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Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

Former FX trader at Citigroup, Chris Arnade, just penned a poignant and entertaining Op-ed at The Guardian detailing how Wall Street came to own the Democratic Party via the Clintons over the course of his career. While anyone reading this already knows how completely bought and paid for the Clintons are by the big financial interests, the article provides some interesting anecdotes as well as a classic quote about a young Larry Summers.

Here are some choice excerpts from the piece:

I owe almost my entire Wall Street career to the Clintons. I am not alone; most bankers owe their careers, and their wealth, to them. Over the last 25 years they – with the Clintons it is never just Bill or Hillary – implemented policies that placed Wall Street at the center of the Democratic economic agenda, turning it from a party against Wall Street to a party of Wall Street.

 

That is why when I recently went to see Hillary Clinton campaign for president and speak about reforming Wall Street I was skeptical. What I heard hasn’t changed that skepticism. The policies she offers are mid-course corrections. In the Clintons’ world, Wall Street stays at the center, economically and politically. Given Wall Street’s power and influence, that is a dangerous place to leave them.

 

The administration’s economic policy took shape as trickle down, Democratic style. They championed free trade, pushing Nafta. They reformed welfare, buying into the conservative view that poverty was about dependency, not about situation. They threw the old left a few bones, repealing prior tax cuts on the rich, but used the increased revenues mostly on Wall Street’s favorite issue: cutting the debt.

 

Most importantly, when faced with their first financial crisis, they bailed out Wall Street.

 

That crisis came in January 1995, halfway through the administration’s first term. Mexico, after having boomed from the optimism surrounding Nafta, went bust. It was a huge embarrassment for the administration, given the push they had made for Nafta against a cynical Democratic party.

 

Money was fleeing Mexico, and much of it was coming back through me and my firm. Selling investors’ Mexican bonds was my first job on Wall Street, and now they were trying to sell them back to us. But we hadn’t just sold Mexican bonds to clients, instead we did it using new derivatives product to get around regulatory issues and take advantages of tax rules, and lend the clients money. Given how aggressive we were, and how profitable it was for us, older traders kept expecting to be stopped by regulators from the new administration, but that didn’t happen.

 

When Mexico started to collapse, the shudders began. Initially our firm lost only tens of millions, a large loss but not catastrophic. The crisis however was worsening, and Mexico was headed towards a default, or closing its border to money flows. We stood to lose hundreds of millions, something we might not have survived. Other Wall Street firms were in worse shape, having done the trade in a much bigger size. The biggest was rumored to be Lehman, which stood to lose billions, a loss they couldn’t have survived.

 

As the crisis unfolded, senior management traveled to DC as part of a group of bankers to meet with Treasury officials. They had hoped to meet with Rubin, who was now Treasury secretary. Instead they met with the undersecretary for international affairs who my boss described as: “Some young egghead academic who likes himself a lot and is wide eyed with a taste of power.” That egghead was Larry Summers who would succeed Rubin as Treasury Secretary.

 

The bailout worked, with Mexico edging away from a crisis, allowing it to repay the loans, at profit. It also worked wonders on Wall Street, which let out a huge sigh of relief.

 

The success encouraged the administration, which used it as an economic blueprint that emphasized Wall Street. It also emphasized bailouts, believing it was counterproductive to let banks fail, or to punish them with losses, or fines or, God forbid, charge them with crimes, and risk endangering the economy.

 

The use of bailouts should have also been a reason to heavily regulate Wall Street, to prevent behavior that would require a bailout. But the administration didn’t do that; instead they went the opposite direction and continued to deregulate it, culminating in the repeal of Glass Steagall in 1999.

 

It changed the trading floor, which started to fill with Democrats. On my trading floor, Robert Rubin, who had joined my firm after leaving the administration, held traders attention by telling long stories and jokes about Bill Clinton to wide-eyed traders.

 

Wall Street now had both political parties working for them, and really nobody holding them accountable. Now, no trade was too aggressive, no risk too crazy, no behavior to unethical and no loss too painful. It unleashed a boom that produced plenty of smaller crisis (Russia, Dotcom), before culminating in the housing and financial crisis of 2008.

