That alone should cause debasement another 30% of USD.

--bh

China's holding of US bonds drops first time in 11 months

"Other emerging powers Russia and Brazil have also trimmed their US bond holdings, the US Treasury said in its monthly international capital data report.....

On the whole, foreigners decreased holdings of Treasury bills by 44.5 billion dollars in April, the data showed.....

According to an online poll, 87 percent of respondents considered China's dollar assets unsafe, the Chinese newspaper Global Times reported this month."

AFP: China's holding of US bonds drops first time in 11 months

13 is an unlucky number, couldn't they have found another $100 Billion lying around somewhere?

@Juvenal - that could be the photo-op for Obama like the Bush Press Club photo where he looked under cushions for the WMDs.

Whether all this spending is inflationary or if deflation will continue. I found this write up on the matter... Pretty good.... Please let me know if there are any holes in it.... Accrued Interest: SMACKDOWN WEEK: Now consumers are all but extinct

A trillion here, a trillion there, pretty soon we'll be talking gazillions.

You just can't make this stuff up:

Bankers group sees U.S. recession ending in 3rd quarter

[snip]
"The economy will return to growth but not to health," said Bruce Kasman, chairman of the economic advisory committee and chief economist for JPMorgan Chase in New York.
Yahoo! 404 - Page Not Found

EUR-USD 0.68%
USD-JPY -1.48%
GBP-USD 0.88%
Oil 1.86%

And the stock market still goes red

$14T?

What a coincidence. That would've paid off all U.S. residential mortgages. That would've been a slight economic stimulus.

We're in the hole one way or another. Might as well have been in the hole for J6P rather than the upper elite.

Eh, but who cares about J6P anyway.

Triskadeckacardsaphobia

As I said, Outsider: Bankers are our friends. People, not so much.

I still say we gather the pennies we have left and keep them home, stop consuming, and quit playing at the rigged table. The house always wins, but not if we refuse to play.

Is that not the very definition of cancer?

//"The economy will return to growth but not to health," //

Oh look, oil is back up above $72 a barrel.

A peak at oil reserves
Jun 15th 2009
From Economist.com

Premium content | Economist.com 

nades. Good link.

Basically agree.

It's all in the timing. Deflationary-esque now. Inflationary-ique in the future.

--bh

"i thought i saw "MILF" but it was "TALF" and "MMIFF"

ROTFLMAO!!!!!! Now thats funny!

I thought the number was $12T.

splat (profile) wrote on Tue, 6/16/2009 - 12:22 pm reply Ignore user Anyone else think this is slightly out of control ? Coupled with $X trillion in the planned healthcare debacle.. Has something gone fundamentally wrong with out government ?

• splat

** Splat, really! I mean, conservative, liberal, democrat or republican, you have to admit 14 trillion authorized through first Q 2009 is so far beyond unprecidented everyone should be asking WTF.....I can rememeber how we all complained about 3 Trillion in Iraq over the life of the war was excessive spending and as you bring up, this doesnt include and further stimulus or new administration programs....******

Mook wrote (from previous thread):
Sorry, Coinz, but I've gotta call you out on this.

Of which 199 are actual, full-time, honest-to-God, in-there-with the-kids-all-day teachers. One hundred ninety-nine.

You need to separate school administrators from support staff. Yes, if you add up all the janitors, bus drivers, vehicle maintenance, IT, media techs (librarians), HR, business office PLUS administrators, the total will be more than teachers. I was only counting superintendents, directors, principals, assistant principals, and special ed administrators -- the people that manage the schools and support staff.

what qualifications?

//What sort of qualifications does one need to be an official government acronymyst?//

The national debt is only 11.4 TT

splat wrote:

Anyone else think this is slightly out of control ? Coupled with $X trillion in the planned healthcare debacle.. Has something gone fundamentally wrong with out government ?

Don't forget to the add the $X trillion for global warming fixes.

