Step Aside BBC "Trader": Head Of UniCredit Securities Predicts Imminent End Of The Eurozone And A Global Financial Apocalypse

Either the YesMen have infiltrated Italy's biggest, and most undercapitalied, bank, or the stress of constant, repeated lying and prevarication has finally gotten to the very people who know their livelihoods hang by a thread, and the second the great ponzi is unwound their jobs, careers, and entire way of life will be gone. Such as the head of UniCredit global securities Attila Szalay-Berzeviczy, and former Chairman of the Hungarian stock exchange, who has written an unbelievable oped in the Hungarian portal Index.hu which, frankly, make Alessio "BBC Trader" Rastani's provocative speech seem like a bedtime story. Only this time one can't scapegoat Szalay-Berzeviczy "naivete" on inexperience or the desire to gain public prominence. If someone knows the truth, it is the guy at the top of UniCredit, which we expect to promptly trade limit down once we hit print. Among the stunning allegations (stunning in that an atual banker dares to tell the truth) are the following: "the euro is “practically dead” and Europe faces a financial earthquake from a Greek default"... “The euro is beyond rescue”... “The only remaining question is how many days the hopeless rearguard action of European governments and the European Central Bank can keep up Greece’s spirits.”...."A Greek default will trigger an immediate “magnitude 10” earthquake across Europe."..."Holders of Greek government bonds will have to write off their entire investment, the southern European nation will stop paying salaries and pensions and automated teller machines in the country will empty “within minutes.” In other words: welcome to the Apocalypse...

Here Comes The "China Hard Landing" - Full Bank Of America Presentation Slides

Earlier today Bank of America released a presentation and a conference call in which the firm's head of China equity strategy David Cui spoke about the dreaded "China Hard Landing" or the event that would kill all decoupling dreams for ever and ever, and probably lead to a world depression. It seems that the latest down move in the market is being partially attributed to just this notification finally making the rounds as can be seen in the note below: "BofAML’s David Cui is the Markets’ #1 rated China Strategist according to the 2011 Institutional Investor All-China Survey. While he is not responsible for our China GDP forecast, he sees significant Chinese specific financial market risks that could trigger lower than expected Chinese growth. He sees that those financial market risks as having increased considerably. He will expand on this on the call, but he sees these financial stresses as having a very high probability of triggering lower than expected growth. That lower growth could well be sub 7%, and therefore by Chinese market standards would be termed a “hard landing”, clearly a HUGE issue for all global markets." Granted this is not news to those who have been following the Chinese situation (as fringe blogs have been for over a year), but the market does tend to have a habit of being about 12-18 months behind the curve. Here is what Bank of America had to say...

Former Chief ECB Economist Tells It Is Inevitable Greece Will Leave Eurozone And The Greek Debt Haircut Will Be 50%

While futures soar on whatever the latest rumeur de l'heure is (soon to be refuted by Germany although with month end window dressing to be done, nobody will care) the relevant facts are once again being largely ignored. In this case, Otmar Issing, former chief economist of the massively undercapitalized hedge fund known as the European Central Bank, has told Stern magazine that "Greece will find it “impossible” to get back on its feet even after the country implements austerity measures and it is inevitable that Greece will have to leave the euro-zone. He added that Greece needs a debt haircut of at least 50%, and even so preventing contagion will be very complicated. His biggest warning pertains to the deus ex machina which everyone knows is the last thing up Europe's sleeve: the prospect of issuing Eurobonds (aka the suicide button for any German ruler at the time when these are implemented). To wit: "Eurobonds will prove the gravedigger of a stable euro." Luckily, that is already priced in, as is the subsequent resurrection, which explains why the EURUSD is back to one week highs on nothing but, well, rumors.

China: Slowdown Or Crash?

Admin at Marc Faber Blog - 7 minutes ago

Basically I look at China this way: between 2000 and 2007 the chinese economy grew and credit expanded at about the same rate as the GDP, slightly higher but not excessively. But after the crisis of 2008, we had essentially a credit driven boom in China and whenever you have excessive credit growth and artificially low interest rates (because inflation in China is much bigger than what the government is publishing) you have symptoms of bubbles developing...clearly in the real estate market where there were some over investments. There fore, I think a slowdown in China is coming and... more » 

 

Reuters Video: Some Sectors Of China's Economy May Crash

Admin at Marc Faber Blog - 43 minutes ago

You can watch the latest video interview with Reuters here: *"Some sectors of China's economy may crash"* *Related stocks and ETFs: iShares FTSE/Xinhua China 25 Index ETF (NYSE:FXI), PowerShares Gld Drg Haltr USX China ETF (NYSE:PGJ), Morgan Stanley China A Share Fund, Inc. (NYSE:CAF), China Mobile Ltd. ADR (NYSE:CHL), Aluminum Corp. of China Limited ADR (NYSE:ACH), China Life Insurance Company Ltd. ADR (NYSE:LFC) * *Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.* 

