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Most Americans Are Slaves And They Don’t Even Know It
Most Americans Are Slaves And They Don’t Even Know It
Most Americans spend their lives working for others, paying off debts to others and performing tasks that others tell them that they “must” do. These days, we don’t like to think of ourselves as “servants” or “slaves”, but that is what the vast majority of us are. It is just that the mechanisms of our enslavement have become much more sophisticated over time. It has been said that the borrower is the servant of the lender, and most of us start going into debt very early into our adult years. In fact, those that go to college to “get an education” are likely to enter the “real world” with a staggering amount of debt. And of course that is just the beginning of the debt accumulation. Today, when you add up all mortgage debt, all credit card debt and all student loan debt, the average American household is carrying a grand total of 203,163 dollars of debt. Overall, American households are more than 11 trillion dollars in debt at this point. And even though most Americans don’t realize this, over the course of our lifetimes the amount of money that we will repay on our debts is far greater than the amount that we originally borrowed. In fact, when it comes to credit card debt you can easily end up repaying several times the amount of money that you originally borrowed. So we work our fingers to the bone to pay off these debts, and the vast majority of us are not even working for ourselves. Instead, our work makes the businesses that other people own more profitable. So if we spend the best years of our lives building businesses for others, servicing debts that we owe to others and making others wealthier, what does that make us?
In 2015, the words “servant” and “slave” have very negative connotations, and we typically don’t use them very much.
Instead, we use words like “employee” because they make us feel so much better.
But is there really that much of a difference?
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Making Me Pay For My Crimes Would Send “Message of Uncertainty to the Markets”: Bank President to Spanish Judge
Making Me Pay For My Crimes Would Send “Message of Uncertainty to the Markets”: Bank President to Spanish Judge
“It’s just a matter of time before injustice prevails…”
A Spanish judge by the name of Fernando Andreu recently violated one of the most important unwritten rules of global finance: namely, that banks and bankers are effectively immune to all laws of all lands (barring, of course, Iceland). As I reported roughly 10 days ago, Andreu had ordered Bankia, its parent company state-owned BFA, the bank’s former chairman, Rodrigo Rato, and three other former directors to pay an €800 million civil liability bond for signing off on fraudulent financial statements in the run up to the bank’s 2011 IPO.
If the defendants fail to cough up the full amount before March 13th, the authorities will embargo assets belonging to them with the equivalent market value. With the clock ticking down and the days flying by, it was just a matter of time before the defendants hit back – and hard!
The Banker Alibi
The first to hit back was Rodrigo Rato, the bank’s former chairman and one-time IMF president. In a 75-page notice of appeal that was leaked to the Spanish press, Rato cautioned that Judge Andreu’s “premature” decision to force the six defendants to compensate the thousands of shareholders they are accused of defrauding could end up provoking a “much greater evil” than that it is supposed to address.
In the worst case scenario, the document warns, it could send a “message of uncertainty to the markets,” which could in turn exert downward pressure (otherwise known as gravity) on the already semi-defunct bank’s share price. This is not the first time that a panicked banker has used this argument; indeed, it is the preferred alibi of all 21st-century banking racketeers.
The argument is simple:
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Federal Reserve Insider Alan Greenspan Warns: There Will Be a “Significant Market Event… Something Big Is Going To Happen”
Federal Reserve Insider Alan Greenspan Warns: There Will Be a “Significant Market Event… Something Big Is Going To Happen”
With the Federal Reserve printing trillions upon trillions of dollars to keep the economic system afloat, many investors and financial pundits have surmised that the fundamental economic problems facing the United States during the crash of 2008 have been resolved. Stocks are, after all, at historic highs.
But the insiders know different. And if there’s any single person out there who understands U.S. monetary policy and its long-term effects on domestic and global affairs it’s former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan. As the head of the world’s most powerful central bank for nearly two decades he’s privy to the insider conversations and government machinations that have brought us to where we are today.
Greenspan recently joined veteran resource analyst Brien Lundin at the New Orleans Investment Conference to share some of his thoughts. According to Lundin, the former Fed chairman made it clear that the central bank is facing a serious problem and one that will have significant ramifications in the future.
We asked him where he thought the gold price will be in five years and he said “measurably higher.”
