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Kiss your cash goodbye! The word is that things would be more convenient, crooks would be confounded and diseases might be thwarted if we’d just get rid of filthy currency as the most essential form of personal financial liquidity. Currently circulating in the corridors of world financial powers, it may appear as an enlightened technical step forward to eliminate cash, but is it also a stalking horse for yet another way global bank interests can separate you from your assets? Ellen speaks with renowned author and media figure Stephen Lendman about why this idea is appearing now and what’s happening behind the scenes that’s moving it forward. Also behind the scenes is a huge and stark reality about municipal debt to Wall Street that the Public Banking Institute is targeting in its new project called What Wall Street Costs America. Co-host Walt McRee speaks with PBI’s Matt Stannard on this groundbreaking campaign. Listen here.

We Need the Pain that Comes with More Saving

March 16, 2016

We Need the Pain that Comes with More Saving

The endgame of monetary side manipulations is upon us. Since 2008, central banks have done what they thought was needed to bring the markets back from the pain they experienced during the crash. The problem, of course, is that these Keynesians and Monetarists placed the high level of stock markets as the goal of “policy” and confused booming asset levels with economic growth.

The enemy of prosperity, in the eyes of global economic policymakers, is the desire of the consumer to save and businesses to refrain — even in the short term — from investment. As such, their “solution” was the very poison that has infected the Western world over the decades: more credit, lower costs of money, more push for “consumer demand.”

The Current Orthodoxy Is Failing

But “easy” monetary policy has merely led to debt-ridden economies and a bubble that is increasingly being exposed as a complete farce. January saw a market pullback tease that reminded investors that what was pushed up artificially can’t be sustained forever. Monetary policy, even if it goes to negative interest rate territory with a vengeance, isn’t going to be the miracle drug needed to provide a better economic foundation. Austrians have long known this. The mainstream is just starting to publicly admit it.

The Savings-Glut Myth

However, the right lessons are not being learned by either the economic policymakers or the financial pundits. In fact, the most dangerous economic fallacies still underlie their entire financial worldview. For instance, there is the ever-constant theme that there is a “glut of savings” and that low consumer demand is the chief villain that stands opposed to economic stabilization. Martin Wolf, writes in The Financial Times:

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Collapse Of Italy’s Banks Threatens To Plunge The European Financial System Into Chaos

March 8, 2016

The Collapse Of Italy’s Banks Threatens To Plunge The European Financial System Into Chaos

The Italian banking system is a “leaning tower” that truly could completely collapse at literally any moment. And as Italy’s banks begin to go down like dominoes, it is going to set off financial panic all over Europe unlike anything we have ever seen before. I wrote about the troubles in Italy back in January, but since that time the crisis has escalated. At this point, Italian banking stocks have declined a whopping 28 percent since the beginning of 2016, and when you look at some of the biggest Italian banks the numbers become even more frightening. On Monday, shares of Monte dei Paschi were down 4.7 percent, and they have now plummeted 56 percent since the start of the year. Shares of Carige were down 8 percent, and they have now plunged a total of 58 percent since the start of the year. This is what a financial crisis looks like, and just like we are seeing in South America, the problems in Italy appear to be significantly accelerating.

So what makes Italy so important?

Well, we all saw how difficult it was for the rest of Europe to come up with a plan to rescue Greece. But Greece is relatively small – they only have the 44th largest economy in the world.

The Italian economy is far larger. Italy has the 8th largest economy in the world, and their government debt to GDP ratio is currently sitting at about 132 percent.

There is no way that Europe has the resources or the ability to handle a full meltdown of the Italian financial system. Unfortunately, that is precisely what is happening. Italian banks are absolutely drowning in non-performing loans, and as Jeffrey Moore has noted, this potentially represents “the greatest threat to the world’s already burdened financial system”…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

A Blended Fundamental and Technical Perspective on Where We Go From Here

February 27, 2016

A Blended Fundamental and Technical Perspective on Where We Go From Here

So I’m currently teaching applied financial modelling at Marquette University in the beautiful blue collar town of Milwaukee, WI; home of the Harley, the (Miller) High-Life and SummerFest. It’s a great town and a great school. A few years ago the business college brought in a pretty savvy guy called David Krause who then started a program called AIM, where the top finance students actually manage more than $2M. Because of the program’s success US News & World Report ranked Marquette’s finance program 21st in the nation this year. Not bad for a small Jesuit school in the midwest.

