Tag Archives: depression

When Was The Last Time You Went INSIDE A Bank?

04 Sunday Oct 2020

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January? Last year? Can’t remember? Neither can I.

I do know that the banks I do business have essentially sealed their buildings to the public. The ATM is now and ITM(!) where equipment permitting, you can speak “directly” with a teller. I’ve heard of branch closings. Others have too. Vox Day issues a warning:

Banks don’t make their money from deposits anymore. And increasingly, they don’t make money from loans anymore. So there simply isn’t any point in maintaining branches for service to non-revenue-producing customers who have no savings and can’t take out any more loans.

It’s interesting that they’re trying to sell the real estate, though. That tends to indicate that they need cash. It won’t be even remotely surprising if the next financial crisis starts later this month; I would be very surprised if it didn’t start before the end of 2021.

Read his whole post, including the email. Then reconcile that with what you know about your town, small or large. Does any of this suggest a remotely healthy economy? And it’s been going on since before the last crisis. Banks and mega-corporations now exist by stealing gold and accepting USG/Fed monetary methadone (thanks, GC!). It’s (way past) time for a reset.

Count The Dollars On The Wall

25 Monday May 2020

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A friend is taking his wife to the best beach in America, one I know very well, and they wanted to know some groovy places to visit. Among my recommendations is a honky-tonk, which I describe as a tropical biker bar. It’s a can’t miss kind of place. Previously I’ve left several dollars there. Some of them – more than one – were taken from me, signed by the womenfolk, and stapled to the wall. It’s a popular way to dispose of money; you have surely heard or seen something like it.

Happy tourists, mainly women, leave the bills behind, thinking it’s their permanent contribution to house decor. Then, along comes The Hoax. Those dollars are now in high demand – and not as decorations.

“The lockdown hit us like a tornado,” recalled Newman, 57, who owns the business with her husband. “I felt hopeless and lost, wondering how on earth we could pay the bills and keep staff on the payroll.”

“But here’s the good part of my story,” she added, leaning forward and placing her hands flat on the bar. “I remembered the thousands of one-dollar bills that customers have stapled to the walls over the decades.”

“I asked a few employees and girlfriends to help take them down,” she said with a smile. “It took two full days to finish the job.”

“Split five ways, we each got about $500,” she said. “That includes a woman who had lost two jobs because of the pandemic; a woman with a mother in hospice care, and a mother of three small children going through a divorce. There was also a single dad who needed the cash.”

“Now,” she added, “our goal is to hang on to the place through summer.”

Ladies, you helped fight the “pandemic.” All: How’s that V-shaped thing coming along?

PS: No, the article’s bar isn’t “my” honky-tonk.

PPS: Yes, the title is Statler-esque.

OT PS: Coulter is not wrong with her honest tirade this weekend except that she did it on Trump’s retarded media of choice, Twitbird.

We Are Rich!

09 Thursday Apr 2020

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I have some very good news for the pandemically-challenged! We Americans are just swimming in cash. So says one Jon Hilsenrath, writing in the WSJ today amount our collective and growing “mountains of debt.”

The Federal Reserve, the nation’s central bank, will play the critical role of navigating the nation through the rising tides of debt. It sways the cost of debt service, whether inflation emerges and whether banks and other financial institutions can bear the burden of lending that the nation demands.

So far the Fed is getting high marks from President Trump and many economists and investors for moving quickly to make credit widely available, though it faces challenges and uncertainties deciding how far to extend itself and when and how to pull back. On Thursday, it announced more programs to support $2.3 trillion in lending.

I for one, am not tired of the winning! This is known as borrowing your way to prosperity. And, buddy, we’re there! The nifty chart Mr. Hilsenrath embedded in his article shows the grand fact that the nominal debt (not even including the really shady stuff) is now around 250% of the precious GDP. Praise be to someone! You’ll recall that we owe this to ourselves, so we are very wealthy from the accounts receivable point of view. In addition to whatever else they might own, each and every one of our 330,000,000 people in the nation-shaped kind of place can count as an asset nearly $200,000 from that mountain of golden debt.

And, as his strength
Failed him at length,
He met a pilgrim shadow—
‘Shadow,’ said he,
‘Where can it be—
This land of Eldorado?’

