Home » Posts tagged 'bail-out'

Tag Archives: bail-out

Olduvai
Click on image to purchase

Olduvai III: Catacylsm
Click on image to purchase

Post categories

Post Archives by Category

Bailing Out Member States: The European (Dis)Union

January 26, 2019

Bailing Out Member States: The European (Dis)Union

Over the years, my good friends at Capitalist Exploits (I highly recommend subscribing) have put together a number of outstanding thought pieces on where they see things headed.

They recently came out with a great overview of where Europe is headed. The trends they highlight are both interesting and actionable for those willing to put the time into thinking through the consequences of the new “Strongmen of Europe.” The EU has now had a decade of economic crisis and is slowly moving from economic crisis towards a full-fledged political crisis which will be its ultimate undoing. There will naturally be many actionable trades along the way. Most important amongst these will be;

  • Increased inflation
  • Issues with energy security
  • Increased national sovereignty
  • Ultimate breakup of the EU

Having a roadmap, gives you the ability to stay a few steps ahead of events with your positioning. With that in mind, I suggest you read the roadmap from Capitalist Exploits. While I don’t agree with everything that they point out, it is those minor disagreements that make late night Skype calls so interesting…

What Lies In Store For 2019 –  Specific Focus: The European (dis)Union

There is so much going on that it can be hard to know where to look without throwing your hands up in the air and saying, “oh fuck it, I give up”. The problem is ignoring problems doesn’t make them go away, and if we get it wrong, we could end up seriously regretting decisions made today.

I’ll be honest with you, we’ve spent time reviewing much of what is taking place in the world at the moment. Not here with you, but with my team and often inside my wee head, hunched over my keyboard at 1AM after tossing and turning annoying my gorgeous wife and getting out of bed to look into something that’s bugging me and keeping me from sleep.

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

Rescuing the Banks Instead of the Economy

November 2, 2018

Rescuing the Banks Instead of the Economy

Photo Source Mark Dixon | CC BY 2.0

You can’t bail out the banks, leave the debts in place, and rescue the economy. It’s a zero-sum game. Somebody has to lose. That’s what happened in 2009 when President Obama came in. He invited the bankers to the White House and he said, “I’m the only guy standing between you and the mob with pitchforks,” by which he meant the voters that he was bamboozling. He reassured the bankers. He said, “Look, my loyalty is to my campaign donors not to the voters. Don’t worry; my loyalty is with you.”

I’m Bonnie Faulkner. Today on Guns and Butter, Dr. Michael Hudson. Today’s show: Rescuing the Banks Instead of the Economy. Dr. Hudson is a financial economist and historian. He is president of the Institute for the Study of Long-Term Economic Trend, a Wall Street financial analyst and Distinguished Research Professor of Economics at the University of Missouri, Kansas City. His 1972 book Super Imperialism: The Economic Strategy of American Empire is a critique of how the United States exploited foreign economies through the IMF and World Bank. His latest books are  Killing the Host: How Financial Parasites and Debt Bondage to Ensure the Global Economy and J is for Junk Economics.. Today we discuss how the bank bailouts, not the crash, are killing the economy. Also, the concept of debt deflation, the magic of compound interest, the growth of the financial extraction FIRE sector, quantitative easing, tariffs, economic sanctions and isolationism.

BONNIE FAULKNER: Dr. Michael Hudson, welcome.

MICHAEL HUDSON: It’s good to be back after a few years.

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

George Friedman: Italy Is the Mother of All Systemic Threats

September 17, 2016

George Friedman: Italy Is the Mother of All Systemic Threats

Italy has been in a crisis for at least eight months, though mainstream media did not recognize it until July. This crisis has nothing to do with Brexit, although opponents of Brexit will claim it does. Even if Britain had voted to stay in the EU, the Italian crisis would still have been gathering speed.

The high level of non-performing loans (NPLs) has been a problem since before Brexit. It is clear that there is nothing in the Italian economy that can reduce them. Only a dramatic improvement in the economy would make it possible to repay these loans. And Europe’s economy cannot improve drastically enough to help. We have been in crisis for quite a while.

Banks were simply carrying loans as non-performing that were actually in default and discounting the NPLs rather than writing them off. But that only hid the obvious. As much as 17 percent of Italy’s loans will not be repaid. This will crush Italian banks’ balance sheets. And this will not only be in Italy.

