history to various degrees. FDR confiscated gold at $20 and then immediately revalued it at $35. If you held your gold you didn't lose anything, while all those holding dollars lost big time.
IMPORTANT TO NOTE that preservation of value is akin to making money when everyone else is losing theirs, because your relative purchasing power increases dramatically.
"It is one of the few "currencies" that is liquid just about anywhere in the world."
I think you hit the nail here - it is a currency, and maybe the currency of last resort...on FOREX. That's way different, of course, from imagining yourself wearing a bandoleer and shaking a burlap sack full of coins while people load goods into your truck. Trade gold like a commodity, the rest (as Bear put it) is psychology... but as much your own as anyone else's.
The gold market seems to be even more manipulated then the securities market. Jacked | 12.22.08 - 12:52 am | #
Totally. As I stated earlier, ultimately it's a sign of economic & political instability, but generally it's a too highly visible reminder of how governments steal from their people via inflation.
I do not expect a Mad Max world, although it's not entirely out of the question. However, I do expect a currency collapse
You plan for the most likely case based on history. Odds of a currency devaluation ("collapse") are very good. Odds of Mad Max are fairly low. Even the Soviet Union still functioned (mostly) after the '89 collapse.
One of my business professors spent several months there in the early 90s. Running water and power were sporadic and a lot of people carried AK-47s under their jackets but food was available and there wasn't a great deal of violence.
In this day and age of shameless currency and general market manipulation, why wouldn't people - wealthy or not - choose to allocate a certain portion of their savings in a (more) objective store of value?
i don't know maybe because i hear the same advice 24/7 on a.m radio?
Another interesting feature of PMs is that they have zero counterparty risk.
I think it's logical that investors fretting over the creditworthiness of available debt products to the desperate point that they're willing to accept negative interest rates on Treasury bills might look towards an alternative that can't be anything but AAA rated with some interest.
I've never understood the attraction.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 12:58 am | #
You don't have to, all you have to do is accept it that it exists. It took a long time for me to figure that out, too.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.22.08 - 1:00 am | # [kill]"
I've seen it. Real "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" gold lust. Gold, the idea of it and the physical reality, makes some people absolutely crazy.
I've been thinking about MP's suggestion that good news would be the nationalization of a few banks plus a sequestering/spinning off of their toxic assets - is it possible that's where these guys have planned on taking us all along? Maybe all the head fakes, misdirections, and lurching was aimed at getting as many dummies as possible to pour their money into the hole before the hole became nationalized. Buffet, for instance. If you know you're going to nationalize, why not pussy-foot with it for a while until it becomes slightly less expensive and a lot more palatable?
Here just a little excerpt (the introt) from the book that provided the source for the French revolution link. I just canned the PDF, so there may be some OCR issues. However, even the intro provides some food for thought.
EARLY in the year 1789 the French nation found itself in deep financial embarrassment: there was a heavy debt and a serious deficit.
The vast reforms of that period, though a lasting blessing politically, were a temporary evil financially. There was a general want of confidence in business circles; capital had shown its proverbial timidity by retiring out of sight as far as possible; throughout the land was stagnation.
Statesmanlike measures, careful watching and wise management would, doubtless, have ere long led to a return of confidence, a reappearance of money and a resumption of business; but these involved patience and self-denial, and, thus far in human history, these are the rarest products of political wisdom. Few nations have ever been able to exercise these virtues; and France was not then one of these few.
There was a general search for some short road to prosperity: ere long the idea was set afloat that the great want of the country was more of the circulating medium; and this was speedily followed by calls for an issue of paper money. The Minister of Finance at this period was Necker. In financial ability he was acknowledged as among the great bankers of Europe, but his was something more than financial ability: he had a deep feeling of patriotism and a high sense of personal honor. The difficulties in his way were great, but he steadily endeavored to keep France faithful to those principles in monetary affairs which the general experience of modern times had found the only path to national safety. As difficulties arose the National Assembly drew away from him, and soon came among the members renewed suggestions of paper money: orators in public meetings, at the clubs and in the Assembly, proclaimed it a panaceaâa way of "securing resources without paying interest." Journalists caught it up and displayed its beauties, among these men, Marat, who, in his newspaper, "The Friend of the People," also joined the cries against Necker, picturing himâa man of sterling honesty, who gave up health and fortune for the sake of Franceâas a wretch seeking only to enrich himself from the public purse. ...
I can accept the "liquidity in foreign currency markets" argument particularly if you are buying gold because you don't know which foreign currency will become the next "reserve" currency.
That kind of insurance I can understand. Fair enough and simply explained.
" If you know you're going to nationalize, why not pussy-foot with it for a while until it becomes slightly less expensive and a lot more palatable?"
I'm too tired to document it right now (I think Naomi Klein does this well) but the trend has been nationalize, then reprivatize to your buds. Take that level playing field.
That kind of insurance I can understand. Fair enough and simply explained. hong konger | 12.22.08 - 1:14 am | #
hong konger,
I know I am repeating myself on this board but I really believe that this section from Bernanke's speech in 2002 should give you pause and also show you why gold might be quite a reasonable insurance in case, after all the other tools are exhausted, that this particular remedy will also be deployed.
... Although a policy of intervening to affect the exchange value of the dollar is nowhere on the horizon today, it's worth noting that there have been times when exchange rate policy has been an effective weapon against deflation. A striking example from U.S. history is Franklin Roosevelt's 40 percent devaluation of the dollar against gold in 1933-34, enforced by a program of gold purchases and domestic money creation. The devaluation and the rapid increase in money supply it permitted ended the U.S. deflation remarkably quickly. Indeed, consumer price inflation in the United States, year on year, went from -10.3 percent in 1932 to -5.1 percent in 1933 to 3.4 percent in 1934.17 The economy grew strongly, and by the way, 1934 was one of the best years of the century for the stock market. If nothing else, the episode illustrates that monetary actions can have powerful effects on the economy, even when the nominal interest rate is at or near zero, as was the case at the time of Roosevelt's devaluation. ...
You don't have to, all you have to do is accept it that it exists. It took a long time for me to figure that out, too.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.22.08 - 1:00 am |
Again, I would never trade anything of real value for a shiny yellow metal that carries no real value in today's economy.
I may be in a minority here but I think I represent a significantly large minority who thinks your gold positions are nuts.
You should probably consider that going forward as people like me are unlikely to cover your gold bets going forward.
Again, I would never trade anything of real value for a shiny yellow metal that carries no real value in today's economy. Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 1:28 am | #
$800/oz is no real value? LMAO!!!
The idea of "Today's economy" is a joke, too. Your "large minority" hasn't a clue what the world is really like because they slept through history class. The last few decades are a historical anomaly, and anyone basing their perceptions upon it is in for a rude awakening.
Some clever comments this evening and not sure what you are referring to but oh well, I'll bite. If you mean transactional risk, then yes.. There is always that.
Otherwise, in addition to my comments above, I'll say that PMs as a store of value are well positioned to address my concerns that an unsustainable exploitation of scarce resources resulting from infinitely expandable debt based currency has occurred in the recent past.
As with any abuse of debt, future earnings have been consumed today beyond our ability to pay.
Precious metals as a store of value more accurately represent the scarcity of our earth's resources. This point is especially important to me as I watch demographics explode in quickly industrializing areas of the world. We are evidently seeing some pullback here, but at some point it will resume and the OECD countries will be asked to share.
I may be in a minority here but I think I represent a significantly large minority who thinks your gold positions are nuts.
You should probably consider that going forward as people like me are unlikely to cover your gold bets going forward. Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 1:28 am | #
I think you just proved tj's point. It doesn't matter what you think as long as there are numerous willing counterparties.
In the last thread I wrote about what I saw on the ground in Spain. I was in Mallorca, but due to an work slowdown by Iberia pilots I saw very little. From talking to folks it seems that the Germans are filling the void of UK expats in buying depreciating property.
sdtfs writes:
I may be in a minority here but I think I represent a significantly large minority who thinks your gold positions are nuts.
You should probably consider that going forward as people like me are unlikely to cover your gold bets going forward.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 1:28 am | #
I think you just proved tj's point. It doesn't matter what you think as long as there are numerous willing counterparties.
sdtfs | 12.22.08 - 1:47 am |
Did I? I thought I suggested that there were far fewer counterparties than y'all suggested. I may be wrong, but I can live with that.
I can go to Costco and load up on staples that will keep me alive and provide an easily bartered item...
Jacked | 12.22.08 - 12:34 am | #
Taking into account that even in dire times a medium of exchange is needed, there's nothing wrong with having a stash of gold and silver coins as well as staples.
Suppose you have plenty of food, but you need antibiotics from a black market merchant who has doesn't want to get involved in food transactions? Or you want to buy ammo from a farmer down the road--who greatly values his limited supply of ammo and doesn't need food because he produces his own?
Either one will accept silver dollars, because they are a universal currency, are easy to conceal, and don't degrade.
I realize it isn't illegal. Hell, one can trade anything for anything so long as the taxable value is assessed in terms of dollars.
My point is that sustained trading in unstruck PMs basically abrogates the taxing authority of a government. Which is to say, the entire edifice of authority.
It also crashes any fiat monetary system and, well, you know the rest.
Does this mean that any of the Level 3 assets in SIV's have to be moved to Level 2 and marked down? (Or are the CDS's too different?) If the former, does this mean that some of the largest banks will be insolvent come the end of Q1 2009, regardless of the enforcement of FASB's relevant rules?
Thanks for any insights.
Unfortunately, I forgot to provide the link that provided the context for my question. Here it is:
Liffe, the futures exchange, and LCH.Clearnet, the London clearer, will on Monday become the first group to offer clearing of credit default swaps, financial instruments that are central to regulatory worries over the risks posed by defaults in the credit derivatives markets.
The development comes as efforts by regulators on both sides of the Atlantic to get such bilaterally negotiated, or over-the-counter (OTC), contracts shifted on to centrally cleared platforms are coming to a head.
It is highly unlikely that current CDS will ever make it onto a clearing house. No one will want to act as guarantor for the drek that was under-written in the last few years. New CDS will go onto the clearing platofrm and government bailouts will be used to cover the losses on the approx. 55T left that will take another 3-5 years to unwind.
More data based information for those confused about what climate change means -
'Between 1.5 trillion and 2 trillion tons of ice in Greenland, Antarctica and Alaska have melted at an accelerating rate since 2003, according to NASA scientists, in the latest signs of what they say is global warming.
Using new satellite technology that measures changes in mass in mountain glaciers and ice sheets, NASA geophysicist Scott Luthcke concluded that the losses amounted to enough water to fill the Chesapeake Bay 21 times.
"The ice tells us in a very real way how the climate is changing," said Luthcke, who will present his findings this week at the American Geophysical Union conference in San Francisco, California.
NASA's Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment, or GRACE, mission uses two orbiting satellites to measure the "mass balance" of a glacier, or the net annual difference between ice accumulation and ice loss.'
Sadly, as some posters here point out, the current models of climate change are very poor. Especially since none of those models actually deals with current reality as reflected in observational data. Recognizing, of course, that predicting the future by straight extrapolation is fraught with problems, the current measured melt rate from Greenland alone is roughly one inch every five years.
'In the 1990s, Greenland took in as much snow and water as it let out, Zwally said. But now, about 15 years later, sea levels are rising about 50 percent faster, making the global climate situation even more unpredictable.
"The best estimates are that sea levels will rise about 18 to 36 inches by the end of the century, but because of what's going on and how fast things are changing, there's a lot of uncertainty," he said.'
For example, the fact is Greenland alone would be able to pretty much cover 18 inch rise by 2100 all by itself, if the current melt rate was sustained.
And as for other places? 'GRACE measured that mountain glaciers in the Gulf of Alaska lost about 84 gigatons each year, about five times the average annual flow of the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon, according to NASA.'
There is that term gigaton again - generally, gigatons are the sort of units that actually have usefulness in discussing planetary scale observations.
Personally, I continue to agree with anyone that states that current climatological models are an inadequate basis for policy making, as those models are clearly not able to even accurately predict what can be currently measured.
Gold is the 'ultimate' money, acceptable everywhere.
Take trade for instance, if the dollar goes to heck, other countries might not accept it but they sure will take gold.
Please don't buy gold, already the europeans and asians are stocking up. If the US starts it too, the price will go sky high for sure.
So refrain from making it too expensive for me to accumulate.
Thanks.
It's odd reading this thread. I heard essentially every part of these debates - in some cases almost word for word - pursued among friends and acquaintances in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
I can't say who among them were genuinely astute, who merely fortunate. All were quite intelligent.
Most moved into Treasuries fairly early, then moved the proceeds from the rise in Treasuries into gold and silver. When that market rose sharply, they sold and began laddering their capital into money markets.
They emerged with their working capital intact, and fairly impressive gains, at a time when many were essentially ruined.
The last few decades are a historical anomaly, and anyone basing their perceptions upon it is in for a rude awakening.
This is the same flavor of BS as the Y2K doomsaying.
We are an immensely productive society able to mine the resources, grow the food, and create the goods we need to live well.
We may think we are all poor now but that is only because so much of the national income is going into land values -- to rentiers, either the banks charging interest on our mortgage balances or LLs pocketing rent.
Investment in land value is malinvestment, a deadloss that strips capital from the productive and delivers it to the unproductive. This deadloss is an order of magnitude greater than welfare transer payments -- ~20% of our GDP.
Troy(Unrated) writes: We are an immensely productive society able to mine the resources, grow the food, and create the goods we need to live well.
US Standard of Living * (Population of India + Population of China) = "PINCH POINT, KEEP HANDS AWAY WHEN SYSTEM IN OPERATION! FAILURE TO OBEY SAFETY PROCEDURES MAY CAUSE MUTILATION OR DEATH!"
According to Citco, they are the mother of all hedge fund administrators.
Does Citco stand for "Curaçao International Trust Company"?
Is it coincidental that dutch antilles are considered a tax haven and friendly port for gambling? (Betcha porn too).
Is this why Roland Arnall was awarded his post in Holland? Ameriquest -- we always forget to mention the big pioneers of sub-prime. They blazed a scummy trail long before countrywide.
No wonder the manager NYT contacted at Citco neglected to respond to the emailed questions they themself invited.
Is nyt is putting on a big show. They're not going to really poke the beast until it gets angry are they?
5,000 years of history, a constitution that mandates it and y-o-y gains of +20 for the last 5 years and still the flatearthers fail to see the horizon. Pearls before swine sort of speak
So maybe Madoff was just a trustworthy face for some bad guys after all?
And Rudy Giulliani's company is involved in all the nastiness?
Some horrifying nepotism going on here... Madoff's lieutenant is Frank DiPascali. DiPascali's (painted as a Sopranos type character by Bloomberg) attorney is our u.s. attorney general's son, who happens to work at the Giulliani law firm.
New Hampshire is stopping all jury trials, criminal and civil, for a month, in an effort to contain costs.
19 other states are likely to follow suit...