Right here in the good old US of Empire, Eddie! The news gets even better! The Fed has announced – maybe more than once – that they’re flooding in another $2.3 Trillion in “gold” so as to “help” us. Something about Alexander Hamilton – and he’s a cool hip-hopper from Broadway or something. This adds a new Everest to the Himalayas of debt they’re created (for us!) in the past few months.

Now, don’t worry if you’re not Goldman Sachs. The money will trickle down to you little, unimportant plebs sooner or later. And, pay no attention to the negative Nancy’s talking about the worse depression ever. Just keep your eyes and your hearts set on your big piece of the mountainous pie. Tell ’em about it down at the breadline. Remember to stand six feet apart.

*Note: This column does not contain echoes when maybe it should. Sorry, I blame the (((virus))).

The Subtle Admissions

01 Wednesday Apr 2020

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Why does the following sound so familiar?

The novel coronavirus has already had a significant impact on the global economy, which will worsen if the outbreak and the shutdowns designed to contain it continue for very long. But it’s only an accelerant: If not Covid-19, as the disease caused by the virus is known, something else would have started the conflagration. Shortfalls in revenue and cash flows, caused by the shutdowns, have simply exposed the vulnerabilities of a structurally unsound economic and financial system.

Well, I mean, really, um, er … it might, you know, not necessarily be the, uh, the um, the virus thingy…

Structural instability and systematic failures. Why does that sound like what I’ve been saying for a few years now? Oh, because it is the same thing. I just noticed a long time ago. There really needs to be hell to pay, but, judging by what passes for people these days, there’s nobody capable of collecting.

 

Goldman Squeaks

20 Friday Mar 2020

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Slight revision: five percent decline to 24%.

Goldman Sachs economists on Friday forecast an unprecedented 24% decline in second quarter gross domestic product, following a 6% decline in the first quarter, based on the economy’s sudden and historic shutdown as the country responds to the coronavirus pandemic [HOAX].

Yes! The same Goldman that sucked up $900 Billion the last time. Soeaking of sucking, way to go Congress-Critters.

Revealed: Four senators dumped millions in stocks while Capitol Hill was being briefed on the coronavirus threat but BEFORE markets started tanking
Richard Burr, head of the Senate Intelligence Committee which was directly briefed on coronavirus, sold up to $1.7m in stock between January and February
Dianne Feinstein, on the same committee, sold up to $6m in stock in same period
Kelly Loeffler, on the Senate Health Committee, sold up to $3.1m in stock starting on the day her committee was briefed by the CDC
James Inhofe sold up to $400k in stocks including real estate all on January 27

And, way to go, voters! Your wise choices have certainly helped things along – all the way to this bright, shining, new dark age.

The Real Emergency

12 Thursday Mar 2020

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It’s not the virus. It’s the economy, the same one we were assured last night was in great shape. Economies in great shape do not require $1,500,000,000,000 in overnight banking giveaways in order to survive.

The Fed announced a bold new initiative in an effort to calm market tumult amid the coronavirus meltdown. In all, the new moves pump in up to $1.5 trillion into the financial system in an effort to combat potential freezes brought on by the coronavirus. This was the second day in a row and the third time this week the Fed has stepped in.

Heretofore, it’s been paltry daily sums, like $165 Billion per day. $1.5 Trillion is…

  • About what the government collects in income taxes in five or six months;
  • About what the federal budget was during Bill Clinton’s tenure;
  • The total amount of federal debt late in Reagan’s first term;
  • The GDP of the entire US economy as recently as 1974;
  • Enough money to pay off ALL students loans (right now, *poof*, gone);
  • Enough to buy 100 new Ford Class aircraft carriers; and,
  • If 1,500,000,000,000 6.14″ dollar bills were laid end-to-end, fashioned into a giant fiat ribbon, the ribbon would be almost long enough to stretch from the Earth to Mars, or from the Earth to Venus and back.

The last one was a ridiculous way to measure money, but these are ridiculous times. There’s no way to be sure, but let’s assume this grafting is split between today and tomorrow – $750 Bn per day. If they keep that up, then they are generating $270,000,000,000,000 per year in fake money, or $.27 Quadrillion. All with the push of a button on a computer. Or with the incantations over a crystal ball. This is financial sorcery and it brings to mind Zimbabwe or the Weimar Republic. And, they’re talking about doing even more “to help.”

Remember to wash your hands.

