Tag: finance

Submitted by James H. Kunstler of Kunstler.com,

Well, at least the poobahs cleared a path to the annual orgy of Christmas, which, along with the S & P 500, have become proxies for the American economy. Lately, the Christmas season starts directly after Halloween, so, the whole fourth quarter of the year becomes a circus of ceremonial distractions. In the background, though, the nation grinds toward anguish, measured in soiled Justin Bieber dolls deposited in the landfills.

Historians who look back on these strange years of suspended consequence will marvel at how this empire of grift kept its wheels turning after its engine died. Being on the downhill slope is often enough to keep anything going. One might think the young people of this land would be seething at the eclipse of their futures, but it seems they have been successfully lobotomized with cell phones — when the endorphin hits lag between text messages, they can watch sitcoms, or porn.

You can be sure there will be a snapback from all this drift and anomie, and when it comes, the snap will be savage. Like the US economy, the Republican Party is dead but hasn’t gotten the news. It killed itself just as the Whigs did in the years before the Civil War, by splitting up into factions — one faction of “know-nothings” preoccupied with scape-goats opposed to a faction of sclerotic parasitical fat-cats too timid and greedy to engage in the emergencies of the day.

The Tea Party faction should change its name to the Cracker Party because it represents the interests of white southerners who are too dumb to know what these emergencies amount to. They are really more comfortable with the supernatural, hence their fondness for religions based on snake-handling, visitations of the dead, and motor sports. Personally, I believe they will eventually contrive to form their own break-away Cracker Republic and attempt to re-enact the Civil War. They will fail, and starve, and find themselves back in an even worse long-term depression than Dixieland experienced from 1860 to 1960, in a de-suburbanized wasteland of bare subsistence farming. Their highest art will be soup-making.

The non-Tea Party Republicans will just shrivel and vanish out of sheer irrelevance. This leaves the Democrats to become the focus of intense ire as they attempt to ‘splain why the nation’s affairs went to shit on their watch. A lot of them will end up being executed and plundered by the new kid on the block, the Savior Party, led by some charismatic character willing to ignore procedural protocols to clear away the debris left by his-or-her predecessors. Alas, the juice will not be there to permit the Savior to really control a territory as large as the continental USA. By juice, I mean money and oil. Thus, the nation enters its new dark age.

Who knows when that will get underway in earnest, though I think the folks who say 2014 are onto something. If you believe in cycles, which I tend to, then it rhymes nicely with 1814 and 1914, two watersheds when one epoch ended and another truly began. 2014 would logically be the year that China tells America to go piss up a rope. The message would be sent on the back of the envelope containing $2.7 trillion in official American debt paper. As Ole Blue Eyes used to say, this could be the start of something big.

Sentient observers of the current scene are clearly frustrated by the remarkable homeostasis that seems to rule the scene, these horse-latitudes of history where the air is still and nothing moves and the mind is exhausted by watchful waiting. Things will get lively, soon enough, so enjoy the holiday quarter of the year which is so soon upon us. Gorge on candy corn. When you recover from that, roast a turkey. Then make a nice figgy pudding. Then pop some bubbly and salute your loved ones. Then gird your loins for the new age of consequence.

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/1OWOlPHDsiE/story01.htm Tyler Durden

.

Obam-Mo is making a call

He heard that his plan covers all

He’s not getting through

He’ll wait till he’s blue

He needs a new plan for his doll

The Limerick King

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First it was David Viniar, rumored for so long to be Lloyd’s next logical replacement, who rode into the Goldman sunset. Now it is the turn of Goldman’s Vice Chairman, Michael Evans, one of the firm’s most senior execs and the person who many had expected would ultimately replace Lloyd Blankfein when it was time for succession at the firm that executes God’s will (net of 3-5% in commissions) to depart quietly into the night.

From Reuters:

Goldman Sachs Group Inc Vice Chairman J. Michael Evans will retire from his position at year’s end and become a senior director, according to an internal memo viewed by Reuters.

 

Evans, 56, one of the most senior executives at Wall Street’s biggest investment bank, is global head of growth markets and played a key role in Goldman’s expansion into Asia. He was one of several executives said to be in the running to replace Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein when he eventually retires.

 

“Michael’s commitment to the firm, his focus on our clients and his deep, global market knowledge have left an extraordinary record of contribution,” Blankfein and Chief Operating Officer Gary Cohn said in the memo, whose contents were confirmed by spokesman David Wells. a

Goldman’s confirming press release:

The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE: GS) announced today that J. Michael Evans, a vice chairman of Goldman Sachs and global head of Growth Markets, has decided to retire at the end of the year after more than 20 years at the firm. He will become a senior director upon his retirement.