"shrinking trade balances will always be reflected in a reduction in foreign Treasury holdings."

but didn't the trade deficit drop months ago? let me dig up CR's chart....ah found it:

"Trade Deficit Increases Slightly in April"
Trade Deficit Increases Slightly in April

Seriously, who is building new houses in this environment? How is this positive?

Ghost,

There is a silver lining here. I posted this on an earlier thread:

This is actually good news for the patient fence sitters. Adding more supply to a glut willl only further depress housing prices.

Over shoot = green shoot to the Angry Saver. Now that is prosperity!

Optimism is not illegal..

//Bankers group sees U.S. recession ending in 3rd quarter//

Your right Stupidity should be.

can anybody confirm this?

google is your friend

I amd 100% sure I remember hearing 50-60BN was the absolute top cost for Sub Prime issues...OK it was some time ago but my goodness thats a fine figure $13 TRILLION and as yet no one on the hook apart from some old Madoff bloke.....amazing.

They forgot to add in all the friggin' repo's done since 2004..
Just an oversight I gather.....

Ciao
MS

"I am 100% sure I remember hearing 50-60BN was the absolute top cost for Sub Prime issues"

Just think, in a couple of years you'll write "I am 100% sure I remember hearing $13 trillion was the absolute top cost for bailout issues"

Scrooge, I'd be the wrong person to take this up. But the mechanism is fairly clear - Treas/GSE foreign interest reflects balance of trade, i.e., China or any other sterilizes b.o.t. surplus with purchase of US debt.

Are they buying other assets here? Don't know, so won't say. Setser's your guy for this, I think:

Setser 

I actually like all prime numbers.... 2 being my favorite of the bunch.....

Get used to (sub)prime numbers. $13.9 trillion ain't no prime number in my book!

Isn't it interesting how we enjoyed watching Roger Maris's home run record get bashed around by a bunch of cheaters, not unlike how we enjoyed the captains of industry cheating their way into the financial record books?

Okay if the Fed is buying treasuries and forgoing SP futures won't real buyers just wait until we get to 4% on the ten-year again

All,

Here's a website that tracks and explains the looting. It's supposed to be non-partisan, just like the rip-offs.

Stimulus.org

Whew! Hard to keep up today ... CR is busy, busy. Must be big doings ... the CR-VIX is climbing.

Seriously, who is building new houses in this environment? How is this positive?

Perhaps the cost of actually building housing has declined in the last decade-- improvements in technology and the supply chain? Plus shoddier practices and materials? So it may be that even at these distressed prices the replacement costs are even lower. Which could be another element to a nasty overcorrection to the downside. Of course, me and Angry Saver are cheering and waiting to buy around the winter of 2012.

c scotto- shhhhh! be very very quiet...

Should we pay to keep him in prison or let him out to work off the judgment?

CA is insolvent and the legislatures are still jockeying for campaign contributions and leadership positions.

this data makes my brain hurt...

Oh look, oil is back up above $72 a barrel.

And the Arctic Circle turns out to be a relative bust:

How Much Oil Is In The Arctic?

Zack attack

I read a disturbing report that average drilling activity (equal to rig count per square mile in thr Gulf of Mx) in the Artic would only yield 4 mos of world oil. Above average may triple or quadruple that but hardly an answer to the worlds energy needs.

No worries. We have dedicated, concerned and intelligent public servants watching over all of this.

Here is the video Rick Santelli metioned 

Defense Department Sees Protests as Terrorism

cryptogon.com » Defense Department Sees Protests as Terrorism

California Puts 90-Day Hold on Foreclosures

Los Angeles Times -- Business, Technology, Real Estate, Hollywood, Economics, News - latimes.com

And I keep paying my mortgage...man am I a sucker for punishment.

A peak at oil reserves
Jun 15th 2009
From Economist.com

Premium content | Economist.com

"Proven oil reserves extracted using current technology should last 40 years, if no new oil was found" (approx.)