OT: Story on p1 of the WSJ this morning: "Developers Ask U.S. for Bailout as Massive Debt Looms"
This hope must be what has propped down SRS lately. The CRE folks may get the short straw here though- they don't elicit the same politics as manufacturers or banks and they don't employ that many people. They are often wealthy with many connections, which is clearly their best hope. If they deserve a bailout, then the US has truly socialized everything (at least everything that can be connected to large numbers of connected people).
--
This explains some of the distortions in the employment data. The actual UR in the US, as measured in Germany, is close to 10% now and headed to 15% during 2010.
What sorts of Americans think that we would avoid depression? Economists come to mind, but then when are they known for forecasting depressions and even recessions months ahead of time.
Economists are part of the problems and should not be listened to for solutions, but what choice do Americans have in terms of who runs their country and how.
The salient feature of the current American system is the political impotence of the population. A vote is not a voice. Ask the shareholders! Hence, democracies decades are numbered here as well as elsewhere.
--
"In the Indian subcontinent, gold bracelets are worn in the fields by peasant women who have on their bodies everything of value they own in the world."
rich,
When I went to attend my nephew's wedding in India, last month, all my sisters got gold necklaces and all my nieces got gold chains as gifts. The bride got a platinum coin. 95%+ of my gifts (by for the past 11 years have been gold & platinum.
--
"We are an immensely productive society able to mine the resources, grow the food, and create the goods we need to live well."
Troy,
We WERE a "productive society." Past performance is not a guarantee of future results!
Americans have degraded 'immensely,' both physically as well as intellectually. But much more so morally. Evildoers have been in power for a reason. Our real rulers, BFNYC, are scum. They have sold Americans into economic slavery to the East Asians. Debt slavery has been known and recognized for millennia.
Stop living in the past, please. It may feel good but it aint good.
What does this mean? You prefer National Socialism, communism or some other form of statism? You prefer mass graves to mass folly?
The question is not what you prefer, but what works. If democracy doesn't solve problems that must be solved, because too few people take on the (relatively small) social responsibility required for this to happen, it will be overthrown at some point. Revolutions don't happen through conspiracies and central planning, it happens because enough people are fed up, and when just a spark may ignite a rebellion. Look to Greece.
The outcome, however, will be random. That's rarely a good thing.
I like gold as much as the next woman, but gold strapped on your body is not invested in a productive asset.
Only rich people invest. The poor hold on to it as a store of value.
That said, it would probably be more productive investing(speculating?) in other instruments if you are in the first world.
You don't know Madoff like Christopher Bollyn does.
"While Madoff has said that he acted alone in orchestrating the fraud, this is seen as very unlikely. There was probably a very sophisticated team working on wire transfers to secret bank accounts, perhaps at Israel Discount Bank's Swiss branch, which opened in Switzerland in 2000. (The very building Madoff carried out his fraud from, the so-called "lipstick building" in Manhattan, is itself Israeli owned. Like Bronfman's partner Rubin Schron, Israeli companies have been aggressively acquiring commercial real estate in the United States -- but where does their capital come from? Israel, after all, is a recipient of billions of dollars in financial aid from the U.S. taxpayer every year.)" www.bollyn.info
Pilgrimwrites: \tOT: Story on p1 of the WSJ this morning: "Developers Ask U.S. for Bailout as Massive Debt Looms" Pilgrim | 12.22.08 - 8:12 am | #
Did you notice the full-page "Thank You America" ad from Chrysler that is right next to the end of the article about the developer's bailout request. Nothing like a thank you letter from a private equity firm to brighten my day.
while the private sector is rapidly lowering conpensation w/ salary cuts/bonus cut/cutting days of work, the most wasteful aspect of the economy, the ever bloated govt, seems blithfully ignorant if this and incoming budget mess.
Govt is where massive cuts in salaries & employment needed. The homeland security expenditure/staff meant some sense during credit orgy..not in these times.
--
In connection with my forecast for the future of democracy
"You prefer National Socialism..."
Get over your prejudices before you ask a question, please.
democrats, like most, as quite good at self destruction. And we are almost there.
It is NOT about the label of the system but about the morality of the leaders, or people who are in power. America is being, and has been recently, led by evildoers Greenspan, Bush and Bernanke. No one could have foreseen the current Crisis? And how come the same evildoers who got us there are still in power?
I am sure that we could do better under a different system. Democracy has turned into demon-o-cracy!
In a Volatile Market, Consider Options "As a conservative investor, I sell calls only on shares I own (a strategy known as selling "covered" calls). But selling puts doesn't require owning shares, since your loss is capped at the strike price minus the proceeds of the sale, should you be required to buy when the stock is worthless.Until the stars recently aligned in this highly unusual market, I've rarely bothered to sell puts. I've had much better luck selling calls, as I've often reported. If the stock price doesn't reach the strike price, you just keep the cash and the shares, as I have on numerous occasions. But with the prices of options so high, my interest in selling puts has been renewed.........Among a bevy of alternatives, I sold puts on J.P. Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo and, a bit further out on the risk curve, Morgan Stanley. I sold $25 J.P. Morgan puts for $8.45 and $10 Morgan Stanley puts for $3.40, both expiring in January 2010, and $27.50 Wells Fargo puts for $9.20, expiring January 2011. (You can also sell much shorter-term options, though the premiums are generally lower.) The cash is now in my account, and it's more than enough to pay for all my Christmas shopping..........I recommend this only for investors comfortable with a degree of risk. But from my point of view, this is a rare opportunity to make money instead of complaining how bad everything is.
Gold fanatics as well Jas's kith & kin forget that their GOLD investments since early 80s is pretty much under water. Much more so inflation adjusted. So much for store of value.
OT, but the AP has an article titled "Where'd the bailout money go? Shhhh, it's a secret": -- RIPT language="JavaScript" type="text/javascript">document.write('<a HREF="http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=14s3ff559/M=714796.13145121.13334510.1383221/D=fin/S=8988914:LREC/Y=YAHOO/EXP=1229961272/L=pBlDAUSOxCavuwmbMBxhaQF.Rnucm0lPnBgAAePi/B=Jkl3bNG_Ru8-/J=1229954072263148/A=5580127/R=1/SIG=1289jr4kc/http://clk.atdmt.com/NMK/go/127993192/direct/01/?time=1229954072263148" target="_blank"><img src="http://view.atdmt.com/NMK/view/127993192/direct/01/?time=1229954072263148"/></a>');</script><noscript><a HREF="http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=14s3ff559/M=714796.13145121.13334510.1383221/D=fin/S=8988914:LREC/Y=YAHOO/EXP=1229961272/L=pBlDAUSOxCavuwmbMBxhaQF.Rnucm0lPnBgAAePi/B=Jkl3bNG_Ru8-/J=1229954072263148/A=5580127/R=2/SIG=1289jr4kc/http://clk.atdmt.com/NMK/go/127993192/direct/01/?time=1229954072263148" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://view.atdmt.com/NMK/view/127993192/direct/01/?time=1229954072263148" /></a></noscript> if(window.yzq_d==null)window.yzq_d=new Object(); window.yzq_d['Jkl3bNG_Ru8-']='&U=13f50gb7c%2fN%3dJkl3bNG_Ru8-%2fC%3d714796.13145121.13334510.1383221%2fD%3dLREC%2fB%3d5580127%2fV%3d1'; "We've lent some of it. We've not lent some of it. We've not given any accounting of, 'Here's how we're doing it,'" said Thomas Kelly, a spokesman for JPMorgan Chase, which received $25 billion in emergency bailout money. "We have not disclosed that to the public. We're declining to." ... "It is entirely appropriate for the American people to know how their taxpayer dollars are being spent in private industry," said Elizabeth Warren, the top congressional watchdog overseeing the financial bailout.But, at least for now, there's no way for taxpayers to find that out.Pressured by the Bush administration to approve the money quickly, Congress attached nearly no strings on the $700 billion bailout in October. And the Treasury Department, which doles out the money, never asked banks how it would be spent.-- Hoocoodanode? The Treasury has been looted, AGAIN.
Many of the jewish 'charities' supported by Madoff and his prominent Jewish investors funded the illegal Settler Movement in the Israeli occupied territories of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem.
It is remarkable that tax exemptions in the US may end up channelling massive funding to an illegal movement officially condemned by the State Department and the international community.
The unintended irony is that by stealing the funding from the settler movement, Madoff may have placed himself as a top candidate for the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize.
Try this again. Sorry for the thread pollution above.
OT, but the AP has an article titled "Where'd the bailout money go? Shhhh, it's a secret":
"We've lent some of it. We've not lent some of it. We've not given any accounting of, 'Here's how we're doing it,'" said Thomas Kelly, a spokesman for JPMorgan Chase, which received $25 billion in emergency bailout money. "We have not disclosed that to the public. We're declining to."
...
"It is entirely appropriate for the American people to know how their taxpayer dollars are being spent in private industry," said Elizabeth Warren, the top congressional watchdog overseeing the financial bailout.But, at least for now, there's no way for taxpayers to find that out.Pressured by the Bush administration to approve the money quickly, Congress attached nearly no strings on the $700 billion bailout in October. And the Treasury Department, which doles out the money, never asked banks how it would be spent.
Hoocoodanode? The Treasury has been looted, AGAIN.
Anonymous writes: That bounce was just that a bounce, decline continues
Baltic Dry Index (BDI) -17 801
It seems to be bobbing around 800.
Baltic Dry is going to reflect drydockings and scrappings more than traffic soon.
Alan Greenspend or Fair Economist or someone has a pointer to a docked capesize table that you might find useful.
The low trade traffic continued for this relatively long period is going to start to poke through soon. This is like the crashing fuel price -- it suggests to me that the real economy is quite dead.
Gold fanatics as well Jas's kith & kin forget that their GOLD investments since early 80s is pretty much under water. Much more so inflation adjusted. So much for store of value.
...If the sacrifices look as though they are going to continue for many months, he said, some workers will grow frustrated, want their full compensation back and may well prefer a layoff that creates a new permanence...
Um, somehow I don't think so, especially this time around. I've been through waves of layoffs before and the first thing they usually do is cut to 4-day workweeks, freeze pay raises, etc., just like the article mentions. But most people hang around. The only ones that leave are typically the younger ones with in demand skills that can be transferred to another industry that is currently unaffected by the current slump. This time, nearly EVERYBODY is going to be looking to prune. I don't think workers are going to "prefer a layoff that creates a new permanence". LOL
In this context, it is noteworthy that the German central bank holds the second-largest reserves of gold in the world. During the first quarter of 1999, at the same time the euro was launched, Germany bought up huge reserves of gold. Enough, according to the Economic Intelligence Review, to back an entire currency (March 2000). In addition, when the 11 nations joined the euro, they signed over their gold reserves to the European Central Bank, in Frankfurt, Germany. Read this Trumpet story from 2002 that poses one possible outcome to a eurozone crisis. Who Will Stop the Greece Fires? | Economy | theTrumpet.com by the Philadelphia Church of God
"We've lent some of it. We've not lent some of it. We've not given any accounting of, 'Here's how we're doing it,'" said Thomas Kelly, a spokesman for JPMorgan Chase, which received $25 billion in emergency bailout money. "We have not disclosed that to the public. We're declining to."
And why can't you mind your own business? And why do you seem to have problem ignoring/skipping my comments? They are not intended for people like you.
All I can say is "No thanks" with respect to selling long dated volatility (Jan 2010 and Jan 2011 options). I'd much rather be a buyer (like you appear to be) of vol for longer time frames than a seller. Theta is mo' bettah on short term options.
Anyone thinking of selling long dated options needs to do a simple calc - take premium received and divide it by days until expiration to get income/day. Compare it to a 3 month option.
I am sure that we could do better under a different system. Democracy has turned into demon-o-cracy!
Jas
Jas Jain | Homepage | 12.22.08 - 9:02 am
LOL. All systems have the same problem. They are run by people. People, in general, are arrogant, greedy, and look out for themselves. The only difference in types of systems is how efficient they are and how well the check peoples' natural inclanations.
WE are in basic agreement. B&BAD believe that we have found the secret -- the best political system. Even if a system starts good it can be turned into the worst over time. It is about the character, or ethics, of the leaders that the system brings to the top.
We have managed to have the worst with real behind-the-scenes power -- BFNYC.
Whether we like it or not we have to build up our savings as a country. How does one build up savings in something that needs to be devalued. No matter what the average cititzen chooses the state will migrate to it like a mosquito to a July 4th barbecue. The state's interest will be paramount.
U,.S. staffing services company Manpower withdrew its fourth-quarter profit forecast Monday, saying demand for temporary workers had been light in December as a spreading global recession prompted U.S. industrial firms to idle plants to cut costs. "Demand for our services will be especially weak in December as we are hearing that many of our light industrial clients are taking prolonged plant shutdowns around the holidays compared to last year," said Jeffrey Joerres, chief executive of the world's No. 2 staffing company.
It is becoming glaringly obvious that many investment banks and the SEC knew for years that Madoff was not operating on the level. Also obvious is the unwillingness of the Treasury and of major banks in accounting for the absolutely massive amounts of 'bailout' money. The sense is slowly forming, I think, that there is something really fundamentally messed up at the core. I have a feeling there are bigger revelations coming than we have seen so far and I think investigations - once they begin - will go on for many years.
its all about those other balance sheets.i said that he(madoff) was like a one man lehman bros. ill take that back hes like a one man bearsterns. come on guys fess up and lets get this thing doing.
got a short attention span and im dreaming about it now. got to know what the "que sera sera."
picking up from another thread - that story about Great American Insurance...
if they are based out of Cincinnati then I am related in law to the owner Carl Lindner. His son married a cousin of mine who was a Doublemint girl on TV.
Not that it did me much good. Some years ago I was trying to finance a very small indy picture in NYC and couldn't get a nickel out of 'em.
Guess investing in race horses makes more sense.
He also owns Chiquita. You may remember all that Costa Rica stuff.
Again, I would never trade anything of real value for a shiny yellow metal that carries no real value in today's economy...people like me are unlikely to cover your gold bets going forward.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 1:28 am | #
nothing caries "real" value
all value is relative...relative to other goods and relative to the situation
apples falling from the tree are worth less in the middle of a sea of orchard trees in september
gold is insurance...under certain circumstances its wise to have more
10:04 a.m. [CAT] Caterpillar suspends merit pay increases, freezes hiring 10:03 a.m. [CAT] Caterpillar to cut other positions pay by up to 15% 10:03 a.m. [CAT] Caterpillar to cut senior manager pay by 5%-35%
I am simply pointing out the giant gulf, bigger than the Grand Canyon, between the theory and the practice of the American econo-political system.
We are not talking about nothing is perfect. We are talking about wholesale corruption that brings evildoers to the top of economic and political power. What limits of power are there for evildoers like Bernanke? Emergency!, Emergency!!, Cries the evildoer. What emergency?
No "innocent bystanders" allowed.
You lived here for past 20 years,
participated in a corrupt system and
now you cry wolf.