Italian loans are packaged and resold, and Italian banks take loans from other European banks. These banks in turn have borrowed against Italian debt. Since Italy is the fourth largest economy in Europe, this is the mother of all systemic threats.

Bail-Ins, Not Bail Outs

The only way to help is a government bailout. The problem is that Italy is not only part of the EU, but part of the eurozone. As such, its ability to print its way out of the crisis is limited. In addition, EU regulations make it difficult for governments to bail out banks.

The EU has a concept called a bail-in, which means the depositors and creditors to the bank will lose their money.

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

German bank that almost failed now being paid to borrow money

March 10, 2016

berlinhyp-negative-interest-rates

German bank that almost failed now being paid to borrow money

The 12.5 hours spent crossing the Pacific on Qantas flight 27 feels like going through a wormhole.

The flight departs Sydney, Australia at 12:50pm and arrives to Santiago, Chile the same day at 11:20am. In other words, the plane lands 90 minutes before it departs.

When I landed yesterday, the captain came on the P.A. and said, “Ladies and Gentlemen, I have good news; if you enjoyed Wednesday March 9th, it’s still Wednesday March 9th!”

It really does feel like going back in time.

This feeling was only reinforced when I whipped out my phone and saw that German bank Berlin Hyp had just issued 500 million euros worth of debt… at negative interest.

I wondered if I really did go through a time warp, because this is exactly the same madness we saw ten years ago during the housing bubble and the subsequent financial crisis.

To explain the deal, Berlin Hyp issued bonds that yield negative 0.162% and pay no coupon.

This means that if you buy €1,000 worth of bonds, you will receive €998.38 when they mature in three years.

Granted this is a fairly small loss, but it is still a loss. And a guaranteed one.

This is supposed to be an investment… an investment, by-the-way, with a bank that almost went under in the last financial crisis.

It took a €500 billion bail-out by the German government to save its banking system.

Eight years later, people are buying this “investment” that guarantees that they will lose money.

The bank is now effectively being paid to borrow money.

We saw the consequences of this back in 2008.

During the housing bubble, banking lending standards got completely out of control to the point that they were paying people to borrow money.

At the height of the housing bubble, you could not only get a no-money down loan, but many banks would actually finance 105% of the home’s purchase price.

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

Greek Capital Controls To Remain For Months As Germany Pushes For Bail-In Of Large Greek Depositors

July 26, 2015

Greek Capital Controls To Remain For Months As Germany Pushes For Bail-In Of Large Greek Depositors

Two weeks ago we explained why Greek banks, which Greece no longer has any direct control over having handed over the keys to their operations to the ECB as part of Bailout #3’s terms, are a “strong sell” at any price: due to the collapse of the local economy as a result of the velocity of money plunging to zero thanks to capital controls which just had their 1 month anniversary, bank Non-Performing Loans, already at €100 billion (out of a total of €210 billion in loans), are rising at a pace as high as €1 billion per day (this was confirmed when the IMF boosted Greece’s liquidity needs by €25 billion in just two weeks), are rising at a pace unseen at any time in modern history.

Which means that any substantial attempt to bailout Greek banks would require a massive, new capital injection to restore confidence; however as we reported, a recapitalization of the Greek banks will hit at least shareholders and certain bondholders under a new set of European regulations—the Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive—enacted at the beginning of the year. And since Greek banks are woefully undercapitalized and there is already a danger of depositor bail-ins, all securities that are below the depositor claim in the cap structure will have to be impaired, as in wiped out.

Now, Europe and the ECB are both well aware just how insolvent Greek banks are, and realize that a new recap would need as little as €25 billion and as much as €50 billion to be credible (an amount that would immediately wipe out all existing stakeholders), and would also result in a dramatic push back from local taxpayers. This explains why Europe is no rush to recapitalize Greece – doing so would reveal just how massive the funding hole is.

