Posts Tagged ‘Greece’

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North European Euro Nations Preparing to Slaughter the PIGS

Thursday, June 3rd, 2010

Full story here from Jim Willie (The Golden Jackass).

Natural forces are at work in Europe, powerful forces, in fact forces that are not evident. It is amazing how little the financial analysts notice the forces at all. Since the year 2007, a hidden force began to put pressure on the European Union financial underpinning. Like any fiat currency, the foundation resorts to debt. It came to my attention almost three full years ago that Spanish EuroBonds had a yield slightly higher than the benchmark German. (more…)

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Meltdown in the EU

Friday, May 21st, 2010

Full story here from Mike Whitney. Like a frozen block of butter, it’s going to take time to melt fully, but trust me, it’s going to melt.

Global markets have plunged for more than a month, wiping out more than $5.3 trillion in total market value. Ostensibly, the catalyst was Greece’s large deficits, but that’s only part of the story. Under the terms of the Maastricht Treaty, (aka–the Treaty on European Union) EU countries are not allowed to exceed the treaty’s 3 per cent ceiling on fiscal deficits. The nonsensical treaty basically repeals the business cycle by edict. Are recessions forbidden, too? (more…)

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Ex-Bundesbank Chief says Greece will never repay debt

Tuesday, May 18th, 2010

Full story here from ZeroHedge. And he says that the bailout is all about rescuing banks and rich Greeks. Well, duh! Welcome to Planet Kleptocracy.

Finally someone speaks the truth. In an interview with Spiegel Magazine, former Bundesbank chief Karl Otto Pohl, says it how it is: “Without a “haircut,” a partial debt waiver, [Greece] cannot and will not ever [repay its debt]. So why not immediately? That would have been one alternative. The European Union should have declared half a year ago — or even earlier — that Greek debt needed restructuring.” As for the reason for the bailout, Pohl’s observation will not be a surprise to our readers “It was about protecting German banks, but especially the French banks, from debt write offs.” Is there any hope for Europe now? It appears no, as the right decision was to let Greece go bankrupt: “Investors would quickly have seen that Greece could get a handle on its debt problems. And for that reason, trust would quickly have been restored. But that moment has passed. Now we have this mess.” Amusingly, when asked if banks used “speculators” as a straw man to break all EU Rules and especially the Lisbon treaty:”Of course that’s possible. In fact, it’s even plausible.” We can’t wait until the German population realizes just how massively it has been scammed. Last week’s Nordrhein-Westphalia Merkel loss will seem like a walk in the park once the mobilized German society decides to fix things on its own.  Oh, and look for the EU and the euro to be a thing of the past. (more…)

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Capitalism without Capital

Thursday, May 13th, 2010

Full story here from Mike Whitney.

Volatility is back and stocks have started zigzagging wildly again. This time the catalyst is Greece, but tomorrow it could be something else. The problem is there’s too much leverage in the system, and that’s generating uncertainty about the true condition of the economy. For a long time,  leverage wasn’t an issue, because there was enough liquidity to keep things bobbing along smoothly.  But that changed when Lehman Bros. filed for bankruptcy and non-bank funding began to shut down. When the so-called “shadow banking” system crashed, liquidity dried up and the markets went into a nosedive.  That’s why Fed Chair Ben Bernanke stepped in and provided short-term loans to under-capitalized financial institutions. Bernanke’s rescue operation revived the system, but it also transferred $1.7 trillion of illiquid assets and non-performing loans onto the Fed’s balance sheet. So the problem really hasn’t been fixed after all; the debts have just been moved from one balance sheet to another.  (more…)

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More rioting in Europe

Tuesday, May 11th, 2010

When the walls come a-tubling down…first Greece, now Ireland. And I’m long on Spain, then France, and God help ‘em when the Germans finally come unglued. Musical tribute to the zeitgeist here, here and here.  Oh, and though it may fluctuate wildly, the Euro will stay up about as well as grandma’s underpants. Honestly, a trillion dollars worth of financial viagra, and this is all we get?!?!

Your gentle blogger can barely go about the day without being interrupted by the computer screaming something. I’ll need to vacation in a non-rioting locale and those are getting harder to come by.

From the Belfast Telegraph

Banks protesters storm Irish parliament

Protesters have stormed parliament during a march against government plans to inject billions of euros into the country’s banks.

Dozens of people broke away from the march and ran at the gates of the parliament’s main building, Leinster House.

They wrestled with police, who tried to force them back and secure the gate.

At least one man suffered a head injury during the scuffles with organisers appealing for calm.