In private conversation I asked him about the outstanding debts… and that the debt load in the U.S. had gotten so great that there has to be some monetary depreciation. Specially he said that the era of quantitative easing and zero-interest rate policies by the Fed… we really cannot exit this without some significant market event… By that I interpret it being either a stock market crash or a prolonged recession, which would then engender another round of monetary reflation by the Fed.
He thinks something big is going to happen that we can’t get out of this era of money printing without some repercussions – and pretty severe ones – that gold will benefit from.
Watch the full interview:
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Throw Your Grandma Under The Bus
Throw Your Grandma Under The Bus
Before we get news in a few hours on the new proposals Greece is required to hand to its slavemasters today, Monday Feb 23, it seems relevant to point out one more time that what is happening to Greece is the result of political, not economic, decisions and points of view. One could argue that Greece is being thrown under the bus because it’s not – yet – deeply enough entangled and enmeshed in the global financial matrix. Just think back to a pointGordon Kerr of Cobden Partners made a few days ago on Bloomberg:
They [Greece] don’t have systemically important financial institutions dragging down their economy ..
In other words, Greek banks are not too big to fail. They could therefore be restructured – by the Greek government itself – without global contagion, certainly theoretically (it’s hard to pinpoint how this would turn out in practice, there are too many variables involved). And that is a major potential threat to other – European -banks, who A) could then also face calls for restructuring, and B) still have money invested in Greece. Just not that much anymore…
Bloomberg’s Mark Whitehouse showed in a piece over the weekend to what extent Germany’s banks pulled out of Greece since 2010. Thanks to the same bailouts that are now being used to try and force Greece into ever more austerity, budget cuts, depleted services and shy high unemployment.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Greek Deposit Run Accelerates Ahead Of Monday’s Bank Holiday
Greek Deposit Run Accelerates Ahead Of Monday’s Bank Holiday
Official Greek deposit data began tumbling in December (outflows around EUR3bn), and accelerated in January in the run up to the Syriza election (proxied by JPMorgan at over EUR 12bn). During the last two weeks, however, the absence of ATM lines and visible bank runs has been curiously lacking as, at least on the surface, there appears to be no panic. However,as Dody Tsiantar reports, sources in the Greek banking sector have told Greek newspapers that as much as EUR 25bn euros have left Greek banks since the end of December with outflows surging this week. Perhaps they are getting anxious that authorities will take Cypriot advantage of the Bank Holiday that is planned in Greece on Monday.
As Dody Tsintar reports (via CNBC),
In the midst of the dramatic showdown in Brussels between the new Greek government and its European creditors, many Greek depositors—spooked by the prospect of a Greek default or, worse, an exit from the euro zone and a possible return to the drachma—have been pulling euros out of the nation’s banks in record amounts over the last few days.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
As Banks Tighten Grip on the Media, British Journalist Rebels Against HSBC-Run Telegraph
As Banks Tighten Grip on the Media, British Journalist Rebels Against HSBC-Run Telegraph
“Banks are the feudal knights of today’s world,” Hervé Falciani says in an interview. “They are a power without a counterweight, without opposition.”
That is not to say that they don’t have a weak point, adds the 42-year-old whistleblower who blew the lid on HSBC’s global tax evasion and money laundering practices. “For the banks, reputation is increasingly important. When they lose it, they don’t know how to get it back.”
Hence the importance of banks being able to control news at its source, as the Daily Telegraph’s ex-chief political commentator, Peter Oborne, has learned, and (to his great credit) revealed in a ball-busting exposé of his former employer’s cozy ties with the world’s second largest – and arguably most criminal – bank:
Three years ago the Telegraph investigations team… received a tip off about accounts held with HSBC in Jersey… After three months’ research the Telegraph resolved to publish. Six articles on this subject can now be found online, between 8 and 15 November 2012, although three are not available to view.