That doesn't sound very optimistic to me at all! I'm sure when we get down to 20 years worth (+ a little new more expensive oil added in), prices and supply are going to be nightmarishly unstable. I found this pretty interesting the other day:
Overhead Crush | Gregor.us

Wars are free, nova. They're off-budget, so they don't count.

The most galling thing about our prolonged 2-front war, is how little grief the military-industrial-complex has suffered as it's prospered greatly. Both theaters of war being the perfect meat-grinder for complex military equipment...

I asked a coworker that today. "You heard from the war? Did it leave town?"

He said " I live by Walter Reed. it hasn't gone away. I see them every day shooting hoops with one arm or hopping on the metal leg."

What if they had a war and nobody came home?

GW told me to go shopping or the terrorists would win.

I got a bronze star from the Wal-Mart greeter.

@Tim - I should have added the /sarcasm.

Maybe this whole week is supposed to be dollar and bond support from the PPT instead of equities.

Who else would buy bonds for 30bp below last week's auction prices?

Sarasota mayor sought stimulus funds in the 1930s

The county, which had been bragging that its growth could not be stopped, was suddenly starved for good news as construction came to a standstill, stores closed and unemployment rose.

Black Star Ranch solves energy shortage...

Cow Backpacks Trap Methane Gas 

Scene from Austin powers 4...

Dr.Evil:" Mr. President I have a weapon that will liquefy the brains of everyone in the world unless you pay 100 trillion trillion dollars !"
Obama looks at Timmah...
Timmah: "Cash or check ?"

• splat

Euro Watch blog has a new post up. He writes about yesterdays decline and Southern Europe.

Basically the whole EU system seems to be in denial on what is happening at the moment. The markets have been focused on the East, but they are now starting to wake up to the fact that the South is still here, and when this "matures" we will have a full blown financial crisis, that is for sure. At that poiunt the Spanish and Greek governments will effectively lose control of the situation, just as they have done in Latvia and Hungary.

This is one of the reasons I am following Latvia closely. Basically what is happening in the East is a sort of "dry run" for what is going to have to have to happen in the South. The whole package, from "fiscal austerity" as a tool to attack recessions, to "internal devaluation" via price and wage deflation is about to be applied in the South as a path towards restoring export competitiveness and economic growth.

Splat - why would they pay? Isn't a brainless population exactly what politicians want most?

If Obama agrees to bailout CA, he will probably ask for the resignation of the governor and the legislature, and then install his own toadies.... No need to deal with those pesky elections... After a little while we could do that at the Federal level too...

Cow Backpacks Trap Methane Gas

And everyone laughed when the money was appropriated to study cow flatulence....

I anxiously await the results of the studies on primate body odor.

Seriously, it's time for better studies on the CO2 cycle of forests. I recall a study from the 1970s (sorry no link) that claimed that the complete cycle actually had no net impact or actually contributed CO2 to the environment. Before we spend a bunch on money on carbon credits for forests, we had better make sure we know what we're buying.

One factor in oil that a lot of peak oil 'end-of-the-worlders' seem to miss, is that increased price will cut usage. Additionally high prices will make currently unprofitable extraction suddenly attractive. An end to extremely cheap oil is unlikely to be a bad thing in the long run.

Look what happened at $140/barrel oil, suddenly people started looking at cars with much better gas millage. Permanently high oil prices will trigger a demand for fuel efficiency and hopefully spur the kind of R&D which results in a move away from current levels of oil dependence. eg. how small a percentage of buyers really needs a V8 tundra crew-cab ?

The renewed interest in diesel vehicles, which give greater gas milage and perhaps more importantly is 'easier' and more efficient to refine, is a positive thing.

• splat

JPMorgan Analysts Predict 60% House Price Decline for High End

Dedollarization

De-Dollarization: Dismantling America’s Financial-Military Empire

America has become a deadbeat