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

 

 

Troika Offers Greece Third Bailout Program, Prepares Emergency Plan If No Deal

June 26, 2015

Troika Offers Greece Third Bailout Program, Prepares Emergency Plan If No Deal

On the heels of Thursday’s failed Eurogroup meeting and heading into what is again being presented as an all or nothing, “Lehman weekend” for Greece and its creditors, reports suggest the troika has offered Greece a third bailout program:

  • GREEK CREDITORS OFFER EU15.5B OVER NEXT 5 MONTHS: HANDELSBLATT
  • ECB, IMF, EU OFFER GREECE 3RD AID PROGRAM: HANDELSBLATT
  • GREECE’S CREDITORS PROPOSE EU15.5B TIED TO AID DEAL: OFFICIAL

Here are the details, according to Bloomberg (citing an unnamed EU official):

EU creditor proposal foresees EU8.7b in EFSF funds: official

Creditor proposal foresees EU3.3b in SMP profits: EU official

Creditor proposal foresees EU3.5b in IMF funds: EU official

If true, this would mark a dramatic about-face for the IMF which had suggested it would not be interested in participating in a third Greek program. Similary, lawmakers in Berlin have voiced their opposition to a third bailout program for Athens as the German public has grown tired of throwing money at the Greek ‘problem.’

European finance ministers will meet again on Saturday. Angela Merkel, who met with Greek PM Alexis Tsipras and French President Francois Hollande on Friday, has indicated that a deal must be struck before the market opens on Monday. Here’s a bit of color from Reuters:

The leaders of Germany and France discussed extending Greece’s bailout programme and providing financing with Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Friday on the eve of a decisive meeting of euro zone finance ministers, a French source said.

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

 

 

 

Why We Are All Now Cypriots-to-bein the New Age of Bail-Ins

June 17, 2015

Why We Are All Now Cypriots-to-bein the New Age of Bail-Ins

According to the mostly ignored and hardly covered piece of newsfrom a couple of weeks ago, it turns out that 11 of the 28 European Union countries have been scolded by the European Commission for failing to implement a new set of rules intended to prop up failed banks. Known as the Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive (BRRD), the stated purpose of the newly required rules is to purportedly protect taxpayers from having to cover the losses of any possible future bank failures, similar to the failures that occurred back in 2008. Taking the place of the more conventional taxpayer-funded “bail-outs,” banks would see their losses recapitalized with the newly-minted practice of the “bail-in.”

A bail-in, in case you aren’t familiar with it, is the emerging alternative to the well-known bail-out. Back in 2008 when a slew of “too big to fail” (TBTF) banks crumbled due to $147 barrels of oil and the bursting of the housing bubble, the entire financial system was put at risk and was deemed to be in need of a rescue. What occurred was an influx of money from outside sources to cover the bank losses, one example being the $700 billion life-line from the US government (which essentially means from the US taxpayer). This is known as a bail-out.

This differs from what occurred with the Cypriot banking system back in 2013, of which has since come to be known as a bail-in. In short, due to Cyprus’ insolvent banking system, all banks in the country were shut down under the “bank holiday” rubric, to go along with withdrawals being limited, if not completely cut off. Upon cessation of the bank holiday measures, it was announced by officials that all bank accounts in excess of €100,000 would have their balances reduced by 47.5% (also known as a “haircut”). As the practice now goes, confiscated bail-in funds are used to recapitalize failed banks, and the depositors who had their balances reduced essentially become owners of a bank that no one has much of an interest in owning.

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

 

 

Oops! Philly Fed Admits QE widens inequality

June 11, 2015

Oops! Philly Fed Admits QE widens inequality

Once again, the Federal Reserve proves that it’s the last one to know everything that we knew already.   Today’s stunning announcement:  The Philadelphia Fed admits they (“may have”) made the wealthy wealthier and Main Street poorer.
Oops.  Sorry America.

inspirational_Redistribution

The Philly Fed insists that “redistributing wealth” to the wealthy isn’t the main idea, but just a potential side effect of stimulus that they can’t do much about.

“Monetary policy currently implemented by the Federal Reserve and other major central banks is not intended to benefit one segment of the population at the expense of another by redistributing income and wealth,” …

“However, it is probably impossible to avoid the redistributive consequences of monetary policy”.

We’re shocked.  Shocked, we tell you.  It turns out that handing out free money,  buying worthless assets at face value and allowing a small cabal of private banks the sole right to access your magic free-money window, “may” have given some financial advantages to “one segment of the population”.   But that’s just a side effect of saving the “economy”.