Thereafter no fresh reports appeared. Reporters were ordered to destroy all emails, reports and documents related to the HSBC investigation… From the start of 2013 onwards stories critical of HSBC were discouraged. HSBC suspended its advertising with the Telegraph…
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Operation Choke-Point Is Worse Than We Thought
Operation Choke-Point Is Worse Than We Thought
Operation Choke Point is an initiative of the DoJ that was announced in 2013 which investigates bank interactions with certain businesses believed to be at higher risk for fraud and money laundering. When first disclosed it was heavily criticised for bypassing due process with critics warning that “it’s a thinly veiled ideological attack on industries the Obama administration doesn’t like, such as gun sellers,” and precious metals dealers.However, as Mike Maloney explains, it is far worse than that… “it violates the most fundamental principles of the rule of law and accountable, transparent government.”
* * *
From: Staff Report, 113th Congress, December 8, 2014
“At a minimum, Operation Choke Point is little more than government-mandated de-risking.FDIC, in cooperation with the Justice Department, made sure banks understood – or in their own language, “got the message” – that maintaining relationships with certain disfavored business lines would incur enormous regulatory risk.
The effect of this policy has been to deny countless legal and legitimate merchants access to the financial system and deprive them of their very ability to exist.
Accordingly, Operation Choke Point violates the most fundamental principles of the rule of law and accountable, transparent government.”
* * *
We strongly suggest you are not holding anything sharp while you watch these clips….
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Spanish Judge Violates Global Rule, Makes Bank President & Former IMF Chief Pay for Financial Crimes
Spanish Judge Violates Global Rule, Makes Bank President & Former IMF Chief Pay for Financial Crimes
Bankers never go to jail. This is one of the unwritten new laws to which most of us have grown wearily accustomed in this new post-crisis reality. Also begrudgingly taken for granted is the fact that a banker’s fortune will never be seized or confiscated by the authorities; in today’s new Gilded Age a banker’s gains, whether ill-gotten or not, are his of hers until death do them part.
However, nobody seems to have told any of this to Fernando Andreu, the Spanish judge investigating Bankia’s allegedly fraudulent and for investors disastrous 2011 IPO. On Friday 13th, he ordered Bankia, its parent company BFA, the bank’s former chairman, Rodrigo Rato, its former deputy chairman, José Manuel Olivas, and former Bankia board members Francisco Verdú and José Manuel Fernández to pay an €800 million civil liability bond for signing off on the bank’s 2010 financial statements – financial statements that were included in the IPO brochure and “whose veracity is questioned with solid and well-founded evidence”.
Referring to a report prepared by Bank of Spain inspectors seconded to the court for the investigation, Judge Andreu said:
From the current experts’ report, it can be seen quite clearly that the financial statements contained in the Bankia IPO pamphlet did not represent a true image of the company.
Breaking with Convention
Two months ago, I wrote that Bankia’s saga of lies, deception, and fraud should (but probably won’t) culminate in the imprisonment of Rodrigo Rato, crippling fines for the auditors (Deloitte), and fireworks at financial regulators [Spanish Judge Exposes Too-Big-to-Fail Bank Robbery].
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Fossil fuel divestment campaign grows as protesters target UK banks
With Britain’s big five banks investing £66bn in fossil fuel extraction, campaigners believe pressure is building on banks to sell off toxic assets
At least 1,400 UK customers are set to move their accounts in protest at their banks’ multibillion-pound funding of the fossil fuel industry. The campaign, mirrored by actions in Australia and South Africa, is part of a global day of actionby the fast-growing fossil fuel divestment movement.
The Go Fossil Free campaign has already persuaded 180 institutions, worth $50bn (£33bn) and including local authorities, universities and churches, to sell off their investments in coal, oil and gas. The campaign will stage a series of protests on Saturday, with hundreds other events planned in more than 50 countries.
A spokesman for the Move Your Money campaign, Fionn Travers-Smith, said: “Britain’s biggest banks have been using people’s money to fund fossil fuels and climate change for too long, and the public simply don’t want to support these socially and environmentally catastrophic industries.”
The divestment movement asks investors to commit to selling their investmentsin the biggest 200 fossil fuel companies over five years. A series of analyses have shown that there are already three times more fossil fuels in accessible reserves than can be burned if catastrophic climate change is to be avoided, as world leaders have pledged.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Banks May Have Overplayed Their Hand Fighting Wall Street Regulation
Banks May Have Overplayed Their Hand Fighting Wall Street Regulation
(Bloomberg) — The financial industry is finding that winning in Washington comes at a cost.