 

“Michael’s deep commitment to the firm, his unrelenting focus on our clients and his broad global market knowledge have left an extraordinary mark at Goldman Sachs,” said Lloyd C. Blankfein, Chairman and CEO. “We particularly appreciate the role he played developing our client franchise across Asia, and his work co-chairing the Business Standards Committee, which was an unparalleled effort to review our business standards and practices. We are pleased that we will continue to benefit from his advice and counsel as a senior director.”

 

Evans joined Goldman Sachs in 1993 in the Investment Banking Division in London and was named a partner in 1994.

 

As global head of Equity Capital Markets, Evans was at the center of many privatizations in Europe and Asia Pacific in the 1990’s and went on to play an integral role in the success of the firm’s initial public offering in May 1999.

 

In 2001, he became co-head of the Equities Division, working in both New York and London. Two years later, Evans became global co-head of the Securities Division, where he helped cement our position as a leading market maker and underwriter to investors and companies globally.

 

In 2004, he relocated to Hong Kong as Chairman of Goldman Sachs Asia Pacific, a position he held for seven years. There, Evans helped shape our strategy and footprint, deepen our leadership bench and develop important client relationships.

 

Over the last three years, Evans was co-chair of the firm’s Business Standards Committee, where he helped oversee the most extensive review of the firm’s business standards and practices in its 144 year history. The Committee’s work resulted in significant changes in how the firm addresses important issues related to clients, reputational risk and accountability.

 

Evans was named a vice chairman of Goldman Sachs in 2008. In 2011, he was named global head of Growth Markets, responsible for driving our strategy, resource allocation and many client relationships across the firm in these important markets.

 

The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. is a leading global investment banking, securities and investment management firm that provides a wide range of financial services to a substantial and diversified client base that includes corporations, financial institutions, governments and high-net-worth individuals. Founded in 1869, the firm is headquartered in New York and maintains offices in all major financial centers around the world.

With that we hope that at least one of the people selling stocks to the hypnotized masses who can’t wait to BTFATH has been identified.

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/vxOOGaJkqsg/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Today’s AM fix was USD 1,316.00, EUR 962.27 and GBP 814.05 per ounce.
Friday’s AM fix was USD 1,317.00, EUR 962.09 and GBP 813.16 per ounce.

Gold fell $5.60 or 0.42% Friday, closing at $1,314.10/oz. Silver rose $0.08 or 0.37% closing at $21.88. Gold and silver were both up on the week at 3.49% and 2.77% respectively.

Gold edged up to near one and a half week highs above $1,316/oz today, supported by a surge in the U.S. National Debt of $328 billion in one day to over the $17 trillion mark.

U.S. National Debt – NationalDebtClock.Org

Gold rose 3.5% last week and had its best weekly gain in two months due to increasing concerns about the appalling U.S. fiscal outlook and the outlook for the dollar.

The can kicking exercise that was the U.S. budget deal last week extends the U.S. government’s borrowing authority through to February 7th and restores federal funding until January 15, threatening a another debt crisis in the coming weeks.

Platinum climbed to the highest price in almost a month, and palladium hit a seven week high, following the news that a union official was shot and killed near the Marikana mine in South Africa. Platinum for January delivery rose 0.2% to $1,437.80/oz,, while palladium for December delivery gained 0.4% to $740.65/oz.

Silver outperformed gold, with silver surging 1.4% to $22.18/oz after the near 3% rise last week.
CNBC have begun polling gold analysts and the latest poll of gold market sentiment showed 52% (12 out of 23 respondents) expect prices will rise this week, 39% (9 out of 23) predict declines while 9% (2 out of 23) see prices trading around current levels.

Gold analysts are again bullish as an alternative to the embattled U.S. dollar amid still fragile economic growth and the surging national debt, according to CNBC’s latest market survey of traders, analysts and strategists.

Gold in US Dollars, 5 Years – (Bloomberg)

Just one day after President Barack Obama signed into law a bipartisan deal to end the government shutdown and avoid default, the U.S. debt surged a record $328 billion in one day, the first day the government was able to borrow money.

U.S. debt appears to be racing out of control and nobody seems to know where or when the spending will end.

The U.S. debt now equals $17.075 trillion, according to figures the Treasury Department posted online on Friday and $17.04 trillion according to the U.S. National Debt Clock.

The one day explosion of $328 billion to the U.S. debt load smashed the previous record of $238 billion in one day, set two years ago.