Better you should have stood up 40
years ago as others did and said "no".
No, Jas. You forgot about Stalin's forced starvation of Ukranians, and the massive Soviet gulag, and the hundred million poeple worldwide who perished by violence because of the poisonous doctrines of Communism. The plutocrats in the US may have stolen lots of money, but they didn't do all of that bad stuff.
Since we are becoming a banana republic, perhaps it might be edifying to read up on the history of the manufacture of demand for bananas... and why only one type of banana is generally available in the U.S. (It's not because Americans prefer them...)
More than 1 million jobs cuts seen in 2009: Challenger WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- The labor market faces persistent weakness in 2009, with more than 1 million jobs cuts expected due to weak spending among consumers and businesses, according to a Monday report from Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. "It will take time for any stimulus measures to work their way through the economy," said John Challenger, chief executive of the outplacement firm. "Even if the measures work, it could take several more months for consumers and corporate America to regain confidence and begin spending again." He added that construction could get an "immediate boost" from Obama's infrastructure plans.
"It is becoming glaringly obvious that many investment banks and the SEC knew for years that Madoff was not operating on the level. Also obvious is the unwillingness of the Treasury and of major banks in accounting for the absolutely massive amounts of 'bailout' money. The sense is slowly forming, I think, that there is something really fundamentally messed up at the core. I have a feeling there are bigger revelations coming than we have seen so far and I think investigations - once they begin - will go on for many years."
Again, the fundamental problem is not financial, it's moral.
Speaking of the CPSU (and that system was truly amoral and dysfunctional), it occurred to me this morning that anyone who told those authorities that what he had done with state funds was none of anyone's business - if he dared - could find himself working in a gold mine at fifty below on 1200 calories a day. But he wouldn't dare.
Some historians are not so sure the plutocrats were so benign, El Cliffo. Some estimate that demographic effect of the Great Depression may have led to millions of premature deaths.
Here's a polemic example:
"First, if you believe American statistics, in the 10 years from 1931 to 1940, 8,553,000 people were lost. And what is interesting is that the numbers of increase in population change at one point by 2 times - exactly at the border between 1930/31. They fall and freeze at this level for 10 years. And just as suddenly, a decade later, they climb back up. No explanation for this is found in the extensive report of the US Department of commerces Statistical Abstract of the United States. Even thought it is full of comments on other less significant issues."
Pavel Chichikov writes: Again, the fundamental problem is not financial, it's moral.
I think blaming it on immorality presumes that there was once a moral forebear or underpinning from whence the current milieu descended.
Probably better to lay it at the feet of lack of effective administrative method. It's about vested interests, once you bring good and evil or morality and immorality in, you're going to be dragging into taking sides in a dispute without right or wrong.
And how would you know if the plutocrats of London and NYC were behind lot of killings during 1850-1950?
Jas, are you saying that those rascally plutocrats were beind Jack the Ripper and the Mad Bomber of 1950s New York? The burden of proof is on you. And why do you always say that the plutocrats live only in New York and London? Is there some kind of conspiratorial theory involved there that you borrowed from your fellow nutjob, Larouche?
Question is this--will Republicans keep insisting on perpetual tax cuts and slashing any gov. programs that help the poor, children, and the elderly?
Really, I'd like to send about one third of our population to Iraq. Let God sort them out.
What we are seeing is the result of corporate brainwashing and 24/7 propaganda--aimed at the bottom 50%. The working class has no defense in the face of the rapacious corporate state and the cynical part of the population that are adjuncts to pure thuggery.
So many of your ethically retarded slugs swallowed the gospel that 'greed is good' and that human solidarity and epathy were degenerate impulses.
I can see you now with your Ayn Rand books, pimping this pathological crap on your kids (who will grow up truncated human beings--incapable of anything other than pathetic sluggery).
Chicken hawks and slugs.
Stuff your pockets and plot your escape. Welcome to lumpen prole hell.
--
There has been a seismic shift in American system under Reagan after Greenspan was first appointed to head the Council of Economic Advisors and later to the Fed Chairman after forcing out Paul Volcker.
Volcker had the ethics of Junkers and Greenspan those of BFNYC, where deception and manipulation are the prized skills.
Volcker served the American People. Greenspan was NOT working for the American People but for BFNYC and himself. Era of the Evildoers had begun. Please read Greenspans Fraud by Ravi Batra! (I am not a big Batra fan, but his facts on Greenspan are correct).
"It's about vested interests, once you bring good and evil or morality and immorality in, you're going to be dragging into taking sides in a dispute without right or wrong."
From my viewpoint as a Christian - and I think most people of other faiths, and atheists, would also take this point of view - there are fundamental standards of morality. It goes without saying that ethical and effective administrative standards are important. Without a moral underpinning there is no guarantee that anyone will adhere to them. Without moral axioms the only normative standard is terror. You don't want to live in a country in which terror is applied to the populace.
earlier thread on commercial re wanting bailout is the cherry on top of this paulsonsundae..they have too save them becse his pigmen buddies financed all those empty boxes making waste of a now empty land..this is like stripmining without backfilling in and replanting...
U2 would be smart to release album right now as people need some inrock that binds not splits up...
We'll scorch the earth
Set fire to the sky
We stoop so low to reach so high
A link is lost
The chain undone
We wait all day
For night to come
And it comes
Like a hunter child
" it is not my fault. I am merely an observer and a commentator/critic."
If you live here and claim to be a citizen, then you are a particpant. Since you also call yourself an investor and a speculator, then you have been an eager participant.
From my viewpoint as a Christian - and I think most people of other faiths, and atheists, would also take this point of view - there are fundamental standards of morality.
If it applies to everyone, then your status as a christian has absolutely nothing to do with it. Why not say, "From my viewpoint as a nonsociopath"?
Jas Jain--and you will note that Greenspan is an acolyte of Ayn Rand.
What a diseased ideology--and it has run the economy into the ground. Pathetic.
Jeez, when we see rednecks looting Walmarts that will be a sign that people have woke up.
eff 'peace on earth', we need to tar and feather anti-union corporate rapists. Instead Madoff is smirking on Park Avenue, and worthless yuppies are asking for the man's autograph.
Without a moral underpinning there is no guarantee that anyone will adhere to them. Without moral axioms the only normative standard is terror.
Ultimately, at least when enforcing your mechanism, you have to enforce with terror.
Morality prevents the problems before they happen. Once the deed is done, it's left to terror to make examples.
You don't want to live in a country in which terror is applied to the populace.
I definitely want to live in one where terror is applied to the bureaucracy and the vested interests that control them. I live in one now where it is entirely absent and this is definitely not working.
I don't think that good and bad are irrelevant, they're just not relevant to this case. It's people squabbling over resources. They all have perfectly reasonable things to do with them -- raw survival in many cases.
The system is just not able to say no to them -- it is killing our society with kindness because benevolence as a fig leaf is quite evidently a very rewarding avenue for gaming.
mal - thanks for the post on bananas...
over here in Cambodia they are much different - green and and far tastier, whereas the Vietnamese prefer a yellow pygmy variety of sorts...
have no idea the effort I've expended trying to teach the locals in the banana market that classic, "hey mister tally man..."
The salient feature of the current American system is the political impotence of the population. A vote is not a voice. Ask the shareholders! Hence, democracies decades are numbered here as well as elsewhere.
What have you done to Jas Jain!
Jas, your posts these last few days have been really lucid and insightful. Whatever you're eating for breakfast, keep it up.
I'm more scared of Conjure's Bond Clock than his Depression Clock. Depressions are severe dislocations of the economy. Defaults are failures of the system. Depressions are the equivalent of broken bones, defaults are akin to amputations. That said the real danger of defaults is that it isolates countries and regions. It is in those places that Pol Pots and Talibans and all the genocide in Africa gain ascendency. Approve or not a bond default world prevent the US from staying in Afganistan/Pakistan for but one instance of a scary consequence that people haven't even considered yet.
"And why do you feel this desperate need to lie, you hatemonger?"
You have written in the past, in replying to me, that you only discuss America. I won't bother to spend the couple of minutes to find the quote (quotes, actually) from a couple of months back, since even if I posted it here, you would go off on some tangent saying how hatemongers or racists (you do remember talking about racism, right?) or crooks or gangsters or born and bred dopes or whatever would be luckier to be slaves. 'LUCKY SLAVES' - makes me wonder what you know about slavery, as practiced where I grew up - not much, to be charitable.
I really should stop - most people ignore you, even when you have an observation or data worth discussing.
fromm the previous thread :
flaminia writes:
...The German auto industry is one of the most seriously overbuilt and too many of their products are aimed at the premium market...
And overpriced too ! Quality seems to have slipped from top notch levels too (e.g. Mercedes, but hey, americans don't know that). It works in Germany, since strangely Germans seem to assume that only they can build decent cars and are prepared to pay a lot. Germanys industry is by far to much car-dominated and will be IMHO in for a rude awakening. Before the "subprime crisis" I would have estimated that to occur in 10 - 15 years or so, but with the current situation it probably comes much earlier.
And then ? Europe has goofed up the computer industry. Will it also (with cars gone) goof up future industries ?
I've convinced my neighbor of the impending reality. He is giving all of his extended family bulk rice and piggy banks for xmas. I have one day to work on him about the squirrel recipes.
I'm still wrapping my head around the fact that the 2nd largest economy in the world had their exports drop by 27%. That frightens me. Good thing our markets don't reflect reality or that would be really troubling.
"Warning: A dangerous new virus, FIV, is rapidly spreading the globe. . .Scientists have dubbed the disease, FIV, the Fiscal Insanity Virus. . . The primary symptom of FIV is irrational, often delusional fear of deflation. The virus has an uncanny ability to seek victims in positions of authority."
"Scientists in 33 countries studying the disease have uncovered similar patterns in the DNA of every victim. To date, every person afflicted with FIV has been found to have one of two distinct Marker Chromosomes now identified as the K-Marker (Keynesian-Marker), or the M-Marker (Monetarist-Marker). . . "
"A hair sample taken from economist Paul Krugman, professor of Economics and International Affairs at Princeton University, and Op-Ed writer for the New York Times shows an unusual pattern of multiple repetitive K-Markers."
furst
Underemployment doesn't count as unemployment, remember. Using our current statistics, starving railroad hobos who performed a day's work in each stopover town to get shelter and public relief amenities food would count as employed.
brother can you spare a dime
Is the 2nd half recovery for 2009 still on...?
Ack... still haven't caught up on the other threads! Oh well... always good insights and banter around here no matter the thread.
Sorry, I meant my earlier comment to refer to the railroad hobos from the great depression.
Major Ca city already in a depression (per Professor Delong's definition):
Bakersfield Bubble
When I buy gold, I trade dollars for gold. So, I'm not just looking at what might happen with gold but also the dollar. A few months from now, I think the dollar will be at least 15% lower against the euro and yen.
Do people who think gold is going to tank also think the dollar will tank? Or are they betting on a strong dollar? One of the biggest factors in the commodity collapse was the stronger dollar. I believe commodities will come back if the dollar collapses.
LOL crispy, I'm thinking that's cancelled..Instead we will see a re-run of the "Grapes of Wrath", it's a classic after all...
Nice chart...it blows through the other slowdowns (73-74, 82-83 and 91-92)
Glod has no real value...except to speculators...
When the depression starts, the formerly wealthy will use their gold as an anchor as they jump into their local lake...just saying
I'm full time at CR!
FFDIC writes:
I'm full time at CR!
FFDIC | 12.21.08 - 11:33 pm | #
yeah, but the pay really sucks!
Biggest misconception out there is that gold isn't good in deflation. You can see that here on this board.
"At the Pretech Corporation, a concrete manufacturer in Kansas City, Kan., that has not had a layoff in 15 years, part of the rationale is pride. To keep the perfect track record, the company has cut overtime, traded a $5,000 holiday party for an employee-only barbecue lunch"
I wonder what they bbq'd...squirrel meat
crispy&cole(Unrated) writes:
\tGlod has no real value...except to speculators...You're entitled to your personal view. But a billion people in China and a billion more in India would not agree with you.
\t
c&c was just stating the fact that we're all speculators.
Anon - millions of people in this country bought houses they could never afford and now they have been f/c'd...I would never buy an argument based on the actions of the sheeple
Is the 2nd half recovery for 2009 still on...?
crispy&cole | Homepage | 12.21.08 - 11:27 pm | #
Yeah, I think the DOW might get back up to 5,000
If only we could get Bernanke, Paulson, Bush, Palosi, Feinstein, Boxer, Frank and Christopher Cox to take an unpaid vacation.
"starving railroad hobos who performed a day's work in each stopover town to get shelter and public relief amenities food would count as employed."
If they are getting public relief amenities food are they really starving?
Personally I like hobos they are kind of like us bums. Free. They move around too much I'll stick with being a bum me thinks.
But a billion people in China and a billion more in India would not agree with you.
Anonymous | 12.21.08 - 11:39 pm | #
So a billion people in china and a billion people in India own glod?
they are better off than I thought.
Gold doesn't taste that good either.
The only thing glod tastes good in is:
Goldschläger - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Am I the only that realized Madoff's exposure as a Ponzi Scam artist is a microcosm to NASDAQ's exposure as a ponzi sceme?
"Glod has no real value...except to speculators..."
ha!
i guess the world's central banks must be the biggest speculators
I think I might like the new america where people work less and save more.
What's with all these graphs going parabolic? How can so many things be breaking at once?
We better paper this over. Quick.
i guess the world's central banks must be the biggest speculators
Anonymous
Was there ever any doubt?
i guess the world's central banks must be the biggest speculators
~~~~
Yep, biggest Ponzi Scheme going ...
Republicans are TRAITORS writes:
Am I the only that realized Madoff's exposure as a Ponzi Scam artist is a microcosm to NASDAQ's exposure as a ponzi sceme?
Republicans are TRAITORS | 12.21.08 - 11:45 pm | #
No...the Naz is still down 70% from its all time high (which it will never see again in my lifetime).
Giving stock options via share buy backs was the biggest scam of all the nasdaq companies
ha!
i guess the world's central banks must be the biggest speculators
Anonymous | 12.21.08 - 11:46 pm | #
They certainly are. Now they are betting trillions of dollars of our future labor/productivity on the financial institutions that got us into this mess.
i guess the world's central banks must be the biggest speculators
Anonymous | 12.21.08 - 11:46 pm | #
LMAO!!!
Fuji Electric misses the part-time memo and goes right to the layoffs:
Fuji Electric to cut 2,000 part-time jobs by Sept. 30 - MarketWatch
Can't eat greenbacks either.
But you can burn 'em.
I better convert my coin back into paper while there's still time.
Firm Built on Madoff Ties Faces Tough Questions
Firm Built on Ties to Madoff Now Faces Tough Questions - NY Times
My gut feel...
Rock bottom will be:
25% unemployed / not looking
25% underemployed (given qualifications and minimum net income to break the poverty barrier)
50% employed and above poverty
So what pops the last bubble (belief in Obamarama and the US Govt. ability to stop deflation)?