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Gold Outlook

Admin at Jim Rogers Blog - 54 minutes ago

Gold has been up 10 years in a row, which is very unusual in any asset class. So if it is up this year or 11 years in a row, gold is overdue for a correction and it could have a nice substantial correction given that it has been so strong. - *in Beacon Equity* *Related: SPDR Gold Trust ETF (GLD)* *Jim Rogers is an author, financial commentator and successful international investor. He has been frequently featured in Time, The New York Times, Barron’s, Forbes, Fortune, The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times and is a regular guest on Bloomberg and CNBC.*

Greeks Sought Irish Central Bank Counsel. No, Seriously!

In what will assuredly be the punchline to many jokes over the course of the next few weeks, The Irish Times is reporting tonight that the Central Bank of Greece sought the advice of the Central Bank of Ireland in July and early August "to share experiences gained". We can only assume it was the double-bluff of figuring out what really didn't work since from what we have seen in the last few years, Ireland's decision to backstop/guarantee the entire Irish banking system during the crisis was perhaps what drove them into the mess they find themselves in today. While nothing surprises us with European (and indeed global) central bankers and politicians, this is perhaps the most astounding evidence of blind-leading-the-blind we have seen, especially given the focus on the stress tests which were wildly inaccurate at best in Ireland's expectations of capital/costs required.

Goldman's 'Unconventional' Inflation Policy vs. Austrian Deflation Endgame

An intriguing research note from Goldman's Global Economics team tonight brought up the subject of 'unconventional' unconventional policies and how they ended the 'first' Great Depression. This gentle push towards softening the inflation leg of the Fed's mandate 'stool', while interesting in its own right given Goldman's policy-leading record, reminded us, by contrast, of a paper discussing how deflation is perhaps the more likely outcome when one shifts perspective from Keynesianism to a more Austrian view of the Fed's options. We are not choosing sides but for a quiet evening following a hope-shattering sell-off in risk assets, we thought it worth reflection.

EuroFAIL - Video Explaining EuroTALF As Dealer Of Last Resort

Yes, we have written and written on the topic of the levered-EFSF / Geithner-fest / EuroTALF seemingly ceaselessly, and still some are confused. So here, in a brief 3 minute video, is an explanation of how the ECB plans to make money appear out of thin air, and how all shall be well. Alas, if you are right now thinking that this plan relies on nothing but credibility, and are confused because the ECB has none left...you are correct.

Greece Runs Out Of Ink, Can't Print Tax Forms

If you thought that last night's news that Greece had been consulting (and paying) the far more "stable" Irish Central Bank on how to, oh, avoid bankruptcy, this may jus top it. In an FT article describing the new set of austerity measures most of which are very loud threats that Greece will very soon (really) take austerity seriously (they promise), we stumble across the following gem: "The conservative opposition New Democracy party said a shortage of ink had prevented the computerised tax centre at the finance ministry from sending out claims to taxpayers over the last 10 days. There was no response from the finance ministry to the claim."...

Frontrunning: September 28

• Euro Crisis Makes Fed Lender of Only Resort as Funding Dries Up (Bloomberg)
• Germany Slams 'Stupid' US Plans to Boost EU Rescue Fund (Telegraph)
• US Inflation Expectations Lowest for a Year (FT)
• Chinese Banks Raise Cash to Cushion Against Bad Debts (WSJ)
• Banks Wary of Financing Big Projects (FT)
• German Ruling Coalition Faces Tricky Bailout Vote (WSJ)
• Health Insurance Costs Deal Blow to Obama (FT)
• China Warns Asia Not to Hide Behind U.S. Military (Bloomberg)
• Japan Ruling Party Proposes $120B Tax Increase (Bloomberg)

Art Cashin On European Political Alliances, Marrying Your Best Friend's Sister, And Fed Fisher's Enlightenment

In his typically anti-prosaic manner UBS' Art Cashin draws the parallels between Caesar's political alliances & apolitical dalliances and the refreshing honesty of Dallas Fed's Fisher with the hope of a new spirit of cooperation blossoming among European leaders and how we lost some belief yesterday afternoon.





Polls: Americans Want Our Liberties Restored, Our Troops Brought Home and the Federal Reserve Reined In





Inflation As Solution: Hosing The Middle Class










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Posted by: thetrader

Post date: 09/28/2011 - 05:29

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