But hey…

For related articles on Hillary’s long standing Wall Street love affair, see:

Peak Desperation – Clinton Campaign Deploys Strategist for Wall Street Mega Banks to Attack Bernie Sanders

A New Low – Hillary Clinton Claims 9/11 is the Reason She’s Owned by Wall Street

COMPROMISED – How Two of Hillary Clinton’s Top Aides Received Golden Parachutes from Wall Street

Who’s the Real Progressive? A Side by Side Comparison of Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton’s Lifetime Donors

Here Come the Cronies – Buffett and Blackstone President Launch $33,400 a Plate Hillary Clinton Fundraiser

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1OVxSY4 Tyler Durden

Going into Friday, Japanese monetary policy already stood out as the most egregious example of Keynesian insanity the market has ever witnessed.

You’ll recall the central bank is monetizing the entirety of gross JGB issuance and is on a lunatic quest to own the entire ETF market.

But the BoJ still hadn’t gone full-Krugman by taking rates negative. That changed overnight when the bank took the NIRP plunge as Haruhiko Kuroda reminded the world that when it comes to maniacal monetary policy, no one does it like he does.

Why is NIRP necessary in Japan? The same reason it’s necessary in Europe and the same reason ZIRP had to hang around in the US for eight years: inflation. Or, more specifically, a lack of inflation.

Japan has been stuck in the deflationary doldrums for as long as some Wall Street rookies have been alive and Europe has bounced around in deflation on several occasions of late although data out today showed eurozone inflation “soaring” 0.4%.

So what gives? How much damn fiat money do the Kurodas and Yellens and Draghis of the world have to print before inflation picks up? Are central bankers contributing to the problem by destroying creative destruction and thus perpetuating the global deflationary supply glut?

The problem, BofA’s Michael Hartnett says, can be traced to the “Deflationary D’s”: debt, deleveraging, demographics, disruption. Read on to discover why “the nominal GDP of the industrialized world has grown just 4.1% since the lows of Q1’2009, one of the tiniest, deflationary expansions ever. “

*  *  *

From BofA

The nominal GDP of the industrialized world has grown just 4.1% since the lows of Q1’2009, one of the tiniest, deflationary expansions ever. And while asset prices are up significantly since their 2008/09 lows, the underlying message from Wall Street in recent years (underperformance of bank stocks – see Chart 1, stubbornly low government bond yields, all-time relative highs in “high quality” stocks, and sustained outperformance of “growth” stocks over “value” stocks) has been doggedly deflationary.

 The Deflationary “D’s”

Why has an almost manic monetary policy been so ineffective at generating a broad, sustained economic recovery, or at least alleviating the threat of deflation? Secular factors, most obviously the 4 deflationary “D’s” of excess Debt, financial sector Deleveraging, aging Demographics and tech Disruption have played a major role:

• 1. Debt levels remain very large: according to the BIS, global debt as a share of GDP was 246% in Q4’2000, 269% in Q4’2007 and 286% in Q2’2014.
• 2. Deleveraging has impeded the housing recovery and its “multiplier” effect: CoreLogic’s Housing Credit Index, which measures mortgage credit availability in the US, has plunged from 100 to 42 in the past seven years; US mortgage credit outstanding has fallen more than $1tn since its peak of $14.8tn in ’08.
• 3. Demographics reveal a dramatic aging of the developed world’s population: in the next 10 days, 112,000 people in the US, Europe and Japan will reach the retirement age of 65.
• 4. Disruption via innovation in robotics, AI and so on, which the World Economic Forum forecasts will cause the loss of a net 5.1mn jobs in the next 5 years.

And while all are secular in nature, the deflationary D’s have also impacted the economic cycle in recent quarters: excess Debt and financial sector Deleveraging have exacerbated problems in China, energy and credit markets; tech Disruption has been a massive factor in the collapse in the oil price; aging Demographics and tech Disruption have played a role in the desire of the Consumer to save rather than spend in the past 18 months.

Indeed, even in the US, the ease with which debt, deleveraging, demographics and disruption have nullified the strong tailwinds of low mortgage rates, low unemployment rates and collapsing gas prices, thus resulting in higher household savings rates, has surprised many. It certainly goes far in explaining the “deflationary” nature of the economic expansion, the wage inequality and insecurity associated with this decade, as well as the rise in political populism across the western world.

*  *  *

We suppose that at some point, policy makers will heed the (loud) calls for helicopter money and once the cash paradropping begins, we’ll see you in the Weimar Republic.