My guess.. A Million family march on Washington..
WE'RE HUNGRY!! WE'RE HOMELESS!! HELP US OBAMA!!
C&C,
When I was thinking of the link between Madoff and NASDAQ (he sat on the board), I was thinking of NASDAQ's collapse. I agree, we will NEVER see NASDAQ 5k, again. That's kind of my point. I think a few quality companies got wrapped into a giant NASDAQ ponzi. Those companies are still left. But in 2001, there were a lot of companies that were an illusion, just like investing in Madoff's Ponzi.
Longwaver,
Sounds about right, except the million families marching on Washington will be armed.
Damn shirkers need to be layed off...
Arbeit Macht Frei! So says our future Caesars.
Labor bubble on deck.
ross: no, they won't be armed.
2d Amendment curtailment is very high priority for incoming administration.
Can't eat greenbacks either.
But you can burn 'em.
I better convert my coin back into paper while there's still time.
Chill Bear & the Vintage Volvo | 12.21.08 - 11:54 pm | #
Growing something edible might be another solution.
Also, I think lower value metals will be more useful than glod for purchasing food and services. If the S
REALLY HTF.
Glod is the domain/game of the super wealthy and they will win your glod at any cost.
Labor bubble on deck.
Rob Dawg | Homepage | 12.22.08 - 12:00 am | #
It's a monster, too.
Underemployment doesn't count as unemployment, remember.
Hoopajoops, LTD | Homepage | 12.21.08 - 11:26 pm | #
Two kinds of 'underemployment' too:
1. Working fewer hours
2. Working & earning below your full potential & desired skill level
Both suck if they aren't 'voluntary'.
BTW, for those of you who insist that gold is somehow not a real store of value, please see the list of ISO currency codes contained in this link:
ISO 4217 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
You will observe that not just gold but also silver, platinum and palladium are assigned international currency codes.
In this day and age of shameless currency and general market manipulation, why wouldn't people - wealthy or not - choose to allocate a certain portion of their savings in a (more) objective store of value?
Cheers and good luck!
ticker:
I'll be picking up another bag or two of dimes most likely as well. Cheap insurance.
Brass and lead are looking more precious on a daily basis.
Can't grow food where I'm at right now. Not real happy about that.
.
not only do home owners in trouble get less pay, part of the tax benefit they factored in long ago, gets a haircut
Likely that many of them will be armed... Assuming that many of these folks are newly homeless and given gun ownership rates for homeowners...
Also to give some perspective... The federal government is nowhere near as powerful as the US consumer.
$13.4B to GM and Chryco.. well $13.4B / $25K = 536,000 cars... My "back o' the napkin" math says that 500K cars is about the MONTHLY auto sales that we've experienced so far...
So maybe that needs to be a monthly wire transfer...
Cause not a single job is saved unless they actually BUILD those cars...
2d Amendment curtailment is very high priority for incoming administration.
Chill Bear & the Vintage Volvo | 12.22.08 - 12:00 am | #
That'll start a civil war faster than hunger.
anon: coin palladium is unavailable from dealers I know about. Haven't checked ebay. Would love to have a tube of 1/2 ounce palladium coin.
The thing about pm in general and gold in particular is that they are pretty much "worthless" investments, until they're not. Then it's too late.
I'll concede that gold will always maintain it's "real" quality since it is irreducible.
However, in times of great unrest, bread is more liquid by orders of magnitude.
BTW- What was the price of gold during the "Terror" (French Revolution)?
Starve the population for awhile and then trade guns and ammo for food. No way? Already a tried and true method...
Calif. residents trade guns for groceries - Crime & courts- msnbc.com
hong konger:
If we go mad max, it will be the 4Bs: beans, bullets, booze and bullion.
Gold is a ware. What's wrong with that?
Ever try to store hog jowls?
Growing something edible might be another solution
I'm already growing something edible... in Washington D.C.
The trick is harvesting it.
.
when we go mad max can i just trade a share of GLD? it's the same right?
Gold will be used as an exchange medium again. What will piss people off is the rate of return they'll get for that gold. Investing in highly lucrative barter items will be smarter then buying gold.
The grocery store has no food, the generator has no gas and the flashlight is out of batteries. Sure I will trade with you. 2 ounces of gold will buy you a weeks worth of each. Of course the trade will only happen if the guy with life sustaining commodities actually has a surplus.
We have lived through a time of unprecedented affluence, and we have seen it as normal, and told ourselves we deserved all of it, that we are entitled to what it has given us. But it's over, and it will be no more, nor will it ever return in our lifetimes. If we are to live in a functioning society in the years to come, we will have to share much of our riches, and we will have to find out how to be fulfilled with much less material wealth. If we don't, our societies will collapse, and we will lose that wealth regardless. But looking around me, I see little hope that we will do all these things before it's too late. It you don't volunteer to share, the difference in wealth between you and your own childrens generation will become so glaring that they will come and take it away from you.
Even with all the dislocations in the market gold still hasn't taken off recently ... at least in dollar terms.
What if anything will drive gold to new levels ?
CEO bonus^h^h^h^h^h retention payment time.
Ok, there's really only one data series that matters right about now: USTs loookit the curves! Two year saddle!??
\tCOUPON\tMATURITY
DATE\tCURRENT
PRICE/YIELD\tPRICE/YIELD
CHANGE\tTIME
3-MONTH\t0.000\t03/19/2009\t-0.01 / -.01\t-0.009 / N.A.\t12/19
6-MONTH\t0.000\t06/18/2009\t0.12 / .13\t-0.01 / -.010\t23:00
12-MONTH\t0.000\t12/17/2009\t0.38 / .38\t0.002 / .002\t23:00
2-YEAR\t1.250\t11/30/2010\t100-27 / .81\t-0-04+ / .072\t23:36
C
CR's NYT article- "...unpaid vacations and voluntary or enforced furloughs, along with wage freezes, pension cuts..."
The above are examples of deflation's pernicious effects on incomes.
Earlier today, I linked to an article summarizing Bloomberg's interview with Bank of Israel Governor Stanley Fischer, Ben Bernanke's adviser at MIT.
Here is the link to a video of that interview. It is most revealing, particularly his remarks about the US economy. Put on your seatbelts.
Bloomberg News
Adornosghost | 12.22.08 - 12:12 am
The Automatic Earth ... great blog ...
What if anything will drive gold to new levels ?
mmckinl | 12.22.08 - 12:13 am | #
Fear. PMs move inversely to political & economic instability, which is why it does well in both deflationary and high inflationary times, because those are symptoms of instability.
You will observe that not just gold but also silver, platinum and palladium are assigned international currency codes.
How's that $2200 platinum worked out for you there sport? As a store of value?
What will piss people off is the rate of return they'll get for that gold. Investing in highly lucrative barter items will be smarter then buying gold.
Jacked | 12.22.08 - 12:12 am | #
History says otherwise.
Jacked,
It will be too late to "buy" gold, or any coin then.
If we get to where prices for food and fuel are ounce of gold per week, it's pretty much game over. We'll be seeing mass starvation in the city, and what used to be called "brigandry" in the country. Half would die. At least.
The above are examples of deflation's pernicious effects on incomes.
mp
~~~~
Just wait until the effect on 50 trillion of U.S. aggregate debt ...
Chill Bear & the Vintage Volvo writes:
ticker:
I'll be picking up another bag or two of dimes most likely as well. Cheap insurance.
Brass and lead are looking more precious on a daily basis.
Can't grow food where I'm at right now. Not real happy about that.
Man I love those old mercury dimes. One of my favorite american coins.
As for not being able to grow your own food. Where there is a will there is a way:
YouTube - pakuataichi Channel
YouTube - Permaculture in Action - Greening The Desert
YouTube - AeroGarden Indoor Herbs
after reading adornosghost, i now agree we should just kick the can down the road
How's that $2200 platinum worked out for you there sport? As a store of value?
Considerably better than FNM, FRE or CA real estate.
How's that CALPERS retirement plan?
Fear ?
And there hasn't been any fear so far ?
Not anything close to what's coming.
mmicknl:
no, there hasn't really been real fear yet. We're nowhere near what it was like in the rust belt in the 70s.
How's that CALPERS retirement plan?
Broward Horne
Did you read about the 103% loss in the real estate portfolio? Turns out they borrowed to leverage the investment.
Buy land ... they ain't making any more of it .
~~`
Did you read about the 103% loss in the real estate portfolio? Turns out they borrowed to leverage the investment.
fear = spending
that's good right?
"How's that $2200 platinum worked out for you there sport? As a store of value?"
I am merely pointing out that PMs have ISO currency codes for those that aren't aware. So does the Zimbabwe dollar. Clearly, the PMs that are heavily used in industry are not doing well in USD terms.
Gold is up modestly YTD in USD though, no small feat this year.
Cheers
Thanks for the video link mp, he doesn't seem like a very happy fella...
Did you read about the 103% loss in the real estate portfolio? Turns out they borrowed to leverage the investment
Yes, I saw it, I'm not surprised.
Past a certain size, it becomes impossible to earn "above average" returns without playing games because you are, by definition, "average".
I have to admit, I didn't anticipate such a large commodities blowout. I expected PMs to drop in tandem with other things but was hoping they'd drop less than average.
Fresno Unemployment rate - 12.1%
source:
http://www.fresnobee.com/business/story/1088375.html
I asked myself what I wanted to trade my dollar wealth for during these times of abundance. The answer was a garage full of items that will keep me and mine alive.
Worse case scenario, which is what you should plan for, tells me a garage full of gold will be worth less and involve actually trading and transporting the new goods I bought with my shiny metal during unrest.
The shiny metal will also be pegged against what in a world gone bad? Will there be a central organization that will set the value of gold?
History says that I'm wrong? Please provide a better argument or links to support the one line proclamation.
Buy land ... they ain't making any more of it .
My favorite example of a great land investment:
Kansas farmland. Still down 90% (real terms) from its peak in the 1880's.
19th Century Kansas Farmland Prices by Bill Bonner
Ecuador CDS Settlement
18 December - The International Swaps and Derivatives Association (Isda) is drawing up a settlement protocol for credit default swaps (CDS) based on the sovereign debt of Ecuador, which refused to make a $30.6 million scheduled interest payment last week. \t\t\t\tThe settlement protocol will be Isda's first on a sovereign underlying. Ecuador last defaulted on its debt in 1999, before the development of a liquid CDS market. The payment was originally due a month ago, but Ecuador announced on November 14 that it would delay paying by 30 days while it investigated the legality of the $1.25 billion worth of 2012 bonds. Ecuadorean president Rafael Correa said on December 12 that the debt was "immoral and illegitimate" and that he was prepared to face creditors in court. The 2012 bonds are now trading at 20 cents on the dollar â they dropped from 41.175 to 26.5 when the first payment delay was announced. Ecuador's credit rating was cut to CCCâ from Bâ by Standard & Poor's last month â the agency cut its rating to "selective default" after last week's announcement. On December 15, finance minister Elsa Viteri said the country would also default on its 2015 bonds. Even before taking office in January last year, Correa had suggested a default was possible, saying much of the country's foreign debt was illegitimate. In February 2007 the finance ministry warned it would delay a scheduled payment of $135 million on its 2030 bonds, before reversing itself and making the payment on time two days later. CDS writers face heavy losses as a result of the default, as recovery rates are expected to be low, said Alessandra Alecci, a senior analyst in Moody's sovereign risk group in New York. "We expect negotiations with bondholders to be complicated and drawn out, with bondholder participation in an exchange perhaps limited by the country's solvency and its unclear grounds for default," Alecci said, predicting long negotiations with the country's government over recovery. Unlike the 1999 default, she added, there was no strong economic or fiscal case for the default â Ecuador is an oil exporter with a relatively strong economy and low debt levels.
Kristina, he may work for Bank of Israel, but Stanley Fischer is one of the smartest central bankers on this planet.
Fresno Unemployment rate - 12.1%
~~~~
SF unemployment rate is always low, When you lose your job in SF ya gotta move out ...
After reading Adornosghost I'd just like to remind everyone abt access to weapons in the defense of the republic.
Make yr own decisions.
I can't advise any further, as am a furriner. It's over to you folks.
C
Bernanke's Doctoral Advisor
Bloomberg News
We know how to finance inflation...er..ah
Jacked,
If you're really that serious, you should be on 200 acres south of Chillicothe. The land is flat and farmable, and the glacial aquifer has industrial size reserves, huge, and untapped.
Will there be a central organization that will set the value of gold?
Jacked | 12.22.08 - 12:25 am | #
Totally emblematic of your backward thinking. Gold is the one thing that doesn't require a central organization to set it's value.
Republicans are TRAITORS writes:
If only we could get Bernanke, Paulson, Bush, Palosi, Feinstein, Boxer, Frank and Christopher Cox to take an unpaid vacation.
Republicans are TRAITORS | 12.21.08 - 11:43 pm |
RaT=Repukes=Akubi=Akira=Labdog=ProjectScobyDo= every other insane sockpuppet you can imagine.
Imagine irritating x 1,000. Yup, you got it.
Yawn.
mp, go figure, I've found that smart people are seldom happy people. It's far too easy for smart people to recognize how screwed up the World really is I suppose...
SF unemployment rate is always low, When you lose your job in SF ya gotta move out ...
mmckinl | 12.22.08 - 12:27 am | #
Not if you are resourceful
Fischer posted prior. Enshuldigung sie mir bitte.
"Yes, I saw it, I'm not surprised.
Past a certain size, it becomes impossible to earn "above average" returns without playing games because you are, by definition, "average".
I have to admit, I didn't anticipate such a large commodities blowout. I expected PMs to drop in tandem with other things but was hoping they'd drop less than average."
It is startling how similar events are playing out so far to the crash pre GD 1.0. Stock market crash, commodities blowout, recession, protectionism followed by bond-market dislocation and ending in depression.
London Bank who posts on his own blog (former junior central banker) posited that we would get a deflationary period followed by bond-market dislocation followed by hyper-inflationary depression.
Thanks for the Fischer video mp.
"we would get a deflationary period followed by bond-market dislocation followed by hyper-inflationary depression."
He forgot the part about the war.
London Bank who posts on his own blog (former junior central banker) posited that we would get a deflationary period followed by bond-market dislocation followed by hyper-inflationary depression.
Pissed Off In California | 12.22.08 - 12:30 am | #
Yeah, that's iTulip's KaPOOM Theory, and my general idea of how things will pan out.
Totally emblematic of your backward thinking. Gold is the one thing that doesn't require a central organization to set it's value.
~~~~
If gold is being traded every market will be local ... the whole system will have broken down.