Now I mention this because after 15 years in banking, teaching financial modeling has forced me to reacquaint myself with some of the basic tenets of markets and valuation. Such things tend to get lost in the midst of “getting the deal done” and chasing paper profits. This reacquaintance process has been quite illuminating for me and I thought perhaps for others too.

A reminder of what the market actually represents is a good place to start. The stock market is simply an asset with some intrinsic value based on an expectation of future free cash flows to equity holders. Those cash flows are generated from revenues less costs of the underlying companies that make up the market. Let’s use the Wilshire 5000 Full Price Cap Index as the proxy market for this discussion as it is the broadest measure of total market cap for US corporations. It’s level actually represents market capital in billions.

Screen Shot 2016-02-25 at 8.29.51 PM

So the market has put a valuation on those expected future cash flows to equity holders (as of today) at around $19.7T (a 55% increase from Jan of 2012) down from around $22.5T (a 77% increase from Jan of 2012) at the market peak last summer.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Where Negative Interest Rates Will Lead Us

February 25, 2016

Where Negative Interest Rates Will Lead Us

Despite zero-interest-rate-policy (ZIRP) and multiple quantitative easing programs — whereby the central bank buys large quantities of assets while leaving interest rates at practically zero — the world’s economies are stuck in the doldrums. The central banks’ only accomplishment seems to be an increase in public and private debt. Therefore, the next step for the Keynesian economists who rule central banks everywhere is to make interest rates negative (i.e., adopt negative-interest-rate-policy or “NIRP.”) The process can be as simple as the central bank charging its member banks for holding excess reserves, although the same thing can be accomplished by more roundabout methods such as manipulating the reverse repo market.

Remember, it was the central bank itself that created these excess reserves when it purchased assets with money created out of thin air. The reserves landed in bank reserve accounts at the central bank when the recipients of the central bank’s asset purchases deposited their checks in their local banks. Now the banks have liabilities that are backed by depreciating assets (i.e., the banks still owe their customers the full amount in their checking accounts), but the central bank charges the banks for holding the reserves that back the deposits. In effect, the banks are being extorted by the central banks to increase lending or lose money. The banks have no choice. If they can’t find worthy borrowers, they must charge their customers for the privilege of having money in their checking accounts. Or, as is happening in some European banks, the banks try to increase loan rates to current borrowers in order to cover the added cost.

In European countries where NIRP reigns, so far, the banks are charging only large account holders for their deposits. So, these large account customers are scrambling to move their money out of banks and into assets that do not depreciate.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Three Reasons to Be Worried About the Economy

February 8, 2016

Three Reasons to Be Worried About the Economy

On January 12, America’s central planner-in-chief gave his State of the Union address. The president promised nothing less than to feed the hungry, create jobs, shape the earth’s climate, and make everyone a college graduate. There’s nothing new here, though. We’ve heard variations of this silly song and dance every year under both Democrats and Republicans. The president lambasted naysayers as fear-mongers that were too partisan to admit we have a booming economy. The fact that the Dow Jones cratered roughly 9 percent in the same thirty-day period President Obama gave his address did nothing to quell Obama’s optimism about America’s future. In fact, he labeled the US economy “the strongest and most durable in the world.”

Despite our leader’s unwavering confidence in America’s fortunes, a quick peak under the hood reveals a pretty grim state of American commerce.

1. The Federal Reserve and US Government Have Warped the American Economy

In just the past decade, the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet has grown from roughly $800 billion to over $4 trillion. Our central bankers engaging in massive asset purchases to pummel interest rates downward is not news to anyone. We’ve been living in a world of falling interest rates since the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Yet, few mainstream economists have taken a good look at the destructive effects of this unprecedented monetary expansion. The calamitous distortions Fed policy has created for actors on both Main Street and Wall Street since 2008 have laid the groundwork for yet another crash.

Low interest rates stemming from a growing money supply are the only reason the US government has managed to service its gargantuan debt in recent years. The Congressional Budget Office itself has pointed out that even a slight rise in interest rates could potentially result in anywhere from $700 to $900 billion in annual tax payments just to service the interest on our debt.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Continuing Demonization of Cash

February 3, 2016

The Continuing Demonization of Cash

The insidious nature of the war on cash derives not just from the hurdles governments place in the way of those who use cash, but also from the aura of suspicion that has begun to pervade private cash transactions. In a normal market economy, businesses would welcome taking cash. After all, what business would willingly turn down customers? But in the war on cash that has developed in the thirty years since money laundering was declared a federal crime, businesses have had to walk a fine line between serving customers and serving the government. And since only one of those two parties has the power to shut down a business and throw business owners and employees into prison, guess whose wishes the business owner is going to follow more often?