These are figures that would normally be seen in banana republics.

One billion dollars is a lot of money. Let’s put one billion dollars in perspective. It has nine zeros in it and for purposes of illustration:

A billion seconds ago, it was 1967.

A billion minutes ago, Jesus was alive.

A billion hours ago, our ancestors were living in the Stone Age.

A billion dollars ago was only 8 hours and 20 minutes, at the rate Washington is spending taxpayers dollars today.

The huge leap toward what some economists fear will be eventual insolvency was blamed on the government replenishing its supply of “extraordinary measures,” that is, the federal funds it borrowed from over the last five months in a desperate effort to avoid hitting the debt ceiling.

Under the law, government coffers are refilled once there is “new debt space,” according to a report in The Washington Times.

The Treasury Department was forced under so-called “extraordinary measures” to borrow $400 billion beginning in May, in anticipation of an agreement between Congress and Obama. 

Gold and Silver in USD and Debt Ceiling, Quarterly, 2000-2013 – (Bloomberg)

“Usually Congress sets a borrowing limit, or debt ceiling, that caps the total amount the government can be in the red,” according to the report. “But under the terms of this week’s deal, Congress set a deadline instead of a dollar cap. That means debt will rise by as much as the government spends between now and the February 7 deadline.”

If the rate of spending continues as it has over the last five months, U.S. debt may eventually increase by as much as $700 billion or $0.7 trillion before it must apply for another increase to the debt ceiling.

President Bush and his administration spent money like drunken sailors and their guns and butter economic policies, more guns than butter, left President Obama with a poisoned chalice.

The policies of enormous tax cuts for the already extremely wealthy and favouring the corporate and financial sector and Wall Street interests at the expense of Main Street and the majority of

Americans have left Main Street America on its knees. This was graphically seen in the massive spending for unnecessary wars.

However, much of Obama’s policies have continued to favour Wall Street and corporate interests over Main Street and  Obama is failing to alleviate the suffering of thousands of Americans who have lost their jobs and or their homes and are struggling to make ends meet.

The National Debt reached  $10 trillion under Bush. At the rate President Obama is going, it should reach $20 trillion under President Obama or doubling the U.S National Debt in just 8 years.

This doubling in the U.S. national debt means that the U.S. is now the largest debtor nation in the world – by a significant margin. This profligacy will be paid back by the American people, and most likely by people every where, in the form of higher taxes, higher interest rates, inflation and almost certainly a currency crisis.

As ever, historical context is all important. The U.S National Debt took 43 Presidents from 1789 until 2008 to reach $9 trillion. The National Debt rose $4.899 trillion during the two terms of the Bush presidency. It has now gone up nearly $8 trillion since President Obama took office.

If Obama’s budget projections prove accurate, the National Debt will top $20 trillion in 2016, the final year of his second term. That would mean the National Debt increased by 87%, or $9.34 trillion, during his two terms.

The silly political blame game is pointless, a distraction and a waste of time. The real issue is how the irresponsibility of American politicians will be paid for by all of us and drastically affect all our personal finances in the coming years. This is where the real focus and debate should be.

The U.S. debt crisis does not bode well for the long term health of the U.S. dollar as global reserve currency nor for the U.S. economy. Conversely, it bodes very well for gold and for those who have an allocation to physical, allocated gold.

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U.S. Conducts Industrial Espionage Globally

France’s largest English-language newspaper – The Local – reports:

Le Monde said the documents gave grounds to think the NSA targeted not only people suspected of being involved in terrorism but also high-profile individuals from the world of business or politics.

 

***

 

French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault [said]  “I am deeply shocked…. It’s incredible that an allied country like the United States at this point goes as far as spying on private communications that have no strategic justification, no justification on the basis of national defence,” he told journalists in Copenhagen.

Der Spiegel notes:

The NSA has been systematically eavesdropping on the Mexican government for years.

 

***

 

In the space of a single year, according to the internal documents, this operation produced 260 classified reports that allowed US politicians to conduct successful talks on political issues and to plan international investments.

The NSA was recently revealed to have been spying on Brazil’s largest oil company.

Guardian columnist Seumas Milne correctly notes:

#NSA–#GCHQ about power not security: hacked #Mexico president for political/investment edge, leak shows, like #Brazil….

The NSA was also recently busted spying on Chinese technology company Huawei.

German companies are concerned that the NSA has conducted espionage in that country. And the leaders of Latin American countries have also expressed disgust at the industrial espionage.

The NSA is also spying on the biggest financial payments systems such as VISA and Swift.