BTW- What was the price of gold during the "Terror" (French Revolution)?
hong konger | 12.22.08 - 12:06 am | #
You can guess and read on...
http://www.compulink.co.uk/~archaeology/civilisation/Later/french_revolution.htm
... But still the economic chaos continued. In 1795 the printing presses were working flat out and the number of assignats doubled from 7,000 to 14,000 only to double towards the end of the year to 45,000 â all these figures in millions of course. But it could not last, and at the end of 1795 a new constitution was adopted and a new government formed â the Directory. And early in 1796 the new government did what all new governments do in such circumstances, it issued new currency. The machinery, plates and paper for printing assignats were destroyed and a new paper notes were issued called the Mandat, to replace assignats at 30 to 1. ...
Totally emblematic of your backward thinking. Gold is the one thing that doesn't require a central organization to set it's value.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.22.08 - 12:29 am | #
You win. How can I argue against that irrefutable logic? I will immediately buy gold, the real physical stuff that seems to be lacking. What? I need to wait up to 8 weeks for delivery? I can buy paper that says I own gold? Just as good? Great!
I can go to Costco and load up on staples that will keep me alive and provide an easily bartered item or I can buy a piece of metal. Really? Buy what you will as will I.
"I expected PMs to drop in tandem with other things but was hoping they'd drop less than average."
Compare gold to oil.
"we would get a deflationary period followed by bond-market dislocation followed by hyper-inflationary depression."
He forgot the part about the war.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 12:32 am | #
Where have you been, we already have two wars.
London Banker was writing about new badness coming our way.
Outside of an end of civilization scenario, if you think any standing body politic is gonna allow you to trade gold for goods and services...I'm not sure where we can go from here.
As far as PMs having currency codes, what does that signify i/r/t "value"?
That possession implies title and so therefore it has a value as a means of exchange? Well naturally, but I hope you're not using that to support an argument of gold's "enduring" value".
I mean, how many "good suits" can I buy in a "mad max" world.
For anon above, if you want to hold gold as an exchange for another currency, why not just buy the desired currency?
I'm not trying to be provocative, buy whatever you like, but, if you're gonna trade for some good or service in some first world economy, you're gonna have to translate your gold into the coin of that realm.
If you think we're at the end of our civil society, only a surplus of essentials will make gold have any value as a means of exchange in any case.
But, as I said, it's still a marginally free country and you are welcome to buy whatever you like at whatever price in whatever quantity.
I was just seeking rich's reasoning for 5000 years of constant "value".
I have to admit, I didn't anticipate such a large commodities blowout. I expected PMs to drop in tandem with other things but was hoping they'd drop less than average.
Broward Horne
Look at nickel and platinum at 4 year lows. Both parabolic up and down. That's just hard to understand even in a mildly deflationary environment. Hard to believe mint issued nickel coins were recently worth nearly that much for their base metal content.
"Gold is the one thing that doesn't require a central organization to set it's value."
True - it just takes someone else that thinks gold is valuable. And it's obviously valuable because...because...wait, why is gold valuable?
And besides that, in a world dominated by gold, just fast forward to the part about who has all the weapons and most of the gold. Square one, I think it's called.
I can go to Costco and load up on staples that will keep me alive and provide an easily bartered item or I can buy a piece of metal.
Jacked | 12.22.08 - 12:34 am | #
You made the point yourself -- if the person you want to barter with doesn't want anything you have, you're screwed... unless you have gold. It's the one thing that usually can be traded for anything else.
It's literally impossible for you to have and indefinitely store (let alone defend) everything you could possibly need.
I was just seeking rich's reasoning for 5000 years of constant "value".
~~~~
Gold hasn't had constant value, Each discovery sends gold lower, When the gold ship sank in 1857 gold went nuts...
There is supply and demand in gold ...
Jacked,
These aren't mutually exclusive items.
Gold is insurance, as is 200 lbs of rice and beans.
Gold, however, is a lot more portable than rice, and it doesn't rot or get eaten by rats and mice and insects. it doesn't get full of algae like diesel.
If we get to a situation where where rice and beans are valuable barter items, small denom silver coins will be extremely useful as a portable store of wealth.
Compare gold to oil.
Well, yes, gold has played out close to what I expected... so far. What I like about gold versus paper is that I think the downside for gold is limited to perhaps 50% of current price but I think U.S. paper could go to zero under the right circumstance.
Platinum Comex kilo bars are $50 oz over spot as of friday and had high shipping . Was told it had to come from europe.
BH, I'm with you, and will start buying into GLD if it gets below 60/share. But that's speculation, not the same as holding a few coins.
Chill bear,
I grew up in Montana on a ranch with farmland for feed grains. If I can find another way to make a living I will always abstain from ever facing the many challenges and never ending workday encompassed by that choice.
You see a farmer or rancher show them respect. They earn it every single day.
"...wait, why is gold valuable"
In a logical, rational world little or nothing. In a world awash in humans, everything.
Everything, and I mean everything, boils down to psychology.
some day gold will be worth what it cost to make
Jacked,
I return the respect anyone gives me.
Farmers and ranchers are no more deserving of respect than anyone else. If a farmer or a rancher is an asshole to me, I'm going to laugh in their face.
I used to be a Reconnaissance Marine (2d Recon Bn). Maybe you and everyone else should show me some respect for going to Kuwait and putting my ass in the line of fire so you farmers and ranchers can drive your F150s and John Deeres. I think I deserve it.
Everyone deserves respect ...
Until they don't ...
I think one of the things of most value will be - being able to cooperate peacefully under difficult circumstances.
el lurko
It's always been really odd to me how those deprecating the value of gold seem to own most of it. So many guns for something so worthless. Doesn't compute.
Chill Bear 2d Recon writes:
It's always been really odd to me how those deprecating the value of gold seem to own most of it. So many guns for something so worthless. Doesn't compute.
Reverse psychology.
CB,
I understand your point. If I had so many resources I could actually afford to hedge my future I would buy some gold.
The gold market seems to be even more manipulated then the securities market.
I always think about being in the desert with a 100 lbs of gold and no water. A Bedouin wanders by and I offer to trade a lb of gold for half his water. The Bedouin has just enough water to make it to the next oasis. Does he risk his life for the gold, make a counteroffer for more gold, or shake his head in wonderment and put some distance between him and the crazy, soon to be dead guy? How you answer the question decides what you see as a store of value.
"For anon above, if you want to hold gold as an exchange for another currency, why not just buy the desired currency?"
What I find interesting about gold is just that.. It is one of the few "currencies" that is liquid just about anywhere in the world. The USD has just about always been perceived as both a store of value and a medium of exchange. The medium of exchange function is a given, I don't think that will change. It's the store of value function that's being called into question lately, and evidently not just by me. Why not diversify, if just a little?
Cheers
I reff'd Londonbanker on this or last thread. Still keeping that flame.
C
Brothers in arms
âGun control in Detroit is racist to begin with. You heard of Dr. Sweet?" he asks, referring to the case of Ossian Sweet, a black physician who, with his family, was tried and eventually acquitted for shooting into a mob that attacked their home when they moved into an all-white neighborhood in 1925. Soon after, the state passed stringent gun-control laws, known as Public Act 372 of 1927. Laney sees those laws aimed squarely at blacks, a reaction to the verdict. âAfter the Sweet case, the Michigan Legislature said we couldn't allow black people to have guns, and that's how Michigan gun laws come about."
âGun control is race control," he adds. âIt has been that way to keep blacks in servitude."
Chill Bear,
You are not the only veteran here. My apologies if I showed disrespect in sharing my opinion. I wish you well and hope both of our viewpoints are validated in whatever may come.
Outside of an end of civilization scenario, if you think any standing body politic is gonna allow you to trade gold for goods and services...I'm not sure where we can go from here.
hong konger | 12.22.08 - 12:36 am | #
You can trade gold for goods & services now; it's just not the "preferred" mde.
I do not expect a Mad Max world, although it's not entirely out of the question. However, I do expect a currency collapse. Even if you never have need to actually trade physical gold for goods or services, it's a great means of transferring wealth between currency regimes.
Example 1: Dollar fails, replaced by "Amero" (for argument's sake). FRN's (and anything denominated in same) are worthless, but gold can be exchanged for Ameros equal in value to the FRN's at the time it was originally purchased.
Example 2: Dollar "devalued" by 90%. FRN's are now worth 10% of their prior value, but $100 in pre-devaluation FRNs is now worth $1000.
Both circumstances have occurred countless times throughout history to various degrees. FDR confiscated gold at $20 and then immediately revalued it at $35. If you held your gold you didn't lose anything, while all those holding dollars lost big time.
IMPORTANT TO NOTE that preservation of value is akin to making money when everyone else is losing theirs, because your relative purchasing power increases dramatically.
"It is one of the few "currencies" that is liquid just about anywhere in the world."
I think you hit the nail here - it is a currency, and maybe the currency of last resort...on FOREX. That's way different, of course, from imagining yourself wearing a bandoleer and shaking a burlap sack full of coins while people load goods into your truck. Trade gold like a commodity, the rest (as Bear put it) is psychology... but as much your own as anyone else's.
I don't think that I could ever be convinced to trade food for gold.
I've never understood the attraction.
The gold market seems to be even more manipulated then the securities market.
Jacked | 12.22.08 - 12:52 am | #
Totally. As I stated earlier, ultimately it's a sign of economic & political instability, but generally it's a too highly visible reminder of how governments steal from their people via inflation.
Ok, gents, so the ol club comes out swinging, but what does that mean?
C
Yves seems to have some of the same concerns as some here:
"We need to collectively find our way out of this smoky airplane, but everyone seems to want to go back to their seats and strap themselves in."
Has Beggar Thy Neighbor Started? « naked capitalism
Interesting comment by the CoFR fellow there too.
Holiday Fun!
(I tried consolidating this into a single pdf file, but could only get it to 20MB's -- to big for google docs' limit of 10MB)
Premium content | Economist.com
I do not expect a Mad Max world, although it's not entirely out of the question. However, I do expect a currency collapse
You plan for the most likely case based on history. Odds of a currency devaluation ("collapse") are very good. Odds of Mad Max are fairly low. Even the Soviet Union still functioned (mostly) after the '89 collapse.
One of my business professors spent several months there in the early 90s. Running water and power were sporadic and a lot of people carried AK-47s under their jackets but food was available and there wasn't a great deal of violence.
I've never understood the attraction.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 12:58 am | #
You don't have to, all you have to do is accept it that it exists. It took a long time for me to figure that out, too.
In this day and age of shameless currency and general market manipulation, why wouldn't people - wealthy or not - choose to allocate a certain portion of their savings in a (more) objective store of value?
i don't know maybe because i hear the same advice 24/7 on a.m radio?
Another interesting feature of PMs is that they have zero counterparty risk.
I think it's logical that investors fretting over the creditworthiness of available debt products to the desperate point that they're willing to accept negative interest rates on Treasury bills might look towards an alternative that can't be anything but AAA rated with some interest.
Cheers
RE-
Thanks for the link.
"Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) writes:
I've never understood the attraction.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 12:58 am | #
You don't have to, all you have to do is accept it that it exists. It took a long time for me to figure that out, too.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.22.08 - 1:00 am | # [kill]"
I've seen it. Real "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" gold lust. Gold, the idea of it and the physical reality, makes some people absolutely crazy.
Night Chill Bear and CB. Thanks for your opinions. Time to rest and dream about the golden toilet I once saw on tv.
Smile, finding humor in hardship is a treasure.
OT, like everything else:
I've been thinking about MP's suggestion that good news would be the nationalization of a few banks plus a sequestering/spinning off of their toxic assets - is it possible that's where these guys have planned on taking us all along? Maybe all the head fakes, misdirections, and lurching was aimed at getting as many dummies as possible to pour their money into the hole before the hole became nationalized. Buffet, for instance. If you know you're going to nationalize, why not pussy-foot with it for a while until it becomes slightly less expensive and a lot more palatable?
Another interesting feature of PMs is that they have zero counterparty risk.
Think a little harder.
Here just a little excerpt (the introt) from the book that provided the source for the French revolution link. I just canned the PDF, so there may be some OCR issues. However, even the intro provides some food for thought.
FIAT MONEY INFLATION IN FRANCE
EARLY in the year 1789 the French nation found itself in deep financial embarrassment: there was a heavy debt and a serious deficit.
The vast reforms of that period, though a lasting blessing politically, were a temporary evil financially. There was a general want of confidence in business circles; capital had shown its proverbial timidity by retiring out of sight as far as possible; throughout the land was stagnation.
Statesmanlike measures, careful watching and wise management would, doubtless, have ere long led to a return of confidence, a reappearance of money and a resumption of business; but these involved patience and self-denial, and, thus far in human history, these are the rarest products of political wisdom. Few nations have ever been able to exercise these virtues; and France was not then one of these few.
There was a general search for some short road to prosperity: ere long the idea was set afloat that the great want of the country was more of the circulating medium; and this was speedily followed by calls for an issue of paper money. The Minister of Finance at this period was Necker. In financial ability he was acknowledged as among the great bankers of Europe, but his was something more than financial ability: he had a deep feeling of patriotism and a high sense of personal honor. The difficulties in his way were great, but he steadily endeavored to keep France faithful to those principles in monetary affairs which the general experience of modern times had found the only path to national safety. As difficulties arose the National Assembly drew away from him, and soon came among the members renewed suggestions of paper money: orators in public meetings, at the clubs and in the Assembly, proclaimed it a panaceaâa way of "securing resources without paying interest." Journalists caught it up and displayed its beauties, among these men, Marat, who, in his newspaper, "The Friend of the People," also joined the cries against Necker, picturing himâa man of sterling honesty, who gave up health and fortune for the sake of Franceâas a wretch seeking only to enrich himself from the public purse. ...
continued in the book
ok anon-
I can accept the "liquidity in foreign currency markets" argument particularly if you are buying gold because you don't know which foreign currency will become the next "reserve" currency.
That kind of insurance I can understand. Fair enough and simply explained.
Thanks
Anonymous says Cheers.
Are you a southern hemisphere commenter too?
Cheers
C
Think a little harder.
Interesting thought but six billion concurrent counterparties is still better than one.
" If you know you're going to nationalize, why not pussy-foot with it for a while until it becomes slightly less expensive and a lot more palatable?"
I'm too tired to document it right now (I think Naomi Klein does this well) but the trend has been nationalize, then reprivatize to your buds. Take that level playing field.
It will be real interesting when China tries to go to California's Central Valley with their grocery list and a fist full of Treasuries to pay for it.
That kind of insurance I can understand. Fair enough and simply explained.
hong konger | 12.22.08 - 1:14 am | #
hong konger,
I know I am repeating myself on this board but I really believe that this section from Bernanke's speech in 2002 should give you pause and also show you why gold might be quite a reasonable insurance in case, after all the other tools are exhausted, that this particular remedy will also be deployed.
http://www.federalreserve.gov/BOARDDOCS/SPEECHES/2002/20021121/default.htm
... Although a policy of intervening to affect the exchange value of the dollar is nowhere on the horizon today, it's worth noting that there have been times when exchange rate policy has been an effective weapon against deflation. A striking example from U.S. history is Franklin Roosevelt's 40 percent devaluation of the dollar against gold in 1933-34, enforced by a program of gold purchases and domestic money creation. The devaluation and the rapid increase in money supply it permitted ended the U.S. deflation remarkably quickly. Indeed, consumer price inflation in the United States, year on year, went from -10.3 percent in 1932 to -5.1 percent in 1933 to 3.4 percent in 1934.17 The economy grew strongly, and by the way, 1934 was one of the best years of the century for the stock market. If nothing else, the episode illustrates that monetary actions can have powerful effects on the economy, even when the nominal interest rate is at or near zero, as was the case at the time of Roosevelt's devaluation. ...