Wall Street lobbied aggressively and succeeded late last year in persuading lawmakers to roll back rules for the $700 trillion derivatives market. Instead of generating momentum for further changes to the Dodd-Frank Act, the victory sparked a populist uprising among Democrats that’s had wide-ranging consequences, including stymieing less controversial requests from regional banks like Capital One Financial Corp.
“A short while ago there was bipartisan agreement on a number of common sense improvements,” said Rob Nichols, president of the Financial Services Forum that represents the chief executives of Wall Street’s biggest banks. “Unfortunately, that bipartisan agreement is gone.”
Financial companies and their employees spent $169 million on the November elections and had expectations that their bid to loosen regulations would get easier with Republicans in control of both the House and Senate. Now, there is second-guessing that banks overplayed their hand, according to lobbyists. The December win on swaps rules has become a rallying cry for Senator Elizabeth Warren, a frequent critic of Wall Street, and spurred repeated White House vows to defend Dodd-Frank.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Crony States of America – Wall Street Firms are Trying to Hide Payoffs Made to Employees Entering Government
Crony States of America – Wall Street Firms are Trying to Hide Payoffs Made to Employees Entering Government
“There is a lot of work ahead for the management to recover its reputation.”
– John Whitehead, Ex-Goldman Sachs Chairman, in a 2010 Wall Street Journal interview
Goldman Sachs may need to work on its image. This year, the firm beat recall-riddled General Motors along with Koch Industries and BP for the dubious distinction of worst corporate reputation, according to a new poll. Market research firm Harris Poll on Wednesday, Feb. 4, published its 16th annual ranking of the 100 most visible companies in the U.S., sorted by how positively the general public viewed them, and Goldman landed at the bottom.
– From the Bloomberg article: America’s Most Loved and Most Hated Companies
Citigroup is one of three Wall Street banks attempting to keep hidden their practice of paying executives multimillion-dollar awards for entering government service. In letters delivered to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) over the last month, Citi,Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley seek exemption from a shareholder proposal, filed by the AFL-CIO labor coalition, which would force them to identify all executives eligible for these financial rewards, and the specific dollar amounts at stake. Critics argue these “golden parachutes” ensure more financial insiders in policy positions and favorable treatment toward Wall Street.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Greece Exposes The Global Economy’s Achilles Heel
Greece Exposes The Global Economy’s Achilles Heel
Countries that can’t repay their debts — won’t
The new Greek political party, known as Syriza, the Coalition of the Radical Left, has done the unthinkable: they’ve dared to speak the truth.
In this case, the truth is perfectly captured by the blunt assessment by the new Greek finance minister, Yanis Varoufakis, who recently declared “I’m the finance minister of a bankrupt country.”
Such honest assessments are not supposed to be uttered in politics, no matter how true they may be. And so, as you can imagine, the machinery of the defenders of the status quo is in quite a lather over the whole affair. And it’s doing everything it can to minimize and marginalize the new Greek government.
One editorial in the Financial Times summed up the establishment view quite well, I thought, putting its contempt for those who dare to simply state what is true right on the table:
Athens plots a daring escape from the troika
Feb 2, 2015
Syriza is as radical as any party to take power within the eurozone. Hardly any of Greece’s new cabinet have experience of government; predictably, its first week was studded with chaotic interventions, including a clumsy blunder into EU-Russian relations. Syriza’s rhetoric is still more suited to a university seminar than a serious programme of government.
(Source)
To summarize, the European establishment considers Syriza to consist of radicals with no experience in government who are acting chaotically as they blunder about brandishing immature rhetoric more suited to young students than the serious business of governing.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Greeks Spooked by Debt Clashes Put Cash Under Bathroom Tiles
Greeks Spooked by Debt Clashes Put Cash Under Bathroom Tiles
(Bloomberg) — Georgios Karavelas drives a taxi in Athens and for the past month has been a silent witness to what ordinary Greeks are doing with their cash.
One passenger, he said, told someone on his mobile phone that he’d withdrawn 25,000 euros from the bank, taken it home, worked loose a tile in the bathroom and stashed the money there. Another took the cash to his village and buried it in the garden. Yet another fashioned a small safe box in the air-conditioning unit on his balcony.