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1SOXABb Tyler Durden

Submitted by Mac Slavo via SHTFPlan.com,

Skyrocketing costs and shrinking opportunity are meeting head on with full on economic disaster. The Dude, Where’s My Stuff? generation doesn’t have much motivation to go on for growing up and getting their life together these days.

Record numbers are out of the work force; record numbers are living with their parents in the basement; record numbers are losing the battle of return on investment with higher education – purchased with burdensome loans – in order to attain better employment and stability. Rising costs are hitting home owners and renters alike, with a real squeeze coming down on those just starting out.

And all of that is driving the economy to the brink.

That American Dream thing is a going up in smoke. Upward mobility has stalled, and stagnation is setting in.

It is becoming apparent that a lost generation is upon us, and the Americans of tomorrow may not even have a meager concept of what this country stood for, because their lives will be so completely desolate and controlled.

A Forbes columnist asked the question: Can Millennials Afford The American Dream? Forbes’ Kerri Zane writes:

The local radio news station in Los Angeles recently reported that the rental rates in this city have reached apocalyptic levels. So it stands to reason the next best step is to purchase a home. Easier said than done, particularly for millennials.

 

At the end of last year my 25-year-old daughter and I were discussing this issue. She and her live-in boyfriend had been exploring the notion, but with the median home price in Los Angeles exceeding $500,000.00, it is completely out of reach for them. Between juggling school loan payoffs and each working in the freelance world of entertainment, saving for a down payment and/or qualifying for a mortgage, in this day and age, is tough.

 

[…]

 

Over the last 20 plus years I have watched as the cost of living in the U.S., and more specifically Los Angeles, steadily climbed. It became apparent, without a doubt, that if my daughters (I have two) were going to have a home, it would be up to mom to help them.

 

Before you rush to judgement about my children’s work ethic or my parenting style… look at the stats… home affordability will decline through-out 2016 by 4 to 5%. We all know that at the end of 2015 the feds increased mortgage rates, and real estate pundits predict home prices will continue to appreciate at 3 to 4%… the cost of  in-state tuition and fees at public four-year institutions have increased at an average rate of 3.4% per year beyond inflation.

These kids are stuck between a rock and a hard place.

It is a pertinent question for this generation. Will there be security and prosperity for those who are willing to work hard?

Basically, all the trends are headed in the wrong direction for a healthy society.

Demographically, people are falling in on themselves.

The Pew Research Center conducted a study in 2012 on the rising number of millennials living with their parents, and the reasons contributing to the decline:

In 2012, 36% of the nation’s young adults ages 18 to 31—the so-called Millennial generation—were living in their parents’ home, according to a new Pew Research Center analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data. This is the highest share in at least four decades and represents a slow but steady increase over the 32% of their same-aged counterparts who were living at home prior to the Great Recession in 2007 and the 34% doing so when it officially ended in 2009.

 

A record total of 21.6 million Millennials lived in their parents’ home in 2012, up from 18.5 million of their same aged counterparts in 2007. Of these, at least a third and perhaps as many as half are college students.

 

[…]

 

Since the onset of the 2007-2009 recession, both age groups have experienced a rise in this living arrangement.

 

[…]

 

The steady rise in the share of young adults who live in their parents’ home appears to be driven by a combination of economic, educational and cultural factors. Among them:

 

Declining employment. … Rising college enrollment. … Declining marriage.

And that’s just for those who were willing to give things a try.

The rest are on the dole, and bulging the size and scope of federal government even further, and millions falling to the bottom are looking to the government as a parental figure and savior – who dispenses benefits and can “take care of” them.

A wave of unemployment, and those who have permanently dropped out of the work force and all appearances of looking for work, is setting in. And things don’t look pretty from there.

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/20cajCE Tyler Durden

 

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/23yZUQO George Washington

Make no mistake, investors didn’t need any more reasons to be bearish on Chinese equities.

Mainland markets are veritable casinos dominated by retail investors who until last summer, were enthralled with the prospect of easy riches in an environment where shares only seemed to know one direction: up.

All of that changed last June when a dramatic unwind in the half dozen backdoor margin lending channels that helped to fuel the rally triggered an epic rout that became self-fulfilling once the retail crowd (which accounts for 80% of the market) became rip sellers rather than dip buyers.