The “Darker Aspects” of Financial Sorcery

04 Monday Nov 2019

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As if there’s any other kind. A good look at them and at what’s coming: The End of Money.

Money vs Real Wealth

I happen to know a good deal about our current system of money; how it is created, how it functions, its benefits and its darker aspects. I find it critical to remember that it isn’t actually “real”. Rather, it is a concept. Specifically, it’s a social contract. An agreement. Albeit one enforced at the end of a gun – or, as seen here, an eviction sheriff enforcing the local tax codes:

So while money isn’t “real” in itself, we value it because it is a claim on real things.

Having a lot of it currently entitles you to a great deal of privileges and power, which are a direct outcome of the spending of that money.

Money can be converted into houses. And cars. And massages. Also groceries, electricity, cell phone services and prescription drugs. These and ten billion other things are what money allows you to buy — the things you actually need or want.

So money is the means, but it is not the real wealth. ‘Real wealth’ is the things that money enables you to acquire.

Read on. There’s a reason I frequently rant about this stuff. Look at those charts. Prepare.

“Like” and “Could Be”

29 Tuesday Oct 2019

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Like, there could be a depression in this banana republic.

At this point, if the Federal Reserve stops juicing the economy, Pento argues, we could be looking at another depression.

“That’s why the Fed’s panicking,” he said. “If anybody still believes they’re omniscient or omnipotent or know their butt from their elbow, that’s over.”

The Federal Reserve is expected to lower its benchmark interest rate this week by 25 basis points, the third such cut in three months. According to the minutes from the Sept. 17-18 meeting, “downside risks had become more pronounced since July,” yet “several participants” wanted the Fed to provide more clarity on when the response to those risks, including “trade uncertainty,” would end.

The fun side of sorcery – nearly unlimited free fiat for the banksters!

The dark side – 100% rates for the working poor!

And yet today, just a few years later, many of the same subprime lenders that specialized in the debt are promoting an almost equally onerous type of credit.

It’s called the online installment loan, a form of debt with much longer maturities but often the same sort of crippling, triple-digit interest rates. If the payday loan’s target audience is the nation’s poor, then the installment loan is geared to all those working-class Americans who have seen their wages stagnate and unpaid bills pile up in the years since the Great Recession.

The crisis is too big not to fail.

Enter the Sag: “This cycle is fading”

18 Friday Oct 2019

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The sorcery has its limits. Ray Dalio says we’ve found them.

Hedge fund owner Ray Dalio said the global business cycle is in a “great sag” and the world’s economy holds at least two parallels to the 1930s.

Speaking a CNBC-moderated panel at the IMF and World Bank annual meetings in Washington, D.C. on Thursday, Dalio said it was now too late for central banks to make much difference as economies enter a natural downturn.

“This cycle is fading, we are now in the world in what I would call a ‘great sag’,” said Dalio, adding that monetary policy, and especially interest rate reductions, were unlikely to offer much stimulus.

“Europe is at the limitation of that, Japan is (too) and the U.S. doesn’t have much to go on for that,” he told CNBC’s Geoff Cutmore.

Dalio said the world was also experiencing the biggest wealth gap since the 1930s and that was creating political stress.

He goes on to mention geopolitical war. One or more of those may strike a little closer to home than most would think possible. It’s not going to be pretty, but it is survivable. Now, what was the ancient punishment for sorcery? As the cycle fades, may the fires rise.

Utterly Confused

01 Thursday Aug 2019

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It’s so hard to predict where the sorcery will go next.

Major Wall Street economists were largely in agreement that the Federal Reserve would cut rates by a quarter point heading into the second day of its two-day meeting on Wednesday afternoon.

But after a confusing news conference by the Fed chief, their forecasts for future rate policy are now all over the place.

The Fed cut its key interest rate by a quarter-point for the first time since 2008. But then Powell said after that this was just a “midcycle adjustment,” causing the stock market to drop and rates to firm.

The middle of the greatest “bull market” in human history, when (fake) money is surely in high demand, is just the time to cut interest rates! Let me tell you… What will the Fed do next? Cut ’em again. Again, after that if necessary. They’ll take it as low as they can – and, there is no downward limit – in an attempt to keep the ride going just a little longer. I think they have one of those toy eight balls to help guide their deliberations. Voodoo is more science than art, you know.