The assumption on the part of government today is that possession of large amounts of cash is indicative of involvement in illegal activity. If you’re traveling with thousands of dollars in cash and get pulled over by the police, don’t be surprised when your money gets seized as “suspicious.” And if you want your money back, prepare to get into a long, drawn-out court case requiring you to prove that you came by that money legitimately, just because the courts have decided that carrying or using large amounts of cash is reasonable suspicion that you are engaging in illegal activity. Because of that risk of confiscation, businesses want to have less and less to do with cash, as even their legitimately-earned cash is subject to seizure by the government.

Restrictions on the use of cash are just some of the many laws that pervert the actions of a market economy. Rather than serving consumers, businesses are forced to serve the government first and consumers last.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Rewardless Risk

February 2, 2016

Rewardless Risk

Faramir:	Then farewell! But if I should return, think better of me.
Denethor:	That depends on the manner of your return.

– J.R.R. Tolkien “The Lord of the Rings” (1954)

I’m going full-nerd with the “Lord of the Rings” introduction to today’s Epsilon Theory note, but I think this scene — where Denethor, the mad Steward of Gondor, orders his son Faramir to take on a suicide mission against Sauron’s overwhelming forces — is the perfect way to describe what the Bank of Japan did last Thursday with their announcement of negative interest rates. The BOJ (and the ECB, and … trust me … the Fed soon enough) is the insane Denethor. The banks are Faramir. The suicide mission is making loans into a corporate sector levered to global trade as the forces of global deflation rage uncontrollably.

Negative rates are an intentional effort to weaken your own country’s banks. Negative rates are a punitive command: go out there and make more bad loans where risk is entirely uncompensated, or we will, in effect, fine you. The more bad loans you don’t make, the bigger the fine. Negative rates are only a bit worrying in today’s sputtering economies of Europe, Japan, and the US because the credit cycle has yet to completely roll over. But it is rolling over (read anything by Jeff Gundlach if you don’t believe me), it is rolling over everywhere, and when it really starts rolling over, any country with negative rates will find it to be significantly destabilizing for their banking sector.

There’s a reason that the Fed kept paying interest on bank reserves even in the darkest, most deflationary days of the Great Recession. Yes, it’s the Fed’s job to support full employment. Yes it’s the Fed’s job to maintain price stability.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Fed Passes the Buck: Blame Oil and China

January 25, 2016

The Fed Passes the Buck: Blame Oil and China

There are a handful of themes out there on recent market action that are either totally wrong or otherwise highly misleading. For instance, regarding the recent calamity in the capital markets, one especially apparent dichotomy has presented itself as offering two choices as to what, exactly, is causing the painful turbulence.

There are some who, in a complete echo of the news headlines, are quick to point the finger at both oil and China. And yet there are others who point the finger at the Fed for “raising rates too early.” Along with the second is the observation that “inflation is totally MIA” and therefore it was ludicrous that the Fed felt the need to “raise interest rates.” Both of these tend to express anguish over the “strong dollar.”

Both of these miss the entire point, and the cause of the current trouble. For one thing, it is ridiculous to blame oil for the falling markets when the falling oil is the very thing that needs to be explained. It is wholly unsatisfactory to explain something by describing it. It works well for headlines, and for shifting the blame away from where it really belongs, but one must learn to look deeper. One cannot expect to impress anyone by explaining that the plane is crashing to the ground because it is no longer flying. What is the cause of oil’s magnificent plummet toward the bottom? That is the true question.

Moreover, the problem with the “China thesis” is that it doesn’t explain anything either. It merely observes a correlation in the markets and therefore makes it highly convenient to put the blame on “the other guys.” Let me not be misunderstood here: the Chinese and US economies are certainly influenced by each other, especially in our age of fluctuating fiat currencies.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

We Know How This Ends, Part 2

January 20, 2016

We Know How This Ends, Part 2

In March 1969, while Buba was busy in the quicksand of its swaps and forward dollar interventions, Netherlands Bank (the Dutch central bank) had instructed commercial banks in Holland to pull back funds from the eurodollar market in order to bring up their liquidity positions which had dwindled dangerously during this increasing currency chaos. At the start of April that year, the Swiss National Bank (Swiss central bank) was suddenly refusing its own banks dollar swaps in order that they would have to unwind foreign funds positions in the eurodollar market. The Bank of Italy (the Italian central bank) had ordered some Italian banks to repatriate $800 million by the end of the second quarter of 1969. It also raised the premium on forward lire at which it offered dollar swaps to 4% from 2%, discouraging Italian banks from engaging in covered eurodollar placements.