Since then, successive efforts on the part of the CSRC to stabilize the situation by pouring CNY1.5 trillion into A-shares has met with limited success as periods of calm are interrupted by violent bouts of selling like those we saw earlier this month when China tried and failed to implement a circuit breaker.

Throw in the ongoing yuan deval fiasco and there’s every reason not to be involved in Chinese stocks.

But when it rains it pours, and now, analysts say margin calls on SCLs are the next landmine that may pose a “systemic risk” for China’s battered markets.

“Some companies that had pledged shares as collateral for loans are now faced with a stark choice – dump them under pressure from impatient brokers and banks and book a loss, or stump up fresh cash or other assets to make up for the difference in value,” Reuters writes.

This is a rather large problem. Over half of all listed companies have their shares pledged. As BofA notes, “1,411 A-share companies have had some of their shares been pledged for SCLs by their major shareholders, representing 50.2% of the total number of A-shares. The value of stocks pledged for SCLs has been rising consistently – from Rmb2.36tr on 1 July 2015 to Rmb3.05tr by 1 Jan 2016, i.e., up by 29% in 2H15.”

In short, the steep decline in margin financing paints an incomplete picture when it comes to understanding how much leverage is in the system. 

On one hand, the headline figure on margin financing suggests quite a bit of deleveraging has taken place since things hit peak absurdity last spring. Here’s a look at how quickly the unwind materialized once things began to get dicey:

But as the SCL chart shown above demonstrates, the decline in headline margin debt only tells part of the story. Indeed, BofA says even the CNY3.05 trillion number for SCLs may be underestimate the amount of leverage in the market. “Our SCL data might have under-estimated the true extent of such activities because 1) only major shareholders, i.e., those who own more than 5% of a company’s stocks, are obliged to disclose their SCL activities; and 2) we have assumed a 12-month duration for the 2,889 deals, 44% of the total, that have no ending date disclosed vs. over 16 months on average for those that have,” the bank writes. 

Where things get truly frightening is when one looks under the hood on these deals. 

Have a look at the following table which shows that of companies with pledged shares, an astonishing 82% were trading at a multiple of 50X or more at the time of their pledging:

“The collateral value,” BofA says dryly, “is far from solid.”

“If the market continues to fall, equity pledging-related selling pressure could increase significantly,” Gao Ting, head of China strategy with UBS warns. 

To let BofA tell it, fully a third of SCLs will face margin call pressure and some 371 of the 1,411 stocks pledged have already hit their triggers. “Assuming 40% loan-to-asset value at the time of SCL granting, our analysis suggests that by now, 371 stocks, worth Rmb641bn based on their current market values, have seen their share prices reached the stop-loss levels; and additional 281 stocks, worth Rmb310bn, the warning levels.”

What happens when the margin calls start you ask? Well, nothing good.

“When a position has to be closed for transactions using floating shares as collateral, the pledger sells on the secondary market, putting further pressure on the stock market,” Ting cautions.

Right. Which means stocks fall further and trigger more margin calls which means more forced liquidations in a never-ending, self reinforcing loop. Or, as Reuters puts it: “[It’s] a vicious cycle where further share price drops are likely to trigger more margin calls and threaten further forced sales.“

And this isn’t some hypothetical – it’s already started. “On Jan 18, some stocks of a company used as collaterals for a SCL were liquidated by the lender, which prompted its share price to limit down the next day,” BofA recounts. “The stock had been suspended from trading since then. So far, at least 11 A-shares have been suspended as their prices approached the cut-loss levels.”

“On Thursday, trading in shares of Maoye Communication and Network Co Ltd was halted after it said it received notice that its controlling shareholder faces margin calls, one of at least eight companies that have made similar announcements so far this year,” Reuters adds.

Note that if this entire thing were to unwind it would be larger than if every bit of margin debt were squeezed out of the system. BofA figures the  average loan-to-asset value is about 40%. Apply that to the CNY3.05 trillion pile of collateralized stocks and you’ve got the potential for a CNY1.22 trillion unwind.