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Euro-banker demands of Greece

Tuesday, May 11th, 2010

Full story here from Michael Hudson.

The wealthy won’t pay their taxes, so labor must do so.

Riddle: How are the Greek rioters like America’s Tea Party movement?
Answer: Both reject government being taken over by the financial oligarchy to shift the tax burden onto labor.

(more…)

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Greece is the canary in the coalmine

Tuesday, May 11th, 2010

Full story here from ZeroHedge. Big props to ZeroHedge this week. They have the best coverage of the multiple meltdowns in play. And go watch Fight Club.

David Rosenberg is out with some very fitting analogies of the current sovereign crisis. If he is proven prescient, which we have no doubt he will, the Greek near-default will have massive repercussions to the entire developed world when all is said and done.”In my opinion, Greece is the same canary in the coal mine that Thailand was for emerging Asia in 1997, which ultimately led to the Russian debt default and demise of LTCM; the same canary in the coal mine that New Century Financial in early 2007 proved to be in terms of being a leading indicator for the likes of Bear Stearns and Lehman. So, the most dangerous thing to do now is to view Greece as a one-off crisis that will be contained.” Furthermore, as he makes all too clear, if a $1 trillion bailout can only buy 400 points in teh Dow, Europe, aside from all the other fundamentals which confirm the same, is doomed, and even the ever-optimistic market now realizes it. Lastly, should Europe pursue the required austerity measures, the hit to European GDP will be massive, and is certainly not being priced in European stocks, but certainly not in US stocks, whose primary export market is about to disappear. (more…)

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Eurozone bailout $955 billion (and counting)

Monday, May 10th, 2010

Full story here from ZeroHedge. Remember when this was $4bn for Greece (about a month ago)? Trying to transfuse the corpse big time. The financial Maginot Line has been constructed. That worked out well–oh wait…

From The Daily Capitalist

“The message has gotten through: the euro zone will defend its money,” French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde told reporters in Brussels early today after the 14-hour meeting.

The eurozone, those countries that use the euro as their currency, is in serious trouble as evidenced by Sunday night’s (here) announcement of a €750 billion bailout to defend the euro from tanking and taking down several sovereigns with it. Greece is only one problem. (more…)

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Greece forced to buy arms with bailout money

Sunday, May 9th, 2010

Full story here.

PARIS: France and Germany, while publicly urging Greece to make harsh public spending cuts, bullied its government to confirm billions of euros in arms deals, a leading Euro-MP alleged Friday.

Franco-German lawmaker Daniel Cohn-Bendit said that Paris and Berlin are seeking to force Prime Minister George Papandreou to spend Greece’s scarce cash on submarines, a fleet of warships, helicopters and war planes.

“I met Mr Papandreou last week. I was in Athens. I’ve known him for a long time,” Cohn-Bendit told reporters, accusing Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel and France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy of blackmailing his friend. Cohn-Bendit accused France and Germany of making their contributions to an IMF-led rescue package for the debt-ridden Greek economy contingent on Athens honouring massive arms deals signed by Papandreou’s predecessor. “It’s incredible the way the Merkels and Sarkozys of this world treat a Greek prime minister,” he declared, adding that Papandreou had recently met Sarkozy and French Prime Minister Francois Fillon in Paris. “Mr Fillon and Mr Sarkozy told Mr Papandreou: ‘We’re going to raise the money to help you, but you are going to have to continue to pay the arms contracts that we have with you’,” Cohn-Bendit said.

“In the past three months we have forced Greece to confirm several billion dollars in arms contracts. French frigates that the Greeks will have to buy for 2.5 billion euros. Helicopters, planes, German submarines.”

Cohn-Bendit, a former leader of the 1968 student revolt in Paris, is leader of the Green group in the European parliament. afp

Remember you heard this first on Shadowtraders blog

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Numerous Euro banks and re/insurers ID’d w/10’s billions in Greek failed repos

Thursday, May 6th, 2010

Full story here from ZeroHedge. It’s like picture day–at the local morgue.

BNP, Commerzbank, HSBC, SocGen, Natixis, BNP, CA, AXA, ING and Rabobank all identified as banks with massive Greek repo exposure. The next question: will writedowns on these now illiquid and, as the Greek bond market is effectively shut down for a second day running, untradeable positions be taken, or will Europe follow the US in pretending tens of billions in valuation gaps will be filled by Hopium? Also, as bankingnews.gr reports, and as we first highlighted, a variety of French re/insurers are about to get whacked. (more…)

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