The “rising dollar” of 1969 had somehow become anathema to global banking liquidity even in local terms.

The FOMC, which had perhaps the best vantage point with which to view the unfolding events, documented the whole affair though stubbornly and maddeningly refusing to understand it all in greater context of radical paradigm banking and money alterations. In other words, the FOMC meeting MOD’s for 1968 and 1969 give you an almost exact window into what was occurring as it occurred, but then, during the discussions that followed, degenerating into confusion and mystification as these economists struggled to only frame everything in their own traditional monetary understanding – a religious-like tendency that we can also appreciate very well at this moment.

At the April 1969 FOMC meeting, Charles A. Coombs, Special Manager of the System Open Market Account, reported that the bank liquidity issue then seemingly focused on Germany was indeed replicated in far more countries.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

We Know How This Ends, Part 1

January 20, 2016

We Know How This Ends, Part 1

The finance ministers and representatives of central banks from the world’s ten largest “capitalist” economies gathered in Bonn, West Germany on November 20, 1968. The global financial system was then enthralled by a third major currency crisis of the past year or so and there was great angst and disagreement as to what to do about it. While sterling had become something of a recurring devaluation tendency and francs perpetually, it seemed, in disarray, this time it was the Deutsche mark that was the great object of conjecture and anger. What happened at that meeting, a discussion that lasted thirty-two hours, depends upon which source material you choose to dissect it. From the point of view of the Germans, it was a convivial exchange of ideas from among partners; the Americans and British, a sometimes testy and perhaps heated debate about clearly divergent merits; the French were just outraged.

The communique issued at the end of the “conference” only said, “The ministers and governors had a comprehensive and thorough exchange of views on the basic problems of balance-of-payments disequilibria and on the recent speculative capital movements.” In reality, none of them truly cared about the former except as may be controlled by the latter. These “speculative capital movements” became the target of focused energy which would not restore balance and stability but ultimately see the end of the global monetary system.

Some background is needed before jumping into West Germany’s financial energy. The gold exchange standard under the Bretton Woods framework had appeared to have lasted as far as this monetary conference, but it had ended in practicality long before. In the late 1950’s, central banks, the Federal Reserve primary among them, had rendered gold especially and increasingly irrelevant in settling the world’s trade finance.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Are We Headed for Another Bust?

January 5, 2016

Are We Headed for Another Bust?

On Wednesday December 16, 2015, Federal Reserve Bank policymakers raised the federal funds rate target by 0.25 percent to 0.5 percent for the first time since December 2008. There is the possibility that the target could be lifted gradually to 1.25 percent by December next year.

Fed policymakers have justified this increase with the view that the economy is strong enough and can stand on its own feet. “The Committee judges that there has been considerable improvement in labor market conditions this year, and it is reasonably confident the inflation will rise over the medium term to its 2 percent objective,” the Fed said in its policy statement.

Unwarranted Optimism

Various key economic indicators such as industrial production don’t support this optimism. The yearly growth rate of production fell to minus 1.2 percent in November versus 4.5 percent in November last year. According to our model the yearly growth rate could fall to minus 3.4 percent by August.

Although the yearly growth rate of the CPI rose to 0.5 percent in November from 0.2 percent in October according to our model the CPI growth rate is likely to visibly weaken.

The yearly growth rate is forecast to fall to minus 0.1 percent by April before stabilizing at 0.1 percent by December next year.

So from this perspective Fed policymakers did not have much of a case to tighten their stance.

%Chng US Industrial Production YOY

Fed policymakers seem to be of the view that the almost zero federal funds rate and their massive monetary pumping has cured the economy, which now seems to be approaching a path of stable economic growth and price stability, so it is held.

With this way of thinking the role of monetary policy is to make sure that the economy is kept at the “correct path” over time.

Following in Greenspan’s Footsteps

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Opinion: The banking system faces an existential threat — and it’s not bitcoin

January 5, 2016

Opinion: The banking system faces an existential threat — and it’s not bitcoin

A movement in Europe would require banks to fully back deposits

In 1666, King Charles II put control of the money supply into private hands. The privatization of the money-creation process gave birth to the system we use today.