And it gets still worse. Remember China’s multi-trillion yuan black swan, the WMP industry? Well the WMPs are involved here too. Here’s an example, again from BofA:

We cite a recently reported example involving the controlling shareholder of Guangxi Future Technology. According to articles by Securities Times (Jan 19) and 21st Century Business Herald (Jan 20), in December 2015 Pudong Development Bank set up a WMP called Tebon Huijin No.1 Asset Management Plan to fund the shareholder’s purchase of its own company’s shares. Essentially, the WMP buyers, as the senior tranche investors, lent money for the shareholder to buy their own stock. Similar to other structured WMPs, this product has a stop-loss clause, and the company’s share price dropped below the stop-loss level on Jan 18. As the controlling shareholder did not put up additional margin, Pudong Development Bank liquidated all stock in the plan (equivalent to 2.13% of the company’s outstanding shares). This is the first case of forced liquidation by such products but in our view there could be additional cases given how sharply the market has declined in recent weeks.

In short, this is a house of cards built on a still enormous amount of leverage. At the risk of mixing metaphors, the problem here is that once the dominos start to fall, it will be impossible to stop the downward momentum.

The takeaway: “we’re going to need a bigger plunge protection team”…

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1JNjvpG Tyler Durden

Submitted by Clare Bernishvia TheAntiMedia.org,

The World Health Organization announced it will convene an Emergency Committee under International Health Regulations on Monday, February 1, concerning the Zika virus ‘explosive’ spread throughout the Americas. The virus reportedly has the potential to reach pandemic proportions — possibly around the globe. But understandingwhy this outbreak happened is vital to curbing it. As the WHO statement said:

“A causal relationship between Zika virus infection and birth malformations and neurological syndromes … is strongly suspected. [These links] have rapidly changed the risk profile of Zika, from a mild threat to one of alarming proportions.

 

“WHO is deeply concerned about this rapidly evolving situation for 4 main reasons: the possible association of infection with birth malformations and neurological syndromes; the potential for further international spread given the wide geographical distribution of the mosquito vector; the lack of population immunity in newly affected areas; and the absence of vaccines, specific treatments, and rapid diagnostic tests […]

 

“The level of concern is high, as is the level of uncertainty.”

Zika seemingly exploded out of nowhere. Though it was first discovered in 1947, cases only sporadically occurred throughout Africa and southern Asia. In 2007, the first case was reported in the Pacific. In 2013, a smattering of small outbreaks and individual cases were officially documented in Africa and the western Pacific. They also began showing up in the Americas. In May 2015, Brazil reported its first case of Zika virus — and the situation changed dramatically.

Brazil is now considered the epicenter of the Zika outbreak, which coincides with at least 4,000 reports of babies born with microcephaly just since October.

When examining a rapidly expanding potential pandemic, it’s necessary to leave no stone unturned so possible solutions, as well as future prevention, will be as effective as possible. In that vein, there was another significant development in 2015.

Oxitec first unveiled its large-scale, genetically-modified mosquito farm in Brazil in July 2012, with the goal of reducing “the incidence of dengue fever,” as The Disease Daily reported. Dengue fever is spread by the same Aedes mosquitoes which spread the Zika virus — and though they “cannot fly more than 400 meters,” WHO stated, “it may inadvertently be transported by humans from one place to another.” By July 2015, shortly after the GM mosquitoes were first released into the wild in Juazeiro, Brazil, Oxitec proudly announced they had “successfully controlled the Aedes aegypti mosquito that spreads dengue fever, chikungunya and zika virus, by reducing the target population by more than 90%.”

Though that might sound like an astounding success — and, arguably, it was — there is an alarming possibility to consider.

Nature, as one Redditor keenly pointed out, finds a way — and the effort to control dengue, zika, and other viruses, appears to have backfired dramatically.

The particular strain of Oxitec GM mosquitoes, OX513A, are genetically altered so the vast majority of their offspring will die before they mature — though Dr. Ricarda Steinbrecher published concerns in a report in September 2010 that a known survival rate of 3-4 percent warranted further study before the release of the GM insects. Her concerns, which were echoed by several other scientists both at the time and since, appear to have been ignored — though they should not have been.

Those genetically-modified mosquitoes work to control wild, potentially disease-carrying populations in a very specific manner. Only the male modified Aedes mosquitoes are supposed to be released into the wild — as they will mate with their unaltered female counterparts. Once offspring are produced, the modified, scientific facet is supposed to ‘kick in’ and kill that larvae before it reaches breeding age — if tetracycline is not present during its development. But there is a problem.