“I can’t fault these people,” said Karavelas, 37. “They were obviously people who had worked hard for their money, with families and jobs, not oligarchs.”
Withdrawals from Greek banks may have exceeded 15 billion euros ($17.2 billion) in the run-up to the elections that catapulted Alexis Tsipras and his anti-austerity Syriza party to power, including at least 11 billion euros in January, according to four bankers citing preliminary data. Tensions between the new government, which won on a platform of debt relief, and Greece’s creditors, including Germany, may keep up the pressure.
“Talks with the creditors is going to be a protracted process so you can’t rule out more pressure on deposits,” said Wolfango Piccoli, managing director at Teneo Intelligence in London. “There is plenty of uncertainty and that can make depositors nervous again.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Yes it is Scary – But Necessary
Yes it is Scary – But Necessary
COMMENT: Hi Martin,
Once again, thank you for all the information you provide on a daily basis. It is informative as well as scary at the same time. I’m afraid you are preaching to the hard headed. Here in Canada, people truly believe in government and socialist ideologies. It is amazing to see that they do not understand that government incompetence and debt is the real problem. They blame the corporations and the “1%” for not “paying their fair share.” No matter what is said, we here in Canada, want more social assistance and government to help us out. Consider the Liberal party in Ontario was re-elected, even though they wasted billions of dollars on boondoggles, and now they want to implement an Ontario pension plan where they take 1.4% from your paycheck and another 1.4% from the employer to put into a government run pension. We only know where that will end up.
Anyway, I would like to thank you for what you are doing but I’m afraid it is too late as socialism has been ingrained from birth through education.
D
REPLY: This is the source of the civil unrest. The bankers should sleep with armed guards because this is the type of people who will drag them from their beds in the middle of the night when they realize all is lost in their pensions as they listen to politicians blame the 1% for their failures. The politicians will NEVER admit they do not know how to manage anything. It is always that 1% who do not pay enough rather than their lack of management skills. Society has been rising up against the bankers in every society as government. Even looking at the rule of law, in China they dragged the chief justice out in his robs and killed him on the sport for always ruling in favor of the government many years ago. Riots against bankers even go back to ancient time as well as in the Middle Ages as the people burned the bankers homes in Florence during the 14th century.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Understanding what propels the World Economy is mandatory to comprehend its Demise
Understanding what propels the World Economy is mandatory to comprehend its Demise
Banking has existed for a long time. The idea of debt dates back to the ancient world, as evidenced for example by ancient Mesopotamian clay tablets recording interest-bearing loans. Far too many people attribute our financial doom to fractional banking etc. They are actually taking the side of the bankers who want money to retain its purchasing power or rise rather than devalue with economic expansion. Indeed, they are in truth arguing for austerity that is tearing Europe apart at the seams. They honestly do not comprehend what they are supporting. They want money to retain its value, yet they expect profits from investment, trading, and their home to rise in value with wages.You cannot have your cake and eat it simultaneously. What these theories tout is the stuff that Euroland was supposed to create and it is now sending the entire global economy into a major economic decline not seen since the 1930s along with the US law FATCA hunting down Americans globally lie dogs.
Here is a picture I took in the Roman Forum. This was the ancient Wall Street of its day known as the Via Sacra (Sacred Road). Cicero (106-43BC) wrote that anytime there was news of a disaster in Asia Minor (modern Turkey), a financial panic would be unleashed in the Roman Forum on this very street. The Via Sacra was the main street of ancient Rome, leading from the top of the Capitoline Hill, through some of the most important religious sites of the Forum (where it is the widest street), to the Colosseum.
Asia Minor was the “emerging market” into which the Romans invested and lent money no different from today. Cicero tells us that the infamous traitor Brutus (85-42BC) who had lent money to the King of Cappadocia (Turkey) and to the city of Salamis at a 48% rate of interest. Brutus was not defending the people and the Republic when he killed Caesar, but his own greedy power. Brutus’ coinage depicts his own image declaring he killed Caesar proudly for the people on the 15th of March (Ides of March – EID MAR). This is why history repeats because human nature and ideas are always the same.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