Christmas did not offer much good cheer to the world’s bankers, who have received a sustained kicking since the financial crisis erupted in 2008.

In the latest blow, Switzerland announced that it would hold a referendum on a radical proposal that would strip commercial banks of the ability to create money, depriving them of a great deal of their profit-making capabilities. If the Swiss proposal catches on around the world, it could shred core business assumptions that have underpinned the banking model over the past three centuries.

From Babylon to central bank

The earliest banks we know of, in ancient Babylon, were temples that doubled as repositories where one could store wealth. At some point, the guardians of the stored treasure realized they could put this accumulated wealth to work, and banks accordingly began to lend capital. Borrowers would pay interest on what they borrowed, and this interest would ultimately find its way back to the lenders after the banks had taken a cut. The banks became trusted intermediaries that brought lender and borrower together and ensured neither would be cheated. Paper money emerged after people found it was easier to buy things using deposit slips from their bank than carrying gold around.

The next evolution happened when bankers realized that since depositors almost never simultaneously withdrew all their funds, banks could lend more capital than had been deposited. This allowed banks to “create” money in the sense that bankers could issue loans not necessarily backed up by hard deposits.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Catastrophic Threat of Bail-Ins

December 30, 2015

The Catastrophic Threat of Bail-Ins

It has now been more than two and a half years since the Cyprus Steal , the first “bail-in” perpetrated in the Western world, occurred. Before reviewing the history of this newest financial atrocity, it is necessary to define the terms.

The term “bail-in” describes a scenario in which a bank confiscates private property to indemnify itself for losses it has suffered. A bail-in is a totally lawless theft of assets, as there is no principle of law (of any kind) that could authorize such a seizure of private property. And in fact, there are many principles of law that demonstrate the lawlessness at work here. As with much of the financial crime jargon, “bail-in” is simply another gibberish euphemism like “quantitative easing” or “derivatives.”

As custodians of the financial assets of their clients, banks represent a form of trustee. The purpose of any trust relationship is to provide absolute security to the beneficiary of the trust (i.e., the legal owner of the property). Thus, one of the most fundamental principles of our legal system is non-encroachment regarding the property held in the custody of a trustee.

From a legal standpoint, it is like there is an invisible and impenetrable wall that surrounds the trust property. The only exceptions to this wall (ever) occur when the trust beneficiary makes a legal request for some disbursement or related transaction, when the trust itself directs some form of action (in the interests of the trust beneficiary), or when the trust allows the trustee to manage the trust assets on behalf of the beneficiary.

The idea of trustees using assets for their own benefit or (worse) claiming ownership of any trust assets represents one of the most serious forms of financial crime in Western civilization. Given this context, how did the government of Cyprus respond when its own Big Banks whined and claimed that they “needed” to confiscate deposits in order to pay off their own gambling debts? It meekly rubber-stamped the lawless theft.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Happy New Year — Bail-In Passed for Europe’s Banks

December 30, 2015

Happy New Year — Bail-In Passed for Europe’s Banks

The mainstream media is not extensively reporting on the “experimental” bail-in that the EU imposed on Cyrus. The bail-in, that they swore would never be applied to Europe, will officially begin in January. This new power will be in the interest of taxpayers as they will no longer be forced to pay for failed banks that were created by the childish structure of the euro that was created by lawyers who never understood the economy. But wait a minute — aren’t taxpayers the people with deposits in banks? Hm. Moving to electronic money is also about preventing bank runs. The bottom-line here is that they will just take your money to save bankers. Eliminating cash accomplishes two things: (1) they get to tax everything, and (2) you cannot withdraw money from banks.

The bail-in directive was agreed upon on January 1, 2015, and the bail-in system will take effect on January 1, 2016. So here we are, just in case you missed this one. Their website states:

Parliament and Council Presidency negotiators reached a political agreement Wednesday on the draft bank recovery and resolution directive, the first step towards setting up an EU system to deal with struggling banks. This directive will introduce the “bail-in” principle by January 2016, thereby ensuring that taxpayers will not be first in line to pay for bank failures.

The entire system of insuring banks after their collapse during the Great Depression was to restore confidence to end the hoarding and revitalize the economy. Now they have allowed bankers to do everything they did before, and they have reversed the insurance created to restore confidence in banking. They justify this by claiming taxpayers will not have to pay for the failed banks.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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