In a slide leaked by Edward Snowden, “economic” was one of the main justifications for spying.

The top U.S. spy’s justification for such financial spying is:

“We collect this information for many important reasons: for one, it could provide the United States and our allies early warning of international financial crises which could negatively impact the global economy. It also could provide insight into other countries’ economic policy or behavior which could affect global markets.”

(Top financial experts say that the NSA and other intelligence agencies are also using the information to profit from this inside information.  And the NSA wants to ramp up its spying on Wall Street … to “protect” it.)

The Spying Has Been Going On For Decades

It is true that the spying is about power, and not security. Proof here, here and here.

But this has actually been going on for decades.

It has long been clear that the U.S. spying program is being used for industrial espionage. The New Statesman wrote about it in 1988. Die Zeit in 1999.

The New York Times reported in 1995:

Each morning, they gave Mickey Kantor, the United States trade representative, and his aides inside information gathered by the Central Intelligence Agency’s Tokyo station and the electronic eavesdropping equipment of the National Security Agency, sifted by C.I.A. analysts in Washington.

 

Mr. Kantor received descriptions of conversations among Japanese bureaucrats and auto executives from Toyota and Nissan who were pressing for a settlement, and read about the competing pressures on Japan’s Trade Minister, Ryutaro Hashimoto.

 

When the negotiations came to a climax in Geneva, the intelligence team was in place at the Intercontinental Hotel, working alongside Mr. Kantor’s negotiators, offering assessments of how far the Japanese side could be pressed.

 

***

 

Spying on allies for economic advantage is a crucial new assignment for the C.I.A. now that American foreign policy is focused on commercial interests abroad. President Clinton made economic intelligence a high priority of his Administration, specifically information to protect and defend American competitiveness, technology and financial security in a world where an economic crisis can spread across global markets in minutes.

 

***

 

At the Treasury Department, the trade representative’s office and the Commerce Department, officials say they now receive a torrent of information from the C.I.A.

BBC reported in 2000:

A report published by the European Parliament in February alleges that Echelon twice helped US companies gain a commercial advantage over European firms. [Here's the report.]

 

Duncan Campbell, the British intelligence expert and journalist who wrote the report, raises the prospect that hundreds of US Department of Commerce “success stories”, when US companies beat off European and Japanese commercial opposition, could be attributed to the filtering powers of Echelon.

 

***

 

The European consortium Airbus lost a $6bn contract with Saudi Arabia after NSA found Airbus officials were offering kickbacks to a Saudi official.

 

The paper said the agency “lifted all the faxes and phone-calls between Airbus, the Saudi national airline and the Saudi Government” to gain this information.

 

***

 

The US firm Raytheon used information picked up from NSA snooping to secure a $1.4bn contract to supply a radar system to Brazil instead of France’s Thomson-CSF.

 

***

 

Former CIA director James Woolsey, in an article in March for the Wall Street Journal, acknowledged that the US did conduct economic espionage against its European allies, though he did not specify if Echelon was involved.

BONUS: 

• Government Has Contemplated Seizing Pension Money for Over a Decade

• Top Economic Advisers Forecast War and Unrest

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/Qz8o9igB6KE/story01.htm George Washington

It would appear President Obama has another gift few are aware of. For at least the 5th time in the last few years, his oratory has forced a woman in the audience to fall to the floor. First in September 2011, twice in March 2012, then in August 2012, and now today during his latest Obamacare pitch, the President’s intonations appear to disturb the brain’s cortex just enough to halt the breathing (and thinking) process. Of course, the end result will be the launch of Obamafood – the non-fainting alternative to listening to his speeches/pitches, which for those who are sufficiently brain dead will come in a prechewed (by other taxpayers) variant, also known as ObamaIV.

 

The Obamacare Pitch sent the girl to President Obama’s left reeling… “This happens when I talk too long,” Obama admitted

 

The first sighting of this strange phenomenon was in September 2011…

 

 

Of course, it would appear he knew about this awe-inspiring gift all along… March 7th 2012…

 

Again on March 16th 2012… but this time he offered some advice:

Another one of President Barack Obama’s speeches was interrupted Thursday when a woman fainted.

 

According to The New York Times, Obama had been criticizing his Republican rivals during the speech, which focused on energy policy, when he paused to alert officials that someone in the crowd had fainted.

 

The president then offered some advice to people attending his rallies.

 

“Remember next time, if you’re going to stand for a long time, you got to eat,” Obama said. “It’s true. You got to get something to eat. You got to get some juice.”