According to an unclassified document from the Trade and Agriculture Directorate Committee for Agriculture dated February 2015, Brazil is the third largest in “global antimicrobial consumption in food animal production” — meaning, Brazil is third in the world for its use of tetracycline in its food animals. As a study by the American Society of Agronomy, et. al., explained, “It is estimated that approximately 75% of antibiotics are not absorbed by animals and are excreted in waste.” One of the antibiotics (or antimicrobials) specifically named in that report for its environmental persistence is tetracycline.

In fact, as a confidential internal Oxitec document divulged in 2012, that survival rate could be as high as 15% — even with low levels of tetracycline present. “Even small amounts of tetracycline can repress” the engineered lethality. Indeed, that 15% survival rate was described by Oxitec:

“After a lot of testing and comparing experimental design, it was found that [researchers] had used a cat food to feed the [OX513A] larvae and this cat food contained chicken. It is known that tetracycline is routinely used to prevent infections in chickens, especially in the cheap, mass produced, chicken used for animal food. The chicken is heat-treated before being used, but this does not remove all the tetracycline. This meant that a small amount of tetracycline was being added from the food to the larvae and repressing the [designed] lethal system.”

 

Even absent this tetracycline, as Steinbrecher explained, a “sub-population” of genetically-modified Aedes mosquitoes could theoretically develop and thrive, in theory, “capable of surviving and flourishing despite any further” releases of ‘pure’ GM mosquitoes which still have that gene intact. She added, “the effectiveness of the system also depends on the [genetically-designed] late onset of the lethality. If the time of onset is altered due to environmental conditions … then a 3-4% [survival rate] represents a much bigger problem…”

 

As the WHO stated in its press release, “conditions associated with this year’s El Nino weather pattern are expected to increase mosquito populations greatly in many areas.”

Incidentally, President Obama called for a massive research effort to develop a vaccine for the Zika virus, as one does not currently exist. Brazil has now called in 200,000 soldiers to somehow help combat the virus’ spread. Aedes mosquitoes have reportedly been spotted in the U.K. But perhaps the most ironic — or not — proposition was proffered on January 19, by the MIT Technology Review:

“An outbreak in the Western Hemisphere could give countries including the United States new reasons to try wiping out mosquitoes with genetic engineering.

 

“Yesterday, the Brazilian city of Piracicaba said it would expand the use of genetically modified mosquitoes …

 

“The GM mosquitoes were created by Oxitec, a British company recently purchased by Intrexon, a synthetic biology company based in Maryland. The company said it has released bugs in parts of Brazil and the Cayman Islands to battle dengue fever.”

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1SpyzLq Tyler Durden

We’ve long known that Canada, like Sweden and Denmark, is sitting on a giant housing bubble.

Indeed we took a close look at the issue back in March of last year and have revisited in on several occasions since. Put simply, the divergence between crude prices and the country’s housing market simply isn’t sustainable a you can see from the following chart:

And while the boom is rapidly turning to bust in places like Calgary, things are humming right along in Waterloo, where Napoleon was defeated in 1815. No, wait – wrong Waterloo. This is Waterloo, Ontario, a town of 140,000 that’s being billed as “Canada’s Silicon Valley.”

As Bloomberg reports, “the town revolves around two universities and a burgeoning technology sector that’s attracted companies such as Google Inc. and dozens of startups.” Here’s a look inside the Kitchener-Waterloo Google office:

The buzz has created a “land grab” and now, condos are renting for nearly C$2,000 per month while one-bedroom units are selling for more than a quarter of a million dollars.

Vacancy rates are at 13-year lows and Google’s country manager for Canada calls the city “lightning in a bottle.”

If that sounds like a bubble to you, you’d be correct but some investors don’t see it that way.

Take Bill Ring for instance, head of operations for a property management company who Bloomberg notes drove two hours to Toronto to attend a rowdy sales pitch for condos in Waterloo put on by a Bay Street trader turned-tech investor, turned-real estate mogul. “Students are coming in and need a place to live, tech companies are opening. It’ll all drive the value up,” he says. “I don’t want to invest in stocks because they’re crazy and real estate is a solid, safe investment.“

Yes, Bill wants a “solid, safe investment” that isn’t “crazy.”

Like Canadian real estate.

Which definitely isn’t a bubble.

After all, if the housing market in Canada were overheating, you wouldn’t be able to get “bargains” like the listing shown below from Vancouver.

Good luck Bill.

via Zero Hedge http://ift.tt/1P2Geel Tyler Durden