Frankly I'm surprised they don't try it now.
Dawg- that just ain't gonna happen.
C
It will be real interesting when China tries to go to California's Central Valley with their grocery list and a fist full of Treasuries to pay for it.
They are already doing this.
404 - Page not found
You don't have to, all you have to do is accept it that it exists. It took a long time for me to figure that out, too.
Comrade Bear (tj & the bear) | 12.22.08 - 1:00 am |
Again, I would never trade anything of real value for a shiny yellow metal that carries no real value in today's economy.
I may be in a minority here but I think I represent a significantly large minority who thinks your gold positions are nuts.
You should probably consider that going forward as people like me are unlikely to cover your gold bets going forward.
Dawg- that just ain't gonna happen.
Counterpointer | 12.22.08 - 1:26 am | #
Which part and why not?
Dawg - tomorrow, dude, it's late.
C
Double thanks, RE. I've never read White's paper.
I have no problem with Chinese companies buying department store chains...sounds like vertical integration to me.
Again, I would never trade anything of real value for a shiny yellow metal that carries no real value in today's economy.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 1:28 am | #
$800/oz is no real value? LMAO!!!
The idea of "Today's economy" is a joke, too. Your "large minority" hasn't a clue what the world is really like because they slept through history class. The last few decades are a historical anomaly, and anyone basing their perceptions upon it is in for a rude awakening.
"Think a little harder."
Some clever comments this evening and not sure what you are referring to but oh well, I'll bite. If you mean transactional risk, then yes.. There is always that.
Otherwise, in addition to my comments above, I'll say that PMs as a store of value are well positioned to address my concerns that an unsustainable exploitation of scarce resources resulting from infinitely expandable debt based currency has occurred in the recent past.
As with any abuse of debt, future earnings have been consumed today beyond our ability to pay.
Precious metals as a store of value more accurately represent the scarcity of our earth's resources. This point is especially important to me as I watch demographics explode in quickly industrializing areas of the world. We are evidently seeing some pullback here, but at some point it will resume and the OECD countries will be asked to share.
Cheers and good luck!
You should probably consider that going forward as people like me are unlikely to cover your gold bets going forward
Those who don't study history are doomed to repeat it.
.
I may be in a minority here but I think I represent a significantly large minority who thinks your gold positions are nuts.
You should probably consider that going forward as people like me are unlikely to cover your gold bets going forward.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 1:28 am | #
I think you just proved tj's point. It doesn't matter what you think as long as there are numerous willing counterparties.
Toyota lost money for the 1st time in history.
In the last thread I wrote about what I saw on the ground in Spain. I was in Mallorca, but due to an work slowdown by Iberia pilots I saw very little. From talking to folks it seems that the Germans are filling the void of UK expats in buying depreciating property.
sdtfs writes:
I may be in a minority here but I think I represent a significantly large minority who thinks your gold positions are nuts.
You should probably consider that going forward as people like me are unlikely to cover your gold bets going forward.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 1:28 am | #
I think you just proved tj's point. It doesn't matter what you think as long as there are numerous willing counterparties.
sdtfs | 12.22.08 - 1:47 am |
Did I? I thought I suggested that there were far fewer counterparties than y'all suggested. I may be wrong, but I can live with that.
Hey, I've gotta diff tv channel; get this:
YouTube - PJ Harvey - To bring you my love
Passion.
C
I can go to Costco and load up on staples that will keep me alive and provide an easily bartered item...
Jacked | 12.22.08 - 12:34 am | #
Taking into account that even in dire times a medium of exchange is needed, there's nothing wrong with having a stash of gold and silver coins as well as staples.
Suppose you have plenty of food, but you need antibiotics from a black market merchant who has doesn't want to get involved in food transactions? Or you want to buy ammo from a farmer down the road--who greatly values his limited supply of ammo and doesn't need food because he produces his own?
Either one will accept silver dollars, because they are a universal currency, are easy to conceal, and don't degrade.
Too bad you don't have any.
if you think any standing body politic is gonna allow you to trade gold for goods and services...
--hong konger
About a dozen years ago I bought used car off a lot (in an OR city) with seven gold eagles.
No law against it.
The dealer took my word for what the spot price was.
You'd be surprised how covetous people can get when they see the gleam of real money in your hand.
uni-
I realize it isn't illegal. Hell, one can trade anything for anything so long as the taxable value is assessed in terms of dollars.
My point is that sustained trading in unstruck PMs basically abrogates the taxing authority of a government. Which is to say, the entire edifice of authority.
It also crashes any fiat monetary system and, well, you know the rest.
In a previous thread I wrote:
What are the implications of CDS being traded?
Does this mean that any of the Level 3 assets in SIV's have to be moved to Level 2 and marked down? (Or are the CDS's too different?) If the former, does this mean that some of the largest banks will be insolvent come the end of Q1 2009, regardless of the enforcement of FASB's relevant rules?
Thanks for any insights.
Unfortunately, I forgot to provide the link that provided the context for my question. Here it is:
FT.com / Companies / Financial Services - First group emerges to offer CDS clearing
First group emerges to offer CDS clearing
Liffe, the futures exchange, and LCH.Clearnet, the London clearer, will on Monday become the first group to offer clearing of credit default swaps, financial instruments that are central to regulatory worries over the risks posed by defaults in the credit derivatives markets.
The development comes as efforts by regulators on both sides of the Atlantic to get such bilaterally negotiated, or over-the-counter (OTC), contracts shifted on to centrally cleared platforms are coming to a head.
Re : CDS
It is highly unlikely that current CDS will ever make it onto a clearing house. No one will want to act as guarantor for the drek that was under-written in the last few years. New CDS will go onto the clearing platofrm and government bailouts will be used to cover the losses on the approx. 55T left that will take another 3-5 years to unwind.
Divergence Grows Between China and the West Part I
YaleGlobal Online Magazine
lulz to be had:
wimp.com
I think the 'glod debate' might be a little Americentric.
In the middle east and Indian subcontinent, physical gold is traded daily in gold souks by speculaters, hedgers, and people who just like shiny stuff.
On another note, I find it fascinating that as soon as gold is mentioned, all the survivalists and militia types come pouncing out of the closets.
dey got arre gold dublooons!
More data based information for those confused about what climate change means -
'Between 1.5 trillion and 2 trillion tons of ice in Greenland, Antarctica and Alaska have melted at an accelerating rate since 2003, according to NASA scientists, in the latest signs of what they say is global warming.
Using new satellite technology that measures changes in mass in mountain glaciers and ice sheets, NASA geophysicist Scott Luthcke concluded that the losses amounted to enough water to fill the Chesapeake Bay 21 times.
"The ice tells us in a very real way how the climate is changing," said Luthcke, who will present his findings this week at the American Geophysical Union conference in San Francisco, California.
NASA's Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment, or GRACE, mission uses two orbiting satellites to measure the "mass balance" of a glacier, or the net annual difference between ice accumulation and ice loss.'
Sadly, as some posters here point out, the current models of climate change are very poor. Especially since none of those models actually deals with current reality as reflected in observational data. Recognizing, of course, that predicting the future by straight extrapolation is fraught with problems, the current measured melt rate from Greenland alone is roughly one inch every five years.
'In the 1990s, Greenland took in as much snow and water as it let out, Zwally said. But now, about 15 years later, sea levels are rising about 50 percent faster, making the global climate situation even more unpredictable.
"The best estimates are that sea levels will rise about 18 to 36 inches by the end of the century, but because of what's going on and how fast things are changing, there's a lot of uncertainty," he said.'
For example, the fact is Greenland alone would be able to pretty much cover 18 inch rise by 2100 all by itself, if the current melt rate was sustained.
And as for other places? 'GRACE measured that mountain glaciers in the Gulf of Alaska lost about 84 gigatons each year, about five times the average annual flow of the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon, according to NASA.'
There is that term gigaton again - generally, gigatons are the sort of units that actually have usefulness in discussing planetary scale observations.
Personally, I continue to agree with anyone that states that current climatological models are an inadequate basis for policy making, as those models are clearly not able to even accurately predict what can be currently measured.
Gold is the 'ultimate' money, acceptable everywhere.
Take trade for instance, if the dollar goes to heck, other countries might not accept it but they sure will take gold.
Sorry - link is Ice melting across globe at accelerating rate, NASA says - CNN.com
Please don't buy gold, already the europeans and asians are stocking up. If the US starts it too, the price will go sky high for sure.
So refrain from making it too expensive for me to accumulate.
Thanks.
It's odd reading this thread. I heard essentially every part of these debates - in some cases almost word for word - pursued among friends and acquaintances in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
I can't say who among them were genuinely astute, who merely fortunate. All were quite intelligent.
Most moved into Treasuries fairly early, then moved the proceeds from the rise in Treasuries into gold and silver. When that market rose sharply, they sold and began laddering their capital into money markets.
They emerged with their working capital intact, and fairly impressive gains, at a time when many were essentially ruined.
The last few decades are a historical anomaly, and anyone basing their perceptions upon it is in for a rude awakening.
This is the same flavor of BS as the Y2K doomsaying.
We are an immensely productive society able to mine the resources, grow the food, and create the goods we need to live well.
We may think we are all poor now but that is only because so much of the national income is going into land values -- to rentiers, either the banks charging interest on our mortgage balances or LLs pocketing rent.
Investment in land value is malinvestment, a deadloss that strips capital from the productive and delivers it to the unproductive. This deadloss is an order of magnitude greater than welfare transer payments -- ~20% of our GDP.
Troy(Unrated) writes:
We are an immensely productive society able to mine the resources, grow the food, and create the goods we need to live well.
US Standard of Living * (Population of India + Population of China) = "PINCH POINT, KEEP HANDS AWAY WHEN SYSTEM IN OPERATION! FAILURE TO OBEY SAFETY PROCEDURES MAY CAUSE MUTILATION OR DEATH!"
Fun hedge fun numbers from the company that audited(?) Madoff's big feeder fund.
http://www.citco.com/fileLibrary/LDDFHIKEIEIE1608.pdf
According to Citco, they are the mother of all hedge fund administrators.
Does Citco stand for "Curaçao International Trust Company"?
Is it coincidental that dutch antilles are considered a tax haven and friendly port for gambling? (Betcha porn too).
Is this why Roland Arnall was awarded his post in Holland? Ameriquest -- we always forget to mention the big pioneers of sub-prime. They blazed a scummy trail long before countrywide.
No wonder the manager NYT contacted at Citco neglected to respond to the emailed questions they themself invited.
Is nyt is putting on a big show. They're not going to really poke the beast until it gets angry are they?
Oh, and I didn't look very hard, but it doesn't seem readily apparent who runs this citco and its evil children.
5,000 years of history, a constitution that mandates it and y-o-y gains of +20 for the last 5 years and still the flatearthers fail to see the horizon. Pearls before swine sort of speak
So maybe Madoff was just a trustworthy face for some bad guys after all?
And Rudy Giulliani's company is involved in all the nastiness?
Some horrifying nepotism going on here... Madoff's lieutenant is Frank DiPascali. DiPascali's (painted as a Sopranos type character by Bloomberg) attorney is our u.s. attorney general's son, who happens to work at the Giulliani law firm.
Madoff Said to Use Unregistered Side-Unit for Clients (Update5) - Bloomberg.com
If this is what goes on the 17th-19th floors of the lipstick building, one really wonders what happens on the top floor.
New Hampshire is stopping all jury trials, criminal and civil, for a month, in an effort to contain costs.
19 other states are likely to follow suit...
Trials halted to save money - Los Angeles Times
Uncle Billy Snorts, go get 'em!
Also, I just finished the Naomi Klein article in the Dec. 8th New Yorker:
Profiles: Outside Agitator : The New Yorker
Thanks for pointing us in that direction. I need to get my head straight occasionally..Wow...
Hi Trader. G'morni
In the Indian subcontinent, gold bracelets are worn in the fields by peasant women who have on their bodies everything of value they own in the world.
You should do more traveling.
Indians own more gold per capita than any other nation on earth. And there are nearly a billion capitas.
OT: Story on p1 of the WSJ this morning: "Developers Ask U.S. for Bailout as Massive Debt Looms"
This hope must be what has propped down SRS lately. The CRE folks may get the short straw here though- they don't elicit the same politics as manufacturers or banks and they don't employ that many people. They are often wealthy with many connections, which is clearly their best hope. If they deserve a bailout, then the US has truly socialized everything (at least everything that can be connected to large numbers of connected people).
--
This explains some of the distortions in the employment data. The actual UR in the US, as measured in Germany, is close to 10% now and headed to 15% during 2010.
What sorts of Americans think that we would avoid depression? Economists come to mind, but then when are they known for forecasting depressions and even recessions months ahead of time.
Economists are part of the problems and should not be listened to for solutions, but what choice do Americans have in terms of who runs their country and how.
The salient feature of the current American system is the political impotence of the population. A vote is not a voice. Ask the shareholders! Hence, democracies decades are numbered here as well as elsewhere.
Jas
--
"In the Indian subcontinent, gold bracelets are worn in the fields by peasant women who have on their bodies everything of value they own in the world."
rich,
When I went to attend my nephew's wedding in India, last month, all my sisters got gold necklaces and all my nieces got gold chains as gifts. The bride got a platinum coin. 95%+ of my gifts (by
for the past 11 years have been gold & platinum.
Gold is the ultimate currency.
Jas
--
"We are an immensely productive society able to mine the resources, grow the food, and create the goods we need to live well."
Troy,
We WERE a "productive society." Past performance is not a guarantee of future results!
Americans have degraded 'immensely,' both physically as well as intellectually. But much more so morally. Evildoers have been in power for a reason. Our real rulers, BFNYC, are scum. They have sold Americans into economic slavery to the East Asians. Debt slavery has been known and recognized for millennia.
Stop living in the past, please. It may feel good but it aint good.
Jas
CR never sleeps.
Off to Miami/Hialeah.
I like gold as much as the next woman, but gold strapped on your body is not invested in a productive asset.
Course we are low on productive assests at the moment.
From another post:
THE DEMOCRACY BUBBLE WILL FULLY BURST BEFORE 2030
What does this mean? You prefer National Socialism, communism or some other form of statism? You prefer mass graves to mass folly?
The question is not what you prefer, but what works. If democracy doesn't solve problems that must be solved, because too few people take on the (relatively small) social responsibility required for this to happen, it will be overthrown at some point. Revolutions don't happen through conspiracies and central planning, it happens because enough people are fed up, and when just a spark may ignite a rebellion. Look to Greece.