 

and again in August 2012…

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/jCJT4UgbPnE/story01.htm Tyler Durden

It would appear President Obama has another gift few are aware of. For at least the 5th time in the last few years, his oratory has forced a woman in the audience to fall to the floor. First in September 2011, twice in March 2012, then in August 2012, and now today during his latest Obamacare pitch, the President’s intonations appear to disturb the brain’s cortex just enough to halt the breathing (and thinking) process. Of course, the end result will be the launch of Obamafood – the non-fainting alternative to listening to his speeches/pitches, which for those who are sufficiently brain dead will come in a prechewed (by other taxpayers) variant, also known as ObamaIV.

 

The Obamacare Pitch sent the girl to President Obama’s left reeling… “This happens when I talk too long,” Obama admitted

 

The first sighting of this strange phenomenon was in September 2011…

 

 

Of course, it would appear he knew about this awe-inspiring gift all along… March 7th 2012…

 

Again on March 16th 2012… but this time he offered some advice:

Another one of President Barack Obama’s speeches was interrupted Thursday when a woman fainted.

 

According to The New York Times, Obama had been criticizing his Republican rivals during the speech, which focused on energy policy, when he paused to alert officials that someone in the crowd had fainted.

 

The president then offered some advice to people attending his rallies.

 

“Remember next time, if you’re going to stand for a long time, you got to eat,” Obama said. “It’s true. You got to get something to eat. You got to get some juice.”

 

and again in August 2012…

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/jCJT4UgbPnE/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Several hours earlier, news broke that a bomb had exploded on a bus in the southern Russian city of Volgograd, a few hundred kilometers from Sochi where the winter Olympics will be held. Russian investigators announced they suspect a female suicide bomber was responsible for the bombing which killed at least five people according to Interfax. Citing a source in the regional Investigative Committee office, Interfax said identity documents belonging to the suspected bomber were found near the site and that she was believed to have been the wife of an Islamist militant. Below, we show the dash cam video which caught this terrorist act in process.

Disturbing as this video is, we believe it is only going to get worse as the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics approach. Recall from “Meet Saudi Arabia’s Bandar bin Sultan: The Puppetmaster Behind The Syrian War“:

Bandar told Putin, “…The terrorist threat is growing in light of the phenomena spawned by the Arab Spring. We have lost some regimes. And what we got in return were terrorist experiences, as evidenced by the experience of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and the extremist groups in Libya…. As an example, I can give you a guarantee to protect the Winter Olympics in the city of Sochi on the Black Sea next year. The Chechen groups that threaten the security of the games are controlled by us…

Was today’s terrorist explosion just a warning shot ultimately funded and organized by none other than the biggest loser from the Syrian detente: Saudi Arabia, because recall that it was Saudi Arabia which orchestrated the near-US invasion after playing Obama and Kerry like a fiddle, in hopes of getting the natgas pipeline under Syria. Following the Putin-brokered peace plan, Saudi will now have to wait at least one more year before re-escalating tensions in the Syria region with hopes of installing its own puppet regime. 

In the meantime, is Saudi now openly lashing out at the one country that made this delay a reality. And if so, when, where and how will Putin retaliate against the country that serves as the anchor of the petrodollar system? We look forward to finding out.

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/uEVm2aKXtjE/story01.htm Tyler Durden

For the first time since July 2009, the European equity markets have risen for 8 days straight. The 4.73% rise is the best run in 3 months and took Bloomberg’s European 500 index (akin to the S&P 500 in the US) to a perfect 61.8% retracement of the 2007/9 collapse. Greece and Spain are outperforming (the former +7% in the last 3 days alone). Away fdrom stocks, bonds are quiet, sovereign spreads are hardly moving as liquidity evaporates and while the EUR strengthened early on, as the US day session opened, the EUR sold off back to unchanged by the close of Europe. In the meantime, Europe’s VIX dropped to 9 month lows (below 16%) today. Oh – and by the way – European Macro data has collapsed to 3-month lows.

European stocks have retraced 61.8% of their 2007-9 losses…

 

and this makes perfect sense…

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We’ve heard statement after statement from any and all talking heads (a sample of the best 25 here) and we’ve seen the numbers (both internally and in context)… and we’ve discussed the unintended consequences and what to expect in 2014. So now (due at 1125ET – so who knows what time he turns up), it’s the big man’s turn to become the Sham-Wow guy; explain how great it actually is (and ignore the bloggers); how any minute now it will all be fixed, and how awesome this will all be (one day)… Don’t forget you can always call 1-800-F U-CKYO for advice.

 

 

 

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/7F0vnL0AUEM/story01.htm Tyler Durden