Of course, it’s not just the bankers.  The 1% also happen to hold vastly more financial assets than the lower 99% — so they may directly benefit from financial asset-inflating monetary policy.

 

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

China Prepares To Bailout Russia | Zero Hedge

December 18, 2014

China Prepares To Bailout Russia | Zero Hedge.

Earlier this evening China’s State Administration of Foreign Exchange’s (SAFE) Wang Yungui noted “the impact of the Russian Ruble depreciation was unclear yet, and, as Bloomberg reported, “SAFE is closely watching Ruble’s depreciation and encouraging companies to hedge Ruble risks.” His comments also echoed the ongoing FX reform agenda aimed at increasing Yuan flexibility which The South China Morning Post then hinted in a story entitled “Russia may seek China help to deal with crisis,” which which noted that Russia could fall back on its 150 billion yuan ($24 billion) currency swap agreement with China if the ruble continues to plunge, that was signed in October. Furthermore, two bankers close to the PBOC reportedly said the swap-line was meant to reduce the role of the US dollar if China and Russia need to help each other overcome a liquidity squeeze.

As Bloomberg reported, earlier in the evening, China’s Wang Yungui noted

  • *CHINA IS CLOSELY WATCHING RUBLE’S DEPRECIATION: SAFE’S WANG
  • *CHINA ENCOURAGES COS. TO HEDGE RUBLE RISKS, SAFE’S WANG SAYS
  • *REAL IMPACT OF RUBLE DEPRECIATION UNCLEAR YET, SAFE’S WANG SAYS

Adding that China plans sweeping reforms to promote FX flexibility.

And then The South China Morning Post hints,

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

Presenting The $303 Trillion In Derivatives That US Taxpayers Are Now On The Hook For | Zero Hedge

December 12, 2014

Presenting The $303 Trillion In Derivatives That US Taxpayers Are Now On The Hook For | Zero Hedge.

Courtesy of the Cronybus(sic) last minute passage, government was provided a quid-pro-quo $1.1 trillion spending allowance with Wall Street’s blessing in exchange for assuring banks that taxpayers would be on the hook for yet another bailout, as a result of the swaps push-out provision, after incorporating explicit Citigroup language that allows financial institutions to trade certain financial derivatives from subsidiaries that are insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp, explicitly putting taxpayers on the hook for losses caused by these contracts. Recall:

Five years after the Wall Street coup of 2008, it appears the U.S. House of Representatives is as bought and paid for as ever. We heard about the Citigroup crafted legislation currently being pushed through Congress back in May when Mother Jones reported on it. Fortunately, they included the following image in their article:

Screen Shot 2014-12-05 at 3.32.12 PM

Unsurprisingly, the main backer of the bill is notorious Wall Street lackey Jim Himes (D-Conn.), a former Goldman Sachs employee who has discovered lobbyist payoffs can be just as lucrative as a career in financial services.

We say explicitly, of course, because taxpayers have always been on the hook implicitlyfor the next Wall Street meltdown.

Why?

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

Euro Zone Debate Third Bailout Package for Greece – SPIEGEL ONLINE

December 4, 2014

Euro Zone Debate Third Bailout Package for Greece – SPIEGEL ONLINE.

It’s no accident that “pathos” is a Greek word. Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, at least, is a politician who is fond of sprinkling his speeches with the kind of emotional appeal that Aristotle long ago identified as an effective stylistic device.

“The era of bailout packages is ending,” Samaras promised in September during an appearance in Thessaloniki. “Greece is now welcoming the new Greece.”

Samaras knew the line would guarantee him applause from his audience, but the promise also came a bit prematurely. Following the announcement, Greece got a small taste of what it might mean were Greece were released from the oversight of the troika, comprised of the European Commission, the European Central Bank (ECB) and the International Monetary Fund. The more often Samaras spoke of a “clean solution,” the more yields rose on long-term Greek government bonds. At the beginning of September, the rates had been 5.8 percent, but they soon climbed to almost 9 percent.

It was the financial markets’ way of hinting that it is still too early to grant Greece full fiscal independence.

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

Olduvai IV: Courage
Click on image to read excerpts

Olduvai II: Exodus
Click on image to purchase

Click on image to purchase @ FriesenPress