The outcome, however, will be random. That's rarely a good thing.
I like gold as much as the next woman, but gold strapped on your body is not invested in a productive asset.
Only rich people invest. The poor hold on to it as a store of value.
That said, it would probably be more productive investing(speculating?) in other instruments if you are in the first world.
You don't know Madoff like Christopher Bollyn does.
"While Madoff has said that he acted alone in orchestrating the fraud, this is seen as very unlikely. There was probably a very sophisticated team working on wire transfers to secret bank accounts, perhaps at Israel Discount Bank's Swiss branch, which opened in Switzerland in 2000. (The very building Madoff carried out his fraud from, the so-called "lipstick building" in Manhattan, is itself Israeli owned. Like Bronfman's partner Rubin Schron, Israeli companies have been aggressively acquiring commercial real estate in the United States -- but where does their capital come from? Israel, after all, is a recipient of billions of dollars in financial aid from the U.S. taxpayer every year.)"
www.bollyn.info
That bounce was just that a bounce, decline continues
Baltic Dry Index (BDI) -17 801
No recovery in sight.
Pilgrimwrites:
\tOT: Story on p1 of the WSJ this morning: "Developers Ask U.S. for Bailout as Massive Debt Looms"
Pilgrim | 12.22.08 - 8:12 am | #
Did you notice the full-page "Thank You America" ad from Chrysler that is right next to the end of the article about the developer's bailout request. Nothing like a thank you letter from a private equity firm to brighten my day.
--
"I like gold as much as the next woman, but gold strapped on your body is not invested in a productive asset."
lawyerliz,
And what about savings and protecting the purchasing power of the savings (a challenge for most)?
Savings arise out of productive work, for most people anyway.
And how should we strap our non-productive human assets, especially, lawyers, I meant economists?
Jas
i figured it out y'll, just reverse
something.
only trouble is i cant remember the dream!
baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawaaaaaaaaa
while the private sector is rapidly lowering conpensation w/ salary cuts/bonus cut/cutting days of work, the most wasteful aspect of the economy, the ever bloated govt, seems blithfully ignorant if this and incoming budget mess.
Govt is where massive cuts in salaries & employment needed. The homeland security expenditure/staff meant some sense during credit orgy..not in these times.
--
In connection with my forecast for the future of democracy
"You prefer National Socialism..."
Get over your prejudices before you ask a question, please.
democrats, like most, as quite good at self destruction. And we are almost there.
It is NOT about the label of the system but about the morality of the leaders, or people who are in power. America is being, and has been recently, led by evildoers Greenspan, Bush and Bernanke. No one could have foreseen the current Crisis? And how come the same evildoers who got us there are still in power?
I am sure that we could do better under a different system. Democracy has turned into demon-o-cracy!
Jas
Another great article from the WSJ: (at least now I know who's selling me the puts I weep for....)
may be subscription: In a Volatile Market, Consider Options - WSJ.com
In a Volatile Market, Consider Options "As a conservative investor, I sell calls only on shares I own (a strategy known as selling "covered" calls). But selling puts doesn't require owning shares, since your loss is capped at the strike price minus the proceeds of the sale, should you be required to buy when the stock is worthless. Until the stars recently aligned in this highly unusual market, I've rarely bothered to sell puts. I've had much better luck selling calls, as I've often reported. If the stock price doesn't reach the strike price, you just keep the cash and the shares, as I have on numerous occasions. But with the prices of options so high, my interest in selling puts has been renewed.........Among a bevy of alternatives, I sold puts on J.P. Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo and, a bit further out on the risk curve, Morgan Stanley. I sold $25 J.P. Morgan puts for $8.45 and $10 Morgan Stanley puts for $3.40, both expiring in January 2010, and $27.50 Wells Fargo puts for $9.20, expiring January 2011. (You can also sell much shorter-term options, though the premiums are generally lower.) The cash is now in my account, and it's more than enough to pay for all my Christmas shopping..........I recommend this only for investors comfortable with a degree of risk. But from my point of view, this is a rare opportunity to make money instead of complaining how bad everything is.
Gold fanatics as well Jas's kith & kin forget that their GOLD investments since early 80s is pretty much under water. Much more so inflation adjusted. So much for store of value.
OT, but the AP has an article titled "Where'd the bailout money go? Shhhh, it's a secret":
--
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...
"It is entirely appropriate for the American people to know how their taxpayer dollars are being spent in private industry," said Elizabeth Warren, the top congressional watchdog overseeing the financial bailout.But, at least for now, there's no way for taxpayers to find that out.Pressured by the Bush administration to approve the money quickly, Congress attached nearly no strings on the $700 billion bailout in October. And the Treasury Department, which doles out the money, never asked banks how it would be spent.--
Hoocoodanode? The Treasury has been looted, AGAIN.
Oh yuck! Sorry for the last post, that was my first (and last) time posting through CR Companion.
Many of the jewish 'charities' supported by Madoff and his prominent Jewish investors funded the illegal Settler Movement in the Israeli occupied territories of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem.
It is remarkable that tax exemptions in the US may end up channelling massive funding to an illegal movement officially condemned by the State Department and the international community.
The unintended irony is that by stealing the funding from the settler movement, Madoff may have placed himself as a top candidate for the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize.
Try this again. Sorry for the thread pollution above.
OT, but the AP has an article titled "Where'd the bailout money go? Shhhh, it's a secret":
"We've lent some of it. We've not lent some of it. We've not given any accounting of, 'Here's how we're doing it,'" said Thomas Kelly, a spokesman for JPMorgan Chase, which received $25 billion in emergency bailout money. "We have not disclosed that to the public. We're declining to."
...
"It is entirely appropriate for the American people to know how their taxpayer dollars are being spent in private industry," said Elizabeth Warren, the top congressional watchdog overseeing the financial bailout.But, at least for now, there's no way for taxpayers to find that out.Pressured by the Bush administration to approve the money quickly, Congress attached nearly no strings on the $700 billion bailout in October. And the Treasury Department, which doles out the money, never asked banks how it would be spent.
Hoocoodanode? The Treasury has been looted, AGAIN.
Anonymous writes:
That bounce was just that a bounce, decline continues
Baltic Dry Index (BDI) -17 801
It seems to be bobbing around 800.
Baltic Dry is going to reflect drydockings and scrappings more than traffic soon.
Alan Greenspend or Fair Economist or someone has a pointer to a docked capesize table that you might find useful.
The low trade traffic continued for this relatively long period is going to start to poke through soon. This is like the crashing fuel price -- it suggests to me that the real economy is quite dead.
Jas,
Why do you stay here?
Surely there's better place
to be with the coming storm?
Gold fanatics as well Jas's kith & kin forget that their GOLD investments since early 80s is pretty much under water. Much more so inflation adjusted. So much for store of value.
Ben is that you?
...If the sacrifices look as though they are going to continue for many months, he said, some workers will grow frustrated, want their full compensation back and may well prefer a layoff that creates a new permanence...
Um, somehow I don't think so, especially this time around. I've been through waves of layoffs before and the first thing they usually do is cut to 4-day workweeks, freeze pay raises, etc., just like the article mentions. But most people hang around. The only ones that leave are typically the younger ones with in demand skills that can be transferred to another industry that is currently unaffected by the current slump. This time, nearly EVERYBODY is going to be looking to prune. I don't think workers are going to "prefer a layoff that creates a new permanence". LOL
On Gild Greece and Germany
In this context, it is noteworthy that the German central bank holds the second-largest reserves of gold in the world. During the first quarter of 1999, at the same time the euro was launched, Germany bought up huge reserves of gold. Enough, according to the Economic Intelligence Review, to back an entire currency (March 2000). In addition, when the 11 nations joined the euro, they signed over their gold reserves to the European Central Bank, in Frankfurt, Germany. Read this Trumpet story from 2002 that poses one possible outcome to a eurozone crisis.
Who Will Stop the Greece Fires? | Economy | theTrumpet.com by the Philadelphia Church of God
"We've lent some of it. We've not lent some of it. We've not given any accounting of, 'Here's how we're doing it,'" said Thomas Kelly, a spokesman for JPMorgan Chase, which received $25 billion in emergency bailout money. "We have not disclosed that to the public. We're declining to."
Did he really say that?
On Gold Greece and Germany was the intended title.
Pavel: According to the article, that's a direct quote.
article
Why do you stay here?
Surely there's better place
to be with the coming storm?
cpmhughes | 12.22.08 - 9:12 am | #
He's been banned from other sites. QED.
"As a conservative investor,...
Eric | 12.22.08 - 9:02 am | #
LOL. Sure, selling puts on a bunch insolvent banks sounds like a conservative strategy to me.
LOL. Sure, selling puts on a bunch insolvent banks sounds like a conservative strategy to me.
Curious | 12.22.08 - 9:19 am | #
I was astounded that the WSJ would even allow that article to be published. Read like a tout piece.
--
cpmhughes,
And why can't you mind your own business? And why do you seem to have problem ignoring/skipping my comments? They are not intended for people like you.
Jas
Eric,
All I can say is "No thanks" with respect to selling long dated volatility (Jan 2010 and Jan 2011 options). I'd much rather be a buyer (like you appear to be) of vol for longer time frames than a seller. Theta is mo' bettah on short term options.
Anyone thinking of selling long dated options needs to do a simple calc - take premium received and divide it by days until expiration to get income/day. Compare it to a 3 month option.
I am sure that we could do better under a different system. Democracy has turned into demon-o-cracy!
Jas
Jas Jain | Homepage | 12.22.08 - 9:02 am
LOL. All systems have the same problem. They are run by people. People, in general, are arrogant, greedy, and look out for themselves. The only difference in types of systems is how efficient they are and how well the check peoples' natural inclanations.
--
"He's been banned from other sites. QED."
Eric,
Name the date and the site, you liar.
People like you are the best evidence of the problems Americans seem to have.
Jas
Pavel Chichikov writes:
Did he really say that?
You betcha.
--
Scott,
WE are in basic agreement. B&BAD believe that we have found the secret -- the best political system. Even if a system starts good it can be turned into the worst over time. It is about the character, or ethics, of the leaders that the system brings to the top.
We have managed to have the worst with real behind-the-scenes power -- BFNYC.
Jas
You tell 'em Jas, I for one enjoy your posts although they can sometimes bite.
Keep 'em coming.
how do i get rid of horizontal scroll?
I appreciate all the intellectual debate about gold as much as anybody.
But I'm investing in gold for mainly one reason.
At some point in the next 18 months, I'm hoping to sell it to a greater fool at a higher price.
I'll let you know how it turns out.
--
Anon,
There are always "few good men." And women.
Jas
At some point in the next 18 months, I'm hoping to sell it to a greater fool at a higher price.
18 months? You sir are an optimist!
Whether we like it or not we have to build up our savings as a country. How does one build up savings in something that needs to be devalued. No matter what the average cititzen chooses the state will migrate to it like a mosquito to a July 4th barbecue. The state's interest will be paramount.
--
rich,
Gold is an insurance and should not be used a speculative play, IMO. Speculators can and do bet burned.
Jas
mp
Any update on Conjure's countdown clock?
Wow... actually on-topic: Manpower Withdraws Forecast, Blames Bleak December - Economy * US * News * Story - CNBC.com
U,.S. staffing services company Manpower withdrew its fourth-quarter profit forecast Monday, saying demand for temporary workers had been light in December as a spreading global recession prompted U.S. industrial firms to idle plants to cut costs.
"Demand for our services will be especially weak in December as we are hearing that many of our light industrial clients are taking prolonged plant shutdowns around the holidays compared to last year," said Jeffrey Joerres, chief executive of the world's No. 2 staffing company.
Any update on Conjure's countdown clock?
this is real, folks
The last update I saw was Saturday, it was 11:59:51
At some point in the next 18 months, I'm hoping to sell it to a greater fool at a higher price.
rich | 12.22.08 - 9:41 am | #
rich, IMO the coming bubble in PMs will take longer than 18 months to get to the point where I'll be ready to make a move.
So much for those green futures; it's all red now.
Comrade Kristina writes:
The last update I saw was Saturday, it was 11:59:51
Didn't Conjure move it to 52 in light of growing bond market instability?
Jas,
Very touchy you are!
But here in the land of the Free,
we're free to post as we see fit.
Now I see why you stay, no other country would put up with your ilk.
Anonymous, yes, you are correct, he did. It's 8 seconds to midnite.
countries need people like jas even if he is a bit abrasive at times
It is becoming glaringly obvious that many investment banks and the SEC knew for years that Madoff was not operating on the level. Also obvious is the unwillingness of the Treasury and of major banks in accounting for the absolutely massive amounts of 'bailout' money. The sense is slowly forming, I think, that there is something really fundamentally messed up at the core. I have a feeling there are bigger revelations coming than we have seen so far and I think investigations - once they begin - will go on for many years.
For you gold speculators, the rules are a-changin.
See: Act While You Still Can : Welcome To Jim Sinclair’s MineSet
--
"But here in the land of the Free..."
cpmhughes,
Living in the past is not a good idea. Wake up! Look at the control BFNYC have over your life.
"no other country would put up with your ilk."
And what kind of country would "put up with your ilk?" And what kind of country "your ilk" would pass on to their children and grandchildren?
Your ilk have degraded and it is not my fault. I am merely an observer and a commentator/critic.
Jas
WSJ reporting that commercial real estate lining up for its bailout. This is never going to end......
They started the bailout train and now can't stop it.
Saving Capitalism No Sure Thing as Statism Undermines Economy
Saving Capitalism No Sure Thing as Statism Undermines Economy - Bloomberg.com
For you gold speculators, the rules are a-changin.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 10:00 am | #
Re-read that rule and tell me where it says anything about gold.
its all about those other balance sheets.i said that he(madoff) was like a one man lehman bros. ill take that back hes like a one man bearsterns. come on guys fess up and lets get this thing doing.
got a short attention span and im dreaming about it now. got to know what the "que sera sera."
--
"Statism."
Communization of the economy by installing big business as necessities to be protected by the gubermint.
The American Big Business Party (BBP) is worse than the Soviet Communist Party!
Jas
picking up from another thread - that story about Great American Insurance...
if they are based out of Cincinnati then I am related in law to the owner Carl Lindner. His son married a cousin of mine who was a Doublemint girl on TV.
Not that it did me much good. Some years ago I was trying to finance a very small indy picture in NYC and couldn't get a nickel out of 'em.
Guess investing in race horses makes more sense.
He also owns Chiquita. You may remember all that Costa Rica stuff.
Story sounds about right for that family.
Again, I would never trade anything of real value for a shiny yellow metal that carries no real value in today's economy...people like me are unlikely to cover your gold bets going forward.
Anonymous | 12.22.08 - 1:28 am | #
nothing caries "real" value
all value is relative...relative to other goods and relative to the situation
apples falling from the tree are worth less in the middle of a sea of orchard trees in september
gold is insurance...under certain circumstances its wise to have more
like now
the dollar is toast
From MarketWatch:
10:04 a.m. [CAT] Caterpillar suspends merit pay increases, freezes hiring 10:03 a.m. [CAT] Caterpillar to cut other positions pay by up to 15% 10:03 a.m. [CAT] Caterpillar to cut senior manager pay by 5%-35%
--
My Fellow Americans,
I am simply pointing out the giant gulf, bigger than the Grand Canyon, between the theory and the practice of the American econo-political system.
We are not talking about nothing is perfect. We are talking about wholesale corruption that brings evildoers to the top of economic and political power. What limits of power are there for evildoers like Bernanke? Emergency!, Emergency!!, Cries the evildoer. What emergency?
Jas
Jas,
No "innocent bystanders" allowed.
You lived here for past 20 years,
participated in a corrupt system and
now you cry wolf.
Better you should have stood up 40
years ago as others did and said "no".
More:
Caterpillar to cut exec pay up to 50%
Caterpillar offers employees voluntary separation program
No, Jas. You forgot about Stalin's forced starvation of Ukranians, and the massive Soviet gulag, and the hundred million poeple worldwide who perished by violence because of the poisonous doctrines of Communism. The plutocrats in the US may have stolen lots of money, but they didn't do all of that bad stuff.
and now you cry wolf.
cpmhughes | 12.22.08 - 10:15 am | #
cmphughes,
You really ought to go over to the Financialsense.com archives and read Jas' extensive works going back a few years.
Thin crowd today.
Speaking of Chiquita...
Since we are becoming a banana republic, perhaps it might be edifying to read up on the history of the manufacture of demand for bananas... and why only one type of banana is generally available in the U.S. (It's not because Americans prefer them...)
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR; Yes, We Will Have No Bananas - NY Times
More than 1 million jobs cuts seen in 2009: Challenger
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- The labor market faces persistent weakness in 2009, with more than 1 million jobs cuts expected due to weak spending among consumers and businesses, according to a Monday report from Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. "It will take time for any stimulus measures to work their way through the economy," said John Challenger, chief executive of the outplacement firm. "Even if the measures work, it could take several more months for consumers and corporate America to regain confidence and begin spending again." He added that construction could get an "immediate boost" from Obama's infrastructure plans.
--
"We only talk about America here in Jas land - not other countries."
rent_to_own,
And why do you feel this desperate need to lie, you hatemonger?
Jas
Thin crowd today.
The_Littlest_Mandarin | 12.22.08 - 10:19 am | #
Gonna be like that all week on Wall Street too (and early close on Wednesday).
Should be easy to push Mr. Market around.
"I'm hoping to sell it to a greater fool at a higher price."
Ain't gonna be me I paid 350 for mine. Hummmmmmmm Hope never has been a good investment strategy.
--
"The plutocrats in the US may have stolen lots of money, but they didn't do all of that bad stuff."
El Cliffo,
And how would you know if the plutocrats of London and NYC were behind lot of killings during 1850-1950? And now they have turned on Americans!
Jas
"It is becoming glaringly obvious that many investment banks and the SEC knew for years that Madoff was not operating on the level. Also obvious is the unwillingness of the Treasury and of major banks in accounting for the absolutely massive amounts of 'bailout' money. The sense is slowly forming, I think, that there is something really fundamentally messed up at the core. I have a feeling there are bigger revelations coming than we have seen so far and I think investigations - once they begin - will go on for many years."
Again, the fundamental problem is not financial, it's moral.
--
"Again, the fundamental problem is not financial, it's moral."
Pavel Chichikov,
Thank you. I have been ranting about that for more than ten years.
Jas
"Pavel Chichikov writes:
Did he really say that?
You betcha."
Speaking of the CPSU (and that system was truly amoral and dysfunctional), it occurred to me this morning that anyone who told those authorities that what he had done with state funds was none of anyone's business - if he dared - could find himself working in a gold mine at fifty below on 1200 calories a day. But he wouldn't dare.
Some historians are not so sure the plutocrats were so benign, El Cliffo. Some estimate that demographic effect of the Great Depression may have led to millions of premature deaths.
Here's a polemic example:
"First, if you believe American statistics, in the 10 years from 1931 to 1940, 8,553,000 people were lost. And what is interesting is that the numbers of increase in population change at one point by 2 times - exactly at the border between 1930/31. They fall and freeze at this level for 10 years. And just as suddenly, a decade later, they climb back up. No explanation for this is found in the extensive report of the US Department of commerces Statistical Abstract of the United States. Even thought it is full of comments on other less significant issues."
source:
Where did Americas missing millions go? Holodomor Lessons
Where did America’s missing millions go? Holodomor Lessons - RT
Pavel Chichikov writes:
Again, the fundamental problem is not financial, it's moral.
I think blaming it on immorality presumes that there was once a moral forebear or underpinning from whence the current milieu descended.
Probably better to lay it at the feet of lack of effective administrative method. It's about vested interests, once you bring good and evil or morality and immorality in, you're going to be dragging into taking sides in a dispute without right or wrong.
Spinning tops everywhere -- market's crazy today.
And how would you know if the plutocrats of London and NYC were behind lot of killings during 1850-1950?
Jas, are you saying that those rascally plutocrats were beind Jack the Ripper and the Mad Bomber of 1950s New York? The burden of proof is on you. And why do you always say that the plutocrats live only in New York and London? Is there some kind of conspiratorial theory involved there that you borrowed from your fellow nutjob, Larouche?
Comrade Kristina writes:
Anonymous, yes, you are correct, he did. It's 8 seconds to midnite.
Comrade Kristina
Thanks Kristina!
tick tock...tick tock...(thinking of Captain Hook)
Question is this--will Republicans keep insisting on perpetual tax cuts and slashing any gov. programs that help the poor, children, and the elderly?
Really, I'd like to send about one third of our population to Iraq. Let God sort them out.
What we are seeing is the result of corporate brainwashing and 24/7 propaganda--aimed at the bottom 50%. The working class has no defense in the face of the rapacious corporate state and the cynical part of the population that are adjuncts to pure thuggery.
So many of your ethically retarded slugs swallowed the gospel that 'greed is good' and that human solidarity and epathy were degenerate impulses.
I can see you now with your Ayn Rand books, pimping this pathological crap on your kids (who will grow up truncated human beings--incapable of anything other than pathetic sluggery).
Chicken hawks and slugs.
Stuff your pockets and plot your escape. Welcome to lumpen prole hell.
I'll just tell you what factors would make me want to lighten up on gold, silver or miners right now.
They are up 20-30% in December alone. If they went up another 10-20% in January, I'd probably lighten a bit. Nothing goes straight up forever.
If the tendency toward backwardation came off, I would lighten up a lot.
If the dollar started to show real firmness, I would lighten up a lot.
If other commodities started to weaken, I might lighten.
Food, the quiet commodity, is continuing its strong two-week run today...up more than 2%.
"cpmhughes,
And why can't you mind your own business? And why do you seem to have problem ignoring/skipping my comments? "
Because he's an observer and a critic just like you.
--
There has been a seismic shift in American system under Reagan after Greenspan was first appointed to head the Council of Economic Advisors and later to the Fed Chairman after forcing out Paul Volcker.
Volcker had the ethics of Junkers and Greenspan those of BFNYC, where deception and manipulation are the prized skills.
Volcker served the American People. Greenspan was NOT working for the American People but for BFNYC and himself. Era of the Evildoers had begun. Please read Greenspans Fraud by Ravi Batra! (I am not a big Batra fan, but his facts on Greenspan are correct).
Jas
"It's about vested interests, once you bring good and evil or morality and immorality in, you're going to be dragging into taking sides in a dispute without right or wrong."
From my viewpoint as a Christian - and I think most people of other faiths, and atheists, would also take this point of view - there are fundamental standards of morality. It goes without saying that ethical and effective administrative standards are important. Without a moral underpinning there is no guarantee that anyone will adhere to them. Without moral axioms the only normative standard is terror. You don't want to live in a country in which terror is applied to the populace.
rich, I was just reading this article on bloombergs about pork prices
Hogs Defy Commodity Bust as Herd Cuts Spur Jump to 13-Year High - Bloomberg.com
It also predicts higher grain prices to come.
OT-auto bailout won't help here.
suppliers won't survive production cuts
http://www.autonews.com/article/20081222/ANA03/812220326/1128
earlier thread on commercial re wanting bailout is the cherry on top of this paulsonsundae..they have too save them becse his pigmen buddies financed all those empty boxes making waste of a now empty land..this is like stripmining without backfilling in and replanting...
U2 would be smart to release album right now as people need some inrock that binds not splits up...
We'll scorch the earth
Set fire to the sky
We stoop so low to reach so high
A link is lost
The chain undone
We wait all day
For night to come
And it comes
Like a hunter child
YouTube - Red Hill Mining Town
early morning rant over...coffee is done...
" it is not my fault. I am merely an observer and a commentator/critic."
If you live here and claim to be a citizen, then you are a particpant. Since you also call yourself an investor and a speculator, then you have been an eager participant.
I seem to recall suggesting CAT as a juicy short opportunity about 2 weeks ago. But I digress...
From my viewpoint as a Christian - and I think most people of other faiths, and atheists, would also take this point of view - there are fundamental standards of morality.
If it applies to everyone, then your status as a christian has absolutely nothing to do with it. Why not say, "From my viewpoint as a nonsociopath"?
Jas Jain--and you will note that Greenspan is an acolyte of Ayn Rand.
What a diseased ideology--and it has run the economy into the ground. Pathetic.
Jeez, when we see rednecks looting Walmarts that will be a sign that people have woke up.
eff 'peace on earth', we need to tar and feather anti-union corporate rapists. Instead Madoff is smirking on Park Avenue, and worthless yuppies are asking for the man's autograph.
Sick.
I don't know which freaks me out more - the thought of Pol Pot raising up here from the dead or Conjure's Clock...
Duke, how bout Pol Pot raising up from the dead holding Conjure's clock? Now that's scary...
Without a moral underpinning there is no guarantee that anyone will adhere to them. Without moral axioms the only normative standard is terror.
Ultimately, at least when enforcing your mechanism, you have to enforce with terror.
Morality prevents the problems before they happen. Once the deed is done, it's left to terror to make examples.
You don't want to live in a country in which terror is applied to the populace.
I definitely want to live in one where terror is applied to the bureaucracy and the vested interests that control them. I live in one now where it is entirely absent and this is definitely not working.
I don't think that good and bad are irrelevant, they're just not relevant to this case. It's people squabbling over resources. They all have perfectly reasonable things to do with them -- raw survival in many cases.
The system is just not able to say no to them -- it is killing our society with kindness because benevolence as a fig leaf is quite evidently a very rewarding avenue for gaming.
They are up 20-30% in December alone. If they went up another 10-20% in January, I'd probably lighten a bit. Nothing goes straight up forever.
Also note the increased number of commercial shorts.
mal - thanks for the post on bananas...
over here in Cambodia they are much different - green and and far tastier, whereas the Vietnamese prefer a yellow pygmy variety of sorts...
have no idea the effort I've expended trying to teach the locals in the banana market that classic, "hey mister tally man..."
The salient feature of the current American system is the political impotence of the population. A vote is not a voice. Ask the shareholders! Hence, democracies decades are numbered here as well as elsewhere.
What have you done to Jas Jain!
Jas, your posts these last few days have been really lucid and insightful. Whatever you're eating for breakfast, keep it up.
I'm more scared of Conjure's Bond Clock than his Depression Clock. Depressions are severe dislocations of the economy. Defaults are failures of the system. Depressions are the equivalent of broken bones, defaults are akin to amputations. That said the real danger of defaults is that it isolates countries and regions. It is in those places that Pol Pots and Talibans and all the genocide in Africa gain ascendency. Approve or not a bond default world prevent the US from staying in Afganistan/Pakistan for but one instance of a scary consequence that people haven't even considered yet.
"And why do you feel this desperate need to lie, you hatemonger?"
You have written in the past, in replying to me, that you only discuss America. I won't bother to spend the couple of minutes to find the quote (quotes, actually) from a couple of months back, since even if I posted it here, you would go off on some tangent saying how hatemongers or racists (you do remember talking about racism, right?) or crooks or gangsters or born and bred dopes or whatever would be luckier to be slaves. 'LUCKY SLAVES' - makes me wonder what you know about slavery, as practiced where I grew up - not much, to be charitable.
I really should stop - most people ignore you, even when you have an observation or data worth discussing.
But we all have our weaknesses.
Rob Dawg,
Where is the best place to read about and understand what the bond stuff means? For a complete idiot, please. TIA.
On the subject of mines.. :
YouTube - Midnight Oil - Blue Sky Mine
"And why do you feel this desperate need to lie, you hatemonger?"
This reminds me of a postcard someone sent me who had heard one of my lectures. It said,
"WHY DO YOU LIE?
IS IT YOUR GREED?"
It's framed.
"WHY DO YOU LIE?
IS IT YOUR GREED?"
No, it's ego.. always ego.
fromm the previous thread :
flaminia writes:
...The German auto industry is one of the most seriously overbuilt and too many of their products are aimed at the premium market...
And overpriced too ! Quality seems to have slipped from top notch levels too (e.g. Mercedes, but hey, americans don't know that). It works in Germany, since strangely Germans seem to assume that only they can build decent cars and are prepared to pay a lot. Germanys industry is by far to much car-dominated and will be IMHO in for a rude awakening. Before the "subprime crisis" I would have estimated that to occur in 10 - 15 years or so, but with the current situation it probably comes much earlier.
And then ? Europe has goofed up the computer industry. Will it also (with cars gone) goof up future industries ?
Jas, your posts these last few days have been really lucid and insightful. Whatever you're eating for breakfast, keep it up.
You can't be serious.
Happy holidays everyone! why so glum?
I've convinced my neighbor of the impending reality. He is giving all of his extended family bulk rice and piggy banks for xmas. I have one day to work on him about the squirrel recipes.
I'm still wrapping my head around the fact that the 2nd largest economy in the world had their exports drop by 27%. That frightens me. Good thing our markets don't reflect reality or that would be really troubling.
More bad news,
from Mish:
"Warning: A dangerous new virus, FIV, is rapidly spreading the globe. . .Scientists have dubbed the disease, FIV, the Fiscal Insanity Virus. . . The primary symptom of FIV is irrational, often delusional fear of deflation. The virus has an uncanny ability to seek victims in positions of authority."
"Scientists in 33 countries studying the disease have uncovered similar patterns in the DNA of every victim. To date, every person afflicted with FIV has been found to have one of two distinct Marker Chromosomes now identified as the K-Marker (Keynesian-Marker), or the M-Marker (Monetarist-Marker). . . "
"A hair sample taken from economist Paul Krugman, professor of Economics and International Affairs at Princeton University, and Op-Ed writer for the New York Times shows an unusual pattern of multiple repetitive K-Markers."